“Ben? Hey, bud, where are you?” Kelly’s voice split through Ben’s skull like an unwanted chain saw.
He groaned. There was no way Kelly wouldn’t know he’d been drinking, and yet, he knew Kelly enough to know he’d be over here to check on him if he didn’t answer. Fighting to get and keep his balance—more from the grief than the alcohol, Ben stood and stumbled over to the phone. “Warren.” It didn’t sound friendly.
“Ben! Oh, good. Listen, Tamitha decided to make up one of her lasagnas for Jason and Holly. You want to come over?”
“Oh, I don’t know, Kell…”
“No, man. We want you to come. You’re not going to sit there in the dark all by yourself. Not tonight. Come on. The lasagna’s already in the oven.”
Ben sighed as he looked back to the coffee table. Why couldn’t they just leave him alone?
“You’ve got time,” Kelly said. “Ya don’t have to break your neck to get here. Just come.”
What could he say? “Okay.”
“So you work with Misty,” Nathan said from his side of the black truck that somehow surprised Kathryn. She’d never been in a truck like this. It stood several feet off the ground, and Nathan had to help her so she could even get in. Once in, the high perspective made her woozy.
“Yeah.” Playing with the strap of her purse, she fingered through the files in her brain trying to think of more to say. She was so hopelessly bad at this.
“I’ve always thought that would be such a hard job. I don’t think I could do it, watching people die all the time.”
With a rush, memories from the day swept back over her, and she put her head down to hide them. “It’s not always so bad. I guess you kind of get used to it.”
Nathan shook his head. “Not me. I couldn’t do it.”
For a long moment, Kathryn searched for something to say.
“Hey, do you like jazz?” Nathan asked, reaching for the stereo knobs.
“I… guess.” She shrugged. Honestly she’d never had an occasion to listen to jazz, so she really didn’t know.
With five clicks, the purr of a saxophone floated between them. She slid down in the seat just a bit, relaxing. Maybe this wouldn’t be so bad after all.
“Hey. You made it.” Kelly met Ben at the door with an out reached hand that turned into a pat on the shoulder hug. Ben couldn’t recall ever being hugged so much in his life. In fact, he had always been pretty much a hands-off person. But apparently that had changed sometime in the last week.
“I made it.”
“Ben,” Tamitha said, coming to the door and extending her arms as well. “I was so sorry to hear about your dad.”
He hugged her—kind of. “Th-thanks.” It was weird. What do you say to something like that? He’d never really thought about it. Following them through the little entry, he stepped into the living room, feeling hopelessly ragged. His hair was far longer than he’d ever let it get. Sometime back before time stopped, he was scheduled for a hair cut. Now he wondered if he’d ever even canceled that appointment. He’d tried to shave earlier, but about all he’d accomplished was making his face bleed almost as much as his heart was.
“Hey, Ben.” Jason stepped from the kitchen with Holly next to him. “We’re glad you could come.”
Ben picked his chin up as if he was going to say something, but movement at Holly’s knee yanked his attention there. With one look, his heart plummeted to his shoes. Carefully Holly reached down and swung the little child up to her ample waist. The little golden curls danced around the little pixie face.
It was a challenge to hold to reality. “Well, who’s this?” Ben asked through the lump. The truth was, it could be no one else.
“This is Ryley,” Jason said, turning with pride in his eyes.
On rubbery legs, Ben stepped toward them. Seeing him approach, the child stuck her thumb in her mouth and bent her head to her mother’s shoulder. Ben didn’t want to scare her, so he stopped several feet away and just stood trying to figure out how that face could be so similar to the one that had haunted his dreams from the moment his mother and brother had left to this.
“Hi, Ryley,” he said, his voice catching on the lump in his throat. The thought that his dad might never have met this beautiful little child brought tears to his eyes. The pain was all still so fresh, so raw inside him. It was as if life had suddenly become brighter, harsher, everything in perfect relief to that moment he had awakened to a new reality.
“And this is my mother-in-law,” Jason said, stepping back to reveal a smallish woman who looked like she would backhand you if you crossed her. Ben decided right then he’d better be on his best behavior.
“It’s nice to meet you, Ma’am.” Ben bowed slightly, hoping the Ma’am would help. At this point, he wasn’t sure anything would.
However, her gray eyes lost some of their harshness as she came toward him. She took his hand in both of hers. “I’m very sorry to hear about your father’s passing. Please accept my sympathies.” The sincerity in her tone touched a chord deep in him.
“Well, thank you.” He had to swallow the lump.
Everyone stood there for a gaping eternity.
“Well,” Tamitha finally said. “I’m sure the lasagna is ready. I’ll go call the boys.”
“That’s fantastic.” Kathryn sat on the opposite side of the table in the quiet restaurant. Nathan had certainly gone all out, and now she felt obligated to make this night not-a-disaster. She looked at him, thinking again he really wasn’t bad. They would make a good couple. He was a good height for her, and their coloring was similar. “So you really graduated from MIT?”
“I did. Why? Is that so hard to believe?”
“Well, no.” She reached for her wine. “You just don’t look like a geek.”
He laughed. “Well, thank you for that.”
Then she realized how dumb that sounded. “No. I didn’t…”
But he waved her off. “It’s okay. Nothing I haven’t heard before.”
She wasn’t sure if that was any better. “And you work in development?”
“I do.” Nathan cut into his steak. “It’s not as glamorous as it sounds, but it’s a job.”
“So what else do you like to do? Do you read?”
He laughed again. “Not much. I really love to rock climb. I’m planning a trip out west at the end of the summer with some friends. We’re going to go repelling.”
Her eyebrows reached for the sky. “Really? You jump off of rocks?”
Nathan shrugged. “I wanted to sky-dive, but my mom nixed that idea.”
Something slipped into her consciousness. “You’re close to your family then?”
“Oh, yeah. My younger brother and I go out nearly every weekend, and we’re always getting together for something—birthdays, anniversaries—there’s always something.”
Nothing about that was bad, but it added pressure she wasn’t sure she was ready for. “So how many brothers and sisters do you have?”
“Four brothers. Two sisters.”
“Big family.”
“Born and raised Catholic.” He stopped and looked at her. “Didn’t Misty say you were Catholic too?”
“What? Yeah.” Kathryn didn’t want him to notice how desperately she was working to make all of this information fit into her dream guy.
“Oh, good. Because you know I only date Catholics. Mom says it makes it easier that way.”
Mom again. She was becoming a fixture. “Oh, yeah? How’s that?”
“Well, you know how crazy some people are in the world today. I sure don’t want to hook up with someone who doesn’t have a good perspective on life.”
How could something so logical sound so stifling?
“Not that there’s anything wrong with other religions. It’s just that, you know, getting some girls to agree to the Catholic thing can be a real nightmare.”
She didn’t know what to question first. “The Catholic thing? I don’t follow.”
“Well, you know, like having a
big family. That’s really important to me.”
Kathryn nodded. “And how… big are you thinking?”
“Oh, I don’t know six… seven.”
The walls started closing on her. Six or seven children? Her eyebrows started for the ceiling, but she forced them to stay down.
“And your wife will work?”
Nathan laughed. “Of course not. She’ll stay home and home school like my mom did. It’s really the best way to raise a family.” He reached for his glass and took a drink.
Nodding, because she didn’t know what else to do, Kathryn ducked and wiped at her mouth with her napkin. If Misty knew all of this, she sure hadn’t let Kathryn in on it.
“That’s why when Misty said she had a good Catholic girl working there at the unit, I just had to meet you.” Nathan smiled at her in a way that creeped her out.
Kathryn swallowed, praying that God would get her out of this before Nathan proposed.
“Terence! Sit down!” Tamitha said as her youngest knelt up on the chair next to Ben.
For his part, Ben was trying to eat without being noticed. The way he figured it, the faster he ate, the sooner he could go home.
“Have you talked to Kathryn?” Jason asked through the children and the clank of the plates, and Ben’s whole awareness snapped to his brother.
“Um. Uh.” Ben wiped his mouth with the little paper napkin. “Yeah for a few minutes today.” He reached for his water as gazes from around the table landed on him. “But just for a few minutes.” It was as if he couldn’t stress that part enough.
Jason picked up his garlic toast. “Did you tell her about tomorrow night?”
Ben nearly choked on the water. Did they have to do this here? “Uh, yeah. I did. I don’t know if she’ll come though, you know. She’s really busy.”
“Kathryn?” Holly asked. “Is this the nurse at hospice?”
“Social worker,” Jason corrected her.
“Oh, that’s right.” Holly trained her gaze on her brother-in-law who suddenly wished nothing more than the ability to disappear. “Jason says she’s really nice.”
Trying to figure out how not to make an idiot of himself, Ben nodded slightly. “She is.” He picked up his fork and let his gaze drop to the plate. His heart turned over at the thought that she was probably out on her date right now. He wondered about the guy, and one major part of him wanted nothing more than to knock the guy’s head of his shoulders. It must be the lost sleep and the stress. He’d never had such a desire before toward someone he had never even met.
“Well, I hope she comes,” Holly said. “I’d love to meet her.”
Ben bent forward farther and scratched his ear. The truth was he hoped she would come too.
“I figured we could catch the 9:30 show,” Nathan said as they drove away from the restaurant.
With everything in her, Kathryn wanted to ask him to take her home. She wanted to put on her warm, fuzzy pajamas, get a cup of hot chocolate and curl up on the couch. But she knew the details of this date would get back to Misty. “Sounds good.”
“No. Really,” Ben said as he pulled on his jacket. “I’m beat. I haven’t slept in my own bed in forever.”
“Are you sure you’re going to be all right getting home?” Tamitha asked as the four of them stood around him, looking like chaperones at a high school dance where he’d just been caught smoking.
“I’ll be fine.” He reached over and air kissed her. Then he shook Kelly’s hand. “I swear.”
Kelly didn’t look pleased. Neither did Jason, but they clearly couldn’t come up with a way or a reason to keep him there.
“Okay, but you drive carefully,” Holly said as he barely brushed her arm in farewell.
“I’m fine.” He looked over at Jason. “And stop looking at me like that. You guys get some sleep. I’ll see you at the funeral home tomorrow evening.” He pulled his jacket closer around him. The night wasn’t all that cold, but his spirit was shivering. Quickly he exited and turned only once, barely, to bid them all good-bye. Then he hurried to his car and with only a bit of trouble crawled behind the wheel.
They were still looking, so he wasted no time. In seconds the car was started, seconds more and he was pulling away from the house and then the neighborhood. His whole body relaxed from the strain of trying to appear all right. Honestly, he couldn’t be sure he was all right or not all right. Mostly he was just numb.
His gaze chanced on the little cell phone, and he thought about calling her. But he shook that thought away. He wouldn’t disturb her now. That wouldn’t be fair. She had her own life to live, and it didn’t include him.
The laser guns cut across the dark black screen as the saviors of the universe fought evil personified. It wasn’t as gory as some, but it was hardly in Kathryn’s realm of enjoyable. Ten minutes after the lights went down, Nathan had stealthily reached over and taken her hand. She hadn’t been prepared for that move, and now that her hand was stuck, she couldn’t come up with a good way to extract it without him getting the wrong idea—or the right idea.
As the spaceship zoomed to a different galaxy, her brain went through her options. He was a nice guy. Yes. But his idea of marriage was so far separated from hers, she couldn’t quite see how the two could ever mesh. She looked at their hands together and couldn’t help but remember how Ben’s had felt. That wasn’t fair, of course. Nathan wasn’t Ben.
And that was as much of a problem as anything else about him.
Although he hadn’t gotten any real sleep in more than a week, Ben’s mind just wouldn’t shut off. Had she said she would come? He thought she had. He hoped she had. What if she did? Could he keep his feelings for her—such that he still couldn’t figure out—from being broadcast to the entire world? He certainly didn’t want to embarrass her. Especially since she was only coming because it was a part of her job.
That was the part that confused him the most. How much of her spending time with him was because of her job, and how much was something else? Was any of it something else? His heart panged forward in hopes that it was, but he couldn’t tell how much of that was real and how much was just wishful thinking.
If he didn’t get to sleep soon, he’d be counting non-existent dots in the dark. How depressing was that?
“I had a great time,” Nathan said at her door. He was definitely making a move on her with his hand pressed against the wall next to her door.
“Yeah, me too.” All she wanted was to get in that door without him following. “Thanks for dinner. The movie was great too. It’s been a long time since I’ve been out like that.” She was rambling because her mouth was stuck on talk.
Slowly he leaned over to her, put his hand on her shoulder, and bent his lips to hers. Air jammed into her lungs, and she slammed her eyes closed just as his lips met hers. Whatever she’d thought it would feel like, this was not it. His hands came around her waist and then her back, gripping her closer as she fought with herself not to push him away. It felt wrong, all wrong. And the only reason she didn’t run was because she couldn’t.
Finally the kiss broke, and she nearly lost her balance careening backward. “I… I’ll see you later.” And with that, she fled inside. When the door was closed and locked between them, she leaned on it, praying he wouldn’t knock. For ten whole seconds she fully expected him to, but when he didn’t, she finally breathed a sigh of relief. Her gaze slid up to the ceiling. “Oh, Lord, please tell me he wasn’t the one You sent.”
Ben had never prayed for anyone or anything in his lifetime. However, as the clock wound around to 1:15 in the cold, dark bedroom, he could think of nothing else to do. He wished he could call and talk to her. Just talk. That always calmed him down and made life seem to make a little more sense. But she was probably sleeping. Or she wasn’t, which twisted his gut. He rolled over and put his wrist onto his forehead. “God, please, please be with Kathryn, wherever she is. Keep her safe for me, and give her peace.”
The apartment was dark, but Kathryn
never slowed down. She picked the bouquet up from the coffee table, went into the kitchen, dumped the whole thing in the sink and flipped on the garbage disposal. Four flowers down the drain, she started sneezing, but she didn’t quit until they were all gone and Lysol had chased them down.
Chapter 15
Although Kathryn had been to many funerals and wake services, this one felt very different. She dressed in her smoke-black dress suit and twisted her hair up into a loose knot. A little make-up and she was ready. Seven o’clock on a Saturday night. Without really even thinking the words, she thanked God that her schedule was so free that she hadn’t even had to worry about changing plans. She checked her watch as she grabbed her purse and headed out to the car. There was plenty of time, but she didn’t want him to think she had forgotten.
The dark suit. The white shirt. The black tie. They were all so formal, all so somber. Ben checked his reflection once more in the full length mirror on his closet. He looked about as good as he was going to. The air escaped from his lungs in a long, protracted whoosh. If he could just keep his nerves from overtaking him, he’d be all right. Grabbing his wallet and keys, he headed out to the car, trying not to remember how much he was hoping she would actually show up.
He knew that wasn’t what he was supposed to be thinking about at this juncture, but it was better than the alternatives. In fact, it would be much better if she actually did come. If she didn’t, he wasn’t sure there would be enough glue in the world to hold him together.
Thirty minutes later, Ben was standing with Jason and Holly as the funeral director gave them the 411 on the itinerary of the service. “We’ll have the service in the main chapel. There’s more room in there.”
The front door of the funeral home opened, and the movement at the far end of the hall grabbed Ben’s attention. The sight snagged his heart and jerked the rest of him around. He blinked twice at the vision that could be no other person on the earth.
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