* * *
Nicholas called her that night after J. B. had brought her home. He made no apologies for his inaccessibility, simply asked her about Nicky, said he’d be home late the next day, then hung up.
Sabrina didn’t take him to task as she might have. For one thing, she was too tired; she wanted to get off the phone and go to bed.
For another, she was unable to talk to Nick without thinking about her talk with J. B., and when she did that, her mind clogged. She didn’t know what to do. Her marriage was hanging by a thread. She had problems with Nick’s behavior, his attitude, his style. But he was her husband.
And still … and still the one she really wanted to think about was Derek. He represented another life, another world; and in that sense, thinking of him was a relief. He was an escape—ironic, but true. Sick as it sounded, she found his problems refreshing. The thought that he might let her write his story after all excited her, and she was badly in need of a little excitement.
* * *
Nicky was awake the next day. The doctors wanted to keep him under observation for a non-sedated twenty-four-hour period before they sent him home. There was always the chance they’d see something they hadn’t seen before—some tiny symptom, or the breath of a clue that could lead to an explanation for all the rest of his problems. An explanation could lead to treatment, treatment to a cure. Sabrina’s battered hopes rose.
But in vain. Staff pediatricians, residents, interns, specialists, nurses—no one saw a thing. Nicky made up in crankiness what Sabrina had been spared the day before. She was more than a little cranky herself when she finally saw the child to sleep, took a taxi home and found Nick in the den with his feet on the coffee table and a neat whiskey in his hand.
“Welcome home,” she said from the door.
Silent, he studied the ice in his glass.
“When did you get in?”
“Several hours ago.”
Several hours ago? “I’ve been at the hospital. You might have joined me there.”
“I had a lot to do here.”
She stood very straight. She didn’t speak. She clutched the strap of her bag hard and waited for him to explain himself. All he did was raise his glass and take a drink.
“The hospital, Nick. I’ve been at the hospital.” Her voice began to simmer with tension. “Your son is still at the hospital. Aren’t you curious to know how he is?”
“I’m sure he’s fine.”
“He’s not fine! He’s epileptic!”
Without looking at her, Nick asked, “When will he be home?”
“Tomorrow.”
“That’s good.”
“How so? Have you missed taking care of him? Or is it the hospital bill that bothers you?”
“Don’t be flip.”
Lips compressed, she sucked in a ragged breath. It hadn’t taken much to snap what meager control she’d had. “Do you know what I’ve just been through, Nicholas?”
“You? I thought our son was the one—”
“Do you have any idea what it’s like to walk into the bedroom at night and find your baby convulsing? Or to spend hour after hour watching him breathe along with the bleeps and hums of a dozen machines? Or to wait endlessly for the doctors to give you the results of their tests and then find that they have nothing good to say? No, you don’t know. If you did, you’d allow me to be flip or anything else I chose to be!”
He took his eyes from his glass long enough to send her a look of disdain. “You’re getting worked up.”
“I think I have that right. Where were you, Nick? For twenty-four hours you were totally out of reach. I called the hotel. I called the office, your secretary, your vice-president. I called the hotel again. And again. I felt like a perfect fool. Where were you?”
A flick of his wrist sent the ice shimmering round in his glass. He was following the circles. “My clients unexpectedly asked me to their house.”
“For twenty-four hours? And you never gave anyone else a thought during all that time? Didn’t it occur to you to check in? You have a son whose health is iffy; what if something really critical had happened?”
“Nicky’s fine.”
“Okay, forget Nicky. Think about your dad. He’s seventy-nine and has a heart condition. He has no wife, no siblings, no other children but you. What if something had happened to him? Or to me? What if I’d had a cerebral hemorrhage, or been hit by a taxi or something?”
Nick thought for a minute before speaking, and then his voice was measured. “If a message to that effect had been left, I’d have answered it.”
She caught her breath. “Your son being sick wasn’t enough?” She rubbed two fingers to her forehead and murmured more to herself than to him, “I don’t believe it. You deliberately chose not to call me back.”
“I knew you’d be on top of things. You thrive on dealing with doctors.” His sarcasm was blatant.
“What does that mean?”
“You love it, Sabrina. You love running from one doctor, one specialist to the next.” He must have found satisfaction in the drop of her jaw, because he went on in the same vein. “You drag Nicky to a new doctor at the slightest excuse.”
“I don’t—it’s not—”
“And even if that weren’t so, I knew you’d do fine. You’re used to dealing with doctors.”
“I’m used to dealing with them because someone had to and you’re never around!”
He set down his glass and looked at her. “I’m never around because this place is depressing. If Nicky isn’t fussing, you are. I’m tired of it, Sabrina. I’ve had about as much as I can take. I want out.”
His words hung in the air, echoing, echoing. But it wasn’t only his words. It was his look, his tone, his manner.
“E-excuse me?” she asked.
“You heard.” He dropped his feet to the floor. “I want out. I came back here early and did as much packing as I could. I can get the rest another time.”
Sabrina commanded herself to be calm, but she was shaken by the thunderous pounding of her heart. Knowing that she needed to sit down, she moved as smoothly as possible to the nearby armchair.
Nick was staring at her, but it was a totally different stare from J. B.’s. J. B.’s was harmless. Nick’s was angry. It was the antithesis of the loving husband’s look and was hardened by the defensiveness that came only with guilt.
“It’s over, Sabrina. There’s nothing left. You said it yourself, only you didn’t have the guts to say fini. Well, I’m doing it. I’m leaving.”
“Just like that?”
“Just like that.”
She tried to gather her thoughts, but she was shocked. Sure, she’d thought of divorce. Deep in her heart, she’d known that was where she and Nick were headed. But she’d expected a little more time to prepare. She’d expected that in the end she’d be the one to leave him, rather than vice-versa.
“Your timing is off,” she said quietly.
“I should have done this months ago.”
“I hadn’t realized that living with me was that bad.”
“It didn’t used to be. We had some good times together. But those days ended when Nicky became your personal crusade. And it’s living with what you’ve become that’s so bad. I can’t take the constant whining.”
“Are you talking about Nicky or about me?”
“Both.”
“You might have helped. If I’d had a little support—”
“Support how? I can’t stay home from work to change diapers, and even if I could, I don’t want to. If you’d had any brains yourself, you’d have gone back to writing after Nicky was born. Then you wouldn’t have sat around analyzing every little thing he did or didn’t do. You wouldn’t have taken Dr. Spock as the be-all and end-all. You wouldn’t have constantly compared Nicky to other kids.”
“Wait a minute, Nick,” she said shakily. “I was perfectly happy right after Nicky was born. If I recall correctly, we both agreed that I wouldn’t do any work for the
first six months so that I could devote myself solely to him. You wanted that as much as I did. And I didn’t look for things to be wrong, as you suggest. But by the time Nicky was three months old, it was obvious that something was wrong and it got worse from there. Now, after three years, can you honestly, honestly look me in the eye and tell me that Nicky is normal?”
Nick looked her in the eye. “No.”
“You admit it!”
He regarded her with disgust. “You should see yourself, Sabrina. Gloating over something like that!”
“Gloating? No, Nick. But if nothing else comes out of this horrid mess, your admission is something. Now that you admit Nicky has a problem, maybe you’ll see about getting him—and us—the help we need.”
“If you’re thinking of counseling, it’s too late. There’s too much anger. And there’s Nicky. He’s alive. He’s here. He’s not going to go away.”
“There are places for children like him—”
“I won’t make that decision.”
“For three years, I’ve tried,” she raced on without hearing him. “I’ve tried everything—physical therapy, hydrotherapy, electrotherapy, reward-and-punishment, patterning—the list goes on and on. Nothing’s worked. Nothing’s going to work. And that’s not my judgment; it’s the judgment of many of the people who work with him. Nicky marks time, while I go backwards. There are good private places, Nick. I’ve been visiting one in Vermont that would give him the best possible care. The idea of putting him in an institution makes my stomach churn, but it’s the only thing that makes sense.”
Nick didn’t even respond to her mention of visits to Vermont, which said something about his lack of emotional involvement with her daily life. “Maybe. Still, I won’t make that decision.”
She heard him this time and went very still. “What do you mean?”
“Nicky’s yours. I’m leaving him with you. You’ll be the one to make the decisions regarding his care.”
She swallowed hard. “But he’s your son.”
“You’ll have sole custody.”
“That’s not fair, Nick,” she whispered, slowly shaking her head. “It’s not fair to push that burden on me.” When he simply shrugged and took another drink, she said, “You’re a coward.”
But he wasn’t about to discuss it. “Money won’t be an issue. I’ll give you what you need and I’ll be generous. The divorce will be amicable.”
Again, she was struck by the abruptness of it all. “Then, you want to go straight for the divorce? No trial separation?”
“What’s the point?”
She wasn’t sure, but the fragments of something deep inside made her say, “If Nicky was out of the house … if he was somewhere, and it was just the two of us, as it used to be…”
Nick was the one to shake his head this time. “Nicky could be on Mars, and it wouldn’t matter. He’d still be here, don’t you see? Every time I’d look at you, I’d see him and remember what he was and that we’d made him.” He thrust a hand through his hair in agitation, as though he’d only then realized what he’d said. Bolting to his feet, he glared at her and said, “Goddamn it, I don’t want to have to look at you, Sabrina! I don’t want to be reminded day after day, week after week, year after year!”
His voice exploded into a silence that was profound and was broken only by the hand he slapped against the mahogany doorjamb as he stormed from the room.
* * *
The next morning, Sabrina brought Nicky home. She added another medicine bottle to the collection on the bathroom shelf. She penciled in another point at the bottom of the long list of “what-to-do-in-case-of’s” that she had tacked on the bulletin board in his room. She put him through his paces at a very gentle speed and spent most of the time after that simply holding him to her, rocking him, humming softly when her voice didn’t crack. She took her time bathing him, spent extra time rubbing lotion and patting powder on his small body. She talked to him, telling him of all the wonderful things the world had to offer, then she held him again, held him tight and cried.
“I only want to love you,” she sobbed. “Let Mommy do that … please…”
Chapter 6
SABRINA WAS largely paralyzed during the first week after Nick’s departure. Caring for Nicky was one of the few things she could do with any semblance of order. She felt, oddly, as though she were waiting to see if Nick would change his mind. A tiny part of her—the pridefully feminine part—wanted that, if for no other reason than that it would give her the chance to tell him, herself, that it was over. And that was what the larger part of her knew. What had happened was for the best. There was no chance of reconciliation; neither of them thought it, mentioned it, wanted it. Whatever had brought them together eight years before was gone. In its wake was an amalgam of resentment, disillusionment and disappointment. Nick had said it first, but Sabrina felt it too; when they looked at each other, they relived the anguish of the past three years. Better to be free of that ugly yoke.
She did feel regret when Nick returned to pick up the rest of his things, but it was a mourning not for the loss of the man but for the institution that had failed.
During the second week, she was able to think. Nick had said that he’d see she remained financially secure—which had been a chauvinistic touch on his part, since she was financially secure on her own. But she retained a lawyer to represent not so much her interests, but Nicky’s, in the negotiation of a settlement. Yes, she was financially independent, but the Greenhouse was expensive. Should she decide to place Nicky there—or in a comparable institution—she wanted to be assured of Nick’s long-range cooperation. Having opted out of all emotional responsibility, he owed her that much.
By the end of two weeks, she couldn’t wait any longer. She needed to see Derek. She knew that it was crazy that she should feel better with him than with just about anyone else, but she did. On the outside he was tough, the son of a felon and a felon himself. But that toughness was born of things like anger and humiliation, and in spite of it all a soft streak showed through.
She identified with him. She felt as though they shared very different kinds of pain that were somehow the same.
With his dark side and his moods, he challenged her.
And the story of his experience was just waiting to be written. She wanted the professional focus it would give her life.
This time, rather than being led to the visiting room in which she’d seen him both times before, she was escorted to an open yard at one side of the prison complex. There were trees and benches, half a dozen picnic tables and lots of grass. In spite of the presence of the guards and the multiple rows of very high, very thick, very probably electrified wire fencing that encircled the prison, the overall atmosphere of the yard was more relaxed.
Sabrina chose a bench beneath a large maple. Sun shimmered through its newly budding leaves to dapple the bench’s worn green paint. She sat down and crossed her legs, trying to look nonchalant when she felt excited and more than a little apprehensive. She was never quite sure how she’d be received.
Then he came. She caught sight of him at the far end of the yard, a dark figure in denim; she watched him approach in what she’d come to think of as the inmate shuffle, though it was truly more a saunter than a shuffle. They all did it; Derek was no different. It was a slow, indolent gait that alternately said, “I don’t have anything better to do,” and, more defiantly, “I don’t give a damn what you say, I’ll get there when I get there.” She didn’t know which he was feeling—indifference or defiance—but by the time he was within twenty feet, she saw something in his eyes that made the point moot.
That something grew stronger with each step he took. By the time he stopped, she’d risen from the bench, and in the next instant she was in his arms, being hugged up into his tall, lean frame. She was aware of feeling an incredible relief, as though she’d been hanging in midair for the past five weeks and only now felt safe. But there was more than that. Her senses were suddenly ful
l in ways they hadn’t been since then—full with the solidity of Derek’s body, his warmth, his scent.
Implausible as it seemed with her life as messed up as his, she felt happy. At that moment she actually felt happy.
She let herself feast on that pleasure for a minute before raising her head. “You got my note, didn’t you?” She’d followed up her call with a note to better explain why she hadn’t been able to come.
Nodding, he took in her features one by one.
“And the phone message before that?” she asked, feeling warm all over and liking it.
“A little late.”
“But I told them it was urgent.”
He raised one shoulder in a negligent shrug. “It’s okay now. At the time I was mad as hell.” And crushed. He couldn’t tell her how he’d been counting each day of those three weeks, how devastated he’d been when he’d waited and waited and she hadn’t shown, how empty he’d felt—and how foolish.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered. Her hands were clasped loosely around his neck, while his moved slowly over her back. She felt the heat of his body through her sweater and skirt, thawing parts of her that she hadn’t known were frozen. “It all happened so suddenly, just the night before…” She was lost in the depths of his eyes, which were a richer gray than she’d ever seen them.
“It’s okay.”
“If it had been anything but that, I’d have come.”
“I know.”
“It was scary, Derek.”
He loved the way she said his name. Even more than that, he loved the way she was looking at him. He saw hunger in her eyes, though whether her hunger was for compassion, companionship or sex, he didn’t know. But she wasn’t making any attempt to break from his embrace, even though she had to feel what she was doing to him. His insides were quivering, and he was growing hard in a place he hadn’t been minutes before.
“Hey, McGill!”
Ice water couldn’t have been more effective at dampening Derek’s passion. His body stiffened. He tightened his hold of Sabrina and whipped his head around. A guard stood a dozen feet away, gesturing for them to separate. He muttered a crude oath as he held Sabrina tightly for a defiant minute longer. The guard had to call his name again, this time more sharply, before he gradually loosened his grip, slid his hands from her back to her arms, then finally released her completely.
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