Chapter Nine
Need any caffeine, Buzz?” Cedra opened a Coke and sat beside him on the back porch.
He didn’t mind the sultry evening air, and in fact, enjoyed the droning sound of the locusts in the groves. “No thanks.”
“A snack? I could fix you something.”
He shook his head.
“You all right?”
“Yeah.”
“Upset about your old man?”
“More like confused, I guess,” he said honestly. Gil’s spell had affected the entire household. The old man was his father, and he should be feeling something more than he was. “Upset that I probably should be more upset than I am.”
“Nothing about these people or this place rings a bell with you? Your graduation picture is on the wall in the hallway.”
“No.” Looking at the old photographs had been nothing short of eerie. They made him think he recognized himself at that point of his life, but the recollection was so vague it disturbed him. “The first time I saw any of them was a few weeks ago.”
“Funny you never mentioned any of them to me before—when you could remember, I mean. You told me you were from Nebraska and that you didn’t keep in touch with your family. I thought they must be real jerks or something, but they’re good people.”
“Cedra, please.”
“What?”
“Stop pushing me.”
“I’m not pushing you, I’m just wondering why you didn’t tell me about them. Having an identical twin isn’t exactly forgettable.”
“Obviously, it is, because I’ve forgotten it, haven’t I?”
“You know what I meant.” She sipped her Coke. “I miss the way it was between us. I miss being with you. Sleeping with you.” Her words hung between them until she spoke again. She picked at the label on the plastic bottle with her thumbnail. “Maybe if we—you know—you’d remember.”
Sleeping with her at this point didn’t seem fair to either one of them. Not that the thought was unpleasant by any means, it was just that he didn’t want to have sex only for the sake of having sex. And an added dimension to their relationship could confuse him more than ever. “I don’t think so.”
“What could it hurt? We’ve done it plenty of times.”
“Did you nag me like this before?”
She stood. “Go to hell.”
“Where are you going?”
“Up to my room like a good little girl.”
He caught her wrist. “Sorry. Sit down.”
She complied.
He scooted the rattan chair he sat in until he could reach to place his feet on the banister. “It wouldn’t be fair to you or to me, Cedra. I’m sorry if it hurts you that I don't remember. I just can’t force anything. The doctors at the university said not to try to force my memory to come back. I do memory-skill exercises twice a week, and they’re supposed to help. Anything more is just too frustrating.”
Her pulse beat gently in his grasp and he turned her hand over and entwined their fingers. “It’s not that I wouldn’t like to. I think you’re really sexy.”
Reluctantly, she smiled.
“I really don’t want to hurt your feelings, it’s just that I don’t want to complicate things any more than they already are.”
“I’m sorry, Buzz.”
“It’s all right. I know this is hard for you, too.” He lowered his feet to the porch floor and leaned over to kiss her.
She kissed him back with a surprising sweetness. She touched his cheek with cool fingertips and smiled half-heartedly. “Being friends is okay, Buzz. I can use a good friend.”
He agreed, and kissed her fingers
On Monday morning, Dan sat in the hospital waiting room, a cup of cold coffee on the magazine-cluttered glass table beside him. An irritating talk show squawked from the television hung from the ceiling. He’d never been a very patient waiter. Thank God he’d been in with Lorraine each time she’d given birth, because he’d have lost his mind waiting helplessly.
Lorraine appeared and sat in the chair beside him, and he straightened. The fresh scent of jasmine drifted to him, a welcome change from the hospital smells he’d endured for hours. “Hi.”
“Hi. Have you heard anything yet?”
He shook his head. “They didn’t even bring him down from his room until about an hour ago. The doctor said the heart catheterization itself only takes about twenty minutes or so. I guess we’re waiting on the emergency cases ahead of him.”
“That’s a good sign. At least he’s not an emergency.”
“True.” He tapped his fingers on his thigh. “This test will tell us if he has any blockage anywhere in his heart.”
A door opened and Dan looked up. A doctor in green scrubs came out and spoke with a family across the room. Dan turned his attention back to Lorraine. “I hate leaving you with all the work like this.” He gave her an apologetic shrug. "I don’t know what else to do.”
“This is where you should be,” she replied. “Try not to worry about it. We’re handling everything. I got the floor chalked off for the booths, so the barn is ready for the renters to come in and set up.”
“When did you tell them they could get in?”
“Tomorrow and Wednesday so they have time to decorate and put their stuff out. My mom and sisters have two booths for all their quilts and needlepoint crafts. Did you eat?”
He’d been gone before breakfast that morning. He shook his head. Lorraine opened her purse and handed him an apple. Dan looked at the Wealthy, his favorite to eat fresh, and her unfailing thoughtfulness touched him. He smiled. “You're getting more like your mom all the time.”
“Scary, isn’t it?”
He wanted to take her hand or wrap his arm around her or touch her face.
Instead he ate his apple.
Another hour passed before the doctor came out. He sat on a chair positioned at an angle to them. “We found some blockage in two of the arteries, so we did the angioplasty,” he explained. “Your father signed permission for the procedure as a precaution.’ ’
Dan sat forward. “I thought you’d send him to Omaha for surgery.”
“Angioplasty isn’t surgery,” the doctor replied. “It’s done through the same shunt that we place in the groin for the catheterization. There’s only one tiny incision.”
“So it's over?” Dan asked.
“All over. He was awake throughout, and he’ll just be a little groggy. In most cases, the ballooning works to open up fatty deposits in the arteries and get the blood flowing again. He’ll have to lie still for eight hours, since we did go in through an artery, but he should be able to go home tomorrow.”
Dan and Lorraine looked at each other in amazement.
“The dietitian will go over his eating with you, and your father will have to develop some better habits, but he’ll do just fine.”
Relieved, Dan stood, shook the physician’s hand and thanked him. He sat back down beside Lorraine. “I guess maybe I overreacted,” he said finally.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean last night.”
“Not at all,” she said softly. “You’ve never been ashamed of your feelings before. Don’t get macho on me now.”
He glanced at her and she grinned.
Before long, a nurse let them know Gil had been returned to his floor. Dan led Lorraine to the room. His nurse placed new sticky pads for the cardiac monitor on Gil’s chest and took his vital signs. “Now, don’t move your leg, Mr. Beckett,” she warned. “I’ll be back in a few minutes to check on you.”
“Well, I made it.” Gil flexed the bruised hand that held his IV.
“We knew you’d make it.” Lorraine patted his foot through the thin white blanket. “You haven’t worked all these years just to die and miss enjoying the fruit of your labors.”
He chuckled at her pun.
Gil grew sleepy and Lorraine told him to rest. Someone would be back that evening to check on him.
“You can work t
he rest of the afternoon and this evening,” Lorraine said to Dan as if she knew his thoughts as they crossed the lobby.
“It’s a good thing we have Tom to help. Where’d you park?”
She pointed to the Explorer beneath a shade tree. “And Cedra.”
“And Cedra. The Festival will seem strange without Dad helping.” Gil had always been a part of Dan’s life. They’d worked side by side since he could remember. This whole thing had been a major scare.
“Your dad may or may not be able to help at all anymore. But at least he’s with us.”
She’d worn her hair loose, and the breeze fluttered the silken tresses becomingly. Her eyes appeared as warm as rich honey in the sunlight. “Can I hold you?” Dan asked impulsively.
Her expression barely altered. She stepped into his embrace, her arms around his waist, her head against his chest.
Dan inhaled her fresh, familiar scent, cupped her head in his palm, and held her body close, drawing strength and comfort. She had always been there for him, was still there for him, even with the knowledge of what he’d done. “I love you, Lorraine," he whispered.
She remained in his arms, but she didn’t speak. Finally, she drew back, and with her palms flattened on his chest, looked up at him. “I’m doing the best I can," she said softly. Finally, she pulled away. “Nothing feels solid anymore.” Her gaze remained riveted to his. “If you're not who I thought you were, then I’m not who I thought I was, either.”
Dan hurt more for her than he did for himself. How selfish he’d been, regretting only the effect this had had on him—how he missed her love and trust. At least he’d known the truth all along, and prepared himself for the possibility of discovery.
“Can you understand that?” she asked.
Lorraine hadn’t known. She’d flourished in life, unsuspecting that one day stability would be ripped out from beneath her. She’d been totally unprepared for her world to turn upside down. That she even cared if he understood or not told him more than her words.
“I do understand,” he answered. He understood perfectly. And that placed them at another stalemate. “Thanks for being here. Thanks for caring.”
She whisked a long strand of hair away from her mouth. “Where else would I be?”
They were a family. In spite of Dan’s masquerade, this was Lorraine’s reality. Her family.
She pulled her keys from her purse, got in the SUV, and backed it out of the space. Dan waved before finding his pickup.
Rolling down the windows, a sizable portion of his heavyheartedness dissipated in the sunny air. His father was going to be all right. And Lorraine still cared for him.
He placed his hat on his head and drove toward home with a smile touching his lips. Amazing what a little hope could do for a person’s outlook.
Lorrie and Cedra brought Gil home from the hospital late Wednesday and set him up in the family room. Tom took Gil’s bed for the time being. The Festival opened on Thursday, cars from surrounding counties filling the gravel parking area.
That night, Lorrie had food warming when the others finally came to the house. Cedra ate a small portion and excused herself to the porch.
“Is Dad sleeping?” Dan asked.
Lorrie nodded. “He conked out a little before ten.”
“I didn’t even get to talk to him today.”
“We’ll eat breakfast together in the morning,” Lorrie promised. “Then, why don’t you come up to the house for a lunch break?”
He nodded. “That’s a good idea. You can get by without me for half an hour or so.”
“Did we do this when we were kids?” Tom asked.
Dan looked over. “Do what?”
“Work the Festival like your kids do.”
“We only started the Festival about ten years ago,” Dan replied. “Before that we had a barn we sold out of, like a truck garden. And yeah, you and I worked summers picking and sorting and selling apples.”
Tom looked thoughtful.
“You never much liked it,” Dan told him.
“I didn’t?”
“You always had somewhere else you’d rather be, something you’d rather do.” Dan glanced at Lorrie and she wondered if he realized what a fine line he was treading by telling Tom his own history instead of Dan’s. Apparently he did, because he grew silent. “I’m beat. I’m gonna shower and hit the sack.”
“See you in the morning,” Tom said.
Lorrie put the last of the dishes in the dishwasher. “’Night.”
After her own shower, she flipped on the television and curled up in bed.
“How did Dad seem to you today?” Dan asked from beside her.
“A little bored. These weeks will be the hardest for him, because we’re all so busy.”
“I don’t know what we can do about that. We can’t spare anybody. Can we?”
“Well... ” She thought a minute. “Why don’t we all take our breaks up here? I could just leave the lunches in the fridge instead of hauling the cooler down.”
“The walk will take too much time from our breaks,” Dan said. “And the kids can’t drive it. Come the weekend, we’d have to fight the traffic getting in and out.” They lay for several minutes, getting sleepy, not paying attention to the TV. “I know!”
Lorrie turned to Dan. “What?”
“We’ll take the mopeds down to the barns. That way, it’ll be a quick ride up to the house.”
They owned two lightweight motorbikes that the kids rode occasionally for fun. Lorrie had taken turns and knew how to handle one. “That’s a great idea.”
He flipped off the lamp, rolled over tiredly, and mumbled, “Yeah, well, consider the source.”
“It must be exhausting being a genius.” Lorrie smiled at the back of his head. “Good night.”
A soft snore was his reply.
The first time he showed her how to do the bank deposit, they were sitting on stools behind the counter in the air-conditioned gift shop, the register readings in front of them, cash and checks counted and stuffed into a zippered pouch. Dan watched her tally the total on a small adding machine and write the figure in the blank provided on the deposit slip.
Taking the paper from her, he signed his name and handed it back. Lorrie stared at the signature. Finally, she looked up.
Her honey-gold gaze inspected his hair, his face, his mouth, poring over him as if she’d never really seen him before. At that moment, he wished he could read her eyes, understand what she was thinking, what she thought of him now. Now that the truth was real to her.
“When I look at Tom,” she said, surprising him with the subject, “I wonder how in the world I could have missed it. He doesn’t look like you—oh, I know he looks like you, that’s not what I mean. I mean, he’s not you, and it’s so obvious to me now.”
Dan didn’t say anything. He took the paper from her fingers and tucked it into the bag with the money.
“If I’d known him better, I would have realized,” she said. “We all saw one another at the pancake suppers and fish fries and fund-raisers while we were growing up, you know. And then high school. But Tom and I really only dated for a few months, and part of that time he was away at college. We went to the movies, we attended school functions. He was pretty... aloof, now that I look back on it. Of course, I understand now that Gil was pressuring him into seeing me. Right?” Reluctantly, Dan nodded.
“My dad was doing the same thing to me,” she admitted. “It’s crazy how I’ve thought about this so much.”
Dan recognized the insecurity and bewilderment she’d experienced initially. But her tone and her words lent him hope that she was coming to terms with the situation.
“That one time with him—”
“Don’t, Lorraine—”
“I want to say this.”
He didn’t want to hear about his brother taking her virginity. He didn’t want to face the fact that anyone but himself had had the privilege of intimacy with the woman he loved. But if she needed to sa
y it, he would listen. They had no one but each other to confide in. He gave her his full attention.
“We’d been to a game in Lincoln, and afterward one of those tailgate parties, you know, where everyone brings beer, and has a good time. I never drank much, so a couple of them went to my head, and I asked Tom to take me home.
“We stopped somewhere. It was dark and I wasn’t quite sure where we were.”
There were a dozen deserted places where couples had parked; Dan could only guess.
“I don’t remember it all perfectly—it was so long ago. But I remember being convinced that if what our fathers wanted was for us to get together, that having sex with him was the right step. And, yes, I was infatuated with Tom. He was fun and popular and good-looking. And persistent.”
Dan studied his hands, palms pressed together.
“So I went along with it.” She sat, thoughtful for a moment. “I’ve looked back on it as both sordid and innocent.”
“What do you mean?” he asked without looking up.
“Well, I—we didn’t even have our clothes off. It was just sort of hurried and clumsy. But... ”
He looked up. “But what?”
“But I didn’t know anything different. I thought, ‘Is this what I’ve been saving myself for? Is this what all the locker-room talk and the big hoopla is about?’ It was messy and uncomfortable and I really didn’t care if I ever did it again.”
As detestable as Dan found the image, he was grateful to know what had really happened. “But you felt something for him, Lorraine. You wouldn’t have done it if you hadn’t.”
“Yes. I felt something for him. Some naive hopeful thing. And I was scared the chance for marriage would pass me by. I was never sure he felt anything for me. That’s why when he—I mean when you proposed to me, I couldn’t believe it. I’d thought maybe you’d just call it off between us or—or I didn’t know what.”
“And now?” he asked, taking the biggest risk he’d ever taken. “Do you feel anything for him now?”
She contemplated Dan’s face for a long, hard, agonizing minute. “Embarrassed. I’ll die when he remembers me.” She looked at her hand and back at him. “Concern. He’s your brother, after all.”
A Husband By Any Other Name Page 13
