by Cassia Leo
She slowly let go of my shoulders and kept a close eye on me as she pressed buttons on the IV machine. Mere seconds passed before I drifted off, thoughts of Boomer and Laurel vanishing in a black haze of morphine.
The second time I woke, I thought I was dreaming. My mother and father stood at the foot of the bed facing each other, my mother consoling my father, who was in tears. I had only seen my father cry once, from about fifty yards away, as I hid behind a tree, so no one would see me at my twin brother Dane’s funeral.
A sharp, female gasp made me turn my heavy head toward the sound.
“He’s awake,” Nicole said, my ex-fiancée’s green eyes wide with shock. Her gaze locked on mine as she stood from the hospital chair.
My nostrils flared as I stared at the toddler in her arms, his blond, sleepy head resting on her slender shoulder.
My mother rushed to my bedside. “Isaac!” she cried. “Honey, how are you feeling? Do you need anything? Are you thirsty?”
“I’m fine, Mom.”
“Oh, God.” She clapped her hand over her mouth as she began to sob. “I’ve missed your voice.”
My father’s jaw clenched as he remained at the foot of my bed. “We’ve been worried sick about you, son.”
Nicole slowly made her way to the other side of the bed as my nephew lifted his head from her shoulder. “We got here as soon as we could.”
I narrowed my eyes at her. “Why are you here, Nicole?”
Her brown eyebrows screwed up as if she was in physical pain. “I was worried about you.”
“Sweetheart, please don’t be upset. We’ve all been very worried about you,” my mother begged as she reached for my hand.
I pulled my hand away. “Getting shot doesn’t change anything,” I said, looking at my mom so I wouldn’t have to look at my nephew and see myself in his blond hair and wide hazel eyes. “I don’t want her here.”
My mother nodded at Nicole and I closed my eyes as I listened to the soft tap of her footsteps leaving the hospital room. When I opened my eyes, my father was at my bedside, the whites of his eyes still red, but the tears were gone. He was not pleased.
“I expected better of you.”
My mother gasped. “Bill! Don’t say that. He needs our support. He doesn’t need that.”
My father nodded. “I’m sorry, but Nicole has been a good mother to that boy. She’s as much a part of this family as you are, son. You need to forgive her, sooner rather than later. And not for me or her. Do it for yourself.”
I closed my eyes as the dull ache in my right thigh began to throb and the shame of not being good enough for my father rolled back into my life like an ocean tide. “I’m sorry I… I need help. I need someone to get my dog.” I took a few breaths and opened my eyes again, keeping my gaze focused on my mom’s round face and shoulder-length blonde hair. “The nurse said my friend Dylan is taking care of my dog, but I don’t know where he lives. Can you ask the nurse for the address and go pick him up? He’ll… He needs me.”
I had no idea how Boomer, my PTSD service dog, was getting along with Dylan. Boomer worked as a bomb detection dog in Afghanistan with one of my buddies. Then, he was retired and I brought him home with me when I returned from my third and final deployment. We’d spent the last few years glued to each other’s sides. He was probably more attached to me than I was to him. No matter how good Dylan was treating Boomer, my best canine friend probably wouldn’t rest easy until he saw me and knew I was okay.
My mom nodded. “Is…” She stopped herself mid-sentence, looking up at my father as if asking for permission, then she decided to continue. “Is it all right if Emily comes to visit you? She’s quite worried.”
I scrunched my eyebrows together in confusion. Emily was not part of the family. She wasn’t even a friend of mine. In fact, I’d never seen her face or spoken a word to her. But I knew her voice. I knew it well.
Emily had been leaving me voicemails, a few per week, for the last two years. Messages from my mother and my VA case worker were relayed to me in Emily’s crisp, melodic voice. Sometimes, when something was funny, she’d laugh, and I’d listen to those messages more than once.
But she was still a stranger. She might feel as if she knew me, but I knew nothing about her.
“It’s okay if you don’t want to meet her,” my mother continued. “But she feels… Well, I’ll let you think about it and you can let me know later.”
I nodded because I didn’t know what to say. Then, a nurse entered the room, saving me the trouble of rummaging through the rubble of my mind for the right words.
Chapter 3
Laurel
Three years ago
My phone was whispering to me that it was half past nine in the evening, but my heart didn’t want the night to end. Watching Jack play peek-a-boo and hide-and-seek with my best friend Drea’s two- and four-year-old boys felt like falling in love with him all over again.
But the night was wearing thin and the boys’ energy was waning. Screams of joy and wide-eyed excitement was slowly morphing into tired pink-rimmed eyes and chubby fingers twirling through silky brown curls. If Drea and her husband Barry wanted to avoid tantrums, they would have to leave soon and get the little ones tucked into their beds.
“You’ll pick me up tomorrow?” Drea asked as we watched from the porch while Barry and Jack strapped the boys into their car seats. “I don’t know how long my car will be at the dealer, and I don’t want to miss another yoga class. I think I’ve gained a stone tonight. Your chocolate cake is bloody evil, you know that?”
I laughed. “Oh, please. You could probably eat that whole cake and not gain an ounce.”
She flashed me a lazy smile. “You’re absolutely right. It’s sickening.”
I punched her arm and gave her a bone-crushing hug before she left with Barry and the kids. The edges of Jack’s dark hair were painted silver by the moonlight as he made his way up the flagstone pathway toward me.
His full lips curled into an alluring grin as he climbed the steps. “You look happy tonight.” He wrapped his arms around my waist and pulled me close. “What are you thinking?”
I smiled as I gazed into his icy-blue eyes. “Just thinking of how much I love you and our life.”
He chuckled. “How about the new house?”
“Love it.”
“Nothing you would change about it?”
I pressed my lips into a hard line as I pretended to think hard about this question, then I shrugged. “Why? Do you have any ideas?”
I was afraid to say that we should turn one of the five bedrooms into a nursery. Though I knew Jack wanted to have children, we had never really agreed on how long we had to be married before we started trying for a baby. If this wasn’t the right time for him, I didn’t want to guilt him into something he wasn’t ready for. Because I would always be ready.
He shook his head as we stepped back inside. “You’re a spoiled princess. You know very well you’re going to get whatever you want,” he said, closing the front door behind me. “I’ll do the dishes if you take a shower with me.”
I smiled. “Deal.”
“Can you do me a favor?” Jack asked as I stepped out from under the stream of hot water. “I keep getting an error on the update code. I need to submit it by Monday and it’s driving me insane.”
“I’ll look at it after yoga tomorrow,” I said, laying my hands on his smooth chest. “Pass me the body wash.”
He kissed my forehead. “Thank you, baby.”
Grabbing the pink bottle off the shelf behind him, he squeezed some of the Chanel shower gel into the palm of his large hand, then he set the bottle down. I turned around, so he could spread the body wash on my shoulders and back, using the slick suds to massage away the tension in my muscles. I smiled and bit my lip as I felt his erection twitch against my backside.
He leaned in to whisper in my ear. “I’ve been thinking,” he murmured, his words barely audible over the sound of the water.
; I closed my eyes as his slick hands slid over my ribs and came around to cup my breasts. “You know how much I hate it when you think,” I said, our standard phrase for keeping the mood light whenever a conversation started with “I’ve been thinking.”
He chuckled as he kissed my neck and the sound sent a fuse sizzling through me. “I’m serious. I’m going to ask you something,” he said, his hand sliding over my abdomen and finding my clit. “Just promise me you’ll say yes.”
I gasped and reached back to grab onto his neck as he plunged two fingers deep inside me, curling them forward until he located my G-spot. How could I possibly say no to anything right now? I couldn’t speak.
With one hand on my breast, he rolled my nipple between his fingers as his other hand worked my center.
Finally, I let out a stale breath, the air evacuating my lungs in a deep moan. “Oh, God, yes… Yes, I promise… I promise I’ll say yes.”
He let go of my breast and coiled his arm around my waist for support. My legs weakened as the pleasure flooded my muscles, my limbs twitching uncontrollably. I dug my fingernails into the back of his neck to steady myself as I writhed against his slick, hard chest.
He pressed his lips to my ear. “I want you to stop taking the pill.”
I let out a feral scream as the orgasm slammed into me, sending a shockwave of raw heat rippling outward from my core. Jack chuckled in my ear as he continued to massage my clit. I rode the wave until it crashed and I had to push his hand away.
“Is that a yes?” he said, turning me around and pinning me against the shower wall.
He pressed his chest into mine to keep me from collapsing on jelly legs. As I wrapped my arms around his neck and he leaned his forehead against mine, I remembered that gush of warmth I’d felt while watching him with Drea’s boys tonight. It was the first time I’d been able to see the kind of father Jack would be.
There was not a doubt in my mind that Jack would be a great father. The kind of father who ruled with fierce love and bottomless compassion. The kind of father who read bedtime stories and played one-on-one basketball games. Who encouraged our children to be the best at whatever they did, but to never forget their success and happiness were the two things no one but they could define for themselves.
I leaned my head back, so I could look him in the eye. “Yes,” I replied, still out of breath. “A thousand times, yes.”
Present day
Every day, our souls are wounded by shame.
When we drive by an animal shelter without stopping to adopt one of those desperate, adorable animals, we judge ourselves.
When we walk past a beggar without handing over the change in our pockets, we call ourselves selfish.
All these little moments of shame amount to a million tiny cuts. For a normal person, this kind of guilt amounts to brief moments of introspection, but it doesn’t define them. For a person with a fragile psyche, who carries the tremendous weight of guilt I’d been carrying around in the wake of my son’s death, these daily injuries spelled a slow, torturous death.
As I lay curled up under the floral comforter on my old bed, in the bedroom where I pined over many high school crushes, I felt as if that slow death had been fast-tracked. The guilt from the way I’d hurt Jack was killing me from the inside out.
The bedroom door was open. I couldn’t sleep with the door closed last night. Not that I didn’t trust my scrawny-but-lovable new roommate to protect me, but I doubted either of us would be a match for a would-be intruder. I should know, considering it was an intruder who murdered my baby boy and mother, the mother who bequeathed my childhood home to me upon her death.
It was a macabre unraveling of events and consequences. If my mother hadn’t died, I would not have had a place to stay when Jack told me he wanted a divorce. But it was my mother’s and Jack Jr.’s deaths that caused the breakdown of our marriage. In the end, everything led back to that night, the night that sealed my fate and the fate of all the people I loved most in this world.
“Laurel?”
I pushed the covers off my face as my head swiveled toward the voice. Dylan stood in the doorway, dressed in his usual indie band T-shirt — today it was The Decembrists — and skinny jeans. His dark-blond hair and hipster glasses were as neat as always. But the expression on his slim face made me want to cry. There was nothing I hated more than being pitied.
“I’m fine,” I mumbled, pulling the covers back over my head.
A few seconds later, the bed moved and Dylan lied down behind me, placing a gentle hand on my arm. “You’re so not fine, Laurel. You’re oceans away from fine. And that’s okay. But Drea just called the landline to say she’ll be here in a few minutes. I thought you’d want to know.”
I inhaled a long, shaky breath and pushed the covers below my chin. “Where’s Boomer?”
“He’s in the backyard. I just let him out to stretch his legs and do his business.”
I sighed. “I didn’t realize how many jobs I’d outsourced to Jack. Important things, like making me feel safe and loved. How will I ever feel safe again?”
He squeezed my arm. “You can figure that out later. Right now, I think you need to take a shower before your friend gets here. You kinda stink.”
I shook my head, unable to muster even a mild chuckle at the perfectly humorous insult. “Thanks.”
I took a fast shower, not wanting to linger alone with my thoughts. Jack and I had showered together in this bathroom so many times, it felt more like a torture chamber. When I came down the stairs, Drea and Dylan were sitting on the sofa munching on donuts.
“Donuts at six p.m. on a Thursday?” I said, grabbing a long cardigan sweater off the coat rack near the front door. It was late October, and not exactly cold, but I doubted I’d ever feel warm again.
“Blue Star,” Drea said, holding up a half-eaten donut with chocolate icing. “I brought a dozen of your favorite Valrhona chocolate crunch.”
I shook my head. “I can barely eat an entire one of those and you got twelve?”
She reached into the box and handed me a donut as I took a seat next to her on the sofa. “Maybe if you eat the whole box you’ll reach donut nirvana and discover the meaning of life.”
I stared at the donut with the crunchy chocolate pearls. “I already know what the meaning of life is.”
Drea and I leaned back and put our feet up on the coffee table in unison. “Oh, really?” she said. “Enlighten us, o wise one.”
I let out a heavy sigh as I picked a chocolate pearl off the top of my donut. “The meaning of life is… Life sucks. Oh, God it sucks so hard.”
“Ouch!” Dylan replied. “Can I get a refund? This is the worst motivational speech ever.”
Drea laughed and high-fived Dylan. “God, I love this man. Can I take him home with me?”
“No, he’s mine,” I replied strongly.
“Ladies, ladies. There’s enough of me to go around. But I do think Laurel needs me more right now.”
Drea shrugged. “I suppose you’re right. But let me know if you ever want to go to London. My parents have a gorgeous flat in Bloomsbury.”
I sighed. “Can we talk about me now? I really need you guys to wallow with me.”
“Of course!” Drea replied. “Let’s start with you telling us every miserable thing that happened with Jack last night.”
The donut in my hand became significantly less appealing as my mind drifted back to the events of last night. Seeing Isaac with a gushing gunshot wound as he was throttled by Jack was the last memory I had before I woke in a hospital bed. Jack told me the paramedics sedated me to keep me from trying to climb into the back of the ambulance with Isaac. Then, according to Jack and Dylan, Isaac confessed his love for me before the ambulance whisked him away.
What a fucking shit-show.
I wished I could remember even a single second of those events, because it seemed I would be paying for them for the rest of my life. Yes, the rest of my life. Even if it wasn’t true, I was cert
ain I would mourn the loss of Jack for the rest of my days. How could I not? He was, without question, the great love of my life. He was my best friend, my lover, my protector, my caregiver, my everything.
I gave Drea and Dylan the full rundown of last night’s events, even the ugliest and most personal parts, like the rough, filthy sex that ended with Jack declaring he wanted a divorce. When I was finished, they both stared at me with mouths agape.
I set my untouched donut back inside the box on the coffee table. “Well, you don’t have to look so shocked,” I said, getting up to go to the kitchen.
They both followed after me, Drea right on my heels. “Laurel, you have to excuse my prudishness, but Barry won’t get within ten feet of me when I’m on my period, much less…” She motioned with her hands as if she was wiping something off her lip. “He’s definitely never gone down on me while I was—”
“Okay, I get it,” I cut her off as I watched Boomer, Isaac’s German shepherd service dog, through the kitchen window that looked out onto the backyard.
Dylan leaned against the kitchen counter with a horrified look plastered on his face.
“Are you judging me too?” I challenged him.
He blinked. “Sorry, I just can’t imagine that being…” He stared at me as he tried to find the right words. “I just can’t imagine loving someone that much. He clearly loves you, Laurel.”
I rolled my eyes and yanked open the refrigerator to retrieve the water pitcher. “Whether or not he loves me is not the issue.” I sighed as I set the frosty pitcher on the counter. “I know Jack loves me. Believe me, I wish I could forget it, because it’s like living in an alternate reality. How could he love me and want to divorce me? How? Why?”
Drea came up behind me and grabbed my arms as she rested her chin on my shoulder. “Because that’s love. It makes absolutely no fucking sense.”
I wiped a tear from my cheek and turned to Dylan. “Let’s talk about something else. I… I think I can get you a job. But you have to invoke Jack’s name.”