A Lonely Sky

by Linda Schmalz

  Sarah pulled up a chair for Julia and guided her into it. “Hold his hand,” she gently suggested.

  Julia took his hand. “I’m here, Sam.”

  He did not respond.

  “Is he in a coma?” Julia whispered, afraid she might wake him, afraid he might never wake.

  “No. He drifts in and out of consciousness. He’s not in pain. His breathing changed about five this morning, and we knew we should call.”

  “Thank you.” Julia could not remove her eyes from Sam.

  Sarah touched her shoulder. “I’ll leave you now for a bit.”

  Julia remembered yesterday’s visit. Sam slept through most of it, but at times was awake and lucid. She tried to remember what they talked about, but she couldn’t. She couldn’t think of anything except that he was leaving her and that this cold, snowy morning would be their last. She rested her head against his hand and closed her eyes.

  “Julia.” Sam spoke quietly.

  Julia lifted her head. He could barely open his eyes and he focused straight ahead.

  “I’m here, Sam.”

  “We’re in England and it’s summer.”

  Julia positioned herself so her head rested next to his on the pillow. “Yes, yes we are.”

  “And so young.” She could hardly hear his words as he continued. “And under the very blue sky. We’ll have no rain today.”

  She stroked his cheek. Tears filled her eyes. “And there are flowers all around. Do you see them, Sam?”

  She looked up at him. His eyes remained half closed but he spoke as if seeing something she couldn’t. “Yes. And the swans.”

  The swans. She remembered them. Two swans floated gracefully across the duck pond while he embraced her during their picnic in St. James park years ago. And he remembered. She smiled through her tears, her throat tight and painful as she spoke. “And it’s very peaceful here. Just you and me… and the swans.”

  He didn’t answer. Julia rested her head on Sam’s chest, listening to each breath he took, each one slower than the last.

  And then, in one quick and unforgiving moment, his breathing simply ceased.

  Julia remained with her head on Sam’s chest, tears streaming, as she willed his chest to rise and fall again, yet knowing he was gone.

  She remained with him, unmoving, watching the snow fall outside his window. The music ended at some point, but Julia barely noticed. She looked up at the gray sky, watching the little white flakes emerge from nowhere, fall to the ground and blend into the beauty of the white-covered land. She traced one solitary snowflake as it spiraled down, disappeared into the whiteness, and became part of something greater than it ever intended.

  Time held no importance to Julia, but at some point she felt the presence of another being in the room and Sarah’s gentle hands stroking her hair. “Julia?”

  Julia looked at her beloved Sam and tears fell anew. “This is so hard. How do I just walk away?”

  Sarah smiled, and helped Julia to her feet. “We’ll do it together.” She put an arm around her waist. “He’s not here anymore, hon.” Sarah’s voice soothed her and Julia allowed her to guide her towards the door. “I’ll take good care of him. I promise.”

  “I know you will, Sarah. You’ve been a dear to him.” Julia hugged the nurse and held her a bit. “Thank you.”

  Sarah patted her back. “Now go to your family. You need them.”

  Chapter Sixty-One

  Julia didn’t go home. No one could help her there. She didn’t need them, certainly not John who couldn’t share in this intense sadness, nor comfort her in her grief. She felt angry with him for that, wondering if he’d be relieved Sam died, imagining him to be, and hating him for it. She needed to be angry with someone, needed to blame someone, needed to fall into someone’s arms that loved Sam as much as she did. But no one here could understand her loss. No one really knew Sam like she did. Kim might be able to provide some comfort, but with six children under foot, and two with chicken pox, Julia couldn’t burden her.

  She drove out to the western suburbs, grateful the snow kept traffic slow, for she needed time to think. Once Sam’s body returned to England, his death would become public. Then the media frenzy would begin. Stories about Sam, his career, his film and his life would barrage television and magazines. Deirdre would stand center stage as the grieving wife and Julia would grieve alone.

  She furiously wiped at tears that would not quit. She knew she shouldn’t be driving half-blinded by the weather conditions and tears. But luckily the exit she sought came into view. She pulled off the highway and headed towards a modest suburb. A few more left turns brought her to a paved driveway and a familiar, two-story house. Drying her eyes, she walked to the door and rang the bell.

  Bert Steele opened the door, took one look at his daughter and pulled her to him in a loving embrace. Locked in her father’s warm hug, Julia felt safe.

  “Julia, my God. What the hell happened?”

  Julia sobbed against her father’s chest for several minutes. Bert finally took her by the elbow and guided her into the house. “Honey, your tears are gonna freeze on your face if we don’t get you out of this weather.”

  “Who is it, honey?” A sweet natured voice called from the kitchen and, through tear-soaked eyes, Julia saw her stepmother, Bonnie, standing in the kitchen doorway. “Oh dear, Bert. What happened?”

  “I don’t know.” He sat Julia down on an overstuffed couch. “Honey, tell us. Is it one of the kids? John?”

  Julia shook her head and tried to compose herself. Bonnie joined them, bringing along a cup of tea and some tissues.

  Julia didn’t know how to explain. Her father never knew about Sam; she had kept her secret well.

  “A close friend of mine passed away today,” she managed. “I was with him at the time. I just can’t go home right now.”

  “You’re welcome to stay here as long as you need, dear.” Bonnie offered her the tea, but Julia shook her head.

  “I can’t have the kids see me like this, you know?” She looked back and forth between her father and stepmother, a widower and widow, wondering if this unforgiving grief ever eased for them.

  “Who’s with the kids, Julia?” Bonnie asked.

  “John. I found out earlier today Sam was...this would be his last day. I called John at work and he took off early for when the kids get home. Elizabeth is old enough to watch Tom, but she has after school activities.”

  “Is Sam a friend of John’s as well?” Bonnie said.

  Julia shook her head. “No. John doesn’t really know him.”

  Silence filled the room and Julia looked up from her tissue. Bert and Bonnie cast curious glances between them and Julia realized how odd her story about this “Sam” must sound.

  “Sam is an old friend.” Julia explained.

  “From high school?” Bert furrowed a brow. “My, that was a while back.”

  “You don’t know him, Dad.” Julia said, trying her best not to lie. “I met him when I was…” She hesitated. “Back when I-”

  “Well, doesn’t matter how she knows her friend, Bert.” Bonnie interrupted with an understanding nod Julia’s direction. “What’s important is that Julia needs some time to herself and she came to us for help.”

  “You’re right, as always.” Bert smiled at both women. “Julia, you want me to call John and let him know you’re here?”

  “No, that’s okay. He’ll just want to come here. I’ll go home after I compose myself, but I really need time alone and I didn’t know where else to go.”

  “You came to the right place, honey,” Bonnie patted her hand. “Would you like to lie down in the guest room?”

  Julia nodded.

  Bonnie linked Julia’s arm in her own plump one and guided her down the hall to a cozy room on the end. “We’ll just leave you to yourself in here, but if there’s anything you need-”

  “-anything at all,” her father added, following close behind.

  “-you just holler.”
Bonnie opened the bedroom door and turned on the light. “Oh, I should have dusted.”

  “Bonnie, you didn’t know she was coming.” Bert shrugged his shoulders like he did when Julia was a girl and her mother said something silly. Julia silently blessed him for the comforting memory.

  “Thank you both.” She stepped into the room and then turned back. “Can I use the phone in here? I need to make an overseas call, but I’ll put it on my calling card.”

  Bert answered. “Of course, honey. Use the phone as much as you need to.”

  Julia blew them a kiss and shut the door. With a heavy sigh and heavier heart, she sat on the edge of the bed and looked for a number hidden in her purse. She found it and dialed.

  Deirdre sat reading a book in the study when the call came. She heard the housekeeper answer and then call for Spencer. Engrossed in her book, she paid little attention to the muffled conversation. Moments later, Spencer entered the room and she glanced up.

  He slouched against the doorframe, his face ashen.

  “Are you all right, darling?” She put her book down and stood.

  He walked towards her, sorrow filling his eyes.

  Deirdre felt a chill run up her spine. “Who was on the phone?”

  Spencer took her hands in his. Softness filled his features and he spoke delicately. “Brace yourself, Dee. It was Julia.”

  “Julia?” She only knew one Julia and that call should not come for months.

  “Julia?” The color drained from her face as realization dawned. “Oh no. Oh no, Spencer. Please.” She turned away but he pulled her back into his arms. She pounded against his chest as her knees gave way. “No Spencer, please don’t tell me this!”

  “I’m so sorry, Dee,” Spencer said, and guided her to a chair.

  “It’s too soon,” she cried. “Too soon.”

  “I know, my love, I know.” Spencer’s tears fell as he held his wife. “Sam is coming home.”

  Part VI-Ten Years Later, March 2007

  Chapter Sixty-Two

  Julia drove through the night, anxious to return home and escape the steamy rain that pounded against the black highway, occasionally blocking her vision. She knew she probably shouldn’t have gone out in this weather, but John insisted a night out with Kim would do her good. She knew differently. Nothing in ten years had helped her feel right after Sam’s death. Nothing. Not being with the children, not the time she spent making a happy home for John, not her involvement in community theater or volunteer activities. And, she was tired of trying.

  Prior to Sam’s death, happiness existed because hope existed. Hope that she might be with Sam again. But when he died, all that remained was the life she created because of him, and memories. She wondered fruitlessly if she had made the right choice, so many years ago, in that New York hotel room, when she chose not to be with him. At that time, she felt she had a long future with him that somehow it would work out later that she could be with him and not hurt John. But then, Sam died, and left a void inside her. Try as she might, she could not help missing what might have been. Nothing erased the emptiness she felt without Sam in the world.

  No one could understand her heartache, no one. John sensed the change in her when Sam died, but she couldn’t regain whatever strength she used to possess to find joy in her daily life. She simply pretended to find excitement in the mundane her world presented. And John knew. He tried everything to help her feel better without ever acknowledging the reason for her pain. She felt bad for him, knowing that when she lost Sam, John lost the wife he once knew. Long talks in which she offered John an out to their marriage only resulted in him swearing his unconditional love and commitment to her. He promised he would always be there for her. John’s love drowned her further beneath a sea of guilt.

  The humdrum sound of the windshield wipers lulled Julia into a drowsy state. She turned up the radio, hoping for a distraction and maybe, a weather report. But only music played. Songs brought back so many memories. Driving alone in the car provided the only solitude where she felt free to relive them without guilt.

  She remembered after Sam died. She helped return his body to England and then suffered silently through the huge media blitz that surrounded the unexpected news of his death. To the world, Sam’s death seemed sudden and a shock. It became the focus of world attention. Julia could not escape hearing about it on the television, radio, or reading about it in newspapers and magazines. For months, people on the streets talked about the famous movie star. Not until the tragic death of Princess Diana of Wales, the following August, would Sam’s death fade into the background. While the world mourned their beloved Princess, Julia kept to herself and mourned Sam.

  She tried counseling to help her find the joy again. But she couldn’t be open in her sessions about the real death that befell her, for who would believe she was the love of Sam Lyons’s life? No one. Even talking things out with Kim didn’t help. It didn’t bring him back.

  The music played on and the rain fell harder. She thought of all the people out there who lived as she did, alone in their private sadness. One therapist suggested medication might help. But pills didn’t stop memories, they just masked feelings, and Julia needed her feelings. They were proof that Sam once loved her.

  Turning onto the last exit toward her suburb, Julia thought of her children. Elizabeth was so beautiful and talented. At twenty-six she unwittingly followed in Sam’s career footsteps, majoring in theater in college and traveling between Los Angeles and New York for auditions. Julia knew one day she’d receive a call that Elizabeth’s lucky break arrived.

  Tommy, now fifteen and a spitting image of his father, set his sights on computer programming. He had big plans to graduate college and move to the Silicon Valley where his computer expertise would earn him at least a seven-digit income. Julia knew if he stayed the course, and pulled the excellent grades as he did in high school, he would fulfill his dreams. She loved and adored her children and knew, come what may, they’d be fine.

  With that final thought, she exited the ramp and turned onto a busy neighborhood street. The rain battered her windshield, and momentarily blinded her. And in that instant Julia mistakenly turned into the oncoming lane.

  A blare of horns and the sound of crunching steel was the last thing she heard.

  Chapter Sixty-Three

  John walked into the house, loosened his tie and threw it over the back of a chair.

  Kim followed. She removed her shoes and headed straight for Julia and John’s kitchen. “I’ll put on some coffee.”

  Elizabeth ran straight to her old bedroom and shut the door. Tommy sat quietly on the living room couch with Grandpa Bert and Bonnie.

  John headed to his bedroom and shut the door. He stared at the bed, wondering how he’d ever be able to sleep in it without her. These last few weeks, when home, he had slept on the couch, but mostly he stayed by her side at the hospital. John looked away from the bed. There would be no more hospital visits. Today he signed the papers, and then, together with the family and Kim, they let her go.

  John walked to the dresser, opened the top drawer, and pulled out a file of papers. He sat down on the bed, and searched for the one he ignored for so long. Ah, there it was, yellowed with age, but still legible. He fingered the letter Sam wrote ten years earlier. Finally he opened and read it.

  A gentle knock sounded on the door.

  “John?” It was Kim. Since Julia’s car accident four weeks ago, Kim became an angel of comfort to John and the family. While Julia lingered and everyone prayed for her to wake from the coma, Kim readily left her own children with her husband and helped John with anything he needed. Bert and Bonnie, although elderly, also stepped in and did what they could.

  Kim talked through the door. “The coffee’s ready, John. Would you like some?”

  “Come in, Kim.”

  The pretty, middle-aged woman entered and stood by the bed, as he stared at the letter. “Are you okay?” She glanced around the room. “I know that’s a
stupid question, considering, but is there anything I can do?”

  “I need you to look at something for me, would ya?” He handed her the letter. “Sam Lyons gave me this before he died. I’d like you to read it.”

  Kim read aloud:

  John,

  If you even read this letter, I will be eternally grateful. I have no right to write it, nor ask you for anything. You have done what I couldn’t. You were there for Julia and Elizabeth and gave them love and a home. I never meant to burden any of them, nor you, yet, in my last days you honored my request to be near Julia, and for all this, I thank you.

  Lest you think any good of me, which is certainly not your due, I must make one last request, and I believe if I’m not already dead when you read this, you will surely take the matters into your own hands. But, I must ask, for like you, I too have loved Julia for years, yet unlike you, I have had, by my own foolishness, to live without her.

  Knowing you have been with her in life, should you outlive her, I would ask that she be laid to rest next to me, in England.

  I can hear you scoff now, John. But I jest not. I hope that this arrangement would be what Julia wished as well, yet I wish not to burden her with this decision throughout her life, nor do I wish her to keep any more secrets from you. So, I will leave the decision as yours, knowing that, should the time arrive, you will understand where Julia should rest. I can only hope that you, having loved her so many years in life, will allow her to rest beside me, only in death. (Included are instructions as to who to contact in England if you so choose to honor my request.)

  Sincerely,

  Sam Lyons

  Kim sat down on the bed and pushed a lock of graying hair from her face. “My God.” She placed the letter on her lap. “When did you get this?”

  “Just before Sam died ten years ago.”

  “And you never told Julia?”