Page 97 of Where We Fall

“I do,” I cry.

I wipe the tears from my cheeks.

“When are you going back?” he asks.

I take a deep breath. “I’m going to give the company my two-week notice. Then I’ll be gone.”

He raises his eyebrows at me. “You know you don’t have to do that. You don’t have to give us two weeks. Let me talk to the group about you working from Chicago.”

“I can’t ask you guys to do that. It’s not fair. Your company hired me to work in Cleveland.”

“That doesn’t matter. We can still work with you if you are in Chicago. It's 2023. People are working remotely everywhere.”

“It’s…not just that. I’ve been thinking about what happens to us when I leave.”

He grabs my hand. “We can figure that out, too. Plane rides or driving, we can make it work.”

I smile to myself. I knew he would make it sound so simple, like it would be a piece of cake for him.

“You’re so sweet,” I tell him.

I can see that he senses something is coming by how he slowly drops my hand.

“I just can’t do that to you. You don’t need to worry about me and my life. I’ll be so busy working when I find a new job and caring for my mom. I won’t have all that time to travel and see you very often. Even if I do, I won’t get to you until Friday night, and I’d have to leave Sunday afternoon. We’d only have a day and a half together.”

“What are you saying?” he asks, his voice a bit shaky.

My tears, which were beginning to settle, are back. I take a deep breath to summon the courage to go on.

“I’m saying you’re too much of a catch to waste your thirties waiting for a weekend with me here and there. If it was short-term, I can see us waiting it out, but it’s not. Are you willing to do the next five-ten years long-distance with me? My mom may be suffering from dementia, but she isn’t going anywhere anytime soon.”

“I….” he pauses. “I don’t know what to say.”

“I know. I’m so sorry. I love you so much. I hate this.”

“But I mean, what if we just see how it went for a while?”

My hands ache to reach out to him, but I resist the urge.

“I’m scared. I’m scared that if I do that, I’ll never let you go. I don’t doubt our connection. I know we could do just fine long-distance. But do you see an opportunity in the next decade where we would live in the same place?”

It’s like everything is finally clicking in for him. His shoulders fall. “No, I don’t. My life is here, my company is here.”

“And I have to do this for my mom.”

“I guess you’re right. I don’t want to take away the opportunity for you to settle down and get married. If I can’t be there for you, you deserve someone who can.”

Crap. It makes it so much worse when he’s so kind. I wish he would stand up and scream at me. Tell me I’m breaking his heart and to get out of his home, out of his life.

At least then, I could tell myself he never really loved me.

We both sit in silence as we take in the words just spoken.

“So, what now?” I whisper.

He sighs. “Well, I don’t want you waiting two weeks to get to your mom. You go ahead and take the week to figure everything out. Don’t worry about us.”

“But I can’t do that,” I begin to speak, but he cuts me off.

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