Total pages in book: 96
Estimated words: 91783 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 459(@200wpm)___ 367(@250wpm)___ 306(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 91783 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 459(@200wpm)___ 367(@250wpm)___ 306(@300wpm)
“I left somebody once. A long time ago. Somebody I loved more than I had any right to. I left because I was scared to stay, and I told myself a lot of pretty stories about why. The truth is I was a coward. Took me ten years to come back to her. Ten years I don’t get back.”
The booth goes still behind the glass. Bex’s pen stops. In the corner, Paige’s hands come off the keyboard.
“If there’s somebody you’re standing at the door on right now, telling yourself the pretty stories about why you have to go, hear me. Don’t take the ten years to find out you were wrong.”
The board lights up. Every slot at once.
“I’m the guy at the door. The one you just described.” A man, gruff, clearing his throat twice before a word comes out. “Split with my wife six months ago. I keep telling myself it’s temporary, that I’ll go back when things calm down. You said ten years and I about drove off the road.”
“How long have you been calling it temporary?”
“…Since the day I left.”
“Then it isn’t temporary. It’s a decision you make every morning by not making it.” I pause, hoping he’s listening. “You don’t have to fix it tonight. You have to quit lying to yourself about what it is. Call her tomorrow. Not to fix it. To be honest. Start there.”
“And if she’s done?”
“Then one of you will have told the truth. Some nights that’s the only thing left worth doing.”
Bex lines up the next one.
“Liam.” A man, older, careful with every word. “I found a credit card I didn’t know we had. My wife’s name. Fifteen thousand dollars on it. She’s been hiding it two years.”
“Two years.”
“I don’t even care about the money. We can fix the money. It’s that she looked me in the face for two years and—” He stops.
“And lied.”
“Yeah.”
I take the volume down. “Listen to me. Money lies are trust lies. The debt is the small problem. The big problem is the why, and you will not get to it in a fight. You sit down, no yelling, and you ask her what she was so afraid of that hiding it felt safer than telling you. Then you listen to the answer. Even if it’s hard. Especially if it’s hard.”
“And if I can’t get past it?”
“Then you find somebody who helps you try before you decide you can’t. You don’t throw out a marriage over a card. You don’t keep one over it either. Somewhere in the middle is a conversation. Go have it.”
Bex points to the next line. I take it.
“Hi.” A woman. Soft. There’s a smile in the word. “I just—I had to call. I listen every night. Your voice, it’s like you’re talking right to me. Like you already know me. Like we’ve done this a hundred times.”
“That’s the job. One voice, a lot of living rooms.” I keep it easy. “What’s on your mind tonight?”
“Oh. I didn’t really have a question. I wanted you to hear me. That’s enough. That’s already more than I—” A small laugh. “Thank you, Liam. Same time tomorrow.”
The line clicks off before I can answer. Through the glass, Bex looks at me a second longer than usual, then writes something on her pad. I file it under nervous first-timer and reach for the next light.
“Hi, Liam, longtime listener of your music.” A young woman, the hum of a car she hasn’t turned off under her voice. “I’ve been with my boyfriend a year. A good year. But he won’t introduce me to his family. Not at the holidays, not at his sister’s wedding, not once. He says it’s complicated.”
“A year is long enough that it shouldn’t be complicated anymore.”
“That’s what I keep thinking.”
“Then stop thinking it and ask it. Out loud, to his face. Not what’s the holdup. Ask him what he’s afraid you’ll find out, or what he’s afraid they’ll say. The answer tells you everything. A man who loves you finds a way to be proud of you in front of the people who raised him.”
“And if there isn’t a good answer?”
“Then you’ll have one anyway. A hard answer beats a year of guessing.”
In between the ones that stick, there are the others. A man who can’t forgive his brother. A bride with cold feet three weeks out. A widow who feels guilty for laughing again. A kid who wants to know if long distance ever works, and I tell her sometimes, if both people are bad at giving up. They come fast once the board fills, and Bex keeps them moving. Two fingers, a tap, a nod. The three of us run a relay I didn’t know I’d be any good at.
Bex likes to close light, something easy after the heavy stuff, so I take a couple of short ones and send everybody home smiling. When the outro comes up, my hands are flat and steady on the desk. They’ve been steady the whole show.