“Those old vinyl things you have in your closet?” Kat asked.
“Those are the ones,” Laura replied.
Laura had never been able to make herself part with her original Beatles forty-fives and albums. She also had recordings of Gary Puckett and The Union Gap, The Mindbenders and Frankie Avalon, Kenny Loggins and Air Supply. Laura loved music. She always had. In the flower shop when she was arranging flowers, she played everything from Elton John’s “Aida,” to Bon Jovi, to Il Divo. She liked passion in her music.
They’d had passion between them…until it had been stunted by the hours he put into his company…by the needs of Sean and Kat…by an undercurrent they’d both denied. Especially the past couple of years. He hadn’t acted on desire when he’d felt it. He’d put everything else first.
When had Laura stopped waiting up for him?
When had he decided not to wake her for early-morning loving?
When had living started interfering with loving instead of adding to it?
After Jason died? After they adopted Sean? When Sean reached his teenage years and had started visibly rebelling against Brady?
Why was he being so damn philosophical this morning?
Because he felt Laura slipping away.
She wanted some kind of spiritual connection they’d had early in their marriage. The memory of it was what kept them together. Their history kept them together. Ironically, their children kept them together as well as pushed them apart.
But what would happen when Kat went to college, too, and he and Laura rambled through the house? Then what? They would have to either begin all over again or—
“So Dad, give her your present now,” Sean urged him, with an enthusiasm Brady thought was a bit forced.
Brady suddenly realized he and Sean might be more alike than he ever imagined. They were both pretenders. For all these years, Brady had pretended he was fine, that he could live a normal life, that he could have a family and find satisfaction in that. Since his heart attack, however, he now saw clearly that he’d just been going through the motions. That was what Sean was doing now with him—saying what he had to say to encourage harmony, going along instead of fighting against, biding his time until he left and was on his own.
Brady pushed his chair back, went to the counter and lifted the package he’d set there. He’d bought one of those gift bags at Wal-Mart and put his presents in that.
He took the gift to Laura and handed it to her. “I hope you like it.”
She pulled out the framed photo first. It was a picture of Sean and Kat, one of those posed photographs where someone had said, Let’s get a picture of the two of you together.
Laura gazed up at Brady, her eyes shimmering. “Thank you. I needed a recent one to put on the mantel.”
He didn’t say anything. He knew that to her the photograph was worth ten digital cameras.
When she drew out the box with the camera, she seemed a little puzzled.
“Now you don’t have to use Sean’s,” Brady explained. “Since he’ll be taking it with him when he goes to college, I thought you might like to have one of your own.”
Standing, she gave him a kiss and a hug. He held her for a few moments, appreciating the fragrance that usually surrounded her, missing the feel of her in his arms.
When she leaned away, she murmured, “Thank you. I can probably photograph the flower arrangements to feature in my brochures. Did Pat take you shopping?”
“No, Sean did. He’s familiar with the camera’s features.”
Her gaze fell affectionately on her son. “Never expected to be chauffeur, did you?”
“Dad wasn’t even a back-seat driver.”
Brady could hear the surprise in Sean’s voice. Apparently his son always expected criticism from him, although Brady tried to not criticize.
In some ways, he felt as if he’d been sleepwalking before heart surgery. Yet now, any step he took toward Sean or Laura was like foreign territory.
Looking a bit uncertain, Laura set the camera on the table. “Thank you all for the brunch and gifts. It was great. I’ll have the charm attached tomorrow. And the camera—I’ll be able to use that at Sean’s graduation party. Which we have to discuss. I thought we’d have it next Sunday afternoon. I’ve already called the caterer. Should I invite your friends, our friends and family? Or would you rather have a separate party just for you and your classmates?”
Sean stared down at the floor, then back at them. “It’s really great you want to give me a party and all. But I…”
He stopped for a moment and Brady sensed he was gathering his words. When he felt strongly about something, they wouldn’t come to him. It was a symptom of dyslexia.
“I…I really don’t expect any big explosion over this. Everybody graduates from high school. If you would like to invite Aunt Pat and Jack and Angie, that’s okay, but not a lot more. As far as the kids at school, there are lots of parties. I don’t need to add another one. A few of us are going up to Gary’s cabin Memorial Day weekend.”
“Will his parents be there?” Laura asked.
“His dad’s coming up to stay overnight.”
“Don’t make light of graduating from high school, Sean. You’ve put in more work and effort than any kid I know,” Brady said, quickly seizing the opportunity to give Sean a well-deserved pat on the back.
“It takes me hours sometimes to do what most kids can do in two,” Sean said. “When I imagine writing papers and taking notes and organizing them and the hours of outside reading—” he shook his head “—I know you don’t want to hear this, but I’ve been thinking about not going to Prescott. I’ve checked into an associate-degree program in graphic design at a school in Scranton.”
“You have to go to college, Sean.” Brady’s voice was firm. His son had to realize how competitive the world was now, how more, not less, education was necessary. “You might want the easy way out now, but in the long run it won’t be easy. Don’t compromise your future.”
All at once Sean’s affability disappeared and his expression became defiant. “Getting an associate degree isn’t the easy way out. It’s what I believe I can handle. You want to be able to tell your friends I got a college degree. Well, I don’t care about a B.S. or a B.A. I want to do something I want to do. For eighteen years I’ve followed your orders and your road map. Now I want to choose my own. If you won’t pay for it, I’ll get loans. Other kids do.”
His chair scraped on the tile as he pushed it back, stood and went to the back door. “I’m going to spend the afternoon with Gary and Boyd. Tonight there’s a party with kids from Red Lion. They don’t know me and I don’t know them. I won’t have to worry…about hearing anything I don’t want to hear. I won’t have to worry about defending you.”
His words were arrows, aimed straight at Brady. And they hit the bull’s-eye in his soul.
Before he could even call Sean’s name, his son was out the door.
Chapter 13
“You shouldn’t be doing that,” Brady said roughly the following Sunday afternoon as he came up behind Laura and settled his strong hands around her waist.
She’d been reattaching a light that had slipped from its clip on the patio awning. But she was standing on one of the lawn chairs, precariously perched. Today was Sean’s graduation party and they were almost ready.
Her husband was looking so much more like himself, in charcoal slacks and an open-collared gray shirt. Her heart beat faster as she simply stared at him. “This one slipped.”
“You could fall and break something. Then where would we be?”
Although his voice was heavy with criticism, she heard the concern there, too. At least that was something. His hands at her waist…that was something else. He hadn’t really touched her in a sensual way since before his surgery. And even then there had been no tenderness in it—not the tenderness they’d once shared.
Gazing down into his blue eyes, she wished she knew what he was thinking and feeling. But
not knowing had become the norm. She did suspect Sean’s parting remark last Sunday had bothered Brady. But he wouldn’t admit it.
He must have seen the remnants of sadness she was experiencing pass over her face, because he asked, “What?”
Lightly placing her hands on his shoulders, loving the solid feel of him under her fingers, she stepped down from the chair. She knew better than to start a discussion now, when guests were going to arrive any minute. “I was just thinking—you begin rehab tomorrow. Are you ready for it?”
He stepped away from her and that distance was there again. But so much more than physical distance.
“I’m more than ready, though I still tire too easily. I’m hoping getting in shape again will fix that.”
“You’ll have to go slow at first.”
“I have common sense, Laura. I’m not going to do anything to set me back.”
The impatience was in his voice again—an intangible quality that she now realized might go along with any resentment. How long had it been there? How long had she ignored it?
She’d always said she wanted to know what he was thinking and feeling, yet when he’d told her, how had she reacted? She’d looked at another man. She was disappointed in herself and worried that she and Brady might never find their way back to each other again.
She couldn’t stop trying, though. She’d had an idea she hoped he’d go along with. “Next weekend over Memorial Day, maybe we could do something…something fun. Just you and me. We could go to the movies or out to dinner. Kat’s going to a sleepover at a friend’s. Sean will be at the Laslows’ cabin.”
“Let’s see what the week brings. I’ll be starting rehab as well as going into the office.”
“Full-time?”
“The doctor advises against that. But I’ve got to get back in there.”
He was putting work before the two of them again. She’d held hope that would change after his heart attack…after his recuperation. But she’d been silly to think that. Still, he’d just take her words as criticism if she said anything about it.
I can never do enough or be enough for you.
Had she actually sent him that message with what she said and did? Or had his own regrets caused the resentment? It didn’t matter. He felt it.
The sound of the sliding-glass doors from the dining room opening onto the patio interrupted them. Sean came out, looking like the young man he was becoming. He’d worn a suit for graduation and had seemed so adult. On graduation night, she and Brady had both gotten choked up. Afterward Brady had shaken Sean’s hand and that uneasy truce had taken hold between them once more. Brady was still trying to convince Sean that he needed to go to a four-year college. She didn’t know for sure what was best. No matter what curriculum Sean studied, there could be roadblocks with his dyslexia. She was inclined to believe that if his passion was really in graphic design, that could take him farther than any four-year degree.
Dressed in khaki slacks and an oversize striped shirt, Sean gave them a halfhearted smile. “There’s lots of food on the table, and a car pulled up outside.”
Laura started toward the house. “I should go see who it is.”
“It’s Jack,” Sean informed her. “But, before you go…” He shifted from one foot to the other. “I hope you don’t mind, but I invited someone else over today.”
Laura looked to Brady, but he just shrugged.
“Who?”
“Her name is Valerie Johanssen. I went to a party at her place last weekend.”
On Mother’s Day night…after the blowup in the kitchen.
“She goes to Red Lion,” Sean rushed on. “She’s a junior. We talked for a bit, and I mentioned my graduation party today, and—”
“That’s fine,” Laura assured him. “We’d love to meet her.”
Quickly reaching into the back pocket of his slacks, Sean pulled out a brochure folded in half. “And I wanted to give you this. Maybe you and Dad can look at it. It’s about the school I want to go to. They sent me a whole packet of information, but this will lay it out. Their online address is there, too.”
“We’ll check it out.” She hoped Brady could be open-minded about it, but he said nothing.
Hearing the doorbell chime, Laura slipped inside to welcome the first of her guests. She thought that maybe if she left Sean and Brady on the patio together they’d talk. But when she glanced over her shoulder, she saw Sean had come inside, too, and Brady was moving the chair back where it belonged.
Soon the house began to fill.
Angie and Jack walked in with wide smiles, along with a present for Sean, and made themselves at home. When Pat arrived, she brought a date. The man had an easy smile and wrapped his arm around Brady’s sister’s shoulders as if they’d been together for more than a weekend. In a little while, he began talking to Brady about investments. Two more neighboring couples also came. Sean had helped them with yard work in the summers before he’d gotten a job at the Galleria in the sports-memorabilia store. He’d be starting back there after Memorial Day weekend. Kat flitted around from one group to another, and Laura knew she was going to miss her daughter when she went to summer camp for two weeks.
They were all filling plates from the dining-room table when the doorbell rang again. Sean rushed to get it. A few minutes later, a pretty, blond teenager followed him into the dining room.
After he introduced Valerie, Laura tried to make her feel comfortable. “We’re glad you could join us. Just help yourself.”
Valerie gave her a smile and Laura noticed when the girl looked at her son, there was interest there…the same interest she saw in Sean’s eyes when he gazed at Valerie.
More than once she spotted Brady’s attention on them, too. She wondered if he was thinking about young love, where it started and where it had to go.
But maybe not. He wasn’t sentimental the way she was. In fact, she wondered if what they’d started with meant anything to him now. The basis of their love—who they’d been and where they’d come from—would always be with her.
As everyone talked and ate, Laura handed off her new camera to Kat, who’d agreed to take shots.
“I put the SD card in,” Kat said. “So we can snap as many as you want.”
“Get everybody. I want to make a scrapbook.”
“You’ll have them in a file on the computer.”
“That’s not the same thing as having an album to page through.”
Kat cast her a questioning glance as if she didn’t understand, and Laura supposed she probably didn’t. She just wanted to sit on her sofa with the album on her lap so she could study each photograph long after the party. Sitting at the computer just wasn’t the same thing.
After most of the guests had wandered outside, Jack put a hand on Laura’s shoulder. “Brady’s looking a lot better.”
“I was scared to death for so long it’s hard for me to believe he’s finally recuperating. But he is…and he looks good, doesn’t he?”
“Are you speaking from a health perspective or a wife perspective?”
Jack always had teased her and she didn’t mind. They’d all been friends for a long time. “From both a health and a wife perspective.”
Brady saw them talking and joined them. “What are you two plotting?”
“Wouldn’t you like to know,” Jack joked.
Brady’s gaze fell on Laura. There was something indefinable there. Some of the old feeling?
Flustered for a moment, she searched for something to say. She asked Jack, “Did Brady tell you he’s going back to work this week?”
Jack frowned. “Not ten hours a day, I hope.”
“Those days are over,” Brady replied with a grimace.
“You say that now, but once you get back in there again—I know you. You’ll be designing or going after a contract and you won’t even realize how long you’re there.”
When Laura swung her attention to Brady, their eyes locked and held.
Were their lives going to cha
nge? Was he really going to slow down?
Brady focused his attention once again on Jack. “Did I tell you about the new robot that…”
Within seconds the men were embroiled in a technical discussion about robots that mitigated improvised explosive devices. Over the years Jack had come to understand a lot of what Brady did, and was interested in it. To Laura, the mechanical aspects were still Greek. Instead of listening, she found herself journeying back about five years to a time when Brady’s work had taken him away from her and the kids.
Although he’d worked long hours in the past building his company, they’d become even longer when Brady had won a surge of new contracts. In fact, he’d been away from home so much, spent nights in his office and called to say he was going to be late so many times, that she’d begun to wonder if he was having an affair. Wasn’t that the first thing a woman thought when a man didn’t make time to be with her?
She and Brady had planned a night out—to go to dinner and a concert with Jack and Angie. Pat had agreed to stay with the kids. But at the last minute, Brady had called and told her he’d gotten tied up and he wouldn’t be able to go. She should. She shouldn’t miss the evening out with friends.
Miss the evening out with friends? She’d wanted an evening out with him! But she’d heard the fatigue in his voice and hadn’t said anything when he’d phoned. She hadn’t gone to the concert, hoping he’d return home at a reasonable time.
He hadn’t.
By midnight, Laura had gone to bed, but she couldn’t sleep.
When Brady came up to their bedroom, she hadn’t known whether to pretend she was asleep or confess what she was thinking. If she put it into words…
He’d undressed, then slid into bed.
She’d turned toward him, hoping she was wrong…afraid she wasn’t.
“I thought you were sleeping.”
The Bracelet (Everlasting Love) Page 16