The first Sunday I called home after he passed, I asked to talk to him out of habit. My mother had to remind me that he was gone.
I didn’t slip into a state of depression, nor did I wad up into an emotional ball. I simply couldn’t bring myself to write a story about anything.
One Sunday, instead of calling my mother, I called my agent. We talked for an hour. She told me many authors, following the death of a loved one, write a book about their relationship with that person.
She explained that I didn’t even need to publish it. Writing it, she said, might be enough.
I decided the next book in the biker series would be about one of the members of the club losing his father.
I sat down at the computer and wrote ROUGH. The story was about a member of the club whose father fell, broke his ankle, collar bone, and arm. A move-in nurse who took care of him fell in love with the biker.
I finished the book and dedicated it to my father.
The book was well received and became a number one bestseller in a matter of days. The readers loved the banter between the Hero and his father, which was taken from what would have been a typical Sunday at my parent’s home.
In the book, I included the actual eulogy I wrote for my father. It seemed writing the novel allowed me to release whatever it was that was holding me back. I was once again free. Free to live life. Free to write. Free to be the father my father would have wanted me to be.
I tucked the children into bed that night as I always did. My appreciation for them, somehow, had grown since the book was released.
The nighttime ritual was the same night after night.
“Good night. Love you. See you in the morning,” I said.
“Good night. Love you. See you in the morning,” Lily replied.
She extended her fist.
As I’d done every night since the day we became a family, I pounded my knuckles against hers.
Then, I turned out the light.
Chapter Sixty-Five
When Christmas came that year, we’d lived in Florida for six months. After it passed, Erin came to visit. We spent ten days together, mostly at the beach. What time we weren’t at the beach, she spent playing with her sister, Charlee.
Seeing her interact with Charlee was comforting. They chased each other, played in the yard, and swam in the pool. They played with dolls, made blanket tents on the couch, and laid in each other’s arms and watched television.
In short, despite their nineteen-year age difference, they did what sisters do.
Erin and I walked along the beach one day, side by side. She, like me, enjoyed the beach in silence, allowing it to take her far away from the reality of earth. She spoke little, but when she did, it was always worth hearing.
“Do you think the boys will come soon?” I asked.
“They want to. They’re just busy with school,” she said.
They’d told me the same thing. Deep in my being, I wanted her to enlighten me. To tell me something of their thoughts, beliefs, or plans when it came to us being a family. I felt I’d lost so many opportunities with them, but I knew there was so much life ahead of me that I could spend with them.
I simply wanted things to be different. They had college to attend, yes. But. A phone call on Sundays, or a text message from time to time would be well received. More than anything, I wanted Alec to acknowledge Jess as being a part of the family.
Until he did, my heart would continue to break each time we were together.
I decided as we walked through the wet sand that Alec’s absence was God’s will. That his infrequent visits prevented Jessica’s heart from being broken any more than she was capable of handling.
Erin left, but only after shedding a few tears over missing her younger brothers, sisters, and parents.
As always, she hugged everyone, thanked Jess for everything, and kissed the kids before she went to the airport.
“It sure was nice to have her visit,” Jess said.
“It was. She’s a good kid.”
Jess chuckled. “She’s a woman, Scott. She’s twenty-one.”
“She’ll always be a kid to me.”
Four months later, while leaving a book signing, I was involved in an accident at the airport in Las Vegas. With third-degree burns over forty percent of my body, I was rushed by ambulance to the trauma unit at UMC, Las Vegas.
Jessica signed a release form to allow them to amputate my left thumb. In tears, she came to my side while they were administering anesthesia.
“They’re going to cut off your left thumb, Scott. You need to know that. I’m sorry,” she sobbed. “They said you could die if they don’t.”
I was in shock, but I understood her. It was the least of my worries. I had been burned from my hip to my knee, and the burns were so severe that my muscle was exposed in places.
I gave a nod, and then everything went black.
I awoke the next day in a hospital bed. Confused, and in agony, I looked around the room. Jess was sleeping in a chair at my side.
I lifted my left hand. It was tightly wrapped in gauze. Frantic, I dug at the bandage.
“It’s still there,” she said. “It’s really bad, but you got to keep it.”
“What happened?” I asked.
“Nobody knows,” she said. “The news is coming today to interview you.”
For over two weeks, I was in the intensive care unit at the burn center. Several surgeries later, I was fitted with synthetic skin and a few skin grafts using my own skin. The pain was horrific. To describe it as unbearable would be a grotesque understatement.
At the end of the first week, I wanted to go outside. I wanted to smell the fresh air. Visions of prison promptly returned – being locked in an institution where I wasn’t allowed to go outside.
“You can take him in a wheelchair,” they said.
“I’ll walk,” I replied.
“You can’t walk.”
“Want to fucking bet?” I said.
I attempted to stand and collapsed. They were right. I couldn’t walk. Defeated, I asked Jess to go home and be with the kids.
She laughed.
“You’re my husband. We do this together,” she said. “I leave when you leave.”
“I might be here for months,” I said. “They don’t know.”
“Then I guess I’ll be here for months, too. I’m not leaving you Scott. Now, or ever.”
On that day, she proved even further that love is much more than a word. When told by friends that she should leave me, she simply laughed and replied, you must not be in love.
Eventually, I used a walker. Then, one day, I used a cane. After a few weeks of walking with a cane, they performed an operation. After I recovered from it, I once again learned to walk with a cane.
When I was released, I walked out, using the aid of a cane.
My next book, NUTS, would be of a biker who fell in love with a burn victim. I dedicated it to the doctors and staff of UMC Las Vegas.
Erin came to visit me in the hospital, along with my niece, mother, brother, and sister-in-law. Immediately after I returned home, she came to visit again, staying for two weeks.
During those two weeks, she didn’t visit the beach once. She sat and talked with us during the day and read books at night. The time we were able to spend with her during that trip was what I’d always dreamed of.
One-on-one time with my children.
Filled with a degree of satisfaction that only a child can provide to a parent, I relished in that feeling day and night for the weeks that followed.
Two months later, Erin returned.
This time, it was with her brothers.
We spent time at the beach. We barbecued. We sat and talked. They drank wine. I drank water. We went back to the beach. We had great talks. We shared laughter, told stories, and stayed up until wee hours of the night.
Derek developed a relationship with Charlee that was heartwarming to experience. They played together. He fed her. Held her. Chased
her through the house. Read to her. Watched Disney shows with her.
On that trip, he became her older brother.
Upon waking in the morning, Charlee would ask. “Where’s Day-Day?”
“Derek’s in bed,” Jess would respond.
Charlee would then run to his bedroom, push the door open, and shout at him. “Day Day!”
Derek would get up, put on a smile, and begin spending another day with his baby sister. Seeing the joy in their eyes as each day unfolded was truly a rewarding experience.
During the last Saturday of their trip, we went to the beach as a family. While Landon and Lily built sandcastles, Charlee took off in a dead run toward the ocean. Her curly hair bounced with each step she took, just as her mother’s had when she entered the donut shop on the night we first met.
At that moment, Alec, Derek and I were combing the beach, looking for the perfect seashell. Alec pointed and laughed.
“Charlee’s going to outrun Jess,” he said.
I chuckled. “Jess has short legs.”
“Not as short as Charlee’s.”
Jess reached Charlee when she was ankle deep in the waves. We were fifty yards away, but I could see that Jess was scolding her.
Alec paused. After bending his lanky body over, he stood erect. “There,” he said, raising a perfect conch shell. “This one’s perfect.”
Derek found an undamaged sand dollar ten minutes later.
Proof of their trip that I hoped they’d treasure for years to come. Something tangible they could hold while I held the memories. We walked past where Jess had the sunshade secured to the sand. Erin was playing with Charlee in the sand. When she noticed us, she jumped up and joined us.
Jess, Charlee, Landon and Lily followed.
Together, as a family, we walked along the beach, looking for sea shells.
I squished my toes into the wet sand, not bothering to look back. I knew another day would come, giving another opportunity to leave more footprints along the beach. There wasn’t anything – or anyone – who could drag me and my family from the place we loved.
As we walked back along the beach, the sun was lowering itself into the sea. Erin and Jess took photos with the sun at their backs. I noticed our previous footprints were gone, and I grinned.
Life couldn’t get any better.
Well, it could have, but it would have required a miracle.
The two weeks passed all too quickly.
When it ended, the big kids packed their suitcases and dragged them to the car. As Erin and Derek passed by the kitchen, they hugged Jess.
“It sure was nice seeing you guys,” Jess said. “Come back any time.”
“We’ll see you at Christmas,” Derek promised.
“I’ll look forward to it,” Jess replied.
Alec loaded the car while Jess bid her farewells. When Erin and Derek reached the door, Alec met them there.
He became the man in the family when I went to prison. He may have only been eleven years old at the time, but he didn’t have a choice. He maintained that fatherly position through the years, always looking out for his brother and sister.
“You guys ready?” he asked.
“Is everything loaded?” Derek asked.
Alec nodded.
“You ready?” Erin asked.
“In just a minute,” he said.
He brushed past me and peered into the kitchen. “Jess?”
She turned around. Her face wore the same phony smile it wore every time Alec left.
“Yeah?” she asked.
“Come give me a hug,” he said. “We gotta go.”
She turned off the stove, set the skillet aside, and walked out of the kitchen with an ear to ear grin plastered on her face.
Alec opened his arms.
They embraced.
The miracle I had wished for happened. My heart swelled to the point I feared it would burst. It seemed he held her forever. Maybe it was because I wanted him to.
When he finally released her, he stepped back and smiled. “Thanks for everything, Jess. We’ll see you on Christmas, okay?”
“Okay,” Jess said, her face clearly expressing the emotion that was running through her. “I’ll look forward to seeing you again.”
“So will I,” Alec said.
With that one hug, a decade of misery that had lived within me vanished.
But, that wasn’t all that vanished. The cracks that once littered my wife’s heart went right along with it.
Epilogue
Another birthday passed without celebration. Things changed significantly during that year. As always, not all the changes were welcome.
Teddy was looking for a home in Naples and intended to move as soon as his home in Kansas sold. Having him to ride with would be a far cry from the motorcycle clubs of my past, but my life had changed. Along with those changes, my priorities changed.
My family came first.
The MC had all but disbanded after continued problems with a rival club. King, Chico, and the Big O had gone on to bigger and better things. Affirmation, I decided, that there’s value in riding solo. Club, or no club, my brothers would always remain my brothers.
Jessica’s parents accepted me wholeheartedly, with Lisa being the driving force behind the open-mindedness. She never came to understand why I wrote the stories I did, but she recommended them to her friends, nonetheless.
An unexpected phone call one Sunday evening brought shocking news. Jessica’s parents, after thirty years of marriage, were going to divorce. We struggled to find sense in the decision. We later came to the conclusion that love, regardless of its depth, requires maintenance.
We opened our home to Lisa and Jessica’s eighteen-year-old brother. They lived with us for five months. She moved a few blocks away, and visits often. When I feel the need, I wrap my arms around her and give her a hug. The gesture is no longer spiteful. It’s driven by love.
I stood on the scale and stared at the display.
“How many more?” Jess asked.
She’d learned over the years that I struggled with my weight on an hourly basis. It sickened her that my weight fluctuated no more than five pounds while she seemed to wear whatever it was she chose to eat on her hips.
“One point three to go,” I said. “The holidays suck.”
“The boys get here tonight, don’t they?”
“They do.”
“It’ll be exciting to see them.” She turned away. “But you’ll gain two more pounds.”
I didn’t need a reminder. The boys ate like horses. In turn, I did the same when they visited. I got off the scale, got back on it, and then shook my head. “It will be nice to see them. And, you’re right.”
Seeing the gleam in her eyes when she mentioned them was enough to convince me that our lives were truly in order.
I’d penned fifty novels, satisfied my three-book contract with Harlequin, and had sold the rights to two of my biker series’. None of that mattered as much as the fact that Alec had accepted Jess into his life.
He never explained what happened to cause him to change, but he didn’t have to. I expected he eventually saw the love that we shared and believed it to be true. It wasn’t surprising, most who knew us claimed to see the same thing.
My love for Jessica wasn’t manufactured, nor was it a claim I made simply to satisfy her. It was a part of my being. Driven by each beat of my heart, my love for her pumped through my veins right along with the blood that kept me alive. As long as my heart was beating, I would be able to express it.
One day, if my heart chose to stop, I knew my love for her would continue. Each wave that washed ashore along the beach would act as proof of my continued existence, and of my love for her.
The smiles our children – and our children’s children – wore would act as proof of the lives I touched while spending a lifetime walking along those beaches.
Eager to see the boys, I showered, got dressed and waited for their plane to arrive. Three ho
urs later, I picked them up at the airport.
I learned on the drive home that Alec decided to go to law school. He was going to make a career out of standing up for what was right. His brother Derek was graduating with an accounting degree and intended to be an actuary. Not surprising, as his father was a man who constantly made reference to statistics.
Erin wrote for the school newspaper and enjoyed writing as much as she enjoyed reading. Her degree, and chosen career, however, differed considerably from what I originally expected.
She intended to manage a care home for the elderly.
Her passion mirrored her grandmother’s.
I couldn’t have been more pleased with each of them, nor could I have been prouder.
“Jesus, Pop,” Alec said as we pulled into the driveway of our new home. “It’s huge.”
Two weeks before their arrival, on the day after Christmas, we moved a few blocks away, but stayed in the same neighborhood. Contrary to our beliefs and expectations, the people in the neighborhood welcomed us with open arms.
When we went to the clubhouse, we were always the youngest family there. We were certainly the only ones covered in tattoos. The residents of the community saw us for who we were, not what we appeared to be. We couldn’t imagine living anywhere else.
“We wanted enough room for you guys to have a place to sleep when you came,” I said. “It’s got enough bedrooms for everyone to have a bed. Pool’s big enough to swim laps in.”
He peered over the windshield of the Mustang and grinned. “No more sleeping on the floor for Dee, huh?”
“Nope.”
Contrary to my belief that they’d spend their days at the beach or chasing college girls, they didn’t. When asked if they wanted to go to the beach, the response was always the same.
No, we’ll just hang here.
We spent the two weeks as a family. During that time, I got lost in the feeling of having them home, laughing while recalling their childhoods, and hearing them tell stories of their grandfather’s colorful life.
As a family, we ate dinner. As a family, we watched movies. As a family, we laughed until we cried. As a family, we bonded. As a family, we grew two weeks older, and lifetimes richer in our experiences.
LOVER COME BACK_An Unbelievable But True Love Story Page 25