I check my email to make sure. First class to LAX. I smile.
–Me: You’re the best!
I call the concierge in the lobby and ask them to arrange for a taxi pickup for the airport, then roll my suitcases out into the living room. I stop and put a hand over my fluttering belly. I’ve never done anything like this before. It feels like cutting ties, making my desires known, insisting on them, in fact…and hoping for the best. I’ve never not had the support of my family, and now here I am, not even telling them I’m leaving.
But I know that if I do, they’ll try to stop me.
My parents love me to pieces. Unfortunately, that means they can be a bit overprotective at times.
But I can’t let them run my life. They don’t have to sleep with my future husband and have his babies. I’m not having sex with a guy I feel nothing for.
I blow a kiss at the baby grand. “I’m going to miss you, sweetheart.”
Nothing calms my anxiety like playing the piano. If I could, I’d take it with me. But I can wait until I get to Ivy’s place. She has a Bösendorfer concert grand I can use.
Inhaling deeply, I grab my bags and head downstairs to go to the airport.
Chapter Three
Declan
I step off the flight from Thailand to Seoul and smooth the minor wrinkles in my shirt. My mood could best be described as extremely irritated, because the flight was five hours late. Which, of course, means I’ve missed my connection to LAX.
Just how difficult is it for the airline to maintain its fleet properly and operate on time?
Delays due to mechanical issues just mean the airline is terrible at its primary function. And I hurried through everything in Thailand to make the damned flight for nothing.
I pull out my phone and turn off airplane mode. Texts and alerts fill my screen. Some of them are from the airline about the damn flight, like I wouldn’t know I’ve been hugely inconvenienced without their idiotic alerts. A mountain of to-dos are waiting for me in L.A. I don’t have time to waste here, even if this airport is spectacularly spacious and nice.
One new email in particular is near the top of my inbox. Despite the fact that it’s in Japanese, I check it first because it’s going to be more effective than meds for bringing down my blood pressure.
Sure enough…
The email contains pictures of old golden retrievers. They look adorable and happy. I smile. Only a sociopath could stay angry seeing those panting doggy grins. And just look at those cute, bright eyes. The dogs are lovable. No other word for it.
This is exactly what I wanted when I started sponsoring a “retirement center” for old seeing eye dogs in Japan. I never knew what happened to those dogs. Actually, I never gave much thought to them at all, since I’ve never known anybody who needed one.
But three years ago on a long trans-Pacific flight, I watched a documentary about what the Japanese did with their animals once they grew too old to serve. Since they can’t be seeing eye dogs anymore, they’re sent to a kind of retirement center where they live out the rest of their lives. Their owners visit them if they live nearby. But it has to be painful for the dogs to be away from someone they’ve known and loved for so long.
Toward the end, the film featured a sick dog named Nana. That poor thing was old and suffering from an unspecified illness. A center worker said they were waiting for a vet to come in, while rubbing Nana to comfort her.
The slow way Nana blinked…and how unfocused her eyes were… It just gutted me. The film wasn’t trying to solicit donations. But I found out where the center was located, hired a translator and flew out there. Nana had already died, so there was nothing I could do for her. But I got to see the other dogs at the center. How intelligent and gentle they were, how happy they were to have a visitor, tails wagging and noses questing to meet this new person.
They’ve spent all their lives in training and service to humans. Now that they’re retired, they could use some pampering beyond what the center’s budget can give. Every single one of the dogs there deserves steak and biscuits. They deserve dignity.
I set up an annual donation on the spot.
Everyone was thrilled about the decision except my accountant. He advised me to choose a different organization to give money to, saying I couldn’t write it off my taxes. Apparently, a foreign entity that isn’t registered with the IRS doesn’t entitle me to a deduction. It’s my accountant’s job to worry about stuff like that, but I ignored his advice. It’s my money. I’ll give it to whoever I deem worthy, not who the IRS considers acceptable.
And I say those dogs deserve to be treated like royalty.
So every month, the center sends me updates and pictures…sometimes videos. I can’t read the updates because they’re in Japanese—Google Translate helps to sort of parse it out—but opening the updates is always a happy moment.
Finally I close the email, then send a quick text to my best friend Aiden.
–Me: Can’t make it for drinks like we planned. Got delayed.
–Aiden: That sucks. Some other time, then.