Chapter 18 A New Day
When I woke up, Jake was sitting at the desk finishing up a phone call.
“Good morning, Beautiful. How do you feel?”
“What time is it?” I asked in a groggy state of mind.
“I think it’s around 10:00 a.m.”
“Oh my gosh.” I jumped out of bed. “I missed my flight. What am I going to do?” I ran to the bathroom, brushed my teeth, washed my face, and started throwing clothes into the suitcase.
Jake chuckled at my plight. He pulled me to toward him and sat me on his lap. It took me a moment to realize that we were back together again. I couldn’t believe that Jake was here holding me.
After a long kiss, he said, “Calm down. You can leave a little later. I have a few more questions. Let’s talk again.”
“No! I’m tired of depressing conversations with you. Didn’t we work everything out last night?” I protested.
“Yes but we still need to talk. Now that we are together, do you need to go back to Japan? I don’t want to be separated from you anymore. I missed you terribly.” His eyes expressed sadness again.
I had to think about that. It was true. I didn’t want to leave Jake. But I made a commitment and I didn’t want to let my students down.
“Honey, I have to go back. I made a commitment.”
He closed his eyes and pondered for a while. I could tell he was trying to find a solution to our new dilemma. “When is the school year over?”
“In two weeks.”
“OK. As much as I don’t want to let you go, I’m going to send you on one condition.”
“And what would that condition be?” I asked.
“When school is done, pack a bag of clothes but Fed-ex the rest of your belongings to my mom’s house.”
“Why?”
“Because you’re going to meet me in Paris. We’re going to take that romantic trip you promised me. If you agree to meet me in Paris, then I’ll let you go back and finish out the school year.”
“And if I don’t agree to meet you in Paris?”
“Then, I’ll have to lock you up in a tower like Rapunzel and come visit you at nights.”
I laughed at the thought. “You wouldn’t dare.”
“Are you going to meet me in Paris or not?”
“Is this a choice that’s not really a choice?”
“Yup.”
“Well, then Paris it is,” I said, thrilled at the thought of spending an entire week with him. It was like a dream come true. No, it was a dream come true.
“Did you end up going to Paris in February?” I remembered that we were supposed to be there a few months back.
“Yes, I had to go. It was the most depressing trip of my life. I didn’t leave the hotel. I went from my room to the conference room. It was hard being there without you.”
I promised, “I’ll make it up to you.” We both cherished our moment together.
“Also, I have one more request.” Jake said. “I’m going to buy you a laptop with a webcam. I canNOT go two weeks without seeing you—not after having endured four months. We will set up a time to talk to each other and you need to check in with me daily, OK?”
“Is that necessary? It’s only twelve days. What a waste of money.”
He gave me a stern look that made me cower into his demand.
“All right, but what about my flight?”
“I took care of it. I just bought you an LA to Tokyo then back to LA ticket. I’ll call back and add Paris to the itinerary.”
“What time do I leave?”
“Midnight. This will buy us some more time together. By the way, you want to change into what you’re going to wear on the plane, so we can go and eat? I’m starving.”
“Can’t I wear these sweats on the plane? It’s a long flight.”
“I don’t think they allow sweats in first class.”
“Jake,” I objected. “It’s expensive flying first class, especially international first class.”
“I’m horrified at the thought of you sitting in coach for twelve hours. Stop complaining. I’ve had no reason to spend any money since you left me. Let me splurge a little.”
“Correction…since you left me. I was forced to leave after that.”
“Whatever,” he said, rolling his eyes. “Let’s go eat and buy you a computer.”
We hung up the phone and got seated for brunch. Jake sat very close to me in our booth and was back to his old self. He was actually worse. He couldn’t keep his hands and lips off of me.
“Jake, we are in public. You can’t keep touching and kissing me like that. It’s making everyone feel uncomfortable.”
“I’ll stop if you’ll agree to go home with me after breakfast and give me a couple of hours of private time with you. We need to make up for lost time.” His face looked dangerous.
“Only a couple of hours?” I asked devilishly. “I was thinking maybe the rest of the day till I had to catch my flight.” I started to laugh.
“Let’s go right now. Forget breakfast.” He tried to hurry out of the booth but I begged, “I’m hungry.”
“Sit down. I really do need to eat something, and I have a few questions that weren’t answered last night,” I said.
“Shoot. I’ll answer everything.”
“First of all, how are you going to get so much time off? Did you get fired?” I sounded horrified.
“Oh, I forgot to tell you. I started lecturing at the medical school this semester. Chief saw that I was not in the right state of mind to be performing several operations a day so he recommended that I teach three days a week and come in the other three days to see patients. I think he felt guilty, because I pleaded with him not send me up to Seattle after I saw you in New York. Once he realized that you left, he became a lot nicer to me. The semester ended on Friday, and summer session doesn’t begin till mid-July. I have a lot of time now.
We should go see the chief before you leave. He’ll be relieved to see you. This is also how I met up with Max. He enrolled in my class and we became friends. You weren’t kidding about him being smart. I think he knew the curriculum better than I did.”
We both laughed.
“It was Max who told me that you were coming back into town, and it was Max who told me how you turned down his proposal. He encouraged me to pursue you when I thought I’d hurt you too much to salvage anything. He strongly believed that you still loved me and left for Japan thinking that I didn’t love you anymore. I’m genuinely sorry, Emily. But, I do have a question that wasn’t quite cleared up. Do you think I can ask you this question?” Jake said this with too much caution. I feared what this question might be.
“Um…OK. I hope I can answer it,” I responded with hesitation.
“I’m still a bit unsure as to why you couldn’t say no to Max back in Vegas. Why did it take you so long to turn down his proposal when you were able to turn me down so easily?”
A slight frown painted my face. I could see Jake still felt insecure. I needed to erase this immediately.
I leaned over and kissed him before giving him my answer. “When I turned down your proposal, I knew that it was temporary. It was only a matter of time till I would trust you enough to want to marry you. My love for you was already there. I couldn’t make that last leap of faith so soon. I believed that you would wait. Although, you gave me a good scare when you went silent on me during the ride home from LAX. Can you promise never to do this to me again? You can’t understand how much I fear your silence.”
“I think your absence cured me of that bad habit. I promise I won’t ever go mute on you anymore. We’ll talk through any issues we may have.” Jake’s lips reached for mine again. I happily accepted.
I encouraged Jake to eat while I explained the rest of my answer. “As for Max, I knew the moment he proposed that he was not the person I wanted to spend the rest of my life with. You were too deeply imbedded into my heart. But, I didn’t say no immediately, because I thought that my refusal w
ould completely end everything, even our friendship. You know that I think of Max as family, even now?”
I formed this into a question, hoping that Jake would understand my need to keep Max as an important person in my life. Jake looked tentative, but willing to accept my feelings.
“I figured out after you left me that there was nothing wrong with loving Max as a friend, and that turning him down would not end our connection. Does this make sense? Maybe the better question would be, are you OK with my love for Max as a friend?”
My answer didn’t erase Jake’s insecurity. I declared my feelings for Jake one more time.
“I love you with all my heart and I can’t imagine my life being void of you anymore. Please don’t leave me again.” This time, I was the one who sounded insecure.
“Emily, though we were physically apart, I never left you emotionally. You know that, right?”
“I know it now. OK, so I have a question. After New York, how come you didn’t come find me? You knew where I lived.”
“I’m glad you asked that because I was curious about something too. First of all, I called you a million times but you never answered.”
“Yeah, sorry about that. I turned off my cell phone after I stopped texting you.”
“I tried to call you at your school but realized that I had no idea where you taught. Funny thing how I loved you enough to want to spend the rest of my life with you but I had no fine details on your life. I didn’t know where you taught. I didn’t know any of your friends’ last names. Worst of all, do you know that we’ve never taken a picture together? I searched my brain for any stops we made to take a picture and there were none. What did we do in Hawaii all that time?”
“We, no I, lost a ton of weight from all the exercise you Reids put me through. So you still haven’t answered my question. Why didn’t you come find me at home?”
“Oh. Sorry, got sidetracked. I did come by your house. I came the next day and you weren’t home. I stopped by at all hours and you wouldn’t answer your door. Then the very next day, the chief sent me up to Seattle to co-lead in a heart transplant and I was gone for almost a week. By the time I got back to your door again, someone else answered and said that you no longer lived there. I tried to convince this person to give me your contact number, but I think she thought I was some psychopath. She almost called the police on me.
“This is where I’m confused,” said Jake. “You hadn’t left for Japan yet because I didn’t get your letter at the hospital till a week or so later. Where were you all that time?”
“Funny how our lives got so crossed. The day I got home from New York, Max came over and we had our talk. Later that night, Sarah and Charlie came over and shared with us their exciting news of marriage. I told Sarah that I only had two weeks left in the States, and we decided that I should stay with her so I could help her prepare for the wedding. I was fortunate enough to lease my house immediately and that would explain my tenant whom you met. I lived with Sarah till I left.”
As we hashed out all the questions, I felt this panic overcome me again.
“Jake. What am I going to do?”
“What do you mean? What’s wrong?”
“I don’t have a home to come back to. My tenant is staying in my house till the end of summer.”
“Fantastic!” Jake exulted. “Move in with me.”
He abruptly corrected himself. “Move into my parents’ home. Of course, you can take up occupancy in the guest room, unless…you get scared on the third floor by yourself and want to sleep in my bed with me.”
“You’re incorrigible,” I said with a huge grin on my face.
“If you’re done, let’s go. My promised my parents that I’d bring you home today. They, especially my mom, are ecstatic that you’re here.”
After brunch, we stopped by the Apple store and Jake bought me a laptop to take back to Japan. Then we stopped by Chief Reid’s house to say hello.
“Emily! Welcome back.” The chief hugged me, a little too tight.
“Hi, Chief.”
“Can you call me Uncle Henry instead? Everybody calls me chief.”
“OK, Uncle Henry.” I smiled at him.
“Thank God you’re back. Jake here has been a basket case since you’ve been gone. I assume you are both back together and all lovey-dovey again? I need him back at the hospital to perform more surgeries. I’ve had to step in and do many of his operations.” He guffawed.
“Did Jake tell you that after you left, he was so distraught that I kicked him out of the operating room? He could’ve killed someone with his lack of concentration.”
“Aw, Chief, it wasn’t that bad.”
“Yeah, it was. Don’t kid yourself. When are you coming back to the hospital full time? Don’t you miss those fat paychecks? Lecturing doesn’t exactly pay the bills.”
“Well, I’ve committed to teaching the summer courses, and then I’ll be back maybe three to four days at the hospital. I still want to teach one day a week at the school. I don’t want to work six or seven days a week anymore, Chief. You’ve got to cut me some slack.”
“Uncle Henry, I’d be grateful too if you didn’t work Jake so hard. We never get to see each other once he’s at the hospital.” I pleaded my case along with Jake’s. I saw Jake smile.
“I’ll think about it. He’s the best heart surgeon at the hospital, aside from me, of course.” We laughed for a while then left for Sandy and Bobby’s house.
I received another gracious welcome from Jake’s parents as they gave me their warm Reid hug. Sandy actually cried when she saw me and thanked me for the beautiful clock.
“I’m so glad I’m getting a chance to thank you for the most wonderful Mother’s Day gift. We were in New York that week for Jane’s graduation. I found your gift waiting for me when we arrived home on Sunday. I was so touched. None of my kids got me anything this year.” All three of us stared at Jake.
“Jake, how can you not get your mother something for Mother’s Day?” I gave him a horrified look. Sandy looked pleased that I was scolding her son.
“I was preoccupied with your homecoming. I couldn’t think of much other than that. Sorry, Mom.”
“That’s a terrible excuse,” I said while Sandy’s head nodded.
“I’ll make it up to you next year, Mom.” Jake won her over with his pleasing tone of voice.
They asked me questions about my stay in Japan and told me how much they missed me. Sandy started telling all kinds of what she called Jake’s “moody” stories during my absence from his life. Embarrassed, Jake attempted to steer me away from his parents.
“I have something for you in my room. Let’s go upstairs,” he whispered.
“I don’t believe you,” I whispered back. “You’re just trying to get me in bed. I think I’ll stay right here.”
“Mom,” Jake interrupted, “Emily and I have some business to take care of up in my room.”
Jake pulled me off the couch and forced me up the stairs.
“Jake. That was so embarrassing. I can’t believe you said that.”
“My parents don’t care. They’re probably laughing about it right now. Anyhow, I really do have something for you in my room.”
When we got to his room, Jake felt the need to hash out our separation a bit more. He initially complained about my lack of trust in him.
“The more I think about it, how could you believe that I didn’t love you anymore? Do you think I go around asking just any girl to marry me?”
I answered, “How could you go three weeks without talking to me—especially when my texts begged for an answer? That was really mean. You were the one confused about my feelings for you. Do you know how hard it is to send someone a message and to sit around and wait for a response?”
“Could it be any harder than waiting for letters that came to everyone but me? That was really cruel. I pathetically had to read my siblings’ letters to find out what you were up to. Don’t even get me started on having to ask my girl
friend’s ex-boyfriend about what she had written him. I bet you he secretly gloated whenever he got a letter from you. Plus, how come everyone in my family got a gift but me?”
I sat on the large couch and watched Jake go into his mini tantrum. I took it all in knowing that he hurt as much as I did.
“You know what was even worse?” he asked with a frown on his face.
“What?” My voice empathetically rose to justify his indignation.
“Whenever you told Jane that you had just written me a letter but tore it up. That was enormously frustrating.”
“Yeah, if I had sent you all the letters that I tore up, you would’ve gotten several per week. Sorry.” I answered shrugging my shoulder. “But you must have also read in Jane’s letters that my feelings for you never changed. They only got stronger while I was away from you.”
“That was my only comfort during those long months.”
“At least you had family and friends to talk to during those days. Do you want to know what was the hardest for me?” I paused wondering whether to share this information with Jake. “I had no one to share my feelings with. I hurt alone, and that was unbearable. I guess that’s why I wrote so many letters.”
I stopped talking. I could feel Jake’s heart break.
Jake walked over to his desk and pulled something out of his drawer. He walked back to me and tenderly drew out my left hand. His look of love made my heart jump-a-flutter thinking that he was going to propose again. I definitely knew what my answer would be this time.
Jake slid the eternity band on my ring finger and I basked in this tender moment. But to my utter dismay, rather than proposing, he warned, “I don’t ever want to see you take this ring off unless I replace with another one, OK?”
“All right.” My answer sounded sore.
Jake mused at my chagrin and asked, “What’s wrong? Were you expecting something else? Do you not like this ring?”
What could I say? No, I like this ring but I’d like a proposal along with it.
“I love this ring,” was all that came out of my mouth.
We said a quick but sweet good-bye at the airport. It pained me to leave him again. I made up twenty different excuses as to why I couldn’t go back. Every excuse pointed to the fact that we would be apart only twelve days. Then, we would have many joyful days together.
“I don’t want to go,” I whined like a young child. “It feels like a dream to be back together with you. I don’t want to say good-bye anymore.”
“Love, it’s only for twelve days. We’ll see each other soon. After that, we won’t ever have to say good-bye. Make sure you log onto your computer at 5:00 p.m. your time. That will serve as a substitute until Paris.
“OK.” I pouted some more. “I’ll miss you.”
“Me, too, my love. Me too.”
I left him standing at the gate knowing that we would soon be together again and if God was kind to us, we would never say good-bye.