Finally, I made my decision.
When I walked back into Dylan’s hospital room, he looked up in surprise. “Tom?”
I pulled up a chair and sat down. “I’ll pay for the surgery,” I said.
“Because I’m not like you, Dylan. I can’t leave you in trouble, no matter what you did to me.”
His eyes, bloodshot and weary, locked onto mine. “Why?” he whispered, his voice cracking.
“After everything I put you through, why would you help me?”
“Because abandoning someone isn’t a one-time act,” I said, my voice cold and measured. “It’s a wound that keeps reopening. Every time I thought I’d healed, the memory of being left behind would slice through me again.”
He broke down, tears streaming down his face.
“I’m sorry,” he choked out. “For everything. For abandoning you.
For failing you.”
“Sorry?” I leaned closer, my anger barely contained. “Sorry doesn’t erase 23 years of loneliness. Sorry doesn’t give me back the childhood I lost.
Sorry doesn’t replace the birthdays without a family, the Christmases without a brother.”
I let out a shaky breath as I tossed wads of money onto his bed. “I forgive you, Dylan. But forgiveness doesn’t mean forgetting.
Take this and save yourself. This is the least I can do for the brother I… never had. We’re done.
Our paths diverge here. GOODBYE.”
He nodded, too overcome with emotion to speak, his trembling hands gripping the hospital bed’s railing. I rose and walked out of the room, the weight on my chest feeling a little lighter.
I’d done the right thing.
I couldn’t change the past, but I wouldn’t let it define my future.
Dylan and I never saw each other again. But there were no more regrets.
Do you have any opinions on this?
Source: amomama
