Come Down In Time (A Time Travel Romance) (7 page)

“
Do you get headaches often?”
Nate asked her as they sat there in the still night.

“
No, I don’t,” she said. “I
don’t know what happened yesterday. It was unusual.”

“
Just checking,” Nate said.

“
Nothing to worry about,” she
said.

A few minutes later, they went
inside. “Do you want me to stay?” Nate asked, uncertainly.

“
Of course!” Jamie said. “Why
wouldn’t I want you to stay?” Nate had always stayed at her
house, or her at his. They had never asked each other about it. It
was just the way it was. No question about it.

They got into bed and Jamie
turned out the bedside lamp. They came close to each other and
kissed. Jamie wanted Nate. She wanted to have a life and a future. As
they made love that night, Nate told her he loved her. She was going
to tell him, had planned to tell him she loved him, but he said it
first. “I love you, too,” she said.

The next morning, when they woke
up, Nate said, “Jamie, I think I want to marry you.”

“
Really?” she said. “Are
you sure?”

“
I think I’m sure,” he
said.

“
Well, so far you’ve said you
think
you want to marry me and you
think
you’re sure.
That doesn’t sound a hundred percent to me.”

Nate got out of bed and put his
jeans on. He laughed then. “Yeah, I see what you mean. I guess I’m
getting carried away and trying to control it or something. Let me
rephrase. I
want
to marry you. I’m a hundred percent sure.”

Jamie had never wanted to marry
anyone but Tommy. But now her life had changed. She had found someone
else, and she didn’t want to be without Nate. She couldn’t be
with Tommy. But she could be with Nate.

“
Then I want to marry you,
too,” she said.

“
If you’re serious, then
you’re gonna make me the happiest man on earth right now,” Nate
said. He pulled his shirt over his head. “Are you serious?”

“
I’m serious,” she said
laughing.

“
Then I’m gonna get you a
ring!” he said.

“
Okay,” she said. Nate leaned
down to Jamie, who still lay in the bed naked. He kissed her.

“
I’m off to the clinic,” he
said. “See you there.”

After Nate left her house, Jamie
stayed in the bed for a few minutes, thinking. She had finally found
someone else, someone who could measure up to Tommy. It had been a
long time since she had felt love from a man and loved him back.
Surely Tommy would want her to find happiness. Surely he would.

Chapter
Six

Jamie didn’t dream about Tommy
anymore. She didn’t want to dream about Tommy. She didn’t want to
feel those feelings for him anymore. What good would it do? Tommy was
dead. He had been dead for a dozen years.

The next weekend, Nate came over
to Jamie’s house and they barbecued chicken on the grill. It was
May and the weather had warmed considerably. She and Nate drank wine
before supper, during supper, and after supper. Jamie was definitely
feeling the effects of the wine.

While she and Nate were sitting
on the couch listening to his Beatles collection she had bought him
for Christmas, Nate pulled a box out of his jacket. It was wrapped in
beautiful silver paper. He handed it to Jamie.

She tore the paper off and opened
the jewelry box. Inside was a sapphire ring.

“
I got this ring in North
Carolina from the Cherokees. I wanted it to be special.”

Nate took the blue ring from the
box and held Jamie’s left hand.

“
If you still want to marry me,
I want to put this ring on your finger.”

Jamie smiled. “Yes,” she
said. Nate put the ring on her finger and kissed her.

“
I can’t believe this,” she
said.

“
Me either,” he said. “I
wasn’t a big believer in marriage after my last one. But I’m a
believer now. I love you.”

They spent the rest of the
evening in bed, making love, and then talking about their wedding.

“
There’s this place up in the
hills,” Nate said. “It’s where I want to build a house. I’d
like to get married there, but I know you might have other ideas.”

“
I don’t have any ideas,”
she said. She supposed that it would be traditional to get married in
her hometown, Baker, but that didn’t seem like the right thing to
do. She hadn’t been there for years and it seemed dumb to go back
to get married to someone who didn’t even know the place. She was
thirty years old. Her connection to Baker was pretty much dead.

“
I want to get married where
you want to get married,” she said. “We’ll have to figure out
how to do a reception up there, but it sounds like the perfect
place.”

When they went to work that day,
Jamie announced to Tiffany and Stacie that she and Nate were engaged.
Tiffany hugged her right away. She was a sweet girl. “I wish you
the best of luck,” she said.

Stacie hugged her next. “You
lucky girl,” she said in Jamie’s ear. “You’ve got a great
guy.”

Jamie talked with both Tiffany
and Stacie about wedding plans then. Tiffany said her aunt did
catering and could do the reception, if Jamie wanted. They agreed to
meet with her aunt the following week, and Tiffany left the supply
room to tend to patients.

“
I’d like you to be my maid
of honor,” Jamie said to Stacie. “You’re my best friend.”

Stacie blushed and then smiled.
“I’d be honored,” she said. “I hope I can return the favor
very soon.“

“
Are you and Dustin getting
serious?” Jamie asked.

“
I think we are,” Stacie
said. “We’re starting to talk about making it permanent. The only
bad thing about that is that I’d probably move to Knoxville with
him. He’s got a good job and I can get a job there easily.”

“
I hate to think about your
leaving,” Jamie said. “But I understand. You’d have to do that.
Leave.”

“
Let’s not worry about that
right now,” Stacie said. “Let’s concentrate on you and Nate.
I’m so happy for you.”

Jamie knew that she had to tell
her parents about her engagement. That was going to be difficult
somehow. She had been so out of touch with them. It felt awkward to
call them with the news.

Jamie planned to call her parents
that very night to tell them about the engagement, but her mother
called her first.

“
Your father has had a heart
attack,” her mother said.

Jamie panicked and her heart
started to race. Had she really thought that her parents would live
forever, over in Baker, where Jamie never would go? What had she been
thinking all those years? She suddenly felt very selfish, allowing
her own trauma to influence her relationship with her parents and
little brother. Very selfish.

“
How bad is it, Mom?” she
asked.

“
He got a couple of stents. The
doctors say it’s mild. He’ll be in the hospital a few days. It’s
been very scary.”

“
I’ll be right there, Mom,”
Jamie said. “I’ll leave right away.”

She expected her mother to
protest that Jamie was leaving in the evening when she would be
driving in the dark, but she didn’t.

“
Okay, honey,” her mother
said. “I’d feel so much better if you were here.”

Jamie ended the call with her
mother. She threw some clothes into her small suitcase and walked out
the door. She locked it behind her and got in her car. She had driven
twenty miles or so before she called Nate.

“
My dad’s had a heart
attack,” she said.

“
I’m sorry,” Nate said with
concern. “Is it bad?”

“
It doesn’t sound severe.
I’ll know better when I get there. But I’m on the road to Baker
now.”

“
Of course,” Nate said. “Your
family needs you.” After they hung up, Jamie wondered about Nate
saying her family needed her. She had not talked about her family to
him, except in the vaguest terms. He had not pried. But Jamie could
tell he was curious about her family and why Jamie had not been home
in so long.

As Jamie thought on the drive to
Baker, she realized she would probably have to tell Nate about Tommy
and why she had not been home in a dozen years. Now, as she drove
down the highway, she thought her reticence to go home had been
foolish and self-centered. She had hurt her parents and her little
brother by dropping out of their lives like that. And now, she was in
love and engaged to be married, and her parents knew nothing about
it. They knew nothing about her life. They must have suffered so
much, Jamie thought. Suffered at the loss of their only daughter. It
had been a terrible loss for them.

Two hours later, Jamie pulled
into the parking lot of the Baker Hospital, the same hospital where
the ambulance had taken Tommy that day. The same hospital that had
declared him dead on arrival. Jamie pushed those thoughts from her
mind and walked inside. She asked the receptionist which room John
Walters was in.

The receptionist checked her
computer. “He’s in room 308, the cardiac wing,” she said. The
young woman directed her to the elevators and told her to turn left
when she got off on the third floor. Jamie rode up to the third floor
and turned left. Room 302, 304, 306, and finally Room 308. The door
was slightly ajar and she pushed it open.

Her father was lying back in the
hospital bed with his eyes closed. Her mother was in a chair by his
bed, and she looked like she was asleep. Jamie walked over to the
side of her father’s bed and he opened his eyes.

“
Hey, honey,” he said.

Jamie tried to hold back her
tears. Her father looked weak and older than the last time she’d
seen him. She tried to remember when that was and was shocked to
realize it had been five years. Her mother continued to sleep in the
chair. Her hair was much grayer now.

“
Hey, Dad,” Jamie said. She
stooped to hug him. She kissed him on his cheek.

“
You look so much like your
mother,” her father said. “When she was your age. So much like
her.”

“
How are you, Dad?” Jamie
asked. “Are they treating you all right?”

“
Oh, definitely. You get the
royal treatment in the cardiac wing, I think. All of the nurses have
been great.”

“
That’s good,” Jamie said.
A young black nurse with close-cropped hair walked in, and Jamie
introduced herself as Mr. Walters’ daughter. The nurse introduced
herself as Adeline. She checked her father’s blood pressure and
looked at the cardiac chart.

“
He’s looking good,” she
said. Jamie followed Adeline out of the room when she left.

“
I’m a doctor,” Jamie said.
“So please tell me anything I need to know. I’ll understand what
you’re talking about.”

“
Oh,” Adeline said. “Okay.
Well, your dad suffered a mild cardiac event and they put two stents
in this morning. His vitals look good and we expect him to go home in
a couple of days.”

“
Okay, thanks,” Jamie said.
“I appreciate your looking after my dad.”

“
He’s a real charmer,”
Adeline said. She put her hand on Jamie’s arm. “Don’t worry.
He’s doing real good. You can look at his chart and you’ll see
that for yourself. He’s going to have to watch his diet and take
some medications, but he’s lucky. I’m sure you know that already.
He got a warning and he can fix it.”

“
Thank you,” Jamie said.

When she walked back into her
father’s hospital room, her mother was awake and standing by her
father’s bed. Jamie hugged her. She was so glad to see her mother,
she didn’t want to let her go. She vowed to herself right then and
there that she would not make her parents suffer anymore by her
absence. She was going to be there for them.

“
I’m going to stay with your
dad tonight,” her mother said. “You go on back to the house.
There’s nowhere here for you to even sit. We’ll be fine.”

“
Okay, Mom,” Jamie said.
“I’ll be back first thing in the morning. You call me if you need
to, okay?”

“
Okay, honey,” she said. She
hugged Jamie. “I’m so glad to see you. It’s been too long.”

“
I agree, Mom. Way too long.
But I want you to know that you and Dad can count on me. I’m going
to be here for you now and forever.”

“
Thank you, honey,” her
mother said in a choked voice.

Jamie walked back through the
hospital and to the parking lot. She got in her car and headed toward
her childhood home, a house full of memories, a house she had not
seen for a dozen years. She was going to have to drive by the spot
that Tommy ran off the road, through the barrier, and down the cliff.
That was the only way to get to her house. That last time she had
driven by that spot was when she left for Vanderbilt. She had held
her breath then as she passed.

It was dark. Jamie reached the
spot and the reflector lights on the barrier glowed at her. Why did
Tommy run off this road? she thought. She held her breath again and
then she was past the spot and on the short road to her house.