Maybe I’ll go out tomorrow morning. Get breakfast at my favorite restaurant. The team will be back in town soon, we could go to happy hour.
This emotional high I’m on feels so good, so refreshing, that I pick up my phone and bring up Ember’s name in the contacts. I’m not sure if it’s still her number, but I can try. Friends can call each other, right? Friends care about the general well-being of one another. If Ember were injured, I’d want to know the outcome.
Before I can think about it any longer, I press send.
The phone rings. Once, twice, three times.
“Hello?”
I freeze. I have no words. My thumb presses down hard on the end button, as though it’s really a button and not a red circle on a glass screen.
Why am I surprised?
Why am I this angry?
He’s her boyfriend. He has the right to answer her phone. Still, it fucking tears me up inside. Is this how people are supposed to feel when they learn their ex has moved on? Is this normal?
“Dinner will be ready in ten minutes, Noah. I’ll refrigerate the other half and you can have it tomorrow.”
I scoot to the edge of the couch and hoist myself up, grabbing my crutches from beside me on my way up.
“You just made your mom’s recipe, Miranda. Aren’t you going to stay and enjoy it?” I look out the black-paned window beyond the dining room table. The lights of downtown Atlanta are taking over the pink and purple sky, and I know there are people out there, gearing up for a Friday night. “I’m sure you have somewhere to be, and spending twenty more minutes with an invalid doesn’t sound like much fun, but—”
“I’ll stay, Noah.” She gives me a reproachful look and shakes her head.
“What?”
“Nothing.” She stirs the contents of the pan.
“Just say it.”
“Maybe you should try and reframe the situation.” Keeping her eyes on the food, she says, “I know things look bleak, but you still have a lot going for you.”
“Are you saying I’m being a baby?”
She glances at me. “Kind of,” she admits.
She’s probably right. Maybe I should look at what I still have, instead of what I think I might lose.
I go to the table and sit down, feeling like an ass because I can’t help her set the table or finish the food. She brings her laptop to the table, and we go through flights and hotels while we eat.
Focusing on the surgery should help take my mind from Ember. But it doesn’t. I’m nodding and giving input on dates and times and car rentals, but I’m only halfway in the conversation.
When Miranda leaves, I lay down in bed and try not to think about what a red-haired female is doing across the country, or who she’s doing it with.
* * *
“Dowe know where the doctor’s office is, Miranda?” I fold myself into the rented SUV, ass first, then use my hands to lift my leg into the car. We landed in Phoenix last night, and my pre-op appointment is this morning.
“Yep.” Miranda places my crutches in the trunk, then climbs into the driver’s seat and brings up the address on her phone.
We crawl along with morning traffic. I grab my phone from my cup holder and find some music. “Why are we staying so far from his office?” My voice is irritable and petulant. I’m in a bad mood. The team is playing a match today, and I won’t be there. It’s my first miss in two years.
Miranda casts a cool glance my direction. “Because it’s close to the hospital where the surgery will be performed.”
“Sorry,” I mutter.
“It’s okay, Noah. I know this all must suck.”
