The other patrons quickly looked away. Beyond them, darkness had descended upon Boston. The people that walked by the restaurant windows were half in shadow, half bathed in pink and blue and green as they passed beneath the electric strobe of neon lights. It looked nice out there. Welcoming. Free from older sisters hell-bent on lecturing me.
I forced my gaze away from the beckoning glow of the Exit sign and back to my sister. “Can we not do this here?”
“Oh, we’re doing this,” she said.
Stacey frowned. “Be nice, Meg. Anyone in Ella’s shoes would be struggling.”
Megan shook her head. “She’s not struggling. She’s hiding down here with us so she doesn’t have to make a decision.”
I leaned back in my chair. “Funny. I could have sworn that I’ve been down here breaking my back moving your furniture halfway across the goddamn city.”
“We finished moving two days ago. What are you still doing here?” she asked.
That hurt. So much for our celebratory dinner. Up until now, this had been a nice trip. A needed trip. Between lugging all their earthly possessions from East Boston to Chelsea, helping them deep clean their old apartment so they didn’t lose their deposit, picking out paint samples, reveling in the warm weather (how sad was it that 50 felt warm?), and eating out at diverse, eclectic restaurants for just about every meal, I’d been able to get out of my own head.
“Love you too, Megan,” I grumbled.
“Don’t do that,” she said. “Don’t deflect or try to turn this around on me. We’re worried, Ella. You’ve been mopey and sad and quiet this entire trip. You haven’t cracked a single fucking joke. I don’t think I’ve even seen you smile. That’s not you. You’ve crippled yourself with indecision. Since when have you ever hidden from your problems?”
I started to get angry. “This isn’t one of my normal problems. The man I love just received a life-altering diagnosis.” I hadn’t really outright lied to them, more like skirted around details and said that Stan had recently found out he had a chronic illness that could potentially make a future with him incredibly difficult and painful and possibly even dangerous.
“And your response is to abandon him?” Megan asked.
“He. Kicked. Me. Out,” I said through clenched teeth. “Because he needs this time more than I do.”
“Fine. But it’s been over a month. That’s plenty of time for you to figure out if he’s worth fighting for.”
I threw my hands up. “Of course he’s worth fighting for. Him, as I know him right now. But this disease might change him.”
“And who’s to say you won’t love the new him just as much? Despite his flaws? Alternatively, he could remain exactly as he is right now. You said so yourself; there’s no way to know.”
I shook my head. “You can’t think of a chronic illness like that. You can’t put your blinders on and hope for the best. Doing that wouldn’t have saved Grandpa or Renee, and it sure as shit won’t save Stan.”
“If my years of anxiety have taught me anything, it’s that you sure as shit can’t go through life continuously thinking up all the ways that everything could blow up in your face. Listening to the way you’re talking right now, I’m amazed you managed to finish that salad without being terrified that it was filled with arsenic-laced rat shit that might end up killing you.”
The woman at the nearest table set down her napkin, meal half done, and called for the check.
I leaned forward. “You’re disturbing the other patrons, Megan.”
She looked over at the woman. “I eat here all the time, and I’ve never gotten sick. If there’s arsenic in the rat shit, it hasn’t reached levels toxic to humans.”
The woman paled.
“Oh my God, Megan,” Stacey said, sinking down in her chair.
My sister turned back to me. “I hate seeing you like this. I meant what I said a minute ago. You can’t let fear dictate your decision.”
“I can’t just ignore it, either.”
“I would never tell you to ignore it. But you also can’t ignore the possibility that it might never get that bad. You need to accept these outcomes and then decide if he’s worth both of them.”
I shifted in my seat. “That’s what I’ve been trying to do.”
“For over a month?” She sat back, arms crossed over her chest. “Have you been miserable the whole time?”
I nodded.
“Has it gotten better or worse?”
