Love Unrehearsed (58 page)

“That person is my lovely wife, Taryn, to whom I owe everything for this moment. She said two years ago that this script was Oscar-worthy and I’m so glad I listened to her.” He breathed out and chuckled nervously, shaking his award as proof.

I blew him a kiss from my hand and rubbed my stomach, pushing a tiny foot back down. Our child was anxious to have his birthday.

He reached for the little piece of paper that he had tucked away in the inside breast pocket of his jacket. Written on it were the names of people he wanted to thank. I was glad he wore the silver tie and white shirt with his black tuxedo. He looked absolutely dashing.

Another powerful contraction hit. I grasped the armrest of my seat and locked my arms to help me ride out the pain. This one was difficult to smile through.

He looked out over the crowd. “I promise to make this quick as my wife just informed me several minutes ago that she’s been in labor for the last five hours, and I really don’t want her to give birth to our first child down there in the front row.”

The audience clapped and laughed.

He continued to fumble with the paper, nervously trying to unfold it. “Tell him to hang on, honey, I’ll be done in a minute.”

The audience laughed again.

He scratched his eyebrow. “I just let it slip,” he muttered, mostly to himself, but everyone heard him. He shrugged, looking back at the five men still standing on the stage with him.

“Oh well, now the tabloids don’t have to speculate any longer and the paparazzi can stop asking. It’s a boy!” He looked out at the audience and grinned proudly.

The audience roared and applauded.

“I don’t know which moment of my evening tonight will be bigger, receiving this award or the arrival of my son, but I am grateful that they are happening on the same day so I can truly say that
today
is the best day of my life.” He took in a few quick breaths, trying to calm himself down.

“I’d like to thank my mom and dad, who are also here somewhere. Dad, yell so I know where you are.”

I heard his father yell “here” from somewhere in the back right corner of the grand theater and couldn’t help but smile.

Ryan continued his acceptance speech, thanking the amazing director, the crew, his co-stars, and expressing gratitude for being recognized among the other four nominees.

I was relieved when he finished, and I smiled when several of the superstars who flanked him patted him on the shoulders as he made his way to the side of the stage.

“Mrs. Christensen, are you in need of an ambulance?” a female stagehand asked, helping me as I tried to stand up.

“No,” I breathed in between contractions. “Just my husband, his parents, and our limo.”

Four hours later, on March 9, at 11:40
P.M.
, Mitchell Ryan Christensen made his debut. Seven pounds, ten ounces; twenty inches long—a perfect miniature version of his father, blue eyes and everything.

“Oh it’s good to be home,” Ryan sighed when we walked through the front doors of our six-thousand-square-foot, completely pretentious log home. Our five-day-old son was bundled up in his cozy blue fleece outfit with little puppy dog appliqués on the toes. He was strapped securely in his car seat carrier and slept the whole way from the airport to his home.

I immediately started unbuckling him so I could hold him again.

“Call the crew, let ’em know we’re back. I’m sure Pete and Tammy will rush right over to see him,” he chuckled, dragging our suitcases into the entryway.

“I will in a bit. After we get settled.”

Ryan took his Oscar out of the felt pouch that it was wrapped in. “I’m going to put this in the office.”

“No!” I quickly yelled. “Put it on the fireplace mantel where we can appreciate it.”

He smirked.

“No one ever goes in your office, honey. Put it up here.” I moved a few of our wedding pictures, making a place for his statue.

I sat down on the couch with the baby, showing him the picture of all of us on our wedding day.

I smiled at the big grin Pete wore on his face when the picture was taken. The trip was a second honeymoon for Pete and Tammy, and sometime during that week, Tammy got pregnant. Their daughter, Madison, was six months old now.

We all joked that maybe our son and their daughter might get together one day. You never know which way the wind is going to blow. Anything is possible.

I had spent all that time worrying about what I would do with my life, only to have it all work out on its own. Wife, mother, partner, lover . . . it was all very fulfilling.

Ryan joined me and the baby in the sunroom that overlooked the lake. He propped his feet up on the coffee table and tossed the box he had in his hands onto the floor.

“Let me hold him now,” Ryan whispered, slipping his hands around our tiny baby boy. “Come here, little guy. Come to Daddy,” he crooned.

Seeing my husband so in love with his son filled me completely.

“What’s in the box?” I asked, watching the sun set over the tops of the evergreens.

Ryan chuckled. “Scripts. More scripts.”

“Well, you know, honey, you only have
one
Oscar. If you had two, we’d have matching bookends.”

He grinned at me. “Nah, I already have one. Maybe
you
should work for the second one?”

I rolled my eyes. “I don’t think so. Besides, I’m not an actress.”

“But you could be, if you try. After all, you’re the one who keeps saying that anything is possible if you point yourself in the right direction.”

So he’d been paying attention.

I slid my leg down the table and kicked him in the foot.

While I was developing the story line for
Love Unrehearsed,
I had the following passage in the beginning as the original dream sequence. I chose to cut it because I didn’t want to give too much away up front. I wanted Taryn’s adoption to be a surprise.

While developing Taryn’s character, I wondered what Taryn’s last memory of Joey might be that caused her to have those recurring nightmares of the “boy with the black hair” and what caused the division on her mother’s side of the family.

I have fond memories of being my father’s “beer fetcher” while he and the other men in the family played horseshoes, so this scene partially comes from my childhood. We went to the same place to have a family picnic every year and the gray cinder-block garage on the property always seemed to be a few degrees cooler than the blistering heat outside.

The little blond-haired girl sneaking ice cubes with a Barbie in one hand? That was me.

Enjoy.

July 4, 1986

“Whoa! Careful there, sweetheart!”

Daddy’s big hands latched tightly under my arms and he spun me up into his arms. The big metal U that Uncle Al threw tumbled right past Daddy’s foot and fell softly like a whisper in the grass.

“Taryn, you know better. I don’t want you to get hit with one of those horseshoes. It will hurt.” His bottom lip stuck out like a big fat worm. It looked funny. I wanted to grab it and squeeze it.

I sat perched in my daddy’s arms and watched Uncle Al make funny faces as he swung his arm, aiming for the rusty spike sticking straight up from the ground. The clanging noise was kind of frightening. I imagined that the horses that wore those big shoes had to be enormous. Like elephants. Or even bigger. Like houses. I wished I could ride one.

“Your cheeks are red, Daddy.”

He placed a few kisses on my face. “So are yours, peanut. Mommy has to put more lotion on you. Who do you have here? Who’s this bum?”

I waved my dolly’s arm to say “Hi.” “This is Ken. He’s my boyfriend.”

“Boyfriend, huh?” He raised his brow, giving me that one-eye look. “What happened to his pants?”

I pointed over to my tiny splash pool, where they were floating. Barbie was still in the water.

“Do I need to have a
talk
with him about showing his heinie in public?”

I giggled. “Can you take me in the big water now?”

“That’s two points for us,” Dad said proudly, shifting me on his hip to retrieve one of the metal U’s.

I patted his cheek. “Daddy?”

He smiled his toothy grin at me and I knew I had him. “In a minute, sweetheart. Daddy and Uncle Al need to mop up Uncle Andy and Bean Man over there first. You don’t go anywhere near that lake without Mommy or Daddy. Understand? You stay here where I can see you.”

I watched Uncle Al drink from the brown glass bottle, tilting it far into the sky to get every last drop. “Hey, Taryn?” Uncle Al called. “Would you do me a big, big favor? Would you throw this away in the garbage and get me and your, um, daddy new bottles from the garage? You can be our special helper.”

Happiness swirled inside me as I ran. I wanted to be the best special helper in the world.

It was cooler in the big gray garage than out in the hot sun. I dug my hands into the chilly coldness of the little squares of ice in the bucket, sneaking one into my mouth like Daddy does. It made my teeth hurt but it felt wonderful on my tongue. They were like special, secret candies that turned into water. And I had a whole pile of them to enjoy.

“Hey! What are you doing in there?”

The voice shook me hard and I immediately dropped the ice cube. I had been caught. I almost wanted to cry.

Joey. I recognized him right away, although he still frightened me when he yelled. His hair was the same color as my bedroom at night and it covered his eyes, but his teeth were really white. I wondered if he knew the monsters that lived under my bed.

“You are way too young to drink, young lady,” he said sternly. Joey walked a little funny. Like one leg didn’t work right. He took the brown bottle out of my hand and put it back in the ice. I wanted to ask him if his mommy painted his fingernails black like that. I thought boys didn’t wear nail polish.

Crouching down in front of me, he pinched the wet strand of hair that hung over my eye and placed it behind my ear.

“You are so beautiful.” He sighed. His eyes crinkled with happiness. “Just like your mommy.” I beamed proudly. My mommy was beautiful.

“And look. You’re already losing some teeth. How old are you now?”

I held out my hand and spread my fingers proudly, remembering to tuck in my thumb.

Joey sat down on the floor and crossed his legs. “Wow. Four. You are getting so big and so smart. God, I wish your mommy was here to see you. She’d be so happy. You have her hair and looks, you know.”

I felt my eyes scrunch. My mommy’s hair was brown, like the crayon I used to color dirt and trees. Not sunny buttercup yellow like mine.

He leaned in closer. “Can you keep a secret? Just between us?”

Maybe Special Secret Helpers had secrets, too.

“You and I have the same-color eyes. See?” Joey’s eyes were deep blue, like the color of the sky outside behind the puffy cotton clouds.

He looked sad, which made me sad. “I wish you had a chance to see your mommy again. But unfortunately, you can’t.”

I didn’t like that. I wanted to run to her now. “Why not?”

“Because,” he exhaled, rough and hard, “your real mommy lives in heaven with the angels.”

Now I really wanted to cry. And get mad. “No she doesn’t. My mommy is over there.”

Joey was looking right in my eyes. “Listen to me. Your mommy’s name is . . . was . . . Kelcie. And she loved you very much. But . . .”

I wondered which cloud in the sky was heaven.

“Damn, I wish I had more time. I wish . . . I don’t know when I’ll get to see you again,” Joey said softly.

“Why?”

“Do you know what the army is?”

I nodded and scratched my nose. “Are they going to paint you green?” Green might be better for him than black. It’s the color of grass.

Joey smiled and laughed. “No. But I’ll have to wear special clothes and all of this will be cut off.” He ran his hand through his dark hair. “Maybe you could write to me while I’m gone and draw me pretty pictures. Would you do that?”

I wished I had paper right now. He reminded me of a zebra. I could go get a crayon from my bag of toys if I ran fast enough.