Grimacing from the pain in my leg, I checked myself into the hospital, borrowing a wheelchair from the nurse’s station. Kind strangers helped me navigate the halls until my wound was finally cleaned and bandaged. By the time the doctor finished, it was already past noon. Still, Sacha hadn’t returned yet nor called or messaged me once. Left with no other choice, I hailed a taxi and made my way home on my own.
By the time I stepped through my front door, it was late afternoon, and only then did Sacha finally call.
“Errol, where are you? I’m back here in the hospital,” she said, her voice irritated.
"I’m home," I replied calmly.
“You’re home? Why didn’t you tell me?” she snapped, her anger sparking over the line. “I went all the way back to here for nothing!”
Not once had she called to check on me, to see how I’d managed with my injury, or even how I’d gotten home. And now, the first thing she did was scold me for wasting her time.
If it were in the past, we would have had a big argument over the phone by now. I would’ve let all my frustration spill out. But now, it no longer seemed necessary.
Maybe, from the very beginning, it wasn’t that she didn’t understand my frustrations or didn’t know what I cared about. She just simply didn’t care. Holding the phone, I suddenly felt like laughing.
How absurd was it to keep demanding care and attention from someone who didn't want to give it to you in the first place?
"Hello? Are you going to say something?" Sacha barked, her impatience palpable through the phone.
I could only shake my head. “I thought you were busy,” I replied, my voice flat. “Didn’t you tell me not to bother you when you’re busy?”
Being reminded of her own words, she could only snort and hung up the phone.
For a long moment, I sat there in silence, the phone still clutched in my hand. In the past, she’d berate me for calling too much, for interrupting her precious time. Now that I didn’t call, she found a reason to be angry anyway. No matter what I did, I was wrong.
As the sky outside darkened, Sacha finally returned. She staggered through the door with a shopping bag dangling from her hand, clearly drunk. Her eyes then landed on me sitting on the couch as I watched TV, and without a word, she plopped down beside me with a smug smile playing on her lips.