Unexpected Family (21 page)

Somehow that boy had figured out how to pull himself from whatever brink he’d been near. And he found himself deeply envious of a nine-year-old.

You’re amazing, Ben,
he thought, and then realized the kid had no idea he felt that way. How could he? Jeremiah had never said it.

“Can I come in?”

Aaron nodded and stepped back. Jeremiah stepped into the den of an athlete, complete with hockey posters and dirty socks. He sat on the floor, cross-legged. The boys all looked at one another, unsure of what was happening.

That makes four of us,
he thought.
Four of us.
He liked the sound of that—
the Four of Us.

“I love you,” he said, staring at his hands, but then decided the boys deserved better. He looked each of them in the eye.

“I love you,” he said to Aaron, who blushed but smiled. “You remind me so much of your dad,” he went on. “Easygoing and fun. Everyone liked your dad, just like they like you. He’d be so proud of you. I…I am so proud of you.”

Aaron nodded, his eyes bright. “Thanks, Uncle J.”

“Ben.” The boy flinched as if Jeremiah had hit him and those eyes of his wouldn’t meet Jeremiah’s. “I love you.”

Ben snorted.

“I do. I know it may not seem like it sometimes.”

“Ever.”

Jeremiah sighed. “I’m sorry for that. I’m sorry for a lot of things I’ve done wrong by you boys, but I’m most sorry that I’ve never told you how I feel about you. How much I care for you. I love you, Ben. You’re so smart and intuitive—you’re an old soul like your mom. Sometimes I look at you and I can see her so clearly, it’s amazing. You’re amazing.”

Ben didn’t say anything but his throat bobbed as he swallowed hard, staring at the Sidney Crosby poster.

“Casey, my little charmer. I love you—”

Casey hopped off the bed and curled up in Jeremiah’s lap, finding the place he best liked to squeeze up next to him. “I love you, too, Uncle J.,” he whispered, and put his head against Jeremiah’s chest.

He gave himself a moment to soak in that love, to acknowledge it in a way that he never had before.

“You still want to leave,” Ben said, his eyes unforgiving.

“I don’t,” Jeremiah insisted.

Ben and Aaron shared a long look and Aaron shook his head. “We…we don’t know how to believe you.”

“We think you’re lying,” Ben said in far clearer terms.

“You know I can’t go back to the rodeo. My accident—”

“Doesn’t mean you don’t want to,” Ben pushed.

Jeremiah searched and he searched and he took as long as he needed to try and find the answer that made sense, a way that he could convince Ben, but it was lost somewhere he couldn’t get to.

“Have you grieved for your old life?” Dr. Gilman had asked, and when she did, he’d broken out in a cold sweat. The grief was in there somewhere. Somewhere he was a little scared to go.

“I think maybe we need to go see a friend of mine. Dr. Gilman.”

“I don’t like doctors.” Casey sighed.

“She’s not that kind of doctor. She’s the kind of doctor that talks, helps people figure out their problems.”

“A head shrinker?” Aaron asked. “That’s what Grandpa calls them.”

“Some people call them that, but Dr. Gilman has helped me a lot and I think she could help all of us…as a…as a family.”

“We’re not a family,” Ben argued.

Solemn and sad, Jeremiah nodded in agreement. “Then being a family is what we need help with.”

* * *

L
UCY
WALKED
THROUGH
the empty house and opened the fridge looking for a beer. Of course there was no beer. Not anymore. Once, the house had been dripping with booze and she hadn’t cared one bit. But now, the one time in her life when she wanted to get rip-roaring drunk, the house was dry.

Figures,
she thought.

She grabbed a Diet Coke and in the dark she sat down at the empty table. More like she deflated, right into the seat. A boneless slop in a yellow dress.

Now,
she thought, staring at the silver can, lacking even the energy to open it,
how do I recover?

From behind, she heard her mother coming out of the laundry room.

“Lucy?” Mom said, stepping into the dark room with a full laundry basket. “What are you doing?”

What am I doing?
she asked herself. To her utter chagrin, to the bottom of her independent feminist soul, she shuddered. “I think I’m waiting.”

“For what?” Sandra put the basket on the table.

“A man,” Lucy answered with a groan.

“Is someone picking you up?”

“No. I’m waiting for a man to come to his senses.”

“Ahhh… A woman’s lot in life.” Sandra smiled and reached into the basket, pulling out the little half curtain that used to hang in the bathroom window.
Mom is washing curtains at eleven o’clock at night?

“Is it Jeremiah?”

“I love him, Mom.” The words came out like a mourning wail and Lucy cracked open the can for a sip to drown out the sadness.

“And you think he loves you?”

‘I think figuring out he loves me is so far down on his to-do list it will never happen. Not in this decade.”

“And you’re willing to wait that long?”

“No… I don’t know. I don’t know anything.”

Sandra handed her one of the long sheers from the living room. “Help me hang this back up, would you?”

“Mom,” she moaned, “I really don’t—”

“Let me give you some advice, honey. Don’t wait. Get on with your life. Work. Be busy. Because if you wait, you lose a little of yourself every day. You can hope this man you love comes to his senses, hope he does what he needs to do to deserve you, hope he returns your feelings in the way he should. But if you wait for it to happen, you’re just wasting your time and yourself.”

Lucy touched the silky edge of the drape—sheer and old, it felt like silk when it was probably just 1970s polyester. “Why are you hanging curtains at eleven o’clock at night, Mom?”

“I am hoping, too.”

“Walter?”

“I know that bothers you, Lucy, but I cannot stop how I feel.”

“It doesn’t bother me, Mom, not like it did…but I just don’t understand how you go from a man like Dad to a man like Walter.”

Sandra took her end of the sheer and walked into the family room. Lucy, holding her end, followed like a fish on a line.

“Perhaps they are not that different.”

Lucy snorted. “Dad was perfect—”

“Don’t, honey. No one is perfect. No relationship is without its problems.”

Moonlight fell across Sandra’s face, and like the sheer, her expression was hiding and revealing at the same time. Lucy wasn’t going to pry—she liked her memories of her father, her memories of her childhood. She had no interest in changing any of that.

Lucy stepped up onto the chair beside the sliding glass door. Carefully she threaded the hooks through the slits in the tops of the sheers.

“So, we’re not waiting?” Lucy asked.

“Nope.”

“We’re getting on with our lives and…we’re hoping?”

“Yep.”

“Then I’m going to Los Angeles to get our stuff.”

“Sounds good.”

“And I’m going to call Meredith Van Loan and make an appointment to show her my wedding jewelry collection.”

“That’s my girl.” With that, Sandra started to pull the sheer back down, ripping holes around the hooks. “Take those off, will you?” she said. “I’m going shopping. This place needs an overhaul.”

Lucy grinned and unhooked the sheer.

“That’s my mom.”

CHAPTER NINETEEN

J
EREMIAH
BOOKED
A
MEETING
with Dr. Gilman for Monday afternoon. The boys went to school in the morning but he picked them up at lunch. He had apples and cheese for the ride over in the truck.

The boys were silent, probably nervous. Jeremiah could relate—he had cold sweat pooling in the small of his back. “I don’t want her to shrink my head,” Casey whispered from the back.

Jeremiah grinned at him in the rearview mirror. “She won’t. Trust me. I’ve been going for months—does my head look any smaller?”

He took off his hat and Casey inspected it. “I guess not.”

“You’ve been going for months?” Aaron asked.

“Saturday nights,” he said. “When Grandma and Grandpa come over.”

“I thought you were playing poker!” Ben cried.

“I lied.”

“You shouldn’t lie, Uncle J.,” Casey admonished.

“I know, buddy, and I’m not going to anymore.”

A few minutes later he pulled up to the red building, and the four of them walked up the sidewalk. As they pushed through the door, the little bell rang four times.

“Well, hello,” the receptionist said, swiveling away from the computer to greet them all.

The three boys all said, “Hi, ma’am,” but Jeremiah wondered if he was going to pass out. It was so hard to breathe. His skin prickled and sweat dripped down his back. His nose was running like he had allergies.

“Go on back,” the receptionist said. “Dr. Gilman is waiting for you.”

Casey gripped his hand and Jeremiah led the boys down the small hallway to the back room, the sunlit office with the Kleenex and the couch. The place where he talked, the only place in the world where it felt all right for him to spill his guts and be afraid instead of pretending like he knew what he was doing.

This was the place where he was weak.

It’s going to be okay,
he told himself.
This is the right thing to do.

Dr. Gilman stood up from her desk as they all walked in. The boys said, “Howdy,” polite as ever, and Jeremiah hung up his hat. He grabbed Ben’s baseball cap and Aaron’s new cowboy hat and set them on the rack, as well. Casey shrugged off his sweatshirt and handed it up to him. Jeremiah set it up on the rack.

He tilted his head. That…that looked right.

The four of us,
he thought.
A family.
It begins here.

* * *

F
ROM
INSIDE
THE
BARN
Walter heard the car door slam and he quickly walked out to see who it was.

Sandra was getting out of Mia’s old truck, her arms full of catalogs and fabric samples. She’d been gone the whole day, not even there at breakfast. Which left him deflated over his toast since he’d spent the hours close to dawn figuring out what he needed to tell her.

She wasn’t there at lunch, either, and his little speech was drilling holes in his head.

“Can I help you with those?” he asked.

She didn’t spare him a glance and he wanted to kiss his way across that stubborn chin of hers. But instead he grabbed the top two big books in her arms. Wallpaper samples.

Interesting.

“Thank you,” she said stiffly, and Walter nodded, following her into the house.

Once in the kitchen, she dropped the stuff on the counter and he followed suit. Then suddenly, with their arms empty, his urge to touch her, to hold her, was strong. Too strong, and despite his speech and his intentions he grabbed her hand. Just that. Her fingers in his, tiny and fragile and perfect.

“I’d like to talk to you,” he said.

She nodded, still unreadable. She was going to make him sweat—the realization almost made him smile.

“I am sorry about the other night.”

She yanked her hand back. “I’m not interested in apologies. Or guilt. We kissed, Walter, it’s not the end of the world.”

“No. I’m not sorry I kissed you. Lord, never…never that. I’m sorry I ended things the way I did. I…I don’t have much practice.”

“Me, neither.” Her smile was shy, sweet, and it sent a lightning bolt into his heart, kick-starting the old thing. “Perhaps we can practice together.”

He wiped his sweaty hand over his pants, hoping it was worth turning away this second chance. “I…I would like that, Sandra, more than you know. But I’ve joined AA. That meeting you told me about down at the church.”

Her mouth fell open, a shock that he utterly understood. But then she shook her head and that gape-faced shock changed into a transcendent smile. “I’m proud of you, Walter.”

He smiled in return, “Thank you. So, ah…so is Jack. He gave me a ride. They have another group at the same time, for the family members of alcoholics. He went—said it was interesting.”

“I’m so glad,” she whispered. “For the two of you.”

She wrapped her arms around him and embraced him with her whole body. And it was like stepping into warm water. It was perfect, just what he wanted, but he had to step away.

With his hands at her elbows, he moved back. “You, ah, you know how I feel about you. And that hasn’t changed. But the thing with AA—I want to do it right. I want to keep making you proud, and Jack proud. I can’t have a relationship like that. Like…the way I want…with you. Not right now. Not for a while.”

She brushed hair off his forehead, her fingers cool. “Can we be friends?”

“Please.”

“Then the rest can wait.” She pressed one tender kiss to his cheek, a brand that would linger, marking him as hers for future use, and then she stepped back.

“But,” she said, her tone bright and friendly, the Sandra of old, “we’re going to have to stay busy. And I have the perfect thing.”

He glanced at the wallpaper books and paint chips. She was going to get rid of the ghosts. She was going to brand this house as hers.

A fresh start all the way around.

“I’m so glad you’re here,” he said.

“Me, too. Now, let’s get to work.”

* * *

B
EN
LED
THEM
OUT
of Dr. Gilman’s. Jeremiah brought up the rear, feeling wrung out. Drained.

“That was good work today,” Dr. Gilman told him at the door. “You should be proud of yourself.”

“Because I cried like a baby?”

She smiled, indulgently, letting him use his jokes as a balm to his pride.

“Thank you,” he whispered, wondering if it would be weird to hug her and then deciding he didn’t care. He crushed the good doctor into his arms.

“Oh!” she cried, and then laughed, patting his shoulder. “You’re going to break me.”

He let her go, waved goodbye to Jennifer and ran to catch up with the boys.

“What did you think?” he asked, once they were all inside the truck.

“I liked her.” Casey, the most easily impressed of the three, quickly gave his stamp of approval.

“She’s nice,” Aaron said.

“Do you want to go back?” Jeremiah asked.

“Yes,” Ben said quickly from the back. Jeremiah turned in the seat to look at him, somehow not surprised. Ben’s eyes were red from crying, as well. And for the first time since Annie’s funeral the two of them had hugged. Jeremiah and Ben needed help with this stuff, somehow; while Casey and Aaron could process their grief and confusion, he and Ben got stuck in places. Lost.

“Okay.” Jeremiah smiled and his heart soared when Ben’s lips curved in response. He turned back around and started the truck.

Lucy is going to love this,
he thought. He could see her face when he told her what happened, how… The thought sputtered out and he stared blindly out the windshield.

“Uncle J.?” Aaron asked. “You gonna cry again?”

Jeremiah smirked at Aaron’s teasing but the boy just laughed.

“I think…” He stopped, started again. “I want to date Lucy.”

“I thought you already were,” Aaron said.

“Yeah, well, I might have blown that last night.”

“You should apologize,” Ben said.

“I don’t think that will be enough,” he said.

“Draw her a picture,” Casey suggested.

“Flowers.” Aaron nodded knowingly. “Girls love that.”

“How in the world do you know that?”

Aaron shrugged—the sage Casanova.

“Let’s just go see her,” Casey said, and then he whispered to Ben, “they have banana bread over there.”

“Good idea, Casey,” Jeremiah said, and pulled away from the curb. He’d start with some groveling and go from there.

* * *

“W
HAT
DO
YOU
MEAN
she’s not here?” he asked Sandra a half hour later, his guts in knots. “Where did she go?”

“Los Angeles.”

He stepped backward, down off the step. A breeze would have knocked him over. “She left? I thought—”

“She’s just getting our stuff,” Sandra said. “She’s coming back.”

Light-headed, he braced himself against the house. “When?”

“A few days. She was going to make some appointments.”

Doubt clawed at him. She was going to get back to her life, back to the work that made her who she was, and she’d forget about him. About the boys. About dating a man with nothing to offer but a dirty house and a hotel room once a week.

Stop.
He squashed those thoughts.
You have more than that. You are worth more than that, and the boys deserve better than your constant negativity.

She’d said she wanted to be chosen, probably because she’d already chosen them, warts and all.

“What’s your address in Los Angeles?”

Sandra blinked, a smile sparking across her face. “You’re going down there?”

“I’m going to give it a shot, Sandra.”

She ducked inside and came back out with a scrap of paper she’d written the address on and a few directions off the southbound highway. “Look for the balcony with the roses—you can’t miss it.”

“Thank you.” In an expansive mood, he gave her a hug, which she returned generously.

“Do you want me to keep the boys?” she asked. “They’re welcome—”

“No.” He glanced back at the truck where the boys were all piled in the front seat staring at him through the windshield. “We’re a family,” he said. “We go together.”

* * *

T
HE
CONDO
HAD
SOLD
a few days before, but she didn’t have to officially move out until the end of the month. So Lucy grabbed some stuff from storage and moved back into her old bedroom for a few nights. All of their furniture had been moved out—the sleek modern replacements were a part of the staging. It was ugly and far, far from homey.

Meredith had reluctantly agreed to meet with her tomorrow. Lucy dug through her boxes looking for her notebooks. She still didn’t have any samples, which probably made this appointment pointless. Meredith wasn’t going to want to look at sketches. Meredith would probably laugh her right out of her gorgeous upscale boutique.

But Lucy was going to give it a shot. She sat on the floor, her sketchbook on the glass-and-iron coffee table that she would never have bought, not in a million years. And she redrew her original sketches in ways that brought out the detail, the brilliance, of each piece.

An hour later she turned on the lamp, contemplated dinner, but decided to finish the details on the amber-and-garnet gold tiara. Ten minutes later the scent of Mr. Lezinsky’s cabbage rolls wafted up through the floor and her stomach howled in protest.

All right,
she thought, and stood, cracking her back, shaking out her fingers. Since she was only in town for a few nights she was going to get her fill of Rosita’s down the street. Her mouth watered at the thought of her carnitas and tomatillo salsa.

There was commotion outside her door and when she opened it, all she saw were balloons and legs.

“Hey, Lucy!” Casey ducked down below the red balloons and grinned up at her. “We found her!” he yelled at some other legs, and Jeremiah stepped forward, a bouquet of wilting convenience store roses in his hands.

In her chest, her heart was inflating like one of the balloons. Every second she looked at these men, it was in danger of getting too full, of popping. And yet she couldn’t look away.

“Hi,” Jeremiah said.

She opened her mouth but nothing came out.

“Can I let go of these balloons yet?” Ben asked.

“I’m letting go of mine,” Casey said, and a silver Mylar balloon wafted into the condo. It read Happy Birthday.

Jeremiah winced. “We let Casey pick out the balloons.”

“We brought chocolates, too,” Aaron said, ducking past the balloons to come in and press a box of candy into her numb hands. “But Uncle J. wouldn’t let us stop for dinner so I got hungry. The coconut ones are all that are left.”

Ben finally stepped in, pulling the balloons in behind him. They crowded through the door, squeaking, but then they bent and shifted and squeezed in. He let them go and red, blue, green and yellow balloons floated past her head, bumping into her nose, her hair.

This is a dream,
she thought.
I am dreaming.

When they bounced up onto the ceiling, strings dangled down around them.

“What…what are you doing here?” she whispered, her eyes never leaving Jeremiah’s face. He seemed different somehow, softer, as if something had melted, as if some invisible wall had been torn down.

He looked young, nervous.

I love you,
she thought.

“We’re on vacation!’ Casey cried, and when he tried to bounce on the rigid couch, he winced.

“Vacation?” she asked Jeremiah.

“We went to a counseling meeting and then stopped by the ranch to see you. Sandra said you were here and, well, the kids haven’t had a vacation in years. After their mom died I just kept them in school trying to keep things normal, but I think maybe…maybe they could use some fun. Just a week. Their teachers said it was okay. I thought maybe we’d go to Disney Land or World, or whichever is out here.”

He was rambling and it was sweet and she was smart enough to read between the lines, but she had her pride, too. Lots of it.