“Jeffrey?”
“You remembered.”
“Of course I remembered.”
Forty-one years vanished in a single conversation.
Then Jeffrey’s voice broke.
“Ruthie, there’s something I need you to know before I die.”
I closed my eyes.
“What?”
“I was in love with you when we made that promise.”
I stopped breathing.
“Jeffrey…”
“And I had already bought the ring.”
My eyes opened.
“What ring?”
“The ring I planned to give you before I left for college.”
The room seemed to shift around me.
“Then why didn’t you?”
He started crying.
“That’s what I’ve spent forty years wishing I could explain.”
His voice dropped.
“I need you to come here.”
“Jeffrey…”
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“Please
come to the hospital.”
His breathing sounded strained.
“There’s something you need to see. Once you see it, maybe you’ll finally understand why I walked away.”
I grabbed my coat.
“Where are you?”
—
Forty minutes later, I entered Jeffrey’s hospital room.
He looked at me and smiled.
“Hey, Ruthie.”
I started crying before I could stop myself.
“Hey, idiot.”
Then I noticed the wooden box beside him.
I recognized it immediately.
It had belonged to my father, Thomas.
He kept important papers inside it when I was growing up.
After Dad died, I searched everywhere for that box and never found it.
I looked at Jeffrey.
“Why do you have my father’s box?”
“Open it.”
My hands trembled as I lifted the lid.
Inside were letters.
Dozens of them.
Some were written by my father.
Beneath them sat a small ring box.
I opened it.
Inside was a simple diamond
ring.
I stared at Jeffrey.
“You bought this?”
He nodded.
“Why didn’t you give it to me?”
He pointed toward another envelope.
Jeffrey’s name was written across the front.
The handwriting belonged to my father.
I unfolded the letter.
My father had written to Jeffrey shortly before he left for college.
He explained that I was likely to be accepted into a teaching program near home.
That I had an opportunity to build a future for myself.
Then he asked Jeffrey not to make me choose between that future and following him.
