After Midnight

by Lacy Hart

  “I’m sorry, James,” I said to him. “You needed to know the truth.”

  Just then, Lizzie appeared at the back door and slowly walked out onto the porch.

  “What happened?” she asked. “I saw Mom heading out and tried to talk to her, but she wouldn’t say anything to me. She just got in her car and took off.”

  I walked over to Lizzie and faced her.

  “I confronted your Mom,” I said to her, “and told your Dad everything.”

  Lizzie moved over closer to her father and put her arm around him. James hugged her close to him and held her.

  “It’ll be okay,” James said to Lizzie, kissing her on top of her head.

  “I know it will, Dad,” Lizzie said to him.

  I went over and stood by Caleb again, and he took my hand in his. James walked over to us and looked at Caleb.

  “I’m guessing you had something to do with resolving all this,” James said to him.

  “Not really,” Caleb said modestly. “Sarah is the one that had the strength to do it.”

  James looked at me and came over and hugged me.

  “I’m sorry you’ve had to go through all this, Sarah,” James said to me. “I wish I could have done more to help you. If had known you were in trouble…”

  “It’s not your fault, James,” I interrupted. “Hopefully, things will be better for all of us now.”

  I broke our hug and looked back to Caleb.

  “We should get this to the police station,” I said to Caleb, holding up the phone.

  Caleb nodded to me as I looked back to Lizzie and James. I went to them and hugged them simultaneously before Caleb and I went back out to the car.

  I sat in the passenger seat of the Jeep and let out a big sigh of relief. I could feel my hands shaking a little bit as I looked down at the phone, and then looked over at Caleb. I could see him glance at me out of the corner of his eye.

  “You were amazing,” he said to me as he reached over and held my hand on my knee.

  “I was a nervous wreck,” I said to him honestly. “I kept expecting something to go wrong, or for me to break down.”

  “You were calm and cool through the whole thing,” Caleb told me. “You did everything perfectly.”

  “Thank you,” I told him as I sat back in the seat. I was feeling proud of myself and had more confidence than I had ever had in my life.

  “And you were right,” Caleb said to me as he turned the Jeep up Oak Street to go towards the police station.

  “About what?”” I asked him.

  “She is a bitch,” he said to me with a wry smile.

  33

  Caleb

  The next few days all passed by as something of a blur. I spent a lot of time with Sarah, trying to help her through the mess she had experienced, and providing her with the comfort and support that helped to build her back up. We spent countless hours talking to police detectives, law enforcement officials, people from the DA’s office and others, all asking question after question to her about what happened, how it happened, and why it happened.

  The police did talk to me several times about what I did to Jared. It was to be expected I guess, and they wanted to make sure of all the facts. I know at one point he was considering filing charges against me for assault, but his lawyers apparently talked him out of it, knowing that he was already facing jail time and that a case like that may make it worse for him.

  When all was said and done, Jared Sterling realized he had little leeway and wasn’t going to get bailed out by his rich relatives this time. The evidence found on Jared’s phone was more than enough to keep him in hot water. The Sterling family didn’t want more of a spotlight shone on them more than this had already brought about and strongly suggested to him that he take a deal and face his prison time. He ended up pleading guilty to multiple charges and accepting a ten to twenty-year sentence instead of leaving things up to a jury, where he could have ended up with a lot more. In my opinion, he got off too easy, but the justice system doesn’t always work the way we want it to.

  As for Denise, after Jared sang about her involvement in the extortion attempt and the evidence found on the phone, the police had more than a passing interest in speaking with her. The problem was tracking her down at that point. Apparently, after she left the house, she went straight over to the bank and cashed out an account she had been using to squirrel away money she got from James, Jared, and her work. The pictures of her on camera at the bank are last ones anyone saw of her as the police searched around for her. The police extended their search to surrounding states, but as of yet, she hadn’t turned up.

  Doug gladly gave Sarah time off from the diner so that she could recover from her injuries and the trauma and deal with everything that was coming along with the case. This gave her a chance to clear her head and try to get settled more with her life. It also gave her more time to spend with James and Lizzie as they tried to pick up the pieces of what had happened and learn to work together as a family again.

  During those few days, I also worked on putting the pieces of my life back together. After all that had happened, I knew how important it was to give my family and those I love the time and attention that is important. It had taken me two long years to see clearly that things can change in an instant, just as they had for me when Ella died, and I did not want to waste the time I had with everyone.

  My first step was to try to find greater closure in dealing with Ella’s death. I had made another visit to Dr. Weber, as I had promised him, and we talked at length about Ella, how important she was to my life and to Adam’s, what her loss meant to me, and how I was working to understand and accept the grief. The meeting was very cathartic for me, and it also made me realize that Adam and I needed to deal with this together, something we had never done in the two years since she had passed.

  Since it was near the time of the anniversary of her death, I decided now was the time to visit Ella’s grave at the cemetery. I had not been out here since here funeral, trying to avoid coming here for all this time because I thought it would be too painful for me. When I first brought up the idea to Adam, he was genuinely surprised that I would want to go. He and Linda had been out to the gravesite several times over the years, and Adam was more than happy to go with me.

  I told Sarah about what we were planning, and how we had planned to go on Saturday morning.

  “I can come with you if you want,” she said to me as we sat on the couch together. “Unless you’re not comfortable with that, which I completely understand.”

  “Actually,” I said to her, “I think it would help me if you were there. It’s going to be tough for me, even with Adam there. It would mean a lot to me if you did come for support.”

  “Of course,” Sarah said to me.

  When Saturday morning came around, Adam, Sarah and I piled into my Jeep and drove out to the cemetery located just on the outskirts of Swanson. It was a warm, sunny day and the weather made it seem more comfortable and pleasant. I parked in the parking area just outside the graveyard, and we began the walk along the paved pathway that mazed its way through the cemetery in different directions. I had a hard time remembering exactly where Ella’s grave was located, so Adam led the way, with Sarah and I following behind. Sarah held my hand the entire walk, glancing over at me as she could see I was getting nervous as we got closer.

  “You okay?” she said to me, giving my hand a tug.

  I gave her a quick smile and nod and looked up to see Adam make a sharp left and head down a row towards where I assumed the grave was located. He slowed as he reached the end of the row and stood before one grave.

  I took a deep breath as we stood before the headstone. When we were here for the funeral, the headstone had not been put into place yet, so I had never seen it myself. All I knew of it was what Linda had described to me, and at the time I was agreeable to anything.

  “Aunt Linda makes sure they take care of it and keep it clean and looking nice,” Adam said to me.


  The three of us stood silently for a minute or two before Adam stepped forward and laid the bouquet of flowers he had brought in front of the headstone.

  “Hi, Mom,” he said quietly. “I brought you daisies, just like we always picked together. Everything is going great. School is almost over, and I’ll be graduating soon, so there’s exams, the prom, graduation and all that. I’ll be going to Duke in the fall on a partial scholarship, and I promise not to just focus on basketball and parties and get schoolwork done. I’ll be sure to come and see you a bunch before I leave for school. I love you and miss you.”

  Adam patted the headstone with his left hand and walked over to Sarah and me. I put my arm around Adam and gave him a hug. Sarah then looked at me to see if I wanted to say anything. I was hesitant at first.

  “Adam, come walk with me,” Sarah said to him, and Adam patted me on the back and walked over to Sarah. Sarah put her arm around his waist, and they walked down the row, back towards the pathway that led out of the cemetery.

  I slowly approached the gravestone and ran my hand over the top, feeling the cold, smooth marble beneath my hand.

  “Hi, sweetie,” I said out loud quietly. “I know I haven’t been out here, but you should know that not a day goes by where you aren’t in my thoughts. It’s hard for me to see or do anything that doesn’t remind me in some way about you, and I can’t tell you how difficult it has been for me these last two years without you. It’s taken me a long time- too long, probably – to start learning how to face life without having you here to help guide me along. We were partners for so long that I didn’t think I could do it by myself. But then I realized that I’m not by myself. I have Adam, who you would be super proud of now that he is a young man, and Linda, who is the best sister ever and who misses you terribly, and… well, now I have Sarah.”

  “I know you and I always talked about what would happen if something happened to me overseas, and how I wanted you to be happy and live a full life and be with someone else if that is what you wanted. You always said you wanted the same for me, even though I never wanted to believe something would happen to you. When it did, I didn’t know how to handle it, and I never wanted to think about anyone else but you. I didn’t think I ever could be with someone again, but Sarah brings out something in me… something I thought I had lost forever when I lost you.”

  “I just want you to know that you are always a part of me and that I will always love you. I’ll keep thinking about you, and I know somewhere you’re watching me, making sure I keep doing things the right way. I love you.”

  I kissed the fingertips on my right hand and touched them to the top of the headstone before walking away. I was feeling choked up and sad and shed some tears on my walk back to where Sarah and Adam were waiting for me. I gave Adam another hug, and then gave one to Sarah, and then the three of us walked back to the car. I walked in the middle with one arm around each of them.

  We got back to the Jeep and got inside and started driving back towards Swanson. Adam peeked his head up from the back of the Jeep in between the two of us in front.

  “It’s still early,” Adam said to us. “How about we stop somewhere for breakfast?”

  “I guess we could,” I said to him. “Where would you like to go?”

  “Well the diner has the best breakfast in town,” Adam said without thinking.

  “Really?” Sarah said to him. “The diner? I agree they have the best breakfast, but I already spend a lot of time there.”

  I kept driving along while the two of them tried to decide where to go before I took a turn from Oak Street and headed in a different direction.

  “Dad, the diner is back in the other direction,” Adam said to me.

  “I know where the diner is, trust me,” I said to Adam, giving Sarah a wink. “I just wanted to take a little drive first.”

  After a couple of turns, we were coming up the back end of Munson Lane. I slowed down and pulled into one of the driveways. Sarah turned instantly and looked at me, and I just smiled at her.

  “What are we doing here?” Adam asked.

  I climbed out of the car with Sarah getting out on her side. Adam finally got out and stood there with us.

  “Who lives here?” Adam asked.

  “Well, no one at the moment,” I told him as we walked up the pathway and got near the front door. I turned the handle of the front door, and it was locked.

  “Caleb, what are you doing?” Sarah said to me, worrying if I had lost my mind.

  I reached up over the door to the top ledge and felt around and found the small black box I was looking for. I opened the box and took out the key I knew would be in there and held it up.

  “Are we breaking into this house?” Adam asked, feeling a little concerned now himself.

  “Caleb, we can’t just go in there…” Sarah said to me as I put the key in the lock and opened the door.

  We walked through the front door to see that the home was now completely furnished.

  “Caleb, someone lives here now, we have to go,” Sarah insisted.

  “You guys have been here before?” Adam asked Sarah.

  “Your Dad and I looked at this place a couple of weeks ago, just to see it,” Sarah said to Adam. “Caleb, come on, this isn’t funny. This is someone’s home and furniture.”

  “Wait a minute,” I said to Sarah as Adam was looking around.

  “Hey… I recognize some of this… some of this is our old furniture, from the old house we rented,” Adam said as he ran his hand over the couch in front of the fireplace.

  “Yes,” I said to him, closing the front door. “It is our old furniture. This is my house… well, our house really. I closed on it two days ago.”

  Sarah spun around and looked at me.

  “How did you manage to pull that off?” Sarah asked me.

  “Well I had been talking to Adrianne, the real estate agent, all along, since we looked at it, and I put an offer in. They had another offer already, but I sweetened the pot and offered them cash on the spot if they closed right away. They jumped at it, so I had a moving company bring the stuff over yesterday.”

  “So, where’s my room,” Adam said with a laugh.

  “Upstairs,” I said to him. “There’s not much in there right now. I figured you would want some of your own stuff from Linda’s house.”

  Adam went upstairs to have a look around while I led Sarah through the kitchen, which was now complete with a table and chairs and everything else needed.

  “I figured we could have breakfast here this morning,” I told her with a smile. I took her by the hand and led her outside, where I had some furniture set up around a fire pit out there.

  “That’s so nice for you two, Caleb,” Sarah said to me. “It’s just what you wanted.”

  “It doesn’t have to be for just Adam and me,” I said to Sarah. “I know it’s only been a few weeks Sarah, and a lot has gone on in that time, but I can’t imagine a day going by where I don’t want to see you, and more than just seeing you while you’re working or walking you home. I want to spend my days and nights with you. I love you, Sarah, and I would love it if you would come and live here with me and make this place your home… our home.”

  I was watching her face to see if I could read a reaction from Sarah. I didn’t want her to feel overwhelmed or forced into making a decision she wasn’t ready to make, and when she didn’t answer right away, I wasn’t sure what to make of the situation. She took two steps away from me and was looking out over the yard.

  “Sarah?” I said to her.

  Sarah turned back to me with a smile on her face.

  “When we first looked at this place, I thought… I mean I could envision myself, here with you, making this our home,” she said to me. “I just never thought it would really happen. I would love to come and live here with you, Caleb.”

  I walked over to where Sarah was standing and kissed her deeply.

  “I love you, Caleb,” Sarah whispered to me.
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  “I love you, too,” I answered, and kissed her again.

  “Hey lovebirds,” Adam called from the back door. “Are we going to have breakfast or what? I’m starving.”

  “Get the coffee started,” I told Adam. “We’ll be inside in a second.”

  Adam just shook his head and went back into the house. I took Sarah’s hand and walked her a bit further back into the yard where there was a small clearing surrounded by a few trees.

  “I hung a hammock back here for us,” I told her, leading her onto the hammock so we could lay together. “And I thought maybe we could put another fire pit back here for us.”

  I put my arm around her as we gently rocked in the hammock. Looking up, there was a clear pathway straight up into the sky.