by JA Huss
When I get to the corner I almost expect her to be gone, disappeared like a ghost. But she’s still walking. And if the clouds weren’t black with the threat of a storm, she’d look like just another mother out for an afternoon stroll with her baby. I follow, staying back quite a ways, and she goes past a slew of apartment buildings. I jog a little to catch up and she crosses another driveway leading into the one of the large complexes that line one whole side of the street. I’m just about to give up being stealthy when she stops, looks both ways, and crosses Veteran. I keep walking, my eyes glued to her small body as she maneuvers the stroller over the curb and then approaches a gate in the long wrought-iron fence that lines that side of the street.
Oh.
Fuck.
No.
My heart crashes as she turns the handle and pulls the gate open, props it against her hip, and pushes the stroller through.
I want to drop to the ground, that’s how much this hurts me. My chest is one gaping hole right now, and I don’t even know how to process what I’m seeing.
Because Ashleigh just walked into the Los Angeles National Cemetery.
Chapter Thirty-Six
Tony is dead.
Tony is dead.
That’s all I think about as I run back to the Bronco.
Tony is dead.
He didn’t leave her, he fucking died while serving. And she was left overseas in a foreign country, all alone, pregnant, trapped.
My hands are shaking so bad when I get to the truck I can barely push the key in the ignition. The Bronco starts up and I take a breath to calm my racing heart.
Ashleigh. I need to get to her. Now.
I pull out and almost hit a fucking UPS truck. The guy honks and screams something derogatory at me as he passes by.
Calm down, Ford. Fuck. You’re no help to her if you’re dead too.
I follow the same route I did walking, but when I get to the gate it hits me. There’s no way to get in on this side of the cemetery. I have to go all the way down to Wilshire and drive around. I try and look for Ashleigh and the stroller, but I can’t see her and pay attention to the traffic at the same time. The turn lane I need to be in on Wilshire is impossible to get to because the far right lane is also the fucking on-ramp to the 405 and it’s backed up past the street I’m currently on, so it takes me almost ten fucking minutes to make it to the cemetery entrance. I drive in cautiously, trying to decide which way to go. This place is massive—nothing but white headstones. Row after row after row of white headstones.
I decide to hit the gate where she came in and go from there. That’s just straight back from the entrance, so I drive slowly, looking out both sides as I creep along. A large thunderclap jars me for a second and then the bolt of lightning that follows send eerie shadows across the darkening sky. I get to the end of the road and it just curves around in a loop so I stop and get out, then climb on top of the truck and look out over the sea of dead soldiers.
“Fuck, Ash. Where the hell did you go?” The rain starts as the last word leaves my mouth so I jump back in and drive. I go right this time, towards a large palm tree that looks like it’s wearing the wrong uniform in a platoon of eucalyptus and scrub oaks. I follow this road as the rain pelts the roof and I can barely see anything. I slow down some more, take another road off to the left, and search both sides. I’m just about to give up and move to another part of the cemetery when I see her—way off in another section, just heading under some large trees. Another clap of thunder gets my ass in gear and I’m already heading that way when the next bolt of lightning flashes. I lose sight of her for a few seconds as I follow the road, but then the stroller pops into view again.
Ashleigh is nowhere to be found.
I panic. What the hell just happened?
I park the Bronco and jump out, heading over to the stroller at a full run. When I get there I see her, spread out on the ground in front of a headstone, lying completely still, her arms outstretched, like she’s desperately trying to hug the grave. Like she’s desperately trying to hug her dead fiancé who lies under it.
My world stops and all I see, feel, and hear is her pain.
The pelting rain competes with a screaming Kate for attention and the world starts up again.
“Ashleigh?”
She is soaked, I am soaked. Kate—I look over at her and she’s half protected from the stinging drops by the canopy, but she too is soaked.
I kneel down in the grass and touch Ashleigh’s back. “Ash?”
She takes a long gasp and lets out a wail punctuated by the crashing thunder overhead.
My heart is in pieces. I’m shattered into billions of pieces with the sight of her grief.
“Ashleigh, we need to go. It’s raining. The baby—” I look over at Kate and she is in full-on wail mode right now. “I’ll put her in the truck, OK? Stay here. OK?”
I grab the stroller and push. I try to hurry, run even, but the soggy grass is not cooperating and I just make it worse. When I get to the Bronco it takes me a few minutes to figure out how to get the fucking seat to detach from the stroller. Once that’s done I buckle Kate into the backseat and shove the unfolded stroller into the cargo area. I do not have time to decipher that bullshit.
Kate roars her complaints. Her face is turning red from the crying and her little fists are shaking as she protests everything that just happened.
Fuck. I need to get Ash, but Kate—
I look around. I’m conflicted. How bad of a parenting sin is it to leave a baby alone in a vehicle?
The rain is still coming down hard, harder, maybe. I can’t leave Ashleigh out there in the rain. She’s falling to pieces on top of her dead lover. She needs me.
Kate is upset, she’s loud with her crying, she’s turning herself red—and that scares the shit out of me.
But Ashleigh is coming to terms with something life-crushing. Ashleigh is experiencing the worst moment of her life, maybe. I stand there, the rain running down my face, undecided. I’m back on that fucking mountain in Loveland and everyone I know is buried under a sea of white.
I slam the door of the Bronco and the sounds of the wailing baby fade. Kate is safe in the truck. She’s not out in the rain. She’s upset, but she is not hurt.
I turn away and jog back over to Ashleigh. She hasn’t moved and the rainwater is starting to puddle up around her. I kneel down and put my hand on her back. “Ashleigh?”
There is nothing but sobs from her. She is face down in the grass, sopping wet, muddy, and dying of a broken heart. I lie down next to her and push my face into her neck. “Ashleigh, please.”
She turns her head and I almost wish she didn’t. Her eyes are so bloodshot they scare me. Her cheeks are covered in mud and stray pieces of grass, and her hair sticks to her skin. Long strands are wedged between her trembling lips. “I can’t do it, Ford.”
“Can’t do what, Ash?”
“Live without him. I don’t want to live without him.”
Oh. My. Fuck. “Ashleigh—”
“I have so many things I need to say and I can’t say them. There’s nothing here, Ford. I thought I’d feel him here. I thought—” She hiccups and pushes her face back into the grass, then turns back and gasps for air. “But they never even found his body. He was blown up, into tiny little pieces. In some country filled with people who would do it again and never even blink. They blew up my Tony. He was the only one who loved me. The only one. And now I have no one. And he doesn’t even know, Ford. He doesn’t even know I had the baby. He missed it.”
Her pain escapes as a long mourning wail.
And I have no idea what to do.
“I’d do anything, Ford. Anything, if I could just talk to him one more time. Just lie on his chest and have his arms around me one more time so I could tell him all these things he needs to know. Why can’t we get one last moment? Why can’t I have one last moment with him? I don’t understand this. I don’t understand why I had to lose him. I just need a moment. Just one
moment.”
I stare at her as my mind races with possibilities, solutions to this problem I know I can solve. I have all the answers, that’s what Dallas told Ash that night. I’m the guy with the answers and she needs me.
I lie down in the grass next to her. “Come here.” I grab her upper arms and she’s like a rag doll, limp. Dead weight. Empty. I pull her on top of me and wrap my arms around her, her sobs rocking against my chest. “Tell me, Ashleigh. Tell me all those things you need him to know. I’ll make sure he gets the message.”
Her crying stops abruptly and she lifts her head to look me in the eyes. Snot is running out of her nose and she sniffs. “Did he send you, Ford? Did he send you to save me?”
I break again. All this time she was asking if her dead lover sent me to help her.
All I can do is stare and nod. Her dark eyes are filled with sadness. But for a fraction of a second there’s hope there too. Hope that I can give her what she needs. I clear my throat and find my voice. “Yes, Ashleigh. He sent me.”
She drops her forehead to my chest and cries again, but this time it has a feeling of relief. “I knew it. I knew it. I knew the moment you asked me to come in your hotel room. I knew he was there that night, looking over me. Trying desperately to stop me from making a big mistake. And he couldn’t contact me himself, so he sent you. He sent you, Ford.”
“Tell me what you need him to know, Ash. He can hear you. Tell me everything you need him to know.”
“I have so much to say, Tony. I had so much trouble with the baby before she was born. I got sick at school and they took me to the hospital and wouldn’t let me go home. I missed your last call. They kept me there, in that stupid little hospital. And then Kate was sick when she was born and they kept me even longer. I didn’t even know you were dead. I didn’t even know you were dead. I went home and I played my messages on the machine and your last call came on and you talked about happy things. Our holiday time we were planning. You said I was probably out shopping for Kate spending all kinds of money. And it made all that crap they put me through with the birth worth it. And then… and then… the message ended and there were so many more messages. All hangups. Until I got to the last message. It was a buddy of yours saying they didn’t know how to find me and I needed to call them right away…”
She cries. She sobs. She loses it, just completely fucking loses it. And I let her.
What the fuck must that feel like?
I can’t even imagine. With all those hormones still in her system. All alone in a foreign country.
“I tried to come sooner,” Ash says, a little bit calmer now. “But I never got the paperwork done for the birth certificate and passport. I couldn’t even come home to see you. I had to call my sister and beg her to help me. Get Kate a passport. And I missed—”
She sobs again.
“I missed the funeral because no one knew where I was. And I called your parents and they—”
“They what? They what, Ashleigh?” This I need to know, because just what the fuck? What the fuck is wrong with these people?
“They refused to talk to me. They sent me a letter with twenty thousand dollars and said that’s all I was getting.” She huffs out a laugh and yells, “I’m Damian Li’s fucking daughter!” She lets out a sob and finishes less angry and more broken. “And they tried to buy me off with twenty thousand dollars.” She takes a minute to inhale a few hitched breathes, then calms herself back down. “And I had to cash it, Tony, I’m so, so sorry for cashing that check. But I needed to see you. I just wanted to say goodbye, that’s all.”
She takes one long deep breath and whispers, “I needed to come talk to you. I’m sorry I took that money.”
We lie there in the rain. Silent for several minutes. I know we should get up and go check on Kate, but I can’t. I refuse to deny Ash this last moment. She needs to come to terms with reality in her own time, in her own way. I refuse to rush her.
“I love you.”
“I love you too, Ashleigh.” The words come out automatically, before I realize she’s not talking to me, she’s talking to Tony.
I’ve never said those words out loud to anyone. Ever. In my entire life. Not even my parents.
“I miss you so much.”
“I’m right here, Ashleigh.”
She breathes erratically for a moment and then settles down again. “I know, Ford. I know it’s you. I’m not crazy.”
I drag the hair away from her face and tuck the wet strands behind her ear. The rain is letting up now. We’ve managed to spend the entire storm lying on the grass in a cemetery. “Would you like to come home with me?”
She nods and holds in a sob. “Yes, please.”
“Do you have anything else to say? Before we go?”
She lifts her head up from my chest. Her sobs are soft now. Just remnants. She leans in and kisses me. First on one cheek, then on the other. And then she stops and cups her hands around my face. “Just… thank you. For believing in me and bringing me here, and helping me say goodbye.” She starts to cry again, her lower lip trembling so bad she has to bite it to try and maintain control. “I’m never gonna get over this pain, Ford. Ever. No one understands how special he was to me. No one understands that he was holding me together, all these years, since we were just kids. He always saw me, you know? He saw me when no one else did. And when I heard that message on the machine…”
She can’t finish.
And I’m not sure I want her to finish. I’m not sure I can handle the image of Ashleigh losing her mind, still hurting from childbirth, a new baby to take care of, and no friends or family there to help. It rips me apart to even start picturing this scene.
So I picture her happy instead. I stare at her swollen eyes and mud-stained face and picture her happy and fulfilled.
I sit up but I clutch her close to my chest, then stand and cradle her against me, like I’d carry Kate.
She hugs me tight and rests her head on my shoulder. She is so small. When I get to the Bronco I open the backseat and set her down on the bench. Kate has cried herself to sleep but her breathing is hitched from her hysterical wailing. Ashleigh rests her head against the baby and I buckle her in, then close the door and take a deep breath as I look around.
She was right. There is no way to fix this. That life she had is over and this is where it ends.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
I take the streets to get home. The 405 is a fucking parking lot from the rain. I cut up to Sunset, then catch Beverly Glen up to Bel Air. It takes us almost an hour to get there, but when I pull up to the gate all I feel is relief. I am so glad to be home.
I punch in the gate code and we climb the long and winding driveway up to the house. I park in the driveway and sit still for a moment, then look over my shoulder. The girls are sleeping, but they are both wrecked.
I have no idea what to do.
Obviously I need to get them both inside, but then what? Ashleigh left almost everything at the hotel. We need stuff. I pull out my phone and text Pam: I need my spare room turned into a nursery. Like now.
She doesn’t text back, so I can only assume she’s on it.
I drag myself out of the Bronco and open the back door. Ash is slumped down on the seat, all curled up in a little ball like a kitten. I pick her up and carry her to the front door, key in the access code, and walk all the way to the back bedroom. “Ashleigh, wake up for me, please.”
“I’m awake, Ford. I just don’t want you to put me down.”
I take her into the bathroom and set her on the counter. “Sit here, OK?” I plug up the bath tub and start the water. “I’ll be right back, gotta get Kate.”
Ashleigh starts crying again, but I think it’s because she might’ve just realized she forgot all about Kate in her grief. I go back outside, grab the car seat and bring her to the bathroom.
Ash is still sitting on the counter, her head bowed in defeat, her long hair falling over her face, hiding her. I set Kate down and go back to
Ashleigh. It’s not easy taking care of two people at the same time. “Lift your arms up Ash.”
She obeys, but her head stayed bowed.
I pull her shirt up and over, then toss it into the corner. “Stand up, please.” She scoots her butt off the counter and her feet drop to the floor. Her legs give out for a moment and I have to reach out and steady her. My hands drift down and unbutton her jeans. They are loose, so they come off easy. “Get in the tub for me.” I hold her arm as she steps in and then I help her keep her balance as she lowers herself into the water. I grab some shampoo and squeeze a shitload of it under the running water. The bubbles froth up and fill in the space around her body, cocooning her in fluff.
Kate is still asleep, so that’s how she will stay for now. There is no good reason to wake her up. So I pull off my shirt and drop my pants. I mess with the switches on the wall and the jets come on, swirling the bubbles up into a frenzy. I pull Ash forward and step into the tub behind her, then wrap my arms around her shoulders and pull her into my chest. “Relax now. We’re just gonna relax for now.”
She sighs. But it’s such a bad, no-good sigh. It’s not even an I give up sigh, it’s a please kill me now sigh. I gently drag my fingertips up and down her arms and then lean into her neck. “I’m so sorry, Ashleigh. I’m so sorry this is happening to you.” She turns a little so she can tuck her face onto my shoulder and her arms slip around my waist.
And we stop.
We just sit.
Pam comes. Or someone comes. I can hear them, trying to be quiet as they deliver things for Kate in the other room. It takes a while, and I have to add more hot water to the tub twice before the knock on the bedroom door startles Ashleigh from her sleep.
“You’re all set, sir,” Pam calls out in a whisper-yell.
I don’t answer, but she’s used to that and then everything goes silent.
