Emily let out a breath, as if she’d actually been punched in the gut. She wanted to talk to him. If he didn’t come home, they couldn’t work through things, get their relationship back on track, back to normal. If he didn’t come home, that gnawing feeling inside her wouldn’t go away, the one that made her feel off kilter, like her life was sliding sideways. Then another text came through: I’m still trying to wrap my mind around everything, still thinking about us. This wasn’t just about him doing a favor for Hala.

Emily stared at the texts. She’d really hurt Ezra—perhaps more than she’d realized. More than he’d hurt her, it seemed. She put the phone’s cursor in the response box. She didn’t particularly want to apologize—and honestly, she wanted him to apologize for not being there for her, for not telling her about Malcolm’s death—but she would if it helped get him home, if it made him process all of this more quickly.

I’m so sorry I hurt you, she wrote. I just never thought those stories about my past would matter. What matters is now, what we have together. The past is the past. I was a different person then.

It felt like that. Like there was one Emily in college, and another one now. There were attributes they shared, but they were two different people. They made different choices, had different passions.

Emily typed again. I love you.

Then she stared at her phone, waiting for those three dots.

He didn’t respond.

Which usually meant that some code had gone off in the hospital and he was rushing to a patient’s bedside. But she wondered now if that was actually the truth.

30

Emily wasn’t particularly hungry after that exchange, so she turned off the boiling water and abandoned her pesto preparation. Instead of eating dinner, she poured herself a glass of wine and found her battered copy of Anne of Green Gables. She wanted something without any real romance. By chapter four, she was feeling better. By chapter five, she’d refilled her wineglass. And again at chapter ten. Once more at chapter fifteen. By chapter seventeen, she was having trouble focusing on the words.

If Ezra were home, she would curl up against him on the couch. If he were home, she wouldn’t have had nearly an entire bottle of wine all on her own. If he were home, she would’ve eaten dinner. She looked at her list again. Even without Ezra there, she should eat dinner. She could eat dinner.