Awakening

by Hayes, Olivia

  "Would you like some coffee?"

  She looked up at me, tears in her eyes. "That would be lovely, thank you."

  As we settled in the kitchen I searched for coffee mugs, which Luke usually had out already. Tessa sat quietly at the breakfast bar, watching me look around.

  "You wouldn't happen to know where Luke keeps the coffee mugs would you?" I asked her.

  "They're in the third cabinet over from the fridge. Top shelf."

  She smiled and I noticed how it softened her face. She was a pretty girl, but she looked like she had led a rough life.

  "I'd never met anyone like Luke," she started, as I poured coffee in the mugs. "One day this town was the same and then the day I met him everything changed. He was like a breath of fresh air to me. Someone I could pin my hopes and dreams to."

  I understood that. Everything changed for me the moment I saw him too. I nodded to her, prompting her to continue.

  "He told me when we met that his heart belonged to someone else. I assumed if I treated him well enough and loved him well enough that I could change that and make him fall in love with me. I know what you might have heard about me. Amanda, the bar tender at The Back Porch, she spreads all sorts of stories about everybody. But I guarantee whatever she told you, it's not true."

  "So you didn't try to trap Luke into a loveless marriage by pretending your were pregnant? It did sound a little despicable when she told me that."

  "Actually, no," she laughed. "Luke and I dated for quite a while before I fell in love with him. When we met he was so angry, brooding, and uncontrollable. That lasted for about a year before his brother died. After the funeral, he was so distraught, he couldn't eat, couldn't sleep. He kept talking about how everything was his fault."

  She paused to take a breath and I stared at her wordlessly, willing her to continue.

  "I couldn't do anything other than sit and listen to him. I listened and listened and listened. Then one day he started acting like the Luke I always knew was in there. He was kind, considerate, affectionate even... After a while, I thought certainly he felt the same about me as I felt about him. So one night at my place, after we had, well... you know. I told him that I loved him. He had rolled over and put his pants back on. Then he sat beside me while I cried and told me how he'd met the love of his life when he was a kid."

  I looked at Tessa, silently questioning what she was trying to say.

  "He told me her name was Caroline and said he thought about her often and hoped she would walk back into his life eventually."

  I was reeling. I could not believe what this girl was telling me. Luke had seriously been waiting for me to show up again? He had told me that in passing, but hearing it from someone else was unbelievable.

  "One day, a week or so later," she continued, "I saw him with this beautiful dark headed girl in the bar. They were laughing and having a blast. I felt like he had stabbed me right through the heart, making up a story about this "Caroline" in order to let me down easy, and meanwhile he was picking up other women. I couldn't stand the thought of him with anyone but me. I was bitter, heart-broken, and couldn't believe he was pretending to be hanging on to some memory of a girl who may or may not ever come back into his life. I confronted him, but it didn't end well. It turns out, the dark headed girl was his sister.

  "Then, the other night, I walked in and saw him kissing you. Kissing you in a way he never kissed me. The jealousy came raging back and I snapped. Once he got me outside he told me who you were. I couldn't believe I had made a fool of myself over him again, and much less, that you were actually the girl he'd been dreaming about. So I had to come out here and see. I waited down the road until I saw him leave for work and then I drove up."

  I stood and looked at Tessa, incredulous, and began pacing the kitchen. If what she was saying was true, then she had helped Luke get back to being the person he was way back when I met him, the man he was now. She had told me that I was what Luke wanted, even before I showed back up in his life. Could I truly be enough to make him happy for the rest of his life?

  "How did you know I was here?"

  "I didn't really. This is the third day in a row that I've waited for him to leave and rang the doorbell."

  I looked from Tessa to the river and suddenly I was overwhelmed with memories of Luke and me as kids. Canoeing the river, he stood on a dare and we both fell in, we laughed until our sides hurt trying to get back into the canoe. Digging for clams, my shoe getting stuck in the mud and Luke digging it out, both of us covered from head to toe by the time we got home. His laugh, his smile, his fingers linked through mine as we walked. And more recently, Luke taking me to the sandbar, racing back through the rain, his body and his eyes on me. Last night he had unleashed a woman I didn't know existed inside of me. I already knew I loved him, I just needed to tell him. Through all of my pushing him away and trying to get him out of my system he had continued to invade my thoughts, planting himself solidly in my heart.

  The doorbell rang, bringing me back to reality. I ran down the hall to find Eva waiting for me.

  "Eva!" I hugged her, a little giddy. "Come on in."

  Eva followed me into the kitchen. Tessa was still seated at the bar.

  "Eva, this is Tessa James. Tessa, Eva Williams."

  Eva looked at Tessa skeptically. "Nice to meet you?"

  Tessa laughed at Eva's tone. "Sorry about the other night. You'll have to get Caroline to fill you in." Tessa smiled and Eva returned it, though it didn't quite meet her eyes.

  "Tessa, thank you so much for coming by. You have been more help than you'll ever know," I told her and hugged her tightly. When I released her she looked at me as if I was crazy, but laughed.

  ~~~~

  The Breakfast Place was pretty slow, but considering I was starving, I was thankful. I called Anne Marie and she wasted no time getting there before us and ordering coffee while she waited.

  "So! How was last night?" She asked excitedly, as Eva and I slid into the booth opposite her.

  "It was... good," I said, deliberately withholding all the details I knew she was waiting for until after the waitress had taken our orders.

  "Good? Come on! Your mom told me all about your dress and how Luke almost beat that loser Darren off of you. The two of you danced and left in a hurry. SO?"

  I laughed as I filled them in on my night. Leaving off at the point when Luke and I got back to his place.

  "Damn girl, he must like you a lot," Eva said. "Crashing the party like that and dragging you back to his house to have his way with you. I'm getting warm just thinking about it."

  I laughed.

  "The best part came in the middle of the night. I woke up to use the bathroom and get something to drink. I went out on the porch and was just sitting there thinking when Luke joined me. He told me how he blamed himself for Mark's death."

  I stopped to gauge their reactions.

  "What? Why?" Anne Marie asked.

  "Let her finish, Marie," Eva said.

  "Luke wanted to be with me years ago but he never told Mark or me. If he had, chances are I would have been with him this whole time and Mark never would have been driving to Athens that day."

  "What is so great about that? It sounds terrible," said Anne Marie.

  "Marie! Let. Her. Finish!"

  "Well, as he was talking about how he blamed himself I realized that I was blaming myself too. This whole time I've been wondering if I could have done something differently to affect the outcome and feeling guilty about all the choices I made that led to Mark's death. When Luke started saying some of the same things I had been thinking I heard how ridiculous it sounded and I realized that I needed to let go of the guilt, and Luke did too. I finally feel weightless; free to move on."

  "Awe, Caroline, that is so wonderful! Have you told Luke?"

  "Not yet. I still need to figure some things out. He is Mark's brother after all and it seems his mother will never like me. I need to come to terms with that. I just don't want Luke to hav
e to choose between his mother and me. I need to be okay with the whole situation and make sure he is too, before I can fully commit to him."

  They both looked at me with narrowed eyes.

  "Caroline, do you love him?" Eva looked at me as if she dared me to lie to her.

  I looked down at my lap thinking about the time we'd spent together recently and how my mind couldn't focus on anything but him most minutes. My eyes welled up with tears and I looked at them with a smile on my face.

  "I do... I definitely do," I told them as they each grabbed one of my hands.

  I gave them both a squeeze followed by a brief rundown on my talk with Tessa that morning. They were both relieved to hear that she wasn't a psycho ex-girlfriend like we had originally thought.

  "Well, we have some news too," Anne Marie began, looking from me to Eva and back again.

  "The other day I went to Mimi's again to find a dress to wear for a date with Nick," said Eva. "I saw a few pieces of furniture that had seen better days and asked her if she was interested in having them either restored or repurposed. We got into a big discussion about the business and she wants to help us open a shop here in Bluffton!"

  "And," Anne Marie added, "your mother has agreed to give us a bunch of items we found in your grandmother's attic so we pretty much have instant inventory."

  "Plus, with Nick's and Ben's business contacts, we're sure to get some decorating gigs in the area," Eva threw in with a smile.

  They talked about moving to Bluffton instead of staying in Savannah. There was still time to get out of the lease at the downtown space, and apparently Mimi owned the entire strip where her boutique was and she was willing to lease some space to them for half the price.

  "That is so exciting!" I exclaimed, standing to hug them both before we paid our bills and walked outside.

  "Well, well," said a male voice. "If it ain't the Three Musketeers."

  We all looked toward a bench outside the restaurant where the creepy guy was sitting.

  "Don't even waste your breath, Eva," I said when I saw her narrow her eyes and open her mouth to speak. "Let's just get in the truck and go."

  She snapped her mouth closed before climbing into Nick's truck and shutting the door.

  "Where to?" Eva said.

  "I need to see my dad."

  ~~~~

  Anne Marie followed us to my grandmother's house and we all headed toward the back door. The front door was still boarded up from the storm damage, but the porch had been rebuilt and it was even better than before.

  "Dad!? Dad, where are you?" I called for him through the house.

  "Caroline honey, I'm up here," he said, coming into view at the top of the stairs. "Is everything okay?"

  I ran up the stairs two at a time. When I got to the top, I paused to catch my breath. "Dad, do you have some time to talk? I need to ask you something very important."

  "Sure baby girl."

  I only paused a moment before I blurted out the question I was so eager to know the answer to.

  "How were you able to let go of Jillian so you could love Mom whole heartedly?"

  He smiled, comprehension dawning over his face. "Come on, we should sit down."

  He put his arms around my shoulders and led me down the stairs to the living room. Once we were settled onto the loveseat he looked at me, smiling again.

  "When Jillian died, it almost killed me. I felt like I had loved her even before I met her. She was so full of life and had so much love to give; I was head over heels. After her death, as you can imagine, I was devastated. It was so sudden, there was hardly any time to say goodbye.

  "The morning before her death, she had a rare moment of lucidity. The drugs usually kept her comfortable and made her incredibly sleepy. But, during that small window of time, she took off her locket and gave it to me. She said that she loved me, and she was sorry to have to leave me before our life together had really begun. She told me to hold on to her locket as something to remember her by, but she made me promise that once I was ready to let her go, that I would get rid of the locket and embrace my future with open arms. She made me promise that I would try to fall in love again and be happy. It was her dying wish."

  I reached out and grabbed my father's hand, willing him to continue.

  "For the first few weeks after her death, I kept the locket with me at all times. I would pull it out whenever I missed her, and run my fingers across the back of it, where I knew it had lain against her skin. I wanted to feel closer to her. In the meantime, your mother was trying to cope as best as she could as well. We were stuck in the apartment together, both of us moping around, crying with each other, sharing hugs, and eventually sharing a bed. Both of us were trying to mend our broken hearts.

  "One night, as your mother was sleeping peacefully in my bed, I took the locket out, opening it up. I looked at the pictures of her and me, side by side, and it dawned on me that if Jillian had to hand pick someone for me to be with after her death, that she would have chosen the person most like her, someone she loved more than anything else in the whole world. Her sister. I cried for hours that night, holding her locket close, and thanking her for bringing your mother and I together. The next morning, I packed her locket up, and mailed it to your grandmother for safe keeping. When I got home from the post office, I told your mother that I loved her for the first time. The rest is history."

  "That's why you were so emotional about seeing the locket again the other day. You still miss her."

  "Caroline, I was emotional at seeing the locket, but not because it was a reminder of what I had lost, it was a symbol of what I had gained. You, Carson, and your mother are the most precious gifts I could have ever asked for. As much as I loved Jillian at the time, I know now that losing her was a stepping stone to my future. If it weren't for her I never would have met your mother and learned what true love really is."

  I sat there for a moment, letting his words sink in. He believed that Jillian was the link that brought him to my mother. What if Mark had brought me back to Luke? If Mark had known he was going to die would he have wanted me to find happiness? I thought of his smile and his laughter, his optimistic view of the world and his zest for life, and I had my answer. Mark would have wanted me to live. He would have wanted me to find happiness, even if it was with Luke.

  I looked at my dad with tears in my eyes. "Thank you Daddy, for opening my eyes." I kissed him on the cheek and stood, knowing what I needed to do.

  I went upstairs to the room I had been sleeping in and picked up the few items I'd left behind last weekend, shoving them in a plastic grocery bag.

  Mark's ring sat there in its box on the bedside table. I picked it up, sliding it onto my finger. I silently prayed that wherever Mark was, he knew how much I had loved him. Then I slipped the ring off my finger for the last time, and placed it back in its box, closing the lid and putting it in the bag with the rest of my belongings.

  After telling Anne Marie and Eva that I was going to walk back to Luke's to give myself time to think about what I was going to say, I started down the long drive way. I decided to cut through the woods near Luke's fort to save some time.

  As I crossed onto Luke's property I heard some noise. I turned to see what it was, and a searing pain in my head caused me to fall to the ground. I tried to stand, but I couldn't get my feet underneath me. Then, I felt another blow to my head. Luke's face, and the thought of never getting to see him again or tell him that I love him were the last things that went through my mind before I blacked out.

  ~~~~

  When I woke, my head was throbbing. I was laying on some sort of hard metal surface. When I peeked open one eye it became obvious that I was in the back of some sort of van. I saw the grocery bag I had been carrying nearby, but my hands were bound and my mouth was full of cloth and appeared to be taped shut. I sat up quickly, making myself nauseous, as I looked around. Part of the van was sectioned off by a metal cage of sorts, and it seemed I was locked inside it.

&nb
sp; I leaned my head back against the side of the van, trying to contain my tears as I thought about what to do. Just then I heard movement outside the van, and the back door was opening.

  "Well, looky who we have here."

  It was the creepy guy who harassed me at the gas station Monday. The same one we'd seen outside of the restaurant this morning.

  "My name's Earl, and you 'n me's gonna be real good friends, now ain't we?" He gave me a nasty grin and I felt my stomach turn.

  I pushed further into the corner as he climbed into the van and began unlocking the cage.

  "Shhh, I ain't gonna hurt ya. I'm just gonna untie yer arms, and take the gag outta yer mouth so you can talk. But, if ya scream, I'm gonna have to gag you again, ya hear?"

  I nodded with wide eyes as he moved into the cage and reached to untie me. Once my hands were free, I pulled the tape off my mouth and spit out the cloth, coughing.

  "Why are you doing this?" I asked him.

  "I been around a long time. Ain't never seen any girl as purty as you. Can't say I got a real reason for keeping ya here, other 'n I didn't want nobody else to have ya. Been trying to catch me a beauty like you for a while now."

  "You're the one the police are looking for."

  "You betcha, but they ain't found me yet and ain't gonna find me this time neither."

  Earl inched closer to me, smiling a toothless grin, and I could smell the decay in his mouth. I gagged, and before I could stop myself, I puked.

  "Stupid bitch!" He slapped me across the face. "Do I make you sick? All you hoity toity girls are the same. Won't give a man the time of day if he ain't got a nice face or a nice car. I seen the looks you n' yer whore friends give me."

  I closed my eyes as the tears threatened to come, and then I heard some rustling outside the van.

  "What the fuck!?" He shouted, and I opened my eyes just in time to see Tomcat jumping up into the van, meowing. When Earl saw him, he swatted at him. "Git!"

  Tomcat hissed at Earl, and swatted with one of his paws, claws out, catching Earl under the eye