Just Once

by Lori Handeland

  How many times had she thought that sentence in the past month?

  ‘It’s …’ Frankie struggled for a word.

  ‘Excruciating. Horrific. Demoralizing. Exhausting.’

  ‘Nightmarish,’ Frankie said. ‘Surrealistic. He keeps asking for Lisa.’

  ‘Shit,’ Hannah muttered.

  ‘Yeah. He had a nightmare.’

  ‘Vietnam? Beirut? Nine eleven?’

  ‘Lisa. He never discussed exactly how she died before.’

  Which was probably why he’d told her now. Much easier to share what he believed to be a dream than reality.

  ‘Was it hard to hear?’ Hannah asked.

  ‘No.’ It hadn’t been pleasant, but it had also felt good to know everything at last. She’d suspected Charley had been taking pictures when their daughter died, but she’d never known. Had never wanted to know, so she hadn’t asked.

  ‘How did you do it?’ she repeated.

  ‘I just did it. There’s no one way to go about something like that. I was there for Heath until he didn’t need me to be any more.’

  ‘All right,’ Frankie said. ‘I can do that.’ She didn’t really have much choice. ‘You’ll catch a flight tomorrow?’

  ‘Sure,’ Hannah said, and hung up.

  Frankie wasn’t sure how she knew Hannah was lying, but she did. She couldn’t blame her for not wanting to be here. Hannah had done this once already.

  Oddly, Frankie was disappointed. She could do this. She would do this. But it would have been nice to do it with Hannah. They’d forged a connection – not a friendship, not really, or maybe just not yet – but it was a connection Frankie had with no one else.

  Frankie returned to Charley’s room. His breathing seemed faster than usual; some nights it seemed slower. According to the visiting nurse, this was common as the end rolled near.

  She pulled the chair closer to the bed so she could hold his hand, then she laid her cheek on the mattress. She was so tired, but she didn’t want him to die alone. She didn’t think she could stand that.

  She woke with dawn just tinting the sky. The room held a soft, pink light that reminded Frankie of a painting of heaven that Charley’s mom had kept above their mantel.

  Charley’s eyes were open. For a minute she thought he was gone.

  ‘Charley!’ She squeezed his hand, which still lay in hers.

  His fingers didn’t respond. They felt far too cool. But his gaze flicked to her face. A tear popped out of the corner of one eye and trickled down.

  ‘Lisa,’ he managed, his voice hoarse and a bit lispy.

  Had he had a stroke?

  ‘I should call …’ She started to stand.

  ‘No!’ The word was perfectly clear, but his hand in hers remained limp. ‘I need Lisa.’

  Frankie realized she was crying too. ‘I’m sorry. She’s …’ Frankie found it hard to breathe. ‘Coming. She’ll be here soon, Charley. Hold on, OK?’

  She didn’t want him to go. She knew he would, he had to, if not now, then soon. But …

  Not now. Please, just …

  Not. Now.

  His gaze, which had been locked on hers, suddenly shifted, and he smiled his Charley-smile. ‘Oh.’ He drew in a deep breath. ‘There she is.’

  That breath left him on a sigh.

  Frankie waited for him to take another.

  But he didn’t.

  Hannah

  Hannah slipped into the cottage just as the moon died. The night was so dark in that instant before the sun rose, she thought she knew what death felt like.

  She shook off that morbid thought. Wasn’t death called ‘going into the light’? She hoped that was true.

  Inside the place was quiet as a tomb.

  ‘Sheesh.’ She really needed her brain to shut up.

  When she had told Frankie she would catch a plane in the morning she’d been lying, but only because she’d never left. She’d taken a room in Green Bay and waited for Frankie to call.

  She had plenty to think about. For instance, what she was going to do with the rest of her life. You was gone. She was too old to start over at National Geographic, and she discovered she didn’t really want to. That had been a dream of her youth and she wasn’t young any more. These days she felt pretty old.

  Then her mother had called and given her even more to think about. Good old Mom.

  She’d also had a lot of calls to make regarding Charley’s medical bills – the Veteran’s Administration, the US Army, Dr Lanier, and finally a lawyer. She was confident that everything would be taken care of. If anyone wanted to give her trouble, she had plenty of ammunition in Charley’s final photographs. They said a picture was worth a thousand words and an essay depicting the famous Charley Blackwell dying from cancer, along with a story about Agent Orange and its effects, might go a long way toward resolving any future issues for others. She’d learned how to raise a ruckus from the best in that business.

  Hannah hadn’t planned to come back to the cottage while Charley was alive; she didn’t want him to be upset, to die confused or frightened. She didn’t want him to die anything but at peace, and she’d do whatever she could to make sure that happened. Even give up the final moments at his side that were rightfully hers.

  So when Frankie had called and said it would be soon, she’d stared at the ceiling for hours. But eventually she had been unable to resist driving north.

  She peeked into the room. Frankie sat in a chair, her head on the bed at Charley’s hip, her hand wrapped around his. She was asleep.

  Charley looked asleep too, so she tried to memorize his face. She knew it would fade from her mind, as her brother’s had. Luckily she’d had Charley’s pictures to remind her of just the way Heath had tilted his hat and winked. The world was a lesser place without Heath Cartwright, and it would be an even lesser place without Charley Blackwell.

  But his pictures … those could keep Charley alive in everyone’s mind for a long, long time. And, perhaps, they could do some good for others as well.

  Charley’s eyes opened and Hannah quickly stepped back. She waited for him to shout for her to get out, get lost.

  She shouldn’t have come.

  But he remained silent and she stood just out of sight and listened to him breathe the way she used to when they were first married and she was amazed that this man loved her.

  She’d been so happy then. He had been happy too. Eventually. At first he was still mourning the loss of his child and, she could admit it now, the loss of his wife. But they’d forged a path together that had been good, if not great. And if he’d murmured ‘Fancy’ or ‘baby’ sometimes in the night, well … now she knew why.

  In truth, she’d always known why. It didn’t make Hannah love him any less.

  The sun began to come up with a strange pinkish light. She found herself fascinated by it and she watched the dust motes dance in that light, turning every shade of dawn.

  ‘Lisa,’ Charley croaked, and Frankie answered him softly.

  Hannah hovered in the hall, listening to them talk. Tears streamed down her cheeks. She didn’t bother to wipe them off. She wanted to go to him so badly. But she’d only make things worse.

  ‘Oh,’ Charley said. ‘There she is.’

  Utter silence descended. Hannah’s skin prickled as her ears strained to hear one more labored breath. But the sound was gone.

  Charley was gone.

  Hannah stepped to the doorway. The whole room was tinged salmon and gold. She couldn’t remember seeing anything quite that color before.

  Frankie’s face was wet with tears, same as Hannah’s, but in her eyes joy warred with sorrow. ‘You heard?’

  Hannah nodded and crossed the room.

  They hugged each other tightly; then they rocked, back and forth, and didn’t let go for a long, long time.

  ‘Do you think she was here?’ Frankie asked.

  Hannah remembered that dream she’d had of Heath, how real it had felt, how much it had comforted her at the ti
me.

  ‘I do,’ she said.

  ‘Me, too.’

  Frankie

  Two weeks later

  ‘Do you want to keep this place?’ Hannah asked.

  They were still at the cottage, and it had been nice. Together they’d dealt with the minutiae of Charley’s death. Irene couldn’t figure them out.

  ‘You hated her for twenty years.’

  ‘Twenty-four.’

  ‘And now you’re BFFs?’

  ‘Jealous?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘No one can ever replace you.’

  ‘She replaced you,’ Irene said.

  She hadn’t. Frankie knew that now.

  ‘Did you forgive him in the end?’ Irene asked. ‘Let him off the hook, make everything OK?’

  ‘How could I forgive him for something he didn’t remember?’

  Irene uttered a few curses. Apparently she hadn’t forgiven Charley. Frankie hadn’t expected that she would.

  ‘You’d be impressed with Hannah.’

  ‘Doubtful.’

  ‘She’s handled everything like a drill sergeant. There was some issue with Charley’s insurance, but there isn’t any more. They actually seem a little scared of her.’

  It had been fun to watch.

  Hannah was not who Frankie had believed she was. She felt a little badly about what she’d believed. The only way to fix that was to believe something else.

  ‘Hannah’s my friend,’ she said.

  ‘Good God,’ Irene muttered.

  ‘I’ll see you at the memorial?’ Frankie asked.

  Irene gave a long, put-upon sigh. ‘Of course.’

  They were having a memorial for Charley in DC. Most of his colleagues still worked at National Geographic and if they didn’t, they lived nearby.

  Frankie hadn’t bothered to call Charley’s brothers. Neither had Hannah. Only people who loved Charley were allowed. There would be plenty.

  ‘Frankie?’ Hannah spread her hands. ‘The cottage? You want it?’

  ‘I seem to recall that everything, right down to his last camera, lens and camera bag, goes to you.’ Frankie shut the sliding glass door and flipped the lock.

  Hannah winced. ‘God, I was a bitch.’

  ‘So was I. We had our reasons. We got over it.’

  ‘Not completely.’

  ‘There are some instances where being a bitch is called for.’

  Hannah gave her a high five.

  Frankie stood in the center of the living room and turned a slow circle. The two people she loved the most in the world had died here. While some might want to hold on to that and mourn, she wasn’t one of them.

  ‘I don’t want the cottage.’

  ‘Me either. I’ll put it on the market. After.’

  They were flying to DC that day. The memorial was the next morning.

  ‘You sure you don’t want to stay with me?’ Hannah asked.

  ‘Thanks, but no.’

  She might be friends with Hannah now; they’d been through a lot. And in loving the same man, Frankie thought they’d learned to love each other. She’d never seen it coming.

  However, she did not want to spend several days in the apartment where Hannah and Charley had lived and loved and laughed what appeared to be a helluva lot from those snapshots. She did have limits.

  Hannah nodded as if she understood. Frankie was certain that she did.

  ‘My mother retired from Balfour Publishing.’

  ‘That was random,’ Frankie said.

  ‘Not in my head.’ Hannah set her bag next to Frankie’s at the door. ‘I’ve been offered her job.’

  ‘That’s great!’ Frankie had been a bit worried about what Hannah would do to occupy herself now that both You and Charley were gone. To be honest, Frankie was kind of concerned about what she was going to do now that Charley was gone.

  This time they’d had together, while difficult, had also been a gift. She’d fallen in love with him again, or maybe just admitted that she loved him still. And while that should have made losing him more painful, instead, in making his final days peaceful, she’d also found peace. Not only had she been able to forgive him, she’d been able to forgive herself. She could move on now, whereas before she’d only been treading time.

  ‘I was thinking of publishing a compendium of Charley’s work.’

  ‘OK.’ She wasn’t sure why Hannah was telling her. Despite their friendship, Hannah still owned everything down to the last camera bag, which included Charley’s slides, minus the ones of Lisa. Frankie had yet to go through them. But she would soon.

  It was time.

  ‘I’d like it if you worked on the book with me. Nobody understands him like we do.’

  Hannah had said something similar to her once before and Frankie had thought soon no one else ever would. But if they did the book, then wouldn’t everyone?

  The idea of a book with all three of their names on it was intriguing. Besides, the world should always be able to see itself the way that Charley had.

  ‘I’d like that too.’ Frankie picked up the urn that held Charley, took one step toward the door, then held it out. ‘You want him?’

  Hannah opened the door and picked up their bags. ‘How about we take turns?’

  Whatever anger or jealousy they’d once harbored for each other seemed to have melted away in their shared goal to allow Charley to die at peace. Frankie knew how hard it must have been for Hannah to leave him with her, to not stand at his side at the end, but she’d done it for Charley. Hannah understood how hard it was for Frankie to stay with him, to pretend that everything was all right when it hadn’t been for years, to lie to him until his last, dying second about Lisa. But Frankie had done it for Charley.

  They stepped out of the cottage and Hannah put down the bags to lock up. The wind swirled in, stirring their hair, and both of them stilled.

  ‘You smell that?’ Frankie asked.

  ‘Graham crackers.’ Hannah sniffed. ‘And basil.’

  Then the wind died as suddenly as it had come and all Frankie could smell were the pines.

  ‘Goodbye,’ Frankie whispered.

  ‘Goodbye.’ Hannah picked up the bags.

  The sun was just peeking over the trees to the east, casting bright yellow rays across the cottage, the water and them.

  ‘A whole new day,’ Frankie said.

  ‘It’s a whole new world,’ Hannah agreed.

  Together, they went into the light.

  Acknowledgments

  This book has been a true labor of love for me, one that haunted me for years before I wrote it. I have several people to thank.

  My agent, Robin Rue, who adored Just Once from the beginning and became an untiring advocate to see it published. Also Robin’s assistant, Beth Miller, who read the manuscript on the subway and wept, proving I’d hit the mark.

  The team at Severn House that has understood my vision for the book from day one and never wavered: Kate Lyall Grant, Sara Porter, Claire Ritchie and all those who have worked behind the scenes to make my dream for Just Once a reality.

  My go-to medical gurus: Dr Joan Handeland of Prevea Health in Green Bay (also a wonderful sister in law!) and Laura Iding, Risk Management at Froedtert Hospital in Milwaukee. All mistakes are, of course, my own.

  My father, Buck Miller, a photographer whose vision the world misses almost as much as I miss him.

  Last but never least, my husband who never wavers in his belief that I am the most talented, beautiful, best at everything woman. He’s delusional, but we’ll let him keep those delusions.

  And thank you, readers, for coming along with me on this new journey. May it be long and full of books!

 

 

 
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