Page 103 of Here We Go Again

She glances down at the fingers curled around her too-hot mug. “And what did you decide?” Under the table, Odie comes and puts his head in her lap. He always knows when she needs him most. She strokes his ears in that familiar, comforting pattern, trying to self-soothe the chaos inside her.

“I don’t know yet,” he says after another sip of tea. “Ask me again after he’s gone.”

Rosemary strokes Odie’s ear over and over again. “Logan is gone, and I don’t think it was worth it at all,” she says, and she feels an immediate stab of guilt for bringing up Logan when Joe is dying.

“Logan is still here.”

The tea is finally cool enough for Rosemary to take a sip. “She walked away from me at the hospital. When I needed her most, she just walked away.”

She strokes and sips and strokes. “And that’s her whole deal. She runs at the first sign of anything real, and I was so naïve to think she might stick around for me.”

“Was I naïve, for believing Joe would come back to me one day?” Remy asks, and Rosemary has no clue how to respond to that.

Remy clears his throat. “Let me ask you something: What do you gain by being in control all the time?”

She’s startled by the question. “Oh, you know. Safety. Security. A false sense of order in a chaotic world. The reassurance that I won’t end up in rehab again.”

Remy nods and sips. “But what do youloseby being in control all the time?”

She stares down at the fragmented image of the abandoned puzzle and thinks about seeing the Grand Canyon at sunrise and the stars over Mesa Verde. About nude photo shoots and dancing in headlights. A Google Doc with ten thousand words and the boring life waiting for her in Vista Summit. Thelonelylife, withoutintimacy or connection, where she comes home to plants and a lamination machine, and only confides in a mother who can never meet her emotional needs.

“Joe will never be able to finish this,” she says as she picks up a single puzzle piece and turns it over in her hands.

“Should we finish it for him, then?” He adjusts his chair so it’s closer to the table, and Rosemary does the same.

“We should.”

She holds the piece beside the completed picture on the box: the gray ocean breaking against jagged rocks. Rosemary’s piece is part of the stormy sky. She slots it into place. One by one, they put the pieces where they belong, until it’s after midnight and the puzzle is finished. Until they’re both crying over all the things Joe will never see come together.

Chapter Thirty-One

ROSEMARY

“I don’t want it!”

“Stop being such a stubborn ass!”

“It’s my ass!” Joe shouts from his hospital bed. “I get to be stubborn about it if I want to!”

“The problem is that other people care about your wrinkly ass, and this is the least you can do for us!” Logan shouts back.

“I’m sorry, Logan, but my death isn’t about you.”

“You made it about me! About us! Will you please talk some sense into him?” Logan wheels around and looks at Rosemary directly for the first time in four days. They’ve been alternating shifts with Joe, passing each other like ships in the night, only existing in the same room whenever it’s time for this fight.

Rosemary massages her temples. The combination of hospital disinfectant, fluorescent lighting, and screaming has her feeling overstimulated and anxious and so very tired. Logan’s hazel eyes aren’t helping, either. “Joe, please. Just get the procedure,” Rosemary begs in her exhaustion.

Joe reaches for the call button and presses it. “Nurses! These cretins are trying to prolong my life against my will!”

Dr. Rutherford, the oncologist, walks over to the call button and turns it off with her usual unflappable calm.

“Can we try discussing this like rational adults?” Remy suggests. “Andquietadults?”

Logan has turned to Dr. Rutherford, her last hope. “Please tell him he has to do it.”

“Unfortunately, I cannot do that….”

“Fine! You gave Hale power of attorney, so she’ll just sign off on the procedure for you!”