Coming Home to Greenleigh

Chapter 36

Sultan + Shepard – Almost Home Lyrics

[Verse 1: Nadia Ali]
As you came into my life
I knew I would be your wife
The choice I had I couldn't make
When I leave, remember that
I'll be back again
I'll be back again

[Verse 2: Nadia Ali]
Touch of heart
Kiss of faith
Open palms anticipate
Carry me through the haze
When you fall, you're the one
Always on my mind

[Pre-Chorus: Nadia Ali]
All the loss and all the pain
Open arms await

[Chorus 1: Both]
Hold on, baby
I'm almost home
I'm almost home
I'm almost home
I said:
Hold on, baby
I'm almost home
I'm almost home
I'm almost home

[Chorus 2: Nadia Ali]
Will you call for me?
Will you wait and see?
What you mean to me?
I said hold on, love
Will you call for me?
Will you wait and see?
What you mean to me?
I said hold on, hold on
Oh, oh, hold on, hold on
Oh, oh, hold on, hold on
Oh, oh, hold on, hold on

[Instrumental break]

[Verse 3: IRO]
As she cries 'till the night
Promises of a life
Familiar voice in my name
Echoing feel the wait
I'll be back again
I'll be back again

[Verse 4: IRO]
Acts of God like a bear
Song of love, kiss of tear
Free of words, free of mind
I'll go forth by your side
Always on my mind
Always on my mind

[Pre-Chorus: IRO]
All the loss and all the pain
Open arms await

[Chorus 1: Both]
Hold on, baby
I'm almost home
I'm almost home
I'm almost home
You said:
Hold on, baby
I'm almost home
I'm almost home
I'm almost home

[Chorus 2: Nadia Ali]
Will you call for me?
Will you wait and see?
What you mean to me?
I said hold on, love
Will you call for me?
Will you wait and see?
What you mean to me?
I said hold on, hold on
Oh, oh, hold on, hold on
Oh, oh, hold on, hold on
Oh, oh, hold on, hold on

[Outro: IRO]
(Hold on, baby)
(Hold on, baby)

*****
"What?"
"Canceled. Didn't your friend tell you?"
Elisabeth stepped back slightly from the counter. "No," she whispered.

"Canceled within the last few minutes, from the looks of it." The man looked at her curiously. 
"Are you all right?"

Elisabeth looked over her shoulder. Shawn sat staring at his phone, her bags next to him, his shoulders slumped. As if on cue, he looked up, and their eyes met. He rose slowly.

She took a deep breath. "Yes. I'm fine. Thank you very much."

She turned away from the counter, stumbling slightly as she walked over to where Shawn stood with the bags. She scarcely felt her feet. It was as if the blood had drained out of her and she were floating on air.

"Canceled," she said.

Shawn said nothing, his gaze holding hers.

"Did you suspect? That he would cancel? That I would end up at the airport, dumped?" Elisabeth tried to say the words lightly, tried to smile. It was ironic, was what it was.

"No." For a moment, Shawn struggled to speak. Then he burst out, "Beth, if it were me, I would never let you get away from me. I've already done this thing. I made a mistake. I wouldn't make the same mistake twice. But maybe Gunnar was afraid to be the one who was dumped. So he dumped you instead."

Elisabeth nodded. There was a long silence as she thought. Then she reached out to put her hand on his arm.

"I don't know where to go," she said. "I don't know what to do. I've shut every door, dotted every i and crossed every t. I don't belong anywhere anymore."

Shawn put one hand over hers. "Come home, Beth. My dad would love to see you. And you can figure this thing out. Stay with us, and you can sort out the house after the weekend. No one's around anyway because of the holiday."

"A staycation at your house," Elisabeth said. She shook her head. "I never would have imagined."
Shawn squeezed her hand. "I promise I won't hassle you. I'll leave you alone. You need to figure this out on your own."

I've gone from being a Burnham of Greenleigh to a homeless person, in the span of a few hours. And it was part of the plan all along, except that I wasn't supposed to be here, and I wasn't supposed to be alone. And I just can't fight anymore.

She hesitated. Shawn was already walking toward the elevators. She took a moment, watching him, trying to judge if there was a hidden spring in his step. Was he smug? Happy? Thinking to himself that Gunnar was not to be trusted after all, and here was the proof?

Did he think that he'd won?

After the initial shock, the initial sense of mounting fear and dismay, anger began to well up in her chest.

She had kept her promise. Why hadn't Gunnar done the same?

After all that I've been through, she thought. After all that I've had to figure out and overcome. Selling the house. Getting rid of everything I own—everything the Burnhams have owned for centuries. Losing my literal place in my town, my hometown, the only home I've ever known! I did this because of you, Gunnar! You didn't have to change a damned thing in your life, but look at everything I've done and everything I've thrown away! Now, what?

She walked over toward the elevators, feeling her cheeks flush as she realized how angry she was. Anger wasn't an emotion she was used to—it wasn't very helpful in the practice of law—but she had turned her life upside down because of Gunnar, and she didn't feel she'd done anything to deserve being dumped at the airport, a two-hour car journey from home on Thanksgiving Day. Okay, she'd left town with an old boyfriend and slept with him, but sheesh. It was none of his business. She'd made it back on time. She'd rushed to the airport to make their flight. She'd upheld her part of the deal.

Shawn was stabbing at the elevator button. He wasn't looking her way, but was studying the slow progress of the floor number indicators as the elevator sat at the street-level baggage claim level for what seemed like an inordinate amount of time before starting its journey up toward their floor.

"I'm really sorry that you drove out all this way."

"Yeah. Sucks."

If there had been any hint of a smile on his face, or a lightness in his tone, she would have instantly decided to have him drop her off at a hotel in Boston, where she could sit alone and figure out what the best course of action was. But there was nothing, not even a carefully blank expression. As best as she could tell, he was pissed for her, pissed for himself, and thinking about turkey and football.

Maybe even Shawn could be pushed too far.

Maybe that was a good thing for her to notice. The limits of love. People had their limits. They thought that love melted everything away, but clearly that was not how it worked.

She had never thought of herself as having limits before. She could set limits, and expect people to respect them.

"Are you sure your dad won't mind if I stay with you for awhile? I don't know how long it will be until I can sort out the house. It's not under contract yet but there are so many interested buyers, there's no question about it selling."

"My dad loves having company, you know that. He'll talk your ear off, though. You won't get anything done."

The elevator doors opened. Inside the elevator there was a woman in a sari holding the hands of two angry toddlers who were trying to make a dash out the doors. Shawn plunked the bags in front of them just as one of them managed to slip his hand out of his mother's. She cried out in alarm, but the boy was unable to get around the suitcases, and began to howl.

"Thank you," the woman said in relief. Shawn smiled down at her as she began to scold the child. His sister stopped tugging, gazing up in fascination at Shawn, who towered above her mother. Shawn pulled a pack of gum from his pocket and offered it to her, and the little boy stopped crying when he saw his sister eagerly helping herself.

"Here you go," Shawn said, offering a stick to the boy. He did not reply, but snatched at the gum, and his mother apologized before scolding him once more. The boy chomped at his gum, then noticed that his sister had folded the silver gum wrapper into a triangle, and began to fold his own wrapper as well. Elisabeth and Shawn left them as they began to shout over each other's voices and show their harried mother their creations.

"I was that kid once," Shawn said as the doors closed behind them. "I hope they don't try to make a break for it through the parking lot. Too bad they didn't get off on our floor, I have some more tricks up my sleeve."

"I think the gum will last long enough for them to get to their car," Elisabeth said. "That was clever of you."

"Well. It takes one to know one. Aw, hell. I hope I remember how to get out of this place. I don't want to end up out in Revere somewhere." He backed the car out of the space, then realized he couldn't remember where he'd put the garage ticket, so he stopped to rummage through his pockets before putting the car back in gear.

This was the old Shawn, not the angry Shawn that had taken two hours out of his life to get her to an airport so that she could leave town with a man he didn't like. He was just the usual level of angry now, and she could deal with that.

Maybe she could handle her life on her own. She wasn't sure, because she'd never done it with any modicum of success before. Before Gunnar, she was broke, humiliated, desperate—all words that she didn't want to think about. Everyone who tried to help her seemed to be filled with pity for her. She didn't want pity, but frankly, her earlier life was pitiful.

Was this it, then? All the adrenaline that had built up around a move to Seattle—gone, poof, just like that? Was it back to the old life, helping out her neighbors and negotiating small claims court?

Elisabeth reached into her purse for her phone, and taking a deep breath, checked her texts. Nothing. He could have at least told her that he was canceling, she thought irritably. She was momentarily tempted to tap out an angry message. But she didn't even know what to say.

I was here, she thought. I never abandoned you. You were the one who abandoned me.

They were out of the parking facility and zipping along the empty highway, headed back out to the Mass Pike before she'd made her decision.

"I'd like to stay with you. If it's really okay. And if it's not—you need to tell me. Because—"

"Because it's not going to be like New York." Shawn finished the sentence for her. "Yeah. I know that. And I'm okay with it."

"Really? Just because—"

"Yeah," he interrupted. Was he trying to avoid hearing her say the words? Was he heading off her statements because he wanted to control the direction of the conversation?

She waited, because he sounded as if he had more to say. After a few minutes, she grew impatient.

"Every time I talk you interrupt," she complained. "And then I wait for you to keep talking, and you clam up."

"Talk, then."

"Nice to see you're back to normal," she retorted. "I thought you were being a little too nice in New York. This feels more like the Shawn I know."

He glared at her briefly before returning his gaze to the road. He clamped his lips together, and the silence grew.

Finally, he spoke, his voice tight.

"I don't want you to think I'm playing a game. I'm not. But Beth, I'm tapped out. I can't ride this kind of emotional roller coaster forever. And it's not like I had a plan to wait for Gunnar to flame out. You made your choice, I respected your choice. But this is a whole new situation now. And I want to help. I'm trying to help without you thinking I have some kind of ulterior motive."

"But I thought you loved me," she protested. "How did this change between last night and today?"

Silence. Then Shawn heaved a sigh.

"Look," he said. "I love you. I will always love you. We're always going to be connected—somehow. It doesn't matter where you are and who you're with. But you need to get through this. On your own. I think I understood that last night. Finally. You convinced me. And nothing has changed about that today, never mind what Gunnar said or did. So I'm trying to help. And I'm trying to tell you what I think is best. Which is for you to hang at my house for awhile. Figure out what you want to do. You shouldn't worry that I'm trying to get you to go back on your decision from last night. It's not like that. But if I'm not exactly friendly—you can't blame me. This is going to be hard. But I'm not going to hassle you to be with me. And that's all there is to it."

Right up until the last minute, he had begged her to stay. Right up until the minute he'd dropped her off at her house. She had his heart, she knew, but Gunnar was still in their way, even invisibly. Not only did she need to finally decide on Greenleigh, but she needed to figure out what had gone wrong with Gunnar before she could settle into any kind of permanent relationship with Shawn.

Suddenly the world seemed brighter.

She was smart. She was a lawyer. She had—temporarily—rid herself of the house as an albatross about her neck. She wasn't broke anymore. Shawn loved her. And now she had to deal with Gunnar. He had disappeared, but if she could just find him, even if it meant hunting him down in Seattle, she could clear this whole thing up.

For a change, she wasn't the pathetic one who needed his clarity and purpose. He was the one who needed her to set him straight.

She could do this. And then...maybe Shawn would still be there for her.