Page 30 of Come Home to Me

I wait for her to continue, but she doesn’t. Instead, she takes a sip of her drink and then forces a smile.

“There’s this saying that’s everywhere on Pinterest and Facebook and stuff. What if I fall? Oh, but my darling, what if you fly?” She waits for me to acknowledge the quote before she continues. “I always fall. At least when it comes to my father. I’ve never been enough for him, even when I tried to be everything he wanted, even when I disagreed with him completely.” Her voice cracks and she swallows hard, then glances around and lets out a shaky breath, shutting down the emotion and hiding it under lock and key. A jailer practiced at doing her job, despite the cries of the prisoner.

I take her hands and rub my thumbs along her knuckles. “You don’t have to talk about it, not here. Not now. But I’m here when you’re ready and I’m a good listener.”

“It’s all right there, you know. Like it wants out.” Sarah presses her hand to her lips as if to keep herself from speaking. I wait and she drops her hand before continuing. “It’s not fair of me to dump any of this on you. I’m a big girl. It’s my job to handle it.”

“Handling it and ignoring it are two very different things with two very different outcomes.”

Acceptance softens Sarah’s features and she nods. “So,” she begins and then clears her throat. “My dad and I had a falling out when I was a teenager. I made a mistake and the solution he saw wasn’t something I could bring myself to do…” She pauses, obviously struggling with her words. “You asked about something that happened when I was a kid. Something that no one knows about. I told you about a stupid note. But this…?” She drops her gaze to the table. “My dad and I didn’t get along well before it happened. After…?”

“You really don’t have to talk about it here. I understand.”

Sarah nods and offers an apologetic smile. “I got pregnant when I was in high school.” She blinks after the words make it past her lips, as if she doesn’t know what to do now that she’s spoken them. “Dad wanted me to get an abortion and if you knew anything about my family, you’d understand what a shock that was for me. I couldn’t imagine going through with it and told him exactly what I thought of the idea. Anyway, life had its own plans and I lost the baby the next week.” Her eyes shimmer with all the unspoken emotions, lost in pain and memories. “I thought my mom was going to lose her mind. She made me swear never to tell my brothers. Never to tell my friends. Never to tell anyone.”

She glances at me as if to gauge my judgement, of which there’s none. Life happens. We’ve all made mistakes and who am I to judge her for hers?

“Anyway,” she continues. “A day of silence between Dad and me stretched into a week of silence, which stretched into a month of silence, and so on and so forth until neither one of us could wait for me to graduate and move out. One night, I was complaining about Colton’s girlfriend at the time and my dad turned to me and there was hate in his eyes. Like, actual hatred. He told me that girl was more a part of the family than I was.” Sarah pauses to push back the hurt that chased the words past her lips. “After all we’d been through, it was a slap to the face that I never recovered from,” she whispers. “I know I wasn’t the kind of kid he wanted, but I’m blood. His daughter. That’s supposed to mean something, right?”

I nod and tighten my grip on her hands, afraid that if I speak, she’ll clam up and it’s painfully obvious how badly she needs to get this out into the open.

“Fast forward a few years and David is getting married. I drag myself to the wedding, an utter nervous wreck by the way, and then there’s Dad. Hugging David’s new wife, cupping her face in his hands and smiling at her the way I always wanted him to smile at me. All I could see was someone else who was more a part of the family than me.” She fiddles with her drink and then pushes it away. “And if I look at things logically, I can understand how he feels closer to her than to me. I’m just as at fault here as he is because all I needed to do was talk to him. It wouldn’t have been easy, but maybe we could have…” She pauses and shakes her head, her eyes darting around the table but not seeing anything but her memories. “Anyway, I saw my mom on New Year’s Eve. Asked her if she thought I could stop by and see Dad because I’m so tired of feeling this way. She hugged me and told me she loved me so much, but Dad wasn’t ready for me. It’s been five years, Frank. Five years! And he’s not ready?”

Sarah pauses to collect her thoughts and then continues. “I had every intention of going to Colton’s wedding, but I couldn’t put myself through that again. Couldn’t stand there and feel like a stranger among family, while another woman, a friend of mine, Tessa, took my place.” She shakes her head. “I’m ready to fix things. Ready to move forward. I just don’t know how. Not if Dad isn’t ready.” Her gaze bounces across my face, ready and waiting for my judgement.

I lean across the table to cup her cheek. “I don’t think you can do much more than take care of you.”

“But I’m not doing a very good job of that, am I?” Sarah leans into my touch and closes her eyes. “If I need a little blue pill to get through my days,” she whispers, “then I’m not doing a very good job at all.” She sits up and looks into my eyes. “I want to stop taking them. I really do.”

“Then stop.”

She makes a face and pulls away. “It’s not that easy.”

“I never said it was going to be easy. But if you want to stop, the answer is simple. You just stop.”

“But what happens if I have a panic attack? What happens if something goes wrong and I freak out and mess things up and I end up worse off than I am now?”

“Then call your brother. Or your doctor. Or hell, call me. Talk to me. I’m here for you. I know it must feel like you’ve been alone for years, but you’re not. Not anymore. I’ll hold you up until you’re strong enough to do it yourself.”

Sarah places her hand against my chest. “You’ve been nothing but amazing to me. Why?”

“Look at you. You’re funny. Smart. Sexy as hell. Why wouldn’t I be amazing to you?” I pause and look deeply into her eyes. She’s hurting, barely more than a raw nerve sitting in front of me, and if she’s anything like Leo, we’re going to have some hiccups as she learns to deal with everything she’s avoiding, but she’s worth it. One look at her and I know she’s worth it. “It’s time to stop falling, Sarah. Let me show you what it means to fly.”

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