One Day Soon (One Day Soon, #1)(48)

“You’re happy though. You have a good job. You have a house and a car and friends. Right?” He sounded strange. More than curious. Not quite frantic.

“I have a good job. A house. A car. A friend or two, I guess.” I didn’t sound convincing.

Yoss picked up on it immediately.

“You were supposed to find your happy life, Imi.” He sounded accusatory. As though I had done something wrong. As if by not going to the beach, I had let him down in some way. It irritated me.

But it also made me feel ashamed. Because even though I loved my job, I had very little else to show for myself.

My marriage had failed. I didn’t have any children. Sure, my mother and I were on better terms, but that really depended on the day.

I had little depth to my life and while I had thought myself content with the existence I led, I realized now that wasn’t true.

The realization made me defensive.

“What about you? Is this what you consider a happy life? Still living in abandoned houses, scrounging for food, barely getting by? Is it a happy life to contract hepatitis B and not realize it? To have so little regard for your health and safety that you would be in a position to contract it in the first place?” I stared out over the park. “You lied, Yoss. You were going to do something better. You told me over and over again that that part of your life was over. Your promises are all broken. Why should I have bothered to keep mine?”

Yoss was silent.

Our breath puffed out in front of us. Small, white clouds drifting off into nothing.

One heartbeat.

Two.

Three.

On and on. Constant and continuous. Infinite.

“Tell me a story, Imi.”

I sighed. “I’m not in the mood for fairytales, Yoss. I haven’t been for a long time.”

He looked at me, his eyes full of remorse and something else. Something stronger. Something that made my heart constrict and my throat tighten. “Then tell me a true story. Something that really happened. Something happy. Something about you.”

“I don’t think I have one of those kinds of stories.”

Yoss put his hand on top of mine. Cold fingers wrapped around frozen skin. “That’s not true, Imogen.”

We stood there, staring at each other, and I wanted to give him what he asked for. My anger was gone. I had never been able to hold onto the useless emotion, much less when it was directed towards Yoss.

“Let’s go inside.” I inclined my head towards the door.

Yoss nodded and followed me back into the warmth of the hospital café. We stood just inside, neither of us moving.

Tell me a story, Imi.

Could I give him a story? Could I open myself up to him the way I once had?

An angry, obstinate part of me didn’t want to. He left me. Discarded. Thrown away. He let me wonder where he went. What I had done wrong. I was alone in my love for him. All alone…

Yoss pushed his hands into the pockets of his robe. “Are you sure I can’t talk you into a cup of coffee?” He tried to laugh. It didn’t quite work.

“You want a true story from me? Why should I give you anything that’s true, Yoss?” I asked him, forgetting for a moment that we weren’t alone.

Yoss’s shoulders slumped a little. He rubbed his newly grown beard. “You don’t have to give me anything, Imogen. I have no right.”

And it was his self-condemnation that shattered my resistance. That broke my heart and mended it.

This was Yoss.

And I was Imi.

That meant something.

He asked me for a story.

I had always given him one.

I’d give him one now.

“Come on,” I told him.

We walked quietly towards the elevator and I took him down to the sixth floor.

He gave me a strange look when he realized where we were, but he didn’t ask questions. Even though I knew he wanted to. I was glad. I wasn’t ready to give voice to what I was handing him.

Then tell me a true story. Something happy.

Sure, there had been happy moments in my life. Some more vivid than others. Meeting Yoss underneath the bridge on a warm summer evening, blood on my hands and tears in my eyes.

The first time he kissed me. How scared and exhilarated I felt when his lips touched mine.

The night we made love for the first time after the fire. With snow falling from the sky and grief on our tongues. All trembling hands and hot skin.

There were other moments too. The ones that came after Yoss. The day I graduated from high school. Making the Dean’s List during my first semester in college. Moving into my own house. Starting my job. Meeting Lee.

But there was one moment that trumped them all. Even though the ending was far from a fairytale, the brief instant at the beginning was one of the few times in my life I remember experiencing true, complete joy.

It had been different from the happiness I had felt with Yoss.

Different, but powerful. Profound in a way I knew I would never experience again.

We continued to move slowly, but Yoss was walking easier now. He still held onto my arm, though he no longer relied on me to support him.

“Hi, Imogen!” a nurse named Brittany called out. I lifted my hand in a wave.

“Is it okay to go back? We won’t be long,” I asked with a small smile. Brittany nodded and then noticed Yoss beside me. “We’re just taking a walk. Getting the blood moving. I figured he could use something cheery after looking at hospital walls all day,” I explained