Speak Now (11 page)

“I wish I hadn’t had to do it, but she’s part of me. I can’t pretend she doesn’t affect the way I think, act, even the way I think about you. I can’t leave her out of us, and I don’t want her to be a part of us at the same time. I thought maybe…”

“I have to go. I’m already so late—” She didn’t want to talk about it anymore. All Cara wanted was a quick trip to the bathroom where she could sob out her grief and guilt alone.

“Sure. I’m sorry.”

“My house after work? You’re still bringing the children?” Cara’s face lit up familiarly for a brief moment before she turned away again.

“You still want us to come?”

The doubt in his tones nearly crushed her. With caution tossed in the wind and now circulating in the office gossip hurricane, Cara wrapped her arms around him fiercely. “More than ever. You won’t get rid of me that easily, Jonathan Lyman. If that was your plan in taking me out there, you failed.”

“That is a huge relief. Now get in there before I get you fired.”

She took two steps before whirling around again. He stood, leaning against the passenger door of his car watching. Cara retraced her steps, holding out her hand. “You have my fortune cookie and I want it.”

Jonathan pulled two from his pocket. “Take your pick.”

She examined them both and chose the one already split in half. “Are you going to stand there and watch me walk all the way in before you leave?”

“Yep.”

She spun on her heel and stalked toward the door muttering, “I wish I had the guts to sway my hips within an inch of their capabilities.”

At the door, she glanced back and waved. Jonathan pushed himself from the side of the car, gave a short wave, and returned to the driver’s seat. As she disappeared into the building, he cracked open his fortune cookie muttering, “It’s a good thing you didn’t, woman. A man can only take so much.”

He glanced at the fortune and then erupted in laughter. Tucking it into his wallet, he took a second glance before he drove home.
Don’t ask, don’t say. Everything lies in silence.

Closed into her office, Cara ignored the concerned looks Tina and a few others gave her as she rushed in, locked the door behind her, and sobbed. She turned the office elevator music to unreasonable levels and allowed herself a full-fledged pity party for herself, for Jonathan, for his children, and for Lily’s parents who probably never imagined outliving their daughter.

As she slowly regained her composure, she opened her hand and found her cookie pulverized by her hands. Rolling the cellophane with her fingers, she worked the fortune away from the crumbs and read.
Speak this day in the universal language of love. Be brave—speak from your heart—and the answer you receive may surprise you
.

“Oh boy.”

Jonathan observed the scene from his place in Cara’s kitchen doorway. On the breakfast bar, crayons, coloring books, glue sticks, and more stickers and paper than he’d ever imagined giving his daughter at one time kept Riley occupied and thoroughly engrossed in her creations. Bryson sat next to her, carefully choosing each piece necessary for his masterful, albeit unidentifiable, creation from a large bucket of Legos on his left.

In the kitchen, Cara, wearing shorts and a sleeveless top that looked almost indecently good on her, tested linguine noodles and watched the corn dogs in her oven with a practiced eye. Nodding to herself, why he didn’t know, Cara set the timer for two minutes and removed the corndogs from the oven. She placed them on pink glass plates, added carrot and celery sticks, and then started for the dining room. Jonathan took the plates from her hands and nudged her toward the stove.

“I won’t burn your meal,” she teased as she turned back to the saucepan where her scallops waited to be poached.

Jonathan gestured for his children to move their projects, which they did in a hurry. He set the plates in front of them and draped an arm over each child’s shoulder, whispering prayers of thanksgiving for the food before urging them to eat. “I’m going to have your movie all ready to go. You just push the play button when you’re done eating and your hands are washed. Do not move your plates though. I’ll get them tonight.”

“Yes, Daddy. Are you having a date night in the dining room?”

“Something like that.” Jonathan frowned. Bryson couldn’t possibly remember date nights. “Where did you hear that?”

“Trevor’s mommy and daddy have date night
s in their dining room every Friday night. He has to stay in the family room with Megan.”

“Date night?” she whispered as he moved to refill his glass
. His eyes must have revealed his pain because she set the spatula on an empty plate, wiped her hands on a kitchen towel, and cupped his face gently. “You—”

He took a deep breath. “Fine.”

“Liar.”

A slow smile spread, showing his teeth and making him look a little diabolical. “If it keeps you there, I’ll lie forever.”

“Lying is a sin, Daddy. You wouldn’t do that.”

“That’s right, Riley, your daddy shouldn’t ever lie to anyone, should he? He should always tell the exact truth.” Cara’s eyes dared him to argue.

He searched for a way to diffuse the growing charge between them and settled on the pan on the stove. “Don’t burn the scallops.”

She stared back at him, looking for something that she must have found. With a smile, Cara turned back to the stove. “Wouldn’t dream of it.

“Do you need a refill?” She nodded and Jonathan reached for the bottle. “I’ll get it.”

“Good, because it’s done. We’ll have to ea
t our salads after the scallops or they’ll be disgusting.”

The children, nearly done with their meals, jumped from the bar and raced to the couches, looking for the most comfortable spot. It wasn’t hard to find a soft cushy place to snuggle with a pillow or twenty on Cara’s couches.
Jonathan called them back to wash their hands as he helped her carry the dishes to the dining room. In much less time than it should have taken to adequately wash their hands, the TV set came on, and the opening music of
Monster’s Inc.
filled the living room.

At Cara’s four-person table, Jonathan folded
his hands to pray over the meal. He paused. Reaching for her hand, he jerked his back again, folding them tightly in his lap and sitting in utter silence as he struggled within himself. Cara took a deep breath, paused in obvious prayer, and then whispered, “Eat before they get cold. There’s nothing nastier than cold scallops.”

Rather than diffuse the tension, her actions sent Jonathan’s emotions out of control. “Three and a half days,” he muttered between bites. “Might as well be seconds.”

“You’re killing me.”

Jonathan set his fork on the plate and dropped his head in his hands, elbows resting on the table. “Don’t I know it? Somehow it feels like murder by suicide.”

Before she could respond, a sweet little sing-song voice chanted, “Daddy, Daddy, strong and able, take those elbows off the table. This is not a horse’s table but a decent dining table.”

Unexpectedly, Jonathan grabbed his daughter, hugging her fiercely as he pulled her onto his lap. All of the emotion and affection
he ached to show Cara Jonathan infused into a thirty-second squeeze that he prayed she’d understand and feel—somehow. Eventually, Riley protested. “Daddy, I gotta potty. I don’t know where it is.”

Cara started to rise, but Jonathan shook his head. “I’ll take her.”

By the time Jonathan returned, she’d finished her scallops and sat with her hands folded in her lap. “Jonathan?”

“Hmm?”
With a mouth full of linguine, Jonathan couldn’t speak.

“Thank you.”

He swallowed quickly and washed his food down with a quick gulp of water. “For what?”

“That hug. I needed it more than I can tell you.”

“I hoped you’d understand.”

She swirled another bite of linguine around her fork before she took a deep breath and said, “I think some
day you’ll learn that I understand more than most people give me credit for.”

“I wish—”

“But you can’t,” she argued. “Even if you would, I wouldn’t. It’d be insane to make such a rash decision after less than a week. We both know it.” She reached for their salads and removed their dinner plates. “I know. I keep waiting for something that says, ‘he’s too good to be true and here’s the proof’ but I don’t think I’ll find it. I just know that if I’m impatient, someone is going to get hurt.”

“Almost a thousand miles…”

Tears spilled before Cara could stop them. “Are you trying to drive the knife in deeper? ‘Cause you’re really doing a good job.” Before he could reply, Cara dashed from the table and down the hall.

With a quick glance to see that his children
remained engrossed in their movie, Jonathan followed. He found Cara with her face buried in a pillow from her guest bed. “Oh, Cara mia.” His heart squeezed at the sight of her pain.

“That is so unfair.”

“I thought—”

“You know how much I like it.” She took a deep breath and dragged her eyes to meet his. “Are you trying to hurt me tonight? Do you want to pick a fight or dump—”

“I want the right to call you something that’d make it possible to dump you. I don’t ever want to do that, but I’d love to know you were someone special enough to be able to do that.”

Barely stifling a giggle, Cara shook her head. “Only you could make the possibility of getting dumped sound like an honor.” Fresh tears flooded her eyes before she could prevent them. “Arrgh. This is mortifying,” she sniffled, trying to compose herself.

Without a second thought, Jonathan broke his self-imposed hands-off policy. Gathering her in his arms, he held Cara. His trademarked silence filled the room; Jonathan said nothing and made no shushing noises. Rather, he stood, held her, stroked her hair, and tried to remember to breathe.

How long they stood there, neither of them ever knew. They didn’t speak and with the exception of his hands as they smoothed her hair from time to time, they didn’t move. Once
her emotions settled, he knew Cara expected him to jump away as he had so many times in the past few days, but Jonathan didn’t shift at all.

The credits rolled on the children’s movie, but in the absence of interruption by Riley or Bryson, neither of them moved. Silence seemed to echo throughout the house, with the faint exception of Cara’s occasional sniffles. Slowly, she grew heavy, until Jonathan realized she was falling asleep in his arms.

Unable to carry her upstairs, Jonathan gently led her to the bed and laid her back on it. He pulled one leg up and the other followed of its own volition. She curled into fetal position and grabbed for the pillow instinctively. Jonathan pulled the bedspread from the other side and draped it lightly over her. As he crept from the room, he flipped the light switch, plunging it into darkness.

An idea occurred to him. He’d clean the kitchen for her before they left. Hoping to hide the noise, Jonathan pulled the door closed behind him just as one final sniffle escaped the sleeping woman. “Oh, Lord,” he whispered as he retraced his steps down the hallway. “What are we going to do?”

~*~*~*~

Cara woke feeling terribly disoriented, her head thick and fuzzy as though coming down with a cold. She tried to remember where she was or what she was doing there, but her mind refused to work. Her hand traveled over the surface of her favorite bedspread. Chenille.
The spare room? What was she—

“Oh!” Cara’s memory flooded her mind with images of tears, hugs, and the most secure feeling she’d ever had in her life.

She snapped on the light and glanced at the bedside clock. Two a.m. He must have taken the children home. How embarrassing to fall asleep on him like that. She hadn’t realized, until that precise moment, just how physically draining their intense attraction had become.

The kitchen shone. Every single dish washed, dried, and put back in the cupboards. The leftovers sat on shelves in the refrigerator, and the garbage stood empty. No splatters of sauce on the stove, no half-empty wine glasses, and no traces of children’s project
s anywhere. They’d vanished.

An envelope on the bar caught her attention. She pulled several sheets from it, settled down on her loveseat, legs curled beneath her, and read.

Cara mia,

You looked so peaceful sleeping; I had to leave you there. We keep dancing around the elephant that follows us everywhere we go, but eventually, we will have to tackle him. I am leaving, but I don’t want to go. I’m not ready to leave without knowing more about what I’m leaving behind.

Every morning I wake, and you are the first thing that comes to mind. For the first time in three years, I think of something other than how to get through another day without Lily. For the first time in eight years, my heart calls for someone other than her. That first day, at the wedding, I was confused. By Saturday, I was thankful. My Lily would be so happy. One of the last things she said to me was, “Jonathan, try to let another woman into your life. There’ll be women who are interested. Give them a chance. I want you to be happy.”

It killed me when she said it. It doesn’t hurt anymore. It’s like a gift she left me. You helped me unwrap that gift.