Daniel's Gift

by Barbara Freethy

  "But she didn't." Malcolm let out a long, shrill whistle. "This is not good. How much does she want?"

  Luke sighed as he sat back in his chair. Why was he surrounded by people who thought only in terms of dollars and cents? Didn't they realize there was a boy's life at stake?

  "She doesn't want anything, Malcolm. Nothing. The child is in a coma." Luke picked up a glass paperweight and rolled it around in the palm of his hand. His initials were engraved on the glass. It had been a present from his parents, celebrating his long-awaited arrival at Sheri-Tech. He had finally come home.

  But come home to what? A life that barely needed him in it. Sheri-Tech was so well organized it practically ran itself. Any changes he attempted to make, even small ones, were met with resistance. His father's philosophies and goals were written in stone.

  And his home -- it was the same. Every time he closed his eyes, he could see his parents' image, feel their smothering love. Their voices rang around in his head. "You'll study hard. You'll be a doctor. You'll take over Sheri-Tech."

  He'd done it, all of it. And now he was left with what? What? The answer refused to come.

  "Luke." Malcolm snapped his fingers in front of Luke's face. "I'm talking to you."

  Luke straightened. "What did you say?"

  "I asked how you want to handle this. With clinical trials starting after the first of the year and the possible acquisition of Genesys, we need to present a solid, unified front."

  "I'm aware of our plans, Malcolm."

  "Then why did you miss the meeting last night?"

  Luke sent him a blank look.

  "Cappellini's restaurant at seven, remember?"

  Luke cleared his throat. He did remember, now. Yesterday he had been thinking only of Jenny. "I forgot. I'll call and apologize."

  "Good. If there is any suspicion that your mind is occupied elsewhere or that you'll be entangled in a long, legal battle, Genesys may go elsewhere. They do have other suitors."

  Luke looked at Malcolm and shrugged. "If they do, they do. Frankly, I don't give a damn about Genesys or Sheri-Tech right now."

  "What?" Malcolm stared at him in disbelief.

  Luke leaned forward in his chair. "You heard me. I have a son, Malcolm. You should understand what that means. You have children."

  "I -- yeah, I guess. But, Luke, this is your business."

  "My whole life has been about business. Danny is family. He comes first."

  "But Sheri-Tech is also your family, Luke. It's your father's legacy to you."

  "My father ..." Luke suddenly felt an intense rage spread through his body. On impulse, he threw the glass paperweight against the wall. It landed on the marble tile and shattered. The family ties were finally broken.

  Malcolm jumped to his feet. "Calm down. Jesus, Luke, I've never seen you lose your cool before. I'll take care of this. Relax, okay?"

  "I can't relax. I'm assigning three people to review Danny's case. I'm not leaving anything to chance."

  "What can you do that his doctors can't?"

  "Dammit, I don't know. I've spent my entire life believing that science has the answer to every human problem. Only things don't add up anymore, and I don't know how to fix them."

  "Maybe you can't."

  "I have to."

  "You're not God." Malcolm walked to the door. "I'll handle Genesys. We'll reschedule the meeting for next week, give you a chance to catch your breath. And I'll write up a press release, short and sweet, just the facts."

  "Fine, just don't put anything in there that reflects negatively on the St. Claires. Jenny and Danny have been through enough." Luke paused. "And, Malcolm, tell Lorraine to call maintenance. Have them turn up the heat. It's cold in here."

  "Turn it up? Charles thought his staff would fall asleep if they were too warm."

  "I'm not my father, Malcolm. It's about time everyone realized that." Luke turned his chair around so he could look out the window. The horizon soothed his jangled nerves. But only for a moment. Then he thought about Danny and the tension came back.

  * * *

  "Where are we going?" Danny asked Jacob as they soared through the sky.

  "To meet a friend of mine," Jacob replied, leading him through a white, puffy cloud. "There he is."

  Jacob and Danny landed in the middle of a baseball field. There was a game going on, and Danny jumped as the ball suddenly came at him.

  Jacob laughed. "You're supposed to catch it, not duck."

  "I don't have a mitt." Then Danny looked down at his left hand and saw the leather glove. Before he could ask how it had gotten there, another ball came his way. It was going over his head. He ran backward, then gave a last, hopeless jump. To his amazement, the ball landed right smack in the middle of his mitt.

  "Throw it home," Jacob said. "Home," he cried.

  Danny hurled the ball to home plate. The catcher made a sweeping tag. The runner was out.

  Danny jumped up and down in excitement. "I can't believe I did that."

  Another boy came running up to him. "Nice play," he said. "I'm Michael."

  "Hi." Danny shifted his feet, not sure what to say, how to act. The game appeared to be over now. The other kids were huddled in the dugout, listening to their coaches. Danny watched as Jacob walked over to the pitcher's mound. He did an exaggerated wind-up, then threw the ball right over the plate.

  "S-t-r-i-k-e," Jacob yelled.

  Danny rolled his eyes and looked back at Michael. "Do you know him?" he asked.

  "Everybody knows Jacob. He comes here all the time. Never brought anyone before though."

  Danny looked around at the field. It appeared to be in the middle of nowhere. Could have been any state in the U.S. Or maybe he wasn't in the real world at all. "Is everyone here dead?" he asked.

  Michael nodded. "Yep."

  There was a wealth of meaning in Michael's simple reply, a meaning that scared Danny, but for the moment he didn't want to face up to the future.

  "How did you die?" Danny asked

  "I was born with cystic fibrosis," Michael said. "I could hardly breathe. I couldn't play sports. My chest hurt all the time. The worst part was my parents. They cried because they couldn't help me. I wanted to die for a long time. I used to pray to God that he'd take me back. After all, I figured he sent my parents a lemon, and it was time to recall the product."

  Danny was shocked by his matter-of-fact attitude. Maybe here in heaven, people just got used to being dead. "I guess he heard you."

  "After I died, my father went out and raised money for cystic fibrosis patients," Michael added. "He's done a lot of good for other kids. My mom isn't stressed out anymore. She started painting again -- only this time her pictures have more depth. See, Danny, I was only meant to be with them for a short while."

  "Don't you miss them now?"

  "I can see them," Michael said. "I can't touch them. They can't touch me. But someday we'll be together again. They'll be happy to see me this way." Michael puffed up his chest. "I can breathe great now."

  "Ifs different for me, though. I wasn't sick before."

  "You are now. You have a head injury. The doctors don't know what functions you'll have when and if you come out of that coma. They don't know if you'll be able to walk or run or hit a baseball. You might even be retarded."

  Danny stared at Michael, suddenly terribly afraid. He didn't want to be sick. He wanted things to be the way they were. "I still want to go back," he said.

  "Even if there's pain, Danny? Even if you're a cripple? You had things pretty easy before," Michael pointed out. "Never sick. Great mom. Plenty of food. You don't know what it's like to suffer."

  "I don't want to know what it's like." Danny looked around him, wondering if he'd be struck down for such a selfish statement. But no one seemed to notice. "Weren't you scared to die?" he asked Michael, still amazed at the other boy's courage.

  Michael nodded. "Yeah. At first. But when my angel came, when I saw the light, I knew it would be all right."

>   "Was Jacob your angel?"

  Michael started to laugh. "No way."

  "Why do you say it like that?" Danny asked suspiciously.

  "Never mind."

  Jacob walked over to them. "Did you see that pitch, kid? Man, I'm good."

  Danny frowned. "I want to go back, Jacob. I want to see what's happening -- talk to my dad again. What do I have to do to go home?"

  Michael and Jacob exchanged a long look.

  "Someone tell me," Danny cried.

  "Relax, kid. It's a long game. Anything can happen, even with two outs in the bottom of the ninth."

  Danny looked at him in confusion, not sure if Jacob was telling him to keep the faith or just saying something stupid. "Can I at least see my dad again?"

  "I think that can be arranged. I do have some interesting news. Your dad came right out and told everyone you're his kid."

  Danny's eyes widened in amazement. "He did?"

  "Yes sirree."

  "Are my parents getting back together?"

  "Your father is married."

  "He could get a divorce. My mother still loves him. I know she does."

  "Your accident brought them back together."

  Danny nodded, beginning to understand what was happening. "That's why it happened, isn't it? You didn't just make a mistake. It was meant to be."

  Jacob smiled and stroked his chin in an annoyingly knowing way. "When the Big Guy closes a door, he usually opens a window."

  Chapter Twenty

  "I better open a window. It stinks in here," Jenny said as she entered Danny's bedroom.

  Luke wrinkled his nose in distaste."Where on earth is that smell coming from?"

  "Something's rotting. We have to find it."

  "Excuse me?"

  Jenny ignored him, intent on finding the offending item. She turned down the covers on Danny's bed. An Oreo cookie fell out. Not the cause of the odor, but definitely the cause of a few chocolate crumbs in the sheets. She got down on her knees and checked under the bed. She came up with a pair of hockey sticks, sweat socks that produced a different but also unpleasant odor, Danny's missing book report, and a magazine.

  Jenny tossed everything aside except the magazine. "Oh, my God. Playboy."

  Luke looked over her shoulder and smiled. "Danny was reading Playboy?"

  "I hardly think he was reading it. He probably got it from Christopher's older brother."

  "All boys sneak a peek at skin magazines."

  "He's only twelve years old," she wailed. "And the worst part is that he hid it from me. What else is he hiding from me? What else isn't he telling me?"

  "You're his mother. A boy is not going to tell his mother that he's ogling naked women after the lights are out."

  "Danny and I have talked about sex." She got to her feet. "I thought he could talk to me about anything."

  "You're making too much of this."

  "I am not. I never make too much of things."

  Luke grinned. "You always make too much of things. You're passionate and emotional. I love that about you."

  The words slipped so easily from his lips that Jenny wasn't sure she had heard him right. Thirteen years of silence, and then an "I love that about you" phrase. As if they had parted friends or lovers just yesterday.

  Jenny tossed the magazine into the garbage can. She didn't want to get into a discussion with Luke about sex or anything remotely related to the topic. She pulled open the drawers in Danny's desk and hit pay dirt. With tentative fingers, Jenny pulled out a moldy piece of pepperoni pizza.

  Luke made a face. "That was in his drawer?"

  "Why, sure. Along with a ruler, a pen, a package of chewing gum, and a batch of Marvel comics. Where else would he keep it?" She dumped the pizza into the trash, picked up the can and walked into the kitchen with it. Dumping everything into a white plastic bag, she tied the two ends into a knot and set it by the back door.

  Luke stood in front of the refrigerator, looking at a photograph of Danny at the science fair.

  "That's Danny's spaceship," Jenny said. "He has a bit of both of us in him, my penchant for adventure and your love of science. Danny wants to be an astronaut."

  "No kidding. I'm impressed."

  "Is that a little fatherly pride I'm hearing?"

  "It's a lot of fatherly pride." Luke's eyes softened as he looked at her. "I want to know everything about him, Jenny. I want to go through your scrapbooks, see his school pictures, hear all the funny stories that you hold in your heart. I want you to make him real for me. That boy in the hospital bed seems so cold, so distant. Wake him up for me, Jenny." Luke reached for her hands and squeezed them tightly. "I need to know him."

  Jenny searched his face in wonder, noting the vulnerability, the anguish, his feelings exposed for the world to see. It was so unlike the Luke she remembered.

  "He wanted to know you, too," she murmured. "I have so much guilt. If only I'd taken him to see you. I was afraid."

  "Of me?"

  "Of Danny. Afraid he'd love you more than me, want to live with you, want to have the things that you could give him that I couldn't. I was afraid of losing him. That's why I stalled. I didn't want to share. This is all my fault."

  "It was an accident."

  "There wouldn't have been an accident if I'd taken him to see you."

  "Its over, Jenny. You can't punish yourself this way. I have guilt, too. My God, I can't believe I told you to get an abortion."

  "Having a child wasn't part of your vision for the future, Luke. But I should have told you to go to hell, that I was having the baby anyway. The truth is, I didn't make a decision one way or the other. I drifted. I debated. I listed my pros and cons until I ran out of paper. You know I could never choose. Well, I didn't choose then. It became too late to have an abortion. So I had him. Then I fell in love with him and knew there had never really been a choice."

  Jenny shook her head as she thought about the past. "I've spent my life reacting to things instead of controlling them. You're different. You're in charge. You can make a decision in ten seconds. It takes me ten minutes to figure out if I want bleu cheese dressing or oil and vinegar on my salad. I'm a mess. My life is a mess. Even now, I'm just doing what the doctors say, doing what you say, doing what Alan and Merrilee say. Like I have no mind of my own. Maybe that's why God's taken Danny. He couldn't bear to leave him with such a poor excuse for a mother a minute longer."

  "Stop it, Jenny."

  "I can't."

  "You have to."

  "I need to do something, take positive action, change things -- "

  "Stop."

  "I'm out of control. I -- "

  Luke cut off her words with his mouth, taking her completely by surprise. The kiss was filled with pent- up anger, passion, and memories. Her lips parted involuntarily. His tongue plunged into her mouth. Reason disappeared.

  Their bodies came together, face to face, breast to chest, hip to hip, groin to groin. He was hard. She was soft. They fit perfectly together. Only their clothes were in the way.

  Jenny pushed off his coat and pulled at his tie. His hands slid up under her sweater, cupping her breasts. He moaned against her lips. She unbuttoned his shirt, running her hands through the thick mat of hair on his chest.

  The tactile memories came back. The feel of his muscles. The coarseness of his five o'clock shadow against her face, his fingers teasing her breasts.

  His mouth left hers to trail soft, wet kisses along her neck and collarbone. Jenny gasped for air. Her mind threatened to function. She refused to let it. She didn't want to think. She just wanted to feel. And, damn, he felt good.

  Jenny pushed Luke's shirt off, ripping a button in her haste. He pulled her sweater over her head and tossed it on the ground. Her bra followed, and he kissed her breasts, working his mouth against her nipples in pure magic. She ran her hands through his air, down the column of his spine and around to his waist.

  Her hands reached for his belt buckle.

  He unsnapped he
r jeans.

  Their eyes connected, their breathing heavy.

  "Oh, my God," Jenny said. "What am I doing?" She reached frantically for her bra, her sweater. The bra took too much time, so she pulled the sweater haphazardly over her head, taking pleasure in the moment when her face was completely covered. Then the sweater slid down to her shoulders, and she was face- to-face with Luke.

  He had pulled on his shirt and slung his tie around his neck. Slowly, he buckled his belt, drawing her eyes to a place where she didn't want to look.

  "Bad idea," she said.

  "Probably." He shook his head and a small smile crossed his lips. "When I'm with you, I can't think rationally or logically. I can barely remember my own name."

  "Even now?"

  "Especially now." He pulled on his coat. "Just for the record, Jenny, I don't make decisions any better than you do. The only real decision I made was to spend that summer with you. The rest of my choices were by default. So if anyone's a coward, it's me."

  Jenny followed him out of the kitchen and down the hall to the front door, thinking about his words. Luke had always seemed strong to her, confident, sure of himself to the point of arrogance. With age had come humility, awareness of his own failings. Damn him. She was starting to like him again, and that was the last thing she wanted to have happen.

  Luke stopped at the front door. "The desire is still there, isn't it, Jenny?"

  "Yes," she whispered. "It's still there. I wish it wasn't."

  "So do I."

  * * *

  Denise was playing solitaire and watching "The Late Show with David Letterman" when Luke walked into the bedroom. She wore a sheer black nightgown with spaghetti straps that fell off her shoulders. A candle on the nightstand had burned down to its wick. A bottle of champagne sat in a bucket of water by the bed.

  Luke tossed his coat onto the loveseat and sat down on the edge of the bed to take off his shoes.

  Denise played a card. "You're late."

  "I'm sorry." Luke sighed, dreading an argument. After leaving Jenny's house, he had returned to the hospital, taken another peek at Danny, then spent the rest of the night at his office, holed up with Keith Avery, as they tried to make sense of the medical studies done on coma patients. Five hours of searching had taken them nowhere. There was simply no medical procedure to pull a patient out of a coma.