Ten Years, One Goodbye He Walked Away Forever

I didn't feel like calling an Uber, so I scanned a bike and pedaled along, taking my time.

Then bad luck piled on bad luck, and a car running a yellow light slammed into me.

Before I could even register what had happened, both the driver and the car were gone.

The kickstand had torn a bloody gash down my shin, and I lay sprawled on the asphalt, shaking all over from the pain.

A man got out of his car, called the police for me, and called an ambulance.

His phone kept ringing while we waited. The crowd was loud, so he put it on speaker, and I caught most of it.

He hadn't shown up on time, he'd held up work, and both his boss and his client were furious.

I felt awful about it and told him he should just go.

But he only smiled and said, "It's fine, man. This is nothing, I can handle it. Right now the main thing is you."

Then he stayed with me the whole time, kept me calm, and didn't leave until the paramedics arrived.

In the five minutes after I'd called Annette, my mind churned.

Three months ago, all I'd wanted was a seafood dinner while it was in season, but Annette said she didn't like food you had to crack open, so she told Kevin to take me and said she'd pick up the tab.

And today she'd gone out with Leigh.

She didn't like having her schedule thrown off, so I'd had to go try on the suit alone.

But she'd promised to drive me, and then one call from Leigh and she'd dumped me.

And then there was that charger.

Once, I'd only borrowed it to try it, and she'd given me the cold shoulder for a week.

Now Leigh was using it to run a little fan.

I thought again of that man's eyes when he said, "Right now the main thing is you."

When the traffic officer came, the stranger offered his contact information without being asked and said he'd be willing to serve as a witness.

I lay in the ambulance, the wound throbbing, while the paramedics took my blood pressure, stopped the bleeding, and asked about my medical history. Every one of them was gentle.

For ten years, I had been waiting for Annette to break a rule for me.

I waited for her to make one exception, to pick up one of my calls in the middle of her chaos, to shift her schedule once for my sake, to set me firmly at the very top of her priorities.

I kept to her rules, bent around her temper, loved her carefully for ten years.

And yet, in this moment, the one willing to put me first, to ache for me, to set me above everything else, was a stranger I'd met by chance.

That was when I finally understood. She didn't love me.

So I shouldn't keep setting myself up to be let down either.

Lying in the hospital bed, I typed and deleted and trimmed the message in the group chat with both sets of parents, and finally hit send.

I'd barely closed my eyes when the wound got infected and my fever spiked to nearly a hundred and four.

Kevin stayed by my side, running back and forth, and it wasn't until the middle of the night that the temperature came down.

Looking at how worn out his face had been lately from working on his project, I hired an aide and told him to go home and rest.

Early the next morning, a smothered sound of crying woke me.

I cracked my eyes open, groggy, every part of me aching and limp.

Through the blur, I saw Aunt Darlene standing in the doorway of the ward, wiping at her eyes, looking at Annette with the disappointment and anger of someone watching a child throw away everything good in her hands.

"Annie, how can you have so little sense?"

"Oliver's hurt this badly, and you still had it in you to go look after your assistant?"

"Tell me the truth. Did you really do something to wrong him?"

"He's been with you ten years. I know his temper, I know what kind of man he is. If he weren't truly done with you, he would never bring up a breakup at a time like this!"

Annette's brow furrowed.

"Mom, you don't understand what happened. Yesterday I couldn't just leave Leigh on his own..."

Aunt Darlene was shaking with anger, her voice climbing.

"But you could leave Oliver, is that it? Annette, how are you exactly like your father!"

As the words left her, she turned and met my eyes, gathered up a smile, and hurried into the room.