Page 55 of The Doctor's Simple Life

As I run out the door, I pass Mikey, who’s leaning against the wall. I hear him take a breath as if to say something or to laugh, but I don’t stop. Instead, I run for my car and burst into tears as soon as I sit down, the full force of the fight we just had hitting me in the chest.

All I can do for a while is sob, my chest heaving as tears flow down my face. Reece is gone. And I meant nothing to him. All of this was for nothing.

Eventually, I catch my breath and start to worry that someone’s going to see me sitting here, crying alone in my car. The last thing I want is to be interrupted by some well-meaning person from town. There’s only one place I want to be.

I cry all the way to Gramma’s and let myself in when I get there, scurrying out of the car so that none of her neighbors will see the mascara running down my cheeks. It’s probably pointless trying to damage control gossip now, but the fewer people who see me like this, the better.

Gramma is in the kitchen and calls out when she hears the door. “Sienna? Is that you?”

I open my mouth, but no words come out. All I can do is stumble to the kitchen. She sees me in the doorway and her face falls in concern. She opens her arms out to me, and I rush over to her, wrapping my arms around her so I can sob into her shoulder.

“Oh, honey,” she coos, soothing me. It’s the only voice in the world that could soothe me right now. “Sweetie, what happened?”

But I can’t speak to tell her.

All I can do is cry.

CHAPTER 27

REECE

Ididn’t have that much stuff to begin with, so packing doesn’t take me too long. Mikey gets us a cab, and we travel back to my house in silence. He tells me he’ll see me tomorrow with that big old grin of his, and I halfheartedly echo him. I tell him I’m looking forward to it. I can’t decide if I’m lying.

As I pack my four suitcases, cramming clothes in without any order or logic, all I can think about is Sienna. All I can see in my mind’s eye is the face she made as she stormed off. The tears in her eyes.

Did she really believe all of that? That I haven’t changed at all? That I didn’t care about her at all while I was here?

Because I did. With all my heart, I did.

Somehow, I don’t think sending her a message would go down well. So I don’t.

Instead, I turn up my music to drown out my thoughts and sit on my suitcase to try and zip it up. I swear I didn’t buy that much new stuff, and all of this came in these bags. How can it not fit?

In the end, I have to abandon a bunch of socks, but everything else fits. I’m calling it a win.

That night, I sleep restlessly, waking up every hour to snatches of dreams of Sienna, of home, of Mikey laughing. Of the tennis ball that sent me here in the first place. It probably means something, but I’ve never understood the point of analyzing your dreams.

It never tells you anything you want to hear.

In the morning, I throw my cases into my car, lock up the house, and post the keys back through the postbox like I was instructed to when I moved in. No going back now.

Best to just make a quick and quiet exit, I decide. After all, I have nobody to say goodbye to. No doubt Sienna went running off to Peggy, so there’s no way she’ll want to say goodbye to me. Not after I hurt her granddaughter.

I drive all the way back to Miami, listening to the radio and mulling things over in my head. I still can’t believe Sienna said all those things to me. Sure, Mikey was unkind, but for her to flip out like that…

Maybe she had just been waiting for me to make a misstep the whole time. Maybe it was a game to her too, a test to see if I would be the perfect guy she wanted me to be. Well, sucks to be her, because I’ll never be perfect. I just spent three and a half weeks of my life trying to be everything she wanted me to be, and it wasn’t enough.

Time to become the old me again. Time to have some fun and leave that mess behind me.

TheWelcome to Miami!sign greets me like an old friend as I pass it on the highway, and I breathe out, the knot in my chest relaxing a little. Back to the familiar. Back to my apartment and my friends, my job and the glamor. I’ve been missing it. Small-town life just can’t compare to the city.

I pull up into the parking garage under my apartment complex and stand staring at the keypad for a second. There’s no way I’ve forgotten the unlock code this fast. It’s only been three weeks.

Soon this will all be a bad dream.

To my relief, the door swings open on my first attempt, and I sigh as I cross the threshold of my apartment. It’s just the way I left it, and just the way I like it. Clean and modern. Fast Wi-Fi. All the kitchen appliances I could ever want and not use.

Thinking about cooking gives me a twinge as I think about Peggy.

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