by Sara V. Zook
THE PULL
By
Sara V. Zook
The Pull
©2015 Sara V. Zook
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without the written permission of the author, except where permitted by law. This book is a work of fiction. Any similarities to real people, living or dead, is purely coincidental. All characters and events in this work are figments of the author’s imagination.
Table of Contents
Title
Copyright Information
Prologue
One
Two
Three
Four
Five
Six
Seven
Eight
Nine
Ten
Eleven
Twelve
Thirteen
Fourteen
Fifteen
Sixteen
Epilogue
About the Author
I’ve never killed anyone.
I’ve never stolen anything.
I pay my bills on time and take care of my responsibilities. I try to follow laws and rules.
Hell, I’ve never even been in a fist fight.
I mean, we all have our faults and do things we wish we hadn’t. I’ve taken some hits, but I’ve managed to get back up on my feet again. We have to, right? Life will still go on no matter what we do.
I think overall I’m a pretty decent human being. So that’s why I ask myself why—why has this happened to me? No one could’ve possibly prepared me for this. I have no idea what to do or where to even begin in this mess. Yesterday if you’d have told me this would happen, I would’ve laughed in your face. Now—it has happened—to me. I don’t deserve any of this. Good people should have good lives. I have to face this all alone with no one to turn to. I have to make a decision no man should ever be asked to make.
- Darin Thorne
PROLOGUE
“Your phone’s ringing.”
It was one of those mornings. I was late for work and no matter what I did, everything else just made me even later. I reached for my coffee cup that was sitting on the kitchen counter.
“Darin…”
I looked up at Violet, her hair slicked back and wet from her shower, her dark eyes lit with amusement by the fact that I was running around trying to remember everything I needed to bring for my work trip.
“Your phone’s ringing,” she repeated.
Grumbling with annoyance, I picked up my cell and looked at the caller ID. An 830 number? Who the heck would that be? “Hello?” I huffed into the phone, shoving it under my chin as I pulled my bag up over my shoulder. I was to be at the airport in a half hour to go to a business meeting in California.
“Is this Mr. Darin Thorne?” a female voice on the other end asked.
I lowered my eyebrows. If it was a telemarketer, I didn’t have time for this right now. “Yeah,” I mumbled, ready to hang up.
“Mr. Thorne, I’m calling from Cauldswell University Hospital.”
I glanced back at Vi, her arms crossing as she watched me in curiosity. “Okay.”
There was hesitation on the other end. “Mr. Thorne, I’m calling you because a patient was transferred here today from Rhinesdale Community Home. Sir, I don’t know how to say this to you exactly.”
I turned around so my back was facing Vi. I let the bag slip from my shoulder and fall to the hardwood floor of the kitchen. “Tell me what?”
I heard the woman sigh into the phone. “That patient is your wife, Livvy Thorne.”
She had my full attention now.
“Mr. Thorne, your wife’s come out of her coma.”
The coffee cup fell from my hand, ceramic pieces and black liquid colliding with the floor. I felt a sudden buzzing in my head like I couldn’t hear or think straight. “Wait. What did you say? I don’t think I heard you…”
“Livvy’s awake. Her eyes are open and she’s talking. There doesn’t seem to be any signs of brain damage. I was asked to call you and let you know,” the girl from the hospital explained.
I tried to swallow but a lump had mysteriously grown large and fierce in my throat. I could barely even breathe. “Oh. Thank you for letting me know.” I pulled the phone away from my body and stared at it for a few seconds.
“Darin?” Violet asked, already on her hands and knees soaking up the spilled coffee with a towel as she collected the pieces of broken glass. “What on earth was that all about? Is everything all right?”
I looked down at my girlfriend, my Vi, the ring on her left hand sparkling as rays of sun hit it as they poured in from the window. That ring had been a promise to her. I’d marry her right away as soon as Livvy—my wife—passed away. The doctors assured me it may be a long time before it happened, but it would happen eventually. Now they call me and tell me she’s back from the dead. The piercing ringing in my ears continued. All I could hear was my own heart thumping away inside my chest. Livvy was awake. Her eyes were open and she was talking. I took a few steps away from Violet, the phone still clamped in my hand. What would this mean for Liv? What would this mean for us all?
ONE
Livvy
I stared up at the white ceiling of my hospital room, the pillow fluffed and tucked under my neck. I tried to sit up, but my muscles were so weak and stiff. A doctor had come in and examined me. He said someone would be in to talk to me soon about what happened. No one had come yet. A nurse had brought in some breakfast. She was spoon-feeding it to me. I had given her a look and assured her I was capable of feeding myself. I felt starved. After I’d eaten every last bite, the nurse just stood there and stared at me. I asked her what she was doing. She said I’d inhaled that so quick, she just wanted to make sure I didn’t bring any of it back up. That was an hour ago. Still no one was here. I was starting to get impatient. I didn’t see any bruises or cuts on my body, just an overall exhaustion, but I wasn’t going to sleep just yet—not until I had my answers. And where in the world was Darin at anyway?
“Mrs. Thorne?”
I looked up. There at the doorway stood a short, stout woman dressed in a dark blue dress suit. She had jet black hair and a huge grin revealing bright white teeth. She walked in the room the rest of the way and pulled over a chair near the side of the bed.
“I’m Emma Klein. I’m one of the counselors here at the hospital.”
We continued to stare at each other.
“How are you feeling?”
I looked down at the hospital gown I was wearing and frowned. “Just a little weak, I guess. Are you here to tell me what happened?”
She smiled again. “You don’t remember anything?”
I sighed and shook my head. “Was I in an accident or something?”
“Yes, you were. A car accident.”
I took a moment to consider this. “Okay. I don’t see any cuts or anything.” I paused and looked up at the woman. “How’s my car?”
Emma raised her eyebrows. She folded her hands in her lap. “I’ll answer any questions you want me to answer, but I need to ask you a few things first.”
I slowly nodded.
“What’s your name?”
I chuckled nervously. Was she kidding? Had I bumped my head? “Livvy Marie Thorne.”
“Very good,” Emma replied. “How old are you?”
“Twenty-six.”
She pressed her lips together. “What’s your mother’s name?”
“Genevieve.”
“Your maiden name?”
“Slate.”
“Where were you born?”
“In Cluster.”
“Wha
t state do you live in now?”
“New York.”
“Are you married?”
I laughed. “Yes.”
“Your spouse’s name?”
“Darin. What’s going on here? You think there’s something wrong with my memory?”
Emma sat forward so that she was almost on the edge of her chair. “Mrs. Thorne, this is going to be very hard for you to understand, but I just need you to listen, okay?”
I narrowed my eyes at her but nodded.
“You were in a car accident as I said,” she repeated. “But the part that’s going to be difficult for you is that the accident occurred a while ago—seven years ago to be exact.”
I gripped onto the bed rail and squeezed the cold metal. “This is some kind of joke, right?”
“I’m afraid not.”
I looked up at the ceiling again. The tiles began to swirl together as dizziness took over me. That breakfast may just come back up after all. I felt like I couldn’t breathe and was on the verge of hyperventilation.
Emma stood up quickly and put her hand on my back. “Livvy, I need you to just take deep breaths, calm yourself down.”
I looked at her and stared at the lines forming on her crinkled forehead. “This can’t be real.”
“You’ve been in a coma, Livvy.”
“A what?” I closed my eyes tight and tried to take those deep breaths as panic seized me. Seven years? “So I’m not twenty-six?”
“No.”
“I’m past thirty?”
“You’re thirty-three years old now.”
Oh god. Oh god. Oh god. This couldn’t really be true. I pushed the woman away from me and leaned back against the pillow. I kicked off the blankets covering my legs and pulled up my gown. My legs—they were so thin, the outline of bones visible beneath the pale skin. I reached up and touched my face, my cheek bones, and continued to go higher to my hair. It had been long. Someone had cut it off without my permission to do so.
“I know it’s a lot to take in. Just give yourself a few moments. That’s it. Breathe. Good.” The counselor began to stroke my hair like I was a child.
I swatted her hand away. “Please, don’t touch me!” I shrieked.
A nurse from the hallway paused at the doorway. “Everything okay in here?” she asked, having heard my frantic voice.
Emma raised both of her hands and took a few steps away from me. “Everything’s fine,” she told the nurse, who nodded and went away again. “Livvy, do you need some water? Is there anything I can get for you?”
“My husband.”
The woman raised her eyebrows.
I pulled the blanket back up over my legs, feeling suddenly like a deformed freak. “My husband,” I repeated. “Where’s Darin?”
Emma shrugged. “I’m not sure, but I can find out.”
“Why isn’t he here? I need to see him. Please, find him. Find my husband.”
I watched the counselor walk to the doorway and speak to someone dressed in white scrubs. The dizziness and nausea were beginning to subside a little. They spoke quietly to one another, then glanced my way. The nurse nodded and came over to me with two small paper cups. In one were some pills, the other contained water.
“Take this, Mrs. Thorne. It’ll calm you down and make you feel better.” She shoved the cup with pills in front of my nose.
I glanced down at the tiny white contents warily. “I don’t want knocked out,” I told her.
“You need rest,” she replied.
I glared up at her. “Sounds like I’ve gotten a hell of a lot of rest,” I snapped back, shoving the cup away from my face. “I don’t want anything. I’m fine.”
“Okay, but you let me know if you change your mind, you hear?”
I didn’t respond. I leaned back again and tried to allow myself to absorb the shocking news I’d just received. Coma. I’d been in a coma for all these years. Yes, I had questions—so many of them I couldn’t even concentrate on just one, but I didn’t want someone I didn’t know explaining everything to me. I needed Darin to be the one sitting here, comforting me, and telling me what I needed to know. I’d missed out on a huge chunk of my life. Wow. I didn’t even know the year, the month, who the president was. Had something happened to my brain? And where had Darin been all these years? Was he still living in the house we’d bought together after we got married? Was he still working the same job? What had happened to my own job? I had seven years’ worth of questions, and I’d be damned if I’d sit here and have some hospital counselor be the one who caught me up on the life I’d missed out on.
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Darin
“No, I don’t understand, Darin.”
I’d been sitting on the couch for the last twenty minutes, my face buried in my palms as I was letting the news still settle—if it ever would. “She’s awake. She’s at Cauldswell Hospital,” I repeated, not believing the words were coming out of my mouth.
Violet stood there, her back pressed against the wall since she’d stopped pacing back and forth for the moment. Her hands were on her hips, an angry fierceness in those dark brown eyes of hers. “Yes, I’ve already heard you say that.”
I raked my hands through my hair, the gel I’d put in this morning sticking to my skin. “Then what don’t you understand?” I shouted, the stress of the situation already getting to me.
“Why do you have to go there to see her?”
“What?” I was on my feet now, a droplet of sweat dripping down the back of my neck. “You don’t get why? She’s out of her coma, Vi! She’s talking and everything!”
“Livvy Thorne, alive and well.” Violet stuck out her tongue in disgust. “The woman you’ve never gone to see once during our entire relationship.”
I growled in frustration. I remembered all too well going to see Livvy before Violet was in my life. I went every day for months. I stayed for hours. I couldn’t work. I couldn’t sleep. All I could do was hope—hope she’d come back to me. But no, the doctors said that my expectations were too high. The accident had caused damage in a part of her brain that would never recover. She was asleep forever. She was pale and fragile but beautiful just the same. I’d brush her hair and talk to her, tell her everything that was going on in my life, and that I missed her. I missed her so damn much that it hurt. It hurt to see her never wake up. I remembered the very last visit, months before I met Vi…
“Wake up, damn you!” I screamed at Livvy. “You have to wake up! I can’t live like this anymore, not without you!” I stood up and watched her face continue to be motionless, her eyelids not even flutter in response. “Liv, wake up!” And I grabbed both of her arms and began to shake her back and forth, all of my pain and tension pouring out of me as I sobbed like a baby and continued to violently jolt her limp body back and forth. Some of the cords attached to her arms were pulled out in the process, making alarms go off and high-pitched beeping noises. Nurses rushed into the room screaming at me. I could barely hear or see them through my tears. They tore Livvy out of my grasp and had security escort me from the building. It was then that I realized what I’d done, that I probably shouldn’t come see her anymore. I was taking it out on her, and it wasn’t her fault. She hadn’t meant to be in that accident. I had never bawled like that before in my life, and I promised myself I never would again.
I blinked at Violet. Her arms were crossed in front of her chest, her lips downward in a frown. “Listen,” I began, “I have my reasons for not visiting her.” I had never told her what happened that day. It was none of her business anyway. My life before was different. It was in the past. It took me a long time to get over everything. I’d put it behind me, and I wanted it to stay that way. There was no benefit to drudging up old memories from a lifetime ago. I was only married to Livvy a little over a year. I had been living with Violet for four years. If it wasn’t for my still being legally married to Liv, I’d be ma
rried to Vi right now.
“We’ve been waiting for her to die,” Violet snapped. “My sister and me, we’ve picked out the perfect wedding dress and everything, Darin.”
“Wow.” I glared at her. “Listen to you. You sound like a total bitch.”
Her mouth gaped open. “Me? You’ve been waiting, too!”
I threw my hands up in the air. “I don’t wish for her to die! That’s just what I was told! The doctors said…”
“Well, obviously the doctors were wrong!” she interrupted me. She collapsed down on the recliner and curled her legs up underneath her. “So your wife is alive. So what, Darin? Just let her go live her own life now. Wasn’t she like a teacher or something?”
“I’m sure they’re still holding her job for her,” I remarked with heavy sarcasm.
“There are plenty of teaching jobs out there.”
I sighed. This conversation was going nowhere and was quickly turning into a shouting match. “This is ridiculous, Vi. You’re getting upset over nothing. I have to go see what’s going on, what the doctors say now. I doubt she’s fully able to function. I might have to get her switched to another home to stay in or something. I have to go figure things out. I know you can at least understand that much.”
Violet was quiet for a few moments. She shifted positions in the chair and looked up at me, the anger draining away from her face. “Well, it’s a long drive, at least four hours to Cauldswell.”
“Yeah.” I looked around the room. “At least I have a bag packed already if I need to stay overnight.” My eyes landed on the suitcase leaning against the far wall.
“Overnight?” Her voice transformed to hysterical again, but then she quickly realized it and went back to a more controlled state. “Okay, then. I’ll go along with you. Just give me a little bit of time to throw some things in a bag.” She stood up and headed toward the staircase.
“No,” I said, sounding more desperate than I had meant to. “You can’t go.”
“What? What do you mean I can’t go?”
“What if it upsets her?”