Letters Home

by Rebecca Brooke

  Sometimes life throws a wrench into your plans. It’s your job to find a way around it.

  The yawn I’d been trying to stifle all day finally broke free. I’d gotten some sleep the night before—well, as much I could with Nate sleeping next to me. Tina must have seen it out of the corner of her eye because she turned toward me. “Look, we’ve been at this all day. Let’s take a break and look at everything again on Monday. I know there’s something in here that will help us win full custody, but we’ll never find it with tired eyes.”

  “All right, I think my brain has absorbed all it can for the day,” I said, standing up to stretch. We’d been working on the case for two weeks straight. Tina figured the divorce would be the easier of the two problems so after the first two days we’d moved onto the custody of the children, which was an entirely different scenario. Where our client and his soon-to-be ex-wife had invested equally in the monetary portion of the case, when it came to the children that wasn’t the case because their mother was almost never home, and didn’t really seem to care about her children—only about the status they provided her. This was the reason I became a lawyer in the first place. I loathed a system that placed children with their mothers simply because they were “the mother,” even if there was overwhelming evidence that they were not the better parent. Someone had to stand up for those kids.

  “You’ve been great these past two weeks. I think we both need a couple of days to process all of the information. What are your plans for the weekend?”

  “Probably more wedding stuff. Nate’s on duty this weekend so I’m gonna take advantage and get my dress shopping done. What about you?” We collected the paperwork and placed it in the correct files.

  “Oh, that’ll be fun. The kids and I are spending the weekend at my sister’s in Atlanta.”

  “I’m sure your nieces are getting so big by now.”

  “Yeah. I can’t wait to see them.”

  Once everything had been put away we collected our bags and made our way to the door. It was long past quitting time but the end of summer sun was still in the sky, turning the clouds beautiful hues of pinks and oranges. “Have a great weekend, Tina. I’ll see you Monday,” I said, before turning off and heading in the direction of my car.

  “You too, Danielle.” Tina smiled and unlocked her door.

  When I pulled into the parking lot I noticed Nate’s car immediately. It was late, but it was still early for how much Nate had been working the last week. It was a little crazy how many hours he’d put in, and that was the main reason I’d stayed at work so late on a Friday. The apartment could get kind of lonely at night.

  Opening the door, I noticed that something just wasn’t right. The lights were on, but the house was silent, Nate nowhere to be seen. My mind raced as put my keys down, trying to figure out what was going on. I listened for the running of the shower, thinking maybe Nate had come home and jumped right in, but the place was eerily quiet. When I walked farther into the living room, I looked down the hall and noticed the light underneath the door to our bedroom. Reaching out to the doorknob, my muscles tightened, a little wary of what I might find on the other side. But I pushed it open anyway, bracing for what was on the other side.

  Nate was sitting on the edge of the bed, his arms resting on his legs, his head in his hands. The silence was deafening and I was shocked he hadn’t heard me open the door.

  “Nate?”

  He sighed and let his shoulders drop, but when his head lifted up to meet my gaze I ran over and dropped to my knees in front of him, the redness around his eyes telling me he’d been crying.

  “What’s wrong? What happened?” I asked in a state of panic.

  “Dani…” He pulled me into his arms and buried his face in my hair.

  In an attempt to comfort him and get him to tell me what was wrong, I rubbed my hands up and down his back, but after a few minutes like this and he still hadn’t said anything my stomach began to churn.

  I needed answers.

  Determined to find out what was going on, I gently pulled out of his embrace and cupped my hands around his face. “Nate, please tell me what’s wrong?”

  Taking a deep breath he answered with the last thing I’d been expecting, but the first thing I should have thought of. “We’re being deployed.”

  Time stopped. The breath froze in my lungs. I never liked the thought of him being deployed, even as short as the time was for his unit. But Nate wasn’t normally upset over being deployed. He knew it was part of his job. There had to be something he wasn’t telling me. Then it hit me.

  “When do you leave?”

  That was the moment his eyes filled with tears. “Two weeks.”

  Then I asked the question I was dreading the most. “For how long?”

  “Three months.”

  Right through our wedding. How could this happen? I’d been waiting for what seemed like forever for Nate to ask me to marry him, and now that we were in the planning phase with a date picked, it was all going to be thrown away. I stood up, taking a step back out of his reach.

  “Dani, I—”

  Without giving him a chance to finish I turned on my heel and went into the bathroom, locking the door behind me. Within seconds Nate was knocking on the door. “Dani? Dani, please come out and talk to me.”

  There was nothing he could say to fix this. My vision blurred as I turned to lean against the door, eventually sliding down it as the sobs overtook my body. It seemed ridiculous to sit there and cry over something that really only had to be postponed a month, but after nine years of waiting to marry Nate, the idea that the career choice he’d made was pulling us apart hurt more than I imagined it would.

  I couldn’t face him. I needed a few minutes alone to let my emotions run wild, before I got myself under control to deal with this. This was something I’d never expected. There was a thump on the door that sounded like Nate’s head. “Dani?” he whispered, his voice slightly shaky.

  I wasn’t sure how long I sat there. Eventually, Nate’s banging on the door stopped—he must have finally realized that I had no intention of opening it. When I’d finally gotten the tears under control, I turned on the shower, knowing the hot water would not only help me relax my muscles, but it would also give me a bit more time to collect my thoughts and figure out a way to deal with this without hurting Nate in the process.

  When I stepped out I couldn’t hear Nate in the apartment. Had he left? Where would he have gone? If he had gone out, it would be my fault for walking away from him when he told me. Without much thought, I threw on a T-shirt and a pair of shorts. I needed to find Nate. The time in the bathroom was enough for me to realize that Nate and I would find a way. Nate was my forever and even if we had to wait another month, it would all be worth it in the end when we were pronounced husband and wife.

  It was weird how quiet the apartment was. There was usually music or noise somewhere. When Nate wasn’t in the living room, I started to really worry. Slipping on a pair of flip-flops, I grabbed my keys from the table by the door but as I reached for the handle, it turned and I gasped and jumped back. The door opened and there was Nate, phone in hand, his eyes widening and his head jerked back. His eyes searched my face but before he had a chance to finish, I threw myself into his arms. “I’m so sorry I walked away.”

  His reactions were a little slower, but as one arm wrapped around my waist, the other cupped my head to his chest. “Don’t be sorry, Dani. It’s not what I wanted either.”

  “I know, but I should have stayed and talked about it.”

  “Can we talk about it now?”

  I couldn’t speak past the lump in my throat, so I simply nodded and let Nate lead me over to the couch. He sat me down and then took the seat next to me. Unable to look him in the eye, I kept my head down.

  “Look at me, Dani.” I must not have moved fast enough because Nate took my chin between his thumb and forefinger and turned my head toward him. “I think I figured out a way to fix this. That’s
why I was on the phone.”

  Hope bloomed. “Do you mean you may not have to go?” I held my breath waiting for his answer.

  He shook his head. “You know that’s not how it works.”

  My brows drew together. “I know, but…I don’t understand?”

  That’s when Nate stood up and went down on one knee in front of me. “Marry me, tomorrow.”

  My mouth dropped open. Of all the things I expected him to say, that was not one of them. “What?” I whispered.

  Taking my hand in his, he gazed into my eyes. “Marry me, tomorrow.”

  Jumping to my feet, I started to pace. What was he thinking? Our families were all over, and we’d have less than a day’s notice. “How are we supposed to get everyone here?”

  “We’re not.” He shrugged. “But what we can do is get married with Marissa and Colin as our witnesses, and then have a full wedding when I get back.”

  It was all so much to take in. Nate was crazy. This was crazy. “We just can’t run and get married this weekend.”

  It was Nate’s turn to get up, stepping into my path to stop me in my tracks. He placed his hands on my shoulders and waited until I was looking at him. “Yes, we can. I want you to be my wife before we deploy.”

  The pounding of my heart increased. Could we really do this? With almost every fiber of my being I wanted to jump into his arms and scream “yes” at the top of my lungs, but a small part of me feared the reaction of our families if they ever found out what we’d done without them being there. “But—”

  “No buts, Danielle. I called and made arrangements with the base chaplain. Marissa and Colin will meet us at noon tomorrow.” He watched me for another second before continuing. “I know what you’re thinking. You’re worried that our parents will be pissed if they find out that we got married without them, but I thought about it and I actually think they will be happy for us. If I wasn’t getting deployed, that would be a whole new discussion.”

  That’s when I realized that we could do it. There was no one to stop us. This was something we needed, and with the thought of Nate being gone for the next three months, I wanted to do something for us. He was right—we could have the formal wedding later and no one would be any the wiser. It would also give us the next two weeks to enjoy being husband and wife.

  “Okay.” I beamed.

  “Okay?” His voice rose in excitement.

  I nodded. “Okay. What do we need to do?”

  He picked me up around the waist and swung me around the living room. “You’ve made me the happiest man on the planet.”

  My legs wrapped around him at the same time as his lips came up to lightly brush mine. Attempting to deepen the kiss I slid my tongue across his bottom lip, but before he opened his mouth to let me in, he pulled back.

  “What is it?”

  He let me slide down his body until my feet hit the floor. “We need to get to the jewelry store before it closes for the night.”

  My gaze dropped to the floor and I began to fidget. “Um…no we don’t.”

  “What do you mean? We’ll needs rings for tomorrow.”

  The blood rushed to my face, staining my cheeks pink. “I kinda already took care of that part.” Stepping away I headed to the bedroom and pulled two boxes out of the nightstand next to my side of the bed. I placed a box in each of his waiting hands. “I saw these one day and I knew that they would be perfect.” While I waited for his reaction, I sunk my teeth into my lower lip.

  The lid creaked and Nate looked at the two beautiful rings waiting inside. He sighed. “They’re perfect. I can’t believe you got these, but I’m so glad you did. It saves us a trip.” Without another word, I watched as Nate moved to the closet to pull out a duffel bag. He filled the bag with a change of clothes and grabbed the garment bag with his uniform in it.

  “Where are you going?” It seemed a little odd that he’d just convinced me to marry him this weekend, but now he was leaving.

  “I’m staying at Colin’s tonight. I’m not supposed to see the bride until the wedding,” he said picking up his duffel bag.

  “Well, that makes sense.” I laughed.

  I followed him to the door, watching as he grabbed his keys and turned to face me.

  “I love you more than anything, and I can’t wait to make you my wife tomorrow. Until then, dream of me.” He bent down and placed the sweetest kiss on my lips. It was obvious he was trying to keep me from taking it too far, to the point we’d end up in bed together.

  “I love you, too.” With that Nate made his way out the door.

  In less than twenty-four hours I would be Mrs. Nate Lewis. I couldn’t contain my excitement as I called for Marissa to come over so that she could help me get ready tomorrow. I sat my phone down and started to daydream.

  Mrs. Nate Lewis…

  I was starting to believe that dreams really did come true.

  It isn’t only in fairytales where dreams come true.

  After Nate left and I got off the phone with Marissa, who promised to be there first thing in the morning, I tried to go to sleep. It should have been easy considering the emotional turmoil of the last few hours—It’d left me completely exhausted—but unfortunately the harder I tried, the harder it became. My stomach continued to flutter, though I wasn’t sure if it was from nerves or excitement. In the morning, Nate and I would finally become husband and wife. Besides the deployment, life was pretty perfect. Thankfully his regiment’s deployments were short. Three months? It could be worse and we’d survived the time apart before. For now, I was going to look forward to the wedding and enjoy the next two weeks. I knew we’d both have to work during the day, but our nights would be our own. With thoughts of Nate, I finally drifted off to sleep.

  It seemed like I’d only been asleep for about an hour when there was a loud banging on the front door. Rolling over, I forced my eyes open to see that it was almost eight thirty. Damn, I needed to get moving and even though I was pretty quick getting out of bed, the banging continued. Only one person would do that. I opened the door and there was Marissa, two coffees in her hand. I stepped back to let her in and she handed me one of the cups.

  “Exactly what I needed,” I said with a smile.

  “I figured as much. Now get your butt in the bedroom and get dressed. We have a ton of stuff to do before we need to be on base.”

  “Like what?” I took a sip of the coffee, letting the caffeine do its job.

  “Well, while your pretty little self has been sleeping, I’ve been making hair and nail appointments.”

  “Really?” Marissa was always good at working under pressure.

  “You can thank me later. Now get dressed so we can get started.” I turned to head back down the hallway. “Plus we need to pick up your dress.”

  That stopped me in my tracks. “Dress, what dress?” I figured I would be wearing something from my closet since I hadn’t had the time to go out and get one.

  “Nate took care of it last night after he left here. He didn’t tell me anything except where and when to pick it up.”

  That brought an even bigger smile to my face. It was just like Nate to think of doing that. “I shouldn’t really be surprised.”

  “No, you shouldn’t. Now chop, chop.”

  The day seemed even brighter as I got ready to leave. Wasting as little time as possible, I ran into the bathroom and took one of the fastest showers of my life. I threw on a tank top and shorts with a pair of flip-flops and met Marissa back in the living room. She was standing by the door, keys in her hand waiting for me.

  “Ready?”

  “Yep, let’s go.” Locking the door behind us, I made my way over to Marissa’s car where she was already waiting in the driver’s seat. The town seemed almost too quiet for a Saturday, but there was a nice breeze taking an edge off of the heat.

  Before she started the car, Marissa turned to me and took my hand. “Okay, since I finally got you in the car, can I just say how happy I am you decided to do this? When Na
te called last night and said you wouldn’t come out of the bathroom I was afraid you might say no to his idea. I know it hurts that he’s leaving again, but at least you’ll get to be married before he does.”

  “At first I did say no. I was nervous about what our parents might say if they found out. Then I realized that it didn’t matter. I don’t want to wait any longer, or push the date until he gets back.”

  Facing forward again, she started the car and backed out of the space. Over the next two hours we got our hair and nails done. At the salon, I had them add big, light curls to my long chestnut tresses—wanting to keep things simple.

  By the time we stopped at a small little boutique in town, I was a little nervous, even more so when we walked in and the saleswoman seemed overly excited to see us.

  “Hi, I’m Danielle Renton and I’m supposed to pick up a dress,” I said to the woman standing behind the counter.

  “Of course, give me one second.” She disappeared into the back room, returning a few moments later with a garment bag, a shoebox, and another small bag. When she opened the garment bag, I sucked in a deep breath.

  The dress was absolutely gorgeous. It was a light pink strapless dress with an angled skirt, a little higher in the front then in the back. Simple, yet elegant, it was perfect. Nate knew me so well.

  “It’s beautiful,” Marissa whispered.

  It took me a few moments to look away from the dress. “What is everything else?”

  “Well, your fiancée didn’t stop at just the dress,” the woman said, opening first the shoebox, then the bag next to it.