Page 96 of Sparking Sara

I look up at Lydia and she smiles. “I think that can be arranged.”

“Really?” I say hopefully.

She nods. “Dan and I don’t have any sisters, and this little one needs an aunt.”

More tears prickle my eyes as I pull her in for a hug. And as we embrace, I can feel our friendship returning almost as if the past three years never happened. Which they didn’t—for me, at least.

I escort Lydia to the lobby when she leaves.

“Please thank your friend for bugging the hell out of me,” she says.

“I will.”

As Lydia gives me a parting hug, I wonder if Denver knows just how much he’s changed my life.

“Your mail, Ms. Francis,” a woman says after Lydia leaves.

“Thank you, uh … I’m sorry, I don’t remember your name.”

She hands me a stack of letters. “You never knew it,” she says. “It’s Carrie. I work the front desk. I heard about what happened to you. I’m sorry.”

“I’ve lived here for years and never bothered to learn your name?” I ask, appalled at myself.

She shrugs.

“I’m the one who’s sorry, Carrie. And please call me Sara.”

She smiles. “Okay, Sara. Have a nice day.”

“You too, Carrie.”

I ride the elevator back up, wondering why Oliver would ever waste his time with me, knowing what a terrible person I was.Hedoesn’t seem to be a terrible person. You’d think that terrible people would attract each other. Then again, he told me I was different around him. I must have felt safe enough with him to pull down the façade. I must have felt with him back then the way I do with Denver now.

And I close my eyes for the rest of the ride up, knowing that I really do owe it to Oliver to try to make things work between us.

I decide to call out for groceries. I’ve learned that Oliver’s favorite meal is chicken parmesan. And although I have no idea how to make it, and it’s a struggle to read the recipe, like everything else in my life these days, I figure I need to learn.

Chapter Twenty-four

The outpatient therapy room is like a cross between a gym and a kindergarten classroom. There are exercise machines, mats, pulleys, and bars, but there are also books, puzzles, Play-Doh, and shape-sorting containers.

I’ve stopped complaining when Lisa, the cognitive therapist, asks me to perform simple tasks like putting various shapes into their proper slots. I get why I have to do it now and I can see the progress for myself. It’s gotten much easier over the past week. I didn’t realize I was having to think about it before. I didn’t get that people should just pick up a shape and know where it goes without having to analyze it. And since she always makes me do it with my left hand, it’s like two therapies in one.

Denver looks over my shoulder as Lisa has me stacking pennies, playing dominoes, doing ‘easy’ Sudoku, and putting together jigsaw puzzles.

“Now, I’d like you to start with the number twenty-one,” Lisa says. “I want you to add three to it three times and then take away seven from the last number.”

It seems easy enough, but I find myself struggling to do it as quickly as I’d like.

“That’s an interesting mental exercise,” Denver says.

Lisa nods. “It helps with processing and organizing information because the brain must hold several details at once.”

It’s amazing the things the therapists notice that others don’t. ThatIdon’t. The physical things, like my left side not working as well as my right, are obvious. But when it comes to processing information, you don’t know what you don’t know.

It’s a lot of work coming to the rehab facility every day. But I know it’s necessary. And it doesn’t seem as much like work on the days Denver is here with me.

After my time with Lisa, Donovan puts me through my paces working my left leg harder than he ever has. When he’s done with me and I’m cooling down on the foot bike, Denver pulls up a chair. “I have a surprise for you if you can come back to my place after therapy today.”

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