Page 113 of Empowered
Epilogue
No one had warned Sarah that Copenhagen could be warm in September. For some reason, her stereotypes about Scandinavian weather had not helped her out when she packed three suitcases for the private plane ride to Denmark.
So when she stepped out of her therapist’s office wearing a turtleneck, trousers, and a heavy coat only to meet blasting sunlight and locals wearing T-shirts, her first inclination was to bemoan this fate.
But she really didn’t have anything to bemoan. One month ago, she moved into Lucas’s historical home in Copenhagen. Five bedrooms, a chef’s kitchen, and enough charm to give those home-improvement shows back in America something to pine after. Everyone was so friendly in Denmark that she almost wondered what she was doing wrong to make them passive-aggressively treat her so nicely. Then she realized that they weregenuinelythat nice… and that included after finding out that she was American.
She wasn’t employed, and outside of occasionally helping her boyfriend with administrative matters, she had no immediate plans to look for any kind of job or even start her own business. Her schedule was packed enough. Danish lessons with a private tutor, therapy with an English speaker who spent more time helping her adjust to culture shock than getting to her “root causes,” and enough sights to see to sate her for the rest of her life.
That’s when Lucas wasn’t taking up her time. With romance. With sight-seeing. With parenting, because Victor lived with them most of the week.
Speaking of Victor, Sarah was tasked with something important that day. Lucas was at an important business meeting, and the Danish nanny they hired to look after Victor when the parents were out had a family emergency. As soon as Sarah arrived home, the nanny was off to catch the bus – and Victor still had to go to his afternoon classes.
The nanny had packed his things, made sure Victor was dressed, and left whatever Sarah needed to remember by the front door. She didn’t even have to take off her shoes.
She also didn’t have to call for Victor. He was already waiting for her in the foyer, kicking his feet from his chair. At least his face lit up when he saw her.
“Ready to go?” Sarah asked. “We’ve got about fifteen minutes to get there, and it takes a while to walk, remember?”
He didn’t say anything. Victor wasn’t a big talker, especially around Sarah, but he never hesitated to take her hand and follow her out the door. The way Lucas explained it was, “If he sees I don’t have a problem with you, then neither does he.” Victor took to his new nanny as quickly, much to everyone’s relief.
This made it sound like Victor wasn’t a shy child. On the contrary, he was only fine around adults. It was other children that brought out his shyness, as demonstrated when they reached the classroom gates a few blocks away.
He stopped in the middle of the path, his grip on Sarah’s hand faltering.
“What’s wrong?” She redoubled her efforts to hold his hand. “Don’t you want to go play with your friends?”
One of the teachers stepped out of the door and waved to Victor. “God eftermiddag, Victor!”This bilingual school was built to immerse young children in both English and Danish, a handy accomplishment for a small child who still wasn’t used to most Danish, regardless of how much his father tried to teach it to him. “Are you coming inside today?”
He looked away, too shy to face anyone. It didn’t help that a few rowdy kids his age tore around the schoolhouse behind the teacher.
“Just a second.” Sarah said to the teacher before kneeling in front of Victor. “Don’t you want to go inside? Looks pretty fun in there.”
His pout reminded her so much of Lucas that she wanted to laugh. “Sarah?”
“Yeah?”
“Why couldn’t Mom bring me today?”
“Well…” Damnit. Why did she always get these questions when Lucas wasn’t around? “Because your mom is busy at the doctor’s.” Part of the agreement to bring Jill over to Copenhagen was that she had to attend counseling for her addiction three times a week. She was at one of her appointments now. “Like I was busy at my doctor’s before I came home.”
“Oh.” That was the response she always got from him. “Can you come with me?”
“The school’s for kids unless you’re a teacher, but I can come pick you up when it’s over.”
“Will Dad come?”
“He can come too. He should be home by then.”
“Okay. You promise?”
“I promise that at least I will be here to pick you up when you’re done with class. How does that sound?”
He smiled. “Ice cream?”
“We’ll see what your dad says about that.”
She stood back up and presented Victor to the teacher on the other side of the gate. “Sorry about that. He’s shy, you know.”
