Page 22 of When We Were Young
For some guys, life really never would be the same again. Noah might’ve been one of them. A statistic in the world of football injuries. He might never have recovered fully if not for one person.
Emily Andrews.
Noah pushed aside his pounding headache. He had to see the kids, had to watch them sleeping in their beds one more time. Their quiet breathing and peaceful innocence. After tonight there would be visits, when the kids came to his apartment for the night. But there wouldn’t be another chance to see them sleeping here. In their own beds.
His brain banged against his skull with every step. The light was still on in the den. Emily must be awake. But she certainly wasn’t going to come find him. Not after the argument they’d had earlier. He didn’t blame her. At this point neither of them could stand being together.
For a long moment he gathered himself outside the kids’ room, and willed his headache to lighten up. Finally he opened their door just a crack. In the glow of the hallway light, he saw Olivia first. She had her blanket tucked up close to her face, her gold curls spread across the pillow. In her other arm she held her teddy bear. As if tonight she needed all the security she could get.
Failure added to his hurting head. He looked at Aiden. His son was in a ball on his side, not moving. But he didn’t quite look asleep, either. Just then he shifted a little, adjusted his hand up closer to his face.
“Aiden?” Noah’s whisper was barely audible. “You awake, buddy?”
Aiden rolled onto his other side, eyes closed. Noah waited. He must be asleep. Just dreaming probably. Trying to figure out why his father was moving out in the morning. How was a four-year-old supposed to understand something like that?
Noah didn’t move, didn’t say another word. But he couldn’t turn away just yet. How were his kids going to survive without him here every night? How would they be okay after he left? What was going to happen to them? He felt nauseous. The headache and the reality of the moment. Aiden and Olivia would probably talk about tomorrow as long as they lived.
“I was four,” Aiden would tell his friends and teachers, his wife and kids one day. “My dad and mom were this Internet famous couple. Everyone loved them. But it was all an act.” Then Aiden would pause for a minute, really let that sink in. “I remember the night before my dad left. How he told me he was leaving. I cried myself to sleep and I guess in some ways I was never the same again.”
Something like that.
Olivia would have her story, too. Maybe she’d have a litany of boyfriends, one after another. With each one she would say the same thing. “My dad left when I was two. I never really had a male role model in my life.”
And then what? Would she be one ofthosegirls? Always looking for affection in the wrong places because she felt rejected by her daddy?
He had to stop. Quit doing this to himself. Otherwise he was going to lose his dinner right here on their bedroom floor. He breathed in. If only his headache weren’t so bad. A few blinks and he peered at them again, struggled to see his Aiden and Olivia clearly once more. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d prayed over them. Sure he said bedtime prayers with them. But he couldn’t remember when he really took a minute and prayed over his sleeping babies.
But here—when it was his last chance to do so in their own bedroom—it was the only option. He steadied himself against the doorframe.My God, I have no right to talk to You. None at all. But I have to ask You something. Before it’s too late.
The pain in his head was screaming now. He could barely focus.
Please, protect Aiden and Olivia, Father. Protect them from my selfishness and Emily’s hard heart. We’re a mess, Lord. It’s too late for us. I know that. Nothing can save my kids from this broken home. It’ll always be part of their story.
He breathed deep, and even that made the pain worse.
I guess I’m asking You for a miracle. You know, that the statistics won’t have the last word for my kids. Divorce doesn’t destroy every kid who goes through it, right? Anyway, I love them so much, God. More than they’ll ever know. Will You help them? Please?
That was it, all he could pray. He couldn’t stand to be here another minute. One final glance at Aiden and Livi. The peaceful in and out of their breathing. The way they still looked so little when they were asleep. Then he stepped back and let that chapter close.
The chapter where Noah and Emily lived in the same house and shared the same name. The part of his kids’ story when Mommy and Daddy still loved each other.
Noah’s dizziness was twice as bad as before. He struggled to make it back to his room and brush his teeth. His vision was blurry and a halo shone around everything he looked at. A concussion migraine. That’s what his doctor called it. Every now and then someone with Noah’s history of head injuries was bound to get a migraine.
But Noah had researched head injuries and concussions. This wasn’t a migraine. It was much worse. It was scar tissue and brain damage making itself known, reminding him that he’d suffered at least some permanent damage with his first head injury out on that football field.
And the second time he’d almost died.
Stress or illness, severe anxiety. There were a handful of triggers for these kinds of debilitating headaches. No surprise he would get one tonight.
He climbed under their covers for the last time, flipped off the bedside lamp and lay back on the pillow. It had been years since he’d had a headache like this. He expected he might end up in the bathroom, vomiting.
Every heartbeat sounded in his throat and temples. The aching grew worse with every few breaths. He should get up and take something for the pain. But he didn’t have the energy. And slowly, in a haze of pain and heartbreak, Noah began to fall asleep until there was only a cloudy, dizzying emptiness.
A preview of his future.
•••
AIDEN OPENED HISeyes as soon as his daddy closed the door. He was kind of asleep. Kind of not. But he didn’t want to talk right now. He was still trying to figure things out. Why his daddy was packing and where he would be sleeping tomorrow.
