Leaving Amy (Amy #2) (3 page)

He spoke so fast I had a hard time deciphering what he was saying. All I heard was: if we don’t go.
We. We go? Oh, no, no, no.
Not me. I couldn’t. I was with Mark. This was not something I could do now. Not ever.

“You’re going to have to think of something to say then, because I can’t go with you.”

He grabbed my hands and held them tight to his chest. I could feel the warmth of his body and the erratic beats of his heart. His eyes pierced me right to the core of everything I ever felt for this man. “Amy, I’m on my knees.” He actually dropped to his knees, still squeezing the life from my hands. “I’ll go bankrupt if you don’t.”

“Stand up, Wesley.” I shook my hands from his grasp and pulled him up. “Surely, I can be sick or something. There has to be another way around this.”

“There isn’t.” He was now eye level to me and not much air could drift between where we stood apart from each other. I swore his eyes were tearing up. “Just go and I’ll make something up why we have to leave early. All I need you for is Thanksgiving. Then you’ll never have to see me. If you don’t want to.”

I could’ve melted in those eyes at one time. Several times, actually. I was sad to admit it to myself, but he still had the ability to get me to do anything for him. No matter what a cheating louse he’d been. Because deep down, I knew there was truth to what he’d said. We were already finished, practically before flower-girl arrived in the picture. She just pushed the knife through for the final split.

“Okay.”

He let go of my hands and embraced me with a most fierce grip. I felt my air push out from my lungs most forcibly. He hadn’t hugged me that tight in maybe forever. I shoved him slightly away. “I mean, okay, I’ll loan you the money in my trust fund. That way you can get back on your feet and see what your options are.”

“What?” Tiny lines around his eyes webbed at the realization of what I was offering. “Amy, we’re not talking twenty thousand. I’m in hock for two hundred thousand, or more. I don’t know what I can get for that restaurant. If it’ll even sell. I think I bought into a bad investment.”

“Why would you go and buy a stupid restaurant, anyway? You wouldn’t even buy me a new mixer. You said the one I had worked just fine.”

“She’s a chef, Amy. She wanted to start her own restaurant. What can I say? I was stupid.”

“Yeah, say it a few more times. I like the sound of it.”

I know that sounds mean, but seriously? I was with the guy practically all my life and he still wouldn’t let me eat French fries in his precious Jeep. And this girl gets a restaurant and a new car?
Come on.

“This trust fund, Amy, is seven hundred thousand dollars.”

I had to catch myself from falling over. “You mean to tell me your dad has seven hundred thousand in an account and it’s with the stipulation you’re married to get it? How completely absurd.”

“I’ll give you half, of course. Who knows what I’d get if I’d made partner.” He shook his head. “I can’t think of that.”

Wesley might be stupid about slut-like extra-marital affairs and moronically buying restaurants. And he might even be stupid about some of the times in our marriage. But I’d have to give it to him for fairness. He would give me half of it if I let him. But I didn’t want it. This was his. And I no longer was a part of that now.

“No, I don’t want it. It’s yours, Wesley. I’m just sorry your dad was such a terrible man to hold it hostage with conditions.”

“So, then will you go to Thanksgiving dinner with me at the cabin? Just for dinner? I’ll think up a reason to leave afterwards.”

What could it hurt? I had plans to go with Mark to his mother’s, but I could tell him and he’d understand. Okay, so maybe he wouldn’t, but this would be the last time for sure. I’d go like every year, smile, and collect Wesley’s trust fund money and be done. With him, with the money, with everything. It would finally be over.

“Fine. But just for the dinner. We have to come back that evening. I’ll still get to see Mark and he won’t be that upset.”

I was certain I saw Wesley roll his eyes when I said the part about Mark. “Thank you, thank you, thank you.” He swung me around in the air.

When he let me go, he pressed a quick kiss on my cheek. I stood, unable to move. As soon as he backed up, I guess he realized how inappropriate it was. His hands held my hips as he looked me in the eyes. “I’m sorry. Was that wrong to do?”

I pulled at my shirt and tried to get my wits. “Kind of.”

“I’m sorry. I’ll go.”

He walked toward the door and suddenly I felt bad. He was just happy. I shouldn’t have looked as though he did something wrong. God knows he has no one now.
Great!
Something new I’d have to worry about.

“Hey, Wesley. Don’t worry about it. It’s all good. If we can’t be friends after all this time, something’s wrong, I guess.”

He turned back to look at me before he put his hand on the doorknob. “I hope there never comes a day that we can’t be at least friends, Amy. I’ll call you later and we’ll decide on what time to go.”

I smiled and waved.

At least be friends?
I should’ve thought about that. What did “at least” mean?

I was still in the identical spot when Mark opened the same door Wesley had just exited. Perhaps I was still mulling over what just happened. Either way, I must not have realized the look on my face.

“Amy, what’s wrong?”

Mark set the bag of food down on the ground and came into the room to kiss me. Before he did, he held me by the shoulders and inspected my expression.

“Was that Wesley I saw walking down the sidewalk? I waved, but he put down his head and kept walking.”

I snapped out of whatever mood I was in and grabbed Mark, hugging him tightly. I needed to get back to the moment before Wesley walked into the apartment and confused all that I knew was right. I needed to feel Mark and know this is where I belonged. Just because Wesley’s life had changed didn’t mean mine was going to.

“Baby, what’s wrong?” His chin vibrated on my shoulder as he asked the question.

“Nothing. And, yes, it was Wesley.” I took a deep breath, knowing I had to tell Mark what I had agreed to do.

He pulled back and looked at me with his blue bedroom eyes. “He came to see you?”

“Yeah, he had a favor to ask of me.”

He turned and threw his coat on the sofa. After picking up the bag of food, he walked toward the kitchen, talking to me over his shoulder. “You asked for the divorce papers first, I hope.”

I followed him, devising a way to say I had to ditch him for Thanksgiving and instead eat with my soon-to-be ex-husband. Oh my gosh.
Soon-to-be ex-husband.
It sounded so failure-like in my head. As if there was something wrong with me and now I had to drag around a horrible title for the rest of my life.
I was an ex.
Well, almost.

I saw him pull a champagne bottle out of the bag and jerked my head back. “Whoa! What’s the occasion?”

He set the bottle on the counter and looked at me with heartbreaker eyes and a devilish smile. That always got me into trouble. And dinner hadn’t even begun.

“You first. Is he signing the papers or what? I mean, what’s the holdup?”

He pulled open an empty cabinet door, perhaps looking for something to pour the celebratory beverage into. “I packed away the glasses already. I have some paper cups beside the fridge.” I pointed toward the other counter.

“Okay.” He took the top two from the stack and frowned slightly. “I imagined clinking sounds when I thought of our toast, but I guess paper will do.”

“Exactly what are you celebrating?”

He popped the cork and the champagne spewed everywhere. He held it out so it wouldn’t hit his suit pants. I laughed, trying not to think about the dish towels I had already packed away in a box. All I had left was half a roll of paper towels that I was going to use to wipe everything down before the final inspection.

Mark licked the side of his hand and poured me a four-ounce amount of the bubbly. After his was poured, he held up his cup and handed me mine. With a smile brighter than a two-hundred-watt bulb, he announced it. “I got a job offer!”

Before I took a sip, I stopped and looked at him, feeling my eyes expand in size. Who knew I’d go from folding pajamas, to a date with my husband, to a new job for my boyfriend? “Job offer? But you have a job. In fact, you are the semi-new chief resident. Did you apply elsewhere?”

He drank his portion down like more of a shot than a fluted paper cup of champagne. When the last dribble swept the back of his tongue, he proceeded with the story of the good news. Good news for him, anyway.

“Well, earlier this year when I was fed up with getting passed over for all the promotions, I reached out to a pal I went to med school with. He heads the department of cardiology in Chicago. I asked if there were any openings in neurology.” He poured himself another cup, although I hadn’t taken my first sip. I was more interested in the meaning behind the whole “I got a job” announcement.

“At the time there wasn’t, but two weeks ago he called and said something was brewing. He’d heard bits and pieces about a change happening in that department and thought I’d like to know. So I sent him my accreditations.” He took a breath. “This morning he called me and said the head of the department just announced his retirement. It’s rumored it has something to do with a pending malpractice suit, so it’s taking effect pretty immediately.” He swallowed down that cup and wiped his mouth with the hand that still held the bottle.

I watched him as if he were a show on television. One of those infomercials where there’s a lot of eye-popping, fluid hand gestures, and barely any breaths between amazing facts.

“I guess because they didn’t think his retirement was so imminent, they hadn’t been looking for a replacement. That’s where my good friend, Russ Williams, came into the story. He told them about me and my success here at General Mercer. Today he called and said they wanted to speak with me tomorrow. And then confided in me that they were only talking to me about the position.”

He took a break long enough to search my eyes for a response. Unfortunately, they were without any. I still had my cup, midair, trying to comprehend what was going down. Even my lips were dry from all the mouth breathing I was doing with my gaping jaw.

“So, what do you say about that, hon? I could be chief of neurology and we could be Chicago-bound within a few weeks. Isn’t it exciting?”

It was as though I was hearing the words, seeing the movement in front of me, and not processing any of it.
Chicago? A few weeks?

He stepped closer to me, setting down the bottle before he reached for me. He took the cup of champagne from me and set it down on the counter, too. I managed to close my mouth and stare into his eyes. His now twinkling eyes. Glowing with excitement like a child who’d just got a new bike for Christmas. With a cool horn and shiny wheels.

“Is anyone in there?” He grabbed me closer by my hips.

I raised my hands to his shoulders to stop the impending embrace. This was not something I shared in his excitement.

“Mark, you didn’t tell me anything about Chicago contacting you. Why would you want to move?” I backed up, waiting for his answer.

He stepped back and rested one hand on the counter. “I didn’t think anything would come of it. And it means I’d have so much more there. I would be head of the department. Do you know how long it would take for me to get that here, Amy? Besides that, I can contribute to the medical journal they have there. I’ve always wanted to write about my research and have it published. Now, I can.”

I looked down to the ground. Everything I knew was crumbling before me. Obviously he had taken this news and ran through town with it, shouting it from the top of his lungs, probably handing out lollipops to children on the way over here. Instead, I just wanted to see it all go away. I thought we were making our own progress here. Divorce for me, co-habitation for us, possibly a marriage proposal sneaking out anytime soon from his mouth. His now twisted mouth.

He approached me again, taking my hand off my hip and holding it like a broken piece of porcelain. Bending over, he looked into my troubled eyes. “What’s going on inside your head, Amy? Don’t get quiet on me, please.”

I licked my lips, hoping the right words would find their way to my tongue. I didn’t want to sound naggy, but I didn’t want to come across complacent and share in his joy, either. Because I didn’t. This affected my entire world. The one that had just changed and broken apart only months ago when Wesley moved away with another woman.

“It’s just that we, I feel, haven’t been together that long and now you’re leaving. That’s all.”

He took my other hand and jerked his head back, laughing at the ceiling.

“What do you find humorous, Mark? Are you that flip about what I thought we had? I was packing to move in with you next week, if you didn’t recall.”

He got eye level and stopped smiling. His levity had evaporated into thin air, although a sheepish grin remained on his lips. “Amy, I want you to come with me.”

I took my hands away from him and paced. My heart kept in time with my steps. “Move? To Chicago? Are you crazy? I’ve got my whole world, the only one I’ve ever known, right here in Portland. I can’t move.”

He stopped me and held me by the shoulders. “Amy, of course I never thought about moving without you. And what world are you referring to? You can get a job with what you’re doing there. And who would you leave behind? You hardly ever go out with any of your friends from work. You can make more where we’re going. I’ll do some checking into the local judicial department when I, or if I go, this coming weekend.”

I tilted my head at his insensitivity. “I’m so glad you think it’d be easy to just leave. Your mom and dad are here, Mark. What about them?”

“There are planes for that sort of thing. They can visit whenever they want. And we can come back when you want, when you feel homesick. But trust me, after a few months, you’ll forget about it here. Amy, there’s nothing tying you to this place. Even your sister lives in another state.”