Somewhere Out There (32 page)

“Where is she?” I asked, unable to keep the panic and desperation from my voice. My head began to spin.
Oh, god. Is it happening again?
I hadn’t felt this way since the morning in the park with the little girl who fell down, all those years ago. Despite the icy air of the February evening, I started to sweat.

“She couldn’t have gone far,” Evan said. “Has she ever done this before?”

“No!” I said. I peered into the field, unable to see more than ten or fifteen feet in front of us, even with the flashlight. “I shouldn’t have let her stay outside. We have a fence at home. Maybe she got confused. What if she’s gone? What if she got hit by a car?” I began to feel as though I couldn’t catch my breath. I bent over, my hands on my knees, my heartbeat pounding between my eardrums. “No!” I cried. “No, no, no! I can’t lose her!” All I could think about was Brooke and Natalie, the last time I held them. The day the social worker carried them away.

Evan stepped over and crouched next to me, putting his long arm over my back. “Hey,” he said. “It’s okay. Come on now. We’ll find her. I promise. You have her chipped, right? If she’s lost, someone will take her to the shelter.” His words were distorted, sounding as though they were traveling to me underwater.

I shook my head, squeezing my eyes shut, feeling as though my skin had been shrink-wrapped and was now too small for my body.
This is my fault,
I thought.
I shouldn’t have stepped outside my routine. I never should have given him my number.

And then, I heard a familiar bark. My head snapped up, looking with blurry eyes in the direction from where the sound had come. “Trixie!” I yelled, and less than a minute later, she appeared, racing toward us, tail wagging. I threw my arms around her, and she licked my face, trying to wriggle away. She was wet and smelled horrible, as though she’d found something foul in which to roll. “How dare you do this to me?” I whispered against her fur. “I couldn’t bear to lose you.”

After a moment, I managed to stand up. My face was hot and I was still shaking. Evan stood only a couple of feet from me. His brow was furrowed. “Let’s go back inside,” he said, and I shook my head.

“I think we should probably just go.” I held on to Trixie’s collar so she couldn’t take off again. “I’m sorry. I don’t think this is going to work for me.”

“What isn’t going to work? Dinner?”

I shook my head. “I’m sorry,” I said again. I didn’t know what to do or what to say. All I knew was I needed to leave. I needed to be back in my house.

“It’s freezing out here,” Evan said. He put his arm around my shoulders, and to my surprise, I didn’t push him away. I let him lead us back to his deck and into the house, mostly because I wasn’t sure I was in any shape to drive. Scout and Trixie wiggled around in the kitchen like they’d been apart for years. Evan removed our jackets and led me to the living room, where he sat me down on the couch. He pushed a blanket toward me, then turned to the fireplace, pressed a button on a remote control, and it roared to life. I stared at the clutter on his coffee table, feeling numb, as Evan grabbed a few old towels from his linen closet and dried off Trixie’s fur. When he was finished, apparently exhausted by their outing, Trixie and Scout both lay down on the enormous dog bed in front of the fire, and Evan came over to sit by me.

He was quiet a moment, then finally spoke. “Can you tell me what happened out there?” When I didn’t answer, when I simply pulled the warm blanket up under my chin, he sighed. “Are you mad at me? Do you think it’s my fault that she ran off?”

This got my attention. “No,” I said. “Of course not. It’s just . . . it’s me.”

“What’s you?” His voice was so gentle, so kind, it made me want to weep.

“I don’t know how to explain it,” I said, keeping my tone low and controlled. “I don’t . . . I haven’t talked about it with anyone. Ever.”
Am I really going to do this? Am I going to tell him about my past?

“You can talk to me,” he said. “Maybe it would help.”

I finally looked at him. His dark blond hair was slightly wavy and grew just over his ears; he needed a haircut. “I don’t know if I can,” I said.

“Try,” he answered, and so along with my heart, I opened my mouth, and told him everything I’d done wrong. I told him about Michael, about my first pregnancy, how my mother pushed us away. I told him about living in my car, begging for money; about getting pregnant with Natalie and everything that came after the night I was arrested at the grocery store.

When it came to describing the decision I’d made about giving up custody of my girls, my voice took on a slightly robotic tone, as though a computer were dictating the details of the experience to Evan instead of me. I used the same tone to tell him the rest of my story, how I ended up back in prison, about the little girl in the park and how sure I’d been she was my older daughter. I explained how Randy took me under his wing and how Trixie basically saved my life when Blake beat me. I told him how I kept my life simple now, as a way to keep myself safe. I told him that when Trixie had disappeared tonight, I’d felt like I did the last day I’d seen my daughters—like my edges had worked loose and I was about to come undone.

Evan didn’t say a word while I spoke. He didn’t interrupt, he didn’t ask questions. He kept his eyes on me the entire time. His face simply held an expression of concern, of interest in what I had to say. When I finally quieted, we both sat in silence for a few moments, and I waited for him to tell me that I should leave and not come back. That I clearly had issues I needed to deal with.

Instead, he reached out to pull down the blanket I’d tucked around me so he could hold my hand. “I’m so sorry,” he said.

“For what?” I asked. The words came out strangled.
Sorry he met me? Sorry this wasn’t going to work?

“For everything you’ve been through,” he said. He reached up with his free hand and cradled the side of my face. His skin was warm and callused, but I found myself closing my eyes and pushing my cheek into his palm.

“Quick,” I said. “Tell me something horrible about yourself.” I was only half-joking; part of me really wanted to know Evan’s ugliest mistake—that he, too, knew what it was to feel a brutal sense of shame.

He dropped his hand and sighed. “Well,” he said, “I cheated on my ex-wife.” He waited a moment. “With her best friend.”

“Lots of people cheat,” I said, thinking that his one transgression didn’t even come close to matching all the things I’d done wrong.

“Yeah,” he said. “But that doesn’t make it any less shitty. I hate being that guy . . . the cheating asshole cliché. If I could go back and change it, I would. But since I can’t, I had to learn to be okay with the fact that I fucked up, because at some point, everyone does. I think the key is to learn from what you’ve done wrong, and try to do better.” He locked his eyes on mine. “Which it sounds like you’ve done. You’ve had to be so strong.”

“I’m not strong,” I whispered. “I’m a mess.”

He didn’t say anything. Instead, he leaned in toward me and put his lips on my own, kissing me until my entire body warmed and finally relaxed. When he stopped, he rested his forehead against mine. “Weren’t you listening?” he asked, glancing toward the coffee table. “Messy is kind of my thing.”

•  •  •

We were married seven months later, in late September, at Randy’s house. It was a small ceremony, with only the clinic’s employees and Evan’s coworkers in attendance. I wore a fitted, simple white sheath and held a bouquet of pale pink roses, and Evan had on a pair of black slacks and a button-down that matched the flowers. Trixie and Scout sat next to us as we stood in front of the fireplace, and we laughingly referred to my girl as the mutt of honor and Scout as Evan’s best dog. Randy and Lisa served as our witnesses. During the reception, as soon as the music started and after Evan and I had our first dance, Randy approached and asked if he could have the pleasure of the second.

“You’ve come such a long way,” he said as we moved across their enormous deck. One end was covered in four round tables where people were eating and the other was empty to leave room to dance. It was a gorgeous, sunny fall day—the sky was a striking shade of blue and there wasn’t a cloud in the sky. The trees that lined Randy and Lisa’s backyard were a wild mix of gold, red, and green—a treasure trove of jewel tones. “It’s been a pleasure to watch you come into your own.”

“Stop it,” I said. “You’re going to ruin my makeup.” I looked over to where Evan stood holding a beer as he chatted with a few friends from work. His smile was wide and his eyes were filled with the kind of love I still couldn’t believe was meant for me.

Since that night when Trixie had run off, when I opened my soul to Evan and let all the pain in my life bleed out in front of him, I’d grown to feel lighter, more capable of moving around in the world without fearing I was, at any moment, about to fall apart. Evan saw who I was—he saw everything about me, good and bad—and loved me, still. And I saw everything about him. Because he understood what I’d gone through in letting go of my girls, knowing it would be too agonizing for me to revisit that loss as I would if I had another baby, it was easier for him to confess that he’d never really wanted children of his own. Like me, he was content with his work, happy to lavish his affections upon his dog, and now, me. Before I’d moved in with him in June, he had a huge parcel of the land around the house fenced in so I’d never have to worry about Trixie disappearing. Neither one of us was perfect, but we seemed to be perfect for each other.

“You picked a good one,” Randy said, watching this silent, loving moment transpire between Evan and me. “We’re so happy for you.”

“Thank you,” I said, standing up on my tiptoes so I could kiss his pink cheek. “For everything. I wouldn’t be here without you.”

“Aw, I just gave you a nudge in the right direction. You’re the one who’s done all the work.” He paused, looking pensive. “As a matter of fact, I’ve been thinking—”

“Uh-oh,” I said, fondly.

“No,” he said, laughing. “This is actually one of my better ideas. Now that you’ve got your bachelor’s, I think you should consider getting your doctorate. You already have more than enough undergraduate work credit hours. Someday Lisa’s going to make me retire, and I’m going to want to sell my practice to someone I trust.”

“Are you serious?” I’d been toying with the idea of going back to school to become an actual, accredited veterinary doctor instead of just a trainer and technician, but wasn’t sure if I could handle the intense course work on top of having to work full-time. I also wasn’t sure I could afford the tuition. But now that Evan and I were sharing expenses, it was possible I could make it happen.

“Of course,” Randy said, spinning me around, “I can’t think of anyone better suited for the job.”

We continued to dance then, both of us quiet, as I considered how lucky I was that Myer had chosen me to meet with Randy in the prison’s community room those many years before. Maybe I could learn to be okay without knowing what happened to my girls. I could continue writing them letters, even knowing they would never be read. Brooke and Natalie were the only people missing from this special day, and I couldn’t help but feel an all-too familiar ache in my chest when I thought about them.

But then it struck me that if I hadn’t let go of my children, I might not have the life I had now. I might not have found Evan. Maybe that decision, however heart-wrenching, was meant to be made. To shift the course of my life and put me right here, exactly where I belonged.

After telling her sister about her pregnancy, Brooke left Natalie’s house around nine thirty. Once home, she slept better than she had in weeks, and she couldn’t help but correlate this with the fact that she’d been so honest with her sister about what she was going through. The only real hitch in the evening came from Kyle. From his behavior at dinner, Brooke suspected that he had concerns about inviting her into his family’s life, which bothered her a little, although she was happy that Natalie had chosen a man who wanted to keep her safe. Brooke hoped that with a little time, he’d learn to trust her and she would learn to relax more around him.

The following week, Brooke arrived at her sister’s house again, just before noon on Wednesday, thinking that they would eat and then head out for her appointment, which was at one thirty. She felt better knowing that her sister would be there with her, if only to sit quietly as Brooke listened to whatever the doctor might have to say. But when Natalie answered the door, she wore bright red oven mitts and a red-and-white polka-dot apron covered in flour.

“Did I get the time wrong?” Brooke asked as she took in the rest of Natalie’s appearance—there were smudges of chocolate on her face and in her hair, accompanied by a slightly manic look in her eyes. The air coming from the house was scented with yeast and toasted sugar.

“Not at all,” Natalie said, gesturing for Brooke to enter. “I just screwed up the date on an order I took last month. I thought the party was next Thursday, but it’s actually tonight. Desserts for a hundred. I’m swamped.”

Brooke clutched her purse to her side. “Oh no,” she said. “You should have called me. You don’t have to come with me to the appointment.”

“Of course I’m coming,” Natalie said. “An extra set of hands is exactly what I need.” She grabbed Brooke’s purse and set it on the entry table. “Come on in.”

“You want me to help?” Brooke said, hesitant. “Are you sure?”

“Absolutely,” Natalie said. “Don’t worry. I’ll tell you what to do. And we’ll be out of here in plenty of time to get to the clinic. I made sandwiches, if you want to eat. I’ve been sampling desserts all morning, so I’m already stuffed.”

“I’m okay, too,” Brooke said. She’d eaten a big breakfast, and wasn’t hungry. She followed Natalie into the kitchen, where the counters were cluttered with bowls dripping chocolate batter down their sides, and piles of silver pans in the sink. The stainless-steel baker’s rack against the wall near the back door was stacked with various kinds of miniature pastries—some had spun sugar on the top and others were covered in a shiny and thick chocolate glaze.