The You I Never Knew

by Susan Wiggs

  “All right,” Cody said at last, keeping his chin up despite his capitulation. “Whatever.”

  “Well,” Michelle said, trying to dissipate the tension. “I suppose we have to decide what’s going to happen next.”

  “You’re going to finish this operation thing and then we’re going back home,” Cody said.

  “It could happen that way,” she conceded. “Is that what you want?”

  “Why would I want anything else?”

  “No reason, maybe,” Sam said, and she was glad he spoke up, because she couldn’t think of anything more to say. “But then again, maybe there is a reason.”

  Silence. And sadness. Sam’s words filled Michelle with a huge ache. Because in her heart she knew they had both made cocoons of themselves. And somehow, it had diminished them. No strings, no connections. Safe from love, safe from hurt.

  “So what are you talking about? You think I want you to take me to baseball games and buy me stuff and all that crap?” Cody demanded. “I’m a little old for that.”

  “Good. I can’t stand baseball. Hate shopping.” Sam drilled him again. That stare was powerful. Where did he learn to do that? Michelle wondered.

  “So here’s the deal,” Sam continued. “If you feel okay in the morning, and it’s all right with your mom, you come out to my place. See how that foal’s doing. Maybe we’ll talk some, maybe we won’t. We’ll just see.”

  Cody sat stiff and silent for a while. “What if I don’t feel like it?”

  “Then you don’t come.” But Michelle and Sam had both seen it. The spark in the boy’s face when Sam mentioned the horse. “You stay here and… do whatever it is you do.”

  More silence. Cody was as still as a stone, but she knew a battle raged inside him. Finally, he said, “Can I go to my room now?”

  Sam’s face turned hard with a silent demand.

  Finally, reluctantly, Cody added, “Um, please?”

  Wonders never cease, thought Michelle. He asked permission.

  Sam looked at her. “Michelle?”

  “See you in the morning, Cody,” she said. “You can let me know then if you need a ride to Sam’s place.”

  Chapter 19

  Sam watched Cody leave the room, noting the studied slouch, the hands jammed in his pockets. Despite the attitude, he was still a good-looking kid, and Sam had thought so even before he’d figured out who fathered him.

  He wanted to ask Michelle what Cody had been like as a baby, a toddler, a little boy, but each time he thought of all those lost years, he nearly choked on rage and frustration. Those years were gone and there was no way to get them back. But that didn’t stop the hunger in him to know.

  “What’s going through his head right now?” he asked softly.

  “In a minute, probably Marilyn Manson on his Discman. I hate his music. And I hate it that I hate his music, because I love music.”

  “Believe it or not, I understand what you’re saying.”

  That coaxed a fleeting, weary smile from her. Sam knew he should go, but he didn’t want to. Leaning forward, he picked up a sketchbook off the table. “May I?”

  “Sure. It’s work, though. I doubt you’ll find it very interesting.”

  He’d always liked looking at her drawings. When they were young, she’d had the sort of talent that made people do a double take. They’d look, then look again, and then the low-voiced comments would start.

  But when he opened the sketchbook, he didn’t see the wild, emotional abstractions he’d been expecting. These were studies, mostly of inanimate objects—furniture and running shoes and grapes and shower nozzles—and a chilly, anatomical study of a winter merganser in flight. Each was rendered with remarkable control and perfection, as if a computer had done it.

  Michelle shifted on the couch, tucking her feet up under her. “I told you, it’s work. I’m a graphic designer.”

  “You’re damned good,” he said with total honesty. “I can’t believe you quit painting. You were so passionate about it.”

  “Sam, I was eighteen years old. I was passionate about everything—about my art, about horses… about you. The trouble was, life outlasted passion. Some people call it growing up.”

  Her statement thumped into him like a dull blow. The firelight flickered off her cheek, illuminating a haunting sadness in her face. He didn’t like seeing this wistful melancholy in her. But he sure as hell didn’t know how to make it go away.

  “Aw, damn it, Michelle.” He moved closer to her on the sofa. “I didn’t mean to upset you.” And because it was late and he was on autopilot, he did the next thing quite naturally. His arm extended across the back of the seat and went around her.

  In the space of a second, she softened against him, and he couldn’t believe the rush it gave him to feel her like this, pliant and giving. But only a heartbeat later, she seemed to realize what she’d done and pulled away. He let out his breath in relief. His life was finally on track, and getting involved with Michelle Turner could cause a train wreck. Nobody in his right mind wanted a train wreck.

  “I’m all right, really,” she said with a quaver in her voice. “Things’ve been difficult lately.”

  “That’s putting it mildly. But you and your dad are strong. You’ll do great with this procedure. I had a talk with Maggie Kehr today, and she accepted my personal reference. The surgery’s going forward as scheduled.”

  She shut her eyes for a long moment. “Thanks, Sam.” Then she opened her eyes and looked at him. “And… thank you for coming over tonight.”

  “So is Cody what parents like to call a ‘handful’?”

  “Oh, yeah. Year Sixteen has been a real picnic.”

  “I got that idea.”

  “Let’s see. He came home the first week of school with a pierced navel and a cigarette habit. He didn’t even try hiding either one from me. I think he liked seeing the effect self-mutilation had on me.”

  “I imagine he did. What’s the point of piercing something if no one notices?”

  “And your suggestion would be?”

  “I guess I’d ignore it until he injures himself zipping his pants. Then let the wound heal over.”

  “And the smoking?”

  “That’s tougher. Maybe the smell will gross out some girl and he’ll quit.”

  “Cigarettes are one of his girlfriend’s major food groups.”

  “He needs a new girlfriend, then.”

  “Oh, and my telling him so is going to work? Sam, you’re not that naive.”

  He had been once, long ago. He’d believed in a love so strong no outside force, certainly no parental disapproval, could interfere. It had taken Gavin Slade precisely one evening to lay waste to that belief.

  Sam pushed away the thought and concentrated on Cody. “Does he play any sports?”

  “Skateboarding and snowboarding. Even a smoker’s lungs can handle both. Here’s the deal, Sam. I haven’t been the most perfect parent in the universe, but I haven’t been awful, either. Something happens to a kid who’s growing up, something the Dr. Spock books don’t mention. The kid becomes his own person. And sometimes that might be a person who does things that drive you nuts, and nothing you can do will stop him.”

  “Is it possible he wants to be stopped?”

  “You mean is he looking for limits? Of course. Do I draw the line? Of course.” She stood up, went to the window, stuck her hands in her back pockets. “Does he step over the line, of course.”

  Clearly this was familiar territory to Michelle. But there were hidden facets she wasn’t seeing.

  “You know, I reckon it’s none of my business, but it appears to me that you’re so concerned with making the kid happy, giving him some kind of life that looks good on paper, that you’re forgetting something.”

  She turned to face him, defenses going up like an invisible wall. “And you’ve figured this out based on knowing us three days?”

  He sent her a lopsided grin. “Hey, it’s a gift.”

  She roll
ed her eyes.

  “Seriously, Michelle, it’s my job to figure out somebody’s problem based on a fifteen-minute office visit. Sometimes that’s all I get—it happens a lot around here, where most people don’t pay regular visits to the doctor and don’t follow up. I have fifteen minutes to work on a patient’s trouble. In the past five years I’ve had a lot of practice.”

  She folded her arms beneath her breasts and eyed him warily. “All right, you have my attention. Tell me your expert opinion, Doctor.”

  Shit. Why was he doing this?

  He planted his elbows on his knees. “My opinion as a doctor is this—Cody’s like a lot of kids I see. The more rope you give him, the more ways he finds to tangle himself up. He needs a shorter rein.”

  “He didn’t come with a how-to manual,” she said. “That’s the thing about raising a kid, Sam. You have to figure it out as you go along.”

  He felt himself teetering on a precipice. Common sense told him to pull back. His heart made him dive in. “You know as well as any doctor that kids who have unhappy parents wind up a lot more troubled than kids whose parents are relatively content. It doesn’t have anything to do with how much money they earn or the sort of house they live in. It has to do with their perception of their place in the world.”

  “Oh, you’re good, Sam. Let’s make it my fault.”

  “Damn it, Michelle—” He was talking himself into deep shit, so he stopped and studied her, petite and slim, unsmiling and coldly beautiful as she stared at the black squares of the window. Then he glanced at the sketchbook on the table. And finally, he stood, taking a wad of keys from his pocket.

  “Michelle, get your coat. I want to show you something.”

  “But Cody—”

  “We won’t go far.”

  She pulled on a jacket and boots while he did the same. The night wind slashed at them as they stepped outside. A high three-quarter moon spread a frozen blue glow over the area, and lights from the main house fanned across the yard. Sam led the way along the darkened drive past the cluster of bunkhouses. At the last one, he turned and waded over the unshoveled walk to the front door.

  Angling his wad of keys toward the light, he selected one, old and worn, nearly lost in the mass of other keys. “Wonder if it still fits.”

  Michelle stood silently by as he inserted the key. It stuck, but that was mainly from the cold. Then it turned, and he opened the door, stepping into a room he hadn’t seen in seventeen years.

  Ghosts haunted this moonlit place. The presence of sheet-draped furniture heightened the eerie effect. He flicked a switch, and the light came on. “Remember this?”

  “What would you do if I said no?”

  “Call you a liar.” He plucked a sheet off a threadbare chair, and one off a nearby table.

  “Sam, I don’t see the point—Oh.”

  He watched her take in the scene, wishing he knew her better, wishing he knew what she was feeling. He’d counted on Gavin Slade having a hidden streak of sentimentality, and he’d been right. The old man had left this place alone, a shrine to the daughter who had walked out of his life.

  “It’s exactly the way it was when I used to work here.” Michelle’s words made little frozen puffs in the air.

  Gavin had equipped the bungalow especially for her. It had a drafting table, easels and clipboards, tons of canvas and jars of brushes, tubes of paint. Everything was still there, left to atrophy with time and neglect. Sam removed another sheet to reveal an old-fashioned sofa, covered in flea-bitten velveteen.

  The sight of it gave him a flash of memory so hot that he nearly shoved Michelle down on the musty cushions. He remembered the feel of her beneath him, the way her legs went around him, the sound of her breath in his ear. He remembered what it felt like to be buried to the hilt inside her. He remembered what it was like to feel a love so pure and strong that it burned like a flame that would never go out.

  Jesus. It was eighteen degrees in here, and he was starting to sweat. He cast a furtive glance at Michelle to see if she noticed.

  She was blushing red to the tips of her ears.

  “I wonder if it happened there,” he said softly, recklessly. “I wonder if that’s where we made Cody.”

  She caught her breath with a little hiccup. “No. It was the boathouse. It… happened at the boathouse.”

  The place by the river had been their secret retreat, where they could steal away and find privacy together. Suddenly Sam was inundated with memories of that summer. It was the one time in his life when he saw everything with perfect clarity, when he felt absolutely certain he was going in the right direction, absolutely certain he knew what the outcome would be.

  Funny thing about life. It had a way of spinning you around, shooting you off in a totally different direction, like a wild ride on a greenbroke horse. You had no idea where you were heading until you landed ass-first in the dirt.

  “Sam, why did you bring me here?”

  I keep remembering what it was like to be with you. He gritted his teeth to keep from saying it. Instead, he said, “There’s a lot of waiting around involved in transplantation and recovery. You could be painting while you’re here.”

  “No.” She spoke swiftly, decisively. Almost defensively.

  “Why not?”

  “I draw and paint for work. As long as I have this enforced sabbatical, why would I do anything that resembles work?”

  He wanted to say that the paintings she used to do were so different from the sketches in her book that they didn’t resemble work at all, but a gifted mind and eye and hand creating something extraordinary.

  He didn’t say anything. She was hard to read, this grown-up Michelle. One thing was certain—she was in a skittish state, and he didn’t seem to be helping matters.

  He could feel himself moving fast toward a conviction that there were things he and Michelle should explore. What would it be like to get to know her again, to look at her through adult eyes? He could see the yearning in her eyes, the shadows of unfulfilled dreams, and he knew he couldn’t dismiss her from his life when the transplant was over.

  “Besides,” she said, picking up a frozen paint tube, “the supplies are spoiled.”

  “You could replace them easily enough. Next trip to Missoula, you could lay in a bunch of paint and brushes.”

  “I’m really not interested, Sam.”

  He let her words sink in. “We’d better get out of here before we freeze to death.”

  He walked her back to her door and stood there for a moment, studying her in the glow from the porch light.

  Suddenly he felt like a trespasser. “I’ve got to go, Michelle.”

  “ ’Night, Sam.”

  “ ’Night.” His hand, without consulting his head, came up and cupped her cheek.

  She didn’t move. “Your hand is cold.”

  “Your cheek is warm.” He leaned down and kissed it, soft skin and a subtle fragrance of perfume and snow. “I guess I’ll be seeing you around… or not,” he added. Then he walked to his truck, resisting the urge to whistle.

  Chapter 20

  When Michelle rushed back inside the house, she pushed aside the kitchen curtain to catch a last glimpse of Sam. The moon, a cold white smile, threw a stream of light over him, and he held up one hand in farewell. Embarrassed to be caught, she dropped the curtain and leaned against the counter. She was shaking all over. Shaking with memories and wanting and, most of all, with fear. Sam McPhee was part of her past, part of a past she had traveled far, far away from, and she shouldn’t be having this explosive chemical reaction to him. But he was so bound up in things that were important—Cody and her art and Montana and Gavin—that she felt both wildly attracted to him and terrified of him.

  She checked on Cody, finding the door to his room firmly closed. Then she brewed a cup of tea, using two bags to make it stronger, and when she sat down on the sofa, her hand went to the phone.

  After two rings, she was tapping her foot with impatience. He picked u
p on the fourth ring. “Brad Lovell.”

  “It’s me.”

  “Hiya, babe.” He sounded warm and comfortable.

  She smiled, her insides watery with relief. “What are you doing? Are you busy?”

  “Going over some papers. Looks like we’ll be able to afford a condo on Kauai after all—”

  “Brad?”

  “Yeah, babe?”

  “I have to tell you something.”

  “What, you’d rather find a place on Maui?”

  “No, nothing like that.” God. When did he get the impression she wanted a condo in Hawaii in the first place?

  “What is it, Michelle?”

  She blew on her tea, took a sip. “It’s about Cody.”

  “Shit. Is he in trouble already?”

  It bugged her no end that Brad’s first assumption was that Cody got in trouble. It bugged her even more that, basically, he was right.

  “Well, there’s trouble… and there’s trouble.”

  “So you want to tell me, or are we going to play twenty questions?”

  She took another sip, then set her cup down. “It’s about his… about the man who fathered him.”

  “The cowboy.”

  “Yes. Um, he lives in Crystal City now. The other night I… ran into him.” She made a swift decision not to explain the details.

  “So did he recognize you?”

  She was a little insulted by the implication. “Yes. And it didn’t take him long to put two and two together and figure out about Cody.”

  Silence.

  “Brad?”

  “I keep waiting to hear you say you’re going on Oprah with all this.”

  She smiled in spite of herself. “Right. Anyway, we—I told Cody tonight. He wasn’t thrilled, but I think he’s still getting used to the idea.”

  “What about you, Michelle? Are you thrilled?”

  She felt a sting of guilt, because she wanted to be able to say that seeing Sam again meant nothing to her. That she felt nothing.

  “I was shocked, I guess. Surprised. I never thought I’d see him again. But it turns out he did all right for himself, became a doctor, and he’s a partner in a horse ranch about ten miles from here. His name is Sam McPhee.”