Page 66 of Holiday Wedding
“The nightmares are back.” So much anguish buried beneath those words.
I press my fingers to my temple, understanding immediately. “The drinking ones?”
“Are there any others?”
The defeat in his voice makes my heart clench. “Tell me about them,” I say, like I always do.
“You already know.” He’s morose.
“Tell me again,” I urge, surprised he’s resisting. In the past he said talking to me about this helped. I’ve talked to him on the phone late at night when he would wake up half-sobbing.
A heavy sigh from him. “It’s the same as before. I’m at a bar, not one I recognize. I drink and drink, but my glass is never empty. It tastes,” here’s where his words get ragged, “tastessogood. Like the best thing in the world. I’m thirsty. I keep going, getting more and more panicked because my mouth is so dry. I can’t quench it…the thirst.” Shallow breathing from Caleb echoes over the line.
“It’s okay,” I say gently. “Remember, the addiction specialist said this is normal. Lots of people in recovery have these dreams. That’s your mind’s and body’s way of processing.”
“It should be over by now.” His words come out slowly, like he has to prod them from his mouth. “I haven’t had alcohol in almost two years.”
The doctor had told us the nightmares might never go away. Caleb knows that, but the crankiness in his tone tells me he doesn’t want to hear it.
Abruptly, he changes the subject. “Your text says you’re stuck in Denver? What happened? Last I heard you were just going to have a layover there.”
I tell him about how the flights got canceled and how we were rerouted.
“That’s just great,” he says sarcastically. “You’re gone. Dean’s gone, trapped across town. Half the guests are stranded. I’m all alone. Everything is going wrong.” He lets out an angry, short sigh, then says in a tightly controlled voice, “Itoldyou to take the jet.”
I close my eyes, stunned by the resentment in his tone. My anger flares to meet his. “What difference would that have made? All the airports in New York are closed. Even to your fancy-schmancy jet.”
He doesn’t like that. He spits back, “You could have gotten out before the storm hit instead of waiting at the airport for hours. Could be home right now if you hadn’t been so dang stubborn.”
“Wow, Caleb,” I say sarcastically, “why don’t you tell me how you really feel?”
He exhales sharply, muttering curses under his breath, too soft for me to make them out. I can hear his bare feet slapping the wood floors of his bedroom, and I know he’s pacing. “I feel angry.”
“Yeah, Captain Obvious.” I’m pacing, too. I can only take four steps in the cramped bathroom before I have to turn around and go the other direction. “I got that already. Thanks.”
“I feel like I’ve sacrificed a lot for you, and you don’t appreciate it,” he says. Bitterness resonates through the phone line and hits me like a punch to the gut.
My vision turns red at that. Memories of my lecture and how those girls treated me come flooding back.
“You? You’ve sacrificed? Really, tell me what you gave up.”
“My movie career. I gave that up to be with you. To stay home with you.”
I gape at the phone, totally thrown off by his answer. “What’re you talking about? You said you wanted out of the film industry. That you were sick of it.”
A frustrated groan from him. “I was, but now that I’ve had time away—I don’t know—maybe I miss it. The producer I met for lunch, my old friend, he has a project that might be good for me.”
“You want to do that kind of work again?” Emergency bells clang in the back of my mind. I see a future where Caleb’s off making movies while I’m at home with 10 screaming babies. A future where I give up medicine, where I subjugate my needs to his.
It’s a picture that terrifies me.
I sit on the closed toilet. The porcelain is cold and hard against my legs. “What about me? Where do I fit into these plans?”
“I don’t know. I’m not even saying I’ll take the job. It’s just something that I would have considered before…”
My heart thuds painfully as I complete that sentence. “Before what?Me?” I inhale a shuddering breath and swallow down the tears that threaten.
“Forget I mentioned it,” Caleb says, cutting me off. Heedless of my emotions, he pours out all his anger and frustration. “It’s not just that. It’s all the stress I’m under.” I picture him tearing his hands through his hair. “I’m trying to keep everything together here. The wedding. Our families. The theater. The restaurants. All while you’re off gallivanting around the country.”
