Let me stare into the depths
Where I’ll see your soul stare back into mine
Take me to the River
The River where I’ll find my heart and soul
Take me to the River
And I’ll finally be whole
I opened my eyes and let the breath I’d been holding out. Adam sat staring down at me with his jaw tight, and his hand rested over the guitar strings as he waited for my response.
“You just destroyed me, man,” Bobby said as I continued to stare into Adam’s glossy eyes.
I shook my head as I took another deep breath, trying to settle the pace of my heart that seemed to have sped up to the point where I was lightheaded.
“I…I don’t even know what to say,” I gasped out.
Adam bit his lip. “In a good way?”
I stood and placed my forehead to his, closing my eyes as our noses touched.
“In a very good way,” I said as the breath he’d been holding washed over me.
I held his face before kissing him and letting my lips hover over his.
“I love you, River—words will never be enough, so I thought if I sung them they’d sound better,” he said.
I let one singular laugh out as I shook my head, opening my eyes to stare back into his.
How could I explain to him that his voice pulled me in whether he was singing or not—that waking up to the sound of his whisper in my ear made my heart stop? There were no words to voice the emotion he pulled from me with every touch, every glance, and every moment.
“Every day I wake up thinking I couldn’t love any one anymore than I love you…and every night I go to bed knowing everything you do makes me love you more…as impossible as that is,” I finally said.
“Even when I do something stupid?” Adam asked with a smirk that made me want to rip off the black plaid button-up he had on.
“Even when you do something stupid,” I repeated.
Adam glanced over my shoulder. “Too bad you two are here.”
I followed his glance and saw Bobby’s eyelids fluttering in annoyance.
“You’re still getting some tonight, so shove it!” Bobby shot back. “Now, where are my presents at? And please don’t serenade me.”
Chapter 51
Sometimes moments in life are so perfect you want to freeze frame them; capture them within your soul forever so they never fade away—they burn themselves into your being until they’re a part of who you are. Waking up in Adam’s arms was always one of those things, but another one was waking up to hear Bobby’s snores in the next room over. I smiled to myself as I moved slowly out of the bed and opened our bedroom door to see Bobby hanging off the couch with Tara cuddled over him with a blanket that could only cover her. Bobby’s face was nuzzled into Tara’s curls, which as always, were frizzing out of her messy bun.
“They do make a cute couple,” Adam said as he tucked his chin into my collarbone.
“Yeah, they do,” I replied, leaning my head back into him.
“You okay with it now?” Adam asked as he wrapped his arms around mine.
I nodded. “This is nice.”
“It’s about to get even nicer,” Adam said as he let go of me and went to the couch.
“Don’t!” I hissed as he knelt down. “He’ll kick you in the face!”
Adam looked over at me and winked.
“Something you don’t know that I do…” he said as he began to tickle the ball of Bobby’s foot.
“Mommy…no…I wanna sleep more,” Bobby mumbled as his foot twitched.
I couldn’t help but burst out into laughter at Adam’s self-satisfied grin.
“I wanna sleep,” Bobby repeated as Adam tickled him once more. “Mommy…Cut the shit, ADAM!”
Bobby shot up, jostling Tara who whined in reaction, but somehow stayed asleep.
“What did you have to do that for?” Bobby asked.
Adam was rolling on the floor laughing, and I was tearing up because I was laughing so much.
“Mommy—” Adam mimicked; “I wanna sleep!”
“Shove it, cowlick!” Bobby shot back, using Adam’s pet name from the hair issue he’d cleverly turned into his hair just being tousled.
“Not everyone can have flowing golden locks,” Adam said as he finally calmed his laughing and stood.
Bobby rolled his eyes and flopped back down.
I came to the edge of the couch and peered down at him. “Explain the tickling?”
Bobby cracked one eye open and looked up at me. “Mom used to wake me up every morning by tickling my feet.”
“Aww!” I cooed, reaching down and pinching his cheeks. “You’re such a Momma’s boy!”
“You still have a night light?” Bobby asked with narrow eyes.
“No,” Adam called from the kitchen. “She’s not afraid of the dark anymore. She has me to protect her!”
“Gag,” Tara mumbled into Bobby’s chest as she pulled her eyes open.
“You’re telling me,” Bobby seconded.
“Speaking of Mom, how did you get her to let you off early enough to come back home anyways?” Adam asked as he came back in the living room and pulled me onto the recliner with him.
“You’re done cooking already?” Bobby frowned, avoiding the question.
“Cinnamon Buns. Now answer the question,” he replied.
“Lied.”
“You lied to Mom?” Adam repeated.
“Said we had to go to Tara’s parents…when we’d already gone on Christmas Eve.” Bobby shrugged as he sat up, and Tara snuggled into his arms.
“Tricky!” I said as Adam pulled a blanket over us.
“Too bad you can’t use that excuse for New Year’s,” Adam said.
Bobby frowned. “Yeah, I’ll never get out of that unless I get disowned.”
I felt Adam’s hands turn into fists on my stomach at the last word; after all, that’s what had happened to us.
Bobby’s eyes darted across my face.
“Riv,” he began, and I shook my head. He sighed and looked down at the rug beneath the coffee table.
“The cinnamon buns aren’t the crappy ones in the tube, either. Adam made them by hand yesterday and let them settle over night.” I changed the subject to something I knew we could all agree on—Adam’s cooking.
“I’m going to need to work out every day for the rest of my life after this week,” Bobby said, but his stomach gurgled and he smirked.
“You already do, Babe,” Tara reminded him.
“Not today,” Bobby said with a yawn. “Your couch sucks, no offense.”
“Gee, there wasn’t a bed only twenty feet away custom made for your jolly green giant frame?” I asked.
Bobby looked down at Tara. “I didn’t want to wake Tara.”
Tara and I both looked at each other before giving Bobby an incredulous look.
“She could sleep through a hurricane!” I burst out.
“It’s true,” Tara agreed.
“I was loaded down with eggnog toast,” Bobby found another excuse that only resulted in more eye rolls.
The truth was it didn’t matter what had made them stay. It was truly amazing to wake up with all the people you cared about most there—even if one was snoring loud enough to wake up the whole building.
Chapter 52
I sat at my desk fiddling with the contrast on the photograph I was looking at using for a local designer who was all about the “vintage” look. I’d taken the pictures on a roof top littered with vintage couches; beat up with holes in them and wine casks as tables. I even convinced Adam to come and figure out how to string up a chandelier on one of my spotlights. I didn’t know how he’d managed to, but the picture was almost perfect without any altering.
“No, that’s too much,” Jesse said as he came in my office. “Go back a bit, increase the brightness…there!”
I smirked up at him. “I’m so glad you think I can do this by myself.”
“You took the p
ic,” he reminded me with a wag of his finger. “And I like how you took most of the color out of the photograph and started to play with the contrast. I’m sure you would have come to the same conclusion I just did.”
“Mhmm,” I muttered as he sat down and stuck his feet on my desk.
“My question is why the hell you’re still here at,” he looked down at his watch; “eight on New Year’s Eve. You’re young, shouldn’t you be partying it up?”
I shrugged. “Adam had a school function…staff only.”
“That’s stupid!” Jesse said as he leaned forward and tapped on my desk. “I always let you invite a plus one.”
“It’s a school…I guess they can’t afford it. Plus, it’s the faculty party. I think it’d be awkward.”
“On New Year’s Eve, though?”
I shrugged. “It was that or do it on New Year’s day, and who wants to do that?”
Jesse rolled his eyes as he stood and clapped his hands. “Look who it is!”
I turned to see Adam in a black suit with a black button-up and green tie that pulled the flecks of the same color from his eyes.
“Why are you all dressed up?” I asked in shock.
“You really thought the school was having a faculty party on New Year’s Eve?”
“I guess so,” I answered, pressing my hand to my chest as I took a breath.
Adam pursed his lips, his brows furrowing at me as he shook his head. “Not at all.”
“I look like a slob compared to you—where are we going?” I asked.
Jesse came around my desk and moved my office door just enough, so I could see the dress bag hanging there.
“I think there’s something here for you to wear,” Jesse said before sliding out the door, patting Adam on the shoulder on his way out.
I sat further back in my chair and gazed at him suspiciously. Jesse definitely knew what was going on, and I was at a loss.
Adam nodded over his shoulder. “Go on, take it and put it on.”
I narrowed my eyes at him before standing and taking the bag to the bathroom across the hall. I closed the door and stood looking at the bag in my hand.
What could be so important we both had to dress up? I lifted the plastic off the dress and stood back to look at it.
It was a rose gold three quarter’s sleeve sheath dress covered in what appeared to Swarovski crystals. I undressed and slipped it over my head. The neck line plunged in the front almost as much as in the back, but it fit me like a glove. I took a deep breath as I looked at the dress before slipping into my sapphire blue heels that fit it perfectly by accident. I stuck my head out of the door to see Adam leaning against my doorframe facing me.
He stood up when he heard the door.
“You like it?” he asked, and his face flushed as though he was nervous.
I stepped completely out and his jaw went slack.
“Tara has good taste,” he muttered to himself as his eyes went up and down my body, then back up until his eyes met mine.
“So Tara picked it?” I asked.
“You think I could’ve?” he replied as he stepped forward, pulling me into his arms.
“You seem like a metro-sexual,” I teased as I tried to catch my breath from the way he was looking at me.
He ignored my comment and pulled me tighter to him, leaning forward and kissing me. I let my hands run up the lapel of his suit to the back of his head.
“You’re still at work!” Jesse hollered from his office.
I pulled away from Adam slowly. He had the devil in his eyes now as he looked at me as if he’d devour me.
“Let’s go.” Adam’s arm slid to my waist, and he guided me to the door.
“Drive safe out there. It’s looking like freezing rain,” Jesse called as we walked back.
“You too,” Adam called back, but I was too enamored in trying to figure out what was going on to respond before we were out of hearing range.
“You’re up to something,” I finally said.
“What makes you think that?” Adam’s voice conveyed his laughter, and I couldn’t help but smile.
“Nothing, nothing at all. You normally pick me up in a suit and hand me a crystal encrusted dress that probably cost a week’s salary.”
Adam held the door open for me.
“It matched this,” Adam commented, fingering the angel wing around my neck. “I figured you might as well look like the angel you are.”
“You two are going to be the death of me,” I replied as his arm found its way to my waist again, but this time he swung me up in his arms.
“I don’t have a jacket to lay on the ground, so I might as well pick you up,” Adam said as I gasped.
“The death of me,” I repeated as he carried me to his car. He set me on the ground only after opening the door for me.
We drove in silence, me casting him suspicious glances and him looking happy in his guilt. We took it slow because the temperature had plummeted and freezing rain was coming down heavily, but Adam didn’t seem to be in a rush. I wasn’t either. We parked in the lot of a gallery just as my phone rang.
“Who is it?” Adam asked as I dug my phone out my purse.
I looked down at the number and shrugged. “I don’t know. I’ve never seen it before…Hello?”
“River Ahlers?” the voice on the other end asked.
“Yes?”
“This is the Mass General Hospital. We’re looking for an Adam Beckerson?”
“He’s with me now—is everything okay?”
The person on the other end swallowed.
“There’s been an accident,” they said.
“An accident?” I whispered back as Adam’s eyes raced over my face.
“Robert Beckerson—”
“Bobby?”
“He’s in critical condition,” the woman explained. “You and Adam are listed as his emergency contacts.”
“Critical condition?”
“You need to come immediately,” she continued.
“This can’t be… him and Tara were supposed to be at the Beckerson’s house for New Year’s,” I gasped out the words as I struggled to breath.
“They were both in an accident heading north on the Mass Pike from Framingham. We aren’t sure of the cause yet, but we aren’t sure how long he has,” the woman explained.
The phone slipped from my hand into my lap as my eyes widened with tears.
“How long he has?” I repeated as my breath clogged in my throat.
Adam grabbed the phone from my lap.
Adam grabbed the phone with shaky hands and asked, “Where is he?” His eyes darted at the space in front of us as she answered. “What floor?”
He placed the phone down and looked straight ahead as the tears began to stream down his cheeks. His chest began to rise rapidly as his nostrils flared.
“We should go,” I suggested, my voice a whimper against the driving rain that had undoubtedly caused the accident.
Adam’s motions were slow as he placed the car softly into gear and began to back out of the parking lot.
All the happiness the week had brought slowly came out of me with each creeping mile towards the hospital. We drove in silence in as an urgent a pace as we could in the weather. The rain slapped against the windows, but I was already blinded by the tears as the words played over and over in my mind, we don’t know how long he has.
“We should call your parents?” I finally spoke as we took the exit from the highway.
Adam didn’t answer. He kept looking straight ahead.
I took a deep breath as I dialed the number, tears still streaming down my face.
“Hello?” Alec’s voice was strained at the other end as if he’d been having a yelling fight with someone.
“Alec, it’s River.”
“River?”
“Bobby’s at Mass General with Tara. They’re both in critical condition. We all need to get there as quick as possible,” I said in as steady a voice as I could.
/> “What?”
“Mass General, Adam and I just got here.”
I hung up the phone before he could respond.
Adam stuck the car in park and looked over at me.
“This can’t be happening…not to Bobby.” Adam’s voice broke as the tears interrupted his speech.
I took a shaky breath, closing my eyes before our gazes met and we both burst out of the car, racing hand in hand into the hospital.
Chapter 53
I’d never seen the man that stood in front of me, but I knew that look. My skin crawled with it as he looked back at Adam and me. He opened his mouth to speak, and all I could see was the movement; all I could hear was white noise. I felt Adam’s hand go slack in mine, and the world spiraled back at me. The force of the realization knocked the breath I had been holding out of my body. I struggled to breathe as the words pounded into my brain and shattered my soul.
“There’s nothing we could do for him.”
Him. Bobby. Gone.
My head jerked in slow motion as I heard Adam’s knees hit the floor. The hospital droned, but all I could hear was Adam’s sobbing at my feet; his fists pounding into the ground. I realized I was still staring at the doctor unblinking as my brain struggled to catch up—as I struggled to get air.
In my mind I was trembling, screaming Bobby’s name, ripping at my hair. In my head I’d lost it. In real life I was standing doing nothing. Not even breathing.
The doctor’s eyes trailed down to Adam and mine followed.
Realty jolted into me and everything suddenly was going too fast; adrenaline rushed through me as I pulled Adam into my arms—a broken shell—something I desperately wanted to be but couldn’t. The noises bore down on me now, pulsating into my skull as I tried to grasp on to Adam as the beehive that was the hospital exploded in my brain.
“Tara?” I finally asked.
I looked over Adam in my arms to the doctor. He swallowed.
More bad news, but it wasn’t that news.
“We aren’t sure yet. She’s comatose.”
I nodded as I pulled Adam to the chairs where he continued to shudder. I closed my eyes as I tried to block out the noises around me. My senses burned with the imagined stench of death, the sound of sobbing and the buzzing of machines as the person on the other end struggled to live…or died. The worst part was the emptiness I felt growing within me; a black hole that fought to consume me, one that had already consumed Adam.
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