Happy Hour

by Michele Scott

  “Yes. Of course. I’ll be right there. I’m going to the restroom first.”

  “Want me to wait?”

  “I’m fine.”

  “Okay. You sure? I can wait,” Darren said.

  She shook her head. “I’m fine. I really am.”

  He nodded and headed off to Ian’s room.

  “There’s no chance, is there?” Terrell asked.

  She shook her head. “I’m sorry.”

  He kissed her on the cheek and walked out.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

  Kat

  Kat sat across from her dad, having a glass of wine and eating a late lunch at the restaurant. They sat out on the trellis-covered patio with grapevines and evening jasmine twining through. The dull heat of the day and the wine made Kat a little sleepy. The mountains in the background shone golden with the sun beating down on them. Even in the middle of a hot summer, Napa Valley was one of the most beautiful places in the world. The smells of the valley alone were heavenly as fruit and soil filled the air. Kat popped an olive from a local grower into her mouth.

  Jeremy was serving them and proud of it. Christian had promoted him to server, and she’d watched Jeremy and Christian grow closer over the last month. Brian was still in his cast and, even though Christian worked hard to take care of him when Kat was in New Orleans to be with Alyssa, Brian still remained a bit standoffish toward his stepdad. On the up side, Christian continued to keep trying, so not all hope was lost.

  “Kitty, we need to talk,” her father said.

  She held up a hand, knowing this was coming, knowing he’d been sent to be the peacemaker. “Mom put you up to this.”

  “No she didn’t. I am doing this on my own and I need you to listen and stop being so stubborn.” He frowned and the creases around his hazel eyes deepened.

  “Dad, there’s nothing to talk about.”

  “That’s not true. I have stood by for years and watched you hurt, watched your sister hurt, and let myself sulk and hurt while you took care of me and everyone else. I moved out here knowing you’d be close by to take care of me. For years I wasn’t much of a father or a husband.”

  “Come on, Dad! What, is she brainwashing you to believe that? You were the best dad in the world and the best husband. I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  He took the bottle of chilled chardonnay from the ice bucket and refilled his glass. “When your mother left, I was heartbroken, that’s true, and I didn’t do right by you. You stepped in and did it all for me and Tammy, and I was comfortable with that. But Kitty, I am a changed man. I’m no longer the man who needs to be taken care of.”

  “I know that.”

  “I don’t think you do. There are some things in my past that I am not proud of. Things that drove your mom away.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  Jeremy came by with a basket of bread. Kat shooed him away. “Not now, Jer.”

  “Your mother held the family together. I know I worked many hours to provide, but she was the glue. I knew she wasn’t happy with all of the hours I worked, and wasn’t there on time for certain events, or at all, on occasion.”

  “You were working.”

  “I know, but that was an excuse for me, too.”

  “I don’t understand,” she said.

  “I used my work as an excuse because I didn’t think I was worthy of such a fine family. I felt the only way to hang on to your mother and you kids was through providing a living.”

  “Exactly. Dad, you didn’t do anything wrong.”

  “Honey, I did.” He sighed and looked away from her for a few second before continuing. “When you and your sister were in high school and so busy with your own lives, your mom needed me, and I pushed her away because I didn’t know how to be there for her. I had an affair, Kat.”

  Her stomach tightened and her hands started shaking. She reached for her wine. “What?”

  “I did, and God bless your mother. She tried for years after that to move forward with me, but it was too much for her and she finally left me.” Kat couldn’t respond. “Her leaving wasn’t really her fault. She deserved better, and if she hadn’t left, I wouldn’t be who I am today, and that is a pretty happy old fart.”

  “I am so confused.” She swallowed her wine, trying also to swallow back all of the confusing thoughts rushing through her mind. What he told her explained so much, but she didn’t know what to think, or where her allegiances sat, or how to handle any of this. She was an adult. She should have known how to handle this. “What about now? Now you’ve been forgiven and she comes back to you, and it’s all fine?”

  “Not entirely, but sort of. I know that time does heal. And time away from one another has seemed to heal her and me. I love your mom. I always have and I always will. If we wind up back together, that would be wonderful, and if not, it’s not in the cards. But, honey, it’s not up to you to worry about us, or take care of me and be angry at her. It’s not. I’m a big boy and she’s a big girl and she loves you with all her heart and so do I. I think what I’m asking here is for you to forgive both of us?”

  “What am I supposed to do?” Kat looked heavenward.

  “You’re supposed to deal with your own family. Love those kids when they’re snots and act like you’re nothing but a pain in the ass. Love that little girl, Amber, for being in your life. Love your husband, faults and all. But most of all, love yourself. Love yourself, first, because you are magnificent. You are a gift, Kat, and your family knows it. Whether they show it or not, they know it. I know it. You need to know it and believe it.” He took her hand and squeezed. “You are truly a gift, my girl.”

  Damn! Now irritating tears blurred her vision and she quickly wiped them away and let out a small laugh. Mix wine and sentiment and there go the waterworks. She stood up and walked around the table, leaning over her dad. “Thank you, Daddy.”

  He stood and hugged her back. She spotted her mom at the hostess stand and then pulled away from her dad and shook her head. She walked toward her mom, who started to turn around. Kat grabbed her arm. Her mom turned back, looking surprised. “Why don’t you come have a glass of wine with me and Dad?”

  Her mom smiled and nodded.

  ***

  The next morning Kat woke to soft knocking on her bedroom door. Christian lifted his head. Amber stirred next to them. “Who the…?” Kat whispered, her heart racing at the thought of an intruder. Jer had spent the night at a buddy’s house and Brian was at the Sperm Donor’s. Intruders didn’t typically announce their presence. Maybe Jeremy had been dropped off early for some reason. To their surprise, Kat’s mother walked in, breakfast tray in hand. “Mom?”

  “I know we’re still on shaky ground, Kitty, and I know you’re going to think I am overstepping my bounds here, but I love you so much, and I love Christian and this family, and the two of you need to be happy together.”

  Kat sat up. “What are you talking about?”

  “It’s all self explanatory,” her mom said. “Take your time. Amber, you ready? Remember what Nanny V told you last night? That today was going to be our day? Why don’t you wake on up now and we can get going.”

  “Okay, Nanny V,” the sleepy little girl said and gave Kat and her dad a hug. “Bye.”

  “Bye?” Kat asked.

  “Yes, bye-bye. Amber and I are going for a nature walk and then Pop-Pop is going to pick us up and take us to lunch and the movies. Didn’t you say Jeremy was staying at a friend’s last night and Brian at his dad’s?”

  “Yes,” Kat replied.

  “Good. Have fun.” She winked at them, set the tray down, and closed the door. She opened it a minute later. “Sorry. Almost forgot the most important items.” She set down a large gift box on their dresser.

  “What in God’s name has she gone and done now?” Christian asked.

  “Who knows? I’m kind of afraid.”

  Christian clambered out of bed and walked over to where Venus had put the tray and box on the d
resser. Kat got up and grabbed the box. She pointed to the tray. “Is that oysters on the half shell?”

  “Sure is.”

  “Champagne, too?”

  “Yes, and lookie here,” he said, “chocolate covered strawberries.”

  “I think there is a theme.”

  “What’s in the box?”

  They took the food and box back to the bed, where they opened the box. “Only my mom.” Kat took out a book. “Tantric Sex for Beginners.”

  “Let me see that.” He took it from her and flipped through the pages. “How do they do that?” He showed her a page with two people facing each other, appearing to be in each others’ laps seated Indian style. Kat turned the pages from side to side.

  “Impossible,” she said, and turned to the back page to see the author photo. The author had long white hair and a braided beard set against his crevice lined face. “Come on. This guy? Who would even have sex with this guy, much less Indian style, funky sex? I wonder if he can even have sex. He looks older than God.”

  “What else is in there?” Christian asked pointing to the box.

  Kat pulled out a blindfold, some honey nectar dusting powder with a feather duster for the body, chocolate sauce, and a vibrator thingamajig called The Tongue. “I am so embarrassed,” Kat said.

  “Have I told you lately how much I love your mother?” He poured her a glass of champagne.

  “I’m going to kill her.”

  “Come on Kat. Let’s have some fun.” He tickled her leg with his free hand.

  “All right, let me see that book. Maybe I could learn something.”

  After two more glasses of champagne and some of the driest reading ever, Kat tossed the book aside and faced Christian. “Know what, honey, I don’t need a book or aphrodisiacs, or dusting powder. I need you and that’s it.”

  He kissed the tip of her nose. “What do you say we play a game of spin the bottle?”

  “Now we’re talking.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

  Danielle

  Danielle knelt down at the pews, the sleeping baby boy in his detachable car seat at her side. A month had passed and there was no sign that her daughter would ever wake up.

  She didn’t hear Mark come in, but she knew who it was when he knelt beside her. It had become their ritual together. He would join her at lunchtime when he could. She breathed a sigh of relief at his company. Why they did this, she wasn’t sure. She’d started coming in here a week after the baby’s birth. Maybe it had something to do with Jamie’s insistence on having faith. Danielle resigned herself that it was better to try to have faith than to not try at all. But she still didn’t know if their vigil would change a thing.

  “Hi.” She glanced over at Mark.

  “Hi.” He touched her shoulder and squeezed.

  “How’s the little man?”

  “Sleeping.”

  “He needed to.” Mark peered into the baby seat.

  Through all the pain and angst she’d suffered these past weeks, Mark had been right there for her. He’d taken to staying in the guest room at the house and getting up in the nights to help take care of the baby whom Cassie had named Shane, after his mother.

  Two weeks after Shane had been born, they all agreed he needed a name and Danielle asked Cassie if she had any ideas. When she’d said Shane, it was perfect.

  Although Mark and Danielle hadn’t become intimate or even been out since Shane’s birth, they’d grown closer than either had been with anyone in a very long time.

  “Why do we do this?” Danielle asked him, sitting back into the pew.

  “What?”

  “Come here every day? Waiting, hoping.”

  “There is nothing else we can do,” he said. He scooted in closer to her. “I know you’re angry and directing it at God because that seems easy. But you come here because there is nothing else to do. Medically, we cannot do anything more for Shannon. So you need to be here. We have to wait and see.”

  “I know. But for how long?”

  He shrugged. “I don’t know. I can’t decide that.”

  “How did you do it with your son? How did you move on?”

  He motioned with his hand inside the small room, set up with an altar and a cross. “I told you before that I prayed. Before we lost Kevin, I wasn’t much into prayer. I accepted that there was God but I didn’t know how, who, or what that meant. It just was, for me. And then we lost Kevin and I grew angry and wanted to stop believing. But once you know something in your heart, you can’t change it. With Kevin gone, I started praying daily for an answer—anything. And, I learned that answers are where you want to find them. Ironically, it took me years to find an answer. The thing is when you lose someone you love, particularly a child, there will never be a good answer. No matter what. It’s all in the questions. You can’t ask yourself why did this happen to my child, but rather, how do I honor the memory? How do I live my life again? How do I find joy and peace again? When I saw you sitting in my office three months ago, I knew I’d found some of the answers to those questions. And, there will be a reason for all of this. I believe that.”

  The baby whimpered.

  “You really think so?” she asked.

  “Yes I do. He’s waking up. I bet he needs to be changed,” Mark said. “Want me to change him? Then we can take him down to see his mom?”

  “Okay. Thank you. I think I’ll stay here for awhile longer though, if that’s okay with you,” she replied.

  “Of course.” He kissed her.” I love you. You know that?”

  She nodded. “I know and I love you, too.”

  Mark picked up the baby and walked out of the chapel, leaving Danielle to wonder about God’s answers.

  After some time of sitting and doing her best to pray, Danielle got up and lit a candle for her daughter and for her grandson. “I don’t know why, but I trust You have a reason.” She made the sign of the cross, and heard her name. It was Mark.

  “Honey, you need to come now. It’s Shannon.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  Jamie

  Jamie rushed through the hospital doors, sprinting past patients and hospital employees to Shannon’s room. She opened the door and saw Danielle and Mark standing over Shannon’s bed. Shannon was wide awake and holding her son. Jamie couldn’t believe her eyes.

  “Hi, Jamie,” Shannon said.

  “Hi. How are you?”

  “A little tired, but good. I think.” She handed the baby to her mom. Even though she was under fluorescent lights and hooked up to monitors and IV’s, there was something so beautiful and luminescent at that moment about Shannon, Jamie couldn’t help thinking that the young woman looked like an angel. “I’m so glad you came. Mom told you?”

  “Yes. She called me and said that you had to see me. That it was important.”

  “It is. Mom? Mark? Can you let me talk to Jamie alone?”

  They left the room with the baby. Danielle shrugged as she walked past Jamie. “It’s a miracle. Your mom and Mark have been here every day and your sister. This is wonderful. When your mom called me, I couldn’t believe it.”

  “I saw Nathan,” Shannon blurted.

  Jamie took a step back. “What did you say?”

  “Your husband. I saw him.”

  “I don’t understand, Shannon.” She had to be talking nonsense. Maybe the coma had affected her brain somehow. “What do you mean you saw him? I met your mom after he passed away so you never knew him. I think you’re tired, honey.”

  “I died. I died for eight minutes. They told me, but they didn’t have to because I remember dying.”

  Jamie sat on the edge of Shannon’s bed.

  “It’s exactly what you hear it’s like, with the bright light. There were people I knew there, like my grandma and my uncle, and even a friend I had in seventh grade who moved away. I didn’t know she’d died. And there were all these other people there that I didn’t know and they were all sending me love. And Nathan, your husband, was there a
nd he told me to give you a message.”

  Jamie choked. Shannon couldn’t be telling her this. This wasn’t possible. “What?”

  “He’s happy you liked the rainbow and he said that it’s time to love again. That’s what he wants you to know. He’s okay with everything. Then this beautiful white horse came over to him, knelt down next to him, and he got on the horse and they rode away.”

  “Oh, my God,” Jamie said. There was no way. No way that Shannon would have known any of this. Not about the rainbow that she’d seen after leaving David and Susan’s house, or what Tyler had told her about loving again and certainly not about the horse that Maddie had imagined her father with. No way. She sat there for a minute, trying to process all of this. After a minute she smiled at Shannon and knew there was no processing this type of information. It just was and accepting it was the only answer. Accepting it on faith was truly the only answer. She hugged Shannon. “Thank you. Thank you so much.”

  “I’m just the messenger.” She took Jamie’s hand and held it for a second. “That’s all.”

  Jamie laughed through her tears and walked out of the hospital room on a mission.

  ***

  Jamie ran through the front door of Tyler’s house. She’d dropped Dorothy at his place on her way to the hospital. Maddie was out with the horses. Dorothy sat in the family room off the kitchen, watching none other than a John Wayne western. Jamie dashed past her. “Tyler?” she yelled out.

  “In here,” he replied. “What’s wrong?” He walked out of the kitchen. “Everything okay?”

  “It couldn’t be better.” She took his face in her hands and kissed him hard.

  “What in the world?” he asked, pulling away.

  “You. Me.” Tears streamed down her face.

  “What’s wrong? What is it?” he asked.

  “Nothing. Nothing at all.” She laughed. “I’m ready. I love you. I am so ready to love you. I look at you and I can’t think straight. I smell you and my god, I go crazy. I kiss you and I can’t think of a better feeling in the world. And you make me laugh and you’re such a good man, and I love you. I really do love you.”