Raphaela's Gift (31 page)

She stared at him, her eyes wide in question, her cheeks flushed. "What's wrong, Garret?"

"I don't know."

She waited for a minute, then stood, rivulets of sudsy white water slithering down her body, and walked from the bathroom after swiping a white towel from the towel bar. "When you're ready to be honest, call me." Pain, embarrassment and confusion reflected in her eyes.

Dumbfounded by his weakness, confused by his own behavior, he sat in the tub and watched her leave, and an hour later, he still sat there and wondered how she'd gotten home. He supposed Marge had called a cab. He was miserable company as he sat and picked at his dinner, then retreated once more to his bedroom, to the giant empty bed, and to the memories of how it felt to have Faith in that very room.

Somehow, the room had grown cold again, returned to its usual lonely gloom. He'd come so close. So close to loving her, so close to admitting his feelings to her. Was that it, or was it something else? Something he still hadn't faced yet.

Why would he run from the one thing--the one person--he wanted so badly he swore he'd die if he couldn't see her again? The night hours dragged by, dreams and thoughts converged into a confusing mass of images. Memories of his marriage to Marian, his most recent relationships, if they could be called that, danced through his mind, playing like a film. He watched, looking for the key, much like he'd searched for the key to Raphaela.

Raphaela.

He needed to see her. He needed to reach her.

Perhaps when he did, he would finally understand himself.

* * *

The morning sun hung low in the eastern sky, blinding him as he pulled up Marian's driveway. It was early--too damn early, he realized as he glanced at the clock, but for some reason, he couldn't wait another minute to see Raphaela and get the answers that had eluded him for the past three years.

He'd thought he'd conquered whatever it had been, whatever had kept him from Faith. No, all he'd managed to do was distract himself with a bunch of trumped up excuses and complications. His work, his daughter, and his ex. Then her work, her boss, and his daughter.

What was he hiding from?

How the hell would a six-year-old autistic child show him?

He was losing it. No doubt about it, his tenuous grip on sanity was failing. That had to be it. All these years he'd assumed it was Marian who would break, would be the first to succumb to the misery of loneliness and regret. Now he could see that he'd been wrong. Oh so wrong.

At least Marian had loved another man. At least Marian didn't run from intimacy. At least Marian had the nerve to acknowledge what she needed and try to get it.

Why couldn't he do the same?

Garret raised his hand, ready to knock on the deep crimson door and then hesitated. Would Marian still be asleep? He glanced at his watch again. Seven thirty. Not likely. Raphaela was usually up by six thirty, quarter to seven at the latest.

Before he struck the door, it opened, and Marian greeted him, her expression a mixture of alarm and bewilderment, "Garret, what are you doing here?"

"I need to see Ella."

"Is everything all right?" she asked as she stepped to the side to let him into the foyer of her contemporary loft. His footsteps echoed through the cavernous space, sparsely filled with concrete, brick and pine. The furnishings were just as urbane and industrial as the neighborhood the building inhabited. Everything was steel, sharp with slick, hard surfaces. Nothing about the place welcomed him. Still he didn't hesitate to enter. He thought of nothing but seeing his daughter. Reaching her, and himself.

"Garret?" Marian searched his face with a worried gaze. "What's happened?"

* * *

Faith stared at the help-wanted ads, but saw only black blurs. The same words sounded in her head, over and over. What had gotten into Garret last night?

What had gotten into her? She'd never been so…so forward. So eager. Had she scared him away?

Would he call her?

A part of her doubted it. She'd acted like a common tramp, stirring up his lust, teasing him, encouraging him. God, all she hadn't done was actually sleep with him.

No wonder he'd shooed her off. Thank God he'd stopped her before things had gone too far. No doubt he'd lost all respect for her.

She sighed. How had things gone so wrong, again? She'd thought she finally had herself all figured out, knew she'd spent her whole life bending to everyone around her--readily acquiesced her needs to every boss, every friend, and every man she'd dated. A people pleaser, to the extreme.

She sipped her hot chocolate, the house so cold it felt like winter. Grandpa had the air cranked up again, said it worked better that way. If it cooled the house early, it wouldn't have to work as hard later, when the air outside heated to scorching temperatures. She inhaled the sweet cocoa. The memory of childhood mornings drifted through her mind.

"Find anything yet?" Grandpa asked from his battered recliner in the family room.

Sitting at the glass-topped dinette table in the nook between the kitchen and family room, she lifted her head from the paper. "No, not yet."

"Don't worry. You'll find something soon. You can stay here as long as you like. You know me, I like the company."

"Yeah, I know, Grandpa. Thanks." Sure, there was no hurry for her to find another job. And Monday she would go to the headhunter who'd helped her find Mountain Rise to see what she had open. But all of that paled in comparison to what truly troubled her. "Grandpa, can I ask you something?"

"Sure." He looked at her with kind eyes. She could see why her grandmother had loved him all those years. He was such a gentle soul, so easy to love.

"How did you know Grandma was the one? I've dated so many, and I'm not some young kid. Still I can't figure it out."

"I don't know. I wanted to be with her all the time, couldn't think about anything or anyone else, I guess. And I did things I wouldn't do for anyone else." He smiled, his expression wistful, and then he picked up his mug from the table next to him and slurped his coffee.

She smiled at the sound, remembering how her grandmother used to scold him for slurping. Fifty years. They'd lived together, shared fifty years of life. That was amazing. She wanted that some day--a love that would endure fifty years.

Of course, things hadn't always gone smooth for them. At times they bickered, and she recalled her grandmother telling her about when they'd nearly divorced. Faith knew their love had lasted not because they rode upon it and let it carry them, like a current in the ocean, but because they tended it, fed it, nourished it.

She thought about her relationship with Garret. Something was missing. Together, their music was discordant, as though they played in different keys. "Do you think a person could find the right person but at the wrong time?"

"I suppose," he answered between sips, his mug still at his mouth. With his free hand, he reached to the table and plucked a sugar cookie from a dish and slipped it into his mouth.

She watched him and wished her grandmother were still alive, not only for his sake, since he was so lonely, but for hers as well. Grandma would have wrapped her arms around her, held her tightly, stroked her hair--even as an adult--and whispered encouraging words into her ear. Grandma had been the one person who'd understood her, had encouraged her through every hardship, no matter how bad it was. Damn, she missed her.

"Have you told him how you feel?" Grandpa asked. "I always did that with your grandma."

"Not exactly."

"Then maybe you should," he said, as though it was as easy as buttering toast.

And buttering toast it wouldn't be. Yet, she couldn't deny its logic.

She sat back and stared out the window, across the green of the cornfield. But it wasn't cornstalks she saw. Instead, she watched scene after scene of her life, as though it played before her on a movie screen. She'd never been able to be honest about her feelings. She'd never sat down and told anyone exactly how she felt about anything, not her mother, father, brothers, boyfriends, friends.

She remembered when her best friend had spread vicious rumors about her, and her brothers had called her names that had cut her to the quick, trampled upon her self-esteem as an awkward adolescent struggling to like herself. And then she recalled how her mother had repeatedly criticized her artwork, until she had quit, having lost confidence in her talent.

Every one of those memories stung, the pain dulled by lapsed years, but still there. She'd skirted those issues and dozens more, all her life. And for what? To avoid angering or upsetting the people around her? And at what cost?

What a fool I've been.
She hadn't avoided angering anyone, hadn't avoided difficulty, heartache or conflict. By not speaking her mind and asserting herself, she'd made things worse. Not only for herself but also for everyone around her.

Even if she hadn't actually confronted them, she'd acted upon her feelings. And she'd hurt them all, done things out of anger and resentment. Purposefully ignored her mother's birthday, conveniently forgot to deliver important phone messages to her brothers, ignored pleas to return phone calls from desperate friends.

And she would do the same to Garret if she wasn't honest with him.

"You're right. I should go tell him how I feel," she said. Her stomach tangled, tying itself into a knot. She planted a kiss on her grandfather's wispy white hair on top of his head and walked to the door. "I'll be back later this afternoon. Wish me luck."

* * *

Garret sat on the floor, staring at his daughter as if the answers to the greatest mysteries of the world lay in her eyes. Raphaela sat on the floor, toys scattered around her. Yet, she stared straight ahead, more interested in a shifting shadow on the wall, formed by a tree limb outside blown by the rising winds.

"Ella, if only you could speak," he whispered.

A distant crack of thunder cut through the silence that lay between them and electrified Garret's nerves. The light from the window dimmed as a heavy cloud snuffed out the sun, and an equally heavy gloom settled over Garret. Would he ever reach his daughter?

And would he ever find the answers within himself? The reason for his fears?

"I don't know what I'm doing here." He scoured his face with his palms and stood, walking toward the window. As he reached it, a vivid bolt of bluish white jutted from the cloud to the ground a distance away, and thunder shook the building.

He turned to see if Raphaela was shaken. Nothing. She continued to stare at the wall, although the shadow was gone.

"When I was a boy, I was scared to death of thunderstorms. Can't say I like them much now, if I had to be honest." He smiled and cringed as another bolt shot from the roiling clouds. "You won't tell anyone, will you?"

She didn't change her position or focus, but he continued, suddenly driven, as hard as the rain outside, to talk. It was there, the connection with her. And his answer was at the tip of his consciousness.

"I used to huddle under the bed, or in the closet, whenever there was a storm, and my mother…" he paused. His mother had always been alone, struggling to raise him and his four sisters. Bedraggled, misery heavy on her shoulders. His father had traveled, a salesman of some sorts from what he remembered, and he had been as solemn as his mother.

And then he remembered the day his father moved away. He remembered how he had pleaded for his father to stay. How he had promised to be good, how he had apologized for scaring him off with his mischief.

And he remembered his father's answer. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I've failed you, your sisters, your mother. None of you deserve this…"

Then he turned and walked out of their lives, never to return.

That day had impacted a large part of Garret's life. He hadn't realized how much, until now.

"I've failed you…" Garret said aloud. He looked at Raphaela. Was that what was at the root of his fears? Was that what stood between him and Raphaela? Was he afraid of causing her the same sort of misery his father had, by failing as a father? Was he so driven to avoid failure, he put such pressure on himself and her that he all but squashed the love that could be?

Was Raphaela hiding from him because his demands scared her? He knew how it felt to be criticized, to be trampled by well-meant but poorly chosen words. His father had done that to him as a child, on the few occasions he had been home to be a father. He'd felt like the most unlovable boy in the world when his father glared at him in that cold, detached way.

Surely, he didn't do that! He didn't glare at his daughter. He didn't yell at her, scold her mercilessly for things she couldn't help doing.

Or did he?

Sometimes, when he was tired, frustrated, desperate, he did try to correct her when she flapped her hands and stared blankly at walls. By doing that, was he criticizing who she was--forcing her deeper into her protective cocoon?

Why hadn't he seen this before?

He walked to Raphaela and sat before her, then, feeling strange, utterly silly, he began mimicking her behavior. Fluttering his fingers, flapping his hands, just like Faith had done that first day at the camp. Her eyes shifted, and she looked at him and smiled. A wide beaming grin that sent tears to his eyes.