by Leigh Riker
It was my job to give him a normal life.
Always that, with Emma, he thought. But now she couldn’t pretend anymore, could she? They’d each been swallowed up by their own grief, just as he and Melanie had been at the end, although for different reasons.
With Emma, it was worse. He’d finally accused her. The last thing he wanted was another divorce. He sure couldn’t live in the house by himself and he wasn’t sure Emma would want to stay there alone, either. Last night it had been filled with memories. He’d walked the floors with Bob at his heels, whining. They’d fallen asleep just before dawn, man and dog curled together on the living room sofa.
In his dreams he saw the General, not in his stall or at the window or in the barn aisle being groomed. Christian saw him running across the field, his beautiful black mane streaming in the wind, his dark eyes filled with what could only be joy. He saw him free.
When he woke, Christian had lain there staring at the ceiling. The General’s episode of colic hadn’t been severe, but Rafe was “keeping an eye on Hailey.”
To save on expenses, to placate Emma, to avoid the constant reminders of that terrible day a year ago, he’d condemned his horse to a fate he didn’t deserve.
How could he make it up to the General?
Christian promised himself that he’d visit the barn again soon.
But when at last he’d drifted off to sleep, he dreamed of the General again.
He and Bob dozed after that with Owen’s “blankie” over them. To his surprise, Christian had found it in his son’s room with the rest of his things. Emma hadn’t given anything away. Not yet.
Daddy, my froat hurts. I got a fever.
Yeah, buddy. I know. Come here and let me hold you.
Mama says I got the flu.
It won’t last long. I’ll take care of you. You’ll be better soon.
Christian’s arms felt full of little boy again, Owen’s skin hot against his, Owen’s eyes glazed. Sick or well, Owen had always needed him. And that last day he hadn’t been there.
He’d asked Emma and Grace to meet him at the barn, but then he’d been trapped in a meeting with his father, Chet Berglund and half a dozen others. Instead of putting Owen on his horse, as he’d promised, then taking everyone to dinner, he’d gotten that panicked call from Rafe. There’s been an accident...terrible...don’t know how to say this...
Emma wasn’t the only one who’d betrayed Owen.
Still holding his phone, Christian had burst from the conference room and run for his pickup, heart wanting to beat out of his chest. He’d driven like a crazy man, heedless of his father’s calls to wait, leaving him to follow on his own.
The paramedics had been at the barn. By then his little boy had been lying on a gurney stretcher, his small form covered by a rough white blanket. At first, dazed, Christian hadn’t seen that it covered Owen’s face. Emma had stood there, sobbing, but when he’d tried to hold her she’d turned away—for the first time. Grace, clinging to Rafe, had cried in his arms the way she had at dinner yesterday. And, before Christian could peel back the blanket as if to prove to himself that Owen was really all right, one of the EMTs had caught his gaze above the stretcher. He’d slowly shaken his head, tears in his eyes.
Daddy, play with me. I got a new dump truck. See?
Yes, Owen. I see. Just a minute...
Another tug at his arm. Can I play with you then?
Sure, buddy. When I’m done here.
And Owen had put his hands on his skinny hips, just like Emma.
Are you working again?
Guilty, he thought. He’d worked such long hours then—like Emma—sacrificed precious time with his son until there wasn’t any more time. Granted, he’d felt goaded by his parents’ expectations—or had he been trying to prove that Melanie and the judge wouldn’t be the only ones who succeeded? He and Emma had been on the move, too, on the rise, building a better future for their family. So he’d told himself. What do you do if the future never happens?
Now, at least he’d have the foundation as a distraction. The invitations had gone out, the RSVPs were coming in and the caterers had a final menu to work with. But would the launch be a success? Would the donations come pouring in from friends and family and the rest of the community? Could it really help those other families as he hoped?
If it did, he wouldn’t be able to keep spinning his wheels. He would have to change, even more than he already had, but in a better way, and another day trip to Atlanta wouldn’t help.
At the next set of stores along Broad Street, he turned around, found a substitute driver by phone and started back. But he didn’t find Emma at her store. She didn’t answer her cell phone, either. Maybe she was still at his parents’ house, sleeping late. Trying to recover from yesterday. Christian headed for Lookout Mountain.
* * *
WHENEVER EMMA FELT UPSET, she found solace in work, as if she could, indeed, reorganize her messy life. Once she was in that zone, nothing could intrude—even today. At her own house, she overlooked the sounds of deliverymen and loud music in the kitchen, where they were installing the new appliances and talking among themselves.
On her way through she thanked them for their hard work, then scooped up several empty soda cans to put in the trash. Everything still had its place. With Bob at her side, tail wagging and getting in her way whenever she moved, she straightened the living room. Before Christian had left, even knowing there’d be strangers in the house all day, he’d neglected to shut Bob in her crate. Was he as distraught as Emma? It appeared he’d spent the night on the sofa.
She picked up the blanket—still warm from Bob’s body—and folded it. It was Owen’s blankie and her heart tripped. Emma took it up to his room and, after a brief hesitation, pushed open the door. She laid the blanket on the bed, then sat down, feeling suddenly limp.
If you’d been more careful, Frankie had said.
For most of a year, Emma had been determined to be so careful that no one could ever fault her for anything else.
Then she’d caused the fire. Yesterday she’d confronted Christian and this morning the things she’d said to Frankie... Emma had lost the family she’d always wanted. Even if some words needed to be said, they couldn’t be taken back.
Emma laid a hand over her stomach. If she and Christian somehow managed to stay together, if only for the baby’s sake, Emma could imagine years of uncomfortable holidays, birthdays and anniversaries. Or maybe she’d simply be excluded.
It had taken Emma only minutes to pack after she’d left Frankie in the living room with that smudge still on the window. She’d even tried opening her shop downtown to avoid going home, but she couldn’t focus. She hadn’t known where else to go but...here. And now, this room.
Yet this time it hadn’t seemed as hard to come in, and it was almost comforting to find Owen’s toys and truck bed, his stuffed animals still here, sunlight sliding between the slats of his blinds and slanting across the quilt. Unable to give anything away after stuffing it all into bags, she’d simply organized this space, too. As if she might tidy her own memories, including one from that last night with Owen.
Another story, Mama. Please, he’d begged in that sweet voice.
Not tonight, sweetheart. Tomorrow, she’d promised, eager to tuck him in so she could go downstairs to finish the dishes, watch TV with Christian, do some paperwork before bed. More tidying. But there hadn’t been a tomorrow.
Surely there was a lesson, one filled with heartache, in that.
’Night, ’night, Mama. Love you lots.
It had been their ritual each night. Love you, too, baby—bunches.
Love you most, he’d murmur, already half asleep.
That wasn’t possible, she thought, because her own love for him had overwhelmed her from the instant he’d slipped from her
body into the world, and after nine long months of carrying him she’d “met” him at last. Now she gently stroked her abdomen, where another child was already growing, and tears welled in her eyes. She tried to blink them back. She’d never been a weeper. She hadn’t even cried last night. But in another moment, in part because the pregnancy hormones must be flowing through her body, she was lying across the bed, wrapped in Owen’s blanket, hugging Grizzle to her chest, sobbing so hard she couldn’t catch her breath.
* * *
LONG AFTER EMMA had left the house, Frankie stood at the broad windows in her living room, staring at the smudged print on the glass. She was still there when Christian blew through the front door and started up the stairs.
“She isn’t there,” Frankie called after him.
Christian clattered back down again, somehow managing to make noise even on the thick stair runner.
“Where’s Emma?”
She turned from the window. For a second Frankie considered not telling him about their quarrel—worse than a quarrel, really. She’d said things that would stay in the air for the rest of their lives. Yet she’d been filled with horror when she saw Emma with that rag poised over the window smear. She’d lost her head.
“She didn’t share her schedule.” She glanced at the mantel clock, which was three minutes away from chiming the hour. “Perhaps she’s gone to work.”
He shook his head. “The shop’s closed. Grace wasn’t there, either.” His eyes looked desperate. “Where can Emma be?”
“With a client?” Frankie suggested, but Melanie’s project, she knew, was finished. She had no idea if any other clients even existed by now. “Emma went up to your room. After that I only heard her drive away.”
“What happened, Mom?”
Christian had seen right through her. They had their issues as mother and son, but each of them could read the other with sometimes frightening clarity.
“We had a few words earlier this morning,” she admitted.
“Words,” he repeated. “You mean a fight?”
Her pulse hammered. “Really, Christian. You make us sound like those cage people on TV. No,” she said, “but I doubt Emma was feeling kindly toward me when she left this house.”
“I need to talk to her,” he said, half to himself. “Where else would she go?” He studied Frankie. “Spill it, Mom. What exactly did you say?”
With a glance at the window, where the sun had shone through the glass at just the right angle, she twisted her hands. And told him. Because of you, my only grandson is gone...
She watched the firm line of his mouth turn grim.
“You know how important this family is to her,” he said, “and I’m just as guilty. I thought I needed to make amends with Emma, but you—” He turned to go. “I have to find her.”
“Christian, wait!” It was as if Frankie stood back like a disembodied spirit, watching herself cross the room in a panicked rush, the way she’d stormed in to find Emma about to wipe away that handprint. “I said things, yes, and I regret them now. But it’s true,” she went on. “Emma was responsible for Owen’s death. You live with that every day. Just as I have to live with another loss...which she was quick to point out earlier.”
He spun around to face her in the hall. “What are you talking about?”
She covered her eyes with one hand. She hadn’t said those words in years. “Your sister.” She clutched his arm. “Sarah was only two when she...the doctors couldn’t treat child leukemia then as successfully as they do now—oh, how I wish they could have—and when she was gone, I thought I’d never be able to live. For months afterward, I shut myself in this house.”
“And put away all her things,” he said for her. “I never saw anything of her. Not a toy, not an article of clothing. Not a picture. For me, it was as if she never existed.” He drew a breath, his eyes hard on hers. “Now it’s as if Owen never existed for you, either. You eliminated both of them—”
“What else was I to do? Would you have me turn our home into a mausoleum? A museum? Only a short while later, you were born. You were a child here. You ran and played and laughed in these halls—”
“I was afraid to laugh,” he said. “No, I was an only child for all I knew. And everyone—you, Dad, all your friends lived on pleasantries. Small talk and careful smiles, anything except the painful truth. Was there an oil painting of Sarah, too, like the one of Owen you packed away?”
“Yes,” she whispered. “Yes, there is.” In the attic.
His voice quavered. “Emma—my wife and I—lost our little boy. As Max Barrett has told me, we’ll never get over that, which of course I knew. But how can you of all people shut Emma out when she needs you most? You two have something—yes, something terrible—in common. That should bring you closer than you ever thought of being with Melanie.”
Frankie’s hands trembled. “I’m not a bad person, Christian.” But flawed, yes, she could see that now. “You’re right. With Emma...” She was on the verge of weeping. “No parent should ever have to bury a child. No grandparent should, either.”
“I couldn’t agree more. But—”
She went on as if he hadn’t spoken. “You’ll never know how overjoyed I felt when we learned I was pregnant again. I wanted to be happy then, to end the sadness and loneliness and the echoes in this house—”
“I’m sure you did,” he said but his gaze remained hard.
“I wanted to start over.”
“In that you’re like Emma, but life doesn’t work that way,” he said. “And I’m talking about myself, too.” He headed out the front door.
He left Frankie thinking of Sarah and the oil paintings stored in the attic.
Christian was right. She and Emma had so much in common, and for Emma, because of how the accident had happened and considering the guilt she must feel, her loss must be even harder to bear.
As the door closed behind Christian, with a whisper rather than a slam, Frankie was alone again.
This time, it felt even worse.
* * *
CHRISTIAN WAS ALMOST HOME—hoping Emma had gone there—when he passed Ponies on Parade. Almost from habit, he flipped on his blinker and sailed into the parking space he’d come to think of as his.
Max was in the back of the shop and Christian followed the high-pitched whine of a power saw. His small carousel pony stood in the corner of the workroom, looking as if it wanted to cringe away from the noise. Max had covered its newly painted side, presumably dry by now, with a tarp to keep the dust off.
He glanced up then cut the power to the saw. “Hey. Christian. Thought you’d be on the road today.”
“Changed my mind. I need some advice and I want to show you something.” He pulled out his phone and thumbed through some pictures. “The graphic designer has come up with a logo. What do you think?”
Max studied the design. “A perfect ten.” He glanced at the pony. “I like this contemporary take on it but I’d darken the color. Your pony’s coal black, not the charcoal here. Other than that, looks great.” He paused. “I assume Emma’s on board about the foundation.”
“More or less.” Christian paced the workshop while Max sanded the roughed-out barrel shape of the new horse he was working on. “Maybe less,” he admitted. He’d always disliked bland pleasantries, but yesterday, he’d been too open with her. “Thanksgiving dinner turned into a free-for-all. After that, I’m not sure we’re going to make it,” he said.
Max stopped sanding. “I’ve always thought you and Emma had a strong marriage. Like mine was. I still remember Emma coming in last year to order that carousel pony. She was all lit up like a kid herself. It had to be done for Christmas, she kept telling me.” Max looked at the floor. “A few weeks later...well, you know.”
“I know what happened to Owen,” Christian said, running a h
and through his hair. “I’m not sure what happened to us. All I know is, she stayed at my parents’ house last night and I went home without her.” Christian couldn’t seem to stop the next words. He told Max about his quarrel with Emma and his own accusations. “She was right,” he said. “Becoming a trucker again hasn’t helped at all. I need to talk to her but I don’t know what to say.” He sent Max a half smile. “I guess I’m stalling.” He wasn’t ready to tell anyone about the baby. He and Emma had to resolve that first.
“Trying to deal with a heartbroken woman is like walking through a minefield. The words had better be good. No second chance to get them right.”
“Maybe I should send Bob in first.”
“I’d suggest flowers, too.”
Christian’s answering smile faded. “I have to come up with something before it’s too late. I can’t keep doing what I’m doing—trying to hold on to the past.”
Max dropped the sandpaper block on a sawhorse, then brushed off his hands. “You know, I’d do anything to have my wife back, to hear her laugh once more at some corny joke of mine. She always said as long as I could make her laugh, she’d stick around. Keep me,” he said.
Christian sighed. “Unfortunately, in the past year I’ve run out of jokes.”
“You don’t have to be clever, Christian. Just honest. Once you get the conversation rolling, Emma will respond. You go from there. Good luck.”
They walked through the shop into the main room. As always, the scents of sawdust, clinging to Max’s shirt, and raw wood and paint made Christian yearn to stay. Maybe, if things settled down with Emma, he’d try a small project of his own, as Max had suggested. He liked being here better than he liked being on the road, better than his office at Mallory Trucking, even if such a solution wasn’t practical.
They went outside to Christian’s truck. “Thanks for listening,” he said.
Max clapped a hand on his shoulder.