Page 96 of The Scars I Bare
Blake laughed a sinister laugh I’d heard far too many times. He opened his mouth to retaliate, but I beat him to it.
“Enough!” I said, probably too loud for our private conversation.
The room quieted for a moment before picking back up.
“This is neither the time nor the place. And I will not let us ruin Lizzie’s special day with our bickering. I’m sorry I didn’t call, Blake; I really am. And I’m sorry to both of you for not mentioning the problems with school sooner. I obviously was in denial. It’s something I’ll need to figure out.”
“We’llneed to figure out,” Blake interjected.
“So, until then, why don’t you all plaster big, happy smiles on your faces for Lizzie and act like adults, okay?”
“Cora?” Dean said my name in a way that had me turning my head.
My heart sank. There, holding a single piece of cake in her hands, was Lizzie, her face long and sad, the birthday glow long forgotten.
“Why are you guys fighting on my birthday?”
I turned back toward the two men, uncaring if it was their fault or mine, feeling the anxiety and pressure of the day weighing down on me, and I snapped.
“Great job,” I said. “You’ve ruined it.”
And then I stormed out of the room.
What was I saying about acting like an adult?
Recovery Journal: Day 1,195
I saw her.
Cora.
I saw Cora. Here. In my town.
Which is now somehow her town.
She’s divorced. I don’t know why I’m writing that first. It shouldn’t be the first thing I write. I should be writing something like why she’s here, but I can’t stop thinking about that one little detail.
She’s divorced.
I still remember that day she turned me down.
I don’t blame her really.
Mentally unstable, newly single amputee asks you out before he’s even discharged from the hospital.
Kind of weird, right?
But I’ll never forgot those eyes.
They were sad eyes. Not because she felt bad for turning me down.
No, they were sad for some other reason.
Over the years, I’ve often wondered what it could have been. She’d always been so upbeat when she visited, almost like she was trying too hard.
Was she making up for something? Covering up a failing marriage perhaps?
She’s divorced.
