Fighting Fate (26 page)

She stopped talking again as the way that night had played out flashed through her mind. Cole continued to wait patiently.

“As the night wore on, I just couldn’t deal with them,” she said with a shake of her head. “They weren’t the kind of people that I would typically hang out with. Brynn and one of the other girls had already spent a good portion of the night in the bathroom, throwing up. She told me as her personal attendant, it was my duty to hold up her hair. A lovely job,” Sarah said sarcastically. “By the end of the night, I’d had it. They were loud, crude and rude to anyone who wasn’t in our group. I was tired and irritable. I knew I’d never be able to sleep once we got back to the hotel. I’d had a few drinks because Brynn had ordered a few rounds for everyone. I told her I was going to call Aaron. I wanted him to come and get me because I didn’t think I should drive. She was furious. She called me selfish for asking him to get out of bed. I think more than anything, she was furious because she felt slighted. Like…how dare I leave her party? 

“I called him anyway and he didn’t seem bothered in the least. He was still up, watching a movie. He said he’d be there to get me in fifteen minutes.”

Despite the heat of the day, she shuddered.

“I waited for him down on the curb. It was freezing out. He never showed up. He was hit by a drunk driver. It was a head-on collision and Aaron never had a chance. Brynn has never forgiven me. If I had just spent the night like I was supposed to, he would’ve been home, safely in bed. That’s all I had to do. Spend one night with Brynn. But I didn’t do that because I just wanted to go home. He’d still be here if I wouldn’t have been so stubborn.”

“God, Sarah, I’m so sorry,” Cole said. idnle Sarah But please tell me you don’t blame yourself for that.”

She let out a mirthless laugh. “Be happy we didn’t run into each other last year at this time. I was really a mess. I was drowning in my guilt. It was easy to do. Brynn made my life hell. She tried to ban me from the funeral. I wasn’t allowed to sit anywhere near the family. In fact, I was in the last row, stuffed into a corner. Gretchen and Liz were there with me, though. Mom and Dad, too. But Gretchen and Lizzy never left my side. I took a leave of absence from work. I was only gone for four weeks but Brynn used that to her advantage. She hates me. Truly hates me. She tried to get me fired from my last job. After my leave of absence, she went to the school board claiming that I was emotionally unstable. She tried to convince them that I wasn’t fit to be around kids.”

“She what?” Cole asked and Sarah felt him stiffen beside her. For the first time since Sarah had begun talking, he sounded shocked. “That’s crazy! They told her
she
was crazy, right? Not you!”

She nodded slowly. “Of course everyone knew why I was gone. I don’t think she really thought she could get me fired. I think she simply wanted to cause trouble. She even had a petition signed by—”

“The signatures were probably all forged,” Cole grumbled. “That’s ridiculous.”

“It was. And it eventually went away. But she didn’t stop there. More than once I came out of work to find that my tires had been slashed. I had graffiti on my garage door. She started calling my phone in the middle of the night. I finally got rid of my landline and left my cell phone off. So then she started leaving me hateful voicemails telling me that her brother was dead because of me. Only, she was a lot more…colorful when she said it.”

“Sarah, it was an accident.”

“I
know
that. But it was an accident that could’ve been avoided.  I had friends in Crawford but I’ll admit, I was pretty withdrawn after the accident. I probably would’ve blamed myself anyway but Brynn made it even easier to do. She wouldn’t let a day go by without reminding me. I finally changed my phone number. I couldn’t stop blaming myself. But then she took it too far.”

“Going to the school board wasn’t far enough?”

“Apparently not,” Sarah murmured. “I came home from work the day that winter break started. It was almost a year after Aaron died. She’d let herself into my house. She nearly cleared it out. I’ll admit we didn’t have much. The apartment had come mostly furnished. There were a few things that were just mine. Anything she thought was his, she took. His books, his watch, a few items of clothing I’d kept, photo albums that I had put together but they all contained photos of Aaron and me…They were gone. Pictures were taken off the wall. It was like she wanted to erase the last bit of him from my life.”

“She took everything? You mean she stole everything,” Cole clarified.

<. It wam" align="justify">She shrugged. “Essentially, yes. At some point Aaron had given her a key because we’d gone on vacation. He’d asked her to stop by and check on things. I had forgotten all about it. I will never forget the way my heart hit the floor when I walked in and saw that she’d taken things she had no right to take. And I knew it was her because who else would it be?”

“What kind of person would do that?”

“Brynn.”

“Did you call the police? She should’ve been arrested,” Cole said.

“No. My life was full of so much drama already. And to be honest, it would’ve felt disloyal to Aaron.”

“But she would’ve deserved it, Sarah. What she did? That was absolute bullshit. She had no right.”

“I know. I called her from Liz’s. She admitted to taking everything. She told me she thought of it as a down payment for the ring because I still hadn’t given it back to her. Really, I’m sure she didn’t care about any of the things she took. She just took them to be hateful. To prove a point. She just used the ring as an excuse.”

“The ring?”

Sarah explained to Cole where the ring originated from.

“It’s a lovely ring in an antique setting. It’s truly gorgeous. But that wasn’t the reason I was so attached to it. It was from Aaron and I wasn’t ready to let it go. I had planned on giving it back eventually. I just hadn’t been able to at that point. I hadn’t been able to take it off,” she admitted. “She told me I was the thief.”

“Well, if that’s not a messed up way of thinking, I don’t know what is.”

“Right,” Sarah agreed. “Up until that point, I’d been letting her push me around. I knew she was grieving even though she had a messed up way of showing it. I think she was trying to push me over the edge. Instead, it just helped me to see things clearly for maybe the first time. I realized I didn’t deserve the way she was treating me. Because that? Coming into
my
home and taking away all I had left of him? That was going too damn far.”

“You’re damn right it was,” Cole grumbled.

The protective tone of his voice caused a small smile to tilt up the corner of her lip.

“I spent the night at Liz’s. Her husband took their kids and went to spend the night at his parents. I cried my eyes out all night long. But in the morning, Liz sat me down with a cup of coffee. Up until that point, Liz had done her best to keep me sane. But that morning, she told me she thought I should leave Crawford. She knew I had the farmhouse here. And she knew that my family was here.

“At first, I refused. I didn’t want Brynn to think she’d finally gotten the best of me. I thought about it over winter break. It was pretty much all I thought about. I realized Liz was right. I had her there and hd fid a few other friends but really, by that point, there was nothing holding me to Crawford. In hindsight, I would’ve been better off moving back to Laurel immediately. But my life had already been thrown into complete upheaval. I just couldn’t deal with anything else those first few months.”

“I know how that is,” Cole agreed. “Sometimes it’s hard to see a situation clearly until you step away.”

“I think that’s what happened. I didn’t realize how miserable I was. Or maybe I should say I didn’t realize how
unnecessarily
miserable I was. I was having the accident thrown in my face all the time. While I was in Crawford, I just couldn’t get away from it. I completely withdrew at first. I pulled away from my friends. Except Liz because she wouldn’t let me. But then it was Liz who finally made me see things clearly. I decided to finish out the school year. But after that? There was nothing keeping me in Crawford. Not really. Just the few friends I had left and a whole lot of bad memories.”

“And you had Cora’s house waiting for you here,” he said.

“Yes,” she said with a small smile. “You have no idea how many times I’d thought about selling it. I just couldn’t go through with it. Now, I’m so glad I didn’t.”

“Even with all of the work that needs to be done?”

“Even with all of the work,” she agreed. “I love that old house.”

“I’m really sorry that you had such a rough couple of years.”

“Thanks.”

“But I think your friend Liz is right. I think it’s good you got out of Crawford. That lady sounds unhinged. I’m glad you’re not in the same town anymore. You don’t need her harassing you.”

“No. Now I just have Melinda showing up at my door instead.”

She felt Cole jerk back in surprise.

“What?” he leaned away from her so he could turn to look at her.

She told him about Melinda’s visit.

“Of course she only stopped by because she wanted something,” Cole grated out.

“I know. But the few times that I’ve seen her over the years, it just really makes me appreciate my real mom. The one that raised me,” Sarah said softly.

“I don’t think you should’ve even let her in. You don’t owe that woman a thing.”

“I know. But in some strange way, I was glad she wanted those keepsakes.”

“Why? Do you think there’s still hope for her?” he asked.

She tilted her head to the side, thinking it over as she looked at him.

“You are way too nice for your own good,” Cole said.

“Enough about Melinda. Tell me how things are with Karen.” Sarah had met her several times while she and Cole were together. While Karen had always been kind to her, Sarah hadn’t really gotten the chance to know her. She was either working, rushing off to work or napping so she could prepare for a nightshift.

“Things are good,” Cole said. He removed his arm from where it had been resting on Sarah’s shoulder. He stretched and then got to his feet.

She smiled as he began searching the ground, undoubtedly looking for a good skipping stone. She leaned back on her elbows so she could watch him. The familiarity of it warmed her more than the summer day.

“Care to elaborate?” she asked as he bent down to scoop up a rock. “About your mom, I mean.”

“Sometimes I feel like I’ve spent more time with her in the last year than I spent with her the entire time I lived at home. It’s been good for us.”

“I always liked your mom,” Sarah admitted with a smile. “She was always in a hurry. But she always stopped for at least a few seconds to talk to me.” That was more than Melinda had ever done for her.

“When I was growing up, we weren’t very close,” he said as he flung his first rock. It skipped half a dozen times and he grinned. “Not bad for being so rusty,” he muttered before turning to Sarah again. “I mean, she wasn’t a bad mom.” He paused, as if searching for an appropriate word.

“She was just absent,” Sarah suggested.

“Yeah,” he agreed. “She was. For the longest time I thought it was because she didn’t want us around. I thought she was gone because she was avoiding us. Then she got sick. I came home for a visit and we talked. She told me the biggest regret of her life was missing out on her boys’ childhoods. She blamed herself for the way Darren turned out. She said if she’d been around more, maybe she could’ve set him straight. But she was working. She was working all the damn time. That old trailer house was a pile of shit and it always had stuff that needed replacing. Any time she managed to save anything, either my dad or Darren would find a way to steal it from her. She just never found a way to get ahead. She struggled her whole life. I didn’t realize, at the time, just how badly she was struggling to take care of us. ”

“I always knew your mom loved you. You could see it in her eyes.”

He knelt down to pick up a few more rocks. He held one out to her. “Wanna try?”

She laughed. “No!”

Cole had done his best trying to teach her to skip stones. She had never gotten the hang of it. If she managed to get one to skip twice, she was impressed with herself. She’d much rather just sit back and watch him.

“How sick is she?” Sarah asked.

“She has good days and she has bad days. I don’t know how much time she has left. Really, it could be years. It’s yea goprobably years,” he said firmly. “Most days are good days but that could change. And I know no one really knows when their time will come to an end but with her, sometimes I feel like I can hear her clock ticking. So I want to be here to take care of her while I can.”

“Cherish every day?”

“Exactly,” he said. He tossed his handful of rocks into the pond. A collection of ripples burst across the surface. When he turned to Sarah, he reached for her hands. She complied and he pulled her to her feet. “Make every day count,” he said as she looped her arms around his neck and pulled him in for a kiss.

Chapter Nineteen

Casual.

But not
too
casual
, he had hastily added.

Those were the only instructions Cole had given her for their date.

She had changed outfits no less than half a dozen times. Finally, she tugged off the polka-dotted dress she was wearing. She placed it back on the hanger and she wiggled into the white capris she’d first tried on. She plucked up the peach-colored chiffon top she’d first tried on as well.