These Three Words

by Holly Jacobs

  He closed his eyes again. I couldn’t tell if he’d fallen asleep again or was simply finding this conversation too taxing. “We can talk about all this later, Gray. I love you and I’m here for as long as you want me to be. All that matters now is getting you well,” I whispered.

  He shook his head. “I will always want you, Addie. But I need to say . . . I need to say all the things I should have said before. I tried to tell you, but everything I said came out wrong.”

  Maybe it’s for the best.

  Those words had haunted me. They’d fueled my anger and made me feel justified blaming Gray. Blaming him for something that couldn’t have been his fault any more than it was mine.

  I glanced at the sonogram. Timothy Hunter Grayson.

  I knew that Gray hadn’t meant those other words. He’d said everything he needed to say when he’d named our son.

  As if he read my thoughts, he said, “I said something about it being for the best. I know that hurt you. But what I meant . . . I couldn’t stand the thought of our son suffering. I know afterward the tests said there was nothing genetically wrong, but . . . I didn’t mean . . .”

  “I know you didn’t,” I told him. “I was so angry and that anger needed a target. But I know you didn’t mean that.”

  I remembered a promise I’d made him right after we started dating in college. We were sitting in the library when Candy, Gray’s prom date all those years ago, walked by. She stopped and chatted a few minutes, then left. And Gray said . . .

  “She’s still pretty.”

  “Oh, really?” I asked, half teasing, half miffed. I knew that Candy was pretty, but I didn’t want Gray to notice it, or even worse, comment on it.

  “Yes,” he said.

  I was always amazed by the cues he missed. I mean, he could notice Candy’s prettiness, but not my annoyance?

  I knew that being annoyed was crazy and not the least bit rational. But I couldn’t seem to stop myself.

  He looked at me and I could see it register that I didn’t necessarily like him talking about other girls being pretty. “Sorry.”

  “No, you’re right, she’s always been pretty,” I said, trying to tamp down my annoyance.

  No. Not annoyance. Jealousy. I was jealous of Candy. And I didn’t like feeling that way.

  Gray shook his head. “Candy’s always been pretty, but she’s always known it.”

  I really wanted this conversation to end, so I simply said, “Okay.”

  “No, it’s not okay,” he insisted with a sigh. “I’m making a mess of this. Candy’s pretty and knows it. You’re pretty and don’t know it. That’s part of your . . .” He paused.

  “Charm?” I supplied. I’m not sure about the pretty part, but I was charmed.

  “Yeah,” he said. “Listen, Addie, I am . . .” He paused again, searching for the right word.

  I couldn’t help fill it in this time, so I just waited.

  “Socially awkward,” he finally said. “Remember Susie? She told me that I was socially awkward.” He glanced at me quickly, as if to check that I wasn’t going to get all green-eyed about that.

  “She was wrong,” I said with a smile.

  Jealousy wasn’t a game I normally played. I didn’t like the feeling and resolved to try to avoid it in the future.

  “Listen,” he said. “In my head my compliments are just that—compliments. But somewhere between my head and my mouth they can turn into something else entirely.”

  “You do okay,” I assured him. “After all, you did say I was pretty.”

  “You see, I goofed that up, too. Adeline Frasier, you are more than just pretty. To me you’re the most beautiful woman in the world.”

  “Now that was pretty much perfect,” I said and kissed him.

  When the kiss ended he said, “Maybe when I mess up the next time, you should just ask me what I really meant.”

  “I should ask what it sounded like in your head before it got to your mouth?” I teased.

  He looked relieved and nodded. “Yes.”

  “I forgot to ask you what you meant,” I said. “All those years ago in college, you told me that sometimes you said things all wrong, and I promised to ask what you really meant. I didn’t. I’m sorry.”

  “I thought I was being strong for you, but you didn’t need my strength, you just needed me to share the grief with you. You needed me to be present.” He closed his eyes and said, “I had so many plans for him, you know. I was going to be the father I never had. Like your dad. Like my mom, for that matter. My mom was the best mother, but she also managed to be the best father. I was going to show up at his games, and read to him. I thought that when he was old enough, we’d surprise him with a trip to Disney World. I mean, really surprise him. Not tell him until the morning, as we left for the airport. I’d researched it. And . . .”

  He shook his head and opened his eyes.

  I realized that he had tears in them.

  Those tears were my undoing. I started to cry as well. I cried for Timothy Hunter. I cried because I’d lost Gray long before I’d almost lost him to his illness.

  “I’d give up the business and all my plans for a chance to be all that for him. I will never get over losing him,” he said.

  “And all the dreams that died with him,” I said, understanding.

  He nodded. “Addie, I’ll be or do whatever you need if you’ll give me another chance. We can go back—”

  I thought about Maude, meeting Bertie at the Piggly Wiggly in Waunakee, Wisconsin. “We can’t go back, but we can make a new start.”

  Maude, James, Harriet, Siobhan, and Mark—I might never know some of their last names or what they did for a living, but they’d all made a profound impact on me.

  “I talked to other people who were waiting for their loved ones while I was waiting for you. They shared a lot of their happy moments.

  “Here I am, Gray, and here I’m going to stay—with you. I love you. We never forgot our love, but we forgot to be there for each other.” I shrugged. “I’m not sure that makes sense to you.”

  It made sense to me. I squeezed his hand again. “The day I came to your office, I’d thought that I wanted to shake you and make you remember the way we used to be, but I had it all wrong. It wasn’t just you, it was me. I got stuck on that one horrible moment and forgot the hundreds of other moments. The better moments. The wonderful moments. Even the mundane moments. I forgot them all. All I could remember was losing the baby and then feeling as though I’d lost you as well.”

  “And now?” he asked.

  “While you were sleeping I fell in love with you again. Or maybe I just remembered that I never stopped loving you.” Like one of those digital picture frames, the moments tumbled over each other in my mind. “Right now, I can see us in a classroom. We had to have been very young because I was at a desk where the seat wasn’t attached. You were leaning over me, explaining something. I don’t remember what, but I do remember you saying, Just take your time, you’ll get it. You’ll figure it out.”

  He’d trusted me to figure it out then. “Well, I figured it out now. I never stopped loving you, but while you were sleeping, I fell in love with you all over again.”

  “I love you,” he said, then closed his eyes. And slowly his breathing changed. I realized he’d fallen asleep again.

  If this were a movie, it might seem anticlimactic, but for me, it was fine. I loved him. He loved me. That was enough.

  I sat back down, and when Alice stuck her head into the room, I held a finger to my lips to let her know he was sleeping.

  She tiptoed in, checked on him, then nodded and tiptoed out.

  I stood and looked out the window. The sky was a bright blue today with big, fluffy fall clouds. Sometime soon, we’d leave this hospital and go home.

  I glanced back at the man I loved. He was stil
l sleeping. A small smile played across his lips. I wondered what he was dreaming about.

  For the next couple of hours, we had snippets of conversations. It was as if Gray had suddenly discovered all the words he’d never said.

  Every time he woke up, he looked for me.

  I saw his fear that I’d left and his relief each time he realized I hadn’t gone anywhere.

  “After you moved into JoAnn’s,” he said, “I used to ride the elevator every morning and watch as the bay came into view. You were my first thought. And though I knew I couldn’t see you, I felt you. All day, I used to stare out my window looking at the bay, wishing I could see you. Then at night, as I left the office, I’d watch the bay disappear from view and I would miss you even more.”

  He’d fallen asleep, and when he woke, he didn’t miss a beat as he continued, “Sometimes, I didn’t leave my office. I slept on the couch and spent the night staring at the lights on the edge of the bay, wondering if one of them was yours.”

  I didn’t have a chance to respond before he dozed off again.

  Smita came in this time.

  “He keeps falling asleep. Is it the drugs?” I asked.

  “He just had open-heart surgery and is taking some heavy-duty pain medication. He’ll still be a bit loopy for a while.” She looked at me. “It’s normal. He’s okay.”

  Those were the words I wanted to hear.

  As Smita left, Gray squeezed my hand. “Do you know one of the things I missed the most while you were gone?”

  I shook my head.

  “Your singing,” he said.

  I managed a small smile. “Maybe I should call the doctor . . . you are obviously delusional.”

  “No, I mean it,” he said. “You were always singing around the house. It seemed too quiet without that.”

  I had my own little playlist of songs that I sang without even thinking about it. I realized that I hadn’t done much singing since I left Gray.

  To be honest, I’m not sure that I’d done any.

  And I realized at this moment I truly felt like singing again.

  “Sometimes you’d catch me midsong and laugh,” I said. “I think I sang all the more because I loved to hear that sound. You are a very serious person by nature.” I smiled as I said the words.

  Gray nodded his agreement, wearing a very serious expression, but then like a small ray of sunshine, I could see his smile lurking behind it. “There’s one song I remembered you singing about a man who didn’t have the words. I spent weeks listening to your iPod, trying to find it. And when I did, I think I listened to it—to the entire musical—a hundred times.”

  “Wait. You had my iPod? I couldn’t find it when I moved.”

  “I found it under the table, but I didn’t return it. When I missed you the most, I’d turn it on.”

  I reached out and ran my finger across his stubbled face. “Ash said you were listening to musicals and it freaked him out. Which song were you hunting for?”

  “From They’re Playing Our Song. I read the synopsis after I found it. I saw me in that main character. He had music and he understood the notes, but the words escaped him. I understand business. I know how to find the information I want, I know how to point the company in the direction I want it to go, but Ash, he’s the one who gets the people. He makes it happen.”

  Gray closed his eyes and for a moment I thought he was going to fall asleep again, but instead he said, “I had the perfect life. Ash at work and you at home. I didn’t even try to say the things I should have because I had you, and you always seemed to understand. Then you left and I couldn’t figure out what I needed to say in order to get you back.”

  “I’m sorry, Gray. I never should have—” I stopped because he’d fallen asleep again. This time I waited, knowing he’d wake again and pick up our conversation.

  I could wait, I realized. We didn’t have to finish this now because we had time. The rest of our lives.

  His eyes fluttered and he began to wake up. “I know I’ll need you to help me find the words in the future, but sometimes the words need to be said. A partnership has to be able to change. I let you down because I pulled away and didn’t say the words. You weren’t asking for an opus.”

  “I didn’t need—”

  “You did. You need to hear me say I love you and, more than that, you needed to hear me say I loved our son. You needed me to say I miss him and I will miss him for the rest of my life. You needed to hear me say lean on me and let me lean on you. We’ll get through this together. I let you down because rather than reaching for you, I turned away just like my father did. Only he made a clean break and left physically.”

  “I only need three words from you, Gray,” I told him. “Three words and you standing by my side. I don’t need you to be strong for me. I don’t need you to save me. I just need you with me and—”

  “I love you,” he said.

  “Those were the words,” I assured him. “I love you, too.”

  He drifted off to sleep again.

  I glanced at the nightstand. There was our picture from before we were a couple. The black plastic swan from the moment that changed us and we were a couple. And Timothy. They all belonged together. They all represented our journey to here.

  One thing on that nightstand did not belong.

  I reached for the smudged, mangled envelope that I’d carried throughout the ordeal. I got up, took it across the room, and dropped it in the garbage.

  It landed with a very satisfying thump.

  I went back to Gray and whispered as he slept. “Here I am.” And most importantly, “I love you.”

  The next morning, Alice came into the room. She smiled when she saw we were both awake. “Have you had your breakfast yet?” she asked.

  “Not yet,” I said with little enthusiasm. The food was adequate, but . . . But. Each meal was edible, but everything was bland.

  Her smile grew as she handed Gray a bag. “Have fun, you two,” she called as she turned around and left the room.

  “What on earth are you two up to?” I asked.

  Gray didn’t say anything as he handed me the bag.

  I opened it up. Two small containers and two spoons were in the bag. “Breakfast?” I asked.

  He nodded. “You know I believe in balanced breakfasts. There’s dairy, and the nuts are protein . . .”

  I popped the lid. “Pralines and cream,” I said.

  “It’s never a bad time for ice cream,” he repeated.

  I took a bite and handed him his.

  As we ate our ice cream and talked, I felt loved.

  Two weeks later, when we went home, I finally opened the freezer.

  Gray hadn’t just bought a few half gallons. No. The freezer was full. Every shelf filled with almost every kind of ice cream I could imagine. And I heard so clearly what he was saying without words.

  I heard his footsteps over the whir of the refrigerator. “Every time I went to the store, I bought a couple more,” he admitted from behind me. “It made me feel better. It made me think of you.”

  I turned around, found my husband, and hugged him as I whispered, “I love you.”

  “I love you.”

  The words were sweeter than ice cream.

  Epilogue

  “To the co-owner of Harbor House,” Gray said, lifting his wineglass.

  I tapped mine to his and took a sip.

  It was neither too sweet nor too dry.

  It was a perfect blend. Rather like Gray and me. The thought made me smile.

  “What?” Gray asked.

  “I am happy,” I said. Those three words summed up my feelings. “This is the honeymoon I always wanted.”

  I’d thrown a buffalo-plaid blanket over my shoulders and along with Gray’s arm, I was warm enough.

  I looked at Gray, who was l
ooking toward the peninsula as the sun slipped behind it, leaving a blaze of orange and pink in its wake.

  “I get it now,” he said, more to himself than to me.

  But I asked, “Get what?”

  “Why you love sunsets so much. Every time I watch one now, I realize that it’s the end of another day . . . another day I spent with you. That’s a gift.”

  It was such an un-Gray-like thing to say, but I’d noticed that he’d said a lot of un-Gray-like things since we’d gotten back together. I tried not to take moments like this for granted.

  I moved closer to him and draped the throw over his shoulder, too, as I snuggled under his arm. We watched the last of the color fall below the peninsula as well, leaving the evening stars in its wake.

  I started to move, ready to go back inside, but Gray held me in place and turned so we were facing each other, the blanket still hanging over both our shoulders. He reached under it and into his pocket.

  “This is for you,” he said.

  I opened the box, and inside was a round opal ring. “I gave you a ring when we got engaged. I gave you another one when we got married. And I wanted to give you something to celebrate us. The last year has been . . .”

  He seemed to run out of words, but I remembered the promise I’d made so many years ago and listened to what he was trying to say. “It’s been amazing,” I filled in.

  He nodded. “Yes. The girl at the jewelry store said opals are a stone that people don’t buy for themselves. She said they’re best given as a gift, and that in some folklore they’re known as the anchor of hope. I liked that.”

  I slipped it on my right ring finger and it fit perfectly. I kissed him and said, “I like it, too.”

  “I thought this was the perfect gift to represent our anchors of hope.”

  My heart melted a little and I understood perfectly what he was trying to say.

  “I’ve sort of bought you an early Christmas present, too,” I said. “Sort of,” I reiterated.