Total pages in book: 82
Estimated words: 74487 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 372(@200wpm)___ 298(@250wpm)___ 248(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 74487 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 372(@200wpm)___ 298(@250wpm)___ 248(@300wpm)
* * *
Fifteen minutes later, I stab a piece of broccoli and quietly lift it to my mouth, my eyes on the television screen. I chew the vegetable and glance toward the main house, the curtains all drawn, the light in Nathan’s bedroom on. Tomorrow, I will get back on his plane and fly to Jacksonville to see my father. I cut a piece of grilled chicken. The fridge didn’t just hold tonight’s dinner. There were five prepackaged meals in the neatly labeled CANDACE stack, each with reheating instructions clearly printed on the lid. I chose the juiciest of the stack, a portion-controlled sampling that delivered the precise ration of carbs/protein/fat that had been preached to me in my afternoon nutritional session by a perky blonde named Beth.
* * *
I can already predict, with absolute certainty, that I will hate Beth. Our first physical training session is set for the day after tomorrow.
* * *
The lights dim in Nathan’s room and I set aside the tray, eyeing the bank of curtains, pulled taut across his windows. I have my own set of curtains, I could close them and hide everything I am doing, the entire exciting process of eating dinner in my brand new silk pajamas. I intentionally left them open, thinking he might see me, might stop by. I had wanted to show him my new look, an adolescent need for approval rearing its ugly head. Husband agrees that Sexual Expectations will be limited to one (1) Sexual Penetration Act per day. That contract had been prepared before we had slept together in Rosemary Beach. Maybe he hadn’t enjoyed it. Maybe we’d never have sex again. He certainly hadn’t shown any interest since then. Wife can initiate additional Sexual Acts if she chooses. I push the tray to the side and settle back in the bed’s pillows, pulling the covers up and reaching for the remote. There is no way I’m going to initiate anything with him. I close my eyes, and try to push the image of his face, the feel of his hand, out of my mind.
CHAPTER 14
Jacksonville, Florida. I finger the ends of my hair, and lean, as subtly as possible, away from the man that sits beside me. He’s a cougher, the sort of stranger that doesn’t bother to cover his mouth, or—from the pungent smell drifting over—bathe. I should have sat on the other side, by the pregnant woman with the snot-covered kid. Poor planning. I sigh, tugging at a piece of hair before letting it go. My head feels strange, my waist-length tresses now glossy and thick, extensions added, my hair dyed the color of dark chocolate. My hair hasn't been brown since I was thirteen and discovered Sun-In.
* * *
I’ve got to get Dad out of here. The waiting room itself is a cess pool, I can’t imagine it being much better wherever they keep the sick patients.
* * *
My name is called, and I stand, swinging my bag, a Chanel that perfectly matches my linen slacks, over one shoulder. I move through a swinging door and follow the woman down a hall and presumably, toward my father. I glance in the open rooms that we pass, some crowded with guests, most empty, the feet of patients tenting the bottom of white sheets.
I want him out of here. I have the two brochures from Nathan in my purse. All I need to do is to tell my father to pick one. All I need to do is walk in and say hello.
It should be easy, yet my hand trembles as I tuck a piece of hair behind my ear. I should be excited, yet the guilt is all but suffocating me. I could have come. I could have gotten on a Greyhound, or rented a car, or found some way, in the six months since he fell sick, to come. There’s no excuse that I didn’t.
As we move closer, I second-guess my steps. Maybe I should have called ahead and warned him of my arrival. Maybe this sort of thing doesn’t go well as a surprise.
The nurse stops in front of a room, and reaches forward, turning the handle. “You coming?” She peers at me in the irritated manner of an overworked woman.
I nod, and walk, smiling brightly, one designer heel stepping in front of another, past an intubated woman and the curtain that hides my father. The sole of my heel sticks to a rough place on the floor and I freeze at my first glimpse of him.
How can a man change so completely in two years? The paleness of his skin, the hollows that frame his eyes. He’s lost twenty or thirty pounds, and I can see it in his face, in the thin neck that now flexes in his swallow of meds.