Until It Fades

by K. A. Tucker

  “Okay. Actually . . .” I hesitate, swallowing against my growing fear. “Can I talk to you for a minute? Somewhere that’s not right here?” I hope I can be a little more articulate in the actual interview. Thank God it’s not going to be aired live.

  A curious frown wrinkles his forehead. “Of course.”

  We weave around all the equipment and people, Brett struggling to edge by. There aren’t many options for privacy around here. Outside is off-limits and I’m not about to lead him into the bathroom for a deep conversation, so it’s basically either Brenna’s bedroom or mine.

  The second we step into mine and he shuts the door, I know I chose the wrong one for my current level of anxiety. I’ve never had a man—besides Keith, when he was hanging a corner shelf on the wall or helping with Brenna—in my bedroom. And to have Brett here . . .

  His eyes flitter around the cramped rectangular space, dimly lit by my bedside lamp, to land on the picture of Brenna that sits on my dresser beside my freshly washed and folded and very unsexy white cotton panties and bras. I see his eyes skim over them momentarily before reaching for the picture frame.

  He studies her face. “She has your jawline. And your mouth. And the shape of your eyes. She’s pretty much your mini-me.”

  “Not quite but . . . almost.”

  “She’s beautiful.” He sets the frame down. “You’re really worried about how all this will impact her, aren’t you?”

  “It’s stirred up stuff I don’t want her hearing about yet. The sooner this is all over, the better.”

  “Right. I hope so. Do you mind if I sit?” He’s already heading for my bed, that same pained expression on his face that’s there every time he moves.

  “Your leg’s really hurting you, isn’t it?”

  “Nah. It’s getting better.”

  “Liar,” I whisper, edging over to take a seat next to him. It’s probably better that I don’t face him straight on for this.

  “You’re really nervous, aren’t you?”

  “Nah,” I mimic.

  “Liar.” He smiles. “It’s going to be fine, trust me. Kate’s one of the good ones, and Simone made sure she knows what’s off-limits. Don’t worry. She told me herself, she wants you walking away from this looking like the hero that you are.”

  There he goes, using that word again. “See, that’s the thing.” I catch myself picking at my fingernail, so I clench my fists to stop. “The other day, when I told you what happened that night? I kind of left something out of the story. Something important.” My chest feels two sizes too small for my lungs to work properly. Brett says nothing, waiting for me. “When I first got there, your head was hanging forward and there was all this blood,” I close my eyes and the image appears. “I put my hand on your chest and I could feel your heart beating, so I knew you were alive. So I tried to get you to wake up. Then, when the car caught fire, I started yelling and trying to pull you out. It was impossible. You were so heavy, and your boot was stuck on something. You moaned but you didn’t wake up.” A prickly knot sprouts in my throat, sparking tears in my eyes. I swallow against it. “The fire was getting so hot, and so much closer, and the smell from the fire and your friend . . .”

  Brett inhales sharply.

  “I gave up on getting you out. I backed away, knowing that you were alive. The other night, you said that most people would have left you there. I’m one of them. I did leave you there.”

  “No, you didn’t.”

  “I did! I was just about to turn and head for the ditch to get away from the fire when you finally lifted your head. That’s the only reason I came back. But I did leave you there.” Suddenly the sickening weight on my lungs lessons, and with each inhale, breathing becomes easier.

  An odd bittersweet relief overwhelms me. Relief that Brett now knows the full truth.

  But what does he think?

  My heart pounds in my ears for ten long beats before he speaks. “You’re kidding me, right?”

  I frown, seeing the mixture of amusement and sympathy on his face.

  “Cath. You didn’t leave me there.”

  “But I—”

  “You didn’t leave me there,” he repeats. “And even if you hadn’t gotten me out, and I hadn’t survived, you still didn’t leave me there.” His eyes narrow with understanding. “Is this why you’ve been hiding?”

  “I guess it hasn’t helped. This, and just being in the limelight again. I had a rough time after that stuff in high school. A lot of people around here saying and doing things to me and to my family. I really didn’t want to relive it, and I don’t want Brenna dragged into it either. She’ll hear about it one day. I just wanted it to be on my terms.”

  In a somewhat tentative move, he reaches over to rope an arm around my body. He pulls me closer to him, until my shoulder is pressed against his side. His other hand finds my chin, lifting it until I’m forced to peer into his eyes. “I won’t let that happen. And besides, I don’t think there’ll be a single bad thing that anyone can say about you after they watch this interview.”

  I feel my cheeks flushing at being so close to him. “You may be a little bit biased.”

  His sad smile dissolves into a dazzling one. “You’re right, I’m completely biased. You could do just about anything and I’d still have you sitting high on a pedestal.”

  My chest swells with a sudden and overwhelming wave of affection for this man.

  I must be starving for human connection because, just like the other night, I can’t help but sink into him, resting my head against his strong chest, trying to get closer, wishing that time would stand still.

  “You ready to go out there and face the world together?”

  “Or we could just stay right here?” I joke.

  “That sounds like an even better idea,” he says softly, as his gaze drifts over my bed and then back to my face, his eyes dropping to my mouth and lingering.

  As if he might want to kiss me.

  Foolish wishes for a foolish girl.

  I remember feeling this same way long ago, sitting in a hard plastic chair at the front of the class, lost in a teenage girl’s impossible daydream, in which my art teacher might lust for me as I did for him. Where he might pick me over all the other, prettier girls in school.

  That impossible daydream turned out to be not so impossible after all.

  Then again, it also turned into a nightmare.

  A sudden rapping against the door makes me pull away. Brett’s arm slides off me, leaving me cold.

  “Brett? Catherine? Are you ready?” It’s Meryl.

  “Just a sec,” he calls out to his mom.

  “What do I say when I get to that part in the story?” The moment of peace is gone and my nerves are kicking in again.

  He uses my bed’s footboard to stand and adjust himself on his crutches. “What do you want to say?”

  “I don’t know. What would you do?”

  He shuffles his way toward the door, stopping just before it. He reaches out for me, his large hand beckoning.

  My breath catches as I eye it. Hesitantly, I step forward, sliding my hand into his, feeling miniature by comparison. He’s shockingly gentle, though, closing his fingers over mine. Pulling me toward the door and closer to him, he reaches up to push a stray stand of hair off my face. I meet his eyes.

  His mint-laced breath skates across my face as he hovers over me for five long heartbeats, something unreadable in his expression. “I’ve always been big on the truth.”

  “The truth.” I exhale a shaky breath, his proximity making me a little dizzy. “I can do that.”

  Chapter 14

  March 2010

  “Mr. Philips is waiting for you.” Mrs. Lagasse’s narrow face is even tighter as she scowls at me from behind her secretary’s desk.

  I don’t bother smiling back—the woman has never been friendly to me. I stroll past her and down the hall to the principal’s office at the end, my stomach in knots.

  “Close the door behind
you,” Mr. Philips instructs somewhat absently, his focus remaining on his computer screen for a long moment after I’ve pushed his office door shut and taken the chair across from him.

  Finally, he turns to settle his naturally cold, hard gaze on me. It’s nothing like his son’s. “Miss Wright, I wish we were meeting under more pleasant circumstances.”

  And which circumstances would those be? I’ve sat across from him at this desk on more than one occasion and it has never been pleasant. Though, I’ll agree, this time feels a hundred times worse. “How is he?” I blurt out before I can stop myself.

  Mr. Philips’s lips press together as he seems to consider his response. What must he think about Scott and me being together? “Hurt,” he finally says. “He doesn’t understand why you would go to the police with this . . . matter.” The way he says it makes me think he knows the truth—that Scott and I are together. Or, were together.

  The lump that’s been lodged in my throat for the past nine days flares, hearing that I’ve hurt Scott. “I didn’t want to, I swear. I would do anything to get out of it. Please tell him that.”

  Mr. Philips settles back into his chair, his fingertips meeting each other in front of him. “Then recant your statement.”

  “What?”

  He smirks, as if he knows I have no idea what that means. “Tell them you’re withdrawing your statement. Tell them you made it all up. They don’t have enough to pursue the charges without your testimony.”

  “But . . . Won’t I get in trouble?” And what about the texts? My mother’s account?

  “No.” He says it so simply. “Do you want Scott to go to jail? Do you want his reputation ruined?”

  “No! Of course not.”

  “Then recant. They’ll let you go.”

  “But . . . lie to the police?”

  “People do it all the time. They won’t pursue it.” Mr. Philips leans forward. “You don’t have to cooperate with them, Catherine. You’re the ‘victim.’ ” I don’t miss his sneer at that word. “They won’t force a victim to testify, and if you refuse to testify, then this whole mess will go away. Isn’t that what you want?”

  I nod furiously.

  I coil my fingers together as everyone takes their places, Brett easing around the furniture with careful maneuvers. I just watched him wash pills down with a bottle of water, unable to delay it any longer. He’s putting up a strong front, but there is pain in his eyes. Even though he encouraged me, I’m feeling guilty for pushing this interview on him so soon.

  Meryl rubs his arm affectionately as he passes her to edge around the coffee table. Just as he’s turning to sit, he knocks his cast against the corner of the table, his face contorting in pain, his eyes closing.

  Instinctively, I reach for him, grabbing his hand, hot and rough and so tense. “Are you okay?”

  Keeping his back to everyone else, his chest puffs out with a deep inhale. With a long, slow exhale, his grimace fades and that relaxed, perfect smile appears again. “Yeah, I’m good.”

  And I’m left holding his hand with a room of people watching us.

  I quickly drop it and resume my old-lady hand-wringing in my lap as Jess clips on my microphone. If we don’t get this over with, I’ll be rocking back and forth soon enough.

  My love seat cushion sinks as Brett settles in next to me, and I feel myself naturally tilting into his big body, as much as I try to hold myself up straight. Rodney spent so much time repositioning me, I’m afraid to throw off my angle by adjusting.

  “You good?” Brett whispers.

  “Yup.” My tight one-word answer, delivered in a high-pitched squeak, betrays me.

  He leans in, ever so faintly catching my ear with his mouth. “Just remember to take a deep breath before you answer each question. It’ll help, I promise. And if there’s something you don’t want to answer, just nod toward Simone and she’ll shut it down. Or take my hand.”

  As if I’m going to take Brett Madden’s hand on a prime-time television broadcast.

  “’Kay?”

  I give him a nod as Kate, in a smart blouse and pencil skirt, saunters in to take her seat, adjusting her microphone. She looks like she might roll out of bed ready to be on camera. I doubt that’s the case, but I wish I was as at ease with this whole production as she is.

  Rodney starts the countdown. “Five . . . four . . . three . . . two . . .”

  You could hear a pin drop on my floor, the two heartbeats of silence are so acute. And then . . .

  “I’m Kate Wethers and we have a special exclusive interview for you tonight. We are in Balsam, Pennsylvania, with Brett Madden, Philadelphia Flyers captain and son of actress Meryl Price, and Catherine Wright, the heroic woman who saved his life by pulling him from a burning car . . .” Kate speaks smoothly and eloquently, and without error, as if she’s practiced her speech for days and could recite it in her sleep, her sharp green eyes—lined with crow’s-feet to suggest she’s older than the early forties that I first pegged her at—locked on the camera. She introduces the accident—in case there’s a single person in the U.S. who isn’t already aware—and the aftermath, ending with the dramatic revelation that the mysterious person who saved the two-hundred-and-twenty-pound Brett is, shockingly, a petite five-foot-four woman.

  With that, she turns to face Brett and me. I feel the camera zooming in on my face, but I don’t look at it, keeping my eyes locked on Kate and trying not to bare my teeth like a feral animal when I force a smile. Brett, Meryl, and Simone promised that Kate is kind and classy, and wouldn’t try to twist my words or come in from left field and leave my mouth gaping open.

  I just want this over with.

  Brett and Kate share pleasantries, Kate expressing how happy she is that he is recovering, Brett congratulating her on a prestigious journalism award she recently won. Not a cord of tension pulses through him. I wish I could be that relaxed.

  “And this is the lovely young lady the world has to thank for allowing us to continue enjoying Brett Madden’s smile, charm, and talent. Catherine Wright, how are you doing?”

  Speak! Speak! Speak! “A little out of sorts, honestly.” I clear my throat several times, flashing a nervous smile at Brett, who nods encouragingly at me.

  “So, Catherine. Or is it Cath? I’ve heard both in the brief time I’ve been here.”

  “Either. Just not Cathy, please.”

  She chuckles and then turns her attention back to Brett. “So, that fateful Friday night, you and Seth Grabner were on your way to celebrate clinching a spot in the Eastern Conference finals, were you not?”

  “That’s right. Sid Durrand has a place up in the Poconos and he was hosting the team there.”

  “And it was Seth’s car that you were in?”

  Brett smiles. “He was dying to get his Corvette out on the road again after storing it all winter.” His smile falls off. “I meant . . . He really wanted to drive it.”

  “And you’ve already been clear that there was no alcohol involved in the accident.”

  “That’s right.”

  She turns to me. “Cath, why don’t you tell us what everyone wants to hear in your own words: the night you saved Brett Madden’s life.”

  “Well . . .” I remind myself to take a deep breath, just like Brett coached me. “I was on my way home from an unsuccessful blind date . . .”—even though Gord sold me out the way he did, and he deserves to have his ego taken down ten notches, I won’t be outright cruel—“. . . and I was taking Old Cannery Road. There was this red sports car. It was—” I bite back my words. I told the police that I thought the driver was speeding, but there’s no need to condemn him now. “It was foggy. Really foggy,” I say instead, which is not a lie. It’s surprising, how much I remember about that night, and with how much clarity I can recall it, right down to the panic and feeling of helplessness.

  “So you found Seth Grabner first?”

  I nod. “Yeah, he was . . . It wasn’t good.” I feel Brett tense beside me, and I quickly move on. �
�Then I found Brett in the passenger side. He was still breathing, but unconscious.”

  “Was the car burning at this point?”

  “No. I could smell something odd, but it didn’t catch fire until about twenty or so seconds later.” I shake my head. “Or, honestly, I don’t know how long after. Anyway, when it did, I knew I had to get him out of there. I had already unbuckled his seat belt, and I was trying to pull him out. I managed to get his right leg out of the car, but his left boot was stuck under something.”

  “You tried to pull this two-hundred-and-twenty-pound man beside you out of the car.” She gestures at Brett right next to me, to emphasize his size, which I’m sure is already clear with me sitting so slight next to him.

  Something about the way she says it makes me giggle. Maybe at the absurdity of me even trying in the first place. “Yeah, he’s as heavy as he looks.”

  Next to me, Brett chuckles softly.

  She leans in, her voice dropping a notch, as if she’s somehow more engaged in the story. It’s a subtle but clever move on her part. “So then what happened, Catherine?”

  I avert my gaze from her and look into a camera lens, but then remember that they told me not to do that, so I drop my eyes to the coffee table, struggling to control my racing heart. “I kept shouting and screaming, but he wouldn’t respond, and it was so hot, I felt like my skin was going to melt off. So I started to back away. For just a few seconds, I gave up,” I finally admit in a shaky whisper. “Nothing I was doing was working.”

  Silence fills the room.

  “You were crying,” Brett suddenly says, almost to himself. “You kept saying that you were sorry, and you were crying.”

  I turn to regard the frown zagging across his forehead. “You heard me?”

  His blue eyes search my features. “I guess I did. I just didn’t remember it until now.”

  For a few moments, Kate, the camera, the crew . . . they vanish.

  Kate’s voice pulls me back quickly, though. “That must have been an absolutely terrifying and impossible decision for you.” Her brow furrows with sympathy. “You’re a twenty-four-year-old woman, a single mom with a five-year-old child waiting for you at home, you had already put yourself in harm’s way. And, by basic logic, a woman of your size can’t possibly have the strength to lift an unconscious man of Brett Madden’s size out of a bucket seat.” She waits a few beats, maybe to let those words sink in, before going on. “But you didn’t really give up, did you? Because otherwise he wouldn’t be sitting next to you.”