Between Octobers Bk 1, Savor The Days Series
Read Between Octobers Bk 1, Savor The Days Series Online
Authors: A.R. Rivera
Tags: #romance, #romantic suspense, #hollywood, #suspense, #tragedy, #family, #hen lit, #actor, #henlit, #rob pattinson
Between Octobers/Rivera/
477
Octobers
Savor The Days Series
, Book
One
By
A.R. Rivera
D
edication
To my father, who gave me patience,
My mother, who gave me faith,
And my husband, who gives me everything.
I could not have done this without you.
Between Octobers
By A.R. Rivera
Published by A.R. Rivera at Smashwords
Copyright 2014 A.R. Rivera
All Rights reserved.
All characters and events portrayed in this book are
products of the authors’ imagination. Any similarities to persons
living or dead are coincidental and unintentional, so don’t get you
knickers in a twist.
For a sneak peek of A.R. Rivera’s next book
in her Savor The Days Series—
September Rain
releases
May 15,
2014!
accompaniment)
Part One
Grace
Because of The
King
My house doesn’t smell like this.
It’s a sort of musty odor, but with a hint
of oil.
A horrendous, confusing pulse lashes through
my cranium, its fingers reaching into my eyes and neck. Pieces and
pictures wander in confusing ways, blurring into strange shapes. I
don’t know what they mean.
My body, tight and uncomfortable, feels like
jeans tangled inside a washing machine. Blinking—I know I blink
because I feel my eyelids move—makes no difference against the
blinding dark. My hands are bound together by something. And my
feet are crammed uncomfortably against . . . something. My neck is
kinked, forced to one side. The position isn’t the source of my
throbbing headache, but it’s painfully unpleasant. I draw a deep
breath. The air is hot, stuffy. The sound of release drags in
reverb, noisy and close. It brushes back against my cheeks.
I focus on tracing the line of my stomach
between my forearms. A bump answers from the inside, soothing
me.
Something knocks against my head,
contributing to the mindboggling ache that turns my stomach. I
blink again, feel my lashes catching and shake my head, trying to
remove the obstruction.
Entrancing fear cripples me as the room
seems to bend. The floor jolts, disappearing for a terrifying
second. My upturned face hits something before I slam back onto my
side.
Suddenly, the sounds, sensations, and smells
all come together but I can’t find the word that describes it. It
laps at the edge, blotted out by fuzz.
There was a talk show I watched the other
day. The guest was a woman, an expert who gave a list of guidelines
about . . . The word isn’t there, but the flood of information is
clear. “Never let them take you to a secondary scene,” the expert
said. “It’s always a place where there’s little to no chance of
reaching help. The captor is in complete control.”
I struggle in the cramped space, but it
doesn’t help. It’s noisy, though. A loud crackling din; almost like
paper. The word is back, on the tip of my tongue, but my brain
can’t make the connection. I remember I was in the kitchen. I broke
the coffee pot. The tarp in the garage. She made me close my eyes,
and then . . . Pain. Now, I’m here.
I have a captor and I’ve already broken rule
number one.
I’m crumpled, stuffed into the trunk of what
can only be a compact car. The space is so tiny; it has to be,
like, a Prius or something. I try to think through the hazy panic .
. .
Lord Jesus, help me remember!
My hands are awkwardly stuck out over my
belly; my wrists feel like they’ve been constricted for some time.
They’re tingling, compressed by a vise. My puffy fingers feel more
swollen than usual. I clasp my hands as in prayer; the same way
Caleb does when he begs.
Caleb! Noah!
As far as my mouth can tell, whatever’s
binding my wrists is too thin and smooth to be rope. I try with all
my strength to stretch the hidden manacles, pushing and pressing
into my restraints, popping the joints, but my wrists can’t
separate.
It’s okay,
my
Nurse Voice soothes,
I can work with
restrained hands.
My feet, however . . . I have no idea what
has them trapped. Again, I concentrate but . . . Fragments appear
and fly away before I retain them and I can’t tell exactly how I’m
wedged. Wiggling my toes, I can tell I’m wearing my shoes. The
sensation helps me map my legs. My feet are apart but my knees are
stuck against the side of what feels like a milk crate. I can’t get
my hands down past my belly to free my scrunched-up knees, to work
my feet free.
I try to turn, readying myself for when my
captor, whoever it is, opens the trunk. A chilling thought freezes
me, mid-roll.
What if they don’t?
No one will know. My boys, my baby, my Noah,
Caleb, Lily, Ronnie, Aunt Rose and Evan. Evan, Evan. The faces
flash before my wet, blind eyes.
October
5
th
I sort of always assumed a person would know
death was coming. They’d have some sort of inkling, like a gut
feeling, or a sense of finality when they said goodbye the last
time they left home. Like in the movies, when the creepy score
starts to play, you know something bad is about to happen. But in
real life, there’s no foreboding music.
I visualized that accident a thousand times.
Dreamt about it. Solomon couldn’t have heard screeching tires; no
one used their brakes. He couldn’t have seen it coming; the fog was
too thick.
Loss: it’s too simple a word. Only four
letters. Three alphabetic representations for such a broad term.
The light tense, the singular syllable, they do it no justice. How
can anyone understand what it means? Every letter of the alphabet
should be used. Its implications touched every part of my life, so
it makes sense that the word itself should carry every letter.
My life, for the last eleven months and
three weeks, could be summed up in two words. Simple phrases: still
breathing, keeping up, getting by. Holding on. I was barely holding
on. To daily chores that didn’t get done unless I did them.
Everything since the day Solomon died had been routine. I’d inhale
to exhale and repeat. Eat, sleep, and breathe. Cooked to wash
dishes. Got dirty to shower. Changed to wash clothes. It was all I
could manage most days: inhale, exhale, repeat.
I know I should’ve been . . . not over it,
but dealing well enough to put his clothes away. I couldn’t seem to
let go of that part of my life. I was never sure if it was because
I was holding onto it or if it was holding onto me.
There, in my big empty bed, inside my
sleeping house, I took a deep breath and held it, straining to
picture myself packing his things. Touching this shirt and that hat
. . . I would have to remember where we were when he got them. I’d
feel the stabbing pain, imagining the beautiful words he spoke when
he wore them.
Aunt Rose said that God never gives us more
than we’re able to handle. Solomon used to say that God may
squeeze, but He doesn’t choke. Doctor Elena Williams, the grief
counselor recommended to me by the pastor of the church I didn’t
attend anymore, suggested I clean out the closet. She said by
avoiding Sol’s things I was tying myself to his memory in an
unhealthy way; and if I didn’t stop, it might affect our children.
She called it pivoting—the illusion of movement while bound in one
place. I didn’t quite agree with her analysis, but I knew something
had to change. And come hell or high water, I had to wade
through.
Words for tomorrow: new leaf, start
moving.
October
6
th
It was well past nine when I woke. I’d slept
in—four hours. Oddly, I felt okay despite the fact that it was a
day closer to the one-year mark.
Noah, the
too
cool
teen, was in the kitchen making his famous
waffles. While he was busy, I pulled out the jars of vitamins
crammed near the rows of glassware in the kitchen cabinet and
started sorting. One of each type into three different piles. That
was routine, though I usually had them out before the boys got out
of bed.
The morning conversation was easy. Noah
wanted to hang out and maybe catch a matinee with some of his
friends. Caleb wanted to go with him, but changed his mind once he
realized he’d have to sit in the dark for two hours. Instead, he
asked to go to his friend Nathan’s house, next door, for a play
date.
While we were gathered around the table, I
made my move. “I’m putting Dad’s things away today.”
After my last failed attempts, making
the announcement was sort of an insurance policy. If I told them I
was doing it, I’d stick to it. No more pivoting—from that day, I’d
be ambulatory. Since making the decision last night, I felt
lighter, more like me—the
me
I
used to be. I wondered what the Good Doctor would have to say about
that.