The Beautiful Now

by M. Leighton

  “Has it been too long, Brinkley? Have we come too far to go back to the way things were?”

  “I…I don’t think we can ever go back.” He nods his agreement. “But I think we can make a way forward. Or at least we can give it a try. If…if that’s something you want to do.”

  He nods slowly, never taking his eyes off mine. “Will this ‘try’ include kissing?”

  I grin because I can’t help it, not any more than I can help the way my stomach flips over and my blood goes up in flames. “I think it most definitely should include kissing. I mean, what kind of adults would we be if we didn’t take advantage of adult freedoms? Like kissing, for instance.”

  “Shitty ones. And I don’t want to be a shitty adult.”

  “Me either.”

  “Maybe I should walk you home and we can be amazing adults right under your window, just to piss Alton off.”

  “Oh, I think that sounds like a superior idea.” The world around me is as dark as blue velvet, but the world inside me…it’s as bright as midday.

  “And maybe we should meet out here tomorrow night. To practice being amazing adults.”

  “I like the way you think, Mr. James.”

  “I like your enormous ass, Ms. Sommers.” I have to laugh at that. “The ‘junk in the trunk’ comment should’ve tipped me off.”

  “Probably.”

  Dane helps me up and I dust off the very trunk we’re speaking of. Dane leans around to watch me as I do.

  “I always did love your ass, but now you’ve brought so much attention to it, you only have yourself to blame when I stare at it every time you turn around.”

  I swat at my shorts. “It is kinda big, though.”

  “It’s not big. It’s round and perfect and…” He makes a hissing sound as he pulls in air through his teeth. “I really want to bite it.”

  “Bite it?”

  Cold chills spread down my arms when he brings his eyes back to mine. I haven’t seen that hungry look in fifteen long, long years.

  His voice drops low and he takes a small step closer to me and adds, “Don’t worry. I’d kiss it afterward. To make it feel better. Because I’m one helluvan adult.”

  I’m breathless. And I love it. “I think anything would feel better after a kiss from you.”

  He bends down, cupping his ear. “What’s that? You’re feeling poorly? I have just what you need.”

  “Poorly?” I barely get the word and the giggle that accompanies it out of my mouth before Dane James is taking me in his arms and pressing his lips to mine.

  That’s the moment when I remember what heaven feels like. And tastes like.

  It feels and tastes like Dane James.

  Even after all this time, he is my heaven.

  And so begins a nightly ritual that makes me fall in love with the wrong boy, but the right man all over again. I can only hope he’s falling for me, too.

  Until I tell him that I hid his daughter from him for fourteen years.

  Then he’ll realize that he hates me.

  Chapter 28

  A barely-audible knock at my bedroom door wakes me. I glance first at the curtains. There is light filtering through the part in them and around the edges, but it still has a bluish cast, assuring me it’s very early. No wonder I feel tired. I probably haven’t been in bed long.

  I smile as I remember the previous night spent making out with Dane James on our rock like two horny teenagers. It’s crazy to think of the things that have changed and the things that haven’t.

  Our insane chemistry definitely has not.

  “Come in.” My voice is hoarse with the need for more rest.

  I see the slender shape of my child as she squeezes through a crack in the door and then closes it snugly behind her. She walks to the bed and I pull back the covers, offering her a place under them with me. It makes me happy when she accepts. I spoon around her, tucking her in close to me like I did when she was little.

  She doesn’t let me do this very often anymore, so I’m wide-awake now, enjoying babying my little girl.

  “What are you doing up so early?”

  “I’ve decided what I want to do.”

  I’m even more awake now. “And?”

  “I want the bone marrow transplant.”

  I think my heart would’ve flipped over no matter what she said. There are pros and cons to both, but I’m kind of glad because this one offers the best chances of actually curing her. This one offers the best chance of her finding her way back to a normal life somewhere in the semi-near future.

  “I think that’s a good choice.”

  “You do?”

  “I do. The fact that it has a better chance of truly curing you is a pretty compelling factor in the ‘pro’ column, don’t you think?”

  “Yeah. That’s why I want to go this route.”

  I hug her tight and kiss her silky hair. “You’re such a wise child. Like a little pink Yoda.”

  “Wise, I am,” she says in her best Yoda voice, and we both snigger. And so goes the next little bit of our conversation, until it turns back to more serious things.

  “Plan, we will.”

  “With doctors, we will speak.”

  “Yes, yes. Consult them, we will.”

  “May the Force be with me.”

  At that, my heart does a little squeeze. “You won’t need that. You have God. And me. And your dad. You’re gonna do just fine.”

  “I hope so.” After a pause that’s so long I wonder if she’s fallen back to sleep, she says something else that quickens my heart. My life is like a damn tornado. “Do you think you should tell him before I have it? You know, so he’ll know. Just in case.”

  Just in case.

  “Celina, stop thinking about ‘just in case’. You read the information. You know that with your age and your diagnosis, the prognosis is incredible. You’re going to do great and you’re going to go on to live a very long and healthy life. In fact, you may live to be as old as Yoda. Only you’ll need adult diapers. No human bladder can hold up for that many years.”

  “You’re so weird,” she whispers.

  “But I’m awesome,” I whisper back.

  “Will you, Momma?”

  “I’ll tell him, honey.”

  “When?”

  I gulp. “I can tell him today if you want me to.”

  “Before we go back to the doctor, okay?”

  “Okay.”

  In the back of my mind, I hear the ticking of a clock, counting down the minutes until I have to drop the mother of all bombs on Dane.

  And the moment when the happy glow he’s been wearing returns to a mask of hatred.

  Dane brought vinegar, baking soda, and an empty two-liter soda bottle to make Celina’s most recent chemistry lesson more fun. He poked his head in the front door and hollered up to her, “Celina, get down here. Mount Dew is about to explode.”

  The grin he turned and gave me was about two steps away from making my ovaries explode. No vinegar or baking soda needed.

  He’d make an amazing father. He already is; he just doesn’t know it.

  She came running down faster than she ever does for me, unless I’m bribing her with something. All Dane has to offer is his presence. She wants him around. And he clearly wants to be around. If only there wasn’t this awful hurdle standing between them.

  Of course, it’s not between them. It will be between Dane and me. He won’t be mad at her. She’s an innocent in all this. I’m the one he will hate.

  And I won’t be able to blame him one bit.

  I watch the two of them make volcano after volcano after volcano erupt in the small patch of grass to the left of the driveway. I know I’ll be putting off telling him until tonight. I can’t bear to ruin the happiness he will leave here with today. Tonight will be soon enough.

  Dane didn’t have to come and get me. I went to the rock on my own. I even beat him there. I sat on it, palms sweating, waiting for him and giving myself a pep talk so that I
don’t chicken out.

  When I see his dark form cutting through the wheat in the bright moonlight, every muscle in my body clenches. I watch him speed up as he nears the rock and climbs onto it in one impressively smooth, lithe movement.

  He walks over to me, grinning. “What?”

  “What what?” My brain isn’t firing on all cylinders yet.

  “Why are you looking at me that way?”

  “What way?”

  “Like you’re about to jump my bones.”

  “Is that how I’m looking at you?”

  “I sure as hell hope so, because it’s about to get a very firm response from me, and I’d hate to think it’s all in my imagination.”

  “Well, that was kinda hot.”

  It was so, so hot.

  “What was kinda hot?”

  “You jumping up here the way you did.”

  He reaches for my hand and pulls me to my feet and into his arms. “Liked that, did you?”

  “Very much.” I couldn’t take a deep breath right now if my life depended on it.

  “I was on my way to your window when I saw you sitting up here. The things that went through my head… Mmmm, I almost took off running this way.”

  “Things? What things?”

  I need to stop this. Of all nights, this isn’t the one when I should be stoking the fire that’s between us. It will just make his reaction that much harder to swallow, that much more painful to endure.

  “Like the fact that my hands are burning with how much I want to touch you right now. Like how the only thing I’ve thought about for days is what your mouth tastes like. And like the fact that, for a week, every night when I lay down, the second I close my eyes I remember what you looked like pulling your panties on in the early morning light. Right here on this rock. Damn, you were beautiful. But not as beautiful as you are now.”

  Oh, God.

  Oh, God!

  I lick my lips. I have to do it now, before this gets out of hand and I lose my nerve.

  “Dane, there’s something I need to tell you.”

  As though he can sense the weight of what I’m carrying, he takes a step back, still holding me, but far enough that he can give me space and look down into my face at the same time.

  “What is it?”

  My mouth is suddenly full of sawdust, my tongue thick and dry. I take a deep breath and I take the plunge. No tact, no couth, no hesitation. If I don’t just come out with it, I might not say it at all. And I have to. For Celina most of all, but also for the boy who stole my heart, for the guy who never gave it back, and for the man who deserves answers.

  “Dane, Celina is… She’s your daughter.”

  There is silence.

  Dense, dark, dead silence.

  I don’t even hear the rush of blood in my ears. It’s like it has all drained away and gone the route of my heart, which is somewhere ten or twenty feet below the big rock on which we’re standing.

  He releases me completely and takes another step back. The cool air that rushes in between us feels frigid. That might have more to do with Dane’s cooling ardor than the actual nighttime temperature, though.

  “What?”

  “She…she’s yours.”

  He stares at me for an untold number of minutes, like he’s trying to understand what I’m saying.

  “She’s…” He wrestles with it, expressions shifting over his face like a kaleidoscope. Then finally, he seems to settle on one when he asks, “Why, Brinkley?”

  Oh, God! There is so much hurt in his voice. It’s like a curved knife tearing through my chest, through skin and muscle and bone and sinew.

  My response comes out on a whisper, one as pained as his face now appears. “I’m so sorry.”

  “I don’t understand. How…how could you do that?”

  “I didn’t want to, Dane. It was Alton. He forced me.”

  “He forced you to run away, have my baby, and never try to contact me again?”

  The ire is back, along with a fair amount of bitterness, neither of which I can blame him for.

  “When he found out, he was so angry. He…he hated you so much. He wanted me to have an abortion, but I refused, so he told me to leave. He said if I told you, he’d ruin you and your father. It was all on the same night that he tried to…tried to…”

  Those last days and hours spent here in Shepherd’s Mill come back in a rush, overwhelming me with emotion. The tears come again and I’m helpless to do anything but let them fall. Just like I’m helpless to do anything but stand here and let him hate me.

  “He asked me how much you’d love me when I was the one who could’ve saved you and your dad from being homeless and jobless and didn’t. I’d just be the selfish bitch who cost him everything and gave him another mouth to feed. I knew he’d do it. He was ruthless. Heartless. I knew he wouldn’t think twice before destroying both of you. I just didn’t know…I didn’t know at the time that he couldn’t.”

  Dane hasn’t moved. Hasn’t said another word. He’s merely staring at me, his expression turning blacker by the second.

  “If I’d had any other choice, I would’ve taken it, but I…I didn’t. And I couldn’t have an abortion. I couldn’t bear the thought of getting rid of the one piece of you, the one piece of us that I might be able to hold onto.”

  When finally Dane speaks, his voice is cold. “So she’s…she’s fourteen years old?” I nod. “Brinkley, you could’ve come back before now.”

  My mouth opens and closes with all the things I want to say and can’t. Because, truthfully, I have no excuse. I was afraid. I was afraid Dane would hate me. That he wouldn’t be able to love me after what I’d done. And I let that fear drag me through year after year until I’d been gone so long, there was no going back.

  “I…I’m sorry,” I offer weakly.

  Dane steps back. “Not as sorry as I am.”

  I watch as he leaps down off the rock and slices through the wheat like a scythe. I don’t take my eyes off him. I can’t. I keep hoping he’ll come back, that he’ll forgive me.

  Only he doesn’t.

  He walks away, a single tall, dark figure being swallowed by a sea of pale stalks, moving quickly toward the woods until he’s out of sight.

  He isn’t out of mind, though. Even after he disappears, even after I leave the rock, even after I sneak back into the house, and even after I curl up and cry into my pillow for what seems like hours, he isn’t out of my mind.

  I wonder if he ever will be.

  Chapter 29

  I haven’t seen or heard from Dane for two days. I’m not entirely surprised.

  What I am is disappointed.

  I thought his fondness for Celina, especially after finding out that she’s his daughter, would bring him around. But it’s clear I don’t know the grown Dane James as well as I did the young Dane James.

  I’m crawling between the sheets, bracing myself for another sleepless night when I hear a telltale tick at my window. I think my whole body sighs in relief.

  Dane James.

  He came back.

  I open the window and look down at him, love surging through me. It’s in this very moment that I realize I never stopped loving Dane. Even this mature version of him is perfect. Perfect for me anyway. The soul inside this man, whether he’s fifteen or fifty, is the one I’ve loved most of my life. That won’t ever change. I feel it as certainly as I feel the windowsill bite into my palms when I rest them on it.

  “Dane James.” There is relief in my voice, even though he’s not smiling. I still may be in for a rough ride, but at least he came back. He might hate me, but if he came back then he at least came back for my daughter. For our daughter. That’s the most important thing. She deserves this man’s love.

  More than I ever have.

  “Are you coming?”

  His tone is as brisk as the wind in November, but I’m ready for it. I knew this would happen. There’s no way he could not be upset with me.

  “Of course.”


  I close the window.

  Of course, Dane. I would follow you anywhere. Just like I always knew I would.

  When I step out the back door, he’s waiting for me. He doesn’t take my hand, but he tips his head toward the fields and waits for me to reach his side. Then we make our way to the rock together. Maybe that’s something.

  We’re both seated on the rock before he says anything.

  “Tell me about her.”

  I don’t ask who he’s referring to. We both know. She’s the one tie we can’t break. Time and distance don’t matter when there’s a child involved. And now he knows there is.

  “Her name is Celina. Celina Holland. She’s fourteen. She’s smart and mature and beautiful and athletic and gifted and—” I stop myself. “Wow! I sound like one of ‘those’ parents, don’t I?”

  The edges of Dane’s lips lift a little bit. Not a smile, but not not a smile either. To me, that’s a good sign.

  “You should be proud. She’s great.”

  I take a deep breath, closing my eyes. “I’m so sorry, Dane. I don’t know what else I can say. How I can make up for it. I was young. I was scared. I was pregnant and in love, and it was all happening at the worst time and in the worst way. I thought I was doing the right thing. I didn’t think I had a choice. Even now, I don’t know what I could’ve done differently.”

  The pause before he responds is so long, so tense, I feel the muscles in my stomach clench.

  “It took me a couple weeks to even know you were gone. I came here every night and waited. I thought something was wrong. I thought… I didn’t know what to think.”

  “I’m so sorry.” I wish I could tear open my soul and let him see how sorry I actually am, how much it hurts to know what I’ve done to him.

  He doesn’t respond to that. He waits for twenty lifetimes, but then finally says, “Look, I’m still pissed. I don’t know how not to be, but she’s my kid. I wanna… I wanna get to know her. And you’re the one who knows her best.” His words slice, but I deserve every cut. “Tell me about her childhood. What kind of baby was she?”

  Although, I’m dying a little inside, Dane picked the one topic that revives my soul, the one thing I could talk about for hours. It starts a cascade of stories that seems to go on forever.