“Your mom doesn’t like him, huh?”
“She hates him,” I correct. “She hates the fact we are together, and she’s firmly against our relationship.”
“It’s not easy for her, I imagine. Your mother has been coming here every single month. Each time she leaves, she cries. She loves you a lot.”
“You know her?” I ask, feigning my surprise.
“Yes. My parents are also from Rotterdam. She’s a very strong lady.”
“Yeah… And very stubborn too.”
Nel lets out a quick chuckle. “She told me the same about you.” I mirror her laugh for a moment, but we keep quiet afterward.
“I can’t live without him.” Shut up, Petra! “I mean, in my dream,” I amend after seeing the astonished look on her face. “It was not the reality I wanted.”
“You mean, you… you ended your life in your dream?”
I nod, not wanting to admit it to myself. And I even confessed it to her. Damn it.
“That’s okay. It means your brain was trying to somehow escape a reality it felt trapped in. I have patients who jumped from bridges in their own dreams. It might have been the reason why you woke up.”
“Please don’t say a word to my mom,” I plead. “She can’t know I’m awake. She can’t know anything.”
“Relax. It’s not up to me to do so. I’m just here to help you.” Nel looks over to the cardiac monitor and continues taking notes, then she reaches for her briefcase again, taking something from it. “Now, let’s check your blood pressure. Shall we?”
Alexander Van Dieren
When I told Roy over the phone that his daughter was awake, he not only said he would cancel all his meetings for the day, but told me in a sobbing voice that he would be here in thirty minutes. I also told him that she was in a consultation with Dr. Nel and to pass by my office before going to see her. While he agreed without hesitation, I have no idea how I am supposed to tell him I’m engaged to his daughter. I know I can’t marry her, and I know perfectly well that I’ve got to move to Singapore now that she is awake.
And yet…
Here I am, a pen between my fingers, trying to figure out how to tell him otherwise. After all, despite what I should or shouldn’t do, being engaged to her feels exactly how it should—so right and natural.
Glancing briefly at my watch, I expect Roy to arrive anytime. Thirty minutes seems quite implausible if he’s coming from Manhattan, but just forty minutes after our call, I hear a knock on my office door. And as I order the person to come in, I see Maria opening the door wide, and then Roy smiling at me with a twinkle in his eye. I mimic his smile and good mood before inviting him to the sitting area. There I take a seat in the armchair, while he sits on the sofa beside me. And as he observes me rolling a pen between my fingers, his glowing face switches into a stern one. “What do I have to know before seeing her?”
He knows me so well. “It’s not that easy…” I tell him.
Blowing out a loud, exasperated breath, Roy starts ruminating. “Did she lose her memory?”
A bit astonished by his question, I say, “Um, no, I don’t think so.”
He nods pensively and then asks, “Can she talk, see, and hear?”
“So far she seems okay…”
But Roy doesn’t stop there. “What about walking? Does Dr. Nel know if she will ever walk again?”
“Dr. Nel is still in there. But I believe after an intensive physiotherapy, she should be able to walk again, yes.”
Roy exhales quickly in relief. “So what are you so worried about?”
Knowing there’s no escape, my heart keeps thundering as I look him in the eye and decide, for better or worse, to tell him the truth. “We are engaged,” I announce. “And before you say anything, she’s the one who proposed.” Then I remain silent as Roy draws in a deep breath, and, in a failed attempt to calm himself down, starts rubbing his eyelids tiredly. “That is not what we agreed upon,” he snaps back in a strident voice. “Engaged or not, you will have to leave.”
I observe the distress written all over his face, and as I do so, I realize how easy it is for him to lose his temper when his reputation is at stake. “There must be another way,” I tell him. And leaning over, I ask in a low tone, “Did they find anything against Tess?”
Roy glances around before leaning closer to me and saying, “They searched quite a lot, but no. They could find neither the files, nor anything against her. Not even a damn traffic ticket.” He exhales once more, his gaze darting down for a moment, before looking back at me. “As it said on the report, she’s the apogee of a law-abiding citizen.”
I can’t help but chuckle at his comment. “What a good, obedient woman she is,” I tease. “I’m surprised she didn’t share your lifestyle.”
But Roy is not in the mood for jokes. “You will have to leave,” he says once more, his tone unusually grave. And since I don’t reply, Roy keeps observing me. “You know that, right? We’ve discussed it many times.” But I’m not convinced, and as he reads my answer in my gaze, his torment keeps growing and his voice rises. “I thought we had an agreement!”
The fear I might break it is something we both share. “I know.”
As I ponder my next words, Roy asks, “When are you going to tell her?”
“I don’t intend to tell her anything.” And before he can yap or get physical, I add, “Tess is coming back in three weeks. We have some time ahead of us.”
“And what do you intend to do until then?”
Leaning back in my chair, I observe him for a second more before saying, “I intend to invite my family over and have an engagement party.”
Roy doesn’t hide his bewilderment. “Oh, I see…” he mumbles pensively. “An engagement party? But of course!” His sarcastic tone is now borderline offensive. “Have you lost your fucking mind or what?”
“Petra would like one. It’s the least I can do before—”
“Before you leave?”
Leave. I hate the meaning of that word, and I hate even more the fact that Tess is anxiously waiting for me to do so. Maybe even Roy. But for now, I just nod at him in agreement. Today is a great day. A day I’ll never forget, August 27, 2020—the day Petra woke up, the day we got engaged, and the day my life made sense again.
“Very well. I guess having a farewell party before your departure seems appropriate.”
I ignore his nasty comment and say, “One more thing: be nice to her.”
Roy looks at me with raised brows. “Of course I’ll be nice to her! Why on earth wouldn’t I be?” He might look outraged, but he knows very well why.
“And no remarks about the engagement,” I add as Roy mutters something under his breath. “You might not approve, but don’t scold her about it.”
I’ve never seen Roy shed a tear. Not even the day he found his daughter in a coma. His face might have gotten unusually gloomy and somber, but I never saw him cry.
Until now.