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)
“You’re on The Love Line with Liam.”
“Hi, my wife wants a dog and I don’t,” the man says.
“I get it,” I tell him. “I had a cat when I married my wife. The cat hated me but loved our son. Now, my son has a dog, and I love the dog. That doesn’t help you, now does it? But here’s the thing, when I go to their house or they come to mine, the dog is the first one to greet me. Her tail is always wagging and she needs ear scratches. So, this really isn’t about the dog,” I tell him. “It’s never about the dog. She wants something in that house that’s glad to see her every single time she walks in the door. Be that or get the dog.”
“You’re right,” he says. “I can’t remember the last time I met her at the door. I’ll try that. Thank you.”
“You’re welcome. Good luck.”
A teenager calls on the sly, voice low, and wants to know if it’s normal or common that her parents fight every night. Bex flags it and I take it slow. “Common and normal aren’t the same word,” I tell her. “Here’s what I need you to hear. This isn’t yours to fix, and it isn’t yours to carry. Is there a grown-up you trust? A grandma, a teacher, somebody’s mom?” She says yes. “Then talk to them. Tonight, if you can. You don’t have to hold this by yourself.”
Then the night turns.
Bex signals at another line. A man, middle of his life, the words coming slow and heavy. “Liam, I haven’t spoken to my brother in fifteen years. We went into business together. It went bad. We both said things you can’t take back. Fifteen years. Our kids have never met their cousins.”
“Who was right?”
“…I was.”
“You sure?”
“Mostly.”
“Fifteen years is a long time to be right.” I let those words linger between us before I continue. “At some point you have to pick one. Do you want to win, or do you want your brother back? Because you don’t get both, and you’ve had fifteen years of winning. How’s that going?”
“Not good.”
“Then call him. Not to argue it out again. To tell him you miss him. That’s the whole call. ‘I miss you, and the rest doesn’t matter to me anymore.’ Then you hush up and let him answer.”
Bex lines up the next one. A woman, younger, her voice worn down to the thread. “My daughter won’t talk to me. She’s fifteen. Since the divorce, she barely looks at me. One-word answers, if I get that much. I feel like I’m losing her.”
“She’s not punishing you,” I tell her. “It feels like punishment. It’s grief. Her family changed shape and she didn’t get a vote, and those one-word answers are her holding it together the only way she’s got.”
“So what do I do?”
“You stay. You keep showing up with no expectations. You don’t force the talk. You make the dinners and the car rides ordinary, you let the quiet be okay, and you wait, so the day she’s ready the door’s already standing open. Give her space. Just don’t vanish into it. Stay present in her life. Ask her how her day was and take that ‘fine’ and run with it.”
Bex slides me another. A young woman who hasn’t spoken to her mother since the wedding her mother skipped. “She said she couldn’t afford the flight. I found out later she took a cruise that same week.”
“Oh, that’s a tough one,” I tell her. “That’s a choice she made and let you find out the worst way. You’re allowed to be done. But before you shut the door for good, ask her why. You don’t have to forgive her or even accept her excuse. Try to understand it. Sometimes the why is uglier than the act. Either way you’ll know and knowing beats wondering for the next forty years.”
The next line’s blinking before the last one’s cold. I press the button.
“Hello.” A man. Older. There’s gravel in the voice, and something working underneath the gravel to stay down. “I need advice. About making amends.”
“I’m listening.”
“I wronged someone. Years back. My son,” he pauses. “I wasn’t the father he needed. I told myself I was doing the best I could. The truth is I didn’t try very hard, and by the time I understood that, he was grown and gone. I don’t know if it’s too late to fix it. I don’t know that I’ve got the right to try.”
I don’t answer right away. Through the glass, Bex looks up from her board and finds me. I lift two fingers off the desk. I’ve got it.
“It’s never too late to try,” I say. “But I’m going to be straight with you, because somebody should be. Reaching out isn’t about you. It’s not your guilt, it’s not feeling better, it’s not getting forgiveness.”