Left Hanging

by Cindy Dorminy

  I stop in front of her. “OCD? Have you ever been in DKA? It sucks.” My pulse is so high right now, I feel as though I’m about to go into V tach.

  Mallory waves me off as if she doesn’t have a care in the world. “I don’t even know what that is.”

  “Diabetic ketoacidosis. It’s very dangerous, Mallory.”

  My phone rings. The ringtone blares, and an announcer’s deep voice says, “Risk, the game of world domination,” indicating to me that Tommy is calling. I scrounge around the apartment, searching for my phone. Thank you, Tommy. He got my mental SOS in the nick of time. When the ringtone starts again, I find the phone in the couch cushion.

  “Don’t you answer that,” Mallory snaps. “We had a deal—no phone calls until we finish.”

  “Finish packing or finish breaking up?”

  She steels her eyes on me. Before I answer, I peer over at her once more. If I take my brother’s call, I won’t hear the end of it. If I don’t, it will confirm that I am one hundred percent, grade A whipped.

  I press the button to send my brother’s call straight to voice mail, and Mallory rolls her eyes. I think I’m the one who needs the break, and not only a time-out. I need a complete break, like the humpty-dumpty kind. I sit down and stare at my shoes.

  “We need to get this done,” she says. “I have a ton of things to do before my movers get here.”

  “It’s not working.”

  “We’ve already been over this. You don’t put in the effort.”

  I hate it when she starts using that school-teacher tone with me. “You don’t love me,” I say.

  “Don’t tell me who I love and don’t love.”

  “What do you love, Mallory? Remember that time I almost quit med school but you talked me into sticking it out?”

  She sighs.

  “Why? What was your motivation? Did you love me in the beginning, or was it the thought of the MD after my name?”

  Bingo. Finally, I’ve got her attention. Those steel-blue eyes throw daggers at me again. Good thing I wore Mallory Kevlar today, because she and I are in the middle of a massive stare down.

  Her lip quivers.

  Dammit. I can be such a jerk sometimes. I didn’t mean to hurt her feelings, but sometimes, she pushes my buttons.

  I run a hand through my crazy hair. “Never mind.” I head to the closet. “We’re both tired and stressed. I’m sorry I said anything. I didn’t mean to be an ass.”

  I haul all the coats out of the closet and sling them onto the back of the couch. Next, I grab the contents of the top shelf and stare at all my old board games covered in dust. It’s like seeing long-lost friends that are crying out how much they’ve missed me. These games bring back fond memories of Sunday afternoons, growing up. They also make me think of Juliet. Oh, sweet Juliet.

  I carry the boxes into the living room. “How about we take a break?” I run my hand over the top of the first box, sending dust particles into the air.

  Mallory rubs her nose and lets out a dainty sneeze.

  “Bless you. Feel like playing a game?”

  Mallory swings around and stares at the stack in my arms. “Seriously?”

  “C’mon, it’ll be fun.”

  Mallory lets out another one of her disgusted-with-me sighs. “Theo.”

  I survey the games, feeling as deflated as a slowly leaking balloon losing its last bit of air. “Never mind.”

  I put the games in a shipping box. After wrapping up the family photo in a towel, I place it on top of the games. The silence is so loud that it practically ruptures my eardrums. I know what’s coming next.

  “You’re a doctor, remember? It’s time you start acting like one.” She crosses her arms. “Come on, babe, you’re not a kid anymore. Let’s get all this stuff packed. I’m exhausted.”

  “I said never mind.” I tape the box shut. “I can’t do this anymore.”

  “Who is she?”

  I scrunch my eyebrows together. “Who is who?” I take my frustrations out on the poor tape dispenser. The box only needs one strip of tape, but it gets five. The contents of this box will never fall out.

  “Who are you in love with?”

  I wish I could answer that question. I knew as soon as I first laid eyes on Juliet that she was the one for me. But I don’t know what happened to her. Hell, I don’t even know her real name.

  “No one, Mallory. There’s no one.”

  She lets out another exputtered sigh, as my sister calls it. Jennifer has her own glossary, and sometimes her words describe the situation to a T.

  “Oh, all right. I’ll play one of your juvenile games.”

  This is not how I imagined feeling after seven years in a relationship. At first, I was flattered that someone like Mallory would give me the time of day. I mean, she has legs that go on forever, and she’s smart as a whip. She put the full-court press on me, and before I knew what had hit me, she had followed me to Johns Hopkins. Lord only knows how she hornswoggled her way into living with me six months ago. It’s all a blur to me now.

  We did have some fun times. And it was nice to come home to a beautiful girl after a grueling day that sometimes consisted of being on my feet for as much as eighteen hours, nonstop. Even if I was dead tired half the time, I guess the other half was fun for a while. That half isn’t enough anymore.

  “Okay, I’ve got a game that won’t take long at all.” I search around the cluttered apartment until I find a black marker.

  “When we get to Nashville, we are going to donate all those board games. I would die of embarrassment if anyone saw those in our apartment.”

  “We are not moving in together. Jesus, Mal, you are so hard-headed.”

  With no paper in sight, I use the side of a moving box to draw a bunch of blank spaces and a scaffold. I show it to her. It was going to be a cute Hangman game that spelled out “Welcome to Music City,” but she has left me no choice but to hammer home the truth. Here goes nothing.

  _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ !

  She scrunches up her forehead.

  “Pick a letter.”

  She rolls her eyes but guesses a few letters.

  I fill in the letters until we end up with most of the puzzle complete.

  We stare at each other.

  “R. N. G,” she says.

  “Hold your horses, Mal.”

  I A _ B R E A _ I N G U _ _ I _ _ _ O U !

  She gasps. “I am breaking up with you.”

  I kiss her cheek and reply, “Okay.” I hate to be such an ass, but she leaves me no choice.

  Chapter Three

  Darla

  “Okay, Stella Bella. Time for beddy-bye.” I draw back the covers of my daughter’s big-girl bed. It seems like only yesterday she was in a crib with a teddy-bear mobile dangling over her head. Now, she has so many stuffed teddy bears in her bed, there’s not much room for her six-year-old body to stretch out.

  One thousand one. One thousand two.

  “Aw, Mommy, not already.”

  Two seconds. Wow. I’m impressed. That has to be a world record. But Stella knows if she puts up a fuss, I’ll give in and play our little game. I can never resist that cute face and those adorable dimples.

  I pat her pillow and point to it. “You don’t want to be sleepy for your last day of first grade, do you?”

  She climbs into her bed, wearing a pitiful pout on her face. “Please. I promise I’ll get up without being a grumpy bear.”

  I tickle her until she’s a big squirmy mess. “Okay, one game.”

  “Yes,” she says, pumping her fist into the air as if she’s a teenager. Oh boy. That’s going to be fun as a single mom.

  She talks me into playing every single night. At first, it was a way to teach Stella her lett
ers and how to read. But it has become our little bedtime ritual. It’s not as though she has to twist my arm to play, that’s for sure. I love playing our game as much as she does. If she only knew how much it means to me, we would be playing it around the clock.

  She hands me her dry-erase board that she had hidden under her pillow, waiting for the go-ahead. She can play me like a fiddle, and I love every minute of it.

  “You are a rascal. No peeking.”

  She giggles and covers her eyes while I write out the puzzle. When I’m finished, I snuggle in next to her, tossing a few stuffed animals to the foot of the bed. I show her the puzzle.

  _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

  “Choose your first letter, ma’am.”

  She grins at me. “A.”

  “I don’t know,” I say, teasing her before I add the letters.

  _ _ _ _ _ A _ _ A _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

  She grins at me and picks two more letters.

  “You are soooo good at this.”

  “I know, right?”

  “And modest too.”

  “What’s modest?”

  “Never mind. Pick a letter.”

  “T.”

  S T E _ _ A _ S A S _ E E T _ _ _ _

  “Stella is a sweet girl,” she says.

  “We have a winner,” I say, tickling her again. I give her a big kiss and let the board slide to the floor, holding on to her so close that I’m not sure where I end and she begins. My eyes close to drink in her goodness. She has no idea how she saves my life every single day.

  “Mommy, why are you always so sad at night?”

  I open my eyes. I thought I was better at hiding it. “I’m not sad.”

  She leans up and puts her sweet little hands on my cheeks. “Your face is sad.”

  I stare at my precious daughter, who is the spitting image of her father. She even acts like him. He’s missing out on so much. I wish I could reach out to him and show him what he’s missing. I wish he wanted us.

  “How can I be sad when I have you?”

  She gives me a suffocating hug that I absorb with all my soul. I cherish every one of these moments because I know that one day, I’m going to blink, and Stella will be all grown up.

  “Oh, and guess what?” She releases me so fast, I don’t know what hit me. She can change topics faster than the weather changes in Nashville. “Miss Silva said we’re going to have a special guest come to our class tomorrow.”

  “Really?”

  She bobs her head up and down, her crazy blond hair going every which way. “Uh-huh. It’s her brother, and he’s a doctor. He’s a ped-a, ped-uh something.”

  “Pediatrician.”

  “Yeah, that’s it. A kid doctor.”

  “That’s super cool. I wish I could be there, but I gotta work.”

  She pats my hand. “That’s okay. You see doctors all the time, anyway.”

  “Yep.” I kiss her cheek. “Now, bedtime.”

  “Not before you get the kisses even.”

  I kiss her left cheek then her right cheek over and over until I get the kisses balanced. On purpose, I keep the kisses unbalanced for a while so I have an excuse to smooch those marshmallow-soft cheeks a few more times. She squeals. I love making her smile. I love anything that has Stella in the subject line. I love that I get to share my life with her.

  “I love you,” I whisper.

  “I love you more,” she whispers back.

  By the time I leave her room, she’s mostly asleep already. I remember when I could sleep that well. I used to sleep through two alarm clocks and my sister’s hair dryer. But that was pre-Stella. That was before I had to sleep with one eye open in case the love of my life needed me. I don’t care. Sleep is overrated. I would take Stella over a full night’s sleep any day, and I have the dark circles under my eyes to prove it.

  I meander down the hallway that still has a smidge of crayon drawings on the wall from that one time I wasn’t watching her for one minute. Her artwork is too cute to wash off. I may never get my rental deposit back, but it’s worth it. The clickity-click of my Chihuahua’s toenails on the hardwood floor follow me into the kitchen. Yeti thinks if I’m heading toward the “food” room, it must be treat time. I retrieve a Greenies bone for him, and he takes off with it, clenching it tightly in his mouth in case I have any intentions of stealing it from him. Yuck.

  I run my hand over the latest addition to my refrigerator art that Stella brought home from school earlier this week. This drawing is of Mickey Mouse. It won’t be long until she gets to meet him in person, or in mouse—whatever he is.

  There are so many drawings on the refrigerator now, I think I’m going to have to buy a bigger one. I can’t seem to part with any of her precious creations. Shelby, my boss, has banned me from posting any of Stella’s artwork in my office at the hospital fitness center where I work. She says they’re too distracting… for her.

  Now that Yeti’s late-night munchies have been satisfied, I drag myself into the super quiet living room and collapse onto the second-hand couch. With a deep breath, I stare at the four walls covered with yard-sale “art.” Yeti jumps up in my lap and gives me a quick, sloppy kiss on my face. I rub his ears, making him groan. I swear that dog’s eyes roll back in his head when I give him ear scratches. I curl up on the couch, and he finds a comfy spot behind my knees. After his typical circling, circling, circling, he settles in and lets out a deep, groaning exhalation.

  “I know, buddy.”

  Stella has no idea how sad I truly am. I try to put on a happy face because she deserves it. I want her to have an uncomplicated life, so if I have to fake my happiness, I’ll do it. But I miss her dad so much it hurts. Even though we only had one night together, I thought he loved me.

  I wish so many things had worked out differently, but Stella is not one of those things. When I invite myself to one of my pity parties, I have to remember that had it not been for that one and only frat party I went to, she would not even exist. My world would be in perpetual suck mode if it weren’t for her.

  I only wish he had wanted me, had wanted her.

  As sad as it makes me not to have him, I see him every day in her. I see him in her sweet, playful smile. I see him in her messy hair. Her love of playing games she definitely gets from him. Yep, she’s definitely the best thing that has ever happened to me.

  But it should have been better. It could have been better. Still snuggled in his bed with the party going on below us, I was seconds away from telling him my real name that night, when some jerk caught the place on fire. I should have stuck around outside the house and waited for him. I should have made sure he was safe. But he made me promise to get out of the house and not look back until I got back to my dorm. I was so traumatized, I didn’t think straight until everyone had scattered after graduation two days later.

  My eyes scanned the droves of people at graduation in hopes that I would miraculously bump into him, but of course, that didn’t happen. And by the time I realized I was pregnant, it was too late. He chose Mallory over us. He had already moved on, and it was entirely my fault.

  Someday, Stella will hate me for it all. If I do an Internet search on the word “idiot,” I will no doubt see my picture staring back at me as the first search result, and I wouldn’t even have to click on the “I’m feeling lucky” icon.

  On days like today, I really think about him. I thought I saw him today out of the corner of my eye. But when I got a good view of the guy, my hopes faded even though the memories didn’t. Right when I think I’m getting my life back together, something will remind me of what Stella and I lost.

  A single tear drops out of my eye and slides down my cheek. It’s followed by another and yet another. The tears rain down my face faster than I can wipe them away. I don’t even try anymore.


  Chapter Four

  Darla

  The constant whirring sound of the elliptical machines isn’t enough to drown out Shelby’s non-stop complaining. I think we all need to take a break and get on the equipment for some stress relief, but Shelby would never go for that. People think since I work in a fitness center, I’m able to exercise any time I want. In actuality, it seems the longer I’m the wellness nurse at the hospital fitness center, the less time I spend actually using the fitness equipment.

  I step out of my office and into the main workout area, where Shelby is lining up all our supplies for the screening visit on a table against the wall.

  “Isaac Matthew Dupont, the Third, we need more batteries,” Shelby says.

  Isaac runs from the closet with an armload of supplies. He clutches a box of pens in his mouth as he dodges a guy doing a set of bicep curls. With the ease of the track star he once was, he jumps over a workout bench. He knows if Shelby uses his full name, he’d better snap to it, even if it’s the last thing he wants to do. Isaac’s real talent is to schmooze with the guests, and it comes naturally for him. With his flawless face and killer grin, he never meets a stranger. Girls are willing to give up practically anything for one date with him, but this dark beauty only has eyes for the guys.

  He drops the box of pens out of his mouth. “Hon, I can only be in one place at a time.”

  Shelby tugs her long blond ponytail tight. “Well, I need you to be in this place right now.” If her hair is pulled back, it’s best to agree with whatever she says. Men are especially afraid of her when she goes into “take charge” mode. But if guys knew her like I do, they would be falling all over each other to get to her.

  Isaac looks at me and wags his head. “Someone didn’t get laid last night,” he says, avoiding a serious Shelby stare.

  I stifle a grin as I throw my supplies down on the table in the corner of the room and go through Shelby’s checklist. Isaac should know by now that talking about men, or lack thereof, is off-limits with her.