Troubled Waters (The Lake Trilogy, Book 2) (27 page)

“Well, there’s nothing to worry about now. Marcus is…gone…and your father is destroying lives in Davidson, gloriously oblivious to anything but his own selfish gain. Since Wes insists on continuing to monitor the firm’s staff for any suspicious changes…” I say grasping his hand in both of mine “…we are free to be John and Layla, happily engaged couple, working our asses off to finish school before the end of time!”

When we pull up to my favorite restaurant, Stir, my stomach is filled with excited butterflies. It reminds me of the flutters I felt the night Will took me on my first date and we picnicked on the dock. I experienced a release of emotions I didn’t know I still had. Then, when Will kissed me on the porch… That’s the night I felt like I really started living again.

We’re halfway through dinner when Will brings up the subject of our wedding. Any normal girl would be chomping at the bit to get wedding plans underway, but I just haven’t been able to focus on that. When I looked at the calendar earlier this week, I was hit in the face with a reason other than the commitment to my education.

“We have to at least talk about a time frame, Layla, even if it’s when we’re finished with school. There has to be a destination here.” Will is visibly upset by my lack of initiative in planning our wedding.

“I just can’t right now,” I say, tearing off a piece of bread. I don’t eat the bread. I just examine it.

“Layla, I know you want to marry me. I just don’t understand why you don’t seem to care about how we go about executing it, beginning by setting a date.” Will takes the bread from me and tosses it back into the basket.

“Their anniversary is next week,” I say softly.

“I thought Luke and Claire’s anniversary was in October?” he asks, his eyebrows furrowing together.

“My parents’ anniversary is next week. It would have been their 25
th
.”

“Oh, baby, I’m sorry. Why didn’t you say something?” Will takes my hand in his and rubs his thumb across my fingers.

“I just noticed it last week.” I can’t even look at him. I’m afraid I’m going to cry and I just don’t want to do that.

“I can see why that’s upsetting to you, and maybe why you don’t want to talk wedding stuff now, but…what does that have to do with why you’ve avoided the subject for the past four months?”

I think about his question and realize that I’m still stuck. I’m stuck with the same baggage I’ve been carrying since I was 12-years-old.

“It’s a chain reaction – a domino effect that I will never escape. I’m marrying you because I met you when I moved to Davidson after my grandparents died. I moved to live with my grandparents because my parents died. If my parents hadn’t died, I would never have met you.” I swallow hard, rehashing this painful truth again. I’ve tried but don’t know if I’ll ever reconcile these feelings. “Babe, my parents had to die in order for us to be together. I have a hard time moving forward with my life sometimes, knowing that theirs was cut so short.”

“You want a normal life, right?” Will says and I nod immediately. More than anything I want my life to be ordinary. “A normal life means that you take what happens to you in it and press on, using those experiences to make you a better person. You can’t spend your life living with guilt and regret. You can’t spend your life so focused on all the death you’ve faced that you forget to live. And from everything you have ever told me about your parents, they would be so mad at you right now for not embracing the life that you have. You survived that car accident for a reason, Layla. I’d like to think that
we
are that reason.”

“How do you do that? How do you know exactly what to say to me at exactly the right time?” I say squeezing Will’s hand.

“I have no idea,” Will says with a bit of a chuckle. “Tell you what…promise me that we’ll sit down next week and set a date, and I won’t bring it up again until then. Deal?”

I lean over the corner of the table and place a small, sweet kiss on Will’s lips. “Deal.”

I’m still gazing into Will’s gorgeous blue eyes when I feel like someone is staring at us. I move my eye and then my head and find it was more than a feeling.

“Hey Layla! I thought that was you!” Eli says approaching our table. All I can think is that I hope I put Will’s worries to rest the other day, but it does seem strange that Eli would be here of all places.

“Hey Eli. What’s up? You remember John,” I say casually but so Will knows I haven’t dismissed his normal level of jealousy.

“Yes, of course…John,” he says as they shake hands.

“What can we do for you, Eli?” Will is curt. He’s not messing around in working to convey that, while I may have agree to help him out of his bind with the student paper, he is not really welcome into our world.

“Oh, I just saw you guys over here and thought I’d come say hey. So…hey! But since I’m here, you can save me a phone call, Layla. Is it ok if I come by next weekend to do the interview?” Eli stands there awkwardly as I consider his request.

“Layla and I have plans next weekend. Perhaps she can meet you on campus one day?” Will offers as an alternative. I just gave him my word that we would sit down next weekend and set a wedding date and there is no way he’s letting me out of that.

“Well, I’m pretty jam packed all week. It should only take about an hour. I know an interview for the school paper doesn’t scream Friday night fun, but I would be more grateful than you could ever know if I could just have a little bit of your time. Please?” Eli looks pathetic. He’s in a real bind and I hate to say no to him.

“If you think it should only take about an hour, then I think Friday should be fine.” Will squeezes my knee under the table – a definite sign that he is not happy with me. “I’ll text you my address. Can you be there at five?”

“That’d be so great! Thank you so much, Layla! I appreciate you, too, John. I don’t blame you for being a little hesitant. Layla seems like the kind of girl a guy would do anything for. You’ll be there right? I mean, you guys are engaged. I can’t exactly interview Layla without her other half being there!”

“Oh, yeah…I’ll be there,” Will says with a smirk. Like he’s going to let me out of his sight with some guy we both just met. I have to admit that I do like being protected by Will. It makes me feel safe.

“Awesome! Ok…let me get out of your hair. You two did not come out tonight to have a third wheel talking your ear off.” Eli starts walking backward, making his way to the front of the restaurant. “If I don’t see you around campus, I’ll see you on Friday! Thanks, again!”

I’m getting a stare-down again, only this time it’s from Will.

“What?” I ask.

“You know what,” he says.

“I’m not dodging the wedding planning. I swear! He’s in a bind! Helping out a new friend at school is a very
normal
thing to do. And it’s only going to take, like, an hour. If he’s there at five, we’ll be done by six or so. Then we have the rest of the evening and weekend to argue over our wedding date and the kind of wedding we’re going to have. Ok?” I smile and tilt my head playfully at Will. “You love me, remember!”

“How could I ever forget?” Will laughs quietly and kisses me on the cheek. “Ok…normal it is! Are you ready to go?”

“Done so soon?”

“I have a very
normal
date planned for us tomorrow. Not that it starts early…I just want to take you home and make out with you on your couch. You know…just your
normal
date stuff.”

“Ordinary making out sounds like fun! We’ll have to be extra quiet because we don’t want my parents or my uncle to hear us,” I whisper. Will smiles and motions for the check.

“I’ve noticed you’ve been doing that more lately: referring to Luke and Claire as your parents,” he says.

“Yeah. It started out as just being an easier way to talk casually about my family without going into the whole mess about my parents. But the more I did it, the more it seemed a better fit. I haven’t called them Mom or Dad to their faces yet, but I have a feeling it’s going to happen sooner or later. The only problem is, that when I think about actually making that switch, I can’t help but think about the problems between my dad and Luke and Gram and Gramps. I never did talk to Luke about the whole not-defending-him-in-court thing. It feels like it’s looming out there. I don’t know if I have questions or not, and if I do, if they’re even about the explosion at the cosmetics factory,” I tell him.

“Just tell them that. Layla, they’re going to understand. They want to fill in any blanks you may have. Honey, you were only twelve when they died. I’m sure there are some things you want to know about your parents that aren’t criminally related. Promise me you’ll talk to Luke and Claire soon, ok?”

“I’m promising an awful lot tonight,” I jest.

“Yes, well, that ring on your finger is the biggest promise of all, and you can’t take that back!” Will grabs my hand and leads me out of the restaurant.

I spend the drive home in quiet anticipation of our make out session. It’s been a while since we’ve been close and I’m actually a little nervous. I don’t worry about Will stepping over any lines. He’s always been so incredibly honorable…no matter how many times I tempt him. He’s committed to us waiting, which is why he’s probably a little anxious to get a wedding date set.

Well what d’ya know? I just found my motivation for setting my wedding date!

I’ve been flipping through the pages of my parents’ wedding album for hours. Staring, examining each picture…hoping to extrapolate something more about them, but every picture, every scene, tells me what I already know. In the midst of the big hair of the 80’s, when wedding fashion called for puffy sleeves and headpieces with veils that looked like they could snap your head off, my mother walked her own path. On her wedding day she wore a long, flowy, soft white dress that made her look like a Greek goddess, a crown of white daisies in her hair, and, of course, no shoes. Yes, my mother was a card-carrying, tree-hugging, granola-crunching hippy.

Oh, my gosh.
I can’t believe I haven’t noticed this until now. The flowers, the brick path…they were married in the gardens Will took me to in the fall! I immediately want to go back there. I want to walk the brick path again knowing this time that my mother took it as she stepped closer to her life with my father. I want to touch the same flowers and trees she did. And I want to hear the wind whip through the leaves the same way she did 25 years ago.

“Layla?” I hear Luke’s soft voice say at my open door. “It’s getting late. Are you ready for some dinner? Claire’s got a pot of spaghetti sauce simmering. Should be her best one yet,” he smiles.

“Tell me about them,” I say quietly.

“What would you like to know?” I love that Luke doesn’t need to ask me a clarifying question to understand what I need. He just knows, like a father knows his child. He sits beside my limp body on the bed and rubs a few small circles on my back.

“Was it really the legal stuff that tore you all apart?” I breathe a heavy sigh having felt a sense of release by Luke’s comforting touch.

“No. Gram did that,” he says without hesitation. “She was a hard woman and didn’t like inconveniences. Your father was eleven when I was born. No one, let alone John, was expecting a baby to interrupt their lives. But there I was, completely oblivious to the disruption I was causing.

“We both heard the phrase ‘Why can’t you be like your brother?’ more times than either of us could count. It was ridiculous, really. John was so much older than me that there was no reason for either of us to be like the other. But…he was my older brother and I
wanted
to be just like him. He was so incredibly smart, and could make or build anything.” There’s a look of admiration on Luke’s face and I can see that, despite any differences, he really did love and respect his brother.

“By the time I was in kindergarten and he was a senior, my mere existence was a problem. I learned early on that I was going to have to carry my own…make sure I didn’t cause any problems for our parents, or John. But there was always this competition. Looking back, it’s so dumb. I was just this little kid, trying to keep up with the intelligence and talent of a grown man.” He sighs and looks lighter. I don’t think he’s spoken of this with anyone outside of Claire. It must be a great relief sharing this with the only other person on the planet who knows what Gram was like. I understand what he’s saying and can see how she would create dissention between them in some wacked out effort to make them into men.

“You’re in their wedding pictures. I guess things were good at some point?” I open up the album to a page with a picture of Luke and my father. He’s got his arm around Luke’s shoulder, a tall young man now, and they’re both smiling.

“Yeah…things got a little better as we got older. There were times we were able to put aside our lack of interest in each other for the greater good.”

“But I don’t see Gram or Gramps anywhere in here,” I say, flipping through the pages in case I missed them somehow.

“Nope. Gram refused to go to their wedding. And Gramps only didn’t go because he had to show support to his wife. Gram didn’t like your mom, but don’t take any offense to that. She didn’t like anyone. No one was good enough for her boys.”

“She didn’t like Claire?” I’m astonished. How does anyone
not
like Claire?

“Well…she lightened up a bit by the time Claire and I got married. Your parents had been married for ten years by the time my wedding rolled around. Gram and Gramps didn’t come to ours either, but that was because we did a small destination wedding in the Caribbean. It was literally us and, like ten of our friends who thanked us for giving them an excuse to go on vacation.”

“Where were Claire’s parents?” I ask, hoping that Claire didn’t come from the same stressful family that Luke and I did.

“That’s…that’s a story for Claire to tell you,” he says. I understand and don’t ask any more about it. I know better than anyone that there are stories that can only be told by their owners.

“So, since you had never been close, the thing with my dad and the cosmetics lab just exacerbated the situation,” I say, doing the math.

“Yeah. Had that not happened, I’d like to think that we would have grown into a more civil relationship. And you would have met Penny,” Luke says with a smile. He can’t help but beam when he says her name. I can’t imagine losing a child at just two in such a tragic way. But I’m so happy that I can be here and be part of the new family they’ve created. “Layla, I wish I could tell you more about your parents. I wish I
knew
more to tell you, but our life as a family was not what I think any of us wanted it to be. I don’t really know what Gram and Gramps were like before I got there. I don’t know if she was soft or kind. I don’t know if your father ever had a good, loving relationship with either of them.

“But what I
do
know, what I
can
tell you about them, is that they loved you more than words or deeds could have ever expressed. So don’t look at them in relationship to me or Gram or Gramps. Look at them as you always did. See them as the parents they were to you. Reflect on the goodness that they cultivated in you. And know that even though they’re gone, they would want you to grab the bull by the horns and take on this one and only life you’ve been given.”

I can’t speak so I wrap my arms tightly around Luke’s neck and squeeze. He crushes me in a hard embrace as we sit there for a long time. There’s a knock at my door and I see Claire and Will standing there with anticipation in their eyes.

“Come here,” Will says, extending his hand. “We have to do something.”

I’ve learned not to question so much when Will says we’re going to do something. Whatever it is I know his heart was full of love as he put it together.

All four of us make our way downstairs and out the back door, not stopping until we reach the end of the dock. There’s a large box with white, billowy things overflowing from it and I feel my brow furrow as I try to make out what they are. Before I can come to any conclusions, Will pulls the objects from the box and hands one to each of us.

“It’s a floating lantern,” Will says answering my unspoken inquiry. “It’s time for some closure, Layla.”

“I don’t understand,” I say quietly.

“I’ll start.” Luke takes a lighter from his pocket and lights the wick on each of our lanterns, instructing me to hold it so the heat from the flame can fill the ballooning top. “This is for John and Elisabeth. They were taken from us far too soon. For my brother…who I hope knew just how much I loved him.” With that, Luke lets go of his lantern and lets it float up and over the lake, releasing with it his sadness for having lost his brother so much earlier than my father actually died.

My heart begins to beat quickly, and my breathing becomes slightly labored. I don’t know that I can get through another memorial like I did with my friends for Will. It was so painful, but…it really did help me begin to move forward. When Mom and Dad died not a single person asked me how I was doing or what I was feeling – with the exception of the mandated counseling I attended. Talking with Luke and sharing with Will about my parents has been incredibly helpful, but ever since Will and I got engaged I’ve been feeling stuck. I can’t escape the guilt I feel for being so happy in a place I wouldn’t be in had my parents not died that horrific night.

“This is for Marcus, who never knew the unconditional love of a family.” Claire’s soft voice fills the air like sweet perfume. She smiles sadly and releases her lantern. I know Claire felt so deeply for Marcus when she found out how terrible his mother had been to him all those years. His mother had an incredible opportunity to replace the cruelty of Gregory Meyer with love and joy, but she threw that away for her own selfish gain.

“This is for John and Elisabeth…for all they did to make Layla who she is…for giving life to the one person who makes my life complete.” Will releases his lantern and gives me a long look, letting me know that it’s ok to say whatever I have to say…to feel whatever I need to feel right now.

I open my mouth to speak but only sobs pour out. I don’t want to cry over them again. I don’t want to feel the pain again. I learned how to shove it down so deep that I don’t feel anything. But now…in this moment…being given permission to speak of them like this, to mourn. I don’t know how to mourn them. I’m so angry for allowing Gram to shut me up so tightly that I didn’t give them what they deserved from me, their daughter, their only child. I listened to that woman when she told me we were not to talk of them again. I erased them from my life because she was so hard and bitter and angry. I didn’t do what my parents taught me to do.

“I’m so sorry,” I whimper. “Mom, Dad, I’m so sorry I believed I had to pretend you never existed. I’m so sorry that I didn’t say good-bye to you the way you deserved.”

“Now’s the time, baby. They’re listening,” Will says putting his arm around my shoulder.

I try to stop crying and when I can’t, decide to push through the tears and get out as much as I can. It’s been bottled up so long that I’m not sure if any of it will be coherent, but it’s all I’ve got and I can’t pretend that I don’t want to let it out.

“This is for Mom and Dad…for loving me…for always taking care of me,” I choke out in between sobs. “This is for my parents who taught me how to fight for what I love and believe in. I’m so sorry I forgot how to do that for so long. I promise not to let you down anymore. You were the best parents a kid could ask for.” I take a deep breath before I make my final statements and find real closure to all that has burdened me for the last
seven years. “This is for Gramps…for being my ray of sunshine in an otherwise dark place. And for Gram…” I consider finding something kind to say, but I can’t. “…the most I can say is…thank you…thank you for my first father, John…and my second father, Luke. I choose to forgive you. I’m not going to let what you did to me keep me from the life I have in front of me now. I’m letting you all go now. I’m moving forward with my life, just like my parents would want me to.” I squeeze my eyes shut and whisper
I love you
to my parents and let my lantern go. I watch it float away for a few long minutes before I feel arms, lots of arms, surrounding me.

“Thank you,” I say to Will. “Somehow you always know exactly what I need. I love you.”

“I love you, too.” Will kisses the top of my head and I feel a smile come to my face. It seems like an odd time to be smiling, but I realize that, for the absolute first time in my life, I’m at peace.

“Layla, I know what you said, about the
father
thing, I just want you to know that…” Luke starts but I have to cut him off. This really has been a long time coming.

“I need parents – a mother, and a father. I need to say those words, call someone by those names. Please…Dad?”

“Oh, Layla!” Luke and Claire are on me in the fiercest hug I’ve ever received.

“We love you so much!” Claire says through tears.

“I love you, too…Mom.”

I haul my heavy bags in from the car and plop them down on the coffee table in the Great Room. There are so many that the stack of slick pages slide out and scatter across the table, with some falling to the floor. I had only planned on buying a few, but after I started looking at all the choices I just couldn’t make up my mind. The look on the cashier’s face was priceless, especially after she caught a glimpse of the gorgeous ring on my left hand.

“What’s all this?” Claire asks helping me pick up my mess. She flips through a magazine and raises her eyebrows in excitement. “Bridal magazines?”

“Yeah. I promised Will we would set a date this weekend. I’ve been avoiding it like the plague, but now…I’m actually getting really excited,” I tell her.

I was on my way to excitement last weekend when Will and I talked about setting a date, but after the lanterns on my parents’ anniversary…everything is so different. I had no idea just how much I had been carrying. I guess I had been shoving it down so long, I forgot just how much there was. I thought about being angry at Gram for the rest of my life. And, to be honest, it would be easier to be one of Gram’s victims – one of the people whose lives she destroyed with her harsh words and cold heart. The lack of people in attendance at her funeral was evidence that I wasn’t the only one she hurt. I’m not that girl anymore, though. I’m Luke and Claire’s daughter. I’m Will’s fiancée. And that girl? She’s strong, tenacious, independent, and full of love and goodness. That is who I am.

I’ll never understand how someone as wonderful as Gramps married someone like Gram. I can only think that at one time in her life she was kind and good. I’ll never know, but I’d like to think that something happened to her and she wasn’t as lucky as me to be surrounded by people who cared more deeply for her than she does herself. That somehow, that was the one time Gramps missed the mark. All of that is in the past now. My future is waiting for me, and I’m not going to delay any longer.

“I’m glad you’re finally embracing your engagement!” Claire says hugging me.

“Mom, uh…how are
you
doing with this?” I ask.

“What do you mean?”

“Well…I don’t really know how to say this, but…I keep thinking about Penny,” I say hesitantly. I can’t pretend that my getting married isn’t a reminder of what they lost when Penny died. I want them to enjoy all the wedding planning and not be sad because it’s not Penny’s wedding they’re planning.