She followed his eyes down to the handsome boy on the ground and sighed as her chest expanded with the mere sight of him. It didn’t matter what he did; with each look at his small face, she felt a piece of herself return. Somewhere inside that beautiful boy was the lovely woman who brought him into the world. Her death wasn’t in vain.
She tore her eyes away when she felt the pull of someone’s watchful gaze. The minute she found Charlie’s eyes, she wondered if he was remembering her. His look was intense and evoked a sensation she couldn’t understand. Lucy’s lips curved into a small smile. Charlie stilled for a moment, as if he had been caught, and then gave her a simple nod before standing up to retrieve his son and leave.
The following week, she saw them the minute they arrived. The sweet boy had become a pro at walking in the last two weeks. He even seemed to have mastered his half-waddle-half-run. She smiled as he ran away from Charlie with a look of pride on his face; he thought he was so fast. It touched her heart to see Charlie, this big, masculine man, pretend that he couldn’t run as fast as the boy. When he finally caught him, he plopped him up high on his shoulder.
He placed the boy in the same spot on the grass as the week before, and then took a seat on the same bench across from hers. As before, his long legs stretched out in front of him and his gaze fell on his son.
Today, the boy growled and made noises that made Lucy giggle quietly. He was growing and changing so much that she found it almost impossible that he had once been that tiny bundle she’d held so close to her heart. Her laughter filled the air as it grew louder with each sound the boy made. She just couldn’t help it. She wiped away a tear and looked up to lock eyes with Charlie, who, this time, tilted his head and seemed to smile back at her. It was small, but it was there.
As she sat there, transfixed by Charlie and his unreadable look, she was startled by a small tap on her leg. She looked down and met tiny eyes and a toothy, drool-filled grin. The boy handed her a small car and growled, a gesture she assumed meant he wanted her to play.
Without a single thought, she slid from the bench and sat down on the ground to join him. She drove the little car through the dirt and grass before bumping it into the car in his hand. He squealed his approval and bumped her car back.
“Beep, beep,” she said, and tried to blink away the tears threatening her eyes.
He made a small rumbling sound, and said, “Bee, bee.”
This was her medicine; it was what she had needed all along.
“I’m sorry if he’s bothering you,” Charlie said from above them. “C’mon, Jack. Grandma’s waiting for us.”
Before Lucy could even think, much less speak, Charlie picked the boy up. As the two walked off together, hand in hand, Charlie turned to glance at Lucy and gave that now-familiar nod.
She went back to that park every Saturday for two months. Some days they wouldn’t be there, and those days were painful for her, but most days they were. Each time, she received a small, unreadable smile from Charlie and a nod that seemed to say more than he intended. It didn’t matter what it meant; what mattered was that each time she watched that precious boy smile and laugh, her life away from the park got easier.
* * *
Charlie Mathews set his sleeping son in his crib and covered him with the blanket his wife had made while she was pregnant. Meredith didn’t even know how to sew; it was just something she’d referred to as her “nesting phase.” He smiled at the thought. She had been so ready to be a mother. She’d even taken a sewing class and came home one day with a blue blanket that she had presented with pride.
“Charlie Bear,” she’d said with a huge smile, “do you think he’ll be warm enough with this?”
Charlie had nodded and pulled her into his lap. “It’s perfect,” he’d whispered, and kissed her cheek.
“I think he’s going to look like you,” she had said as he wrapped them up in the new blanket. She’d placed her hand over her belly and sighed. “At least that’s what I hope.”
“Why do you hope that?” he’d asked, and covered her hands with his.
Meredith had looked up at him with her deep brown eyes. “Because I’d be a lucky girl if I had two of you.”
If he’d known that only a month later he, their son, and that blanket would be leaving the hospital without her, he would have told her that he was the fortunate one; he would have told her how much he loved her and needed her.
He would have told her how utterly lost he would be without her.
Fate was a cruel thing, he’d soon discovered. Like his late father, Meredith wasn’t perfect, but she did most things in her life the right way. She was loving, giving, healthy, and always looking to improve and move forward. With their lives cut short, Meredith and Carl Mathews gave new meaning to the phrase, “sometimes bad things happen to good people.”
He walked out of his son’s room and into his own. The walls were powder blue, the beige carpeting looked like sand, the furniture was white, and a white down comforter lay across the king-sized bed. Meredith had wanted a beach house theme when they were decorating. He gave it to her without much thought; he always just went with the flow. Thinking back now, he wondered if she had taken that to mean he didn’t care.
If second chances existed, he would do everything over. He would do it the right way, the way that would have reminded her how much he cared. It constantly plagued him: did she slip away from him knowing how much he loved her? He would give his life to take back every time he’d rolled his eyes at her strange questions and incessant need to say everything that was on her mind. If he could go back and do it over, every time she’d put on a new dress and spun around just hoping he would tell her how beautiful she looked, he would fall to his knees and tell her from the floor.
Life would never give him those chances, though, and it looked like the guilt in his heart was there to stay.
He pulled open the white armoire’s mirrored door, revealing her jewelry box and perfumes. To the left of a little angel trinket was a picture of them on their wedding day, only two years before. He picked it up and read the words engraved on the bottom of the frame. It was a line from her favorite E.E. Cummings poem. He hadn’t understood it before. But, as she’d read it at their wedding, the words rolling from her beautiful mouth, it had hit him and a tear had fallen from his eye with his brothers and everyone they knew watching. In that moment, he knew that she wanted him and anyone listening to know that her love for him was infinite; it meant more than the moon and would reach further than the sun’s endless rays.
“I will always carry your heart in mine, Meredith,” he whispered, and set the picture down.
He twirled his wedding ring, wondering when he would be ready to take it off. Or, more importantly, would he ever be ready?
It wasn’t that he was under some unhealthy impression that she would someday come back to him; he was heartbroken, yes, but he wasn’t delusional. He missed her a lot and he was positive he had placed her on a pedestal that normal, living people couldn’t possibly reach. People tend to do that. The lost loved one goes from a typical, loving individual to a flawless being who may as well have worn a halo while alive.
Charlie was under no false pretenses and he was completely sane. He was just a man who missed his wife and frequently drowned in the sorrow of how unfair the world was. He was lonely and, as crude as it felt to think, it had been a long time since he felt the body of a woman beneath him. He really missed that—the way Meredith couldn’t seem to keep her hands off him after they were married.
As lonely as he was, however, he never wanted to feel that pain for the rest of his life. It was absolute agony—torture—to grieve this way and he never wanted to experience it again. Never. He would spend the rest of his life alone if it guaranteed that he would never again know the feeling of a broken heart—that relentless stinging in his chest.
He stopped spinning his ring and looked at it for a moment. Someday he would take it off, but not toda
y.
He placed Meredith’s things back in order and closed the armoire. He walked to the edge of his bed and collapsed on his very cold and lonely side. Meredith’s side was clean, still made, and completely empty. Her pillow had lost the dip it once held—the shape of her head that used to embed the soft material. He ached for that piece of her, of course, but she was still everywhere he looked and he couldn’t decide if that was an unhealthy feeling or just him keeping her memory alive.
While he lay on his stomach, he watched the last of the setting sun through the window as it cast a shadow of darkness over her pillow. When it was finally out of his sight, he could sleep and pretend that she was there.
Chapter Two
Charlie stepped into his mother’s home and was instantly greeted with the familiar scent of cookies. He bent over to loosen the laces of his boots, mindful of the verbal ass-whooping he would get if he tracked dust all over the place. It hadn’t escaped his attention that his mother had been a bit more lenient with him in the past year. Like everyone else in his life, she handled him as if he were the most fragile human being to ever exist.
And maybe he was.
“Charlie?” Linda Mathews called from the kitchen. “Is that you?”
“Who else would it be?”
Linda appeared in the doorway and smiled. “Your brothers are coming into town. I’m not sure what time, though. Brandon and Jonah had to find Hugh first.”
Charlie rolled his eyes. Over the last year, it seemed as though he had seen a lot more of his brothers, who lived in California, a six-hour drive away. With him being the only one of their large group to stay in Phoenix, he saw them so much that it was almost as if they had never moved away. He wasn’t sure if he should be thankful for how much they cared or resentful about how much they hovered. Perhaps it was a little of both.
“Dylan called,” Linda said as she began to unload the dishwasher. “She’s getting nervous about the benefit and the wedding. They’re both coming up so fast. She sure did plan a lot around that time, didn’t she? I don’t know why she did that to herself.”
Charlie felt an unintentional smile form on his lips at the mention of his baby sister. “It’s a backyard wedding, Mom. She’ll be fine.”
Linda thought about that for a minute. “That’s true. Still, I hope she takes some time to rest in between.”
Anyone who knew Dylan would never be surprised at her decision to have a low-key wedding. The fact that she had agreed to have a small ceremony—one that included a white dress and an audience—was enough to shock everyone. Alas, Linda Mathews would never let any of her children get away with a courthouse wedding, especially her only daughter. A backyard celebration was Dylan’s compromise.
“I haven’t talked to her in a couple weeks. Is she surviving the end of winter out in Boston?” Charlie asked.
Linda frowned. “She hates it. They had a big storm the other day and it knocked the power out. But, of course, you know she’s got Ben to keep her warm. Why is it still snowing anywhere in March?”
“I have no clue.” Then it was Charlie’s turn to frown. “And, no, Mom. I don’t want to think about how they keep each other warm.”
Linda giggled from the other side of the counter. “Oh, stop. They’re so cute together. I can’t even stand it.”
Charlie nodded. “Still, just … no.”
It was true: Dylan had never been happier. Even Ben—who Charlie had considered a brother for most of his life—had a cheesy side he hadn’t known about when it came to the love he shared with Dylan. But, with all he knew of Ben’s past, he couldn’t handle thoughts of him keeping his sweet, innocent sister warm, even if he was marrying her in June. He wished them well, but didn’t need to hear everything.
“So, how was Jack today?” Charlie asked, and stole a cookie from the cooling baking sheet. He took a seat on one of the stools along the counter. “Did he give you any problems at nap time?”
Linda shook her head as she licked dough from her finger. “He went right down. I thought about waking him up just before you got here.”
“He’s been tired. He hasn’t been sleeping all that great at night.”
“It’s the age. He thinks he’s gonna miss out on something if he sleeps.” Linda raised one eyebrow and glanced at Charlie. “Much like his daddy at that age.”
“He doesn’t stop. And, now that he’s walking, I don’t know how to keep up with him.” Charlie looked down at the counter and heaved a heavy sigh.
Linda sighed with him and reached over to pat his hand as if she could read his mind. “You’re doing a great job.”
Charlie shook his head and stood. “I probably wouldn’t be able to do it without you. I don’t know what I’m doing, Mom. Like, at all.”
“That’s Meredith’s father and his bully attorneys talking. Stop letting him get to you.” Linda groaned in frustration. “Charlie, don’t be so hard on yourself. Everyone needs a little help from time to time. Tom Monroe is a pompous ass. He’s trying to get under your skin and you’re letting him.”
Charlie said nothing as he walked into the living room and began to gather the endless toys that Jackson had thrown about. He did have to laugh at the fact that, while growing up, his mother had pretty much expected them all to keep her house clean. However, when it came to her only grandchild, “clean up your mess” didn’t seem to be in her vocabulary.
“Did you hear what I said?” Linda asked from the step that led into the living room. “I don’t want you to just hear what I say; I want you to believe it.”
Charlie stuffed a pair of socks into the diaper bag. It was the same bag that he had given Meredith just before Jack was born. He didn’t care that it was a Coach bag and screamed female; like everything else he shared with her, it was a link that he would hold dear.
“Charlie, look at me.”
“Mom, please. I can’t hear another ‘You’ll be okay’ talk today. I just can’t. I know I’ll be okay. I know Jack will be okay. Just let me have some doubt so I can feel somewhat human.”
Linda took a sharp breath. “I know what you’re feeling, Charlie. That’s all I was getting at.”
“I know you do,” he answered mechanically. He had heard this before.
“I’m not trying to compare my situation to yours. But, when your dad died, I remember looking at you and your brothers and thinking, how the hell am I supposed to teach them how to be men?”
“Well, obviously I’m not thinking that. I know how to raise my son to be a man. What I don’t know is …”
“How to raise him without a mother’s love.”
Charlie collapsed onto the tan couch and took a deep breath. “Exactly.”
Linda made her way into the room and took a seat next to Charlie. “Well, I look at the last year and the sweet little boy Jackson is growing up to be. I think he’s got his mother’s love; she’s in his heart.”
“Don’t start that spiritual garbage, Mom.” Charlie laughed and rested his head against the back of the couch. “Leave it to you to make me want to throw up right in the middle of feeling sorry for myself.”
“It’s my job, right?” Linda smiled and patted his leg. “After twenty-seven years of me doing this, you’re still surprised?”
Charlie turned his head to look at his mother. “You’re nothing if not cheesy.”
Linda smiled as she leaned into Charlie’s arms. “Let me go get Jack up while you set the table for dinner, okay?”
“I love how you never even ask us to stay for dinner,” Charlie said with a chuckle. “You always just assume.”
“I always just command,” Linda corrected, and headed upstairs.
Charlie continued to pack away Jack’s belongings. As his mother walked away, he reminded himself to count his blessings. He was right: he would have never made it without her help. He wondered when he would take the next hit from the powers that be. It wasn’t enough to take his father; the universe just had to have his wife,
too.
In the midst of his self-pity, Charlie heard the garage door open and close, followed by the sounds of his brothers’ voices as they made their way inside. He crept up to the wall and stood just on the other side of the laundry room door, where they all gathered and took off their shoes.
“How old was she?” he heard Brandon ask. “My age? Mom’s age?”
“Please say Mom’s age,” Jonah said, laughing.
“Go to hell, both of you,” Hugh snapped.
A harmonious laughter erupted from the room, which was then followed by both Brandon and Jonah confirming in unison, “Mom’s age.”
When his brothers emerged from the laundry room, Charlie wrapped his arms around Hugh’s neck in a chokehold. “You messin’ with cougars?” he asked as his younger brother tried to squirm away.
Hugh freed himself and straightened up. “No,” he said, rubbing his neck. “The cougars are messing with me.”
“Sure they are,” Brandon, the oldest of the group, said.
Jonah slapped Hugh on the back. “Isn’t that what cabana boys do?”
“Cabana boy?” Charlie asked, roaring with laughter.
“I’m not a cabana boy. Jesus Christ.” Hugh set his bag down on the kitchen table. He shook his head, and added, “I’m bartending at a resort in San Diego.”
“Poolside, baby,” Jonah said as he rubbed his hands together. “He was telling us all about the money he’s been raking in from one of the guests—a cougar with a big fat bank account.”
“Please, God, tell me he wears a speedo,” Charlie said, chuckling.
The three brothers quieted and stared at Hugh for an answer.
After a few long seconds, Hugh finally snapped. “I don’t wear a speedo!”
“I should hope not,” Linda said from behind them. “That’s not something a mother wants to picture.”
“Hi, Mom,” Brandon said as he pulled her in for a hug.
Beyond the Orange Moon (Mathews Family Book 2) Page 2