by Nicole Helm
Mom’s hands paused and then she drew them into her lap. “Your father and I did quite the number on you, huh?”
“It’s not your fault. I just... I’m not sure there’s a way to handle it that makes it any easier on the patient. I’m not sure it’s fair to ask the people who love the patient to act a certain way. I don’t know. I only know I can’t handle it if I’m sick. It’s bad enough watching it as a bystander.”
“So...what are you going to do?”
“I can’t do anything, because what kind of woman tells the man she loves she can’t be with him when his mother has cancer? It’s...wrong.”
“I can’t believe I’m going to disagree with you...”
Leah sat up. “Jesus, I can’t, either.”
Mom smiled, took her hand and patted it. “Sweetie, I know it bothers you that I want you to have someone to watch after you. And I even understand why, but the bottom line is, someday I won’t be here to take care of you when you can’t take care of yourself.”
Mom swallowed, shook her head. “I’ll admit, maneuvering Marc into moving here is a bit of a concession that you might not have a husband to do it. And perhaps it’s because he’s agreed that I can say...if you can see right now that Jacob isn’t going to be able to handle the health challenges you’ll likely face, why, I hardly think it’s wrong to express that to him. Sure, not today, but maybe once his mother’s back at home and settled.”
“Mom...” Leah couldn’t even begin to believe her mother was agreeing with her, siding with her. “I—I do love him, though.”
“Sometimes...oh, honey, sometimes love just isn’t enough.” Mom’s expression went tight. “I love your father. You know I do. And we’ve managed to repair a lot of the rifts we had there for a while, but...if we hadn’t worked very hard to understand each other’s side, love wouldn’t have been enough to overcome seeing a very serious subject very differently.”
“And it helped your subject disappeared.”
“It wasn’t you, honey.”
At Leah’s raised eyebrow, Mom sighed. “It was...the situation. An uncontrollable, nobody-at-fault situation.”
“That happened to beat inside my chest.”
“Oh, hush. The point is, we were too stubborn to let that...difference of opinion be the end, but it was a lot more than love that brought us back together. So, regardless if you love him or if he loves you, if he can’t give you what you’re going to need, then it isn’t right to stand by him.”
“You think I should...break up with him? Now?”
“I think you have to do what’s right for you, and leading him on just because he’s going through a rough time isn’t the answer. Wait maybe a few days, but find the right moment and tell him. He’s not being what you need him to be.”
Leah pressed her hand to her chest. The pain there was excruciating. But neither answer, neither choice, eased the pain.
“And...” Mom cleared her throat. “I regret what I said a few days ago, about not trusting you to take care of yourself. Maybe I didn’t want to see it because it makes me feel so...disposable after spending so much of my life with you at the center.” Mom shook her head. “You’re very...capable. And strong. I envy your strength, actually. And I’m sorry it took this long.”
“You’re not disposable. I...I’ve missed you. Even knowing how hard things were, I so badly wanted you back in my life.”
“I see that, too. Maybe that’s why I can admit it now. Coming here...seeing your life. It mattered, my beautiful girl. And I like to think it’ll make things better.”
Leah swallowed, heart aching in a whole new way. “I think so, too.”
* * *
JACOB WATCHED SNOW flutter down onto the parking lot below. The window to Mom’s hospital room gave quite a view of Bluff City, gray and snowy. He could see the river in the distance, wished he was on that damn bridge driving the hell away from all of this.
“Knock, knock.”
At Leah’s voice he popped to his feet. He should do something, say something, just blurt out an apology and screw the fact Dad, Mom and Grace were watching. But no words came out. He was paralyzed by the avalanche of feeling that would pour out after it.
“I was going to leave this at the nurses’ station, but your door was open.” Leah didn’t glance at him, didn’t once look his way. The stabbing pain in his chest felt all too real.
“Come in, sweetheart.” Mom shifted a little higher in her elevated bed.
“Um, all us MC people put together a little care package.” Leah placed a gift bag on the movable table next to Mom’s bedside. “Just in case you’re bored or need some sweets.” Her smile was tense, pained.
“Aren’t you all so sweet.” Mom smiled broadly. “You shouldn’t have, but thank you for thinking of me, and thank everyone else, too.”
“I will. And I thought I’d offer to get some lunch, if you guys were tired of hospital food.”
“Kyle loaded us up with all sorts of things before he headed to work,” Grace said, walking over and linking arms with Leah. “But thank you.”
“Anytime.”
“Your parents got off all right?” Jacob’s voice was hoarse from not saying much of anything today. Yes, that was what he’d blame it on. He hadn’t showered since he’d insisted on staying with Mom last night. Where else would he have gone? Obviously not Leah’s, and an empty MC had zero appeal.
He’d barely slept, and he felt like shit run over, but it was still better than those options would have been.
You could have gone to Leah’s and apologized.
“They got off just fine. Left bright and early. Should be back to Minnesota in time for dinner. Um, Marc stayed, though. He has an interview at Bluff City P.D. on Friday.” She unhooked her arm from Grace’s and looked around the room once more. “Well, I should head to work and catch up. If I can help out at all, you guys know how to get ahold of me.”
For the first time in too long he managed to get his limbs to work properly when it came to her. He reached out for her wrist. “Leah.” The way she withdrew her hand made his gut tighten. “Um, you have a few minutes?”
She looked around the room and then nodded. Stiffly, he followed her into the hall. Which wasn’t much in the way of privacy, what with the open door and nurses’ station not far off.
“Hi,” he offered lamely.
“Hi,” she returned with a pained smile. She looked...uncomfortable. As if she’d rather be anywhere else.
He’d done that, and he didn’t have the words to fix it. Every time he tried to get apologies out of his mouth, everything seized up. Excessive emotion behind it, the words the only dam to keep them inside.
“Um, Kyle and Susan have gotten almost everything for the New Year’s party canceled, but I should get over there and help tie up any loose ends.”
“Leah, just, um, give me a few days to...deal.”
He didn’t know why that would make tears fill her eyes. “Yeah,” she said, barely audible.
“I know I was a jerk, but...” If he said the rest, he’d lose whatever grip on sanity he had. She just had to know.... He tried to take her hand, but she stepped away. “What’s going on?”
“Nothing. I just have to go. We’ll talk later. When you’re... Later.”
“Talk about what, exactly?” Because he had the sinking suspicion this wasn’t just about him being an ass. This was deeper. Bigger.
“Don’t do this now.” She shook her head, the last word coming out desperate and broken. “Please.”
“What am I doing?”
“Talking about this isn’t a good idea right now.”
Yeah, definitely not just about him treating her poorly. “What exactly is this?”
“Jacob—”
“I love you.” At least he could get that out.
Sure, it was tight and nearly indecipherable, but he’d said it.
“I...” Her eyes darted to the room and back to him. “I have to go.”
His stomach did a slow roll. Things were definitely...not right. “Tell me. Straight-out. Don’t tiptoe around it because of what’s going on. I want to know.”
She shook her head and for a moment he thought she wouldn’t say anything, but then she squared her shoulders and looked him in the eye. “Last night...I saw a glimpse into our future, and I can’t live with it.” Her voice broke, but the tears in her eyes didn’t fall. “I’m sorry. I can’t do this with you.”
“That’s...it?”
“Look, we can talk more later. When things are more calm and it isn’t so...” She made useless hand gestures.
“But it’s over. What’s there to talk about?”
“I just meant if you needed more explanation.”
“You’re breaking up with me.” For the first time he felt...nothing. Blissfully blank and numb. “I’m pretty sure I knew this would happen, so no explanation necessary.”
She looked down, a tear trickling down her cheek. Christ, why were they always crying so damn much?
She cleared her throat. “I tried, but...”
“It’s my fault. Yes, I get it. I have been here before.” Again and again. Not what anyone needed, no matter how hard he tried.
“Don’t...” She looked back into the room, but he didn’t. He stood perfectly still looking at a poster about how to cover your mouth correctly while coughing.
Something inside him had snapped. All he felt was a kind of numbness that made it rather easy to stand here and understand. This was his fault. Because when push came to shove, when things came right down to it, he couldn’t control himself; he couldn’t be perfect; he couldn’t make the right choices.
When shit hit the fan, so did he. So there wasn’t any point in arguing, in being mad or hurt. This was just...it. A thing he’d chosen, more or less. He’d known what she needed from him, and he’d thought he’d given it to her.
But then it hadn’t been about her, and he’d lost.
“It’s not your fault. I just...can’t. But I’m still your friend. If you need—”
He stepped away from her and her outstretched hand. “No. Not that. Not now.”
“I still care. I still lo—”
“Go away, Leah. That’s the last damn thing I want to hear.” He turned away, walking back into the hospital room.
His family was silent and still, but he didn’t dare look at them or out in the hall to see if Leah had left. He just walked stiffly to his spot at the window from earlier and went back to watching the snow fall.
Honestly, he didn’t know what the hell else to do.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
LEAH SHOULDN’T BE HERE. It wasn’t as though she’d never poked around Jacob’s office before. There had been times he’d been out of town or had the day off and she’d needed paperwork he kept in his meticulously organized desk.
But everything was different now. There’d been talk of fantasies and terrible moments in hospital hallways and...everything associated with Jacob seemed wrong.
And it hurts. It damn well hurts.
Yes, that, too. She couldn’t seem to stop hurting. But Susan had asked her to get the Abesso’s Lighting file, and since it was something Leah needed to actually do her job today, here she was.
Her hands weren’t steady as she flipped through the top drawer of Jacob’s files. When the door creaked she all but jumped a foot.
“What are you doing in here?” a gruff voice demanded.
Jacob stood in the doorway to his office looking like...hell. Absolute hell. He was pale and his dark hair a mess, the short beard on his face looking grizzly and unmanaged. So not Jacob.
His eyes were red-rimmed, his lips chapped, and the urge to cross the room and hug him was so great she kept the drawer open to have a physical barrier between them.
“I needed a file,” she said in a squeaky, guilty-sounding voice. “What are you...? We thought you’d...”
“They kicked me out.” He took one step into the office, hands jammed into his pockets. “Not in a bad way, I mean. Mom settled in at home yesterday, and this afternoon they were all taking naps, and they wanted me to...breathe.”
“So you came to work?”
“That’s what I do best.”
Leah nodded because she didn’t know what to say. She didn’t know...what he wanted from her or if she was even in a place to give it to him. She was tied up in so many knots, she didn’t know where to pull to loosen any of them.
“I’ll...get out of your hair.”
His eyebrows drew together, and because he was still standing right next to the door, and she’d all but barricaded herself behind the open filing-cabinet drawer, there was no way to accomplish that.
“Can you tell me...how to fix this?”
She didn’t trust herself to speak, so she only shook her head.
“I know I should apologize for how I treated you that night. And I want to. I do, but every time I try...” His voice was tight with pain, his expression drawn together in anguish. “I haven’t apologized because I can’t without falling apart.”
“It’s okay to fall apart.”
“No, it isn’t, because when I do, people don’t want to be with me.”
“Jacob, I...” She didn’t know what to say to that. It broke her heart more than it already felt like it was broken, but she couldn’t deny that him falling apart was exactly what had sent her packing. “It’s not you.”
The sound he expelled from his throat was probably supposed to be a laugh, but it didn’t sound like one. “‘It’s not you. It’s me.’ You’re seriously using that line on me?”
“It’s true.”
“It’s bullshit. You not wanting to be with me is a direct result of me losing my crap that night. Seeing your future in it. So, it’s me, Leah. It’s all me.”
“You’re not wrong. You weren’t wrong to get upset. Maybe taking it out on people was kind of crappy, but you had a right. You’d been lied to, multiple times, about something that was important. I don’t deny you your anger, Jacob. I’m angry for you.”
She clutched the file to her chest, trying to find some center of calm and honesty that would somehow make this okay.
How could this ever be okay?
She swallowed the words and the lump that went with them. “However, someday I’ll probably be in similar shoes as your mother. Maybe even directly because of something I did. Maybe you’ll blame me and call me stupid. Maybe you’ll just lose it in the hospital room. Maybe you’ll get that blank look on your face that’s supposed to fool me into thinking you aren’t torn up inside.”
With each maybe she felt a little stronger. A little more right. “I don’t like any of those things. I’ve already been there, when I know the people in the waiting room are at each other’s throats. I’ve already had to listen to people tell me I’m not strong enough to deal with my own issues.
“So, it’s me, Jacob. Because of who I am and what I’ve been through, I need to know the person...who chooses to get roped into anything with me is going to treat my family, the people we love, the staff and doctors and nurses who are there to take care of me... I need to know those people will be treated with kindness and gentleness. And I’ll be given the benefit of the doubt, not just...pretended at.”
“Is that supposed to change my mind about whose fault this is? Because that still sounds like I’m the problem.”
“What I’m trying to say is that I do love you, but—”
“Maybe you could not be in my office.”
God, that hurt, but he had every right. Who broke up with a guy and kept telling him she loved him? That was a serious jerk m
ove, even if it was the truth. So she nodded once, pushing the drawer closed and skirting around him, putting as much space between them as possible.
“Wait. Here.” He jammed a hand into his coat pocket and found a bag of animal crackers. “Not that,” he grumbled, tossing it on his desk. He rummaged in his pocket again and pulled something out in a clenched fist. When he uncurled his fist, the little gold trumpet glimmered on his palm.
She stepped away from him, horrified that he’d even think to give that back to her. Horrified that she was so close to tears yet again. “No. No, I don’t want that.”
“Well, I don’t want it, either.”
When his gaze went to the trash can, a sound escaped her lips. Not quite a sob, but something idiotically close.
“Here.” He shoved the little figurine at her, but she couldn’t make herself take it.
“I’m very sorry I hurt you.” There were more words she wanted to say, but they weren’t nearly as nice. So she just walked out of the office, leaving him standing there with an outstretched arm.
Anger slammed into her chest so hard, she stopped. She tried to talk herself out of the furious words building, the inappropriate comebacks just dying to come out, but in the end her frustration and hurt won.
She whirled around and stomped back to his door. “If you throw that away, I will...” She looked at the filing cabinet. “I will take out every other file and throw them out the window, contents first. So...don’t.”
And then, because she was ridiculous, she turned on a heel and left. She stormed into Susan’s office. “Here’s the stupid file.”
“Whoa. Wait. Where are you going?”
“To my damn work shed to cry.”
“Give me ten. I’ll bring the soy ice cream.”
Leah gave Susan a curt nod. She’d really prefer to be alone, but, well, she might as well cry all over her friends. It wasn’t as if things were going to get better anytime soon.