There he stood, soaked up from head to toe, the constant stream of rainwater dripping from his trousers forming a pool around his shoes. He repeated with the same shaky voice, though this time with a hint of confidence in it, “I’m sorry. I should never have said that.” He continued, “You were right, you’re always right. I took you for granted, and now, I don’t know how to live without you. Please forgive me. Give me a chance to make it right. Give a me chance to love you right.” He finished with a smile chasing away shadows from his face.
Shea took only a moment to make her mind, the flattening of her eyebrows reflected her determination and the gradually spreading frown spoke her disapproval even before she opened her mouth. “I forgive you and wish you a beautiful future,” she said and turned to enter back in the house. “I don’t want it”, Ryan shouted over the din of the downpour, “I don’t want no future, without you, I can’t imagine it without you”, his voice breaking in places, as this new Shea broke his confidence. His Shea, who never even took offense at the meanest of his jokes, who was always there for him like an obeying shadow. When did she change so much?
“I don’t know Ryan, I just don’t have it in me to be with you anymore. The love I had for you evaporated that very moment, and all these months living without you has made me a different person, who I know you cannot live with anyways.” She continued stepping a little closer to his dripping self so that she doesn’t have to talk louder, she never could talk loud for stretched moments. “And it’s not because I’m mad at you that I’m saying this. It’s because I know I’m no longer that person you came to apologize to, who you came to bring back. I’m moving to Frankfurt tomorrow, and I guess I appreciate your coming here, and I’m sorry for the state you’re in right now. But I have moved on, and would really want nothing from you except to move on yourself. I don’t want that guilt on me, and that’s all I can think of right now.”
He couldn’t believe his ears. He couldn’t even trust his eyes. Shea truly has turned as a person. Her eyes do not have any traces of adoration Ryan has seen all his time with her. Her eyes, still warm, do not hold any tender emotions, but an unprecedented heat of determination. He struggled to find words to respond, but they seem to be melting down his throat before he could utter them, and he just stood there, blinking at this transformed woman.
Shea took a deep breath and softened her expressions a little. “Wait here”, she said and entered the house. She came back with a towel and offered it to Ryan. “I’m sorry things cannot be the way they were, but I know you’re a good person at heart, and when I said I wish you a beautiful future I meant it. Here please,” she said extending her hand an inch further. Getting no response from Ryan, she tightened her facial muscles and placed the towel on the porch bench. “I think you should head home”, she said as she turned back and entered the house, closing the door behind her.
Ryan stood there, still dripping, still confounded. The rain has turned down to drizzle but the noise seemed to have made a permanent home in Ryan’s head. He still could hear it, his thoughts not forming a single word in all that noise. He couldn’t remember how long he stood there when Hannah came out. Her face, very similar to her daughter still held all her natural warmth. She approached Ryan and placed a hand on his stooped shoulder. “Son let me drive you home”. The pity in her voice did it. He turned got, to his car and drove away speedily.
Windshield wipers moved furiously, cleaning the water from the screen. But merciless rain has now also found a home in Ryan’s eyes. A strong man of thirty, who never showed any sign of weakening emotions on his face, even against the most driving of situations, was crying like a baby. He didn’t drive towards his home, he didn’t even know where he was driving to. He was just driving away from the sorrowful voice of his mother-in-law, away from that woman who looked like her beloved wife but also not. He drove farther and farther away until he just couldn’t.
It was a pitiful sight, Ryan breaking down in his seat. He couldn’t believe how Shea has responded, but more so, he couldn’t believe how deep she has made her place in his heart in just one year. But he’s not a weak man, he has never been a weak person. He has lost everything not just once but twice. And he still got back onto his feet. Surely one woman couldn’t break him down so badly, only that she has.
Shea sat motionless on the chair seeing nothing but staring down into the fireplace as Hannah came into the room. “He drove away”, Hannah said to her daughter disapproval coloring her usually kind voice. “He was definitely not in the state to drive, yet he drove away, aren’t you worried even a little bit. I know what he …” Shea interrupted her mother, “He’ll be fine.”
“I still could not understand why you just can’t tell him the truth” Hannah’s eyes watered as she spoke these words. Shea got up to embrace her mother. “I cannot be his weakness”.
“And Frankfurt, that’s too far from everything you’ve known since, everything that you have cherished”
“Not everything, I’ve always adored alps you know and that’s where I want to spend the last days…”
“Don’t say that, you don’t know it yet” Hannah said loudly.
“Please at least let me come along” she continued in a much softer tone.
“I can’t, please,” said Shea, the topic of her moving away to the healing center thousands of miles away from everything she knows never seem to break her voice. And it was this determination, confidence, and that hint of hope in her eyes, alongside the fact that this is the only thing she has ever asked for, made Hannah accept the whole scheme of things. Her youngest daughter, barely in her late twenties is relinquishing everything to live around the swiss alps and hopefully recover from this unnamed disease that is causing deterioration in her health at a rate that doctors have given her a timeline for three months to live.
But there’s hope for sure in that. Hasn’t she already started looking better ever since the prospect of moving to Frankfurt was approved? Only if she allowed someone to go with her. Her husband, who loved her so dearly for sure could’ve arranged for a more reliable setting. But Shea has remained adamant about it since the beginning. How she has created the situation back home for him come here to apologize and make her moving away from him seem like a natural consequence is still beyond her mother’s imagination. But at least, she’s allowed to drop her to the healing center.
