Statistically

Chapter Thirteen

I wait until everyone else has had their turn to visit with Lee, and then I take mine.  I walk slow down the hallway, trailing my finger against the wall.  Trying to extend this peice of time, trying to prevent whatever it is that comes next.  I pass an elevator and seriously contemplate jumping into it, just leaving and finding my way back to my life of self imposed exile.  I wouldn't even have to say goodbye.

But I don't.

I'm not sure where to start, on my climb up from the bottom.  I don't know how to even begin to pick up the peices of all the things I have broken, shattered to bits, over the years.  All the things I have pushed aside, all the wounds I thought time would heal, but were only made worse by all the things I never said.

I stand in his doorway for a while, counting all of the wires attached to him.  Taking in how small he looks in his gigantic bed.  I know he knows I'm there, but he doesn't say anything at first.  Just stares out the window with far away eyes, and I know that he has been hiding things, too.

Eventually, he rolls his head towards me and his eyes meet mine.  "Come sit down, you big idiot."

And my feet feel like they are made of lead, my legs don't quite remember how to work.  But I manage to make my way to the chair beside his bed, manage to make myself sit in it.

We sit in silence for a while.  I start a million sentences in my head, try to string together words that might convey even part of what I want to say to him.  But I have never been good at expressing myself, made evident by pretty much everything I have ever done in my life, so the silence drags on.

Somehow, I bring my eyes to him and for a second I don't see him as he is in this moment.  I see him as all the people has has ever been.  A chubby toddler, stealing all of the attention.  An annoying little kid, whom I used to let beat me when we played video games.  A teenager, driving up in his brand new car, the excitement in his eyes as he waited for me to tell him it was cool.

He eyes fall on mine and the moment is gone.  He looks at me with a look on his face, that even though I've only saw it once and even though it was a long time ago - I remember.

"So, how long have you been fucking my wife?"  And even with tears welling up in his eyes, he manages to say it with a smile.

I hang my head down low, stare at my hands clasped together in my lap.  I think about lying.  But I don't.  "Not long."

He nods his head, like I'm not telling him anything he doesn't already know.

"Lee, I'm sor-"

He holds up his hand, covered in tape from his IV, and cuts off my words.  "Don't tell me you're sorry."

I wait to hear the anger in his voice, to see it in his eyes.  But it doesn't come.

"You know, I've known from the start that I could never be to her what you were.  That there would always be a part of her that belonged to you.  At first, it bothered me." 

He shakes his head, his eyes far away.  "But it doesn't anymore.  We have been married for ten years, Noah.  You missed ten years.  I could be intimidated by what you two have, and maybe I should be, given the situation... but I'm not.  You two were together for what?  A year?  When you were eighteen?"

It wasn't quite a year.  But I don't feel like telling him that, at the moment.

"Maybe I will never be able to be what you are to her, but what you had back then doesn't hold up against what we have right now."

His words make me feel hollow inside.  I down at my hands, cause I don't want him to see what the truth of his words are doing to me.  "You're right."

He smiles and shrugs, comfortable in the fact that he has always been smarter than me.  "Of course I am.  I'm always right."

For one absurd second, I have to fight the urge to hit him.  He must see it in my eyes, which he has apparently never had a problem reading.

"Now, I heard today that the odds are starting to look up for me.  It'll take me a while, after all this is over, to get back into shape.  But don't think for a second I'm not going to punch you in the nose for this."

I stick out my hand and he takes it as I say, "You're on."

And then we talk about other things.

*

She's waiting in the hall when I come out of the room.  For a brief moment I wonder if there will ever be a time in my life when I am actually prepared for something.  When I have had time to prepare my words, all those perfect things to say.  Once again, I am not ready.  Not sure I'll ever be ready.  Definitley don't want to have this conversation in the hallway of a hospital.

She looks into my eyes and I fight that urge to fall into them, like I always do.  Like I maybe always will.  I want to tell her that I love her, that I will until I die.  That nothing else matters but the way she makes me feel.  But nothing that I want to say is what I should say.  So I don't.

"Elle-

"Noah-"

She laughs a little, crosses her arms over her chest.  "You first."

And I suppose I will always wonder, what she would've said if I hadn't interrupted her.  If anything would've been different if I'd let her talk first.

But I didn't.  So I'll never know.

"We can't do this."

And we stand in the hallway, a safe distance apart.  I tell her why it won't work.  I tell her that I can't hurt Lee.  I tell her that we are caught up in the past, that we don't know what we really feel.  I tell her all the things I should've told her on that first day in the garage, when I chose to ignore reality for just a second - just one second that turned into minutes, days, weeks. 

Her eyes start to fill up with tears and when one starts to make it's way down her cheek, I don't reach out to wipe it away.

Eventually, I tell her I have to go.  Where to, I don't know.  Back to their house?  I'm not sure.  Back to New York?  Maybe I should.  I leave her behind, standing by Lee's door and wiping her eyes.

I wonder what she will say to him, what he will say to her.  I wonder if they will be able to get past me, past what we have done.  I wonder how it is that anyone survives a true broken heart, because the pain I am feeling is so intense it is almost physical.  I fight the urge to turn back at least a dozen times, to just take one more look at her.  But I make myself put one foot in front of the other.  I keep my eyes straight ahead.

I am just stepping into the stairwell when I hear her coming up behind me.  I turn around and she is hurtling towards me, through the door I am holding open with one hand.  It closes when I put my arms around her, and in an instant we are alone.

She squeezes me to her and I squeeze her back, our hands roam up and down each other's backs.  And I know this is it.

That last moment. 

The last time I'll touch her just the way I want to.  The last time I'll tell her what I really want say.  The last time I will look into her eyes, without trying to shield what I am feeling.

The very last moment that we are a we.

She whispers something in my ear, so quiet I almost can't hear her, turns around and is gone. 

And I am left standing, just looking at where she went.