Page 119 of If This is Love

I managed to look at her eyes through my bleary gaze. “He’s breathing.”

It was all I could come up with to say.

She nodded back hastily, a tight-lipped smile forcing its way across her pretty face, but her hazel eyes were spilling with tears. “Yeah, he is. That’s a good sign. And the ambulance is on its way, and it’s all going to be okay. Yeah?”

She rubbed my arms some more, staring at me through her cheery-but-teary eyes, and it was like they reached deep down inside me and grabbed the nastiest, ugliest truth that had been festering for years, and pulled it right out of me.

“My husband died because of me. It was just like this.”

The forced smile rapidly melted off her face. “No, Ruth, that’s not true.”

“It is true. It was just like this, and it was my fault. If Gabe hadn’t—”

“No, Ruth.” Liza was as calm and still as a lake in the middle of winter. “None of that is true at all.”

“He wouldn’t have been out driving where he was if I hadn’t found a particular property for sale that would have been a great place for the project we were working on. I found it. I told him to go scope it out that Saturday. If I hadn’t, he would still be—”

“That doesn’t mean it was your fault,” she replied, serene as ever.

I sniffled back tears, and my bottom lip trembled. “That’s what they said to me the day he died. I tried to tell them it didn’t even make sense just like you are right now, but they just kept telling me that. And it just makes me feel like anything bad that happens is my fault somehow.” My gaze drifted to the scene on the street. The paramedics were there. Brennan was talking to them and checking on Gabe. “Like this. All I can think is how it’s somehow my fault that we were right here at this exact moment, and look what happened.”

“Ruth, look at me. Seriously.”

I did as she said. When I first met Liza, I was struck by how uncommonly beautiful she was, and I always felt like she looked like someone I’d seen but couldn’t place who. But just now, in this foggy, teary, sniffly state of adrenaline-riddled panic, I decided she looked like Vivien Leigh as Scarlett O'Hara, wearing that red dress, cocked eyebrow, and unamused expression.

“Fuck,” Liza said slowly and with emphasis, pausing before she continued, “that.” She rolled her hand in a circle between us. “Say it with me. It’ll be cleansing.Fuck. That. For real. Say it with me.Fuck…”

“That,” I picked up with her, a small laugh breaking through my hitched breathing. “Yeah…fuckthat.”

“That’s right.” She pulled me in close and hugged me tight. “Fuck that. Fuck them. Fuckallof that.”

“L.?” Brennan called to her. “Are you going to take her—”

“Yes, I’ll take her,” Liza said, lifting her chin to rest it on top of my head while I rested my cheek on her shoulder. “I’ve got this. I’ll go with them.”

The two friends went back and forth about logistics that seemed meaningless to me, and eventually Liza was helping me into the passenger seat of her car. We were eventually driving to the hospital. I was numb and shaky, like I was recovering from an awful stomach flu, and I just sat in my seat, meditating on the warmth of the setting sun’s rays on my face, closing my eyes, and repeating the profane words like they were a life-saving mantra.

Fuck that. Fuck them. Fuck all of that.

I would never let anyone or anything make me feel like that again.

* * *

Miraculously,Gabe didn’t have any major injuries. He had a mid-grade concussion, a laceration on his scalp, a dislocated shoulder, two fractured ribs, and road rash, but given whatcould havehappened, everyone was relieved. I was relieved but mostly still terrified.

Liza had been here momentarily, but then she left shortly after Luke and Chloe arrived. Luke was in with Gabe and the doctor, while Chloe and I sat in the waiting room with our fancy evening gowns on and tear-smudged mascara, looking like some kind of movie tragedy. I was trying to sip water. I’d managed to get the lid off and on the water bottle a few times, but every time I went to take a drink, the doors to the ER would open, and I’d leap up, looking for Luke and closing the bottle again.

“It’s going to be another few minutes, Ruth,” Chloe said, taking the bottle from me and unscrewing the lid then passing it back to me. “Go ahead and sip this, okay?”

“Thank you. I’m so sorry.” I paused and took a long drink. “I feel like a damn fool making a scene like this when it’s your… you know…” I picked at the label. “I’m not even part of—”

“Youarethough, Ruth.” She took the water bottle from me and put the lid back on. “This is what you have to understand. Healreadyloves you. He just does. We all know, and you do, too. Right? That was literally the last thing he said to you before… like…” She bit her bottom lip as she flicked her green eyes to and from the doors. “You know, all this. So all you have to do is love him back. With Gabe, you always just have to show up and love him back.” She clasped her chest with both hands just as her eyes filled for the umpteenth time this evening. “Because he’s already there loving you, and giving to you, and sacrificing for you, and serving you, because that’s just what he does. You just have to be there, and appreciate it, and love him, and he’ll do it for you… foryou,sis,forever. It really is that simple. And yes,youare even part of the… the…” She waved her hand blindly at her side. “Just this weird, special chaos gumbo that we all are together.”

A shaky smile forced its way across my face, pushing a couple more tears out of my eyes. “I love everything you just said.” A teary laugh shook out of me. “Especially chaos gumbo.” I laughed again, dabbing the corner of my eye. “Sounds like some good gumbo.”

She matched my laughter, little tears collecting on her lower lashes, and she wrapped her arm around me, giving me a tight squeeze. “It’s honestly the best I’ve ever had.”

Just then, the doors opened, and Luke burst through them in his fancy tux, making a beeline straight for us.

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