Our Last Time (Complete Novel)

August 31st, 2006, 7:31a.m.

Willow:

Yesterday, I had watched Wyatt leave the small hospital right after our little moment. He wore the clothes he apparently arrived in, and to say he was tantalizing would have been an understatement. All he had to do was sign himself out, like he had been at an obligatory event, or work, or maybe even school. Yesterday was the day he was ready to leave. Maybe he was ready to meet his students. Maybe he was ready to meet Annette.

I hadn't known the details of his reasoning. I was able to read his face and his body language - not his mind. And now that the truth was out between Wyatt and me, I hadn't really known how to react to it.

What now? I had asked myself multiple times. I was simply unsure, though I hadn't had any bad feelings. I hadn't even had unfamiliar feelings. They were just feelings I hadn't felt in a very long time: I was nervous, I was excited, and of course, I was scared.

It was the stages before love that made me feel these things. The anticipation of love was beyond rattling. The feeling hadn't been touched since Kennedy, but then Wyatt came along. Wyatt came, and made me feel like this. He made me feel like love could become something real again.

I was taking Annette to school early today. I was going to walk inside with her, but only because Wyatt had said to me, "I'll see you tomorrow," before getting on the elevator yesterday. I had watched him wink at me for the first time before the elevator doors closed. Tessa was going on about a patient she hadn't enjoyed caring for, and I had purposely tuned out most of what she had said. It had been because of Wyatt and his tendency to captivate me. I knew then that he expected to see me today. He'd be wearing a suit, probably, and I was ready to see him in one. I intended to wear normal clothes, because Wyatt was so used to seeing me in scrubs. I had planned to change in my car in the parking lot at work and if someone saw me (I had thought about this prior), I'd play it off as no big deal. I was ready to see Wyatt as Mr. Blanquette and I knew he was ready to see me as just Willow.

The school doors had opened at seven-thirty every morning each weekday. Annette was constantly groaning as we walked towards those doors, because I made her get up a little earlier and she hadn't wanted to go to school early.

As a compromise, I just kept telling her, "I have a conference with your real teacher today."

She'd catch on to that lie eventually if I kept using it as a daily excuse to see Wyatt, I had thought at the time. But I knew Wyatt and I would find other ways to find each other. All we had to do was make plans; go on dates, possibly. Learn to tolerate each other more, but up close sooner than later.

I hadn't wanted to treat him like a dirty secret. I wanted the world to see us together and I wanted to be his. I wanted him to want me as his. I hoped he had hope for us.

"Mommy," Annette pulled on my hand and had forced me to stop where I was. We were standing directly in front of the double doors to her school.

"Yes, sweetie?" I responded quietly. I was trying not to let the vein in my neck look noticeable as I watched the cars on the highway pass the school entrance.

"You're acting really weird and I don't think you really have a meeting with my real teacher today," Annette sighed. "Why are you so weird today, mommy?"

My daughter thought I was weird today. I knew she was too smart to believe that lie I had made up. I released her hand, knelt in front of her, and then looked her in the eyes. "Baby, I am meeting someone very important here today at your school. He just so happens to be your real teacher. Would you understand if I told you mommy had a crush?" I spoke cautiously. I had never talked to Annette about crushes, not even guys in general. Maybe it was because I had only two genuine crushes in my lifetime. One was her dead father whom she never met, and the other was Wyatt, who I was mentioning to her now.