Sarah closed the door to John’s room. Telling him they were staying after all was absolutely the hardest thing she ever had to do. And she had had to do some very hard things in the last two years. He simply nodded and went back to whatever he’d been doing on his laptop. Sarah could actually see the wall come crashing down between them.
As she stood in the hallway she saw her mother standing by her bedroom door, waiting for her. It was late and her parents had retired hours earlier.
“You okay, Mom?”
Her mother looked every minute her seventy years when the makeup was gone and the shape wear was replaced with a sagging nightgown cinched in the middle by the belt of a favorite robe. She looked frail and vulnerable. Sarah tried to imagine her in the village in Wales where the people chose to kill their elders rather than feed them. She felt a shiver go down both arms.
“A word, darling?”
Sarah wasn’t sure she had ever felt more exhausted in her life. The two days of happiness-charged adrenalin had pushed her further and longer than she could possibly have gone on mere drugs or good intentions. But the comedown was a bitch.
“Sure, Mom.” Sarah moved to her own bedroom and heard her mother’s soft tread behind her.
That afternoon when Sarah’s father delivered the terrible news that she wouldn’t be able to travel back to Ireland felt like years ago. How she had stumbled through dinner and a mindless evening of TV until she could break the news to John was beyond her. All through the relentless hours of waiting she promised herself a good long cry in the privacy of her bedroom.
The fantasies of running into Mike’s open arms dissolved like some taunting, treacherous nightmare where the love of your life turns into a monster before your very eyes. It had taken every ounce of courage and self-control she had not to think of him, not to see his face, remember his laugh…
She sat on her bed, her shoulders slumped in defeat, and waited for her mother to sit down next to her. She was sure to come bearing the wisdom of the world for just this occasion and Sarah needed to be sure and act as if it made a difference.
Her mother took her hand and Sarah braced herself. “You know, darling, how much your father and I love you.”
“I do, Mom.”
“And how we would do anything for you.”
“I know.”
Now it was her mother’s turn to take in a long breath as if working up the courage to continue. Curious now, Sarah turned her attention away from the carpet beneath her feet, and to her mother’s face. Were her fingers trembling?
“What is it, Mom?”
“You father wants what’s best for you.”
“I know.”
“And so do I,” her mother said quickly. “But…”
Sarah forced herself to be patient. To wait for it.
“But I also want you to be happy.”
Sarah felt the pulse in her throat begin to beat in double time. And she couldn’t say why, but somehow she knew something was coming. Something big.
“Maybe that is a mother’s special difference in the way she loves,” her mother said, holding onto Sarah’s hand.
“Mom, what is it?”
Her mother turned to look at her and said firmly. “Your father’s information about the government closing all travel is accurate,” she said. “But…”
“But?” It took everything Sarah had not to stand up and shake the next words out of her mother. “But?”
“But,” her mother said, her face glowing with pain and sacrifice, “what he didn’t mention is that there is a window. A small window. After which time there will be no travel between the US and any other country for at least ten years. Maybe more.”
Sarah stared at her mother as if trying to comprehend what she was telling her. “You’re saying intercontinental travel isn’t restricted yet.” Sarah said the words slowly to make sure she understood.
“If you leave immediately you can go back, but you won’t be able to return, Sarah,” her mother said. “Not for at least ten years. Your father and I…” Her mother looked away.
We may not be alive when you return. The unspoken words filled the air between them. Sarah pulled her hand away and drew her mother into her arms and held her closely.
“I love you, Mom,” she whispered. “I love you so much.”
“I know, dear. And that is why I feel I can ask you, please, not to go. Your father’s way was to keep the truth from you, but I knew once you found out you’d hate us. I am begging you, Sarah, for John’s sake and for your father’s and my sake, and yes, even yours…please don’t leave.”
Sarah held her mother. She could feel her own heart beating and feel it pounding in her throat.
“I know it’s a terrible thing to ask,” her mother said. “But you are all we have. All I have. It has to be your decision. It can’t be something that prevents you from going. That much I know. So now you know all the truth. You can leave but you can’t come back.” She took a long ragged breath and pulled back to look at Sarah’s face.
“And I am begging you to stay.”
Sarah looked into her mother’s eyes and thought of Mike. She thought of her request to meet him in five years. If I push it to ten, would he still come? Will I even want him to? Will he?
The tears came then as she thought of the years between now and then. The long years that would spin them forever apart—even further than the miles across the ocean that separated them now. The years of habit and routine and life that would push him to the back of her memory—where David was—until he never really existed at all.
Sarah knew what she had to do. In a way she had probably always known and just refused to see it. As she leaned her head down on the frail shoulder of her now weeping mother, Sarah felt the death of all her dreams in one moment of pure despair.
“I’ll stay,” she whispered.