My eyes winked open to assaulting sun, and I heard my roommates’ voice reverberating through the closed door to our room….”She sleeps all day and goes out every night. She comes back in the morning….It can’t go on….She’s a zombie….It isn’t fair that….” I hugged my jacket around me, cradled my journal, and closed my eyes….
My dad was calling me….I picked up and immediately began to cry… “What’s wrong? Why haven’t you called me? You’re getting to be like Violet, she never calls. That city must be treating you girls well”….”Yes,” I said, “just homesick sometimes….I’m great,” I said… “School is keeping me busy”….
The pigeon lady brought more food for me….She said I was sick….She said I needed to eat. The park isn’t safe for us girls, she warned me. I told her about him….She said she was sick like me too once, the man who’d broken her heart made her sick, she asked me if my loves name was Karl…that was who’d done it to her….I said no…it’s Daniel….
A call from Violet came….I’d ignored too many from her and our dad, so I picked up….I answered too rushed now…big tests, full class load, I lied…some don’t have it made, like she did I shouted….She grew upset and hung up on me….I knew she wouldn’t call again until I apologized….The important thing was that she wouldn’t call anymore….
A figure came around the corner in blue moon night. Pigeon lady began to wheeze and rock, I couldn’t quiet her, and she wouldn’t hide….I dragged her by the shirt with both hands into a corner….We hid and watched… trapped, trapped in here, she wheezed, he looked in, he seen us, we’ll be sick again, she panted, rocking faster, as he began to break in….I covered her mouth with my hand and shushed her, softly….
It was daylight….My phone rang until it died…and there was nowhere to charge it….I threw it in the park trash can. Then my stomach lurched and I covered it in sick. Pigeon lady—Zelda—was at the bench….I’d slept in the brush behind it, on my blanket….She was wearing my jacket….She’d taken it from me, but I didn’t want to hurt her….
I was running down the alley in the dark, pulling the jacket on, stuffing my journal in my waistband, I could hear Zelda shrieking from behind me….I took it from her bag while she slept, but she heard me….She liked to collect things but not this. She couldn’t anymore….I would find my own food….Two men grabbed me as my foot landed on the sidewalk….I’d almost made it to the street….
“Where did you get that?” he asked harshly…strong accent, so familiar to me…so happy to me…there were four other men in suits in the back of the limo with us….”Roll the bloody windows down, get some air in here,” he shouted… that same crinkle I saw in every face….”Answer me, girl, where precisely have you gotten that terrible garment….”He wasn’t like him…so mean…but he knew whose it was, I could see. And his nose was the same….”What do you know about it?” I asked timidly, I had too much to protect….”It belongs to that redneck friend of his,” he hissed under his breath, but I heard. My eyes widened. “Tell us, whom did you steal it from?” I was right, he knew him…my first glimmer….”Do you know him? He’s alive! Please, please, tell him I’m here! It’s urgent….I don’t know how much longer I can wait….Daniel told me to wait and I haven’t stopped waiting. Tell him he needs to come back….””Are you bloody joking!” he threw back his head and laughed….”How disgusting of him. Not on my life. Listen, little scruffy bitch. Who you wait for does not exist. Not for you. Look at me.” He grabbed my face. “Nothing waits for you. Nothing wants you. Did you hesitate to think how many mistakes my—all men—have made, never to look back? Ones much finer than you. I promise. He has moved on. You are not special. You are nothing.” He wasn’t being mean anymore, just honest….I began to sob and he looked so amused…it made me sob harder….”Put her out. No,” he paused. “Let her out in Brooklyn….”Shut up, shut up, he kept saying to me….
They opened the door, one foot was on the sidewalk when he snapped….”Stop. Whose is that?” He looked unused to shock…one of the men grabbed my arm and was hurting me….I’m just a little sick, I said… not much…just a little….I threw up again as if on cue onto his shoes, and he lost his grip and I ran…. I heard them chase but they gave up…and I didn’t….
I was back at the park…walking in the grass, summer pounded away above making my head feel like tinder….Zelda was there but she was angry with me…my feet hurt, they throbbed…even though she was mad she gave me a gyro she was given by a street cart….I devoured it and didn’t notice when the two police officers grabbed me…Zelda smiled broken clay and waved….They asked my name, I told them and took off my jacket…I was burning, sweat rolled into my eye, and they spoke into their radio….”We found her…a missing…the Gabrielle Valentine…she’s not coming to the precinct…she needs a hospital, she’s pregnant.”
“I was waiting for someone,” I said, swallowing spit to wet my crackling throat, pointing to the woman stomping pigeons. Then I looked down at myself in similar dust-toned hues. “He’s not coming anymore.”
Gravity came back then.
I woke up in a hospital room. Not awake, but my eyes could crack. Daniel was there, leaning over me. He had the sun at his back. I glanced around to survey our surroundings. Was it the alley, or could we be at the house? It looked like a room. A small television wired in the corner making no sound. Only a poor overhead light shone down us. My eyes adjusted, and I saw Daniel more clearly. He was streaked with concern but looked healthier, like he’d spent the summer going jogging and doing push-ups, and drinking a lot of water. Wiser, too, as though he’d read a lot of good books—while I was waiting for him.
I screamed.
Then someone else was there, sweet August. Daniel strode away and I kept screaming because he was leaving again, but then I saw him lift up my son, carry him out of the hospital room, burying his butterscotch head into his father’s shoulder. Daniel covered his other ear with a strong hand. My scream collapsed into a cry, and I cried myself to a sleep.
Later, I heard voices rousing me.
One set woke me. Like a bass guitar playing a Dwight Yoakum song. And a lighter one, a triangle playing electro music. My eyes slitted open, and Violet looked down at me. I was angry with her, so angry, and I didn’t know why, so I screamed again. Hunt tried to pull her away, but she was fighting him. Jill appeared on the other side, her arms wrapped around herself, swollen-eyed, she took my hand and I tried to squeeze hers, because I owed her so much and a new cry hit me in a wave as I thought of Tristan.
Time passed. Daniel was there. I didn’t always hear his voice but I knew. Just like when I found him in the resort bar in the Hamptons. My hands twitched for him, openly. At night, his voice was beside me reading to me. In the day I heard his footsteps on the linoleum floor. There were plenty of doctors and nurses in and out too. A few pokes and scans were a small discomfort in contrast.
I became conscious one night hearing a low voice beside me, a serious piano. I felt the indentation to my side. My eyes cracked and couldn’t adjust for a while, for it was dark. Daniel’s elbows were digging into my hospital bed and his head was bent over them. He was reciting a long poem I thought. But to someone not in the room. He finished and unbowed his head, and I saw old water glisten in the duct of his eye. Water from a place he’d hidden and didn’t ever want seen. I’d seen that place. He’d showed it to me once, he took me there along his side, and we looked into it together and in the reflection was me. My eyes began to well, and no sob followed. He looked at me with his eyebrows knit together, and it registered that my eyes were open and that was surprising him. He was there, and I was here I realized. He didn’t know I recognized that place now. I loved him. I’d meant it when I said it to him at dinner. But that had no comparison. I kept searching myself for it like checking for lost keys, but this came from the inside. From underneath the ground. It burrowed its way from the inside out like a great force tearing all the earth up beneath me until it broke free.
He ros
e off his knees and his hands hovered around me, conflicted to touch. My hand twitched, and he watched a tear blink out, disappearing into my hairline. He collapsed on the bedside heavily and leaned down to wrap me in his embrace, surrounded by a cacophony of beeps from medical machines.
It was daylight. My eyes were open, and I was still receiving my surroundings. But for some reason, I couldn’t wake up. Fear finally hit me. My eyes were shifting, slowly, which was as fast as I could move them. Daniel was asleep on the chair in the corner with Tristan curled against him. I watched Tristan’s hand twitch, and then he stirred, rubbing his eyes. He looked at me and slid down to his feet. I blinked. He walked over to me and climbed on my bed, then he snuggled against me. This was a different love, but as overwhelming, just as engulfing. I didn’t cry because he didn’t need to see that. I wrapped my arms around him and hugged him with all I had in my noodled strength.
Daniel approached the bed. His green eyes shone.
“Is it you?” He swallowed after getting out the words, but his jaw stayed tense. “You remember?”
I opened my mouth to speak with a throat too parched to follow through.
He closed his eyes, sucking a breath. “I’m sorry.”
My eyes watered. “Me, too.” I ran my hand on Tristan’s head.
He turned his back to me, so I told him, “Turn around, Daniel.”
I spoke as he faced me. “You were with me, Daniel.” My tears swelled, flooding my eyes. “Every day. I never knew what it was in me that had changed me. How I could go from barely navigating the subway to raising our son. Our son! And my business. My bravery….”
“You’ve always been brave.”
“No,” I disagreed. “It was you. You saw me. You loved me and made me know I could do anything. I forgot everything else but not that. My soul remembered every validation from you. You believed in me. You were the first one who ever did.”
He bowed his head. “And you loved me.” He lifted his eyes. “I told you. You are the first who ever has.”
I nodded. “And the last.”
He tilted his head, understanding my meaning.
“I’m not insulting you. I’m promising.”
He breathed, chest rising and falling, as I stroked our son, nuzzled in my lap. Daniel came to the bed then. His weight pressed it down, and Tristan shifted to the other side, with my help. Daniel’s hand reached for my thigh, his long fingers griping into the sheets, and my flesh, firmly but gently. I took in his face in the weak light from the hospital fixture. In that light, he was breathtaking. The green of eyes were a mirage of my hearts one salvation. Its home, first and final. He leaned in.
“Do you promise me this, Gabrielle?” Daniel asked, but his eyes begged.
“I already have.” I reached my hand up to stroke his cheek and a shudder ran through him.
“I was disloyal to you,” he confessed, shutting his eyes. My fingers brushed across the silken hair just above his ear. Upset as his statement made me, I couldn’t stop touching. Sucking in a breath when I caressed his earlobe, he continued, “I recalled every second, each day, and I waited, Gabrielle. As long as Earthly possible, I held on to you. But I was unfaithful.”
I felt a lump form in my throat as my tears returned. “A man has appetites.” My voice cracked as I swallowed back a choked sob.
He jerked forward, tears welling in his own eyes, and cupped my cheek in his warm hand. “I have no appetite. I have only starved. Nothing has filled me like this,” he said. We both looked down at Tristan, who was snuggled into me, eyes shut, but the bottom lids were wet.
I turned back to Daniel. His hands still cradling my cheek. “Then let’s be full, Daniel.”
He lifted his one hand to stroke my lip, and kissed me. “I don’t deserve you, yet,” he said after he broke off the kiss. “But I will.”
August appeared in the doorway. He cleared his throat and drew our attention. Daniel hands fell. A joyful expression crossed his features. We both smiled.
“Tristan, since you’re up let’s go get some breakfast,” he said. Daniel and I both nodded. It made my head hurt. As Tristan scampered to August I reached up and felt my scalp.
“Did they shave my head?” I croaked.
“We had no choice. It’s just a patch,” Daniel soothed. “They had to surgically remove the aneurism.”
“Aneurism!”
“Stay calm, Gabrielle.” He settled his hands. “You’ll heal faster. You shouldn’t touch it. Medication numbs it but don’t be deceived into thinking you shouldn’t use extreme caution.”
I took my hand away from the awful feeling situation on the right side of my scalp. My hair was braided down around it.
“Your sister braided it down around the area they needed to shave in order to operate. It was the only way to avoid shaving your entire scalp.”
“I’ll thank her. My goodness. I must look like a Star Trek character.”
“You look perfect,” Daniel said firmly. His hands clasped mine. My God! It was him! My Daniel.
Daniel took me in through green eyes fringed with dark lashes, allowing me to stare. Desiring me to. The last time I remembered him I didn’t believe I’d ever see this face in daylight….or at all…
“I remember lying in the hospital pregnant with Tristan.” I sucked in a horrible breath. “I wished you away. I thought you’d left, or died. And if you’d just left, I wished you’d die. Though I couldn’t live with either option. I was never crazy, Daniel. I knew what I was doing every second out on the street. I knew I was throwing away everything I’d worked for, my family, every ambition.” His brow furrowed as he listened. “You were everything. And I’d do it all again if it was the only way back to you.” My eyes widened at my own admission.
He ran his hand through his hair and keeping his eyes down.
“I have embarrassed myself beyond belief, Gabrielle. I never wanted to be this man. You make me reconsider everything when you show me your love. It feels like light. And it when it hasn’t been there I became vastly aware of the contrast.” He raised his gaze to mine. “With every look and word you strip me down into the unmitigated jackass I fight being. You’re the reason I fight to become better. I don’t always win.”
“You got engaged.” My mouth ran dry.
His features hardened. “I never proposed. Sophie gave Kate that ring. Perhaps as consolation for wanting a life with a man who couldn’t and wouldn’t ever love her. Sophie could relate.” “Her first outing with it she implied it was an engagement. I didn’t contradict it because I benefitted from it. Hawk gave me more control of the company after that. I thought you were punishing me when you pretended not to know me. Because I was with her.”
“But you said you waited, too.” I paused. “So you meant you weren’t engaged. You only slept with Kate.”
He sighed and looked deeply into my eyes. “It wasn’t Kate. I never had sex with Kate, Gabrielle. Not since my vow to you.”
I exhaled. The article was true. “But you just said you were unfaithful?” I was so confused. He grew still.
“I will tell you everything,” he struggled, shutting down. “Now isn’t the time. We must be careful. Trauma caused you to forget me. Traumatic stress caused you to remember. You’ve shouldered more than your share. Now is the time for rest.” Without looking away he began the tucking the covers in around me.
I began to nod but it turned into a painful wince. He face crossed with concern.
“They’ll release you now that you’re awake,” he began softly. “Maybe tomorrow. I want you to come home with me. I want to care for of you.” He paused. “In our home.”
I smiled as my eyes welled with tears again. “It’s got good bones. It’s worth saving.” He’d bought the townhouse on the park. The one I’d picked out the night we fell in love.
His eyes grew damp as he reached up to caress my neck. “Could you ever see that potential in me again, angel?”
I sniffled and rubbed my cheek into his advancing han
d. “I do.”
Chapter 35 - A Room without Ceilings
“Breakfast on the rooftop?” I said in surprise, looking at a fine French blue and ivory cloth laid out with a basket set atop. Daniel had woken me and led me onto his rooftop.
“The blanket could have other uses, but yes,” he said, leading me over, indicating where I should sit. I put my hands on hips.
“Does that mean you’re finally ready for a roll in the hay?”
“Absolutely not.” He laid a gentle kiss on my lips and took my hand. I was breathless. “Physical exertion could harm you.”
I grinned and arched a brow up at him. “I think your piano playing is more dangerous.” It was tease. He was plenty dangerous in bed. It was almost two weeks since my release and he still tread on eggshells around me. Daniel grimaced. “You’re like Liszt. Your piano playing is what made me follow you that night. Then it triggered an aneurism.” Finally, he smiled.
“When we go to your next follow-up I’ll reassure the surgeon know your humor is intact.” He rubbed his thumb across my knuckles, still cradling my hand gently. He stepped back and nodded his chin. I smiled and sat, folding my legs together like Tristan does in class and sat up straight. He sat across from me, stretching one leg out and bending the other at the knee.
“The sun is already up.” I smiled, facing the soft yellow tone beaming out radiantly. “We missed the sunrise.”
“Another time,” he said gently. “Pass me the basket, Ms. Valentine.”
I inclined my head in curtsy and passed the lidded woven basket to him.
“I have six things for you in here. I’d like you to open them, slowly, so I may watch.”
“If this is six pairs of sexy underwear, you’re in trouble, Mr. Baird,” I said, and he gave me a shrewd quelling look before pulling out the first. He handed me a small wooden box. I glanced up and he raised an eyebrow, encouragingly.
I flipped open the box and inside was a large pearl. Unmounted or fastened to anything, but substantial inside a provincial solid box.
In the Land of Milk and Honey Page 51