Another silence passed, after which the woman said, slowly and pointedly, “Ms. Black is in critical condition, Ms. O’Rourke. The doctors are not at all certain that she will recover from her injuries. Her instructions to the nurses were that she wanted to speak to you. I don’t know what else I can say.”
Guilt swelled within me as the memory of Sheila’s sweet, concerned voice badgered my mind. Is there anything else you want to say? she had offered. We had talked for forty-five minutes. I thought everything had gone splendidly.
May I contact you again? I had asked. Exuberant, optimistic, naive. She had smiled and written her address and phone number on the back of one of the coffee shop’s customer survey cards. I had thrust it in my purse, my heart full of hope for our future relationship. An uncertain one at best, yet for the first time in my life, one not totally out of reach.
I’ll call you sometime, I had said as we parted.
I’ll look forward to it, she had answered.
I had lived in the clouds for weeks afterward… until the day I worked up enough nerve to invite her to a home-cooked dinner. Only then did I discover that the number she had given me was that of a pizza delivery outlet, no employee of which had ever heard of a Sheila Johnson. The street address hadn’t existed at all.
My hand began to shake as I held the phone. I tried to steady it, but the pain of that moment, once remembered, was difficult to dislodge.
How could she? How could she cut me out of her life not once, but twice—deigning to claim me only in her hour of greatest need?
“I’ll leave you to think about it, Ms. O’Rourke,” the administrator concluded. “Let me give you directions to the hospital, just in case.”
My hand reached for a pen, and with unstable fingers I scratched down the information. We hung up, and I stood for a long time, staring idly at the letters and numbers. Sheila was at a community hospital in Pennsylvania’s Laurel Mountains. I was living north of Pittsburgh. It was a two-hour drive, maybe less. Two hours was all that separated us. All that separated me from final closure—or, perhaps, from even greater heartache.
The old Meara would have vacillated—afraid to reopen wounds, afraid to offend. But eventually, she would have decided to go. She would have gone because she felt obligated, because she felt she owed something to the woman who gave her life, no matter what else that woman had—or had not—done for her.
But not the new Meara. The new Meara—as of yesterday—was taking responsibility for her own life and her own happiness.
I would make that same trip to the hospital, yes. But I wouldn’t be doing it for Sheila. I would be doing it for me.
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Table of Contents
Dedication
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Epilogue
Author’s Note
Books and Plays by Edie Claire
Excerpt from Meant to Be