Page 281 of The Havenport Collection

Sam

I rolled over and squinted at my phone. My mom had generously come and picked me up at the farm last night.

Rose, Yael, and I had cracked open another bottle of wine, and I was in no shape to drive home.

My mother, in her typical fashion, thanked me for calling her and making the responsible choice, as if I were sixteen and not forty.

But I loved her. Even if I knew she’d be over later to lecture me about making healthy choices and treating my body with respect.

I had another text from Gio. It was a picture of him with a giant magnum of champagne.

Gio: I’m buying this. We’ll drink it all when you’re cancer free.

Sam: That must be several gallons.

Gio: We can share with friends. Do you think I can check it in my suitcase?

Sam: No, you dummy.

Gio: you don’t think I can sweet-talk the customs officials?

Sam: I am too hungover to bail you out of Euro jail right now.

He sent me a meme of the Mona Lisa with messed-up hair and smudged eye makeup, and it was pretty much how I felt at the moment. I laughed before pulling the covers up over my head.

Gio has always known how to make me laugh and pick me up when I needed it the most. His texts, emails, and silly voicemails always seemed to find me at the right moment, no matter how long it had been since we’d last seen each other.

It was one of the best things about our friendship—the ability to jump in and out of each other’s lives over the years.

We always picked up where we left off. There had been times when we had gone weeks and sometimes even months without speaking.

But then I’d get a funny text or meme and it would be like no time had passed.

I rolled myself out of bed in search of water, wrapping myself in a fuzzy robe and attempting to put my hair into a ponytail.

As I chugged water and aspirin, I couldn’t stop the grin from spreading across my face as I thought of him.

Because something had changed. The what-ifs and the curiosity had taken over.

Because the desire had always been there.

Just lurking quietly in the background, a soft buzzing that I never stopped to notice before.

But since coming back to Havenport, it had intensified and now it was deafening.

I couldn’t stop thinking about what it felt like to kiss him. How his rough, work-calloused hands felt against my skin. How much more I wanted to explore his strong, masculine body.

My sex drive, which had been MIA since my diagnosis, was coming back with a vengeance. After almost two months of total dormancy, I had been wearing out my vibrator with my current Gio fantasies.

These days, my emotions were all over the place, and I couldn’t exactly trust where they would be from one moment to the next. But I knew, deep down, that I wanted to feel desired and sexual again. And who better to explore that with than Gio?

I’d never had trouble trusting myself. But when it came to Gio, I couldn’t allow myself to admit the depth and complexity of my feelings for him.

It was easier to blame cancer, but the more time we spent together, the more his kind gestures and sense of humor disarmed every one of my defenses.

And I was hardly an innocent virgin. I’d had several boyfriends over the years—some casual and some more serious.

And they had all been great in their own ways.

I wasn’t someone who took a scorched-earth approach to my exes.

I was a grown-up and knew that sometimes relationships just ran their course.

But I had never met someone special enough to make me want to settle down, to compromise.

My freedom had always been my top priority, so I avoided getting attached.

I wasn’t a white-picket-fence type of girl. And while companionship, respect, and, of course, sex, were all super important, there was just so much more I wanted out of my life.

And then there was Steven. He had texted me a couple of times since we ran into each other, but I hadn’t responded. Just looking at his messages made me cringe.

He wasn’t a bad guy. I had long since forgiven him for high school, and I’m sure he had many wonderful qualities. He was certainly handsome and successful, but he wasn’t Gio. And that was all I wanted these days.

Because if I wanted a casual hookup, Steven would be perfect. Polite, good-looking, and unlikely to get attached. I could work off all this sexual energy without compromising my friendship. Give myself one last hurrah before everything changed forever.

But I couldn’t bring myself to respond. I just didn’t want to. Steven was fine. But late at night, when I reached for my Satisfyer, it wasn’t Steven I was thinking about.

It was my best friend, my biggest cheerleader, and one of the best men I had ever known.

Unsurprisingly, my mother came over around lunchtime, bringing fancy smoothies, quinoa salad, and raised eyebrows.

“Out drinking with your girlfriends until one a.m.?” she said with an annoyed smile. “That was what I expected when you were in high school, not middle age.”

I shrugged and slurped down the purple smoothie; it was delicious. “We were blowing off steam. And you said to always call you.”

“And I’m glad you did. You never turn it off, you know, the mothering instincts. I’ll be available for late-night rides for the rest of my life.”

“Or at least until I take your keys away.”

“Hey! You wouldn’t dare!” she said with faux indignation.

“Try me, old lady!” I stuck my tongue out at her.

“Gimme that smoothie back!” She reached for the cup, but I spun around, avoiding her.

After force-feeding me vitamins and minerals, the interrogation began. I had to spend a lot of time and energy explaining that no, I was not spiraling. And yes, I was managing.

She glared at me. One of the downsides of having a mom fewer than twenty years older than you is that she generally can see through your bullshit. “You are so not. but I’ll give you a pass. I know you’re not lying to me. You’re just lying to yourself.”

“Mom!”

She patted my hand. “I call it like I see it, kid. You’re in shock and you are grieving. The social worker said this would be a complex process, and you have to give yourself space to feel things.”

My mother was a master at feelings talk. I blamed her master’s degree in social work and her love of personal development podcasts. But I knew she was right. I was going to have to start talking about things and feeling all these complex, annoying emotions at some point.

“This is bigger and scarier than I thought. Not just the surgery and treatment, but also being out of work for so long. And I just wasn’t prepared for that. It took me a long time to get to this level, and now, I don’t know what’s going to happen.”

Mom put the kettle on for tea, listening as she tidied up the kitchen. “You’re brilliant, and you’ll get wherever you need to go eventually. But time spent recovering is valuable. Gives you a bit of space to think about things, reprioritize if necessary.”

She wasn’t wrong. And I saw right through her “reprioritize” remark. But I couldn’t shake the feeling that I did need time. Time to sort through a whole bunch of baggage I’d been carrying around for years.

“I just…I don’t know. I feel like I’ve lost my momentum. And I’m beginning to suspect it was the only thing carrying me along. Things have been,”—I trailed off, unsure how much I should tell her—“not amazing for a while.”

She cocked her head to the side, a classic mom signal to keep talking.

“And without that momentum pushing me forward through the meetings, the travel, the demanding clients, I don’t know if I can get back to where I was.”

There it was. The ugly truth. I wasn’t the go-getting, butt-kicking international finance superstar I pretended to be. I was someone who had been treading furiously, trying to keep her head above water, for years.

All the money and the travel and the constant demands…they kept me trapped and complacent. But now, having stepped away for only a few weeks, the cracks were beginning to show.

“But why do you want to go backward? If things haven’t been fulfilling, you have a unique opportunity right now to evaluate your life and make any changes you want. Look forward, sweetie. There’s a great big world out there for you.”

But that was just the problem. I had spent the last two decades buzzing around the great big world, and I still hadn’t found whatever it was that I was looking for.

I had spent my entire life proving myself.

Proving that I was smart enough, hardworking enough, and good enough.

Facing challenges head-on and clamoring for bigger mountains to climb.

Had it all been for nothing? Had I been pushing myself for years, only to end up at forty, sick and alone?

I tried to fight back the tears. Because once they started, it would take hours for me to stop. These days, crying was an exhausting, but essential part of my days. But I didn’t want to do that now. I wanted to soak up this time with my mom and try to see things from her perspective.

I looked around the living room at the hand-crocheted afghan on the couch, the potted plants in the window, and the family photos on the walls.

I felt the warm embrace of this home, a place my grandparents and mother had made special for me for so many years.

And suddenly, I felt better. I wiped my eyes.

My mom was right. I didn’t want to go backward. I needed to think about the future.

Since coming here, I had already grown and changed.

I couldn’t imagine fitting back into my Geneva life.

Conference calls with China in the middle of the night.

Jogs along the Rh?ne river before heading to the office.

Sleek business suits and international travel.

Always being upgraded. Desperately trying to send emails from the business class lounge.

At one time, it had been my routine. Comfortable.

I could create spreadsheets that would knock your socks off, all while powerwalking in my sensible Bruno Maglis and snagging a dinner reservation at the hottest restaurant in a different time zone.

But lying here on the couch, that all felt so far away. It had only been two weeks, and my old life was slipping away. There was nothing tethering me to it. No good friends, no connection to my work, no things that made me want to stick.

It had been the story of my life. I’d settle somewhere for a bit and then I’d get itchy. I’d feel the pull of something new, of a new place, a new job, a new experience.

I couldn’t figure it out. Did I have wanderlust because I didn’t have roots? Or did I not have roots because I wanted to indulge my wanderlust? Were the two mutually exclusive?

Because I wanted something different. I wasn’t sure what. But it was clear that I had outgrown my old routine. I was in the process of shedding that skin and growing into a new version of myself.

But what would that woman want? What did the future hold for her?

Could I allow myself to want more? Give myself hope that this experience would change me and help me finally figure out what the hell I wanted out of my life?