by Dianne Drake
It seemed like she’d been sleeping for ever when a knock at the door awoke her. Turning over to look at her clock, Joanna discovered it was only ten. Only two lousy hours of sleep and now someone was intruding on the rest she had coming to her.
Slipping into her bunny slippers, the blue pair she kept there, Joanna plodded to the front door, ready to give someone a good piece of her mind, and peeked through the peephole. It took several seconds for that face to register as she didn’t expect to find him standing there. Once she did realize it was Chay, she opened the door.
He was grinning.
She wasn’t.
“Did I catch you in the middle of something?” he asked, stepping in, dropping his overnight bag on the floor just inside the door.
“Other than a good night’s sleep, no.” She wasn’t ready for this. Didn’t want to face him, didn’t want to ask him the question that needed to be asked. Didn’t even want to resume what she was sure he’d assume they would resume now they were together again. “You didn’t tell me you were coming.” Not that it mattered any more.
“I wasn’t sure until I found someone to take call for me for the next three or four days.”
“Three or four days?”
He nodded. “That’s all I have right now. My mother called and asked if I could get some things arranged at the house for her for when my father goes home.”
“So you’ve come home to help your mother.” Even to her ears, her words were flat, unenthusiastic. No, she didn’t begrudge Wenona her time with Chay, but over these past six weeks, when Joanna had asked him if he was coming home, he’d put her off. Get over it, Joanna. You’re not enough of a draw to get him here. That’s the fact, now let it go. It had just been sex, and that was all she was to him.
It was finally beginning to sink in. Hard. “Look, I’ve got to go back to Rising Sun early. My bed’s not big, so you can take the couch.”
Chay pulled Joanna into his arms, placed a soft kiss on her lips and in spite of her best efforts to shrug it off, she shivered anyway. Shivered from the top of her head to the tips of her toes. Damn it, anyway! Why did he still have that kind of an effect on her even after she knew what she meant to him? Even when she tried so hard to fight it? “Or you can have the bed and I’ll take the couch.”
“A bed for one can be fun for cuddling,” he said.
“Except when one of the cuddlers has flu.” She pulled out of his arms. “I really need some sleep, Chay. We’ll talk in the morning.” Even though there would be nothing to say.
“Can I fix you anything?” His voice was so full of sympathy her heart started to break all over again. She’d only just started getting through the days without so much pain, and suddenly it was all coming back—the empty feeling, that sense of a vague hopelessness that nothing would ever be quite right in her life again. Just these last few days she’d been able to go for brief periods of time without thinking about him. But now…
Joanna shook her head as she and her bunnies shuffled back to the bedroom. Behind her closed door, she kicked off her bunnies, slid to the floor, and wept.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
“LOOKS good,” Chay said to Lawrence White Eagle, who was heading the reconstruction effort at the Ducheneaux home. Front steps gone, a ramp had been built instead. Handrails in the bathroom. A shower stall instead of a tub. All for a father who wouldn’t acknowledge him, but Chay didn’t bother with that. This would make his mother’s life easier, and hiring the White Eagle men to make the renovations was the least he could do for her. If he could have hired a private nurse, he would have done that, too, but there were none available in that part of Montana. None who wanted to come to the emptiness of the Big Open.
“We’ll go into Billings and get that lift chair for Leonard this afternoon,” Lawrence said, “and that should just about do it. When he gets home, though, if there are any other changes he needs, just let me know and we’ll take care of it.”
“Would you mind making his office at the ranch accessible when you have the time?” Chay didn’t know for sure if his dad would be able to return to work, but if there was any way Leonard could manage, Chay figured he would. “Same kind of changes you’ve made here. Ramps instead of steps, grab bars, whatever else you think is necessary.”
“You’re a good son,” Lawrence said.
“Yeah, real good,” Chay muttered, glancing across the front porch at Joanna, who was trying to calm down both Wenona and Macawi. They’d both wanted to ride from Billings to Rising Sun with Leonard, but the private hire ambulance company wouldn’t allow it. So both women had spent the morning fretting and fussing, and now that the ambulance was fifteen minutes overdue they were nearly inconsolable, and the last thing anybody needed in the middle of all that were the bad feelings between him and his father. It would be a better transition for his dad, not having him there.
“Look, I’m going back to Macawi’s now,” he called to them. Instead of staying with Joanna, he’d been sleeping on his grandmother’s couch these past couple of nights. No explanation other than Joanna was still recuperating from her bout of flu. Admittedly, he was disappointed. He’d hoped this trip would have turned out differently for the two of them, but she’d been pretty distant. In fact, if he hadn’t known better, he might have thought she was trying to avoid him.
Hell, maybe she was. Certainly, over the weeks he hadn’t given her any indication that their situation was other than it was—long distance. “Damn,” he muttered, heading to his rental car. A father who snubbed him, now the woman he loved who avoided him. Could he make an even bigger mess of things?
“Will you wait?” Joanna called. “We might need you to help get your dad settled in.”
Before he had a chance to answer, Chay saw the dust cloud kicking up down the road and knew that somewhere within it was an ambulance bringing his father home. Sure, he’d stay and take whatever his father handed him today. He was used to it.
Several minutes later Leonard Ducheneaux emerged from the ambulance, and with help from Wenona on one side of him and Joanna on the other walked up the ramp, right on by Chay without saying a word, and on into his house. Then he sat himself down in the same recliner in which he’d sat for the last twenty years, put his feet up and asked to see the latest edition of Will Two Crows’ newspaper. It was like he’d never been sick, never left his home. This was simply another day in the life of Leonard Ducheneaux.
Another stubborn day like all the rest. Some things never changed, Chay thought as he handed the paper to his father.
“Thank you, Chayton,” Leonard said.
Chay blinked in surprise, staring down at his father, who simply opened the paper, picked up his reading glasses from the table next to his chair, and began to read. “You’re welcome, Dad,” he replied.
He was wrong. Some things did change, and as he looked over at Joanna brushing her tears away with the back of her hand he smiled. Change was better than he’d ever expected it to be. And for the first time in eighteen years he knew he desperately needed it in his life—that change to permanence he’d never wanted before.
“I had them put extra pepperoni on it,” Chay said, sliding the plate with an extra-large piece of pizza on it across the table to Joanna.
She slid it back at him. Her stomach was fine now, but the last thing she needed was something to upset it again. Tomorrow, first thing in the morning, she was off to Steele to take a look at Michael Red Elk’s progress. He was coming along nicely, following all the rules she’d laid out and exercising. Then she had to drop in on Billy Begay in Flatrock to see how he was doing, managing his diabetes. It was tough going for a kid, but overall he was handling it pretty well. Much better than his dad, actually. So maybe the kid could be a good example for his father. Joanna could only hope.
“Sorry, but no pizza for me,” she said, sliding back her chair and preparing to stand. “I’m still eating bland.” Chay was going home tomorrow. He’d already mentioned that, so there was no wondering ab
out it this time. And in a way she was grateful for the flu, because she’d been able to keep him at an arm’s length because of it. “Look, I need to get up early—”
“I don’t blame you,” he interrupted.
“For what?”
“For avoiding me. But you’ve got to know, Joanna, that this isn’t easy for me either. Coming home, seeing you…”
“Look, we had fun. We worked well together, we played well together. I knew from the start what it was, and I’m not complaining. And I wanted it as much as you did, Chay, so—”
“I love you,” he said. “And damn it, Joanna, it’s been killing me, being separated from you.”
This was the moment she should have flown into his arms and confessed her love for him, too. But hearing the words she’d wanted to hear from him for so long hurt more than anything ever had before. Even more than the morning they’d made love for the last time and he’d said goodbye. She thought about their separate lives for a moment, and about Kimi, who desperately needed something other than separation. Maybe Chay turning his back on Kimi was what hurt Joanna the most, because she’d truly believed for a while that Chay was everything she wanted. But he couldn’t be, not if he didn’t honor his obligations. And while she might not be numbered among those obligations, Kimi certainly was.
“I love you, too, Chay,” she admitted, almost sadly. Because she did, with all her heart. “But that’s not enough.”
Standing, she spun around to retreat to the sanctity of her curtained-off bedroom and nearly fell she was so light-headed. “Oh, my,” she said, grabbing hold of the corner of the kitchenette table. “Maybe I should have eaten some pizza after all.” Suddenly Joanna’s knees started to buckle under her and she pitched forward, but before she hit the floor Chay jumped up from his chair, scooped her up into his arms and whisked her to the bed. “I really need a day off,” she said, leaning her head against his chest.
The last thing she heard was the steady, comforting beat of his heart.
“Her blood pressure’s a little low, but other than that her vital signs are fine.” Chay tossed his stethoscope over on the table next to the bed and took hold of Joanna’s wrist to check her pulse for the tenth time in an hour. Normal, as always. “She’s dehydrated, and I’m guessing she hasn’t eaten much for a few days.”
Macawi patted him on the shoulder as she scurried into the kitchenette. “She’s overworked. Maybe you should take her away someplace nice for a vacation.”
“She gave me the brush-off just before she fainted.” He flinched, thinking about it. Hearing that she loved him, then hearing that it wasn’t enough. He would have asked her why but she’d chosen that particular moment to black out. Now, almost an hour later, she was intermittently sleeping, occasionally waking, but mostly sleeping. “And, believe me, if I thought Joanna would go, I’d take her.”
Macawi put the kettle of water on to boil for hot tea, then spun around to her grandson. “So why wouldn’t she go with you? What did you do to her?”
“You’re blaming this on me?”
“Someone needs to take the blame. You love the girl, she loves you. The rest of it shouldn’t be so difficult.”
“Except that she won’t come to Chicago. Which makes it real damn difficult.”
A sly grin crossed over Macawi’s face, followed by that devilish glint in her eyes. Chay knew he was about to get everything she had, and he had a hunch what it was going to be—something he’d been considering almost since the moment he’d left here weeks ago. “OK, beautiful, let me have it.”
“It’s simple. You stay.” She took two tea bags out of Joanna’s tin and dropped them into two mugs. “She stays, you love her, so you stay, too. That way she won’t be passing out from exhaustion because there’ll be someone here to help her.”
Chay pulled a squeeze bottle of generic honey out of Joanna’s cabinet and handed it to his grandmother. He couldn’t remember how many times they’d had these serious talks over hot tea with honey. And he couldn’t remember the last time they’d had one. “I’ve been thinking about it.”
“And thinking gets you where, Chayton? Sometimes it’s good to act with your heart, not your head.”
He glanced over at Joanna, who was thrashing around in the bed. Such a restless sleep when she needed peace. “Believe me, I have been thinking with my heart. I’m worried about her, Macawi,” he said, taking the cup of tea his grandmother handed him.
“And you should be, a woman all alone such as she is. You have a choice to make now, Chayton, and this time it has to be the final choice. No going back once it’s done. You owe Joanna that much.”
He owed Joanna that much. Truer words had never been spoken.
An hour later, sitting on the front step of the clinic, looking up and down the deserted road running though Rising Sun, he wondered if he could make it here. He wasn’t the kid who’d never seen the world now. Wasn’t the kid with no expectations other than where to get his next dime for his next cherry cola. He’d gone a long way away from here, and it was going to be a long way getting back. “Joanna,” he murmured. And a long, miserable life without her if he didn’t come back.
But even with Joanna, could he make it?
He sure as hell wanted to. He wanted to come back to Rising Sun much more than he’d wanted to leave. But it scared him. So many dreams had come full circle, leading him right back to the beginning. It scared him, but leaving here again scared him even more because, as much as he questioned his ability to make it here, he knew he couldn’t make it anywhere without Joanna.
Sighing, Chay watched the lights from a single vehicle make their way slowly up the road. “Turn around,” he said quietly. “There’s nothing here for you.” But the vehicle kept coming anyway, persistent devil that it was. Someone had a mission that wasn’t to be thwarted. Like Joanna.
Joanna…God, he loved her. And even though she was just upstairs, he missed her like crazy.
The intrepid vehicle stopped in the roadway across from Chay, and it wasn’t until he heard the familiar rusty creak of its door that he looked up and saw his mother climb out. “Come to commiserate?” he called, standing to greet her, shocked to see that his mother had been the one driving.
“I came to bring your father.”
“My…”
“He said he wanted to see you. That he had to see you.” Wenona scooted around to the passenger’s door and opened it. By the time Leonard had dropped both feet onto the ground, Chay was there, holding on to his arm for support.
“Why?” Chay asked.
Leonard didn’t answer. Instead, he headed into Joanna’s clinic, leaving Chay with no other choice but to help him across the road and inside.
Once there, Leonard sat down in the waiting room, then went dead quiet.
“Did he tell you what this is about?” Chay whispered to his mother.
“He told me that he had to come here. That I was to drive him.”
“But you can’t drive. Why didn’t you call me?”
“I can drive, Chay. I’ve always been able to drive. I’ve just never had a reason until tonight.”
He chuckled. Joanna had been right. It was all about choices. His mother’s choice, Joanna’s choice, and now his choice. And, like his mother’s, his choice did have a reason. “And you didn’t ask him why he wanted to come?”
Wenona shook her head. “I’m going to go sit with Joanna for a while. You stay here with your father.”
Wenona was barely up the stairs when Leonard looked up at Chay. “She bears you a child,” he said. “With great difficulty.”
“Who…? What?”
“Dr Killian bears you a son. But she needs help other than that which your medicine can give her.”
Chay shook his head, unable to get past the first part of his father’s pronouncement. “What do you mean, Joanna bears me a child?”
“You’re the doctor, Chayton. Figure it out.”
“When did she tell you?”
“She d
idn’t.”
“So you’re what? Guessing?”
“Not guessing. I don’t have to guess. I know.”
“Oh, that’s right. You’re the shaman. You know these things.”
“You’re the shaman. If you were to look deep enough inside, you would know the things you need to know.”
“So why didn’t she tell me? She’s been saying it’s flu.”
Leonard let out a deep sigh. “Because she believes it to be flu. It will be for you to tell her otherwise. Now, please, tell your mother to take me home.”
Chay headed to the stairs, too numb to even comprehend the fact that his father knew Joanna was pregnant when Joanna didn’t know that herself. “You said something about help that my medicine can’t give her. I don’t understand. What’s that supposed to mean?”
“She suffers a deep brooding.” Leonard didn’t explain, didn’t say another word. But after he was gone, and as Chay watched Joanna toss and turn in bed, he understood. Besides her exhaustion, Joanna was in emotional turmoil. She called his name over and over in her turbulent sleep, then rebuked him as he took her hand to comfort her.
“Joanna, what have I done to you?” he asked, trying to get a little orange juice down her the next morning.
“I’m just so tired,” she said, shoving it away. “A little more sleep and I’ll be fine.”
“You need to eat, Joanna,” he said.
“Tomorrow, promise.”
She dozed off again, and this time her sleep was a little more restful. At least restful enough to give Chay a few minutes for a quick shower and a shave. In the bathroom, he looked at his face in the mirror while he combed his hair. “A son,” he said. “ My son.”
He hadn’t thought about it since his dad had dropped that bomb. It was too absurd to think that he would know when Joanna didn’t. But as Chay studied the face in the mirror, he saw something far deeper than his reflection. He saw the next generation. “Joanna,” he whispered, gripping the edges of the sink to steady himself.
