The Light Before Us

by Stephanie Vercier

  If there are still any wounds left open, I hope this letter will seal them.

  I nearly jump out of my seat as a hand lands on my shoulder. When I turn around, Jack has raised his hands in a kind of surrender and is laughing softly.

  “Crap, I didn’t mean to scare you. I thought you heard me coming down.”

  I shake my head, feeling a surge of guilt in writing to another man.

  “What is that?” he asks, looking at my handwritten letter on the table.

  I actually consider lying, but there is no reason to lie to Jack. I don’t need to feel guilt in reaching out to Michael, not as a way to bring him closer but in order to keep us apart.

  “It’s a letter to Michael.”

  “Oh?” Jack’s eyebrows lift. “I didn’t know you were in contact with him.”

  “I’m not—I haven’t been. I just think he deserves to know why I left. Maybe he won’t care, but if he does, even just the smallest amount, then I think it’s my responsibility.”

  Jack crosses his arms over his chest. “Okay. But if he tries to win you back, he should know he’s going to have a fight on his hands.”

  I set the pen down, slip out of the chair, pull his arms down and press against his chest. “He won’t, but it’s good to know you’ll fight for me.”

  “Always,” he says, holding me close to him. “I’ve got a surprise for you upstairs.”

  I wiggle out of his grip and laugh. “You know how much I love sex with you, but we can’t spend the entire day in bed.”

  He smirks. “You think that’s all that’s ever on my mind?”

  I give him an appraising look.

  “Okay, well, maybe you’re right, but this isn’t about that. It’s a surprise.”

  “And how can I resist that?”

  Leaving the unfinished letter on the table, I follow Jack back up the stairs, but instead of leading me into his bedroom, he takes me to the third bedroom in the cabin and opens the door before I can be left to wonder what’s behind it.

  Right away, I see the surprise, and bring my hand to my mouth before searching Jack out, wanting to be close to him. With his arm around me, my eyes drift over the crib set below the window. It’s been beautifully crafted from wood and painted a shiny, bright white. There’s no doubt it’s been made by Jack’s very talented hands.

  “For our baby.” He draws me to him. “For wherever we are, in California, here… anywhere.”

  “I love it!” I only escape Jack’s arms to explore the crib further, to run my fingers along its curved edges and the intricate depictions of flowers, lambs, puppies, kittens and even a baby giraffe carved into it. “You missed your calling,” I say, turning back to him. “You’re an artist.”

  “Surgery is a sort of art.” He joins me at the crib with an expression of pride. “But there’s a peace I find in building that I don’t get from being in an operating room.”

  “I can understand that.” I’m still marveling at the beauty of his work while the image of a baby lying inside of the crib pops into my head.

  I start to cry. I can’t help it.

  “Hey… hey.” He’s at my side, rubbing my back. “Are those tears of joy?”

  I nod. “I think so… it’s just these hormones are wreaking havoc on me, and this is all so much, so fast… but in a good way, Jack. I know it sounds cheesy, but every day feels like a surprise, and I love every minute I get to spend with you.”

  “My sentiments exactly,” he says, planting a kiss on my forehead.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  JACK

  As I watch Natalie trace over the edges of the crib with her fingers, I’m overcome with a sense of rightness, like this is one moment of many to come, moments she and I will spend together over a lifetime. She is young and beautiful, smart and caring, strong enough to leave everything she’d known behind to build a new life for herself, a life she’s going to let me share with her. I can’t deny there is worry attached, fear that I could lose Natalie the way I’d lost Marjorie, but I can’t let that overpower all the good, can’t let it creep to the forefront of my mind. To spend time thinking about the worst just means time lost to the present, and I don’t want to miss a second of my life with Natalie.

  From the master bedroom, the phone rings, echoing down the hallway. It barely registers in my mind that is so focused on this beautiful girl, pride filling my soul at her admiration of my craftsmanship, but more, pride in knowing she’ll be my wife and soon the mother to our child.

  The phone is like a distant memory when it goes into a second round of ringing, and I find myself hating technology. But when it starts up for the third time, Natalie draws her attention away from the crib and raises a brow at me.

  “Maybe it’s important?”

  “Not more important than you.” I lean next to her, putting my hand on her shoulder. “They can leave a message.”

  She lets out an amused sound when it rings into round four, and I sigh as though I’ve been beaten.

  “I’ll be right here,” she says as though she wouldn’t mind a few moments alone to think about what the bassinet means, that in less than nine months, our baby will be lying in it.

  “All right.” I plant a quick kiss on her cheek before turning for the door. “I won’t be long.”

  When I get into my bedroom, the phone just keeps on ringing insistently. I have half a mind to throw it against the wall—or just turn it off—when I pick it up and see Lincoln Bouchard’s name flash across the screen.

  Hell. What does he want now?

  I can’t imagine he’s calling about anything good, but I’m not going to go around trying to duck away from Natalie’s father.

  “Lincoln?” I say, taking the call.

  “Oh… finally!” It’s not Lincoln.

  “Sharla? Everything okay with Lincoln?” I imagine an accident and him lying in a hospital room, Sharla desperate to get in touch with Natalie who might have blocked their numbers or simply turned off her phone.

  “Yes, he’s fine, and the reason I’m calling has nothing to do with him.”

  I prepare myself for a full verbal lashing. Lincoln got his chance to dress me down in person, but Sharla hasn’t yet had the opportunity.

  “Then what’s this about?” I ask, preparing for a shit-storm.

  “It’s about your foundation, about one of the recipients.”

  “One of my… recipients?” Color me confused.

  “We got a call from the hospital. I suppose it’s because of the clinic’s connection to the foundation. Anyway, apparently a young man by the name of Enrique Alonzo was in quite an accident. He’s comatose, Jack, and his parents don’t speak more than a few words of English.”

  Comatose?

  Her words take a few moments to settle in, and it’s a few moments more to picture the young man I’d spoken to after giving out the scholarships. Enrique Alonzo is a young artist who local businesses and property owners pay to paint murals on the sides of their buildings. He’s exactly the kind of young man Marjorie would have called inspiring, someone who deserved the chance to go to college and pursue his dreams. And I’m gutted at the thought his life might be forever altered or cut short.

  “What kind of an accident?” I want her to assure me it’s something he could recover from, that perhaps the coma was induced to help him heal.

  “Something about a bike,” she says after several quiet moments. “I think someone hit him.”

  “God… that’s… that’s terrible.” Holding the phone to my ear, I drag my hand through my hair, wishing there was something I could do.

  “Like I said,” she continues, “his parents don’t speak very much English and could really use some support. I know they got in touch with us, but I thought maybe they’d actually remember you.”

  Me?

  In my mind, I’m already saying yes to what she’s actually asking, visualizing grabbing my keys, hopping into my truck and heading north to Seattle. But then I think about Natalie—of cou
rse I do. I don’t want to leave her again, but I don’t want to upset her schedule here either.

  “They don’t have translators at the hospital?” I ask, hoping to find a better solution. Of course I know they do and feel like an ass in even asking. What I’m sure Enrique’s family needs is someone they have at least some connection to, not a stranger or an intermediary who is only there to translate words.

  Another pause. “Most likely. And I suspect they’re using one for whatever clinical issues come up, but, well, don’t you think Marjorie would want you to go?”

  It doesn’t matter whether or not Sharla is trying to guilt me into going. The fact is that Marjorie would want me to go.

  “I’ll make the arrangements.” I’d feel like an unworthy asshole if I didn’t. “What hospital?”

  “Swedish,” she says, relief in her voice. “Please let me know when you’re coming, and let me… let me know if you’re planning to bring Natalie, won’t you?”

  “I will,” I say before hanging up.

  I remain in the bedroom a moment, allowing everything to sink in. Funny how Sharla’s only mention of her daughter came at the very end with absolutely no discussion of the fact she’s pregnant or the blow up we had with Lincoln. But maybe I’m not giving her enough credit. A young man—Enrique—needs help, and maybe she just didn’t want to risk an argument derailing her mission to get me up there as the family’s advocate.

  But before I tell all of this to Natalie, I need to be sure it isn’t any kind of ruse, that Sharla isn’t making it all up to get me to bring Natalie to Seattle for some kind of ambush. So, I very simply call up Swedish Hospital, and within thirty seconds, I’m told that Enrique Alonzo is indeed there. The first woman I speak to even transfers me to the floor that he’s on, and after providing my name, a nurse returns to the phone and tells me the family is allowing her to share details of his injury with me.

  Sharla’s call was no ploy. The young man I’d presented a scholarship to just the other night is gravely ill, his chance of survival hovering around fifty percent. Life, even for the young and healthy, can turn on a dime. I’m not sure I’m prepared to be up close to tragedy like that again, and I momentarily consider calling Katherine. She’s put her heart and soul into the foundation, and she would know Enrique much better than I do. But that’s a cop out. I was Marjorie’s husband, and she’d want me to see this through.

  With my mind made up, I turn back toward the door where Natalie stands, her arms crossed over her chest.

  She’s so damn beautiful, and as I move toward her, I wish it weren’t to tell her I’ve got to leave. “I have to go up to Seattle.”

  “Yeah. Sounded kind of intense.”

  “It was your mother.” No sense in lying to her.

  Natalie drops her arms away from her chest and sighs. “What did she want? To berate you like my dad did?”

  I shake my head and slide my arms around her waist. “One of the students we awarded the scholarship to was in an accident. I don’t think his parents have any family there, so they somehow got in touch with the clinic for support I guess.”

  “Oh.” The anger she’d been building up for her mother dissipates right before my eyes and is replaced by concern. She puts the palm of her hand on my chest, and I quickly cover it with my own hand. “And you feel like it should be you that goes?”

  I nod. “Yeah. I think that’s what Marjorie would have wanted.”

  She tilts her chin forward. “Of course. I understand.”

  I pull her close and kiss her, then whisper, “Thank you.” My words don’t seem like enough. I’m not sure how I’d react if someone in Natalie’s past still remained a part of her present, the memory of a man I had to share her with. Perhaps she’s a better woman than I am a man, and I’m eternally grateful to her.

  While I actively push for her to come with me, Natalie decides it’s better if she stays here in Oregon. She doesn’t exactly come out and say that she thinks her parents might be planning to show up at the hospital, maybe even with Michael, but I can tell she’s thinking it. I’d thought it myself.

  “You’ll be staying at Melissa’s again for the night?” I confirm after I’ve packed a quick overnight bag, maybe fifteen minutes having passed since Sharla called.

  “Yeah, I’ll head on over there in a few.”

  “Could you head over before I leave? I just don’t want you out here all by yourself.”

  She gives me a look, half exasperated, half amused. “Okay, fine, but it’s not like I haven’t been out here half the day alone before.”

  “Yeah, but that was before I let it slip to your family you were here. I don’t want them taking the opportunity to sneak down here and kidnap you while I’m away.”

  She laughs. “I’m not sure they care enough to want to kidnap me at this point. It was pretty obvious to me that my dad has washed his hands of my choices.”

  I’m stung with guilt that I have anything at all to do with that and resolve that I’ll at least attempt to meet with her parents again while I’m in Seattle. I can’t be sure of Sharla’s feelings, but how Lincoln could ever want to turn his back on a woman as amazing as Natalie, I can’t understand.

  It takes a good ten minutes of me with my arms wrapped around Natalie by her car to finally let her go. If it were up to me, we’d head right back inside the cabin and just be together, but there is a bigger world out there along with responsibilities that can’t be avoided.

  “I love you,” she tells me, her door open, one foot already in her car.

  “And I love you too,” I say, giving her one last kiss before she slips in. And then I watch her drive away.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  NATALIE

  “This is turning into a regular slumber party,” Melissa says when I drop my overnight bag next to the couch Barbara is sitting on.

  I shrug. “It makes Jack feel better to know I’m not alone at the cabin.”

  Barbara huffs. “He should know that you can take care of yourself! I didn’t burn my bras in the sixties for nothing!”

  Melissa and I exchange amused, knowing looks before we fall into a round of giggles.

  “I never pegged you for a bra burner, Mom,” Melissa says once she’s recovered from her laughter.

  “Well, there are a lot of things you don’t know about me.” Barbara tilts her chin upward and presses her lips together with a pompous flair.

  “Hey, I’d love to hear them.” I take a seat next to her on the couch. “If you don’t mind my company today of course.”

  “I’ll tell you anything you want to know,” she whispers conspiratorially.

  Melissa rolls her eyes. “Well, if you both don’t mind, I’ll use this opportunity to finally organize the garage. And I’ll pay you for today, Natalie. It’s your day off, and—”

  I wave a halting hand at her. “No, this isn’t about work today. This is me visiting two friends who are kind enough to put me up for the night. There’s no need to pay me.”

  There is a slight look of relief on Melissa’s face while Barbara’s lips turn up into a grin.

  “Thank you,” Melissa says. “If I have to leave and help Camille out at the diner, I’ll let you know, okay?”

  I nod. “Okay.”

  “And if you want to talk to us about how things went with your dad, please feel like you can.”

  My chest tightens at the mention of my father, but I appreciate her offer. “Thanks, Melissa. Rain check?”

  “You betcha.”

  Barbara puts her hand on mine as Melissa heads down the stairs. “I figured your dad could be a touchy subject, but I’m all ears if you want to unload.”

  “I don’t want to burden you with—”

  “Oh, stop it! It’s not a burden. I’m an old bird who’s still kicking after a stroke, so I think I can handle hearing some family drama.”

  And so I tell her.

  It’s actually a relief to say the words to someone other than Jack, someone who isn’t so cl
ose to the drama. And Barbara is an attentive, yet opinionated listener, though I can’t say her advice is the most practical.

  “Kick that man in the balls next time you see him!”

  “I’m not sure I could do that to my dad, Barbara.” Though the visual does make me giggle.

  “Why not? Sounds like he deserves a good ass kicking. If Camille were a man, let me tell you!”

  “Things still aren’t good, huh?” I ask, assuming there have been no breakthroughs where Camille is concerned.

  She rolls her eyes and nearly grunts in disgust. “Mel keeps on giving that girl chances. She scares good customers away from the diner, wasting time flirting with the men hoping for good tips while she ignores everyone else! You watch—give it twenty minutes, and Mel will come up here and say there’s some incident she needs to fix, some fire she needs to put out. I just hope Camille will go back to school at the end of the summer so Mel can hire someone decent.”

  “I guess both our families are a little messed up at the moment, huh?”

  “Damn straight.”

  My phone rings, and, thinking of Jack, I pick it up, then raise my eyes at the number flashing across my screen. “It’s Al’s diner,” I say, turning the phone to Barbara before I slide my finger across it and answer it.

  “What did I tell you?” she says quietly.

  “Hello?” I ask tentatively, shrugging at Barbara.

  “Natalie?” It’s Camille’s voice.