Total pages in book: 124
Estimated words: 122514 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 613(@200wpm)___ 490(@250wpm)___ 408(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 122514 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 613(@200wpm)___ 490(@250wpm)___ 408(@300wpm)
If I was ready to go to sleep and he wasn’t, he’d watch television, but he’d watch it with no volume. He never wanted to wake me up.
“He drove me to work, and he’d pick me up if he could.”
“Yeah.” Brenda nodded, her hip brushing against mine. “He’d come home during his lunch breaks to check on me. He bought me puzzles. He always knew I loved them. Now we do a puzzle here every Sunday together.”
A new wave of grief broke over me.
She was in her sixties, doing a puzzle with her son who was thirty-one.
As if sensing my feelings, Brenda stopped and gazed at me. “It’ll get better. The first visit is the hardest. You’re going to cry probably the whole time, and when you leave, and maybe for a few days after. But it will get better. You’re grieving the family you didn’t get a chance to have. Not just him, but you’re grieving a part of yourself. It always gets better. Time moves along, and the hole you have for him may always be there, but you’ll grow layers around it. It’ll begin to heal.”
A hole. Check.
Layers around it? Maybe.
But getting better?
We turned the last corner, and she opened the door to Damian’s apartment. He sat in his living room, the television on, and as I entered, I remembered the day and the time. I knew, before walking in, that he’d be watching Reese’s basketball game, and I also remembered that I always got Damian during those games.
As he turned to look at me, I saw recognition and a bright smile broke over his face. Inside me, something clicked back into place.
This was family.
Brenda was right. It would get better. It already had.
Five days ago, I’d sat next to my ex, listening to him tell me Reese Forster’s stats, hearing the old ribbing he used to give me about my crush on Reese. I’d sat there with tears welling up, but I never let them fall. Not in front of Damian. The tears weren’t for the teasing—far from it. And they weren’t even from the pain of seeing where Damian was in his disease.
The tears were good tears, finally.
I hadn’t realized how empty I’d been without him.
I’d gone back two more times through the week, meeting AJ for the first time and getting closer to Brenda. And I met Mickey, who was adorable. A German Shepherd, whose first priority was always Damian —always checking on him, watching him. It wasn’t until Damian sat down that Mickey was off-duty. He hadn’t been brought up as a typical service dog. He had training specifically for dementia, and while I hated the terminology—because Damian wasn’t Damian with dementia to me. He was just Damian—I understood the training was needed.
A few times Damian started to get up and do something, and Mickey sensed it, whining, pressing him back down. One point he prepared to leave the apartment, but Mickey blocked him, and AJ called his name. Then Damian remembered we were there. His eyes lit up, a smile spread over his face, and he came back for another round of Reese Forster stats.
Going to see him had been a goodbye in my heart.
Not a goodbye forever, because I could never do that, but a goodbye to him being my romantic partner. Maybe if I were older, if we’d had kids, things would be different. I would’ve stayed at his side, held his hand, kissed his cheek, and known he was my soulmate for life.
But I was too young.
He tried to send me away so many times because of this reason, so I could still have a husband, perhaps children. I got it. I got it then, but I never accepted it. I hadn’t wanted to lose him either.
At one point, one of the other residents had tried to classify my relationship with Damian.
I wouldn’t have it.
I wasn’t his sister. I wasn’t his best friend any longer. I was family. That was it.
And now, I was back to traveling.
A part of me felt whole again. I was getting there, and I had one more piece to fix. Reese.
“Why are you going to Chicago?” my seatmate asked once they announced we were starting our descent. He’d kept to himself the whole time, headphones plugged into his phone, but after going to the bathroom, he didn’t immediately tug the headphones back on.
I’d been slouching down, but I sat up now, stretching my arms and back. “I’m, uh… I’m seeing a friend.”
He nodded. “Yeah, yeah. Good friend?”
He was in a business suit, and I because I didn’t want to talk about the details, I gestured to him. “You’re going for work?”
“What?” He looked down and laughed. “Oh. No. I travel so much, I forgot. Nah. Not this time. A friend of mine has box seats to the Chasers game tomorrow. I’m flying in to see him, catch the game, and then I’m off to Japan after that.”