Perfectly Undone. Jamie Raintree
“You know we need this.”
I purse my lips. I’m failing at everything, and it’s coming at me so fast, I can’t keep up.
“I’ll see what I can do,” I say.
* * *
I spend Friday afternoon catching up on my charts, giving myself a chance to regroup on my application. Around five thirty, I run home, slip through the front door and peel off my tennis shoes. I have time to grab a bite of dinner before I head back to the hospital for a delivery. Normally I would work straight through dinner, but I’m trying to make the effort. For Cooper. He hasn’t brought up the vacation again, and I’m hoping that if I can give him more time here at home, we can put it off for another year—just until I get my grant.
Cooper calls to me from the kitchen where I hear the everyday sounds of the man I love closing the refrigerator, opening a cabinet. Without the tension behind all the words we’re saying and not saying lately, it’s comforting. I soak in the warmth of home, add it to the collection of memories I carry with me as a reminder of why I love to bring families together and why I work so hard to keep them from falling apart. It’s the simple things, like the sounds of the people you love, that end up meaning the most when they’re gone. Like the way Abby used to loudly flick each page of her magazine as she turned it, and the buzz of her curling iron on the counter in our shared bathroom.
“You’re home early,” he says.
“Well...kind of.”
I follow Cooper’s voice toward the kitchen, but he appears in front of me as I round the corner, catching me off guard. He takes a strong hold of my arms before either one of us topples over.
“Hi,” he says with a shy smile. He’s still in the crisply pressed deep blue shirt and tie he wore to work this morning—the combination that makes the blue of his eyes ethereal. He kisses me, deeply, all of his body pressed against all of mine until I’m out of breath. I try to enjoy it, but anticipating the reason behind it sets butterflies loose in my stomach.
“Hi,” I say against his lips once he’s released me. “What’s got you so worked up?”
“Follow me,” he says.
“Okay, but I have to—”
“Follow me,” he urges.
He turns toward the kitchen and drags me along. I shuffle my feet in an attempt to stay upright in my socks on the hardwood floors. He places me in front of the kitchen counter, then moves to the side, revealing a bottle of very expensive champagne—the kind my dad used to buy for special occasions, when he would let my brother, my sister and me each have half a glass—and two champagne flutes I’m sure we didn’t own before. We haven’t had much reason for champagne over the last few years.
“Are we celebrating something?” I ask.
“We are,” he says.
I raise my eyebrows, waiting for him to elaborate.
“I did it, babe. I made partner.”
I open my mouth in surprise and something that resembles excitement, but nothing comes out. I knew this was coming. I did. I just didn’t expect it so soon, or that he’d reach his goal before I’ve even really started on mine. The air thickens around me, tense with his anticipation of my response.
I am happy for him. I know I am because his news stirs something in my chest. I just imagined we’d share the day, when my grant came through at least. It’s illogical to think we’d reach our goals at the same time, but still, I’ve held a picture in my head of us celebrating together. A re-creation of the day we graduated med school. Both of us moving forward as one. Now Cooper’s moving forward. I’m not.
“Dylan?” he asks, when I say nothing.
“Wow,” I whisper.
His grin reveals the only evidence of his true age in the wrinkles at the corners of his eyes.
“Oh, Cooper. Wow.”
I fold myself into him and he laughs.
“Can you believe it?” he asks. “Two years. They never ask doctors to become partners so soon. Didn’t I say this was going to be the right place for me?”
He did, the day he started there. We’d been lying next to each other in bed that night, our legs and fingers intertwined. We said a lot of things that night, drunk on possibilities and each other, talking like reality couldn’t touch us. Was that only two years ago?
I swallow hard. “I remember,” I say.
“C’mon, let’s have a drink,” he says. I make a noncommittal noise against his warm shoulder. He places a kiss on my forehead and walks to the counter in his black-socked feet, the hem of his slacks dusting the floor. With his back turned to me, I take a deep breath to compose myself. Surely he doesn’t remember everything we talked about that night. Surely he doesn’t expect me to make good on those promises so soon, before I’ve reached my own goals.
After I make partner, he’d said, there’s nothing else I want but you...and a couple of little yous. By then, I’ll finally be making enough money to give you the kind of life you’re used to.
Cooper, we could move back into that studio apartment forever, and I’d still spend the rest of my life with you.
You mean it?
I mean it.
I still do, but in the heat of the moment I didn’t want to add that before I settled down with him, I needed to make some things right. Back then, I thought we had so much time to work out the details. The future stretched out like a long expanse of open road in front of us. But suddenly, it’s here and I’m not there.
“You’re not drinking,” Cooper says. I hadn’t noticed Cooper place the full glass in my hand. His brow is furrowed. I watch every emotion cross his face as realization sinks in—confusion, comprehension, frustration. Then, disappointment. “You have to go back to work, don’t you?”
I look away, nod. “I’m sorry, Cooper. I didn’t know this was going to happen. I have a delivery. I’m expecting the page any second.”
“I thought you weren’t on call tonight.”
“But she’s my patient, Cooper.”
He sets his champagne on the counter. “And I’m the one who always comes last.”
His words echo through the room and through my mind, tearing my heart further in half. He scrubs his hands through his hair in anger.
“It’s fine,” he says, but his voice is detached. “I understand.”
“Cooper...” I open my mouth to apologize, but the words are meaningless.
He busies himself with trying to force the cork back into the bottle. It’s useless, but it keeps him from having to look at me.
“It’s okay, Dylan. Really.”
I take a step toward him, but then my pager buzzes on my waistband, and that low hum, in the silence of our kitchen, is deafening.
“Go ahead,” he says. He looks up at me, doing his best to reassure me, because he knows I can’t leave for a delivery with my mind still here, wondering if he’s okay. If we’re okay.
I nod and leave the kitchen, slip my tennis shoes back on and walk out into the fading light.
Behind the wheel, I stop to look at our house. The light from the kitchen filters through the living room to the front windows, and for a moment, I see the shadow of Cooper standing in the middle of the living room, motionless, and I don’t have to wonder if we’re okay because I know we’re not.
Cooper is following our dreams without me.