by Natalie Ann
“Working,” he said, cracking the barest of grins. Reaching forward, he pulled her into his arms. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah, why?”
“You seem awfully distracted.” He hugged her for the moment. She seemed like she could use it.
“Just a lot on my mind.”
He heard the hitch in her voice and tilted her head back with this hand to see tears in her eyes. “Aw, baby, what’s wrong?”
She started to sniffle, trying to hold back the tears, he saw, but it didn’t matter. They started to run down her face.
“Nothing,” she said, pulling the neck of her shirt up and wiping her face on the inside of it.
“Since I’m looking at the tears on your face, I’d say you’re a big fat liar.”
Her lips twitched, just what he was hoping for. “Nothing major. I was having a flashback of my mother.”
“Want to talk about it?” She shrugged but didn’t say anything. “Come on, tell me. Maybe it will help. Did you remember something that might help you with your search?”
“I wish, but no.”
“Talk to me then. Just tell me what you remembered.”
“It’s really nothing important, Drew. I was remembering the last time I painted a room. It was with my mother and I was a child. I don’t even remember how old I was. Young, elementary school, probably second or third grade. It had more to do with the conversation we were having.”
“You remember the conversation?” he asked, amused.
“Yeah, what’s so funny about that?”
“Nothing really. I remember things like that with my mother all the time, but not when I’m awake.” He laughed at her confused face. “I used to dream about my mother all the time,” he explained. “My father still does, and Brynn, too. Those dreams seemed so real, like she was standing right next to me.”
“Really? I’ve never had that happen. What did she say?”
“Nothing much, I guess. It’s the way she was. Her movements and actions, the look in her eyes.”
He missed that more than he could say. The way she kissed his cheek when she left each morning, or the way his father and mother flirted back and forth all the time. The love that had always shown so bright in his mother’s eyes.
He’d never get over the loss of her, and though it got better, there were times he wished she’d come to him in his dreams so he could remember some more. It’d been too long since he’d seen her. Not since Brynn had said she was pregnant almost a year ago.
“Oh. I don’t have memories like that. My mother wasn’t very affectionate. I mean she was, but not like what I think you mean. She’d hug me and kiss me now and again, but not all the time. More like rubbing her hand on my head, petting is a better word.”
He felt sorry hearing her say that, but didn’t think she’d want his sympathy. “So tell me about this conversation you were having with her. Or remember having with her.”
“We were painting the living room at our house. It was just the two of us and it seemed like a lot of work for us. I’d asked why we couldn’t ask someone to help us.”
“What’d she say?”
“She said I had to learn to do things on my own. Pretty much told me to never rely on others because they didn’t keep their word even when they said they would. She was always saying things like that.”
“That’s kind of harsh to say to a child.”
He couldn’t imagine his parents being that straightforward about things when he was young. They taught him about life and expectations, but not like she was obviously taught.
She lifted her shoulders slightly. “It was the way she was. She didn’t have a lot of friends and she didn’t trust anyone.”
“Was your mother running from the law?”
Laughing, she asked, “Why would you say that?”
“It’s the first thing that popped into my head. You said she was mistrustful of people and didn’t have a lot of friends. You don’t know anything at all about her family or childhood. That seems like a rational assumption.”
“I guess when you put it that way. But she worked for the court system for the State of Florida. She had to go through background checks and such, so if she were running from the law, they would have found her. Trust me, she might have run away, but she wasn’t running from anyone, or hiding from them.”
“Did she ever make any comments about friends in her past? Anything like that?”
He watched as she frowned then shook her head. “No. She had some friends she talked to at work, but she never went out with anyone and did anything. She never went on any dates that I remember, either. Whatever happened to her in terms of my father must have soured her on men in general. I hate to say she was a lonely woman, but I guess she really was.”
“That’s sad, Jordyn.”
“It is. But I don’t remember her being sad, if that makes sense. She always seemed happy. I guess, whatever was in her past, she reconciled with it and moved on. Sort of.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“It’s just she never made excuses or anything. She lived her life and encouraged me to live mine. She never said I couldn’t have friends or couldn’t date. Nothing like that. She actually expected me to. She wanted me to have freedom to do things, but I felt bad leaving her alone. That last year of her life I began to notice that she seemed to have regrets.”
“About?”
“I think the secrecy. She often told me that she hoped her negative attitude on life hadn’t rubbed off on me and that she hoped I learned to live life to the fullest. Something she felt she never did, and missed so many things because of it. Like I said, she never seemed negative in general about life, just men, so it was a confusing comment to me.”
He heard the sadness in her voice and he hoped that he’d be able to help her live her life that way too.
“It seems to me you’re trying new things and enjoying them.”
She smiled softly at him and his heart started to thump, and then it felt as if it dropped right into his stomach and rolled around. “I am, thanks to you.”
“My pleasure.”
And it was. He enjoyed being with her, learning about her, helping her learn new things. Not only about life, but also about herself.
“Anyway, in her letter to me, she said her biggest regret was never telling me my father’s name, and that it started to eat her alive.”
“If she felt that way, then why not tell you when she was alive? Why not tell you about that package? None of that makes sense to me.”
He was frustrated over it, so he couldn’t imagine why she wouldn’t be.
“I don’t know. I’ll never know, I guess.”
“What did her letter say? Do you mind me asking?”
He’d brought it up a few times, but she’d never gone into any detail on it. He suspected it was a pretty basic letter at this point.
“You can read it if you want. There wasn’t much in there to lead me to anything in the past. Just that she was sorry she held his name back and it was time for me to know. That maybe I could find the comfort that she never had as a child. The rest was just information on where titles to the house and her things were. Basic stuff.”
He wasn’t sure he wanted to read the letter. It seemed pretty personal, and though she made the offer, he could tell she would be just as happy if he didn’t look at it.
“And you have no idea what that comment meant? About her never finding comfort as a child?”
“No. I feel like her letter and that package opened up Pandora’s box, making me ask more questions than if she never said anything. I’d kind of given up hope of ever knowing anything about her family or my father, and I feel like that letter is really stopping me from grieving.”
She started to cry again, even harder now. He’d thought she was relaxing and wasn’t as upset, but now it seemed a dam was breaking open.
“I feel like I’m stuck in a place with nowhere to go and don’t know where to look. Nothing ma
kes sense and I’m pissed off she did this to me.”
He held her tight. It was the first time he’d seen her show any real emotion at all. Not just sadness, but anger, true anger.
“I’m sorry, Jordyn. I shouldn’t have brought it up and made you feel this way.”
“It’s not your fault. Maybe it’s good for me to let it out. I don’t often. I’ve decided to give myself a timeline for answers.”
He was rubbing his hand up and down her back now, trying to calm her. “For what?”
“I’m giving myself no more than one year from when I read the letter to find answers. If I don’t find anything, then I’m going to stop looking. My whole life I wanted to know these things but pushed them aside. I don’t like the way I feel now trying to find them. I have to move on at some point and I feel I can’t if I’m always looking in the past. If this is always hanging over my head. I don’t think it’s healthy for me. For anyone.”
“I’ll help you. I’ll help you move forward any way I can, but you can’t forget the past either. No one can.”
See You Fall
Jordyn wiped her face on her shirt again. She felt like crap now. Every time she cried she felt physically ill afterward. The last thing she wanted to do was cry in front of Drew. What must he think of her?
“Anyway, sorry about all of this. I’m sure you’ve got work to do, so I’ll let you get to it.” She moved a few more feet back from him and picked up the can of primer and started to open the lid.
“Let me help you.”
“You aren’t here to help me paint. You’ve got your own work to do.”
She didn’t need him to help her; she could do it alone. Didn’t she just get done telling him that she learned to do things on her own?
“I do, and I’ll go up there in a minute. I meant don’t do anything now and let me help you do this later and this weekend.”
“No. That doesn’t feel right to me.”
“Why’s that?”
“I’m not paying you to do it.”
“Hell no, you aren’t.”
She didn’t mean to insult him. That wasn’t what she meant when she said those words. “I meant that I don’t feel right with you helping me to do this. It’s not part of the contract I have with Harper’s.”
“Jordyn, I want to help you as my girlfriend. I know I just told you the past can’t be forgotten, but what your mother told you isn’t true. You can rely on others. You can ask for help. Some people do keep their word.”
She was going to cry again. She felt the tears gathering in her eyes. It was probably the worst thing he could have said to her. Not that she didn’t believe him, because she did, but it didn’t help with getting her emotions under control.
“It’s hard to wipe away everything I knew growing up.”
“I’m not asking you to wipe it away. I’m asking you to give me a chance to prove to you that what you know isn’t necessarily the truth.”
She thought for a moment on what he said. It made sense, but she still didn’t feel right about it. It felt like she was taking advantage of him. “Can we compromise?”
“Maybe?” he said smirking. “It depends on if I get to help you or not.”
“I’m set up to do this room, and I’m in that mindset, so I’m going to do it. And then I’m going to move on to the next room I planned on doing. Whatever I don’t get done by the time you’re finished for the day, we can do together this weekend.”
“That I will agree to.”
“See, I can compromise. Aren’t you proud of me?”
He leaned down and kissed her tenderly on the lips. “Yeah, I am.”
“Are you here to help us or to stand around kissing the client?”
Jordyn turned her head to see an older man standing in the doorway of her living room. She’d never seen him before and didn’t even know he was in her house. She’d been pretty good about keeping track of who had been coming and going while she was home.
“I didn’t know you were working here today,” Drew said, turning her and putting his arm around her waist. “Jordyn, this is my father, Andy Palmer.”
She felt the heat traveling up her neck and into her face. Talk about first impressions.
She eyed Andy and noticed his amused expression, the same grin as Drew’s, the same brown eyes sparkling with mischief. He walked forward and offered his hand. “It’s nice to finally meet you, Jordyn. I’ve heard a lot about you. You’re keeping him in line, I hope.”
Her eyes darted back and forth between the two of them. “It’s nice to meet you too, Mr. Palmer. Drew was helping me…” She stopped that statement when Andy burst out laughing.
“Call me Andy,” he said, winking at her. “Now come make me proud, Drew, and get your butt upstairs and walk through Jordyn’s master bath with me. We should be able to start it early next week.”
Drew leaned down and gave her a quick kiss on the lips and walked out of the room laughing. She could hear them walking up the steps while she tried to keep her mortification at bay. Andy had obviously heard the end of their conversation with the way he told Drew to make him proud.
***
“Well, I guess that answers things for me.”
Drew looked over at his father after he’d made that comment. “What’s that?”
“You and Jordyn. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to see how you feel about her. I didn’t have to hear you trying to convince her to let you help her either. Or see the tears on her face that you were trying to stop.”
“Do you have a problem with it?” He’d never known his father to really pry before in any of his relationships.
“Not at all. I guess I’m a little sad.”
That made no sense. “Sad over what?”
“That my Colleen isn’t here to see you fall.”
Drew dropped his head down and looked away from his father’s knowing grin. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he argued.
“Yeah, you do. But you can keep fighting it if you want, or keep denying it. Whatever works for you.”
Maybe he could talk to his father about this. His father had always been there for him before, just like his mother used to be. “Is it supposed to feel like a huge weight on my chest when I see her upset?”
“Absolutely. That’s all part of it, Drew. You want to help her. You want to protect her. And at the same time you don’t want her to know you are doing those things.”
Bull’s-eye. He didn’t know how his father became so wise. “I didn’t mean to make her cry.”
“I don’t think you had as much to do about it as you think. Brynn filled me in on some things going on with Jordyn. It seems she has a lot of baggage. Are you okay with that?”
“I wouldn’t be here if I weren’t.” He didn’t like the sound of that word—“baggage”.
Yeah, Jordyn had baggage, but not in the bad way he’d always thought of before with other women. This was different. Jordyn was different.
“Do you think you can help her?”
“I’d like to think I am, even if it’s not with helping her find the answers she’s looking for.”
That wasn’t the only thing he was trying to help her with. He wanted her to learn to live her life to her fullest. She’d said she had a new lease on life and he wanted to help her find it. He wanted to help her find the person she wanted to be. He just hoped that person still wanted to be with him.
“You’re a good kid, Drew. Your mother would be so proud.”
“I’m far from a kid anymore.”
“That’s true, but you’ll always be a kid to me. And that helping nature of yours—that protective one that makes you want to do all those things for Jordyn—that’s from your mom.”
“I’m pretty sure it’s from you too.”
He’d never known his father to not do everything in his power to give his wife or children what they wanted or needed.
“I’d say you’ve got the good and the bad from both of us.”
“The bad, huh?”
“There is such a thing as being overprotective and a bit smothering. You’ll have to learn where that line is and walk it carefully.”
“How much of the conversation did you hear between Jordyn and me?”
He was starting to wonder if his father was there all along and heard the frustration in Drew’s voice trying to get Jordyn to accept his help.
“Just the tail end of it, but I know you, and I know your caring nature. It’s a good thing to have; just remember to tread carefully.”
It reminded him of what Brynn had said to him weeks ago about treading carefully with Andy. Maybe Drew was a bit overbearing at times. He wouldn’t say he was controlling, that was all Brynn, but Drew felt like he wanted to take care of everyone.
“Have I overstepped myself with you?” he asked hesitantly.
“Not recently, you haven’t.” He didn’t miss the humor in his father’s eyes.
“I’m not apologizing for when you were hurt. You needed someone to tell you to cut it out and rest.”
It was true. His father’s accident had scared him silly and he wasn’t apologizing for getting on his father’s case about taking it easy and resting. He only wanted Andy to recover fully.
“I didn’t expect you would, and no worries there. Your mother blistered my ears one night in a dream, telling me not to get frustrated with you, that you only meant well.”
“Do you dream about her all the time?”
Andy always talked about the dreams and their mother, and he loved his father for that. Loved that his father kept those memories of their mother alive so much. But Drew wanted his own memories. He needed his own visits from his mother from time to time.
“Define all the time?”
“Once a week. Once a month,” he amended.
“Not as often as that. I keep her memories alive in my mind before I fall asleep each night. But she comes to me when she thinks I need it the most. She’ll come to you too when you need it. Don’t worry.”
He wasn’t worried. But he wondered what his mother felt was a need compared to what he wanted.
Your Family