Saved (A Standalone Romance) (A Savery Brother Book)

by Naomi Niles

  “Win you something? What would you like?”

  “Well, I’ve always wanted one of those big, giant teddy bears. The ones that are almost too big to carry on your own.”

  “Oh. I can buy you one of those.”

  She nudged me in the side. “Harrison, that’s not the same. I want you to win one just like in the movies where the guy wins something like that for his girlfriend.” She tugged on my arm until I came to a stop. “Like, right there. Perfect. See how things work out in the end?” That is exactly what I had hoped would happen between us. She pointed through the crowd. I saw a line of large, stuffed teddy bears sitting on the floor against the wall inside of a booth. The game was basketball.

  “I don’t know about that one,” I said. I wanted her to believe that I was no good at the sport, but in reality, I was an all-city high school basketball player. I would have gone to college for that reason alone, but when Sarah’s mom got pregnant, all of those dreams came crashing down. “That game might be too tough. How about another?”

  She pulled my arm. “No, this one. Now, the Harrison I know would never back down from a challenge.” I reluctantly followed her to the basketball booth. The man behind the counter bounced the ball between his legs and behind his back while he looked in my direction. It came off as a challenge. “Sir? Can he have a ball, please?”

  The man bounced the ball as he walked towards the counter, then propped it on the table. “Sure thing. The price is $2 per ball. You make one, you get one of those prizes,” he said, pointing to the small bears. “If you make two, you get one of those,” then he pointed the medium sized bear. Finally, he pointed to the large bears on the ground. “And if you make three, then that big one is yours.”

  I looked at Caroline as she stood to the side. A line had begun to form behind us. I hadn’t felt any pressure like this since I was on the basketball court ages ago. I took a $10 bill out of my pocket. “So,” I said to the guy, “what do I get if I make five in a row?”

  He took the $10 bill and chuckled. “I’m not sure, but I think we can work something out. But, as long as I’ve been here today, I haven’t seen anybody make five in a row. So, if you think you can do it,” he looked at the large bears, “I will give you two of those. But, if you don’t make at least four, then you don’t get anything. Deal?”

  Caroline shook her head no as a smile escaped my lips. “Deal.” Caroline laughed as I grabbed the ball and took a few bounces. “Oh, this is funny?”

  “Well, I guess we can just buy the bear,” she said with a smile on her face.

  “Oh, ye of little faith.” I took a few more bounces, then sent the ball traveling towards the basket. It bounced off the side of the rim, then hit the backboard and fell to the ground.

  “That’s alright,” the guy behind the counter said, “four more tries. It’s possible, but we will see if you got it in you.” I narrowed my eyes at him as he handed me another ball. I heard the crowd chatter behind us as I bounced the ball on the ground. The dust fluttered into the air as the ball made contact with the dirt. I spun the ball in my hands, then lifted it to shoot my next shot. Swish! The man grabbed the ball, “Alright, alright. Nice shot. Let’s see if you can do that three more times.”

  I grabbed the ball, then sank the shot again, and again, and again. Caroline stood beside me with her eyes wide open, surprised that I effortlessly made the shots. A few of the young kids behind me slapped me five as the man behind the counter asked which bears I wanted. Caroline answered, “The pink one and the blue one.” As he handed us the bears, I realized that even though I’d won, I’d still lost because I was the person who was going to have to lug these big ass bears around the festival until we left. We ended up dropping them off in my truck before the day was over.

  We spent our time walking with my arm around her shoulder like we were in high school again. We shared drinks, meals, and everything else while we were there. I couldn’t count the number of times we stopped to kiss as we walked through the festival. They were tiny pecks of affection in the midst of the lights and business of the event. She had even convinced me to get on the Ferris wheel. It was hard to believe that a man like me was afraid of heights, especially since I had spent so much time extended in the air while working on building construction. I felt I was at home when those moments came, but without my equipment, I was like a fish out of water.

  “Wait, Caroline, don’t rock it too hard! We might tip over.”

  She laughed, “Harrison, we will not tip over! Just enjoy the ride, Mr. Scaredy Pants!”

  I held her tighter both because I wanted to and because I was scared out of my mind. The day went by in the blink of an eye, and I couldn’t believe how much I enjoyed myself with her. In the beginning, she was somebody who was there to help me through Sarah’s death, but eventually, she turned into a lover and a friend. I knew I had to keep her here with me. The only problem was how to go about doing it without proposing to her.

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Caroline

  I woke up the next morning in Harrison’s bed. The two stuffed bears that he’d won yesterday sat on the floor against the wall. I reached my hand out for him, but he was nowhere near me. I turned over in the bed and reminisced about yesterday. Before long, I started to tear up because I knew that this would all come to an end sooner than I wanted it to. The way he reacted when I sort of brought up being married is what made me believe that he wasn’t ready to settle down. I knew he had strong feelings for me. That was obvious, but that didn’t necessarily mean that it would translate into an engagement. Even though I wasn’t asleep, this relationship slowly started to feel like a dream.

  I removed the covers then headed to his bathroom to clean myself up. I didn’t know what we had planned to do today, but a part of me wanted to go home. I didn’t want to continue getting further attached to him, not knowing how things would end. The thought alone sent a jolting pain through my body, but I stopped the tears before they had a chance to fall. I imagined Sarah sitting on the bed when I came out of the bathroom. Her voice was still poignant in my mind.

  “Caroline? Just ask him.”

  “Ask him what?”

  “Ask him if he wants to marry you.”

  “I am not proposing to your father.”

  She laughed, then put her hand over her head. “Nobody is asking you to propose to him. Ask him how he feels about marriage. You know that he had a fear of commitment and that was all because of my mother. I think you should just bring up the topic and see what he says. No pressure behind it, you know?”

  “There will be. I indirectly brought the topic up a little while ago, and he looked at me like I shouldn’t have said that.” I sat down on the bed next to my mind’s imagination. “Who knows what will happen if I actually say the word, ‘marriage.’”

  “Right. Who knows? You can’t just go around thinking for everyone else. Let my dad think for himself, and then you will hear how he feels about it. Don’t assume, though, because you know what that makes, right? That makes you an asshole.”

  I laughed. “Sarah, that is not how that saying goes.”

  “I know. I just wanted to call you an asshole for old times’ sake. Now, go talk to him. Please?”

  I huffed. “Alright.”

  Just then, the mirage vanished. I took a deep breath, then headed into the kitchen. I could smell bacon before I made it into the room. Harrison stood by the stove, in a housecoat, dodging grease that popped out of the skillet. He didn’t even notice that I was standing 10 feet away from him. I nervously tapped my foot against the ground, tempted to turn around and go right back upstairs. If it wasn’t for Sarah’s image standing just a few feet away from me, I would have left. Instead, I took a deep breath and walked closer to him, wrapping my arms around him from behind.

  “Be careful, honey; I don’t want you to get popped by this grease. I’ve already gotten hit a few times.” I placed my head on his shoulder blades, oblivious to the small sound of popping grease
in front of me. It took him a few moments before I completely grabbed his attention. He turned off the eye on the stove, then spun around to face me. “Honey? Something wrong?”

  “I was just thinking about some things while I was in the other room.”

  “Oh? Things like what?” I took a deep breath, hesitant to go forward. I didn’t want to send us into a tailspin, but I needed clarification as to where we stood with each other. The thought was not going to leave me alone until I was at peace with it. I grabbed him by the hand and gently pulled him to the kitchen table where we could both have a seat. The sunlight peeked through the kitchen window as I looked into his eyes. “Baby? What is it? You are starting to worry me.”

  “You know that I am supposed to leave in a few more months, right?”

  He leaned back in his chair. His housecoat was halfway open down the middle of his chest. I tried to avoid looking at it because I knew it would distract me from what I needed to say. “Yes,” he responded, “I am well aware.”

  “I, um. I love my job, and I love you, but I’m not sure I can just stay here in Cottonwood for the rest of my life. I mean, things have been good so far, but my desire was to move out there, you know? I mean, there is something that could keep me around. Something permanent. But, I just don’t want to stay here not knowing what will happen…”

  “What will happen?”

  He waited for me to continue with what I had to say, but I found it hard to put the words together. No matter how I said it, it was going to come off as me rushing him or being pushy. That wasn’t the case, though. I just wanted clarity. “Nothing,” I said, finally. “Nothing. Just forget I mentioned it, OK?” I stood up, but he grabbed my arm and kept me from getting away.

  “Caroline, I believe I know where this is going. Listen, I love you, OK? I love you a lot, and I’ve never felt this way about any woman before now. You mean more to me than what you think, and trust me, I wouldn’t lead you down a dark road without any hope that things would get brighter at the end. That is not my intention with you, but, I am asking you to trust me.”

  “Trust you?” I sighed and walked out of his grasp. “I mean, a lot of women have trusted men in the past, but it didn’t end well for them. They put their trust in them just to get burned. I don’t want that to happen. I don’t want to sacrifice something and end up regretting it.”

  “Caroline, please listen to me, OK? You can’t keep comparing our relationship to others. Our relationship is clearly not like any other relationship out there. The grounds under which we met. The backlash we received because we joined together. I mean, the list can go on, but we are here. Our unique bond still remains intact. I know it may be hard for you to trust, but it is hard for me as well. The one woman that I loved, before you, left me. She left me when I thought she would always be there. She left me at the hardest time in my life, so yes, there is still a little bit of fear there for me.”

  He pulled me closer to him. “But I am learning to let things go like you advised me. I’m learning to live and just forget that things like that happened so I can enjoy my life fully. That is what I am focusing on right now. That is my goal.” Just then, the oven beeped. He left my side, then grabbed an oven glove so he could pull something out. The biscuits were golden brown on top when he placed them on the counter. He cut a slice of butter and slid it over them until it melted. I wanted this life so bad, but I didn’t want it temporarily, and sadly, that wasn’t going to be enough for me to stick around further than I had to.

  I had already begun looking for apartments and homes in California just in case I had to move. I remember crying as I flipped through websites and made phone calls. My heart was there with Harrison, but I just didn’t believe that he felt the same way. Maybe I was rushing it a little bit. Maybe I was just too anxious because I finally found the man of my dreams, but he was moving too slow for my comfort. I don’t know what the answer was, but right now, I needed to know. I needed to know, but he kept his lips locked together. “Now,” he said, “I think we should dig into this food. The bacon has been sitting out for a little while, and I don’t want it to get cold.”

  “Alright, Harrison.”

  I took a seat at the table and waited for him to pile the food onto my plate. It felt like we were coming to an end, but if he wanted me to trust him, I could give him that. I could give him all the trust he needed until it was time for me to move to California and when I moved, I knew I wasn’t going to look back. There would just be a big “what if?” in the back of my mind and that alone was more painful than anything else.

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Harrison

  I tossed and turned all night with Caroline in the bed next to me. A few times, she had asked me if I was OK. I told her I was fine, but in reality, I was worried about our future. The closer I came to popping the question, the more my nerves shot through my body like fireworks. I never imagined that I would be in this situation. I felt like I would be single for the rest of my life, messing around with random women until the day I was buried. Caroline changed all of that though. She touched a place in my heart that I believed was unreachable. She wanted more from me, and I wanted to give her more, but there was something that held on to my words and kept me from moving forward.

  As the clock shifted past 7 am, I snuck out of bed and went downstairs with my phone in my hand. I turned on the coffee machine and pulled a mug from the cabinet. As I waited for the coffee to brew, I scrolled through my voicemail until I landed on the final message. I pressed play. “Dad, you’re going to find love one day, and it is going to be amazing. But, you have to just accept it. You can’t walk away from it, and you can’t think that every woman is going to leave you like mom did, because then you will force everyone away from you. Give love a chance. I don’t know, but I am just feeling lovey-dovey right now, and you didn’t answer your phone. Again. Anyways, I am going to head to this party. I love you, Dad, and you be safe tonight.”

  I wiped tears from my eyes as the voicemail ended. That was the last message she left me: on the night she died. I wanted to take my phone and launch it into the wall, but I settled down before I got to that point. Just then, the coffee machine beeped, snapping me out of my moment of rage like fingers of a hypnotist. I knew that I had to find someone to help me out of this train of thought. I pulled up Brian’s number and gave him a call.

  “Boss? This early? On a Sunday? Something must be wrong.”

  “Yeah, kind of.” I looked towards the hallway to make sure that Caroline didn’t climb out of bed and make her way towards me. “Hold on a sec, buddy.” I moved the conversation to the wooden deck on my back porch. I didn’t spend much time out here because of the memories I had with Sarah. The times we would sit on the chairs talking about everything under the sun. It was too much for me to bear, so I tried to avoid it. But ever since I started accepting her death earlier this week, it was a little easier for me to come out here and relax.

  I took a seat on one of the lawn chairs. “It is about Caroline. Now, you know how I feel about her, Brian. You know that I care for her and I love her a lot. She is supposed to move to California in a few months, and I don’t want her to move, but the only way that I think she will stay is if I propose to her. She wants some kind of guarantee that if she stays, we will get married. I get it, though. I mean, who wants to just stay in Cottonwood unless you are further along in life? She is still young. A lot of life to live.”

  He sighed. “Yeah, I had a feeling that something like this was coming. Do you want to marry her?”

  “Yes, I do. I know I do, I just – I mean, it is the unknown that makes me a little apprehensive about everything.” I looked behind me to make sure she wasn’t standing near the glass door. “I don’t want her to leave me. That’s it. I don’t want to put my all in this just so she can realize that she doesn’t want anything to do with me anymore.”

  “You can’t think like that, boss. You can’t. You’re going to ruin everything. Look, I don’t know Ca
roline personally, but I can tell that she loves you. She looks at you the same way my wife used to look at me when we first got together. I know the difference. She is in it for the long run, and the best thing about it all is that she knows you have been hurt. She knows where you are weak–”

  “And that scares me, too. How do I know that she won’t use that against me?”

  “Really, boss? Really? You think Caroline will use your pain against you? That woman has done nothing but try to take away your pain ever since you two got together. It is clear that her motive is to make things easier on you and nothing else. It is crazy for you to think anything else about her. She loves you, boss. She loves you dearly, and if you feel the same way about her, then go for it. Now, marriage is nothing to joke around with, and I am sure you know that. But, just be wise about the situation. Don’t propose if you truly feel she is not the one for you, but if she is, you better make it known because I don’t think she will stick around for anything less than, ‘will you marry me?’”

  I took a deep breath as the warm sun beat softly against my flesh. He was right. I had to make a choice before the woman I loved decided to walk out of my life. “Thanks, Brian. I appreciate you being here for me.”

  “Anytime, boss. I thought it was something else, though. Thank God.”

  “Yeah. Well, I guess I will see you tomorrow.”

  “Alright, boss. See you then.”

  I sat outside, enjoying the sunshine as the thin white clouds were pushed across the sky by the gentle breeze. I propped my feet up on the table in front of me and tapped the side of my mug with my fingertips. The porcelain was warm to the touch. Just then, I heard a knock on the glass behind me. When I turned around, Caroline stood behind the glass in long white T-shirt. I smiled, and with that, she opened the door and made her way outside. She kissed me on the lips, then took a seat beside me on the deck. “Up early,” she said as she folded her legs up on the seat.