I frowned. Tears sprang to life in my eyes, and I shook my head as they started to fall.
My mother stopped walking, and I sank to my knees in the grass. She sat beside me, her dress fanning out all around her like she was in a Disney movie. She sighed and clasped her hands in her lap and let my cry.
It smelled like honey and hay here, just like it had when I was growing up. If I concentrated, I could pick up on other smells, too. A neighbor was baking apple pies. Maybe rhubarb. It was hard to tell the difference on smell alone. Another neighbor was cooking steaks. It smelled like hickory and frying onions.
I took a deep breath and closed my eyes. The tears rolling down my cheeks were warmer than the afternoon breeze.
“Why are you crying, baby girl?” my mother asked.
I shook my head.
She inched closer to me in the grass and took my face in her hands. She wiped my tears away with her thumbs, the way she used to when I was little and crying over a skinned knee or something another child said to me at school. She smiled at me. “You can tell me anything, Lina. Why are you crying?”
My bottom lip trembled. “I just want you to be proud of me, Mom.”
My mother smiled. She was the most beautiful woman I had ever seen. Her teeth were a radiant white from never drinking anything besides water or green tea with honey. In the summer, on a very hot day, she might have half a glass of chilled lemonade. But besides that, she always favored water. Her eyes were light green like mine but streaked with flecks of gold that shone as bright as the sun above our heads.
She tucked my hair behind my ears. “I am proud of you, baby girl. So proud.”
“I’m not what you wanted me to be.”
“And what did I want you to be, Lina?”
I looked up at her. “Something better than a model.”
My mother shook her head. “No. That’s not true. When you were ten and we went to pick blueberries down at the thicket, do you remember what I told you I wanted you to be?”
I thought hard back to that day. My mother had wanted fresh berries to make a blueberry pie, and I wasn’t the sort of kid to turn down the chance to load up my belly with blueberries, so I went with her while my father stayed home and read the paper.
As we were picking berries, my mom asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up. I told her I wanted to be a veterinarian—like every other kid on the planet. She had smiled at me and told me that was a wonderful thing to be.
Then, out of sheer curiosity, I had asked her what she wanted me to be.
She’d paused, a blueberry pinched between her thumb and forefinger, about to be plucked from its branch, and she’d smiled. She let go of the berry and crouched down in front of me. Her cream-colored skirt was stained blue, as were her lips from sneaking in a berry every few minutes. She took my shoulders in her hands and rubbed them with her thumbs.
Then she had said the simplest thing to me. “I want you to be happy, baby girl. That’s all. Just happy.”
Now, as my mother stood before me free of blueberry stains, her words rang in my head. I nodded, and she let go of my face. “You said you wanted me to be happy.”
“And are you?”
My bottom lip trembled again. “No, Mom. I’m not. I’m so alone.”
She laughed. I looked up, confused. She was shaking her head at me so vigorously that her braid fell over her back. “Oh, sweetheart, you are so very far from being alone.”
“But I don’t have anyone. I go home to an empty apartment once every few weeks and think about you and Dad and everything I’ve lost.”
“You can choose to think about other things. Like Kelli. And Judy. They still need and love you very much.”
“Kelli,” I breathed. Her name stirred something inside me that felt wrong. Fearful. It felt like there was something I had forgotten.
My mother took my hand and rose slowly to her feet. “You still have a lot of trials to endure, baby girl. But you will never have to face them alone. Your father and I are always with you, no matter what. And with us in your heart, you can face anything. Right?”
“I don’t know.”
“Of course you do,” my mother said, her laughter floating around us in the breeze. “Come on! Let go, Lina. Let go!”
She let go of my hand and, with a bubbly giggle, lifted the skirt of her dress and started running barefoot through the grass.
I watched her go. Her braid flew behind her as she went, and her laughter fluttered back to me, filling my chest with lightness and hope and joy. Why couldn’t I have held on to this a little bit longer?
I ran after her.
She cried out with delight and threw her arms up to the cloudless sky as she twirled in dizzying circles. When I caught up with her, she took both my hands, and we both leaned back, spinning in wide circles, both of us laughing with our eyes closed.
The sun was radiant and warm on my face. It was bright behind my eyelids. I felt like the same little girl I used to be. Free. Wild. Full of life and spirit and not burdened by heartbreak or fear or loss.
Death.
Grief.
Guilt.
When we stopped spinning, we fell apart and collapsed on our backs on the grass. We stared up at the cloudless sky and caught our breath.
“Were you happy, Mom?”
My mother peered over at me through the tall blades of grass. “Yes, baby girl. I was happy. So was your father. Very happy. And we loved and still love you more than anything.”
“I love you guys too. And I miss you like crazy.”
My mother reached for me through the grass, and I took her hand. “It’s time you find someone else to love, baby girl. Someone who will make you laugh like your father did. Who will keep you safe. And love you. And cherish you. And who you can make a life with and create memories with of your own. It’s time to stop looking back.”
I swallowed. “But I don’t want to forget you.”
“You could never forget me, Lina. Even if you tried. Your father and I are part of you. But death is a part of all things. It does not mean new love and life can’t bloom again. It is like a flower. Destined to grow and die and be reborn over and over. But you must water your flower to keep it strong.”
I smiled.
My mother sat up, and I sat up with her. She gazed out across the open field and lifted her other hand, pointing out over the hills in the distance. “Do you see him, out there?”
I looked where she was pointing and squinted against the glare of sunlight. Then I saw him, a man walking away with his head down and his hands in his pockets. He was in shadow, even though there were no clouds above him.
“Yes,” I whispered.
“He is your flower, Lina. He always has been, and you know it. You’ve known it for a long, long time. And he,” my mother smiled, “well, he has needed a bit more time to figure it out.”
Cal stopped walking through the tall grass and turned back to me. I couldn’t make out his face, but I felt him smile, and the shadow over and around him disappeared. He reached his hand out as if inviting me to go with him.
I looked back at my mother.
She nodded after Cal. “Go to him, baby girl. He is your flower.”
15
Callum
My chin hit my chest, waking me up for the tenth time in the last hour. I sucked in a breath and sat up a bit straighter in the rigid, metal-framed chair beside Lina’s hospital bed. Monitors beeped all around me in that steady yet unsettling way that they did, and nurses bustled by soundlessly out in the hall as Lina slept.
She hadn’t woken since the accident three days ago. She’d been here, on her back, pale and expressionless, for over seventy-nine hours now. The doctors had told Kelli’s mother, the closest person Lina had to a relative, that Lina had bleeding and swelling in her brain. They were unsure if she would ever wake up, and if she did, they didn’t know what state she would be in. There was a chance she would not be the same person she was before the crash. She might have
lost her ability to speak, to walk, to be.
She also might not wake up at all.
I rubbed at my eyes with the heels of my hands and groaned without meaning to. When I opened my eyes again, my vision was blurred with white splotches from rubbing too hard. I peered around and sought out a pitcher of water that one of the day nurses had brought before I dozed off. I poured myself a small paper cup full of water and drank it down before refilling it.
A soft knock on the door made me look up.
Judy Rollins stood in the doorframe, illuminated by the fluorescent hallway lights behind her. “Hi, Cal. Do you mind if I come in?”
“Of course,” I said, motioning her in with my hand.
Lina had a private room down the hall from Kelli.
Judy came in and sat in the chair beside me. She put her brown leather purse in her lap and stared at the young woman on the bed before us for a few minutes before she sighed and glanced at me. Her knuckles were stark white as she gripped the straps of her purse. “How is she?”
“About the same,” I said.
Judy licked her lips. “You don’t have to stay, you know? You’ve been here for three days, Cal. I can watch over her if you want to go home and get some rest.”
“No,” I said, forcing myself to smile at her. She was going through worse than me. Both her daughters were lying in hospital beds. “I can’t leave her alone. Besides, you have enough on your plate as it is. I’m the one who should be offering to help you.”
Judy’s smile was tight lipped and more of a grimace. But she tried anyway. “I appreciate that, Cal. It’s been… difficult.”
I nodded. “How is Kelli?”
Judy looked down at the bag in her lap. “Today hasn’t been good, if I’m being honest with you. We sat down with the doctors this morning, and they… they gave Kelli their prognosis.”
“Which is?” I asked. Then I realized I was being inconsiderate. I shook my head apologetically. “I shouldn’t pry. We don’t need to talk about this.”
“They told her she won’t walk again.”
I knew my mouth was open, but I was incapable of closing it. I just sat there like an idiot, staring at the mother of a girl who had just received life-changing, terrible news. I swallowed hard and forced my tongue to work. I took a steadying breath. “Judy, I’m—”
She looked at me and gave me a real smile this time. She put her hand on my knee. “I know, Cal. It’s all right. It’s not your fault. If anything, without you getting to them when you did, things could have been a whole lot worse.”
Her words didn’t make me feel any better. “I should go see her.”
“No, she doesn’t want visitors. She’s not ready for that sort of thing yet. I think she needs some time to wrap her head around this, and we’ll take each day as it comes. I just wish…” She trailed off and sighed. She leaned forward and put her purse on the floor between her feet before running her hands up and down her thighs. “I wish her father was here. I don’t know how to handle all this on my own.”
“You seem to be handling it well from where I’m sitting.”
She smiled. “Thank you. You’ve always been kind, Cal. Lina would appreciate you staying by her side like this. Even given the circumstances.”
I shrugged. “I don’t know if I’m doing it for her or for me to be honest. All I know is I can’t leave.”
“Nobody would blame you if you did.”
I shook my head. “I would.”
Judy didn’t say anything after that. She stayed beside me for another ten minutes or so, listening to the infuriating blip and beep of the monitor over Lina’s right shoulder and gazing upon the girl in the bed. She was pretty banged up. She’d taken a hard blow to the head. She had stitches about an inch and a half above her right ear. They’d had to shave a small amount of hair in order to get the work done. If she styled it properly, it would be easy to hide.
Of course, that was assuming she would wake up and be capable of styling her hair again.
I swallowed. I couldn’t go down that line of thought. It led to nowhere but darkness and unease. And guilt. So much fucking guilt.
Judy got to her feet, went to the bed, and kissed Lina’s forehead. Then she turned to me. “I’m going to get back to Kelli now. Come get me if you need a break. Seriously.”
“Same goes for you.”
She nodded. “Sounds more than fair.”
“Goodnight, Judy.”
“Goodnight, Cal,” she said before slipping out into the hallway. I listened to the heels of her boots strike the linoleum as she made her way four rooms down.
And then I was alone with Lina again.
I rubbed at my forehead and eyes to try to keep the fatigue at bay. It only sort of worked. I drank more water, stood up, walked around, and stopped at the big bay window to look out at the Pittsburgh city lights all around us.
It had snowed yesterday. The roofs of buildings lower than the eighth floor of Lina’s hospital room were white. The streets far below were mostly rid of snow, which had been pushed up to the curb by plows. The blanket of white made the lights seem even brighter. Christmas lights winked on apartment balconies and along roofs and windows. Trees glittered in front of patio doors, and I thought of Asher, who had been at home with my dad for the last few days. He wanted to put the tree up. I’d promised we would soon.
As soon as I could wrap my head around celebrating.
It would be hard this year after everything that had happened, but that wasn’t Asher’s fault. He deserved a damn good Christmas, and I was going to give it to him.
“Tomorrow,” I said. If Lina didn’t wake up by tomorrow, I would go home, and we would put up the tree and watch Christmas movies. Otherwise, I might never leave this place.
My attention was pricked when the beeping on Lina’s monitors quickened in speed.
It had happened so slow at first that I didn’t realize until it had nearly doubled. I turned around to put my back to the window.
She was looking at me.
“Lina?” My voice was barely a whisper.
She blinked.
I moved slowly toward the bed. She gripped the sheets, and her eyes widened a little bit. Was she afraid of me?
I stopped moving toward her. It took all my will to stay where I was and not go to her, not fall down on my knees beside the bed and cry like a child out of relief that she was awake. “Lina, are you all right?”
Her lips formed an ‘O’ and it looked like she was about to speak, but no words came out. Her brow furrowed, and she made a sound in the back of her throat.
“Are you in pain?” I asked.
Lina shook her head slowly.
“I’m going to get the doctor,” I told her.
I walked around the bed. She never moved, but her eyes remained fixed on me as I went out into the hall and looked both ways. I spotted a man in a white doctor’s coat and recognized him immediately. He’d been in and out of Lina’s room for the last few days, going over her bloodwork and checking her monitors. I hurried toward him as he scanned a file on a clipboard.
“Doctor?”
The doctor looked up at me and pushed his silver-framed glasses up his nose. “Yes?”
“Lina Nelson is awake.”
He brushed by me immediately, and I followed him into her room.
Lina was trying to sit up straighter, and the doctor hovered around her and talked in a calm, soothing voice. He told her that she was all right. That she was at Pittsburgh General Hospital. That she had taken a hit to the head and had been sleeping for a few days. Then he asked her how she was feeling.
Her light green gaze flicked from him to me. And then she asked, “Who are you?”
“I’m Doctor Brennan.”
She didn’t look at him. “Not you. Him.”
My heart fell out of my chest. All I could think about was how she used to look at me. In high school, she looked at me with love and admiration and pride. At the reunion, she looked at me with distast
e and anger and disappointment. But now, the glazed look in her eye was empty. She had no clue who I was.
“I’m Callum,” I said.
The doctor patted Lina’s hand. “Lina, do you know who you are?”
She turned her attention to him and licked her lips. She shook her head.
Doctor Brennan gave her a well-rehearsed, reassuring smile before looking over his shoulder at me. “Would you give me and Miss Nelson a moment alone? I will meet you out in the hallway in a few minutes.”
I nodded, dropped my head, and went out into the hallway. My heart raced. Sweat formed on the nape of my neck, and I crammed my hands into my pockets to prevent myself from fidgeting.
I had to wait about ten minutes. It felt like an eternity. Then Doctor Brennan came out of Lina’s room and closed her door behind him.
I pushed myself off the wall. “How is she? What does this mean?”
The doctor held up his hand. “Slow down, son. This is a lot. Even for me. She has memory loss from the brain swelling. This can happen, and it’s something we were prepared for. She’ll need to stay in the hospital for another night, maybe two, just to make sure the swelling is gone and she is healthy, and then she’ll be released. But she has no recollection of who she is, and therefore who anyone else in her life is. Including you. She will need twenty-four/seven care.”
“I can give her that.”
“I’ll have to clear that with Mrs. Rollins.”
I nodded. “That’s fine. What should I do? How can I help her remember?”
Doctor Brennan sighed and leaned over to pump a wad of hand sanitizer into his palm from a dispenser on the wall beside me. “Well,” he said as he massaged the stuff into his hands. “You can start by taking her to places that hold meaning to her. Places she used to go to. Do things she used to do. Things like that should help jog her memory. But, of course, you should be prepared for the worst-case scenario.”
“Which is?” I didn’t need to ask. I knew what his answer would be.
“That she might not ever remember who she is. Or who you are.”
My Holiday Reunion: A Second Chance Holiday Romance Page 9