by Leah Scheier
Chapter 35
My nasty plastic tube and bottle are removed that evening; the bandages on my belly are trimmed down to a little square. I get a glimpse of the red scar underneath, and to my great relief, it’s much smaller than I’d imagined it would be. The surgery resident seems optimistic I’ll be home by the weekend, and he carries the news to my support group in the waiting room. They file in and out over the next two days, bringing teddy bears and oversized flower baskets and stories from the snow emergency outside. Nobody mentions the reason I’ve been hospitalized; they take their cue from me and respect the fact that I don’t want to talk about it. Everybody focuses on me—at least when they’re in front of me. Occasionally, ripples of an argument between my parents travel up to me, but they’re careful to keep that stuff muted when I’m around. Mostly they come in separately, and one leaves when the other walks into the room.
I begin to take small trips around my bed after the bottle is removed. The IV pole has wheels on it, and I use it as a movable crutch, leaning on it when I get light-headed. I’m alone when I decide to take my first steps into the hall. Everyone’s gone down to the cafeteria for dinner. The ward is very quiet; it’s a shift change so the nurses are busy signing over their patients to the next team. I hobble over to the curtain and draw it aside, squinting down the corridor at the nurses’ station. I’d hoped to take a walk to the dining hall to join my family, but my loose hospital gown gapes in some embarrassing places. No one answered my call button; I wanted another robe so I could drape it over my back and stop mooning the other patients.
I’m about to call out when I hear voices down the hall. Hope and Ethan round the corner and stop a few feet away from me. I’m partially hidden by the curtain, and they don’t look up to see me standing there.
“Can I have one of those?” Hope asks and Ethan holds out a bag of cookies.
“You can take the rest.”
“Are these gluten free?” she inquires between bites. “They’re really good.”
“They’re not gluten free.”
She stops chewing and gives him a strange look. “You just ate half a bag.”
“Yes.”
“But I thought you couldn’t eat this.”
He shakes his head. “That diet was my mom’s idea. There’s no medical basis for it. I was tested five months ago, and I’m not sensitive to gluten. So I can eat whatever I want.”
She laughs. “How long have you been eating cookies?”
“Since I was tested.” He reaches out and pops another one in his mouth.
“But your sister’s been making all those crazy recipes for you! Why didn’t you tell her?”
“She didn’t ask.”
“That’s not the point, Ethan. She’s spent a lot of time cooking those…creations for you. She has a right to know that you’re ignoring the diet.”
He shrugs and grabs another cookie. “I’ll tell her if you want. But I think it will just make her sad.”
She hesitates and rubs her hand over her forehead. I feel bad about spying on them, again. I know I should draw back into the room and give them their privacy. But it’s the first time that I’ve heard Ethan predict someone’s emotional reaction. I’m dying to know how he’s come to it. Just one more minute, I tell myself, and then I’ll leave them alone.
“Why do you think it’ll make Rain sad?” she inquires.
He considers for a moment and brushes the crumbs from his lips. “Every time she brings out a new recipe, she’s smiling. If I like it, she tells me how excited she is. Then she runs off to make more. I don’t want to tell her to stop. It’s the only way I know to make her happy.”
“Oh.” Hope’s mouth falls open. “God, Ethan.”
He appears startled by her reaction. “What?”
She looks like she’s about to cry. “That’s just… I can’t…”
He starts toward her and then stops, confused. “Are you upset?” His voice is panicky.
“No!”
“Then what’s the matter?”
“Give me a minute, okay?”
He nods and drops his head. I can see him mentally counting to sixty.
Hope only uses thirty-eight seconds.
“I think I’m ready now,” she says, stepping forward and looking into his startled eyes.
“What?”
“I want to kiss you now.”
“Oh.” The panic begins to drain away. He swallows once and takes a deep breath. “Okay.”
“Like we talked about. We’ll count down from three, so you’ll know what to expect—”
“All right.”
“Ready?”
“Yes.”
“Three, two, one…”
I step back into my room and let the curtain fall.
Chapter 36
It takes a couple of weeks for things to start feeling closer to normal. All the roads are plowed and clear, though mini snow mountains still border the sidewalks. Christmas break comes and goes, and I don’t hear from Liam even once. I eventually stop jumping when my phone rings. Marcus and Kathy come to hang out and watch movies, Hope is a permanent fixture in our living room. A couple of days after my discharge, my father returns home to his second family. I hug him before he goes. My mother watches from the kitchen but doesn’t comment, and I don’t make excuses. I tell him that I’m looking forward to spring break. He gives me a grateful smile.
When the door closes behind him, I walk over to my mother and give her a silent hug, a longer one than I gave my father, just in case she’s counting. I wish she didn’t look so wounded, but I hope, with time, that she’ll get used to this new reality. The love her husband gave to another was stolen from her heart, and I understand why she can never accept that. But my love for them has nothing to do with that. I think, if I try hard enough, I can make her feel that.
We go back to school after New Year’s and try to settle back into our routine. At home, things have fallen into place. At school, though, nothing feels the same. Liam is still there, but he’s separate from me now. You wouldn’t know it from the way he flushes when a new boy in class tries to flirt with me, or the way I stare at him when he isn’t looking, but we barely speak to one another.
I try to speak to him once—I try several times, actually. I experiment with the “maybe we can still be friends” thing for a few days. He’s always sweet and responsive. He answers my questions about our homework assignment, he listens patiently to bits of silly gossip, he nods encouragingly when I tell him about a new idea for my blog. I admit I’d secretly been hoping I could somehow salvage what I’d destroyed, that maybe we could slowly find a way back to each other. But he’s shut himself off from me. I may have broken up with him because I was scared of getting hurt, but it doesn’t change the fact that I’d actually hurt him. And he was protecting himself now, just as I had tried to protect myself.
He tells me random details about his life, when I ask him. I know that his dad is still away and that his heater is fixed. He’s accepted the scholarship and is leaving Montana forever in a few months. But I don’t know how he feels about anything. When I press him, he tells me he’s excited. But his eyes give him away.
There isn’t much I can do, I realize. I was the one who’d pushed him to go. What can I say to him? I can’t destroy his dreams—again. So I stay quiet and try to focus on other things. I bake obscene amounts of cookies and record the recipes in a journal. I’m searching for the perfect chewy/chocolaty combination to post to my page.
There was an old message waiting for me on my blog, sent by a new reader while I was in the hospital. I don’t see it until I’ve been home for a few days, and I disregarded it as spam until a follow-up message pops up a few days later.
Dear Rain: A college buddy sent me a link to your blog, and I’ve been following your column for a while now. Your recipes and serving suggestions
are both inventive and fun; I’ve tried several of them with excellent results. I was wondering if you’ve had formal culinary training. If not, I’d like to recommend some of the evening courses at our culinary program. I think you could learn a lot from our instructors. My contact information is below, and I’ve attached a brochure. We’ve trained some of the best chefs in the area and have placed our students in some of the finest restaurants in the country. I hope we will hear from you soon.
There are about a thousand things wrong with the letter, so of course I don’t believe it. What are the chances that the head of a culinary program would find my obscure blog? How did he even know that I live in the area? And how do I know that he is who he claims to be and not some creepy sixty-year-old dude who gets off by triggering useless cooking fantasies in teenage girls?
Still, I can’t help daydreaming. Cooking classes with actual experts! Talking to classmates about unusual food and not getting puzzled (or disgusted) looks! Sharing ideas, swapping success (and horror) stories, bringing in edible homework assignments!
What excites you, Rain? my father had asked me.
I knew the answer; I’d known it forever. It had always been there, dangling at the tips of my sugar-coated fingers. For years, my mom had pushed me in a direction that ran parallel to my dream. She had the right instincts, maybe, but her plans for me were too concrete. Yes, I wanted to help people. But I was excited about working with food. So why couldn’t I do both? Maybe I could invent new recipes that were a cross between gourmet and healing. A menu tailored to a customer’s medical history, lifestyle, or mood—their choice. A groundbreaking eating experience. A restaurant that merged Rain’s rules of cooking with customers’ dreams of health and happiness.
I start working out the menu in my mind. But I don’t answer the blog message. It seems too good to be true.
A few days later, I get a suspicious submission to my blog:
Dear Rain: I plan to visit my daughter in Montana next month and I want to make her something special. I know she’s partial to unusual recipes and chocolate. Can you help me?
—Lawyer from DC
Dear Lawyer: Why do people keep hijacking my blog for their own personal agendas? If you want a recipe, Dad, you can just ask me.
The reply comes a few minutes after I post.
Dear Rain: I just wanted to make sure you were still checking your blog messages. Just in case important people write to you. Also, I really do want to make you something.
—Dad from DC
Dear Dad and Important Cooking People Stalking my Blog: Rain’s Chocolate Chip Cardamom cookies, because nothing says love like cocoa and spice.
After I post, I look up the number of dad’s important chef friend and tap it into my phone. I don’t call him right away though. There’s an experiment I’ve been working on, and I haven’t perfected it yet. It involves a plate of nachos, an artichoke head, sage, cheddar, and a large blowtorch. (Next blog post: Blowtorches! They’re not just for crème brûlée!)
I can’t wait to heat up the kitchen and present the culinary master with my perfect charred creation.
Chapter 37
A few weeks after we return to school, I finally feel ready to resume my daily run with Ethan. The recovery from my surgery took longer than we expected. At first, I got winded just walking up the stairs to my room. My tennis shoes sat next to my bed as a hopeful hint, placed there by Ethan after my discharge. “Baby steps,” I’d told him. In the beginning, that’s exactly how it felt; a baby could have outrun me.
But by the end of the first week, I don’t need to take breathers every few minutes. And by the end of the second, my energy level rises. I’m starting to get restless.
Ethan looks surprised when I knock on his door and hold up my running shoes.
“It’s going to rain,” he says, glancing at the forecast on his computer screen.
“So what?” I say. “It’s never stopped us before. Rain doesn’t change the rules, remember? Only you can do that.”
I think he misses the joke, but he smiles anyway. “I’ll get my shoes.”
The air is heavy with the smell of a coming downpour, but the earth is dry when we set out. We run quietly for a few minutes, but to my surprise, it’s Ethan who eventually breaks the silence.
“Why did you split up with Liam?”
I jog for a few moments before I answer. “Why do you think I broke up with him?” It isn’t a fair question, especially for my brother who isn’t the best at predicting or understanding romantic relationships. But then, he’s still in a relationship, while I’m the one pathetically staring at my ex-boyfriend’s back and trying not to cry.
“Did Liam cheat on you? Or lie to you?”
“No. Of course not.”
“So what did he do?”
I shake my head and slow down to a walk. It takes me a moment to catch my breath. “We wanted different things,” I say finally. “And he was leaving town in a few months. It wasn’t going to last.”
“Okay.” He hesitates and then turns to look at me.
“Does that answer your question, Ethan?”
“No.”
I laugh and shake my head. “Well, it’s the best that I can do.”
“But he wasn’t leaving today. You could still be together until he goes.”
“I know.” I sigh. “But we’d always know that the end was coming. And it would ruin whatever we had left.”
“Why?”
“Because it just…would. It’s hard to explain. Wouldn’t it bother you if you knew that you and Hope were definitely going to break up at a certain date?”
“No. Every relationship breaks up eventually. We’re all going to die. And you, as a female in the United States, have an average life expectancy of eighty-two years. Which is nine hundred and eighty-four months.”
“Okay. So?”
“So if you can be happy for six of those months, why wouldn’t you be?”
I stare at him for a moment. “I…I never thought about it like that.”
“Well, that’s how I think about it.”
I study him quietly for a minute. We’ve stopped in the middle of our run, and he’s bouncing on his heels impatiently, staring off at some point behind my tennis shoes; his chapped fingers tug nervously at his jacket hem. On the face of it, he seems shut off in his own world, oblivious to everyone around him. But he isn’t. He’s closer to me now than I’ve ever been to him.
“You know what?” I say. “You and Hope aren’t so different.”
He nods and his eyes flicker up to meet mine. “I know. I made it to the bottom of the list.”
He hadn’t just made it to the bottom of the list. He’d blown us all away.
“I’m going to take your advice,” I tell him. “I’ll talk to Liam.”
It doesn’t seem like such a crazy idea, suddenly. I’d found a space for myself between my warring parents, hadn’t I? They were both right and wrong, and I was discovering a way to love them both. What if there was a gray area between this black and white too? A friendship after a breakup might be too much for both of us—if Liam stayed in Montana. But what if it was a long-distance friendship? We still cared about each other. Did I have to stop caring about him because he was a thousand miles away? He was eventually coming back. That could be the start of a whole new adventure for us.
Ethan and I start off again, and we jog side by side in silence while I think about my last conversation with Liam. It isn’t the most encouraging memory. He’d been really polite, but so, so guarded. “I’m still scared,” I admit after a moment. “I’m not sure what Liam wants now.”
“He wants you,” he says. “Hope told me.”
I can’t help laughing at the matter-of-fact way he says it.
“Well, thank you for talking to me about this.”
“You’re welcome.”
“And you can add that to your points, right? You’ve just discussed somebody else’s problems.”
“Yeah, that’s true!” he remarks, with a pleased smile. “That’s not why I asked, though. I really wanted to know.”
We’ve slowed down outside of Manny’s Ice Cream Shop, and I take the opportunity to stretch my aching legs.
“We should head back soon,” I say. “I told Mom I’d start dinner.”
“Make it a high-calorie one. She promised me that she would actually eat today.”
“I think she’s finally getting better. And she’s been taking her meds religiously, did you know that?”
“I know. I’ve been counting them.”
“Me too!” I chuckle to myself. “I guess she’s paranoid that we’ll ask Dad to come back if she gets sick again.”
“Probably.”
“Speaking of which,” I say after a short silence, “Dad’s invited me to come visit him for spring break. I know he asked you to come too.”
“Yes.”
“So I’ve been looking at tickets for both of us. You can take the first flight, if you like. Stay with him for six days and then come back. Then I could fly out there for the end of the break.”
He seems confused. “You’re not coming with me?”
“I wasn’t planning to. I thought that you wanted to do this alone. Be independent from your sister. That’s been the point all along, hasn’t it?”
“No. It hasn’t.”
“Really? Because I was just trying to make you happy.”
“Okay.” His brow wrinkles, and he drops his head so his hair falls over his face. “Rain?”
“Yeah?”
“Secret Rule?”
My voice catches on the words. “What can I do to make you happy, Ethan?”
“You can come with me to DC,” he says. “That’s what I want.”
“Okay,” I tell him. “I’ll buy the tickets tonight.”
“Thank you.”
It’s started drizzling, and I’m about to suggest hurrying back when Ethan suddenly steps forward, and silently, abruptly, throws his arms around me. I stop breathing for a moment; my arms are limp and heavy, frozen at my sides, my mouth is hanging open in surprise. Then, very cautiously, I raise my arms and wrap them around his shoulders. It’s an awkward and short embrace, yet it’s the sweetest hug I’ve ever gotten. I have to blink away my tears before I let him go, or he’ll think he has somehow made me sad.
