Dr. Gordon said to answer direct questions. But I didn’t think he meant ones like this. Not ones that were rife with the kind of emotional turmoil he’d told me to avoid. If Danny didn’t remember on his own, chances were his psyche wasn’t ready to deal with the information yet.
He’d found the green-and-yellow bag. The one Mom had given me before they moved to Florida. The one that held Bailey’s best-friends necklace. And a letter.
One I’d never read.
I took it from him.
“Oh, here it is. Mom left this and I...” I glanced from the bag to him. “Things have changed since your accident, of course. Bailey moved to Boston for a while, but then she got offered a partnership at Mayer and Mayer and—”
“Bailey’s a partner already?”
“A junior partner, yes.”
“We have to celebrate with her!” He picked up another batch of my Bailey mementos. Photos. Trinkets. Tickets to concerts we’d attended. Airline itineraries for trips we’d taken. I had no idea why I hadn’t thrown them all awayHard to believe that had all been in this lifetime.
“Seriously,” Danny said. “I’m sure you guys have already done it up big, but I wasn’t there. And partnership...that’s something Bailey’s wanted since high school. Let’s do it, Kor. Have her over. And some of the other gang, too. Let’s do it tomorrow night. It’s Friday. No one’ll have to work the next day.”
Did he remember about Mattie? And that Jake and Bailey had been lovers?
Did he know that, other than the weird time before the accident, he’d never, ever initiated doing anything with my former best friend?
Did he remember more than that? Like the fact that there’d been something between him and Bailey at the end?
“What’s wrong?” He was staring at me.
“Nothing.”
“Yes there is.” He shoved the things back in the box and stood up, crossing his arms, his face taking on an expression that had become familiar only during the past several weeks. “I won’t be treated like a dimwitted child, Koralynn. What’s wrong?”
He was breathing hard, as if he’d been running. Getting agitated.
Calm, Dr. Gordon had said. It’s best if he remembers things on his own, when he’s emotionally ready to deal with them.
“There’s nothing wrong,” I told him, and then added, “except that I’m worried about you and don’t know if you’re ready for a full-on party.” There, I’d told the truth. Because I couldn’t lie to him. Not anymore than I had to.
His arms dropped. “Okay. That’s fair. So call Bailey and we can get together, just us.”
“Do you remember that she...doesn’t live alone?” God, this was hard.
“Of course I do. If you’re talking about Mattie. I remember how crazy you were about him.” His eyes shadowed. “But surely she can get a babysitter...”
He didn’t want to see Mattie.
Interesting.
“I’ll talk to her,” I said. And had no idea how to get out of that promise.
* * *
I’d never known I could be so good at prevaricating. But I managed to put Danny off from his party-with-Bailey plan for almost another week. Six days of getting myself so worked up I was sick to my stomach.
And not just about Bailey, either.
I’d missed my period.
I knew it was stress. I’d skipped several months’ worth during the eighteenmonths Danny had lain unconscious. But I panicked anyway.
The following week Danny had an all-out blowup about my treating him like a child, generated by his own frustration when he couldn’t remember how to change the furnace filter and I had to show him. After that, we ended up on the whole Bailey thing again. He knew I was hiding something and out of desperation to prove that I wasn’t, I agreed to get in touch with her and make some arrangement for the three of us.
I called Dr. Gordon, first, to make sure that Danny’s meeting Bailey was okay, hoping the neurologist would advise against it. On the contrary, he was very encouraged by Danny’s insistence that the three of us get together. Danny was fighting his way out.
I tried to keep that in mind later that night when, after Danny was asleep in bed, I climbed the stairs to my little spare room office and sat down to write her a short email.
* * *
She felt like a five-year-old going to her first day of kindergarten. Approaching the coffee shop Kora had designated at precisely three thirty, as she’d requested in her cryptic email, Bailey wasn’t sure if she was looking forward to the meeting or dreading it. Both, she supposed.
They saw each other inside the shop at exactly the same time. Kora, in her beige pants and striped silk top, with her long hair in a bun, and Bailey, whose hair was loose and curly, in her expensive black suit and red camisole, exchanged looks as though they were waiting to see what would happen. They’d both already unbuttoned their coats.
Bailey started to cry. Kora turned away.
Following her to the counter, Bailey recited Kora’s order for a hot caramel latte no whip, in her head as Kora spoke it aloud. She wondered if Kora would order Bailey’s double espresso, black, too. And when she didn’t, stepped up to the next register and ordered it for herself.
They were in the same room together. Because Kora had asked to see her. Nothing was going to ruin this moment.
Bailey’s hands were shaking as she and Kora moved to a corner table. Kora stood aside as Bailey slid in, her back to the wall, as smoothly as if they’d practiced the move. Or done it a thousand times before. Which they had. They dropped their coats on the backs of their chairs before they sat.
“I need a favor.” Kora came right to the point. She’d changed. Lost the warmth in her eyes. The smile on her face. There were new lines, too, at the corners of her eyes and her mouth.
Could that really happen to you in less than two years?
Or had the lines started long before and Bailey just hadn’t noticed?
“Anything,” Bailey told her, giddy and sad and needing a hug in the worst way.
“Danny’s complete recovery hinges on his remembering things on his own.”
Bailey nodded. How much did Kora know about Bailey’s conversations with Jake and Mama Di? She didn’t want to say the wrong thing. To misstep at this critical time.
“I’m doing everything I can to keep his agitation to a minimum.”
“I know,” Bailey said, reaching out to touch Kora’s hand, but pulling back just as Kora let go of her coffee cup to push a strand of hair that had fallen from her bun behind her ear. “Jake told me.”
“Mom said she did, too.”
She couldn’t tell if Kora was angry about that or not. “Yeah.”
“Dr. Gordon thinks Danny’s psyche is on the brink of working it all out.”
“That’s great!” Bailey’s enthusiasm drew looks from the businessman at the next table doing something on a tablet. She didn’t care. Jake hadn’t given any indication that they were so close to a total breakthrough.
“He wants to see you.”
For a second there, she’d thought Kora meant Jake. Until she remembered that mind reading was a fantasy reserved for teenage girls.
“Okay.”
Kora’s frown didn’t bode well. “He doesn’t know anything about...”
The urge to assure Kora that there’d been nothing between her and Danny—not sexually anyway—was almost too strong to resist. But Kora wasn’t going to believe her unless she explained what had really been going on that day. And there was no way she was going to exacerbate her best friend’s pain by telling her that her sterile and injured husband had fathered the only child he’d ever father—with Bailey.
Not because it would end any hope of reviving her own friendship with Kora, but because Kora didn’t look li
ke she could sustain that kind of shock.
“I’d like you to come over,” Kora said, starting again. Her control was impressive. And sad, too. It was like Kora had become a mini Bailey—everything trapped inside with no way out.
“I need you to pretend there’s nothing wrong between the two of us,” Kora continued. “Danny has no idea we haven’t seen each other at all.”
Kora closed her eyes. And Bailey’s heart broke wide open. Her friend’s struggle was agonizing. And yet...there was something reassuring about it, too.
“Kor, I’ll do whatever you need. You know that.” Her voice faltered, but she didn’t care. She’d never had to keep up appearances with Kora, although she hadn’t understood that as clearly when she was younger.
Kora nodded. Took a sip of coffee and reached for her purse.
“I’d do anything—will do anything, whatever it takes, to make things right and...”
Kora was on her feet before Bailey could even finish the sentence. “I just need you to come over, pretend for Danny that all is well, and give him the chance to work things out on his own. That’s all.”
“I’m there. Name the day and the time.”
Kora’s face was blank, expressionless. “Whenever,” she said. “We’re home every night.”
“How about tonight then? Mattie’s sitter already said she can stay late.” Because Kora’s email hadn’t given Bailey any idea what to expect from this meeting and she’d wanted to be sure that she had whatever time she needed at her disposal.
The mention of Mattie brought a new expression to Kora’s face. Longing.
It spoke straight to Bailey’s heart.
“Tonight would be fine. Give me an hour to get home and changed and to make sure that he’s up to it.” She put her coat back on.
There were so many questions Bailey wanted, needed, to ask, but sensing the tenuous hold her friend had on her emotions, she held her tongue and simply nodded.
She didn’t get up as Kora turned to walk away. Didn’t say anything else. And was surprised when Kora turned back.
“About...anything else, please understand, I can’t go through that right now. I’m focused on the future. On Danny. Anything else is a drain on an emotional well that’s almost empty.”
The words were so Kora. So dramatic. And, Bailey knew, bone-deep true.
“You got it,” she said, having enough strength to draw on for both of them. Forever if need be.
Strength that was taken from the well Koralynn had filled for her all those years.
As Koralynn walked away, her back ramrod straight, not missing a step, Bailey’s eyes filled with tears.
“I’d give you a kidney,” she whispered.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Coming off eighteen months of a life in total standstill, things were happening too fast for me to keep up. I tried. Every morning I’d get up with enthusiasm for the day, even if it was forced. And by afternoon all I wanted to do was crawl into bed.
Bailey had been over a couple of times, and the visits had been completely uneventful. The three of us had been like actors on a stage, drinking coffee we didn’t want, pretending to have a life we didn’t have. And Danny had been Danny. Sitting there quietly, sipping coffee and off in his own world.
Apparently seeing Bailey again hadn’t been all that important to his recovery. I expressed my disappointment to Dr. Gordon, who told me to be patient.
“The mind works in mysterious ways,” he told me. He was still convinced that Bailey’s readmission into our lives was somehow critical. And because I trusted him, I let him convince me, too. I still didn’t like it.
Oddly, though, Danny always suggested a babysitter whenever we got together with Bailey. I theorized to Dr. Gordon that my husband was still repressing the fact that we’d lost our son and the doctor said I might be right about that. It also meant I didn’t get to see Mattie, and now that I’d seen Bailey again, not having contact with my godson was driving me crazy.
That next week—hard to believe it was the beginning of March already—I finally broke down and purchased a home pregnancy test. I waited until Danny was asleep and went upstairs to the spare bathroom to do the deed. I knew I wasn’t pregnant, but I also knew that until I could relax about it, I might be preventing my body from taking its natural course.
I peed. I waited the requisite few minutes. I’d been through this so many times before, I could do it in my sleep.
Except that I wasn’t particularly sleepy.
I glanced at the stick on its way to the trash with the rest of the kit. And lurched forward.
Had I seen that right? It had to be a mistake.
But it wasn’t. There was no blurring of colors. Nothing indeterminate at all in the reading.
I’d made a mistake that night with Jake, and I was going to pay for the rest of my life.
According to the damned stick, I was pregnant.
Shit.
* * *
The last person Bailey was expecting to see at her door that first Saturday in March was Jake Murphy. Hoping maybe. In her dreams. But...
“I was wondering if Mattie wanted to go to the park?” he asked, as if he stopped by every day wearing jeans, a winter jacket and tennis shoes, with a miniature football under his arm.
“He’s taking his nap,” she said. And at two years and two months, Mattie was still a little young for football.
He tossed the small football between his hands. “It’s kind of cold for the park anyway,” he said, not quite grinning at her.
“You want to come in?” It was a bad idea. Definitely. But he was just standing there.
“Sure.” He opened the door before she could, then took up residence in her foyer as though he’d been there many times before. “I like what you’ve done with this place.”
He wasn’t looking at her place—most of which he could see from the foyer. He was looking at her.
“I brought this for Mattie,” he said, handing her the football.
“Thank-you. I’m sure he’ll like it.” Not that she was encouraging her son to play football. She’d be happier with a less physically brutal sport—like tennis.
“Jenna asked me for a divorce.”
“What? When? Why?” Was he there to ask Bailey to represent him? How ironic would that be?
Not that she’d do it, of course. It wouldn’t be appropriate.
“A week ago. We’re doing the short form. Uncontested dissolution.”
“Jake! I’m so sorry.” She was. Truly.
He shrugged. And suddenly she didn’t want to know why he was there. If this was because of her...Surely she hadn’t come between a second man and his wife, caused a second disaster as she had between Kora and Danny...
Was she cursed? Crazy? Was she actually going to let Jake Murphy kiss her?
No! She took a step back from him. “Why did Jenna ask for a divorce?” She had to know.
“She said she didn’t look forward to coming home to me anymore.” Bailey read the truth in his eyes.
“You guys weren’t really in love enough to marry,” she said, hoping she wasn’t just making up stuff as she needed it to be.
“Nope.”
“It wasn’t because of me.”
“Jenna knew I was talking to you about Danny’s progress. She didn’t mind.”
“Do you think she’s seeing someone else?”
“Quite possibly.”
“I’m sorry.”
“I’m not.”
She supposed that said it all then.
Not quite all. “So you and Mattie want to come to my place for dinner tonight?” he asked.
“I...” Of course she wanted to. She wasn’t fool enough to deny that she loved this man. But...
; “Nothing’s changed, Jake. I don’t want to get married.” And how could she, anyway, when Jake’s best friend was her son’s father? And fighting to get his life back because of it.
“People change, Bailey. Life changes. Everything changes. And it was an invitation to dinner. Not a marriage proposal.”
Had he changed then? Discovered that marriage wasn’t the be-all and end-all he’d expected it to be?
Life was messy. Too messy.
But she accepted his invitation to dinner anyway.
* * *
The third week in March Danny started back to work at his old firm. His doctor had cleared him for driving, and we went out and bought him a new economy car. I’d sold the old one when I moved. I rode with him the first couple of times he drove, but felt kind of superfluous when he’d had no hesitation about what he was doing or where he was going.
“You’re a pro,” I told him with a grin. I hadn’t felt much like grinning lately. I was pregnant with another man’s child, and had no idea what I was going to do.
“If I was such a pro, I wouldn’t have wrapped my car around a tree,” Danny said. And I knew we both still had hard times ahead of us.
He hadn’t wrapped his car around a tree. He’d wrapped Bailey’s.
I wanted so badly to tell him about the baby, about that hour I’d spent with Jake Murphy. I was so desperate, I even went to Dr. Gordon with my news. He’d sympathized, but made it unequivocally clear that he was Danny’s doctor, and had only Danny’s welfare in mind as he advised that I hold back my confessions until Danny could remember things on his own. Important things that had changed our lives and could do so again.
It wasn’t my way to be duplicitous. Or to keep secrets. It seemed cruel to let Danny just fall into the truth of his infertility with no one there to ease the blow. But I didn’t know what else to do.
My angst became pretty much unbearable the afternoon I arrived home from work to find my husband already there, a calendar and a suspiciously familiar-looking package in his hand.
“I’ve been counting the weeks, Kora,” he said as I came in and shed my coat, purse and leather satchel in a pile on the counter. Jake and Bailey were going to be over that evening, a night of cards set up by Danny, and I’d hoped to have time to shower, make some hors d’oeuvres and convince myself I could act my way through the night.
The Friendship Pact Page 26