The Fall (38 page)

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“Dean! I can’t find my necklace!” I raced into the bedroom. “I am positive I put it on the bathroom counter last night. I can’t find it!” I said in a panic. He remained in bed, having come in late last night from a delivery.

“Do you have to yell? It was a full moon last night. I delivered three babies!” He protested with a groan throwing a pillow over his face.

“Dean,” my voice shook. “Oh, God, what if it fell in the sink!” I quickly made my way to my kitchen, grabbing my toolbox and ran back to the bathroom. I took the wrench out and the damn thing hit the floor with its weight. I lifted the twenty-pound tool as I maneuvered myself under the sink and quickly started cursing when the capping would not move.

“Babe, I’m freaking out here. Please come and help me.”

I saw Dean’s pajama clad legs first as he squatted under the cabinet to peer at me with a smile. God, he was gorgeous. Would I ever get used to it?

“What the hell are you doing?” He chuckled.

“My necklace! Weren’t you listening to me! I can’t lose...I love it. He opened his hand to reveal my necklace dangling from his fingers.

“You shit! You had it! God!” I dropped the wrench, shimmying out of the cabinet, then stood glaring at him. He closed his hand quickly then walked out of the bathroom just as I reached for it.

“Give it to me. I need to get going. That wasn’t fun—”

I paused when he turned back to me quickly and hit his knee. “I’m going to give you a choice.” I took in his appearance, noting his sexy, sleepy, dazzling smile, beautifully sculpted bare chest and disheveled hair. The look on his face was filled with awe and love just for me. He reached over to the bed and pulled the box from underneath my pillow. He scrunched his nose at me, knowing I realized I had screwed up his surprise proposal.

Of course, it was under the pillow.

“I had back up,” he winked. My heart exploded as he grabbed my hand. “You were never supposed to have that damned necklace this long. It was a promise for something more.” He opened the box, but I didn’t bother looking at the ring. I was way too interested in the man that was watching me, eager for words I had waited years to hear, filled with all the love my heart could hold.

“I’ve waited a very long time to ask you this question and since we both agreed not to waste any more time I thought I would go ahead and ask. I’ll never again make you a promise I won’t keep. I love you, Dallas. Gift me the other half of my heart. Marry me, be my wife?”

I nodded quickly, throwing my arms around him, unable to utter a single word as I cried into his chest. He picked me up, carrying me to the bed, cradling my head in his palm, looking down at me as he set the open box on my chest and my eyes wandered to it. It was absolutely perfect. He removed the ring as I raised my finger and he slipped it on.

“It’s about time,” I croaked, my face soaked with tears of joy.

“Sorry I’m late,” he whispered as he cradled my face above me.

“Way to go, Martin,” I murmured as his lips came down to meet mine.

We laid Beatrice to rest a month later in a quiet cemetery on the outskirts of Dallas. She left her geriatric cat to me, and though I was reluctant at first, we managed to get along well. Minutes after Beatrice passed, a tornado touched down in downtown Dallas, heading right toward the hospital. The irony was not lost on me when I was completely unafraid of the raging cloud. The storm that had terrified me in my dreams had actually managed to bring an eerie calm on a day when I should have been anything but. It became clear to me in those few minutes when the large cloud raged its fury over us that what I feared most was the loss of control, and that some deep seated need in me craved to reign over things I had absolutely no power over. I couldn’t change the past or the mistakes I had made, and I damn sure had no ability to predict the future. And no matter how hard I tried, I would never stop the storms from coming. Letting go of that illusion of control had freed me in those moments and I was never going back.

You live, you love, you lose. You fall down, and you get back up.

That was living. And if you can manage to weather the storm, you came out that much stronger and more capable of handling the next one.

No one lost their life that day and the hospital suffered minimum damage. Somehow, I knew that Beatrice’s passing had everything to do with that tornado. It was if she was telling me not to be afraid.

I got her message loud and clear.

I married the love of my life in a small ceremony in his mother’s garden. He looked on at me as I said my vows, his posture rattling with what I knew was pride and excitement. His eyes glittered as his love overflowed. And even though he had his own vows to recite, I felt his promise to me before he ever uttered a single word. When we were finally married and he kissed me deeply to seal our fate, he raised our hands together and shook them in victory as our guests laughed. My husband was an amazing sight in his perfectly manicured tux and flawless hair, but what was most breathtaking was the way he regarded me. In those moments between I do and I do, I became keenly aware of what I truly meant to him, and it was then I knew in our relationship we both thought we loved each other more than the other.

My mother had always told my sister and I when we found love to give it everything we had. That no matter the outcome, the result of handing yourself over to love would be that you had truly lived through the act of loving alone. She said the best part of falling in love was the fall itself. She added that the feeling can’t be matched or replace but only remembered of the biggest highlights of a person’s life. I never truly understood her words...until today.

There is a saying that goes “Marriage requires falling in love many times with the same person.”

As my husband took my hand to lead me to the dance floor and I gazed into his beautiful blue eyes, I knew we would have unseen storms to go through and times we may be uncertain about the future, but what I was absolutely sure of is that I would always look forward to the fall.

Dallas

• Two and a half years later
  

I walked into my parent’s house with my two screaming children and as soon as I saw an adult in my line of sight capable of taking the noise away, I handed them over. In this instance, the adult waiting was Rose who met my eyes with a small amount of sympathy and a large amount of amusement.

“Never, ever have sex again,” I warned, absolutely exhausted as she took thirteen month Annabelle from my arms, who was still protesting in her most authoritative voice that she wanted the purple yogurt that I had given Grant.

“This is over yogurt?” Rose asked, kissing Annabelle’s plump cheek and soothing her back with her hands. She eyed Grant, all of twenty-two months, who stood by my side, arms crossed and shaking his head like a disapproving adult.

“That happened
this morning
. They are tired. Please make them disappear,” I said, waving my hand in dismissal. I needed a few minutes to regain my senses long enough to be the mother they needed. I climbed upstairs at a slow crawl my mother at the top of the stairs, a knowing smile on her lips, completely happy over my misery.

“Dallas, how are you?” she asked, chuckling as I pulled myself up at an agonizing pace.

“How in the hell did you do it, Mom? How? My God, I haven’t bathed alone in years!”

“God made them cute so you won’t kill them.” She chuckled again, wrapping me in her arms as I hit the top of the stairs.

“I just want a bath with no interruption, is that too much to ask?” I said very close to selfish tears.

“Paul and Hillary are bringing over the twins. We can make a night of it. Towels in the closet, candles too, and there is some really awesome tonic in my bathroom. Go there. Go on, baby. I can handle this.”

“Mom, I’m sorry for everything I have
ever
done,” I said, hugging her tight.

“Go on, Dallas, that bath will change your life.” She eyed me proudly as she brushed my hair behind my shoulders.

I almost skipped down the hall with renewed energy as I grabbed a fresh towel and some candles and made my way into the quiet of the bathroom. I undressed quickly and turned the water on as hot as my skin could stand it. I poured a small amount of my mother’s tonic into the water instantly smelling the citrus and breathing in deeply. I lit two candles and stood in front of the mirror studying my body. I had fared well with the birth of Grant seven short months after my wedding but had suffered horribly at the hands of Annabelle. There were faint but large stretch marks etched over the top of my stomach. Dean had told me time and time again that he loved them and thought they were beautiful
.

Idiot.

I picked up my phone to call him as I stepped into the tub, getting him on the second ring.

“Hey, wife,” he said sweetly, instantly making me long for him.

“How long will you be?” I asked letting out a moan as my body hit the scalding water.

I heard a chuckle and then, “What the hell are you up to?”

“Me?” I replied coyly. “I’m just soaking in a hot tub surrounded by candles.”

A throaty moan accompanied his next question. “Hmmm, is there room for me?”

“Absolutely not, I don’t want to be anywhere near you or your impregnating penis,” I teased.

“That bad today?” he asked, already knowing the answer.

I loved my children with everything in me and so did Dean, but the truth was they were hellions.

“Look...stay far away from here. I love you enough to tell you to run. Run for your life! Go have an adult beverage with a friend...or better yet, have an entire dinner where you aren’t interrupted, then go home and watch an hour of adult programming. Live for the both of us!”

More laughter then a quick, “No, it was partially my penis that got us into this mess. I’ll be there soon.”

“If you insist, but the girl child has grown up a year since this morning. I love you.”

I hung up then folded a hand towel in thirds, making a pillow for my head, when a soft knock at the door interrupted me, just a mere thirty seconds after I had found my Zen.

“No one is in here,” I barked loudly.

“Dallas, I need to talk to you.” Rose, of course it was Rose.

“I love you, sis, but you will be hit with anything I can find if you enter this room.”

The door opened and I grabbed a handful of my mother’s mini soaps, assaulting my sister with them.

“Stop it. Damn it, I need you!” she said, swatting away my flying weapons.

“Everybody needs me. I need a bath without interruptions, you selfish hag!”

“Fine,” Rose said pouting, slowly backing away giving me just enough time to change my mind. I wasn’t about to give in.

No way!

Damn it!

“What is it, Rosie?”

“Stop calling me that!” She walked over and put the toilet seat down, making herself at home. I sighed, peeking around the curtain to get a look at her.

“Spill it,” I demanded with a sigh.

“I...I...”

“I...I...what? My water is getting cold,” I whined.

“I slept with Jack,” she said, peering around at me, catching my reaction.

“Well, hell yes, sister. It’s about time! But I can’t say that’s a big shocker, Rose. Is that all?”

“He wants to start something with me.” She sighed heavily before she continued. “I know Grant’s gone and I have to move on, but Jack scares the hell out of me.”

I was overjoyed at the thought. It had been long enough, but I approached the subject with caution.

“Why does he scare you?”

“I don’t know. He’s amazing, he really is. If I hadn’t...I just can’t get over the thought I’m doing something wrong.”

“Rose, moving on doesn’t mean you didn’t love Grant.”

“You have to do better than that,” she said in a whisper.

“Okay, how about this...Whatever you think you are doing wrong, you put in that head of yours. You put that barrier there and you are going to have to break it on your own.” I leaned back, hopeful that my little bout of tough love would do her some good. I had tried everything to get her to start dating again a year ago. At least this was progress.

“I just hate feeling like this. I know Grant would be pissed at me for taking mourning him this far. I don’t have a life. He wanted me to have a life, a family,” she admitted. I could hear the desperation in her voice and it ate at me.

“He wanted you to be happy and that included giving you your own dream of having a family.”

“Yeah,” she said, standing to walk out in an effort to flee the conversation.

“Sit down,” I said forcefully. This was the most she had bothered to talk to me openly about moving on in months. I wasn’t about to let her go back to the dark place she lived in when she wasn’t at the clinic.

“You have so much left to give, Rose, and you’ve buried it. It’s time to get back on the horse. I know what happened crushed you. I don’t blame you for going inside and staying there, but you clearly want to come back out. If Jack’s the one who gets you to do it, great, if he’s not, at least open yourself to the possibility.”

“I don’t think I’m ready,” she said dismissively.

“Then wait until you are, but at least you took that first step,” I said, giving up on my bath and wrapping myself up in a towel. “I’m fond of Jack and he’s gorgeous, and he seems like a good guy. Just remember guys like that don’t just come falling out of the sky. It couldn’t hurt to have some fun with him while you figure it out. And please, for the love of God, wrap it up tight.”