Remembering You

by Stella MacLean

  From the end of the driveway, I watched the brake lights on Jonathan's car as he turned right onto Hudson and out of sight.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Feeling absolutely stuffed from lunch with Kate, I sat down in Graham’s chair to read another letter, glancing around to be sure I’d left nothing out of place after the incident a night ago. I braced myself for the all-too-familiar ache of loneliness, the tears at the unfairness of it all. Those feelings were still there but not nearly as bad as before. It was more a sense of yearning now, tempered by acceptance.

  It'd been ten days since I started reading these letters from Graham, and during those days I’d come to see how comforting his words were. His letters had given me a chance to see our life through his eyes.

  Fergus bunted his head against my leg. “Want up, big guy?” I asked, reaching down and lifting him onto my lap. “Fergus, I’m getting you a treadmill for Christmas,” I scolded as he snuggled his ample body close to mine, and I opened the letter.

  Dearest Susan,

  May 21, one mere month until summer’s underway. You’ve been fussing in the vegetable garden all morning, trying to coax the lettuce to grow big enough to be part of a salad.

  As I sit here looking out on the backyard, I'm reminded of that wonderful Saturday morning in early May, just after Megan was born, when you planted your climbing rose in front of the trellis next to the porch. I watched you, enjoying the methodical way you worked.

  When you looked up and saw me, you smiled from under your broad-brimmed straw hat. The love in your eyes made me want to cling to the moment the way a shipwreck victim would cling to a life raft. It was as if everything in our lives had led to that moment—our marriage, our life together and the arrival of our first grandchild.

  I waved and you waved back before getting up and coming to the kitchen window. I opened the window and you grinned up at me, offering me a chance to earn my keep by working for you. Seeing you so happy, I tossed aside the journal was reading and came outside. As I sat on the porch and listened to your commentary about the garden and your plans for it, I felt a rush of longing for all the missed moments we didn’t share because of my work.

  Later that day, the scent of honeysuckle hovered over us as we ate our lunch of Caesar salad and chicken, washed down with a glass of Chardonnay. That day is one of my very best memories.

  Today, I try to nap but can’t. I managed to gather enough energy to come back in here to my desk. Still, tired though I feel, my mind can’t seem to stop remembering...

  How much we enjoyed playing with Megan—and the weekend she spent with us before Jonathan and Linda moved to Seattle. I can still see you holding baby Megan in your arms, dancing around the room as you sang to her, a smile on your face, despite the fact that Megan, Jonathan and Linda would be on their way in a few hours.

  And the day Amy and Thomas were married in our backyard. I remember how hard you worked to have the gardens just perfect, and the way she looked at us that afternoon, as if seeing us for the first time. A wonderful girl, through and through.

  Yet the most wonderful woman in my life will always be you.

  As I sit here, trying to prepare for what is ahead, I can’t help wondering about my incredible good fortune that you were in the library that particular day. So many events in our separate lives led up to it, ensuring that we were both in the library at that moment.

  As I write these words, I feel my hand begin to shake, the ever-present exhaustion clawing at me like some relentless beast.

  How I wish I could make love the way we used to, but I can’t, and it shames me more than I could ever have imagined.

  And now, as the light begins to fade from under the trees along the back of the property, and the wind has eased to a whisper, I’m reminded of just how lucky I’ve been in my life. I've known the best of times, and now I'm to experience the worst of times.

  None of it matters, as long as you're here with me and I‘m with you.

  I’m not a religious man, but I do believe you and I were destined to be together.

  Love always,

  Graham

  * * *

  I bit my lip to hold back the tears. I remember that day so well. Graham had been getting steadily weaker. The gray pallor of his skin, his breathing difficulties and his restlessness terrified me. Digging in the earth was my salvation.

  Remembering that time reminded me of another. It was late one night, two weeks before he had been admitted to hospital...

  Lying still so as not to disturb his restless sleep, I listen for his raspy, breathing.

  Jonathan arrived today. His presence in the house brings a frail smile to Graham's lips.

  Tears seep through my lashes but I no longer care how many tears I cry. My heart pounds with love for the man lying beside me in our bed, his body a dim replica of its former self.

  Feeling a cramp start in my foot I flex my toes.

  “Are you awake?” Graham asks.

  “I'm sorry, I didn’t mean to disturb you,” I whisper, turning to face him in the darkness.

  “I wasn't asleep. I was lying here, trying not to wake you.”

  “We're a strange pair," I say, taking his bony hand in mine.

  “We are.” He squeezes my fingers and I can’t stop myself from thinking that this could be our last night in this bed. I can’t free my mind of the fear that were having our last days together. Graham goes to his oncologist today and he'll be going in a wheelchair. I smother a sob and force my thoughts to something positive. “Connor called after you went to bed last night,” I tell him.

  “He did?”

  The listlessness in Graham’s voice frightens me. “Yes. He’s coming home on Tuesday.”

  “I'm glad...so glad. I want you to have the children with you when I go into the hospital.”

  “Graham, don’t say that. I don’t want—”

  “We have to talk.” He shifts closer to me. “We probably won’t have another opportunity, and there are so many feelings, so many memories, I can’t keep them straight.”

  "You don't have to. We're going to take care of you.”

  “Susan, listen to me. Life is what you make it. It’s how we deal with a problem, not the problem itself, that tests us.”

  What's be saying? Does he know something he’s not telling me? Did something happen in the night? I fight the rising panic. “I don't want to be tested.”

  “You've always faced our problems better than I have over the years, and you have to continue.”

  I can’t tell him I don’t want to face anything ever again. I'm petrified when I imagine my life without him. “Let's not talk about this.”

  “Promise me something.”

  “Anything,” I manage to say, panic rearing up in me.

  “Promise me you'll remember every moment we spent together, and you'll share those memories with our children. Then, let the memories go and make room for a new life.”

  “I...no, this isn’t right.”

  “Susan, right or wrong, that's the way it is.” He moves my hands to his lips and kisses my fingers. We cuddle together, the sound of his labored breathing invading the stillness.

  Looking back now, realize that I felt closer to Graham than at any other time in our lives…

  * * *

  An hour later, after I’d scrubbed the kitchen floor on my hands and knees, I had finally forced the memories out of my mind. I was giving serious consideration to cleaning the freezer when & loud banging on the back door startled me.

  Nearly slipping on the freshly scrubbed tiles, I peered through the glass panels. It was Sam, and he looked as if someone had torn up his precious rose garden. “What's up?” I asked, opening the door. “Is dance class canceled?”

  “No, I need to talk to you.”

  I'd never seen him so agitated. “Come in.”

  He seemed to burst in the door. “I can’t stay, I have hours of work to do outside. Are you still interested in helping Phillip?”

&n
bsp; “Sure. When do you want me to start?”

  “Is today too soon?”

  “It’s that urgent?” I asked, trying not to be too obvious in my perusal of Sam. His eyes were red rimmed and dark. He hadn’t shaved.

  “Phillip’s teacher is very unhappy with his reading abilities. She says he should’ve done remedial reading this summer. You were right all along. He needs to be get that message across to my son and his ex-wife. If you could work with him on his reading while I work on the parents...”

  Between my concern for Amy and my promise to get Graham’s office cleaned out, not to mention wanting to visit with my grandson, Sam’s request came at an awkward time. But the pleading in Sam’s eyes made me want to help. “What about early next week?”

  “That would be wonderful. I really appreciate this. I don’t want Phillip to have more problems than he already has.”

  He was referring to Robert's ditzy ex-wife, I was pretty sure. It was Graham who labeled her ditzy after many hours of listening to Sam describe the outrageous escapades of his daughter-in-law. “I'll see what I can do.”

  “Thanks.” He took my hands between his huge ones, his skin surprisingly warm. He leaned down to give me a quick kiss. “About the class tonight, does six-thirty sound okay?”

  Next time you kiss me, I want a little warning so I can join in. Or maybe Sam’s kiss was in friendship only.... “Sixty-thirty will be fine.”

  “I'll pick you up. What would you say to having coffee after our class?”

  A date? “Coffee would be nice,” I said, wondering what was really going on behind those expressive blue eyes.

  I smoothed my hair and fluffed my bangs as I watched him skip down my back steps and stride across to his own property.

  * * *

  The restroom at the dance class needed a coat of paint and an interior decorator, It was nearly time for the class to start, and I desperately wanted a few moments alone.

  “Why did I agree to do this?” I asked my image in the mirror—then cringed at the thought that someone might be in one of the cubicles.

  Sam and I had driven downtown to the dance class in stark silence. 1 couldn’t have come up with a topic of conversation to save my soul and obviously neither could he. He spent the twenty minutes in the car frowning and gripping the wheel as if it was trying to getaway from him.

  And now he was waiting for me on the dance floor, and I had the overpowering urge to climb out the window and hail a cab.

  The night would not end well. Of that I was certain.

  What would we say to each other? We exchanged our bleak comments about the weather when I first got into his Subaru station wagon, just ahead of the verbal blackout. Wishing I could develop a sudden attack of some highly contagious—but not serious—disease and have to be rushed home, I checked my makeup and adjusted the neckline of my dress.

  What made me think this was a good idea? Seeing nothing in the mirror that would explain my temporary insanity, I rubbed my sweaty palms together and left the ladies’ room.

  When I reached the dance floor, Sam was there—his long, lanky body draped along the far wall. The incandescent light in the large room softened his features. When he smiled at me, I managed to smile back.

  I glanced around, looking for another couple our age, but all I saw were young men with their hip-jutting poses and the wide, flirtatious smiles of their young partners. Feeling frumpy and keenly aware of my thickening waist, I kept my eyes on Sam. His smile was encouraging, and the way he pushed off front the wall was pure James Dean.

  I hadn’t worn a dress and heels in ages, so the feel of the smooth cotton swinging around my legs as I teetered across the floor was oddly exhilarating. Sam watched me. I was unnerved by the awareness in his eyes.

  Stop it! This is your neighbor—your somewhat odd neighbor whose poodle watches you from the living room window.

  “Are you ready?” he asked, holding out his hand as I drew near.

  “Why not?” I replied, focusing on what lay ahead.

  We stood there staring at each other as the seconds ticked past. Finally, the instructor pranced onto the center of the floor, flicking a glance our way, a gleam of disapproval in his eyes. His pompous arrival gave us something other than our mutual discomfort to focus on.

  Eddy St. Simon was one of those thin-nosed, thin-bodied people who you suspected from the stiff set of his mouth would be one royal pain in the butt. He did not disappoint.

  He herded us all out on the floor with phony words of encouragement mixed in with orders to stand straight, face your partner, heads up, smile. I fantasized about stomping out.

  He worked his way among the couples, offering smiles to some, frowns of haughty displeasure to others; reaching Sam and me last. With an exaggerated sigh, he picked up our arms and moved them into position, making a funny sucking sound with his lips. He finally had Sam and me aligned to his satisfaction. The music began—a Tommy Dorsey tune.

  Sam tightened his arm around me and gently squeezed my hand. We stood so close I could feel the heat of his body and the fresh lavender scent of his cotton shirt. I rested my hand on his shoulder.

  Eddy took my hand, pulled it farther up Sam’s shoulder and hissed in my ear, “Hold your wrist as if you’re looking at your watch.” He gave my wrist a not-so-gentle twist and roared off to the next couple.

  Sam and I were left alone to follow the caller who was carefully enunciating each dance move. “I feel it’s only fair to warn you that I like to lead,” I told him.

  “That's what happens when you dance alone in your living room at night,” Sam said, chuckling as he pulled me closer.

  “Just keep it in mind, that’s all I'm saying.”

  “As long as you don’t forget who’s watching our moves. You wouldn’t want to upset you-know-who,” Sam said, taking a daring step toward me. I took an equally daring step toward him. We collided in the middle. Trying to regain our balance, he grabbed my waist, and I felt myself swooping toward the hardwood floor as I locked my fingers onto his shirt.

  So much for watching my watch.

  “Did the commander see us?” Sam asked. He tugged me upright and I landed on his feet rag-doll style.

  “Do we care?” I squeezed out the words as I sneaked a peek in Eddy’s direction. The man had some unfortunate couple cornered on the other side of the room. We did our best to concentrate on our feet while making a stab at shuffling in time with the music.

  “I’m getting the hang of this,” Sam said jovially as he planted one of his big feet firmly on my arch. I wanted to howl with pain, but checked it when I saw the embarrassed look on his face.

  “They have a mind of their own,” he murmured by way of explanation, looking first at his feet and then at me.

  “They sure do.” My foot burned with pain.

  “Okay, dancers, let’s move to the music,” ordered Eddy St. Simon, appearing out of nowhere, his creepy hands landing on my waist. “This is the correct position,” he admonished, lifting Sam’s arm farther up my back.

  Eddy stepped back and checked us over with the expression of someone who’d just smelled something rotten. “Now, little lady, let’s see you hold your wrist properly. Maybe the two of you should consider taking private lessons. I’m available,” Eddy said.

  I was about a breath away from indulging in some really childish actions, like sticking out my tongue. Then I glanced up at Sam and saw the scowl on his face as he grimly tried to keep his feet moving in the right order.

  “Now, you two continue practicing and I'll be back.”

  I felt Sam’s arm tighten on me as he disentangled his feet from between mine for about the tenth time. “Should we take him up on his offer of private lessons?” he asked.

  “Not in this lifetime.”

  “I wonder if we might be smarter to work at this on our own.”

  “Sam Bannister, what are you suggesting?”

  “I've seen the way you dance. It’s so much smoother than what we’re doing h
ere.”

  Was that a compliment? His words seemed sincere. “That’s kind of you to say.”

  “I’m not being kind, I mean it.”

  We stumbled along for a few more minutes, our knees bumping occasionally as we clutched each other. “What are we doing here?” Sam gasped in dismay after a particularly clumsy collision.

  “Learning to dance?”

  Eddy glowered at us from the other side of the room. I could see that he was torn between working with the agile couple in front of him, or coming across the room and propping us up yet again.

  Sam held me tighter, stopped moving his feet and whispered, “Do we need him in our lives?”

  He was reading my mind. “We definitely do not. Want to make a getaway?” I asked in my best conspirator’s voice.

  “Sounds like a plan to me. We'd better make our move before he sees us standing still. I don’t want another lecture.”

  “Then let’s dance our way out of here. You lead.”

  We danced somewhat awkwardly toward the exit, chuckling like a pair of schoolkids. “Think he saw us?” I asked as I wobbled on my heels into the parking lot with Sam’s arm steadying me.

  “I don’t care if he did,” Sam said triumphantly, pulling me against him and hugging the air out of my lungs.

  I tilted my chin and smiled up at him, at this man who was willing to risk looking foolish. “I don’t care, either.”

  “Why don’t we dance out here in the parking lot?” he asked, doing his version of a slow waltz over the asphalt.

  “You're making real progress,” I declared, trying to keep the surprise from my voice.

  “Just call me Fred,” he said with a smirk.

  “Astaire, that is?”

  He nodded. “And you'd be?”

  “Ginger Rogers, of course.” And I did a little dance step all my own,