“Mom?”
“Honey, hi!”
“I’m leaving.”
“What?” Katherine sounds alarmed. “What do you mean? Where are you going?”
“I’m going home.”
“Honey—” she calls out to Isabel’s father “—pick up the phone! It’s Isabel! She’s checking herself out of the hospital! Isabel, did they say you were ready for that?”
“They said I could leave when I felt ready and I do.” Isabel feels like it is real now that she has told her mother. “Can you come pick me up?”
“Isabel? What’s wrong?” Her father sounds preoccupied to her.
She takes a deep breath, bathing her internal organs with oxygen, and releases it.
“Isabel?” Her father is calling out to her through the telephone line. Through years of missed opportunities. “What’s wrong?”
Though he cannot see her, she smiles into the phone.
“Oh, Dad—” there’ll be plenty of time to talk about that “—I’m ready to leave, that’s all.”
“Of course we can pick you up, honey,” Katherine says. “When?”
“Tomorrow. At ten. But if that’s not good for you it could be later, I suppose.”
“Tomorrow? So soon! It seems a little rushed,” Katherine says.
“Why are you leaving?” her father worriedly asks.
“It’s time, Dad.” Isabel has to sound sure of herself for her parents. She pictures Kristen’s wild-eyed return to Three Breezes, trapped between gurneys like a human burrito.
There is a slight pause while her parents struggle to decide whether to ask Isabel more questions or simply take their daughter’s word.
“We’ll be there,” her father says.
“Thanks,” Isabel says, hoping this time he means it.