Claiming Her_A Romance Collection

by R. R. Banks

  "I understand that my son is eighteen, but he is still my son. If something has happened, I deserve to know about it."

  Andrew was getting angrier and his voice was rising. I could see his hands gripping the side of the desk so hard that his knuckles were turning white. A door behind the desk opened and a man who looked several years older than the guard, and who was dressed in a suit rather than a uniform stepped out. He looked at Andrew and me with a disarming expression.

  "Good afternoon, sir. Is there something that I could help you with?"

  Andrew turned his attention to the man and let out a breath, trying to get himself back under control.

  "My son is supposed to be living in this dorm, but this man has just informed me that he no longer lives here. He won't tell me where he is or why he was moved out of the dorm."

  "What is your son's name?"

  "Michael Long."

  The man's face darkened slightly. The next few minutes went past me in a blur. I knew that people were talking, but their words sank into me without voices. I didn't hear them, but I felt them as they seeped into my brain and became my reality. I didn't remember walking out of the dorm or going across the grounds again. The next moment that I was aware of I was sitting in a cold, silent room. The dark blue carpet and floral furniture looked like it had been chosen to bring a friendly, even home-like feeling into the space, but somehow it only worked to make it more imposing and uncomfortable. I was waiting for a doctor to come and talk to us, to explain to us why Michael was in the hospital.

  A few seconds later the doctor appeared at the door and stepped just inside. He had only started speaking when something about what he was saying struck me.

  "Michael," I said.

  "What?" the doctor asked.

  "Michael. His name is Michael. You called him Jeff."

  The doctor looked at me strangely and glanced down at the chart in his hands.

  "It says here, Jeffrey Long."

  I nodded.

  "Jeffrey Michael Long. He has always gone by Michael."

  "Jeffrey was my father's name," Andrew said. "I named him after him, but I never intended him to be called that. He's only ever been called Michael."

  "I'm sorry," the doctor said. "I didn't know."

  "You didn't know?" I asked. "How can you be treating him and not know what people call him?"

  The doctor looked at me with a still-expressionless face.

  "When Jeff came in--"

  "Michael."

  He gave a single nod.

  "I'm sorry. Yes. Michael. When Michael came in, he wasn't in any condition to speak to us. He couldn't communicate. We only had his identification card to go by, and that has his legal name on it."

  "He hasn't corrected you?"

  "No. He is still having only periods of lucidity."

  I knew what that meant. I knew that the diagnosis they had said when we came in meant that the future he had planned was now tattered.

  Just then a woman in scrubs appeared at the door, followed closely by Michael. He was wearing a sweatsuit and though I could still see him, the person he really was, he no longer looked like him. He gazed at his father and then at me, then back at his father. For a few seconds, he didn't seem to know why he was there.

  "Your sister is here," the nurse said leadingly, gesturing at me.

  "I'm not his sister," I said through gritted teeth. I stood, taking a step toward him. "I'm his fiancée."

  The nurse looked embarrassed, but Michael's eyes brightened slightly.

  "Gwendolyn," he said, his voice powdery as though he hadn't used it recently.

  I closed the space between us and he took me in his arms. I felt myself melting into him, closing my eyes and pretending that nothing had changed, that all of this wasn't really happening. I stepped out of the embrace and started to lean to kiss him, but Michael turned to look at the nurse.

  "I told you that she was here. You said she wasn't."

  "What?" I said. "What do you mean?"

  "I heard you last night. You were singing in the hallway outside my room, but when I came out to see you, you weren't there. I tried to find you, but they said that you weren't even here."

  I shook my head.

  "I wasn't here last night," I told him. "I just got here this morning."

  Michael glared at me angrily.

  "No," he said. "I heard you. Why are you lying?"

  I felt like the breath had been taken out of me. I didn't recognize him anymore. I looked at the nurse and then the doctor, my mouth open, words not coming out.

  "I think that it's just about dinner time," the nurse said as if trying to break the tension. "Come on." She took Michael by the shoulders and started leading him out of the room. "Let's go get something to eat."

  The doctor told us that we could return the next day and that he would try to tell us more about what was happening. Andrew agreed, and we left the hospital, nothing left to do but to go to the hotel we had reserved and wait for the next day. We were walking across the parking lot when we heard a voice coming from behind us.

  "Mr. Long?"

  Andrew and I turned around and saw a young woman rushing toward us with a bag in her hand. She held it out to him.

  "These are Jeff's belongings. The doctor said to give them to you."

  "Michael," I growled at her, the tears finally spilling over the bottom lids of my eyes and flowing down my cheeks. My voice rose to a scream. "His name is Michael!"

  I didn't realize that I was lunging toward the woman until I felt Andrew's arm wrap around my waist and start dragging me back.

  Present day…

  I brushed the tears away from my cheeks and shook my head. I wanted to put the thoughts back in the section of my mind where I had delegated them. I knew that they would never go away. Those memories and the emotions that they brought up would never just disappear. Now though, it was a new rush of emotion that cut through me. I could still hear myself screaming at the nurse, and now when that went through my mind, I saw Garrett in front of me. I heard his voice sliding through his gritted teeth as he explained Jason's name. The assumption that I had made and the pain that it had caused felt like a rock landing in my belly.

  I was still seething about my confrontation with Garrett, but now I also felt bad. My emotions felt torn and raw inside of me. I hadn't meant to hurt Garrett, but I also felt hurt by him. He obviously wasn't who I thought he was and now any chances that I might have had at pursuing a relationship with him were gone. With that, though, came even greater determination to reach out to Jason. Garrett had told me to back off, to not do my job, but I wasn't going to listen to him. I felt like I was all that Jason had. Garrett didn't know what he was doing, what type of damage he could be causing for Jason's future. If I didn't intervene, he was going to turn out exactly like his father, and while he was being touted as such an amazing fire chief, I could see now that he wasn't the person who everyone thought he was.

  I looked back at The Reverend.

  "You were right," I said. "I never should have even thought about a relationship."

  Chapter Eleven

  Garrett

  I glared at the black leather bag sagging on the floor in front of the laundry room. I felt like we were in a stand-off. If I stood here in the hallway glaring at it long enough, maybe it would vaporize. Or at the very least, unzip itself and tip into the washing machine. Unfortunately, there was no such luck and I eventually walked up to it and grabbed it.

  This is ridiculous. Jason needs to start doing his own laundry.

  I brought the bag into the laundry room and opened it on the folding table, immediately regretting my actions. The table was now coated with fine red dirt and I got a face full of the smell of a teenage boy's baseball uniform after a long practice. I closed the bag as fast as I could and stomped out into the hallway and to the bottom of the stairs.

  "Jason, get down here."

  A few seconds later he came lumbering down the stairs, looking startl
ed.

  "What did I do?"

  "I have no idea, but it smells like something died in your baseball bag."

  "Oh. Yeah. Coach had us run extra laps today and since he wants me to diversify and try catching, I did it in pads."

  He was grinning widely, and I couldn't help but feel a pulse of pride go through me. It had been several weeks since my showdown with Gwendolyn -- Miss Martin -- and something seemed to have clicked in Jason. He had tried out for the baseball team and made it. He had calmed down and gotten rid of most of his attitude. And while I wasn't expecting to be clearing space on the mantel for any student awards anytime soon, I also hadn't gotten any more calls from the principal or letters home from his teacher. He seemed to have made a meaningful turn and I felt both relieved and hopeful that this was just the beginning of the improvements I had wanted for him. For both of us.

  At that moment, though, what was most pressing was the chemical warfare that was happening in the laundry room. Today was the day that my son got the lesson he should have many years before and learned how to wash his own laundry. That way I could make sure that I was at a good distance any other time that black bag made its appearance in the house.

  I walked him through the process of separating out the laundry, choosing the correct settings on the washing machine, and dosing out the laundry detergent. As I watched him very carefully go through each step, moving almost impossibly slowly to make sure that he was doing it correctly, I got a rush of "single dad" feeling. I didn't think of our relationship that way very often. Of course, I was aware that I was, in fact, a single father. But I felt in a way like that was how it had always been like that was just the way it was supposed to be with Jason and me. It was the two of us, we didn't need anyone else. We just went about our lives without really thinking about how anyone else lived theirs. It was moments like this, however, that underscored that I was all that he had. I had to be both parents for him. I had to be the one who he both talked to about his baseball practice and got tips for his technique, and then taught him how to wash his uniform. I remembered when I learned how to do laundry. I was much younger than Jason, and I was in the foster home I wished that I could stay in forever. The mother, a short, pudgy, sweet-smelling woman, who was the one person that kept me from spiraling completely out of control any earlier than I did, brought me into the laundry room one day and proclaimed that I was going to learn how to do the laundry. Every man should know how to wash clothes, do dishes, and cook at least four meals, she said. That way if you find yourself alone or with one of those women who don't do that kind of stuff, you will be able to take care of yourself.

  None of that had meant anything to me at the time. I thought that she was just rattling on, the way that she often did about her younger years or what she had heard at the beauty shop that week. Now though, I wondered if she had seen something in me, something that told her that I was going to need these skills one day. I often wondered how my life would have changed if I had been able to stay with her longer. If They -- the mysterious "They" who always warranted a capital letter and seemed to be able to control everything in the world -- hadn't decided that she couldn't handle a brood of boys rapidly heading into preteen and teen years, and I had been able to stay there rather than being shuffled around, would things have been different?

  The washing machine roared to life and Jason dropped the lid down triumphantly. I smiled at him and patted him on the back.

  "Congratulations, son, you are one step closer to self-sufficiency."

  "Awesome. When's dinner going to be ready? I'm starving."

  "What about your homework?"

  He sighed.

  "I'll get it done," he said.

  "Well, if you hit the books, I'll hit the kitchen and we'll meet back up in about an hour."

  Jason gave another labored sigh as if I had asked him to go outside and build me a smokehouse so I could get started on some bacon for next winter, but he turned and walked out of the laundry room and back toward his bedroom. I headed into the kitchen, trying to figure out what it was that I was going to make that night. This is the pattern that my life had fallen into. Other than that first fire that happened the day Jason brought the letter home from school, work had been silent. I supposed that was a good thing. I probably shouldn't be hoping that somebody would experience a devastating car crash or have their house light on fire just so that I could have some more excitement in my life. In the back of my mind though, I knew that it wasn't just about the excitement. I needed more because I wanted to spend as little time as possible in the firehouse. Every minute that I spent there was a reminder of Gwendolyn. After the first few days, the rest of the team started working normal shifts again, which meant that I wasn't alone in the station anymore. I was constantly surrounded by the other firefighters sitting around waiting, playing cards, watching TV and eating. On the overnight shifts, we would go upstairs to the barracks to sleep. I knew that we were all waiting for something to happen in those hours. We were waiting to be awakened by the scream of the alarm or an emergency phone call. But even that didn't stop some of the guys from falling deep asleep and spending those hours snoring.

  I rarely got any sleep on those nights. While the other guys were just trying to pass the time, I was trying to keep my mind from worrying about if Jason was alright at home alone, with just a check-in from one of my crew that was off and a phone call from me. I also tried to keep my mind away from Gwendolyn. I was trying not to think about the nights that she had come to the firehouse to visit me. It was like I could still feel her there with me. I could still hear her voice. It was driving me crazy. I was torn between not being able to stand the woman, and not being able to stop wanting her. The passion that I felt for her was so intense, so blistering, so close to hatred, it was almost tangible. There were times when it felt like the angrier I was at her, and the more I let myself think about how much she reminded me of all the other women who had disappointed me, lied to me, clung to me, the more I felt like I needed her. I couldn't stop myself from feeling like she had betrayed me somehow. The more that I thought about it, the less that I really understood how I was feeling, or why.

  The weather was unseasonably warm that night and after dinner, I told Jason that I was going to take a walk. I needed the fresh air and solitude to clear my mind. I shoved my hands deep into my pockets and started wandering my way through the neighborhood and into the center of town. I was so lost in my thoughts that I didn't even realize how far I had walked or where I was going. When I looked around me I saw that I had found my way back to the neighborhood that I had lived in before leaving Silver Lake. It has been so long since I had seen it that I wasn't entirely sure that's what I was looking at. My memories of these places were the memories of a child, but the longer I stood there the more I knew that that's where I was. I could remember running down the sidewalk with the one friend that I had in the neighborhood at the time. He was older than me, but I always had fun chasing him and trying to keep up with his games. I let my feet follow the same path that they had run so many years before. I could imagine them touching the same parts of the cement, covering over the tiny impressions that my shoes would have made then. It was like I was covering the memories, replacing them in a way, protecting them.

  I paused in the middle of the sidewalk, looking down at a crack in the cement. In my mind, I could see that same crack, narrower and fresher. Now it had been widened by time and rain and the pressure of people walking over it. The edges had crumbled, creating a larger space. Tiny plants were growing in it now, making their way up from the ground beneath it through the harsh, cold cement and up toward the sun. I knew exactly where that crack was in the cement. I knew the space in the sidewalk that it marked. I took a breath and let my eyes run across the sidewalk and over the narrow stretch of grass beside it, to the base of a white picket fence that marked a front yard. Paint that had once been a bright, pure white, was now faded and softened by the years and the wind. Flakes were forming on it n
ow, and I wondered how long it had been since it had been painted. Or even if it had been painted at all since that summer when my father crouched beside it and drew the paintbrush up each slat in long strokes, turning what had once been ash gray wood into pristine white. He had done that for my mother. I would never forget that.

  My eyes lifted higher to the winter-deadened grass that stretched beyond the fence. The blades no longer stood upright. Instead, they looked like they had collapsed beneath the weight of the years, and tangled into each other until they created a thick carpet that led toward the back. There the ornamental grass of what had once been a landscaped front yard gave way to a tall growth of weeds. It took several minutes before I could bring myself to bring my gaze to the house itself. Like the fence, once-white wood was now flaking and grayed, and black shutters were bleached pale, some hanging from the windows, where they had been pulled away from the house by storms. I walked a few more steps until I stood at the gate. It was secured in place, the lock rusted from disuse. I stood at it and stared at the house. The door was closed, but that wasn't the way that I remembered it. The last time that I saw the house, the door was standing open. I hadn't closed it behind me when I ran, and I hadn't touched it since. I wondered who had been the last one to close it. Had it been one of the police officers? A member of the cleaning crew? The lawyer?

  "No one lives there anymore."

  I turned and looked over my shoulder toward the voice. A bent elderly man stood in the pool of light spreading across the sidewalk from the streetlamp. The light seemed to be getting brighter, more clearly defined as the evening darkened around us, but the hat that he wore kept his features under shadow.

  "Excuse me?" I asked.

  "That house," he said. "Nobody lives there anymore. They haven't in some years now."

  I nodded and looked at the house and then back at him.