The firefighter shook his head, not missing a beat. “Sir, this is how CPR is done. I’m sorry, but his ribs are not the priority right now.”
“You might break some ribs, but just keep going! Remember—stayin’ alive!”
I brought my hands to my head, gripping my hair at the roots, as a woman with “Manager” on her name tag joined us. “I’ve got the heart hospital on the line,” she said, holding out an old-school wireless phone. “I’ve put it on speaker.”
“Sir? I hear there might be a heart attack?” asked the tinny voice on the line.
“I don’t know what it is,” I said, agitated. “He’s recovering from a double bout of pneumonia. There was something about his valve, maybe?”
“Okay, we’ll get the ambulance out to you as quickly as possible.”
The fireman, still pushing out compressions, shook his head. “This is EMT badge number 78445, and an ambulance isn’t gonna cut it. This man needs a life flight.”
The beat of silence on the line nearly gavemea heart attack.
“Yes, sir,” the solemn voice on the call replied. “AirLIFE helicopter is on the way.”
After that, I only remembered the rest of the evening in flashes. Young, fit-looking people racing in with a stretcher. The fireman—who I later learned was the on-call EMT for the local firehouse—giving them the details. Calling Holden. Sitting on the curb outside of H-E-B, watching the helicopter rise up into the air and knowing I’d never see Robert alive again.
Tears streamed down my face as I relived every hopeless feeling, my reverie only broken by the opening of my front door.
“Dad? Are you awake?” Holden called out.
His voice spurred me into action, and I started ripping the sheets off the bed, horrified when the plug hit the wall with a dullthunk. “Sorry—woke up a little late,” I shouted back as I struggled to capture the slippery toy one-handed. “Let me take a quick shower, and I’ll join you downstairs in a minute.”
“Take your time. I’ll put on the tea,” he said as Ru’s and Beckett’s voices joined his in the background. “Oh, Major left a jar of strawberry preserves at the front door—mind if we break into it?”
“Uh… not at all.”
I stuffed the soiled sheets into the hamper, tossed the plug into the small trash bin by the sink, and started the shower. I tried not to cry about the fact that Major had left a jar on my doorstep the day after our encounter in his office, too, and he’d even included a brief note:Hoping you’re okay.
As I stepped under the water, I tried to assuage my guilt by reminding myself that what Major and I had done in his office had honored Robert’s request. Though I doubted my husband had thought one of his former students would be the one to step up and do the job.
The bigger problem was the fact that Major had turned out to be a fantastic lover. He was confident and knew how to mixgentleness with the right amount of force. Had the encounter simply been mediocre, I wouldn’t be getting shampoo in my eyes right now. But he had gone and rocked my entire world, and now the guilt of reliving what we’d done was killing me.
Jacking off to the memory of it on the anniversary of my husband’s death was just the cherry on top.
I flushed out my burning eyes, then raced through the rest of the shower, my mind going in a million different directions, all of them sad and confused. After battling to pull clothes over my still-wet skin, I finally made it downstairs. Holden handed me a mug of tea and showed me the note that’d arrived with today’s jar:In memory of Mr. Paige.
Terrified that my son might read something on my face, I made appreciative noises as I shoved down the desire and shame that threatened to overwhelm me and made the pain of missing my husband even more acute.
Oh, Robert. I fucking hate life without you in it.
CHAPTER 5
major
It was the anniversary of Mr. Paige’s death, and I was in my office, thinking about what Ren and I had done on this very desk not two months ago. Was it wrong that I frequently woke up hard and remembering how it had felt to take his body?
I’d felt a tiny bit guilty about those thoughts when he’d texted me earlier, thanking me for the gift.
Ren:We had breakfast together as a family, and Ru declared your preserves even better than Smucker’s.
Ren:Coming from an 8-year-old, that’s a high compliment.
Me:Glad he liked it. Hope you’re doing ok.
Ren:I made a small mess of my husband when I attempted to scoop some of his ashes into an empty prescription bottle for Holden, if that gives you any idea of how today has gone.
