She squeezed her eyes shut. “Yeah. I can’t talk long. Dad’s in the ICU. He’s really sick.”
“Hmm. I’m a . . . sorry. Yeah. Sorry to hear that.”
Brooke paused.
Waited.
Swallowed.
The long silence felt like a knife in her side.
Finally, when it became obvious that she wasn’t going to fill the empty conversation, Marshall said, “How are—”
“You know what . . . I’ve got to go. Enjoy Florida, Marshall.”
“Brooke?”
“Really. I gotta go.” She hung up.
All of the red flags Marshall had been flying slid up her spine and slapped her in the face with his silence over the phone. I’m sorry. Not “Oh shit, what can I do? Let me get on the first plane out. I’m coming to be there with you. What happened?” God, any number of questions or concerns. Just I’m sorry.
Carmen might have been right in waiting to do anything about her decisions, but Brooke had already made them.
Regardless of what happened with her father, her relationship with Marshall was over.
CHAPTER THREE
Her father was in the ICU for over a week, then moved to a surgical floor where he stabilized enough over three weeks to be transferred to a skilled nursing facility. That didn’t mean he was a hundred percent. Sepsis did a number on his body, his recovery. He’d lost a ton of weight, couldn’t control his own bodily functions, and his wound wasn’t closing.
Brooke was once again on the hamster wheel of caring for her father, as best she could, and attempting to balance her life.
Which she was failing at miserably.
The nursing home wasn’t as welcoming with visitors as the hospital was, and their rules made it so her father needed to be kept in isolation for his first week in the facility. Which meant she couldn’t visit.
Back at the condo, she pushed open the door and looked at stacked boxes of her life filling the free space between the furniture.
She’d broken things off with Marshall with very little fanfare.
Truth was, he saw it coming.
How could he not?
“So that’s it? You’re not even going to come home and do this in person?” he asked through the FaceTime call she’d made in an effort to not break up in a regrettable way.
“I waited until you were back from Florida. It’s the best I could do. Leaving now isn’t an option and I see no need to pretend any further.”
Marshall was sitting at the counter in their kitchen, his kitchen, staring into his phone. “I knew your father was going to come between us.”
Brooke literally bit her tongue to keep from saying the words that wanted to escape. Her father’s illness had been the catalyst, not the cause. The point in arguing now was moot.
It was over.
She’d made up her mind and nothing was going to change it.
“I asked Carmen to help pack up my things.”
“I can—”
“Marshall.”
“Fine.” He leaned back in the chair, narrowed his eyes at the screen. “You hate your father’s condo.”
“That’s no longer your concern.”
“You’ll go crazy there in six months.”
She was already going nuts. But she wasn’t about to tell him that.
They ended the conversation with little more than a bitter goodbye.
With the help of FaceTime and Carmen, Brooke’s belongings had been packed up and sent down.
The bulkier things she’d brought into the equation with Marshall she told him to keep or sell, or do whatever he wanted with. She didn’t own a car. There wasn’t a need when living in the heart of Seattle. Now it seemed as if it was all meant to be.
And pathetic.
Her life had been boxed up and shipped off in a matter of two weeks.
Now she’d been plopped down smack in the middle of her father’s life.
Yes, the condo was hers . . . technically.
Living there to take care of her father to help him convalesce—again—was the right thing to do.
Yet with her own belongings surrounding her, it felt more like a noose around her neck that threatened to choke the breath from her lungs. Worse, her father wasn’t even there. And no one had an end date to his time needed in the nursing home.
There was a question as to what his needs would be when he came home and if she had the capability to manage him.
Brooke covered her face with her hands and tried to steady her breath.
In Seattle, when she felt as if the walls of her life were closing in, she’d make her way to the water’s edge. She’d sit on a pier in Puget Sound and listen to the ocean meeting the land. The crisp, wet air would often drive away her thoughts and give her something else to meditate on and release her anxiety.
Here, in an area where water could only be found in backyard swimming pools and man-made rivers forged from concrete, that escape wasn’t possible. Even though Brooke didn’t miss the constant rain of the Pacific Northwest, she missed the effects of it.
Realizing she’d been standing in the center of the condo staring at boxes for a good twenty minutes, ruminating on her situation, Brooke dropped her purse on the coffee table and moved to the kitchen.
From the refrigerator, she removed a bottle of chardonnay. A few minutes later she found herself on the small back patio with her laptop open. The work project she had to complete sat before her unfinished. A marketing campaign for an organic vegan soap company that normally Brooke could work up something brilliant for in a weekend. Well, at least the ideas, and then the work and effort of putting it together would take a bit more time. While her boss understood the delay, it was time to get on it, and now that there wasn’t the possibility of her father stealing her time, she absolutely had to get the work in.
But Brooke stared down at her computer and blinked.
She sipped her wine and rolled her shoulders.
Her computer pinged, telling her she had a text message.
She clicked over.
How’s dad?
It was Carmen.
Instead of typing, Brooke pressed FaceTime.
Carmen’s smiling face came in view. “Hey, you.”
“Hey.”
“Oh no.”
“No. It’s okay. I’m okay.” I’m not okay.
“Where are you? I thought you’d be with your dad. Didn’t they transfer him today?” she asked.
“They did. They won’t let me in. Apparently, the nursing homes don’t play by the same rules as the hospitals.”
“When will that change?”
“At least a week.” Brooke reached for her wine.
“What are you doing?”
“I’m trying to work.”
“How is that going?”
Brooke looked at the pergola above her that was falling apart. She really should do something about that. “Not well.”
“Wait . . . is that wine?”
She glanced at the glass in her hand. “Yeah, why?”
“It’s two o’clock . . . on Tuesday.”
Brooke rolled her eyes, sipped unapologetically. “My days bleed into each other here.”
Carmen was silent for a breath. Then . . . “I think I need to come down before you need an intervention.”
Brooke set the glass down, looked away from the screen, and said nothing.
“What? No argument?”