by Sharon Sala
This is my baby.
She watched her for only a few moments, then, afraid her presence would wake Hope up, she went back to the bedroom she shared with Daniel. For a few moments, she stood in the doorway, staring at the room and the feelings it evoked. Finally, she took a deep breath and began taking off her clothes. Seconds later, she was in the bathroom and stepping beneath the warm water jetting from the showerhead. It could only be symbolic, but she had a sudden urge to wash away every remnant of her old, sad life.
Daniel’s heart sank when he saw the empty bed, then he heard the shower running and smiled. With a quick glance over his shoulder to make sure the door to Hope’s room was still closed, he shut the door to their bedroom and then turned the lock. Mary had strewn her clothes on the foot of the bed. He added his to the pile and then headed for the bath.
The water was warm on Mary’s skin as she closed her eyes and turned her face to the jets, but when she heard the shower door open then close, her breath caught in the back of her throat. Suddenly, Daniel’s hands were tracing the length of her back, then around, cupping her breasts and pulling her back against his body.
“I love you, Mary Faith.”
Tears welled against Mary’s eyelids. To hear these words and to feel her husband’s touch after all this time was staggering. Why and how this was happening was no longer of concern to her. If this was madness, then so be it. God knew it was better than what she’d had.
She turned in his arms, her heart pounding, her body weak with longing. With a soft, desperate moan, she threw her arms around his neck, relishing the roughness in his kiss.
Reluctantly, Daniel stepped back and began touching her all over, as if to assure himself that she was truly okay.
“You scared me today,” he said softly. “When you went limp in my arms, my heart almost stopped.”
Mary didn’t want to think or talk about anything that had to do with before. All she wanted was Daniel.
“Make love to me, Daniel. I need to feel you on me…in me…I’ve been so lost.”
Daniel turned off the water and then pulled her out of the shower and into their bed, his need to be with her driving caution completely out of his mind.
Mary had a few brief moments of cognizance as Daniel laid her down and then took the phone off the hook. After that, there was nothing left in her head but a series of mind-numbing images.
The slight drip of a faucet in the other room.
The beads of water still on Daniel’s hair and the shuttered look on his face as he beheld the woman beneath him.
The sound of her own heartbeat loud in her ears.
The flare of Daniel’s nostrils as he slid inside her body.
The shattering of her thoughts when he began to move.
The curl of need deep in her belly.
The building heat.
And then ultimately, the blinding insanity of release.
They lay wrapped in each other’s arms, their hearts still pounding, their muscles weak and lax. But the unity that Mary had remembered was still there—even stronger than before.
Daniel had his arms around his wife, and when he rolled onto his back, he took her with him. Now, Mary lay with her cheek against his chest, feeling the strong, even heartbeat beneath his ear and closed her eyes.
Heaven. Sweet heaven to know this again.
“Love you, Danny.”
He couldn’t remember the last time Mary Faith had called him Danny, but the sound of it on her lips made him smile.
“Ah, baby…I love you, too,” he said softly and held her a little bit tighter.
She sighed with pleasure.
Somewhere within the next few minutes, Daniel felt her go limp and knew that she slept. Carefully, he slipped out from under her and covered her with a sheet. Aware that Hope’s nap wouldn’t last much longer, he hurried into the bathroom and cleaned up the mess that they’d made, then dressed. Pausing beside their bed to look at his sleeping wife, he felt a familiar tightening in his chest. For all these years, it was still the same feeling he’d had the first time he’d seen her. She was the anchor to his world.
As he watched, a slight frown creased the middle of her forehead. Impulsively, he leaned down and brushed a kiss across her lips and as he did, the frown disappeared.
“Yeah, baby…I know. That’s what you do to me, too,” he said softly, and then closed the door behind him as he left.
It wasn’t until much later that he remembered what she’d said just before he’d taken her to bed—something about being lost. But it didn’t make sense. There hadn’t been a day in the almost seven years of their married life that he hadn’t known where she was.
Mary woke with a start, her heart pounding, her body covered in a sweat of panic.
Alone. She was alone.
“No,” she moaned, and bolted from the bed.
She didn’t want to be awake. She wanted back in the dream.
Yanking on her clothes with shaking hands, she tore out of the room. It wasn’t until she reached the head of the staircase that she realized she was still in the house from the dream.
She stood, her legs shaking, trying to still a racing heart as the sounds of childish laughter floated up the stairs.
Hope? Was that Hope?
Without caution, she bounded down the stairs, following the sounds of her daughter’s laughter and then found both Hope and Daniel in the kitchen having cookies and milk.
The moment Daniel saw her, he got up from the chair and went to her.
“Hey…look who woke up,” he said, and then nuzzled her neck, whispering a more intimate welcome that only she could hear. “Ooh, lady, you look like a woman who’s been had.”
Mary went limp with relief, clinging to his embrace and trying not to weep.
“I wonder why,” she said, cherishing the hard, hungry kiss that he slanted across her lips. Then she stepped out of his arms and peeked around at the table. “Hey, you! Did you save me any cookies?”
Hope giggled and pointed to the neat pile of raisins on her plate.
“Only the raisins.”
Mary stared at the plate. “You don’t eat raisins?”
Hope rolled her eyes. “Mommy…we never eat the raisins, remember?”
Mary stumbled to the table and then slid into a chair beside her daughter. She knew her voice was shaking, but there wasn’t a damn thing she could do to hide what she was feeling.
“Yes…I do remember. We always give them to Daddy, don’t we?”
Hope giggled. “Yes, and we pretend that—”
“…they are pills to grow hair on his chest,” Mary added.
Daniel gave a pretend growl, popped the handful of raisins into his mouth, then thumped his chest with both fists. Hope shrieked with laughter and Daniel loped around the kitchen like a monkey on the run.
Mary watched the pair’s antics without comment, making sure that she was nodding and smiling in all the right places, while she struggled to understand. This was nothing like a dream. She distinctly smelled oatmeal and raisins and the scent of fresh-brewed coffee, and there was something else about the moment that she couldn’t get past. The longer she sat, the stronger her sense of dêjá vu.
The vague scent of meatloaf was still in the air as Mary hung up the dishtowel and then dried her hands. At first, it had been awkward, delving into cabinets in search of bowls and pans, looking for spices, trying to find dishes with which to set the table for a meal. But the longer she’d worked, the more comfortable she’d become. By the time the food was cooked and ready to serve, she was on a roll. More than once during the meal, she felt a little like she’d felt as a child playing house, pretending that everything was real. But she’d never tasted pretend meatloaf as good as what had come out of the oven, or felt as much joy from the dolls that would join her for tea parties as she did with this man and this child. She felt like Alice, who’d fallen down the rabbit hole. For some reason, up was down, and down was up, and the faster she ran, the later i
t got.
But confusion paled in comparison to the love on Daniel’s face and the sound of her daughter’s laughter. Even now, the faint sounds of their voices in the other room made her want to cry. She couldn’t count the number of times she had dreamed of such an evening. Giving the kitchen a last, satisfied glance, she decided that beggars should not be choosers and moved toward the other room where her family waited.
“Mommy!” Hope cried, and bounced up from the sofa where she’d been sitting to launch herself at Mary’s legs. “I want to watch 101 Dalmatians…please, please!”
Mary braced herself for the impact and then laughed when Hope’s arms wrapped around her knees.
“You’re going to be watching Mommy fall if you don’t turn me loose,” she said.
Hope giggled, then started dancing around in a little circle, still pleading her case.
Mary’s first instinct was to never say no to the child that she’d lost, then looked to Daniel for support.
“Hey, kiddo,” Daniel said. “Tomorrow is a school day. You need to get a bath and get in bed. You know the rules.”
Hope’s lower lip jutted, but she didn’t argue.
Mary knew that a crisis had been averted and breathed a small sigh of relief.
“Come on, honey…you can use some of my bubble bath,” she said, and then took a deep, shaky breath as an image flashed through her mind. Her—in the boutique section of Savannah Square—buying freesia-scented bubble bath and body powder. God…how did this keep happening?
“Yea!” Hope squealed, and headed for the stairs.
Daniel stood, then circled the sofa and took Mary in his arms.
“You sure you’re up to this?” he asked. “You insisted on making dinner and doing the dishes, even after what you went through this afternoon.”
Mary leaned against him, remembering the power of their lovemaking and suddenly shivered.
“Cold?” he asked.
She made herself smile. “No…just an unexpected case of goose bumps.”
Daniel scooped her up in his arms and buried his nose beneath the nape of her neck.
“You like goose bumps? I can give you goose bumps.”
She clung to him, thrusting her fingers through his hair and offering her mouth to his kiss. Again, the touch of flesh to flesh was like lightning—shocking and heated.
“Those will do for starters,” Mary whispered. “I’d better hurry or Hope will have dumped the whole bottle of bubbles into the tub like last time.”
Daniel rolled his eyes and then grinned. “Yeah…I remember. I smelled like flowers for a whole damned week.”
“No, you didn’t,” Mary said. “It was only more like two days.” The hair on the back of her neck suddenly rose. The line between reality and fantasy was blurring more with every passing hour.
“I stand corrected,” he said, and then razed her mouth with one last kiss as he cupped her backside and pulled her hard against the juncture of his thighs. “Feel that?”
Mary closed her eyes, giving herself up to the pure animal attraction between them.
Reluctantly, Daniel finally turned her loose, then lifted a stray lock of her hair from the corner of her eyes.
“You sure you don’t want me to help Hope with her bath?”
“I’m sure,” Mary said.
“Okay…but later, you have to help me with mine.”
She laughed. “We’ve already done that once today.”
Daniel smirked. “Cleanliness is next to godliness, Mary Faith. Would you have me become a heathen?”
“You already are,” she said, and then headed up the stairs to find her daughter.
Chapter 5
It was twenty minutes after three in the morning and Mary had yet to fall asleep. Her eyes were burning with fatigue, her body trembling from the strain of trying to stay awake. Daniel’s arm was across her shoulders, holding her firmly in place against the curve of his body. It would have been so easy to just close her eyes and let go, but the fear of losing what she had was too strong. This had become her reality. Going back to the emptiness of her other life would kill her, and that’s what she feared would happen if she let herself sleep in this one.
Daniel shifted where he lay and then sighed. She felt his breath against her cheek and clung to him in desperation. Moments passed. Moments in which she remembered the scent of her freesia bubble bath emanating from Hope’s skin as she helped her into her nightgown, and the heartbreaking sweetness of her daughter’s good-night kiss on her cheek.
Mary stifled a sob as another thought surfaced. What if she had nothing to fear? Maybe she was already dead. Maybe this was heaven. If so, then there was no danger in going to sleep.
Yes! That must be it! Back there in the antique store when she’d started to get dizzy, she must have been dying! The fact that Daniel and Hope had been there to greet her should have been her first hint, because she’d never had dreams like that before.
Suddenly, the urge to look at this world anew drove away her exhaustion. She’d been looking at all of this wrong. It wasn’t exactly what she’d thought heaven would be like, but who was she to quibble? With the people she loved best, it was perfect.
Careful not to awaken Daniel, she slipped out of his grasp and tiptoed from the room, anxious to see Hope again.
She was there in her bed, sleeping soundly, with that same old one-eared rabbit clutched tight beneath her chin. The urge to take Hope in her arms and never let her go was overwhelming. Instead, Mary straightened her covers and forced herself to walk away.
She paused for a moment in the hall, thinking of going back to bed and lying in the comfort of Daniel’s arms. But the relief she was feeling wouldn’t let her sleep. Not yet. Not now. She needed to see the house again, without the fear and confusion she’d had before.
Her steps were light as she moved down the staircase, her gaze curious and accepting as she studied the shadows made by the nightlight at the foot of the stairs. The carpeted floors in the living room were soft beneath her feet. The scent of bougainvillea was faint, but familiar. She turned toward the hall table and saw the vase of fresh flowers, then moved toward it, touching the clusters of tiny blooms with her fingertip, then bending to inhale the perfume.
A brass ship’s clock on the mantel over the fireplace began chiming out the hour. The sudden noise within the silence of the room sent her spinning about. Sensing she was no longer alone, she looked up the stairs. Daniel was standing at the top, looking down at her in the darkness.
“Mary…are you all right?”
His presence was so real, so strong. There was no more doubt. She sighed, and as she did, gave up the last of her reservations. This now was her truth.
“Yes, darling, I’m fine.”
“What are you doing down there in the dark?”
She hurried up the stairs and into his arms, relishing the comfort of his embrace.
“Oh…I just had a bad dream. I needed to make sure that everything was all right.”
“Next time you wake me and let me be the one to chase away the ghosts. Okay?”
“Okay.”
“Now that’s settled, come back to bed. The alarm clock will go off before you know it.”
Mary laughed softly to herself. Alarm clocks in heaven? Who would have known?
Hope downed the last of her milk and started to leave the table when Mary caught her and quickly wiped the milk mustache from her upper lip.
“Mommy…I’ve got to hurry,” Hope wailed. “I don’t want to be late for school.”
No sooner had she said it than Daniel yelled from the living room. “Hope! Come on. You’re going to be late for school.”
“Okay, okay,” Mary said, giving the bow in Hope’s hair a last fussing tug. “Don’t forget your backpack.”
“It’s by the door,” Hope said.
Mary followed her daughter’s exit, unwilling to let go of the both of them at once. But Daniel was at the door with briefcase in hand and Hope was already s
houldering her backpack when Mary got there.
“Don’t forget I have dance class after school,” Hope said.
A wave of panic hit swiftly, leaving Mary floundering for answers to questions she didn’t know how to ask.
“Dance class?”
Hope rolled her eyes. “Mommy. I have class every Wednesday. Mrs. Barnes will bring me home.”
“What time?” Mary asked. “What time will she bring you home?”
Daniel grinned and tweaked Mary’s nose. “Five o’clock, honey. Just like always.”
“Oh yes…at five. I was thinking of something else. Sorry.”
Moments later they were in the car and driving away. Mary held her breath until they were safely out of the driveway, then stepped back inside the house and closed the door. It was just after eight. She started to smile. It was a long time until five o’clock. She would have plenty of time to prowl through the house and familiarize herself with everything in it. The daily paper was lying on the hall table where Daniel had laid it. She picked it up and carried it back into the living room, then tossed it on the coffee table to be read later. Her step was light, but her heart was lighter as she went upstairs because her family was, once again, intact.
Daniel pulled up in front of the school as Hope began scrambling with her backpack.
“Have a good day, honey,” he said, and hugged her tight when she leaned over for her goodbye kiss.
“You, too, Daddy. I’ll see you this evening, okay?”
“Yep. And don’t forget Mrs. Barnes is picking you up after school.”
“I know,” she said, slamming the door behind her as she hurried up the front walk toward the building.
Daniel watched until he saw her enter the building with several of her friends, then he drove away. His mind was already shifting gears toward the preliminary hearing for one of his clients. He was well prepared and wasn’t worried about that outcome, but he was concerned about Mary Faith. Even though she swore she felt fine and had shown no other symptoms of being ill, he couldn’t get over how startled he’d been when she’d fainted in his arms. Her confusion afterward had cemented his worries even more. He made a mental note that as soon as he got to the office, he was going to give their family doctor a call. He wanted to hear someone else tell him there was nothing for which he needed to be concerned.