by Gina Holmes
Craig’s shoulders slumped as he watched the car pull away, and I could almost feel his heart breaking. I reminded myself that he promised to visit me daily, even if it meant being nice to David.
My father, on the other hand, said he couldn’t make the same promise. He’d forgiven David’s father for the most part, but David was another story.
As we rounded the corner, I took a deep breath and turned around.
Chapter Thirty-seven
As David sat at his desk on the opposite side of the living room punching numbers into a calculator, I sat in a wheelchair by the bay window watching the wind blow through barren treetops. If he was aware of my presence in the house, you wouldn’t know it. How Lindsey could stand living with him was beyond me.
He was scarcely aware of anyone or anything’s presence except his beloved Lindsey, his stock portfolio, and the television set when the Virginia Tech Hokies played. Apparently I was the only one in the house it seemed to bother, so I kept my opinions to myself.
Sweet Pea meowed at his feet. David frowned at him and gently kicked the cat away with the side of his shoe. Sweet Pea’s orange fur shot up as he bared his teeth. David flinched and drew back his legs. When the cat sashayed away, not making good on his threat, David mumbled something about a gift that keeps on giving and dove back into his spreadsheet.
I heard a car pull into the driveway. The side of David’s mouth curled up, and I knew he was relieved to have his wife home. He needed her almost as much as Isabella needed me. After a few minutes, Lindsey fluttered through the front door, carrying department store shopping bags in one hand and holding my daughter’s hand with the other.
“Look, Mommy!” Isabella ran to me. She patted the hot pink earmuffs she wore and grinned.
“Wow,” I said, trying to keep my drooping eyes open. I’d been awake for only half an hour. I shouldn’t be as tired as I was.
“Mommy Lindsey bought them for me.”
My heart tripped on the new endearment. Lindsey couldn’t have looked more guilty as her gaze flew to me.
If I hadn’t been dying, the thought of my baby calling anyone besides me Mommy, Mama, or any derivative close to them would have broken my heart. But this, I reminded myself, was the goal of my being there. This was good.
Lindsey started to stutter an explanation, but I cut her off. “It’s okay,” I said. “That’s what we want.” A moment of panic overtook me. “When can we plant the tree? We need to do it soon before it’s too late.”
Her smile looked sad. “You already did. Your father helped you, remember?”
“That’s right,” I said, relaxing. “That’s right.”
Isabella’s gaze traveled between us, then settled on me again. “Mommy, can you come play Barbie with us?”
I reached my hand out to touch her, but my arm was so weak that it dropped back to my side. “Maybe after my nap, sweetness.”
Isabella crossed her arms. “All you do is sleep!”
Lindsey laid her bags down and hurried over to me. “Honey, your mommy’s sick, remember? Isn’t it nice that she stayed awake just so she could see your new earmuffs before she took a nap?”
Isabella’s scowl dissolved. “You stayed awake just to see my earmuffs?”
“Of course,” I said. “And they were well worth it.”
“Do you really like them?” she asked, patting them once again.
“They sure do look pretty on you,” I said with a yawn.
“Come on, Bells, let’s help your mommy to bed so she’ll have the energy to read you your bedtime story tonight.”
I mouthed a thank-you to Lindsey. She had become such a godsend. Without her and my hospice nurse, I don’t know how I would have survived the last few weeks. Mama Peg wasn’t strong enough to bathe me or help me to the bathroom, and I was thankful I didn’t have to let my father or Craig see me in such unflattering situations. But Lindsey handled it gracefully, affording me a dignity I know I wouldn’t have been able to keep had I stayed at my father’s house or with Craig at the saddle barn.
Lindsey wheeled the chair I occupied to my room, helped me pivot into bed, and covered me up. Isabella leaned down and kissed my cheek. Lindsey surprised me by doing the same. I would never have thought it possible, but somewhere over the last weeks, I’d grown to love this woman, who I knew had also grown to love me. I looked at them, my heart overflowing.
I studied Lindsey, with her doe eyes and sweet spirit, and finally understood why David had chosen her. I would have too, I thought without a twinge of jealousy.
Lindsey laid a finger over her lips to signal Isabella to be quiet as they started for the door.
“Wait,” I said.
They both turned.
“Lindsey, please make sure you wake me before she goes to bed.”
“I always do,” she said softly.
“I’d like for you to come too this time.”
She gave me a questioning look.
“Tonight’s bedtime story is going to be about the day I brought Bella home from the hospital. I thought you might want to hear it too. I tell her that story every year on her birthday. And since you’ll be pinch-hitting . . .”
She laid a hand over her heart as her eyes filled with tears. I could tell by the shape of her lips that she was trying to thank me, but the words wouldn’t come.
“I love you,” I said, making deliberate eye contact with both of them.
“I love you too, Mommy,” Isabella said.
Lindsey covered her mouth. Tears trickled over her hand as she closed the door.
Chapter Thirty-eight
Three weeks later, pain ripped into my right side. I tried to lift my head, but it throbbed so severely, I had no choice but to lay it back down. I must have forgotten to take my pain pill before I fell asleep. Lindsey was usually good at reminding me, but maybe she’d been distracted by Isabella and had forgotten.
I opened my eyes, surprised to find my father’s head resting on the mattress beside me. “Daddy,” I whispered. “Can you help me?”
His eyes shot open and he sat upright, looking shaken and confused. “What is it, pumpkin? What’s wrong?”
My throat felt like sandpaper, but that was the least of my problems. Every nerve in my body felt as though it were on fire. “It hurts.”
“It’s okay, Mr. Lucas. I’ve got her medicine right here.”
A woman with black curls and a round, chocolate face leaned close to me. She smelled like cotton candy. “Hey, sweet stuff. Long time no see.”
“Hi, Darlene.” I winced. “How long?”
“You were out about two days this time. It hurts bad, doesn’t it?”
“These tears aren’t from joy,” I said.
Her dark eyes filled with sympathy as she brushed the damp hair from my face. “I’ve been giving you your medicine as shots, but now that you’re awake, you may want something you can swallow.”
I ran my dry tongue over my teeth and tasted the mint of toothpaste. I wondered if it had been my hospice nurse, Darlene, or Lindsey who had groomed me this time. “I don’t remember any shots.”
Darlene smiled. “I’ll take that as a compliment. So what do you prefer, injection or pill?”
I groaned in pain. “Whatever works fastest.”
She must have already been preparing to give me a shot because she pulled a syringe from her lab jacket pocket. “I’m only going to give you half of what I normally do because you have some visitors and I don’t want to knock you out again. It should be enough to take the edge off at least. Okay?”
I tried to look around the room, but the pain was so bad it had affected my vision. Before I could ask who my visitors were, I felt something cool wipe against my arm and a sharp prick like a bee sting. The pain was nothing compared to that which ravaged the rest of my body.
Within minutes, the fire began to cool and the throbbing dulled. I was finally able to lift my head. When I looked down, I noticed an air mattress pulled next to my bed. It had a crum
pled afghan piled in the center of it. I recognized the blanket as the one Mama Peg had made my father the same year my mother died. I turned to him. “How long have you been here?”
He rubbed at the scruff on his cheeks. “Awhile. We all thought . . .”
“Wow,” I said. “My father sleeping at a Preston’s house.”
He shrugged, caught between a smile and tears. “I figured if you could stand to live with him, then I could tough out a few nights too. Besides, anyone that gave Bella half her genes can’t be all bad.”
I almost couldn’t believe my ears.
He leaned in and whispered, “But I have to say, I’m still glad you didn’t marry the fool.”
“Is that mine?” I pointed to a cup of water sitting on the bedside table.
“Mine, yours, what difference does it make? If you’re thirsty, drink it.” He picked up the glass and then the pillow behind my head.
The water felt so wonderfully cool sliding down my parched throat. “Where’s Bella?”
Mama Peg answered. “In the living room, kiddo.”
I turned to the far corner of my bedroom and grinned when I saw my grandmother sitting in a chair with her oxygen tank resting at her feet. “Mama Peg . . . you’re here.”
Darlene laid a damp washcloth on my forehead. “Everyone’s here, Jenny. I asked them to come.”
A moment later, Lindsey appeared in the doorway with my daughter in tow. Isabella moved to my bedside with a cautiousness that I’d never experienced from her before.
“Hey, sweetness.” When I reached out to touch her, she drew back. My heart felt the sting of rejection until I noticed that my hand was the same shade of mustard that my mother’s had been right before she died.
I brought my hand to my nose and cringed. It smelled of rotting fruit. “It’s okay, Bells. I may look and smell bad, but it’s still me.”
Isabella scrunched her eyes closed, puckered up, and bent down as though being forced to kiss a frog. I suppose it would have hurt my feelings had I not been through the same thing with my own mother. Under the circumstances, I took no offense.
Isabella’s gaze fell on the window as she pulled away from me. “It’s snowing, Mommy!”
“Are you going to go play in it?” I asked her.
“I already had a snowball fight with Craig and Mommy Lindsey.”
“Craig’s here?” My heart skipped a beat. “Where?”
My father exchanged a worried look with my nurse. Confusion overtook me when Craig brought my hand to his lips and kissed it. “I’m right here, baby.”
Before I could ask where he had come from, the ceiling rolled back on both sides like a great scroll, giving me a clear view into another realm. A wall, made of what appeared to be a perfect sheet of opal, opened. From within, I heard music so beautiful and joyous that it brought tears to my eyes.
I didn’t know if it was the morphine, the cancer, or God Himself behind this vision, nor did I care. It was magnificent.
Everyone I loved was gathered at my side as though attending my funeral. I wanted to ask them if they saw the vision too and tell them not to look so somber, but my gaze would not move from the scene above me. My eyes were fixed upward and my mouth lay parted in awe.
Out of this glimmering gate emerged a woman who looked like a more beautiful version of myself. She wore a gown of finely spun lavender silk and a radiant smile. My mother was no longer the sickly, pitiful creature of my last recollection, but far more lovely than she had ever been in her youth.
My heart filled with joy, then sadness, as I realized that it was almost time to join her.
“Are you ready?” she asked me.
Almost.
The music faded. My mother closed her eyes and lifted her face toward a blazing white light above her.
Unable to withstand the brilliance of it, I turned to the handsome blond kneeling at my side. “Let’s dance in the snow,” I said.
His eyebrows shot up in surprise. “You can’t even stand.”
“Carry me.”
“Baby, it’s cold. You’ll—”
“What, catch my death?”
“Jenny,” my father said. I expected him to lecture me about needing my rest. Instead, he surprised me with “Have fun.”
Craig looked at me, unsure.
My grandmother coughed. “Oh, for pity’s sake, the woman’s dying. Craig Allen, if you don’t dance with my granddaughter, I’m going to flick your forehead good.”
“Make hay while the sun’s still shining,” I said.
He smiled through tears.
Lindsey and my nurse swaddled me inside a thick comforter. Craig waited for them to finish before scooping me from the bed into his strong arms. Strangely, for the first time in weeks, I felt no pain, just an uncanny sense of euphoria. I laid my head on his chest as he carried me outside. Though I tried to inhale his wonderful scent one last time, it was not him that I smelled, but the sweet fragrance of incense.
Craig carried me into the cold outdoors. Inches of powder coated the ground and tree branches as fat white flakes continued to flutter down over us.
Soft and cold, they hit my face, then melted. I felt something glide across my neck. I reached up and felt my engagement ring still hanging by its chain. I touched it, searching Craig’s face. “I thought I gave this back to you.”
Such sadness brewed in his stormy hazel eyes. I prayed that it was just passing through and would not take up residence there. He deserved to be happy. I laid my hand on his cheek. “I love you.”
With great effort, I unlatched the necklace from my neck, slid off the engagement ring, and held it out to him. “I don’t want it to be buried with me. It isn’t mine. . . .”
He leaned his forehead against mine. Foggy white puffed from his mouth in quick, hot breaths against my lips. “It is, baby.”
When I felt tears trying to form, I let out a deep breath to ward them off. I slid the ring and chain into the breast pocket of his coat. “It belongs to a woman who will love you almost as much as I do.”
“There’s not going to be anyone else.” He nuzzled his nose into my hair. “You’re the love of my life.”
“The love of your life so far. She’s out there, but you won’t be able to give yourself to her if you’re engaged to a dead woman.”
His eyes glistened as he hummed softly in my ear, twirling me this way and that. I smiled at him and he grinned back. His blond lashes turned white before my eyes.
Watching us from my bedroom window were the delighted faces of those I loved most in the world. Isabella was among them, held up by her new mother. Using my last bit of strength, I waggled my fingers at them and they waved back.
“It’s time now, Jenny,” I heard my mother say.
When I looked up, it was not her looming before me, but a Man who was far more than a man. The closer I drew to Him, the more familiar He seemed. He gathered me into His arms and uttered beautiful, unspeakable things to my soul. Warmth and joy, so perfect and complete, overwhelmed me.
As He held me, I realized that all along, it was He my heart had longed for—not David and not even Craig. I was getting ready to ask if He was the one who had whispered to me in the wind and in my dreams, but He answered before I could utter the question.
I Am.
Epilogue
A blanket of peace fell over me as I tucked my mother’s notebook into the desk drawer and peered through the window at lavender tulips reaching heavenward through a dusting of snow.
Today marked the official start of spring, but like a lingering guest, Old Man Winter refused to believe the party was really over. Nonetheless, channel six assured me it would be seventy degrees by noon. Listening to the chickadees caroling outside my office window as an orange orb rose in the blue sky, I felt confident in their prediction.
This promise of life renewed brought a smile to my lips . . . that and finally finishing my mother’s journal.
Reading it had affected me more deeply than I ever could hav
e dreamed. My normally happy-go-lucky disposition hibernated as I became engulfed in my mother’s melancholy musings. My husband, Ben, worried that I was sinking into depression, but I assured him it was her tears, not my own, streaming down my cheeks as I turned the pages. He no more understood that than why I’d been so compelled to finally read the notebooks I had carried with me for so long.
I explained to him that there was something about becoming a mother myself that fed the sudden desire to understand her.
Twisting a ringlet of hair around my finger, I wondered if she knew that I had grown up to be a teacher and married a man who loved me the way she always hoped David would love her. Or if she knew I was about to deliver her first grandchild, and that if she truly was a girl as the ultrasound promised, I would name her Genevieve Peg Wilkinson.
I picked up my mother’s opal ring, fingering the delicate prongs holding the stone in place. After today, it would be tucked safely away with the rest of my memories of her, hidden from the little hands that would soon be born.
A curl of steam tickled my lip as I leaned in to sip chamomile from my mug. Through paned glass, I watched a robin poke its tiny gray head from a birdhouse hanging from our powder-coated willow.
Yes, spring was definitely here despite winter’s vain attempt to hang on. The snow would be melted within the hour, unlikely to return until December. I wondered if the dogwood I planted last year would bloom. I wondered a lot of things as I sat there. Would I have been able to do for my child what my mother had done for me? Would I face my own death with the grace with which she faced hers?
I set the cup down and lifted open the window. Crisp air greeted me just as the phone rang.
A familiar string of numbers flashed on the caller ID. I picked up. “Hey, Mom.” A twinge of guilt pricked at me as it always did when I called Lindsey Mom, but I recognized the false accusation for what it was and dismissed it. After all, the woman had raised me to adulthood. She’d earned the title through and through.
“How’s Dad?” I asked, forcing myself to at least sound interested. My mother had been right about him. David had never become the father either of us had hoped he would be. Indifferent and moody, he cared more about numbers adding up than he had pushing me on a swing. But Lindsey loved him completely, and what he lacked in the parenting department, she had more than made up for.