Butterfly Dreams (11 page)

Shit.

She wrenched her hand free and I tried not to be hurt by her rejection. But damn it, I was.

“I just can't believe he's gone. I spoke with him only yesterday. He called to give me his wife's recipe for carrot cake. He was in a great mood. He said he had a doctor's appointment on Friday but he felt good about it. He was supposed to talk about the new pacemaker.” Tammy was crying. Several other group members were sobbing not so silently, adding to the chorus of anguish.

“It sounds so horrible, but I'm terrified that will happen to me. That I could be playing with my granddaughter or watching a movie with my wife and poof. That's it. I'm done. No warning. Just gone,” said Carl, the forty-year-old taxi driver with coronary heart disease, and there was a murmur of agreement from most of the others.

There it was. The tangible dread. So thick I could taste it.

One by one Candace went around the circle and let everyone give voice to their shock. Their terrifying fear of their own mortality. And with every person's words, Corin became more and more agitated.

I tried saying her name a few more times but she continued to ignore me.

“Corin. Do you have anything you'd like to say?” Candace asked after she had gone around the circle.

Corin remained mute, her trembling hands an iron vice in her lap.

“Corin?” Candace repeated, and I looked at the woman beside me, recognizing a brokenness in her eyes that I had felt in my bones so many times before.

“Corin,” I whispered, leaning in close, touching her arm. Connecting.

She jerked away and got to her feet. Without another word she fled the room, leaving a room full of people gaping after her.

Candace immediately went to follow but I stopped her.

“Let me. She and I…well…we're friends,” I said. Candace nodded and patted me on the back.

“Okay, but come and get me if you need me,” Candace offered, looking concerned for Corin.

“I will. I think Geoffery's death has hit her hard,” I excused, knowing deep down it was a lot more than that.

“I understand. We all do,” Candace sympathized.

I walked out into the hallway, calling her name. There was no response and I didn't see any sign of Corin. Where did she go?

I walked out to the enclosed courtyard—she wasn't there.

“Corin?” I called out. No answer.

I searched every room, every shadowed hallway, and she was nowhere in sight. It was obvious she had left.

I pulled out my phone and typed out a quick text. I had never texted her before. But I was starting to get really worried. I just kept thinking about her face as she ran from the room.

She looked as though ghosts were chasing her.

Where are you? Are you okay? -Beckett

I leaned against the wall, waiting for her to respond.

One minute.

Two minutes.

Nothing.

I checked my phone but there wasn't any response to my text. So I wrote another one.

Please, Corin. Let me know you're all right. I'm going out of my mind here.

One minute.

Two minutes.

Three.

Then my phone chimed just as I was ready to jump in my car and start trying to track her down.

I'm fine. I'm sorry if I worried you.

That was it.

Can I come and see you? I texted back.

I was half out of my mind wanting to see her. I knew pushing Corin was a bad idea but at that moment I didn't give a shit. I needed to make sure, with my own eyes, that she was fine. I didn't want to take her word for it.

Not tonight.

I frowned, getting frustrated.

Tomorrow? How about we get breakfast?

Radio silence.

“Damn it, Corin,” I growled under my breath. There were times that she didn't make caring about her very easy.

Later. Mornings are the enemy.

I smiled. Relieved that she was joking with me. But I'd feel better if I could just hear her voice.

Midmorning then. Let's have tea at the park.

My phone chimed almost instantly.

Tea at the park? Are we 12? Only if we can play on the jungle gym.

Then there were the times that caring about Corin was the easiest thing in the world.

Corin was already at the park when I showed up around midmorning. I hadn't been able to focus at work. I had been too focused on seeing
her
.

I jogged from my car, tea sloshing over the edge of the Styrofoam cups, burning my hand. I was out of breath by the time I reached the bench where Corin was sitting. I stopped, wheezing a bit, trying to catch my breath.

She was chewing on her thumbnail, the wind blowing her hair in every direction. I tried not to stand there and stare at her like a creeper, but it was hard. I enjoyed looking at her.

“Corin,” I called out. She looked up and gave me a strained smile.

“Hey,” she said in a strangled voice as I approached.

“Here you go. One nasty herbal tea. No latte.” She took the cup and I noticed that she was careful not to touch me.

It was sunny and on the warm side, but she was still shivering as though she were freezing from the inside out.

“Can I have a seat or am I going to be forced to stand the whole time?” I joked, trying to lighten the mood.

“Sure. If you don't have an aversion to sitting in dried bird poo.”

“A little poo never hurt anybody,” I remarked, though I made sure not to sit in it before taking a spot beside her.

I quickly took a drink of my own beverage, trying not to think too much about the very awkward vibe that Corin was giving off.

“So…” I let that one word fade away. Carried off. Into nothing.

Way to make things comfortable, Beck.

“Sorry about last night. I keep making an ass of myself in front of people. It's a talent of mine.” She licked her lips and stared at her hands.

“I can think of worse talents to have. Like golf.”

Corin's lips twitched into something that resembled a smile but didn't quite get there.

A woman walked by pushing a stroller. I noticed a soft smile on Corin's face as she watched them disappear down the hill. She finally looked at me, her brown eyes regretful.

“I didn't mean to make you worry. I really am sorry,” she said, wrapping her hands around her cup.

“Stop apologizing. It's okay. You were upset. I get it. Did you know Geoffery well?”

She shook her head. “Not really. I mean I spoke to him in group some. Nothing worth noting. But he seemed like a nice man.”

“He was. A little heavy-handed with the mints, but definitely a great person. And it doesn't really matter if he was your best friend or a complete stranger. It's hard not to feel grief when people pass away suddenly. It's called compassion,” I told her.

Corin snorted. “Compassion, huh? I've never been accused of being compassionate before.”

“You give yourself way too little credit, Corin.”

Corin stared out at a stream, present in body but not in mind.

“Did you know that Geoffery was a medic in the Vietnam War?” I wanted to get her talking. Her introspective silence was disconcerting.

“I had no idea,” Corin exclaimed, looking at me again.

“Yeah. He was injured and honorably discharged. After that he became a war protestor. That's how he met his wife.”

“Wow. You'd never know that by looking at him. You know, with the flat caps and all,” Corin said. “How did you know all this?”

“I like talking to people. I like to know their stories. I want them to know that I care about who they are and what they've done.” I gazed into Corin's eyes and hoped she picked up on what I was trying to say to her.

“Or you're just a busybody,” she joked half-heartedly.

“Or that,” I shrugged.

“You're a good guy, Beckett. I barely know you and you're always riding to the rescue. Like my own personal white knight.”

I bumped her shoulder with mine. “I have a thing for damsels in distress.”

“But who saves you, Beckett?” she asked softly, and my smile slipped.

“I don't think that I need saving,” I responded.

“Are you so sure about that?” she asked me, raising an eyebrow. I felt a stab of awareness in the center of my chest. Why did I always get the sense that she saw more than I wanted her to? More than I had ever let anyone see?

Corin sighed loudly.

“You must think I'm a real whack job,” she muttered.

“Nah. No more than everyone else I know,” I quipped, glad we weren't talking about me anymore.

“I can't help it. It just sneaks up on me. Before I really know what's happening. It's the most horrible feeling…”

“Like you're dying?” I filled in for her.

She kicked the dirt with her shoe. An oddly endearing gesture.

“I don't have long, Beckett. I just know that my time is running out.” She sounded resigned. But also scared.

I thought again about my own questionable health and could understand that fear.

“But who saves you, Beckett?”

I leaned down. Close. Almost cheek to cheek.

“Stop thinking about your life in increments. Seconds. Minutes. Days. Look at the bigger picture and embrace whatever time you have. Don't look constantly toward
the end.
Enjoy the
right now.
”

The girl with death in her eyes glanced up at me, her wet eyes suddenly clear. I tried not to feel embarrassed by my cheesy advice. Because I truly believed the words I had just given her.

Even if I did sound like some Mr. Miyagi rip-off. Or a really bad fortune cookie.

Corin must think I was a total douchebag.

I felt suddenly light-headed but I wouldn't think about that. Not now.

“The
right now,
huh?” She wasn't laughing at me. She wasn't smirking or looking at me like I was an idiot.

She said it matter of factly. Seriously. As though what I had to say really did have some merit.

A thought came into my head unbidden. A strange thought. A powerful one.

“But who saves you, Beckett?”

Just maybe I was looking at her.

I grabbed her hand and gave it a squeeze. She didn't pull away. Not this time.

And I didn't either.

“Absolutely. It's all any of us can do.”

Neither of us said anything else. So we sat there in the sun, listening to the sounds of kids laughing on the playground, and I knew that this woman was filling a hole inside of me that I hadn't realized was there.

We finished our drinks and I got to my feet. “Can I push you on the swing?” I asked, holding out my hand.

Corin grinned. “Only if I can bury you in the sandbox.”

I laughed.

She laughed.

Some things just felt
right.

“How often have you been feeling light-headed?” Dr. Callahan asked, her stethoscope pressed against my chest as I took deep, long breaths. In and out.

“It started a few days ago and has only happened a handful of times. It passes after several minutes but I figured I should come and have myself checked out.”

Dr. Callahan moved the cold stethoscope across my skin and I tried not to flinch. Couldn't she at least warm it up first? Or buy me dinner before she stuck her hand up my shirt?

“For most people a little light-headedness is nothing to be concerned about. It could be a drop in blood pressure after standing up suddenly. Dehydration. Not getting enough sleep.”

I forced myself to smile. “I'm just special like that, huh?” I joked, but it sounded weak in my ears.

“Of course you are,” Dr. Callahan smiled. She listened to my chest, moving the stethoscope around.

“Your heart sounds good. Your lungs are clear. But let me just check your ICD to make sure it's still working properly. Were you doing anything strenuous when you experienced the dizziness?” Dr. Callahan asked, removing the stethoscope and letting my T-shirt fall back into place.

I shook my head. “Not really. I thought maybe it could be low blood sugar or something.”

Dr. Callahan nodded. “It very well could have been. But let's just make sure it's not something more serious.”

My phone chirped in my pocket and I pulled it out while Dr. Callahan got the paddle to check my ICD.

Want to grab a tea? Maybe I'll go crazy and have a muffin.

I grinned at Corin's message. Something had changed between us that day in the park. We breached some invisible barrier that had been between us.

As if Corin finally decided that she didn't need to keep me at arm's length. And I decided I most definitely wanted her in my life.

Her messages were usually short. Random observations. Sometimes biting critiques meant to be jokes.

She was an odd chick. But it was odd that I appreciated. She was different. A little paranoid. A bit too obsessed about my health and hers. But she was also a good listener. Picking up on things that other people didn't. Sometimes her observations made me squirm but she was usually right on the money.

And I liked making her laugh. Because I knew, without her ever having to tell me, that it was something she didn't do often enough.

Wish I could but I'm at an appointment. You still want to grab some dinner after the workshop tomorrow?

A big pile of gooey lasagna, just for you.

Sure, if you want me to force-feed you coffee for dessert.

You really don't have to come you know,
she responded a second later, ignoring my faux coffee threat.

I was having a hard time convincing her that I was coming to her pottery workshop for
me.
Because I genuinely wanted to go.

She seemed to think that I felt sorry for her. Because of the panic attacks.

Because her heart was so much like mine.

It was a role reversal for me. Typically I was the one people felt sorry for.

I'm not talking about this again. Figure out where you want to eat. No flesh of the unborn please.

Joy killer.

I chuckled under my breath and put my phone away.

Corin Thompson was becoming important to me. We connected in a way that didn't make much sense.

Maybe we were bound by our barely functioning hearts. Maybe we were tied by our mutual experiences with death. It was intense, whatever the reason. She wasn't someone I would have chosen to spend time with
before.

She was prickly and self-conscious. She was blunt and at times rude.

But she also had a wicked sense of humor that showed itself at random times. She was obviously very passionate about her pottery studio.

We had been thrown into each other's lives, and I was thankful for whatever put her on that sidewalk that day in the snow.

“Everything seems to be working fine, Beckett. You can put your shirt down,” Dr. Callahan instructed. She made some notes in my file and put the paddle away in a drawer.

“I don't see any reason to be concerned, and the dizziness could very well have been a result of low blood sugar, like you suggested. But remember that it's important if you feel light-headed again, you come to the emergency room immediately so we can see what's going on. It could be nothing, just like this time. But as you know, it could be very serious as well.”

I swallowed around the lump in my throat.

“I will dance right over here, doc. No worries.” I winked at her and hopped down from the examining table. I covered my fear so well even I believed me.

Dr. Callahan gave me a stern look. “I'd prefer it if you found someone to drive you over instead.”

I chuckled and gave her a salute. “Yes ma'am.”

“I know you were wanting to increase your activity levels, but I think with these recent dizzy spells you should continue to not overexert yourself. We'll discuss it again at your next appointment.” I shrugged into my coat as my doctor opened the door for me.

“I figured you'd say something like that,” I pouted, trying to cover up how disappointed I really was.

“Baby steps, Beckett,” Dr. Callahan lectured.

“I know,” I replied.

“I'll see you at your scheduled appointment next month then,” Dr. Callahan said, following me out into the hallway.

“As much as I love our visits, I hope I won't see you until then,” I said, smirking.

Dr. Callahan patted me on the back. “Me too, Beckett.”

After chatting up Lynn for a few minutes and eating a couple of her butterscotch crèmes, I headed for my car and got in. It was already five o'clock so I didn't need to head back to the office. Though if truth were told, I'd have probably made an excuse not to go back. It was becoming harder and harder to get up and join the rat race every day.

“Maybe you should find something else you want to do,” my little sister Zoe had said a couple of weeks ago over dinner at our parents' house.

She was eighteen, in her first year at the local university, and was firmly entrenched in that annoying idealistic phase full of fairy-tale dreams where a college education actually helped you land the perfect job and not just a mountain of debt.

I gave her an indulgent smile. “One day your pretty bubble will pop under the weight of jaded experience, little sis.”

Zoe hadn't appreciated my attempts at humor. “I just think you're selling yourself short by working a job you don't even like.” She really meant what she said. What a delusional little girl.

“I sort of like a roof over my head and two hundred channels on my television. I won't give up HBO for anything!” I had filled up my plate with more salad and waited for her to give me another dose of her teenage fantasies.

“That sounds pretty shallow, Beck.”

“Whoa, Zoe, tell me how you really feel,” I bit out.

“I just figured after everything you had been through that you wouldn't be wasting your life being unhappy. Seems ridiculous to me.”

“It's easy for you to say, Zoe. Mom and Dad still pay your car insurance and give you an allowance every month.” I had abandoned any attempt at keeping the conversation light, going for defensive instead. Mostly it was because she wasn't saying anything I hadn't already thought a million times myself.

Zoe had shrugged. “Whatever, it's your life. Though I think it's a good start that you finally dumped the materialistic bitch.”

Mom had gotten after Zoe for her language choice and I had lost my appetite.

It was weird having my little sister give
me
life advice. Life advice that actually made sense.

I quickly typed out a text after turning the key in the ignition.

Still up for that tea?

I waited for a reply, letting the car idle. The heat warmed up the interior, making me sort of sleepy.

Finally my phone dinged with an answering text and I smiled, feeling happier than I had been only moments before.

How about we get some fresh air instead?

I quickly typed out my response.

I'm not letting you bury me in the sandbox.

I was smiling when I pulled out of the parking lot.

My phone dinged.

No sandboxes. Promise.

So what do you have in mind?

A car honked behind me and I pulled out onto the street. Corin's text came a few seconds later.

Why don't you come and find out?

My heart began to thump a little wildly in my chest.

Was Corin flirting with me? And why did that make me feel tongue-tied and jittery?

When I stopped at a red light, I sent back my own text. One that was completely honest. Words I felt in my bones.

I'd like nothing better.

“Here you go.” Corin handed me a Styrofoam cup. Having tea together was becoming our routine. I realized I liked having something that was “our thing.”

“We sure are spending a lot of time outside for a girl who hates being outdoors,” I commented, scalding my tongue with the hot beverage.

“I never said I hated being outdoors. I just don't like it when it's hot. Or cold. Or when it's raining. And I'm not a big fan of snow. And wind really sucks—”

“And yet here we are,” I observed, grinning at her.

“I'm trying to step outside of my box a little bit. Give me some credit.”

“Oh, I'm totally giving you credit!” She had a way of making me smile like a total idiot without even trying.

We walked, side by side, up the wooden steps until we were standing in the middle of a pretty wooden bridge that arched over a rushing stream on Ash Street.

Corin had no way of knowing how important this particular place was to me.

As a kid, I had been obsessed with photography and had taken a hundred pictures of this very location.

And then after my cardiac arrest I had spent many a day here, trying to figure out how my life had gone so horribly wrong.

It was peaceful under the trees, the late afternoon light filtering through leafless branches. It was warm and I was happy to be outside without a coat. I hated winter. I didn't like being stuck inside.

“So here we are. In the fresh air. What sort of crazy stuff did you have in mind?”

Corin leaned against the bridge railing and drank her tea. “I used to come here a lot when I was a teenager,” she remarked.

I was surprised by her statement. Startled by the connection of this bridge that I hadn't realized we shared.

“Oh yeah?”

“Being here helped to clear my head. When inside I was screaming, just standing here, staring out at the stream, all that noise went quiet. And I could breathe. For just a few moments, I could forget…”

Her voice trailed off and I wanted to ask her what it helped her to forget. I wanted to know so much more about her.

I wanted to know everything.

She didn't continue. She didn't tell me anything else. She let her words die out and I was left wanting so much
more.

But I knew by now that you didn't push Corin. You had to wait. Be patient. Even if it sucked.

“I wish I had thought to bring my camera,” I said suddenly.

Corin gave me a small smile but didn't comment.

“I used to take pictures of this bridge when I was younger.”

Corin looked up in surprise. “You did?” I nodded. “So you grew up around here.”

“Sure did.”

“Huh,” was all she said and turned her attention back to the stream.

We were quiet for a while. It wasn't a weird, awkward silence. It was actually sort of nice. Even with Corin picking obsessively at her thumbnail and my trying not to be obvious as I stared at her.

“You have a camera on your phone,” Corin said after a while.

“Yeah, I do.” I frowned, not getting her point.

Corin sighed and looked exasperated. “You can take pictures with your phone, Beckett,” she said slowly, as if I needed help with comprehension.

I pulled out my phone and swiped the screen, finding the camera icon. “You're right.” I grinned at her, holding my phone up and quickly taking a picture of her before she could protest.

“Hey!” Corin yelped, holding her hand up in front of her face. “I'm not the subject here!”

I looked down at the photograph I had just taken. Corin was looking directly at me, her mouth slightly open, the wind blowing her hair across her face. My breathing hitched a fraction.

“I don't know, I think I've found the perfect muse.” I tried to sound teasing but the words came out more as a strangled whisper.

“Let me see,” Corin demanded, grabbing the phone from my hands. “Oh god, I look awful! How do you delete it?”

I quickly took the phone back. “No way, that one's a keeper,” I told her. There was no way in hell I'd delete that picture.

“If you use it for blackmail later, I'll have to do something really horrible and nasty to you,” she threatened without any real heat.

I quickly took another picture of her. Then another. “How are you going to stop me?” I asked, lifting the phone up over my head as she tried to pull it out of my hand.

“How about I push you into the stream, smart ass!” Corin pressed her body against my front as she craned up on her tiptoes in her attempts to grab the phone.

Then I wasn't playing anymore. Because all I could focus on was the feel of her. Our faces were only inches apart, and while her eyes were trained above our heads on my outstretched arm, my eyes were glued to her face.

Her lips.

The tiny dimple at the corner of her mouth that peeked out when she tried not to smile.

The slope of her neck as she arched her back.

Then all feeling headed south.

I went very, very still. So as not to alert her to the sudden presence of my very noticeable hard-on.