A Second Chance (17 page)

“
No, not at all. This is
nice.”

Madeline’s eyes were soft, and Kathy
knew she sincerely meant it. Clara’s eyes looked the same when she
gave compliments, which Kathy realized for a young girl, she did
often.

She picked up the flowers she’d
brought for Madeline and handed them to her. “These are for
you.”

“
Thank you. That was
thoughtful of you.” She smelled them and smiled.

“
I was just admiring the
pictures of the kids.”

“
They’re growing up so fast.
Everyday Ed gives me a countdown until he can drive.” She shook her
head as she laid down the flowers and picked up her cup of coffee.
“I’m not sure I’m ready for that.”

“
I don’t think his father is
either.”

“
It’s funny. Regan and I are
the same age. My kids are ready to drive, and hers is learning to
hold his own bottle. All big milestones.”

Kathy sipped her coffee and hoped
Madeline didn’t notice her hands shaking.

“
How are you
feeling?”

“
I’m doing better. It’s nice
to have a little energy again. I still have a long road, but I feel
much better.”

“
Clara says you’re going
back in for surgery soon.”

“
Yeah. I’ll have
reconstruction done at the end of the month.” Madeline’s eyes
clouded over, her shoulders stiffened. “I’m scared as
hell.”

“
Why?”

“
Just have read too much.”
She rolled the tension from her shoulders and then tucked her feet
up under her. “You know having your breasts removed sucks, you
anticipate the hard times to come. Getting them back should be the
easy part, but it’s not.”

“
Let me know if I can do
anything for you.”

“
I’ll be fine, but thank
you.”

The brush-off hurt, but she didn’t
know what else she’d expected Madeline to say. The few minutes
she’d been there suddenly felt like hours. Kathy set the coffee mug
back down on the table and picked up her purse. “I should be
getting home. I promised everyone I’d bring home something for
dinner. But I wanted to bring this by for you.” She reached into
her purse and pulled out a wedding invitation.

“
Thank you,” Madeline said
as she reached for it, and Kathy noticed her hands shook
too.

“
I just wanted you to know
how important you are to everyone and that it wouldn’t be the same
without you there to share this day with us.”

Madeline bit down on her lip. “Are you
sure? This is your special day, and I don’t want to intrude on
it.”

“
I’m sure,” she said as she
stood. “I’m glad you’re feeling better.”

“
Thank you. Thank you for
coming by.”

Kathy nodded and moved toward the
door. “By the way, I really liked the red hair.”

Madeline laughed. “Did you? Arianna
brought it for me. It’s been fun. I have six wigs in all different
colors and lengths. It’s like being someone new every
day.”

Kathy clutched her purse under her arm
tightly. “Call us if you need anything.”

Madeline nodded. “Thank
you.”

Kathy walked through the back door of
the house with her arms full of bags. She’d driven around for an
hour before she finally stopped at the grocery store and picked up
sub sandwiches and chips. Carlos jumped up from his chair and
helped her with the groceries.

“
This wasn’t the takeout I
thought you’d bring.” He crinkled up his nose.

“
I just couldn’t come up
with anything better,” she said as she shrugged off her coat and
hung it on the hook.

The kids picked up their books and
papers, and Carlos walked back toward her after setting down the
bags.

“
Are you all right?” he
whispered as he touched her arm.

“
I’m okay.”

“
Did something
happen?”

“
Nothing bad. Let’s talk
about it later, okay?”

Carlos nodded and went about cutting
up the sandwiches and opening bags of chips.

When everyone had settled in for the
night, Carlos found her in the living room with a magazine on her
lap, looking out the window into the darkness.

“
Hey, what’s up?” He sat
down next to her on the couch, and she adjusted until she was
wrapped in his arms.

“
I wasn’t at a meeting
tonight,” she admitted and felt his body stiffen. “I went to
Madeline’s house.”

He didn’t respond right away. When he
did he asked, “Is everything all right?”

Kathy nodded her head. “I just haven’t
been dealing well with the way I acted a few weeks ago. I’ve never
been a jealous person before.” She turned so she could look him in
the eye. “I never had anything to lose before.”

“
You’re not going to lose
me.”

“
But I think I was
threatened that I didn’t have all of you.”

His brows knit together in obvious
confusion. “What do you mean?”

“
I’ve never needed you in
the way that she has. You shared something with her that I’ve never
shared with anyone. You were in love when you were young. I was
still searching. You’ve seen your children born and looked at their
mother like she was the most perfect person in the world. I’m still
waiting for that day. You have a friend in her that I don’t have
with anyone I know.” She sighed and a tear fell. “When I was trying
on dresses with your sisters, I realized that your family is so
amazing. I don’t have the kind of relationship your sisters have
with my own sisters. Yours don’t even live nearby, and yet they’re
still so close you wouldn’t know they only speak on the phone a few
times a week.”

He sat quietly and let her talk. “When
I was at Madeline’s, she had pictures all over of her and the kids.
It was like nothing I’d ever seen. My mother only ever kept up our
school pictures.” He gave her a gentle squeeze as if to tell her he
understood what she saw. “But what got me were three little
pictures hidden behind a lamp.”

“
Newborn pictures,” he said
simply.

“
Yeah, newborn
pictures.”

He nodded and kissed the top of her
head. “Is that what bothered you? Pictures of me in her
house?”

“
Maybe a little.”

“
Why were you
there?”

Kathy turned again to look at him. Her
stomach tightened. “I took her an invitation to the
wedding.”

He gave her a slow nod, and the crease
between his brows deepened. “Why did you do that?”

“
Because she should have
been on your list. You should have had her on your invitation list,
and because I was being childish, she wasn’t there.”

“
It’s okay. She’s my
ex
-wife. Most ex-wives
don’t attend the wedding of their ex-husbands.”

“
But the two of you are
different.” She wiped at her eyes. “When I was trying on dresses, I
was looking at myself. I realized everything she had gone through
in the past few months. Except for the kids, you were all she had.
I took that away from her in her time of need because of my own
selfishness. I had to change that. I can’t be the bad person I was
feeling I was.”

His mouth softened into a smile, but
the crease between his brows didn’t lessen. “I don’t think you have
it in you to be a bad person.”

“
She’s going to have surgery
again at the end of February.”

“
Clara and Ed mentioned
that.”

When he said it like that, she knew
he’d completely stepped away from Madeline, just as she had asked
him to.

“
I want you to be there for
it.” Her voice was finally unwavering. It finally felt good to
encourage him to take care of Madeline. “I want you to be there
when they take her in and while she’s in recovery.”

“
Kathy, don’t do
this.”

“
No. You need to be her
support. She needs you. Please.”

Carlos kept his eyes on her and his
face softened. He bit down on his lip and began to slowly nod his
head. “Okay. I’ll call her and get the details.”

“
Thank you.”

“
Come here.” He stood and
pulled her hand. “I wasn’t going to show this to you until
Valentine ’s Day, but I think I want you to see it now.”

He led her to their bedroom and shut
the door. She sat on the bed, and he walked to the dresser. He
pulled an envelope from his sock drawer and turned toward
her.

“
I took my mother shopping
the other day. When we couldn’t find anything, we called in
reinforcements. So Regan and Arianna met us. Can I tell you it was
the longest day of my life?” He laughed and she shook her head, not
understanding him at all. “Anyway, when I couldn’t find what I
wanted, and the women in my life hadn’t been any help, I called
your mother for some insight.”

“
Insight? Into
what?”

He sat down next to her and opened the
envelope. “Your ring.” He pulled a familiar ring out of the
envelope, and Kathy’s lips quivered.

“
Carlos, that’s my
great-grandmother’s wedding ring.”

“
I know. I’m glad I called
your mom. She said you’d always had your eye on it.”

“
It was like no other ring,”
she said, smiling at the princess-cut ruby set in rose
gold.

“
She asked me to give it to
you. She wanted it to be your wedding ring.”

She lifted her hand to her lips to
stop them from trembling.

Carlos examined the ring he held
between his fingers. “If you want to wear it as your wedding ring,
we’ll put it on your left hand. If you just want to keep it and
have me get you another one, we’ll put it on your
right.”

Kathy stuck out her left hand and
Carlos slid the ring onto her finger.

He was going to marry her. In his
heart he loved her. But when he looked at her and smiled, she
wondered when the love he had in his heart would reach his
eyes.

Chapter Eight

Madeline laid the necessary items
she’d need for her hospital stay on the bed. One by one she checked
them off her list as she put them into the suitcase.

The next time she put things into a
suitcase she was going somewhere far, far away and warm. A beach.
An ocean. A margarita!

Clara stood at the doorway and watched
her mother’s process. “So will you look normal when you get
done?”

“
Don’t I look normal now?”
Madeline asked with a smile.

“
You know what I
mean.”

“
I do, and I’ll still look
different. But I think I’ll feel better about myself.”

“
What are they going to
do?”

Madeline decided it was a good time to
sit her down and explain the procedure. Besides, maybe she could
instill in her eleven-year-old daughter the importance of taking
care of herself. Especially since she noticed Clara’s breasts were
starting to fill in.

“
Come here.” Madeline walked
to the large overstuffed chair in the corner of the bedroom and sat
down. She patted the seat next to her, and Clara climbed up. She
reached across to the nightstand and grabbed the pamphlet that
she’d studied over and over again. “This little book tells you all
about what the surgery is going to be like.”

Clara took it and flipped through the
pages. “This sounds gross.”

“
I suppose it
is.”

Clara crinkled up her nose and looked
at Madeline. “They’re going to cut your stomach and take off the
skin?”

Madeline only nodded, but she wanted
to laugh. Clara was right. It sounded gross.

“
They have to take the skin
from somewhere to rebuild the breast.”

Clara flipped though a few more pages.
“Will you be”—she grew quiet—”as big as you were?” she
whispered.

“
I’ve opted for a smaller
size.”

Clara lifted the pamphlet. “Why do
this?”

“
It’s just a personal thing,
honey. I want to feel normal again.”

“
You don’t feel
normal?”

“
No, baby. I don’t.” She
touched her cheek to the top of Clara’s head.

“
Why?”

“
Well. . .” She gave it a
moment’s thought. “It’s been hard. I didn’t know if I would die or
not. I’m lucky. They have medications and procedures that make
women strong, and we survive things like this. I had to have
surgery to remove my breasts so they could take out the cancer. I
lost my hair and got very sick from the medication that kept the
cancer away. Now I have a little hair, and I can have surgery to
have some of my body back. Maybe by next year it’ll be like nothing
ever changed.”

“
Will
they
look the same?”

“
No. They’ll never look the
same again. But that’s okay. I don’t need working breasts.” She
smiled and Clara scrunched up her face.