Page 57 of Running Into You
“Don’t be absurd. Of course, I care about you.” She straightens in her chair, her defenses rising again.
“You have a funny way of showing it.”
“This conversation is pointless, Elizabeth, and I will not entertain it any longer. I made time in my extremely busy schedule to get an update on your life. If I had wanted theatrics, I would have gone to the cinema.” The sneer that once would have left a lasting mark bounces off me.
“Is everything all right over here?” A woman in a fitted black dress asks tentatively. My mother shoots me a warning look, which I ignore.
“Everything is more than all right,” I say with a smile as I scoot my chair back and stand. “Better than ever, in fact.” I pick up my purse and take a final look at my mother. “Here is your update. I’m twenty-five years old. I have a job that I enjoy and that I’m great at. I have good friends. I like baking competition shows where everyone is nice to one another. I don’t read a lot and I strongly dislike classic literature. I am learning to run, and I’ve got a great coach.” My voice catches as I finish. “Thank you for the drink, Dr. Hopkins. Please lose my number.” I walk away from the table and don’t look back.
Chapter 33
Josh
Every item of clothing I have has been laundered, folded, and put away. I wasn’t even missing any random socks this time. That never happens. I guess anything can happen on a Saturday night.
I grab a beer and turn on the hockey game. It’s the bottom of the first period, and the Bruins are being dominated. I watch for a few minutes before getting up and wandering around my apartment, looking for something to occupy my mind. Something that will keep it off Betty, even if only for a few hours. What plans did she have tonight? I doubt she’s hanging out with Maggie again and she didn’t mention anything yesterday about meeting up with people from work. Would she be going out with Andrew again? The thought has occurred to me several times since her text and each time it enters my mind, my stomach gets tight. I have the same back-and-forth argument over and over again in my head.
You were the one who decided to be only friends.
That’s because I don’t want her to be with me unless she really wants to be with me.
She wanted you to kiss her yesterday. You pulled back.
I pulled back because I didn’t want to wind up in the same place we were when she broke things off.
I know what I want, and I want Betty. I’ve known for weeks now. She is smart and funny and sexy and infuriating, and I want her so much that sometimes I can’t breathe. I think she wants me too and not just physically. But there is something holding her back from me, or maybe any relationship. I need to know what that is and if we can move past it. God, I want us to move past it.
Enough obsessing. I pick up a book that Rilla sent me a few weeks ago. It’s a sci-fi novel that takes place in the not-so-distant future about rebuilding the earth after a series of catastrophic natural disasters. I’ve been meaning to read it but haven’t gotten around to it yet.
No time like the present.
Settling on the couch, I prop the book up on my chest and start to read. By the end of the first chapter, I’ve established that the year is 2063, and humanity is fucked. Like, for real. No food, no water, daily earthquakes, and half of the earth has been flooded. Mankind really has its work cut out for them in this dystopian wasteland.
My phone, which is charging on a side table, starts to ring and I readily accept the distraction. My sister’s picture appears along with the caller ID.
“Shouldn’t you be pouring shots of Jager for college kids?”
“Josh?” Rilla’s voice is panicked and as soon as I hear it, I’m on my feet.
“What’s wrong?”
“It’s Dad.” She sobs into the phone. “They think he had a heart attack.”
* * *
Traffic is non-existent on the I-95 North this time of day and I make it to Maine in under four hours. I text Rilla once I park in the hospital visitor’s lot and she’s waiting for me just inside the entrance. I barely get to look at her before she’s buried her head in my chest and I hug her back without saying a word. After a minute, she pulls away and punches me in the arm.
“Mom’s gonna be pissed that you made it here so fast.” Her eyes are red and puffy and the sight of her like this is unsettling. Rilla was never one to cry, not even as a kid.
“How is he?”
“Stable.”
I nod and she leads me through a maze of fluorescent-lit corridors. It’s eerie being in a practically deserted hospital. It feels like something out of a horror movie and part of me is expecting a chainsaw-wielding maniac to burst out of hiding and chase us down the hall.
“The nurses don’t like us. They want us to go home since he’s resting and there is nothing we can do. But mom won’t leave him.”
“And you won’t leave mom.”
