Chapter 37
Ron was asleep in his clothes when the phone rang. It was 3am. He knew immediately.
“Hi Ron, I know I’ve woken you.”
“Hi Robin. It’s ok. I don’t have work tomorrow. I figured you didn’t. I was talking to my Dad earlier and he said that it was snowing like hell. How are you?”
Ron tried to think. How long had it been since he’d heard from her, six months. She must be working at a bar again and just getting home from work. “I’m ok. I’m snowed in but it’s warm here.”
“Are you alone?”
“Yes.”
“Can we talk for a while?”
“Sure.”
“I’m struggling with a decision Ron and I wanted to hear your voice. My boyfriend Keith wants me to move in with him.”
Ron was silent. He felt his hand tighten on the phone. Well there went the rest of this night’s sleep. “Do you love him?”
“Yes, I think I do.”
Ron felt tears start to run out of his eyes. “Well, that will help,” he said, hoping that she could not hear it in his voice.
“It didn’t help us much did it?”
“I guess not.”
“I never thought that I would be able to live with anyone but you. But I have been seeing him for a while now and it seems like the next step.”
“I think you’ll be fine Robin.”
“He reminds me of you, but he’s different.”
Ron wasn’t going to take the bait. He held the phone away from his mouth and tried to clear his throat so that his voice didn’t sound heavy. Then he tried to be light. “Well, concentrate on the differences,” he said.
“How’s the teaching going?”
“It gets better all the time. I know the girls now. I know the school. I make fewer mistakes. I feel confident when I stand up in front of them.”
She was silent for a while. Then she said, “Maybe I should come for a visit.”
Ron almost choked out a sob. “You could stay here.”
“I think that I would like that.”
“When do you want to come?”
“In a couple of weeks. Before I do anything.”
Ron said that he would pick her up at the airport and she said that she would call him with the information and then she was gone.
He sat up turned on the lights and went back to his typewriter. Maybe, just maybe if he could recreate how he was when she fell in love with him, she would fall in love with him all over again. Either that or at least it would be as if he had never met her. He wrote until he looked up and saw light coming through his windows. Then he went back to bed and was asleep almost immediately.