Nights in Rodanthe - By Nicholas Sparks Page 0,48

edges, and he kept them downcast, as if trying to hide them.

“You know how to reach me at the clinic. I don’t know how good the mail service is, but letters should reach me. Mark’s always gotten everything Martha has sent him.”

“Thanks.”

He shook the pouch. “I have your address, too, in here. I’ll write to you when I get there. And call, too, when I get the chance.”

“Okay.”

He reached out to touch her cheek, and she leaned into his hand. They both knew there wasn’t anything more to say.

She followed him out the door and down the steps, watching as he loaded the duffel bags into the backseat of the car. After closing the door, he stared at her a long time, unwilling to break the connection, wishing again that he didn’t have to go. Finally he moved toward her, kissed her on both cheeks and on her lips. He took her in his arms.

Adrienne squeezed her eyes shut. He wasn’t leaving forever, she told herself. They were meant for each other; they would have all the time in the world when he got back. They would grow old together. She’d lived this long without him already—what was one more year, right?

But it wasn’t that easy. She knew that if her children were older, she would join him in Ecuador. If his son didn’t need him, he could stay here, with her. Their lives were diverging because of responsibilities to others, and it suddenly seemed cruelly unfair to Adrienne. How could their chance at happiness come down to this?

Paul took a deep breath and finally moved away. He glanced to the side for a moment, then back at her, dabbing at his eyes.

She followed him around to the driver’s side and watched as he got in. With a weak smile, he put the key in the ignition and turned it, revving the engine to life. She stepped back from the open door and he closed it, then rolled down the window.

“One year,” he said, “and I’ll be back. You have my word on that.”

“One year,” she whispered in response.

He gave her a sad smile, then put the car in reverse, and with that, the car began backing out. She turned to watch him, aching inside as he stared back at her.

The car turned as it reached the highway, and he pressed his hand to the glass one last time. Adrienne raised her hand, watching the car roll forward, away from Rodanthe, away from her.

She stood in the drive as the car grew smaller in the distance and the noise of the engine faded away. Then, a moment later, he was gone, as if he’d never been there at all.

The morning was crisp, blue skies with puffs of white. A flock of terns flew overhead. Purple and yellow pansies had opened their petals to the sun. Adrienne turned and made her way toward the door.

Inside, it looked the same as the day she’d arrived. Nothing was out of place. He’d cleaned the fireplace yesterday and stacked new cords of wood beside it; the rockers had been put back into their original position. The front desk looked orderly, with every key back in its place.

But the smell remained. The smell of their breakfast together, the smell of aftershave, the smell of him, lingering on her hands and on her face and on her clothes.

It was too much for Adrienne, and the noises of the Inn at Rodanthe were no longer what they had once been. No longer were there echoes of quiet conversations, or the sound of water rushing through the pipes, or the rhythm of footfalls as he moved about in his room. Gone was the roar of waves and the persistent drumming of the storm, the crackling of the fire. Instead, the Inn was filled with the sounds of a woman who wanted only to be comforted by the man she loved, a woman who could do nothing else but cry.

Sixteen

Rocky Mount, 2002

Adrienne had finished her story, and her throat was dry. Despite the breezy effects of a single glass of wine, she could feel the ache in her back from sitting in one position too long. She shifted in her chair, felt a tinge of pain, and recognized it as the beginnings of arthritis. When she’d mentioned it to her physician, he’d made her sit on the table in a room that smelled of ammonia. He’d raised her arms and asked her to bend her knees, then gave her