He rubbed her back, and a small sigh slipped from her lips before she turned her head and looked up at him.
“Morning,” he whispered.
Katie pulled her hand from around his waist, rubbed one of her sleepy eyes, and then rested her cheek on his bare torso. “I love you.”
Chase hauled her up until she was sprawled across his chest, their faces inches apart. “I love you, too.”
He grasped the back of her neck and pulled her down until their lips touched. With a reluctant groan, she leaned back. Her long lashes fluttered against her cheek before she opened her eyes and met his gaze.
“What are your plans today?” she asked.
“I’m going to take a personal day from the hospital. I have some things I need to take care of.”
She searched his eyes for a moment before she nodded and let it go. He fell a little more in love with her at that moment because she knew when he needed to be left alone, pushed harder, or called out for his thickheadedness.
“Well, I need to get to work,” Katie said.
Pulling herself up, she pecked his lips and made her way to the bathroom to take a shower. Chase grabbed his phone and called the hospital to let them know he wouldn’t be in.
After he dropped off Katie at work, he drove into Pacific Grove and stopped at the little florist shop on Forest Avenue to pick up flowers. When he entered the cemetery gates, he felt his chest tighten. The fact that he hadn’t visited since he’d laid Terri to rest made him feel like he had neglected his duties as a husband.
Chase drove down the winding path to the center of the cemetery. Grabbing the flowers and a bottle of water, he climbed out of the car before he had a chance to change his mind. His feet were like bricks while he made his way to the plot. Glancing out over the grounds, he tried to avoid the sight of the headstone he had never seen. There was a sliver of ocean in the distance, along with the lighthouse and the first tee at the Pacific Grove Golf Course. Taking a deep breath of the cool morning air, Chase stopped under a cypress tree and took the final step he needed to move on with his life.
“Hello, Terri.”
He read the inscription that had been carved into the granite. Terri Lynn O’Donnell. Beloved Wife and Mother. December 22, 1979 ~ March 7, 2011. Chase took a steadying breath and sank to his knees in front of the headstone. Pulling off the lid to the stone’s metal vase, he poured in the water before adding his flowers. Then Chase sat back on his heels and stared at the arrangement, trying to gather his thoughts.
“I don’t know where to start. I don’t even know if you can hear me, but I have to believe you’re out there somewhere. Liz and Tony need you too much.”
The tears welled in his eyes, and he took another deep breath. He had struggled with his grief for three years, and he wasn’t going to allow himself to fall victim to the past again.
“I felt guilty for a long time for what happened. I thought if I’d done something different, maybe you’d still be here. That if it had been me who died, it would have saved our children so much grief. Then you’d have been here to raise them and our—” A lump formed in Chase’s throat, prohibiting him from even mentioning the child he had lost.
“I believe things happen for a reason and sometimes we don’t know what the reason is.” He looked toward heaven. “Maybe we’ll never know.”
He sniffed and then sat down next to Terri’s headstone. All the bad decisions he’d made since her death weighed on his shoulders.
“I need to apologize for the way I’ve handled your death. I let my actions hurt our children in so many ways. I didn’t care for them the way you would have wanted me to. I left Liz to find her own way of dealing with your death and haven’t kept your memory alive for Tony.”
Chase sat there for a long time, letting his painful mistakes echo in his mind. Little by little, he felt a sense of peace after admitting his faults. He traced his fingers over the engraving on the headstone.
“You were a wonderful mother, and I never dreamed I would find someone else. Especially someone like Katie, who loves Tony and Liz and treats them like her own children. She has a wonderful little boy, Shawn. He’s Tony’s age, and they’re inseparable.” Chase’s thoughts drifted to the boys’ brotherly bond. “He’s been good for Tony. He’s helped him out of his shell and is teaching him to be more outgoing. Katie has raised him well. He’s respectful, kind, and smart, with a little bit of stubbornness thrown in, like his mother.”
Chase felt the smile return to his face. “She makes me a better man—a better father.” He looked out over the grounds and felt a warmth wash over him like a comforting blanket. This was what he needed. It was time to let go of his past and embrace his future.
“I want her to be with me for the rest of my life. I know Katie and I haven’t been together for very long, but I’m going to ask her to marry me. I don’t want to live without her any longer. It’s taken me a while to understand that by loving her, I wasn’t betraying you. It just meant my heart had grown to include her and Shawn. I’m finally living up to the promise you wanted me to make to be happy. I’ll always love you, but I have to stop feeling guilty for living.”
He kissed his hand and touched the headstone. “Thank you for ten wonderful years, Terri. I love you.”
~*~
“Chase? What are you doing here?” Katie asked when he walked into her office. “I wasn’t expecting you until I got off work.” She sprang to her feet, and her hands went to his cheeks. “What’s wrong?”
Pulling her into his arms, he buried his face into her neck. “I needed to see you.”
Chase placed a kiss below her ear, and her hands went into his hair. She held him close for several moments. “Please talk to me.” Her whispered plea sounded frightened.
“I took flowers to Terri’s grave.” He pulled back and looked in her eyes. “I haven’t been there since we buried her. It was time to say goodbye.”
With a watchful eye, she nodded and pulled him back into her arms.
“Can you take your lunch now? I need to see Allison, and I want you to come with me.”
“Yeah, I just need to let Amelia know I’m leaving.”
Kissing his cheek, she pulled away and went out the door while he waited for her in the lobby.
Chase and Katie drove into Monterey, and he explained to her why he needed to speak to Allison. She was supportive and told him she’d be happy to go in with him or sit out in the waiting room—whatever he decided.
“Chase, it’s so nice to see you again,” Allison said when she took his hand in a firm shake.
“Thank you for seeing me outside of our regular schedule.” He turned to Katie. “I’d like to introduce you to my girlfriend, Katie.”
Allison smiled and took Katie’s hand, then motioned for them to have a seat on the couch while she pulled up a chair.
“What can I do for you two?”
“I went to the cemetery today and found some closure. I want to take the kids, but I’m not sure if that’s a good idea. They haven’t been there since we buried Terri.”
Allison looked thoughtful for a moment. “Sigmund Freud thought children didn’t have the ability to grieve. He believed it was too difficult an emotion for them to comprehend and that only in adolescence, when development was more advanced, did true mourning become possible.”
Chase looked aghast at the idea that his kids couldn’t grieve over their mother. The idea was preposterous.
“Do you believe this, too?” he asked.
She let out a short bark of laughter and shook her head. “Not at all. Some sections of our society think children should be kept away from the devastation of death, while others believe they’re resilient and will bounce back quickly. I think it’s somewhere in the middle. While children may go through the pain and grief from the death of a parent, they can also learn and grow with the help of supportive adults.”
Chase nodded his agreement, even though her words stung. He hadn’t been a supportive parent for
a long time, so he needed reassurance that his actions wouldn’t harm them any more than he already had.
“So with what you know of our situation, do you think it would be okay to take them to visit their mother?”
“The reason I brought up Freud’s theories was so you could see that you have a firm grasp of your own children’s needs already. No one needs to tell you what is best for them. You already know. You need to have a little more faith in your decisions. Give them the choice, and see if they want to go. If they decide they would rather not, then maybe they could make a card or write a letter.” She reached out and touched his arm in a reassuring gesture. “Just make sure you’re there to discuss their experience and help them through it.”
~*~
Chase talked to Tony and Liz and asked if they wanted to visit their mother’s grave. He was struck by how much they didn’t understand about the idea of visiting her even though she was gone. Starting from the beginning, he told them a little about his experience. Liz thought about it before she said she wanted to go, whereas Tony shrugged his shoulders and said he didn’t mind.
They set time aside after their next family therapy appointment to make a trip down to the cemetery. Katie and Chase decided it would be best if he took the kids alone, so she opted to go back to his place and have dinner ready when they returned.
When Chase parked the car, he glanced at Liz in the rearview mirror and noticed she had a pensive look on her face. “Are you ready, sweetheart?”
Tony glanced from his father to Liz with a confused look. He didn’t seem to understand how hard this might be on his sister. Even so, he surprised Chase when, after they climbed out of the car, he wrapped his arm around her waist and hugged her.
Chase led them down to the gravesite, then stood back and let them have their space. Tony knelt down and replaced the flowers Chase had brought the day before with a fresh arrangement. Tony fussed with the stems for a moment before he rose and went to his father. Chase wrapped his arm around his shoulder while they all stood there in silence.
Liz turned to Chase with tears in her eyes. “What do I do?”
“What do you want to do?”
She shrugged her shoulders and looked up at him. “Nona said if I say my prayers, Mom will hear them. Should I say a prayer?”
Chase nodded. “That sounds like a good place to start.”
Liz looked at Tony, but he shook his head and stayed where he was. She turned back to the headstone and sank to her knees.
“Mom?” Liz’s voice cracked. “I miss you.” She paused while her shoulders shook. “Daddy got me a box I can put things in that remind me of you. I put Grandma’s bracelet in it. I remember you used to wear it all the time.” Her voice grew steadier while she became more comfortable with speaking to the wind.
After Liz went through the contents of her memento box, she launched into the more mundane things like school and everyday life. Chase caught himself smiling when she told Terri about Katie and Shawn. She had come so far in such a short amount of time. After a few more stories, Liz decided to wrap up her heart-to-heart.
“I love you, Mom. Amen.”
Chase smiled at the innocence of her faith, but then he felt Tony shaking against his side. Tears trailed down his son’s cheeks while he stared at the ground. Chase knelt beside him and grasped his pants’ belt loops.
“Are you okay, slugger?”
Tony’s face lifted until his blue eyes stared back at him. He shook his head, and a soft cry came from his lips. Chase took him in his arms and hugged him close, tucking Tony’s head under his chin.
“Do you want to talk about it?”
Tony nodded but didn’t try to speak. Chase didn’t push him. Liz came up behind him and rubbed his back while he continued to soak their father’s shirt with his tears.
“What’s the matter?” Liz asked in a soothing voice. After a few sniffles, Tony pulled back and looked at Liz with glassy eyes.
“You remember Mom, but I don’t. You talked about her reading to you and playing at the park, but all I can remember is that she looked like you.” Tony turned back to his father, buried his face once more into Chase’s chest, and clung to him.
“Daddy, what would happen if you died like Mom?” he asked.
Chase gripped his son closer. “I’m not going anywhere.”
“Mom didn’t want to go anywhere either, but she’s gone.”
“If anything happens to me, then you’d still have your grandparents and Gina and Daniel.”
“But I want Katie,” Tony said. “She does all those things Liz said Mom did with her. I want Katie to be my mom.”
Chase gathered his children to his chest and clung to them while Tony’s plea echoed in his heart. After several minutes, Tony and Liz looked up at their father, waiting for his response.
Chase smiled through the tears in his eyes. “I’ll see what I can do.”
~*~
Katie and Shawn headed over to the O’Donnells’ for their Saturday morning ritual of cartoons and pancakes. Afterward, Liz and Katie drove into Monterey to have some girl time. Gina had given Katie a gift certificate to a posh salon on Cannery Row. She’d received it as a gift from her bridal shower, but she claimed she’d never go because she was loyal to her own manicurist. Katie suspected she had done it as a friendly gesture since she knew Katie didn’t get many opportunities to pamper herself. Whatever the reason, Katie was glad for some one-on-one time with Liz.
“So how were the first couple weeks of sixth grade?” Katie asked once they’d climbed into the massage chairs sitting side by side.
Liz shrugged and slid her toes into the tub of warm water. “It was all right, I guess.”
“Well, that doesn’t sound all that exciting.”
Liz folded her hands in her lap and leaned back against the massage chair while the tech began to scrub her feet. “I don’t know. It’s just . . . everything’s changing.”
Katie’s brow furrowed while she wondered what had brought on the melancholy shift in her mood. “How so?”
“Shannon has a boyfriend.”
Katie smiled when understanding dawned on her. “So she’s not around all that much anymore, huh?”
“Yeah.”
She reached over and patted Liz’s hand in a sympathetic gesture. “How long has Shannon had a boyfriend?”
“Since Thursday. He asked her if she wanted to go out when we were standing in the lunch line. She’s liked him since last year.” Liz sighed and looked at Katie. “I don’t like him at all.”
“Why’s that?”
Liz rolled her eyes, but then gave Katie an apologetic glance. Katie waved it off.
“Because she spends every lunch with him and they make goo-goo eyes all the time. It’s gross. She also won’t shut up about him when we’re together. I’m so sick of hearing about how sweet and cute he is.” Liz made a gagging noise before closing her eyes and slamming her head against the headrest.
Katie held in a chuckle and tried to stay straight-faced. “Is he mean or do bad stuff?”
Liz shrugged but didn’t look at Katie. After a minute, she opened her eyes and shook her head. “No. He’s never been in trouble at school, and I’ve never seen him be mean to kids like some of the boys are.”
“Hmm.” Katie looked thoughtful for a moment. “I guess I’m not really sure why you don’t like him.”
Liz thought about what Katie had said for a minute and then looked at her. “He’s just . . . just . . . a boy, and we never hung out with boys last year. They were all bratty and immature.”
Katie nodded. “And things should be like they were before when you were in elementary school.”
Liz started to nod, but shook her head instead. “No, I’m glad we aren’t at River School anymore. I was tired of being with all the babies.”
Katie couldn’t hold in her laugh. “I’m sure Shawn and Tony would object to being called babies.”
Liz smiled. “I guess I’ll have to remember that next
time they whine about dad’s lizard limit in the house.”
“Oh jeez,” Katie said with a chuckle. “Yeah, they whined pretty loud when your dad put his foot down.” Katie tried to rephrase her question to get the conversation back to the original topic. “So you don’t think things should be like they were in elementary school?”
Liz closed her eyes, and Katie saw her lip tremble for a split second before she spoke. “No, but I don’t want to lose my best friend.”
Katie squeezed her hand. “Did you lose Gina when she married Daniel?”
“No.”
“Then what makes you think you’ll lose Shannon?”
“She’s just different now.”
“Does she treat you differently?”
“Well, no, not really. She just talks about him all the time and stuff.”
“Well, how’s that different than you talking about something you like? What about that new book you just read? You talked about it so much, I ended up borrowing it so I could see what you were so excited about.”
“Yeah, I guess you’re right.”
“Honey, we both know that change can be hard. Just make sure you’re not fighting it for the wrong reasons. People change, life happens, and sometimes friends move on. You can accept it, change with it, or be bitter about it, but the choice is always yours on how you handle it.”
Liz nodded, and they both fell silent while the nail technicians scrubbed, filed, and buffed their toes. Katie snuck glances at her while they relaxed to the rhythm of the chairs’ massagers, and she could almost see the moment when Liz realized what Katie meant. When they picked out polish, Liz handed Katie her choice, then slipped her arm around her.
“I’ve been really mean to Shannon,” Liz confessed. “I told her I didn’t like hanging out with her boyfriend and she needed to choose me or him or I was going to hang out with Marissa.”
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