His room was at the very end of the hall on the fourth floor.
I stood outside it with my hand flat on the door, trying to work out how on earth I’d gotten there.
Forty-one years.
That’s how long it had been since I’d seen Jeffrey Hale. Forty-one years since his last letter, the one that asked me not to contact him again.
And now his son was standing beside me in the hallway saying:
“He’s been asking about every ten minutes if you’re here yet.”
I looked at him.
Peter had his father’s eyes. Exactly. That same gray-green, the same slight droop at the outside corner. I had to look away.
“Is he awake?”
“He’s been fighting to stay awake for you since eight o’clock.”
That almost made me turn around and walk back down the hall.
I Was Sixty Years Old
I’d spent most of my adult life learning how to live without that man.
