Holly finished her wine, and I reached for the bottle to refill her glass.
“Thank you,” she softly replied, though she didn’t touch it. She simply sat there, staring at a large framed painting of a sailboat on the wall. I suspected she was thinking of Leah.
I finished my dinner and sat forward with my forearms on the table. “That was delicious. Thank you.”
At last, she pulled her gaze from the painting and turned toward me.
“Did you look him up?” she asked. “Did you find out what became of him?”
I thought about the regrets Leah had described. Since that’s what brought me here in the first place, I decided to hold nothing back. “Yes, and that’s partially the reason why I knocked on your door earlier today, but I expected to relay the information to your sister. She’s the one who asked for it.”
Holly raised her chin. “Well then. Since it was Leah who sent you on that errand and she’s not here to follow up on it, I’ll do so in her place.”
Recognizing Holly’s clear grief over the loss of her sister, I reached into my pocket and withdrew a sheet of paper, which I unfolded, laid down on the table and slid toward her.
Chapter Thirty
“What is this?” Holly asked, picking it up.
“His address and phone number,” I replied. “I’ll leave it up to you to decide what to do with it, but I can at least tell you what I learned—and most of it was easily accessible information.”
She seemed to brace herself emotionally for whatever I was about to reveal.
“After Riley was released from prison and drove out to LA,” I said, “he was arrested again for possession and served more time behind bars.”
Holly closed her eyes and pinched the bridge of her nose.
“But when he got out,” I continued, “he must have decided to clean up his act. As of two months ago, he was living in Montana and working for a construction company. He runs a couple of support groups out of his church—for addicts and family members of addicts. He’s married and has two young children, a boy and girl, ages four and two. He and his wife own their own home. His wife is a clerk for an insurance agency.”
Holly stared at me with wide eyes, blinked a few times, then abruptly stood up and walked out of the room.
I rose from my chair and followed her to the kitchen. There, I found her leaning against the center island with one hand over her face.
“Are you all right?” I asked, moving closer to lay a hand on her shoulder.
Holly turned and surprised me by wrapping her arms around my neck, burying her face in my shoulder. “I’m so happy to hear this,” she sputtered. “Really, I am. But at the same time it’s excruciating. It’s like a knife in my heart.”
“Why?”
“Because he hasn’t wanted to call us or see us or introduce his children to us. Or his wife. He must think we’re horrible people.”
I stood for a moment, running my hand up and down her back, smelling the clean fragrance of her long, silky hair.
Suddenly, the moment Leah placed her newborn baby sister into my arms on Christmas Day came flashing into my heart and mind. It seemed like only yesterday because I’d just relived it in the hospital, yet here she was—a grown woman. Brilliant, beautiful. In my arms again.
Something burst open inside of me and all I wanted to do was protect her. I wanted to spare her from all the pain and unpleasantness of the world. Take care of her forever.
This child I’d held.
A lifetime ago.
No longer a child.
It took me a moment to catch my breath and remind myself that all of those thoughts were ridiculous. Holly certainly didn’t need taking care of. She was a Harvard grad and had a third degree black belt in karate. She could kick my ass if she wanted to.
“He would have wanted to move forward, not backward,” I offered. “That’s why he hasn’t tried to contact you. It’s not uncommon for addicts to avoid situations that they associate with their lowest moments.”
Holly stepped back, sniffed and rubbed her nose with the back of her hand.
“Rationally, I know that,” she said. “But it’s not easy to be objective when it’s your long-lost brother who had his head bashed in by your father when you were thirteen. And when your recently deceased sister comes back from the dead to make sure you have your brother’s address and phone number. If that’s what actually happened. I still don’t understand any of this.”
She became emotional again and turned into my arms a second time.
I didn’t know what to say. All I could do was hold her.
“Will you tell them?” I asked. “Will your parents want to know?”
She stepped back. “I’m not sure. Couldn’t they have found out this information on their own if they wanted to? But they didn’t. Maybe they assumed the worst—that he was in jail again or dead from an overdose. I’m pretty sure my mother would faint if I told her she had grandchildren she didn’t know about. As far as my father is concerned… I honestly don’t know how he would react. He might fly into a rage and warn us never to contact Riley or there will be hell to pay.”
“What do you want to do?” I asked.
Furiously, she wiped away a tear. “I want to see him again. I want to meet my niece and nephew.”
“Then that’s what you should do,” I replied, feeling no regret whatsoever about encouraging her to defy her father’s wishes.
I suspected I might come to regret that eventually, but in that moment, Holly was all that mattered.
I wondered what Leah would have thought about all of this, and suspected that maybe she was the one orchestrating it all.
Chapter Thirty-one
I ended up spending the night on Holly’s sofa in the front parlor. The following morning she claimed she’d offered me a bed in one of the guest rooms, but apparently, I wouldn’t budge when she shook me.
“How late were we up?” I asked as I sat down on one of the kitchen stools while she poured me a cup of coffee.
“I’m not sure,” she replied. “The last time I remember the clock chiming, it was 3:00 a.m., but we were still talking at that point. When I went upstairs it was 4:30. I must have dozed off for a while because you were sound asleep beside me.”
I remembered the moments leading up to that. She had fallen asleep at the opposite end of the sofa, curled up in a ball with her cheek resting on her hands, and I hadn’t wanted to wake her. That’s when I must have nodded off, too.
Just then, the grandfather clock in the dining room chimed for 9:00 a.m. and I jumped. “How do you live with that thing?” I asked. “Doesn’t it drive you insane?”
“It’s been doing that since I was a baby,” she explained, taking a seat on the stool beside me. “I don’t even hear it.”
“You’re lucky,” I replied, sipping my coffee and thinking about our conversations the night before. We’d talked about everything from favorite music to most embarrassing moments.
There was no question I was fascinated with Holly by then. She seemed to be everywhere in my mind, all at once. It was as if I’d known her forever, which in a way, I suppose I had.
“How do you feel about everything this morning?” I asked, referring to the question of whether or not she would contact Riley, or tell her parents about it.
“I’m still not sure,” she replied. “I know I want to see him, but I don’t know how Dad will react to that. I’m pretty sure Mom will fall to pieces and want to see her grandchildren, but will she be able to stand up to my dad if he says no? Will she do it anyway?”
The telephone rang. Holly stood to answer it.
“Hello? Oh hi,” she said in a familiar half whisper, turning her back to me. “Did you get home okay? How was the flight? Any delays?”
I waited patiently while she carried on a quiet conversation about airports, work, and how she was coping.
Slowly, as she continued to talk in quiet tones, a tight knot took form in my stomach. I couldn’t he
lp but draw some conclusions about the person on the other end of the line. I raised my coffee cup to my lips and downed what was left of it, then set it on the counter and slid it away from me.
At last she hung up the phone. I swallowed heavily over my rising disappointment.
“Sorry about that,” she said, blushing slightly as she returned to the stool beside me. She picked up her mug and took a sip, then glanced around the kitchen, unable to meet my gaze.
“Boyfriend?” I asked, raising my eyebrows.
“Yes.” She shrugged her shoulder, somewhat apologetically. “He was here for Leah’s funeral and just flew home yesterday.”
“Where’s home?”
I wondered how long he’d been gone before I’d knocked on her door. Hours? Minutes?
Just thinking about that made me want to knock my head against a wall a few times. What was it about me and women I was attracted to? There always seemed to be some other guy…
Holly nervously cleared her throat. “Dallas. He’s doing a residency there.”
Another doctor? Great.
Since I had no claim on this woman, all I could do was make light of it. I leaned forward and grinned. “What is it about this family? Don’t you people know how to mix and mingle with the rest of the world? With those of us without medical credentials?”
To my relief, she laughed and covered her mouth with a fist, as if she was afraid of spraying coffee all over me. “Maybe it’s because I didn’t watch enough SpongeBob episodes as a kid. Clearly my world is far too small.”
“Maybe you need to live in a pineapple under the sea for a while.”
Holly laughed again and the clock pendulum clicked steadily in the other room. The humor of the moment faded quickly, however. The mood turned melancholy. Again, I knew she was thinking of Leah.
“What’s his name?” I gently asked.
“Paul.”
“How did you meet him?”
“Med school,” she told me. “He was in his final year, I was just starting. Thanks to my dad—who made a few calls on Paul’s behalf—he got into a great neurosurgery program in Dallas, which is exactly what Paul always wanted. He’s from Texas originally.”
“I see.” I nodded my head in an exaggerated manner. “Your dad must love him. He probably has a church and reception hall already picked out for the perfect date in June.”
Holly gave me a warning look. “I would tell you to behave yourself, but you’re probably right. Dad adores him. He thinks he’s the cat’s meow.”
I detected a hint of cynicism in her tone as I watched her sip her coffee.
“What do you think?” I asked. “Will there be a June wedding?”
Holly sighed. “Not after everything that happened with Leah. I don’t think it would be wise for me to make any major life decisions right now.” She continued to hug her coffee mug in both hands. “Now that I think about it, it’s been that way for the past couple of years, ever since Leah was diagnosed. All I could do was keep gliding along. I feel like I’ve been living my life on auto-pilot.”
I stood up to refill my coffee cup, at least relieved to hear that Holly wasn’t tempted to rush into anything. “So is it serious with this guy?”
“I suppose.”
Returning to my stool and wondering why she hadn’t mentioned a significant other the night before when we were up all night talking, I set my mug on the counter. “That kind of sounds like an auto-pilot response.”
We gazed at each other intently, then she let out a sigh. “He’s an amazing man, Josh. Really. Smart, handsome, responsible. I’m very lucky.”
“But…” I prodded, leaning forward and feeling not the least bit guilty about urging her to rethink things.
What the hell was I doing? I’d just come out of a relationship with a woman who wanted to be with another man whose neck I wanted to wring. Now I was trying to become that “other guy” who couldn’t keep his hands off a woman who was already taken?
Holly set down her cup.
“What’s his family like?” I asked.
“His father owns an investment firm so they’re very well off. His mother didn’t have a career, though she sometimes does volunteer work. They’re a lot like my own parents I suppose.”
I nodded in understanding, and we quietly finished our coffees.
“I should probably get going,” I said, though I didn’t really want to leave, but it seemed the appropriate thing to say in that moment. “Thanks for the dinner and the use of your sofa. I enjoyed talking to you.” I rose to my feet.
“I enjoyed talking to you, too.” Holly followed me to the back hall where my jacket hung on a hook. “But some of the things we talked about still seem so…unanswered.”
“You mean about Riley?” I asked as I slid my arms into the sleeves of my jacket.
“And Leah,” she replied. “What happened to you during your surgery was incredible all on its own, but then you talked to my sister—if that’s what really happened. I don’t know how you’re getting by without knowing what it all means. Whether it was real or not. Part of me thinks we should put you in a lab and do experiments on you.”
“That sounds like a whole lot of fun.” We walked to the front door. “You know, it’s strange,” I said, pausing on the braided rug. “A month ago, I never gave a single thought to heaven or the idea that we might actually have souls. I’ll admit I was arrogant about that kind of thing. I thought people who believed in their “higher selves” weren’t operating on all four cylinders. I thought I knew everything about who and what we are—that when we die, it’s game over; pure nothingness—but now I feel completely…humbled. At the same time, I think I saw things most people can’t even dream of. Maybe that’s arrogant too.”
Holly gazed at me, looking bewildered.
“I should get going,” I said again when she made no comment.
Moving to the door, I waited for her to open it, then stepped out onto the covered porch.
“Will you let me know if you’re going to get in touch with Riley? I’d like to see him myself, but I don’t want to get in your way.”
Holly stood in the doorway, holding the screen door open. “I’ll keep you posted. The first thing I need to do is talk to my parents and tell them what you told me. See how they feel about moving forward. And you have my cell number, right?”
I nodded. “And you have mine? Call or text any time, Holly, because Lord knows I’ve got nothing else to do for the next five weeks.”
She smiled and waved good-bye as I walked down the steps, going easy on my sore leg, as best I could.
Chapter Thirty-two
That night, I dreamed I was back at work, alone in a squad car, pursuing a speeding black vehicle on the Interstate.
Rain came down in buckets and I could barely see through the water sloshing down my windshield.
I increased the wiper speed and they beat back and forth in front of me like two upside-down clock pendulums, but nothing could clear away the watery blur.
I was driving dangerously fast. Though I gripped the steering wheel tightly in both hands until my knuckles turned white, I still felt as if I had no control. I feared that at any second, my tires would skid and I would spin around a dozen times and tumble down the embankment.
Suddenly the guy I was chasing hit the brakes. His vehicle flipped over and flew into the air. Everything seemed to happen in slow motion as I drove under his airborne car and looked up at the undercarriage—like an airplane over my head.
It was a mistake to take my attention off the road, because the instant I faced forward again, I slammed my foot on the brake pedal to avoid a woman pushing a baby carriage across the street.
It was too late. My front grill collided with the carriage. It flew up into the air, over my head—just like the speeding vehicle.
The baby, swaddled in a white blanket, landed on the hood of my car and bounced across the windshield.
I woke in a panic, sat bolt upright. “No!”
&
nbsp; Breathing heavily, I lay a hand on my bare chest. My heart was pounding like a drum. I was completely drenched in sweat.
Taking a few deep, slow breaths, I lay back down and blinked up at the ceiling. Why did I dream that? What did it mean?
After a few minutes, I knew I couldn’t go back to sleep, so I switched on the light and got up.
Release
Chapter Thirty-three
Holly James
It’s funny how some days are dull and unremarkable—a small fleck of gray in the tapestry of your life—while others are like explosions of color that can define your entire existence, from the moment of your birth until you draw your last breath.
The day Josh Wallace walked through my door and spent the night on my sofa turned out to be one of those days.
Or maybe the word “explosion” is putting it too mildly.
Chapter Thirty-four
Since I’d already taken three weeks off from school to remain at Leah’s bedside during her final days, attend her funeral and hobble through the initial stages of my grief, I knew I couldn’t continue to avoid school much longer. After Josh left that Sunday morning, I sent an email to one of my instructors and asked what would be happening on Monday.
I was told there would be a brief oral exam on obstetrics. He gave me the option to postpone, but since I had the entire day to prepare and I was a rock star when it came to hitting the books, I promised to be there.
o0o
Three hours later, I sat at the desk in my room eating a bowl of leftover lasagne when a car door slammed shut outside. Rising from my chair, I crossed to the window, pushed the lace curtain aside with my finger, and looked down at the driveway below.
My parents were unpacking the car and heading for the door with their suitcases.
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