I told James and Arthur you know what.
I told them I was a lesbian. Can you believe it?
I wish you’d been there.
I wish I’d said it to you first.
I’m so sorry that I hurt you.
You hurt me.
You knew exactly how to hurt me.
No one’s ever known how to hurt me like you do.
Please come back.
She typed and erased, typed and erased. Finally, Anne ended up with:
I’m here.
She sent the text. After a long second, it went through.
Almost instantly, the screen scrolled up again on its own as the typing indicator appeared. Then the bubble vanished, and before Anne could start to worry, it resurfaced. Disappeared. Again and again, because—Anne held her breath—Sadie was also trying to find the right thing to say.
Eventually, a large red heart appeared. Just that. Nothing else.
Inside Anne, small sprouts of possibility were twitching back to life. Hope—that shitty little nemesis of common sense.
Chapter 15
Sure, Anne could’ve just called Hal back. But a visit was better, wasn’t it? They could talk.
And maybe Sadie would want to talk, too. Or listen. Or both.
At any rate, she’d want her phone back.
She knew she’d made the right decision when Talisha opened the front door, revealing a strained expression that broke into obvious relief.
“Don’t you have work?” Anne asked after the kind of quick, perfunctory hug you gave someone who was sort of family and sort of not. “It’s Monday. I didn’t expect to see you.”
“I came home after Hal called me. He’s pretty worried.” Talisha beckoned Anne into the house, a perfectly renovated two-story Craftsman Anne had only been inside once before. “Anne’s here!”
In no time at all, Hal thundered down the stairs, and if Anne had thought Talisha’s face reflected concern, it was nothing compared to her husband’s demeanor.
“You got my message,” he said anxiously with a quick look at Talisha. “I’m so glad you came. Mom won’t tell me anything, and normally I can’t stop her from talking to me. Even when we did that silent retreat together, we had a blinking code.”
Anne clutched Sadie’s phone tightly in one hot hand. “Is she—?”
“Still in the guest house out back, yeah.” He bit his lower lip. “I should check on her. She’s probably hitting her head on that ceiling. We never should’ve gotten the option with the elevated bed.”
“Baby,” Talisha said, her tone low. “Remember, your mom’s a fully capable adult. She can take of herself.”
Hal didn’t seem convinced. “I know, but—”
“And you’re a grown man with a job and your own life. You can support her and not drop everything else at the same time. You’re not responsible for managing her feelings.”
The reminders were clearly little tendrils of a larger conflict between Hal and Talisha, but Anne had other priorities at the moment. “I’d like to go talk to Sadie. If—”If she’ll talk to me. “If that’s all right.”