Heartbeat (26 page)

“You're doing it again,” he whispered as they sat by the campfire that night, after a delicious dinner. The boys had sung songs until they fell asleep, and they were both in Bill's tent, but Tommy swore he was sleeping with Adrian the next night.

“Doing what?” she mused, sitting close to him and staring into the fire with a distant look. It had been a lovely evening.

“Thinking about something much too serious. Every now and then your eyes get sad. I wish you'd tell me what's bothering you.” It upset him that she shut him out at times, yet most of the time they had never been closer.

“Nothing's bothering me.” But she wasn't convincing and he wasn't convinced.

“I wish I believed you.”

“I've never been happier.” She looked him in the eye and he believed her, and yet he knew she was also preoccupied about something. She was worrying about the baby. How she would take care of it. What it would be like being all alone with it …giving birth with no one there to support her. As the baby grew, it became more real to her, and she was beginning to get worried. And she was afraid of losing Bill, and yet she knew she had to. It was inevitable once he knew, if not sooner. And suddenly, as she thought of all that, there were tears in her eyes, and Bill saw it, and without saying a word to her, he pulled her into his arms and held her.

“I'm right here for you, Adrian …I'm right here., for as long as you need me.”

“Why are you so good to me?” she said through her tears. “I don't deserve this.”

“Stop saying that.”

She felt so guilty toward him. It wasn't fair misleading him and not telling him about the baby, and yet she couldn't. What could she tell him? That she was here on a camping trip with him and his children, and she was falling in love with him, and yet she was pregnant with Steven's baby? How could she? And then suddenly she was laughing through her tears at the absurdity of it all. It was a ridiculous situation.

“Where were you a few years ago anyway?” She laughed and he smiled in answer to her question.

“Making a fool of myself as usual. But better late than never.” The trouble was that he was too late.

She nodded, and they sat that way for a long time, holding each other, and looking into the fire, but this time he didn't kiss her. He wanted to, but he didn't want to upset her.

He suggested they go to bed finally, and helped her into her tent, and then got into his sleeping bag in his, and a minute later he heard a noise, and she was standing next to him, looking worried.

“What's wrong? Are you okay?”

“Yeah,” she whispered nervously, “I heard a noise over there.” She pointed into the distance outside his tent. “Did you hear it?”

He shook his head, he had already been half asleep when she woke him. “No, it's nothing. Coyotes maybe.”

“Do you think it could be a bear?”

He grinned at her, wanting to tell her it was ten of them and she'd better get in his sleeping bag to stay safe, but he didn't. “I don't think so. And the bears around here are pretty tame,” despite an occasional disaster, but usually then the bears were teased, they seldom if ever attacked unprovoked, and she wasn't provoking anyone but him, standing there in her blue jeans and his sweater. “Do you want to sleep in here with us? It'll be a tight fit, but the boys will love it.” She nodded, looking like a kid, and he smiled at her as she settled down in her own sleeping bag next to him, and she fell asleep, holding tightly to his hand as he lay next to her, and watched her.

T
HE FOUR OF THEM WOKE UP IN THE TENT TOGETHER
the next day, and Tommy immediately took advantage of the situation to pounce on his father. He tickled him mercilessly, and then Adam and Bill turned the tables on Tommy. Adrian had to come to his rescue then, so Bill tickled her, while Adam assisted, and within moments they were a wild tangle of arms and legs and feet and squeals and hands that were tickling anything, anywhere on anyone, until Adrian finally begged them to stop, laughing so hard, she split the zipper on her blue jeans. Fortunately, she knew she had another pair, so she didn't panic. But she was laughing so hard, she could hardly walk, and so were the others as they all stumbled out into the sunshine. It was a nice way to wake up, and it was certainly a lot better than waking up in the empty silence of her now unfurnished apartment.

“How come you slept with us last night?” Adam asked as he stretched in the sunshine.

“She was afraid of being eaten by a bear,” Bill explained matter-of-factly.

“I was not.” She tried to cover up as he hooted and the kids grinned.

“You were too! Who showed up in our tent after we were all asleep and said she heard noises?”

“I thought you said it was coyotes.”

“I did.”

“All right, then, I was afraid of being eaten by a coyote.” She laughed and they laughed with her, and as she organized breakfast with Adam's help, Bill announced plans to take everyone fishing right after breakfast.

“And we can eat whatever we catch for dinner tonight.”

“Great. Who's cleaning?” Adam was quick to ask. He knew that game from previous camping trips with his father. He usually wound up cleaning the fish even when his father did have a girlfriend along, because they were always too squeamish.

“I'll tell you what,” Bill suggested as Adrian lit the fire. “We each clean our own. Is that fair?”

“Perfectly,” Adrian agreed with a broad grin, “because I've never caught anything in my life. I'll have a hot dog.”

“No fair!” Adam complained, sniffing at the bacon she was cooking.

“Can we have corn bread?” Tommy inquired, it was one of his favorite things about camping. That and sharing a sleeping bag with his father. It was like sleeping with a big teddy bear who cuddled all night and kept you warm and toasty.

“I'll cook some tonight,” Bill promised, looking up at the sky. It was a gorgeous day, and all was right with the world. He looked at Adrian over the boys' heads, and smiled at her, and she felt her heart turn to mush inside her.

“Why don't we go swimming today?'' Adrian suggested as she fried her eggs. It was almost warm enough already, and in another hour it would be. It was freezing in the lake, but there was a lively river that ran a little distance behind where they were camping. They had seen it the day before, and there was a cascade of water running out of the mountains that made a sizable current to raft on.

“Let's go fishing first.” It was Bill's suggestion, as she served him his breakfast and then served the children. But they agreed with Adrian, they wanted to go swimming, and fishing later.

“All right, all right. We'll go swimming, and then I'll buy the bait. And after lunch, we can get down to serious business. And whoever doesn't catch a fish will starve.” He growled at them and they all laughed, as Adrian looked at him primly.

“Just don't forget my hot dog.”

“Oh, no. You too. And don't tell me you're afraid of water.” He was teasing her because she hadn't gone gliding or up in the balloon in the Napa Valley. But that was because of the baby, just like the horses she had avoided in Santa Barbara. The only thing was, he didn't know it.

“I am
not
afraid of water.” She looked highly insulted at the suggestion, as she finished her eggs. She had just eaten yet another mammoth breakfast. But the mountain air made her ravenously hungry. “I was captain of the swimming team at Stanford, thank you very much. And I was a lifeguard for two summers.”

“Can you dive real good?” Tommy inquired, highly impressed by her credentials.

“Pretty good.” She smiled at him, tousling his hair with a gentle hand.

“Will you teach me when we get back to Dad's place?”

“Sure.”

“Me too,” Adam said quietly. He liked her a lot, and he admired her even if she hadn't gone up in the hot-air balloon. “Dad taught me to dive last year, but I think I forgot over the winter.”

“We'll get to work on it as soon as we get back.” She cleaned up the breakfast things then, and they helped her. They rolled up their sleeping bags, and then took turns changing into their bathing suits, before zipping up their tents and going to the river. Adrian wore a T-shirt over her suit, which looked fine, even to Bill.

And they found a wonderful swimming hole full of other families and children and jumped in and out of it, laughing and teasing, and splashing water on each other. And in the distance, well beyond it and some rocks, were the rapids where people were rafting.

They played
in
the swimming hole for well over an hour, and then finally Bill got out and announced that he was driving to the store to buy bait and some supplies and he'd be back in a little while, and Adrian and the boys opted to stay in the swimming hole until he came back again. They were having a good time, and there was plenty of time for fishing later. He also wanted to look into renting a boat for them, and he had to go to the bait-and-tackle shop to do it.

“I'll meet you back at the campsite,” he called out to Adrian with a wave as he disappeared across the clearing, and she turned back to the children. Tommy was having a wonderful time, and Adam was trying to dive underwater to see how deep it was, but she told him not to. The water wasn't clear and she couldn't tell if there were rocks and she didn't want him getting hurt, but he was very reasonable and listened to what she told him. She was explaining to him that it was never a good idea to dive where you didn't know exactly how deep it was, and she turned to explain the same thing to Tommy, and as she did, she realized that he was nowhere to be found. She began to panic as she looked for him, then she saw him on the rocks, watching the people in the rafts shooting the rapids in the river just beyond them. She called out to him, ready to scold him for leaving the swimming hole without telling her, and he didn't seem to hear her. She called him again, and then decided to get out and go get him. She asked Adam to get out and wait for her, and she got out and clambered over the rocks to go and get Tommy.

She called his name and Tommy turned and grinned mischievously at her, and she climbed over more rocks in her effort to reach him. He was standing on the riverbank and leaning as far forward as he could, as three rafts came racing past him. It looked like great fun to him, and he was planning to ask his father to rent a raft and take them rafting. It was a lot more fun than renting a rowboat and fishing in the middle of Lake Tahoe.

“Tommy! Come back here!” she called out to him, and Adam followed her over the rocks a little more slowly, annoyed that his brother had dragged them out of the swimming hole. But as he watched him, suddenly the smaller boy disappeared. He slipped right off the bank and into the turbulent water. “Tommy!” Adrian screamed at him. She had seen it, too, but he didn't hear her as he began moving swiftly downstream toward the rocks that were far down the river.

Adrian looked frantically for something to hold out to him, an oar, a pole, a limb from a tree, and at first there was nothing, and no one had yet seen what had happened. Adam came running toward her and he started to scream the boy's name, too, but all Adrian could see was a look of panic on Tommy's face as he was carried downstream, and suddenly two men realized what had happened.

“Get him! …Get the boy! …” one of them shouted to the people in the raft, but they couldn't hear over the roar of the water, and they didn't see the small figure in the blue bathing suit as he bobbed under the water. He was flailing wildly with his arms, but he kept going down and Adrian realized instantly that something terrible was about to happen. Adam was crying hysterically, and he started to jump in, but she grabbed at him and pushed him roughly aside, shouting at him as she pushed him away from the water.

“No! Adam, don't you go in there!” and as soon as she said the words she ran away from him, and as fast as she could, she ran along the river, sailing over rocks, and leaping over obstacles and trees and pushing away people in her path. She had never run so fast in her life and she knew that his life depended on it, and all along the riverbank people were screaming. They had seen him now. But everyone seemed to be helpless. Two men shoved an oar at him from one of the boats, but he was too small and too stunned to grab it, and he was pushed under the surface by the currents and disappeared again as Adrian continued to run without stopping for breath or for anything. She knew exactly what she was doing and where she was going, if only it wasn't too late by the time she got there. She could feel branches rip her legs, and something struck her hip, and her feet were numb from the sharp rocks, and her lungs screamed, but she could still see him, and then she dove, just before the rocks where the water was the roughest. She dove smoothly near the surface of the water, praying that she wouldn't hit anything and that she could catch him before it was too late. If she didn't, it would be all over, and no matter what it took, she knew she couldn't let that happen.

She was almost hit by an oar as she swam past, strong and swift and sure, battered by the currents, and in the distance she could hear people shouting, and from somewhere there was the whine of a siren. And then, as she was pushed down by the force of the water, suddenly she struck something hard, it hit her in the face, and she grabbed at it, and as she touched it, she knew she had him. It was Tommy. She pushed him to the surface, gasping for air herself, and the current dragged her down again, but she shoved him high above her head, trying to force him out of the water. He was sputtering and gasping, and swallowing water each time they went down, and he was fighting her with what strength he had, but she wouldn't loosen her grip on him and as the currents kept ripping at her, she kept pushing him upward, and then suddenly he was gone. She couldn't feel the weight of him anymore. He was somewhere and she couldn't find him, she was pressed down into a black hole, and she was falling into something very deep and very soft, and it was quiet there, as she continued falling.