Demanding His Brother's Heirs

by Michelle Celmer

  “Everything is great.” She loved him, and she was sure that he loved her, too, although neither seemed to want to be the first to say the words. But she knew it would happen when the time was right. And even though he hadn’t come right out and said he loved her, he’d showed it in so many ways. He wasn’t just the twins’ uncle. On some level, she had come to think of him as their true father. He treated the boys as if they were his children.

  The scar on his chest was a daily reminder that he could be living on borrowed time, but the truth was she cared about that less and less.

  “Have the two of you talked about the future?”

  “Not specifically.”

  “And you’re okay with that?” Miranda asked, sipping her sweet iced tea and nibbling on snack mix. She still wasn’t eating enough, but at least she’d stopped dropping weight. Losing thirty pounds in the span of a few weeks had left her looking sad and haggard. She’d lost all interest in trying to conceive, saying that she just couldn’t go through that again. Although on the bright side, she was no longer living in her pajamas, and Holly had even coaxed her out of the house to go clothes shopping.

  Holly shrugged. “What’s there to talk about? Everything is great. We’re both deliriously happy.”

  “Ignorance is bliss, I guess.”

  Holly shot her a look. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  Miranda sighed, rubbing her temples as if she had a headache. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to sound so snarky. I’m just worried about you.”

  “Well, don’t be. Jason and I are fine. You need to concentrate on making yourself well.”

  “Lunch is ready,” Miranda’s housekeeper called from the patio door, saving Holly from another lecture on her relationship with Jason. Her philosophy was: if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.

  Holly gathered up the twins and they relocated inside the air-conditioned house. The boys played on the family room rug while she and Miranda ate cucumber sandwiches and sipped sweet tea. Well, she ate and Miranda picked. Unlike her friend, Holly had been ravenously hungry lately. It was probably her nightly dose of exercise in Jason’s bed. It was her bed, too, now. She had all but moved into his room. In almost every respect they lived just like a married couple. The only thing missing was the ring.

  And maybe the sex wasn’t nightly anymore, because sometimes they were just too tired. And he did spend at least one week a month in the city working. He’d invited her to come with him on numerous occasions, but not only did she hate being in the city, she felt wrong leaving Miranda. She wanted to stay close, just in case Miranda had another emotional break.

  As if on cue, Miranda said, “You don’t have to keep coming here all the time. I’m okay.”

  “I like coming over,” Holly said.

  “But you must get bored.”

  “Not at all,” she said, even though it wasn’t completely true. “Or are you getting sick of me?”

  “Of course not. I’m just tired of everyone treating me like I’m on the edge of a breakdown. It’s like you and Lewis have me on suicide watch. It’s okay to leave me alone for a while.”

  “We’re just worried about you.”

  “I’m okay. Yes, I’m sad and I’m angry and I’m hurting, but I’ve accepted it.”

  “It’s all right to take time to grieve.”

  Miranda blew out frustrated breath. “I have been grieving. It feels like it’s all I do. I just want to move on.”

  “Do you want me to leave?”

  Miranda sighed and slouched back into her chair. “No. But I want us to have a real conversation. I want us to talk and laugh like we used to. I don’t want you to be afraid you’ll say the wrong thing and hurt my feelings. I want to feel happy. Happy for me, happy for you. Happy for anyone.”

  She thought she was helping Miranda, but it sounded as if maybe she had been only exacerbating the problem. “I didn’t mean to make you feel bad.”

  “The truth is I’m a little jealous.”

  “You are?”

  “Well, not just a little. I’m a lot jealous.”

  “Jealous of what?”

  “What you have with Jason. You two are so passionate. So hot for each other. I mean, look at you, you’re practically glowing.”

  “That’s just from all the greasy foods I’ve been eating,” she said, patting the slight bump of fat growing under the waist of her shorts. “I really haven’t been eating right. I feel so hungry all the time.”

  “That’s what happens when you’re happy. I was a size six when I married Lewis.”

  And she was nearly that small now.

  Looking embarrassed—and Miranda wasn’t the type to get embarrassed about anything—she told Holly, “Lewis and I used to be that way. Now he won’t even touch me. We haven’t had sex since before I lost the baby. We haven’t even fooled around.”

  “Maybe he’s worried that you aren’t ready. Maybe you need to make the first move to get the ball rolling.”

  “I’ve tried,” she said, looking hurt and confused. She set her plate aside and drew her knees up to her chin. “He always has some reason why we can’t. He’s tired or he has a headache or he has to get up early. I’m the one who’s supposed to be using the I’ve-got-a-headache excuse. Not him.”

  “He is older. Maybe he’s just slowing down. It’s bound to happen.”

  She shook her head. “No, that’s not it. We used to be so close. Now there’s just no connection. He’s completely shut me out. Half the time when I try to talk to him, he doesn’t even hear me.”

  “Maybe you just need to give it time. He’s grieving, too.”

  “Not really. I mean, I know he was disappointed, but he only agreed to have a baby in the first place because he knew how important it was to me.”

  “Did he actually tell you that?”

  “Not in so many words.”

  “Then how do you know he feels that way?”

  “We agreed that if the last IVF failed we would look into foreign adoption.”

  “That’s a good idea.”

  “I thought so. I thought it was what he wanted, too. I brought it up last week. I told him I thought that I was ready and that starting the process would give me something positive to look forward to. He said he didn’t think it was the right time. And maybe we could think about it next year. Next year? I’m thirty-eight years old. He’s fifty-two. How long does he think we can wait?”

  “Maybe he’s just worried about—”

  “Stop that!” Miranda shrieked, shocking Holly into silence. She’d heard Miranda raise her voice a time or two, but never like that. “Stop making excuses for him. I’m not imagining this or blowing things out of proportion. Our marriage is falling apart right before my eyes. I don’t even know if he loves me anymore.” She covered her face with her hands and started to cry.

  Holly didn’t know what to do. Why was she making excuses for Lewis? And by doing so was she suggesting that she thought Miranda wasn’t clearheaded enough to recognize her own marriage crumbling?

  “I’m so sorry,” Holly said, touching Miranda’s shoulder. “I didn’t mean to be so insensitive. I was just trying to help.”

  Miranda took a deep breath and composed herself, wiping away her tears with the handkerchief she kept in her bra. Now that she was wearing a bra again.

  “I just want things to be normal again,” she said. “I want us to be happy. The way we used to be. I want us to be like you and Jason. You’re so in love.”

  Holly was, but was Jason? Though she was pretty good at blocking it out and pretending everything was okay, the harsh reality of her situation was that she didn’t really know how Jason felt. And she didn’t have the courage to ask him. Maybe she’d been focusing on Miranda so she didn’t have to confront her own fears. Maybe she wasn’t as happy as
she let Miranda think.

  “You’re frowning,” Miranda said. “What’s wrong?”

  Holly gave her an automatic “Nothing. Everything is great.”

  “You’re lying.”

  “I am?”

  “Yes, and maybe no one has ever told you this, but you’re not very good at it.”

  Miranda was right. As a kid Holly had never been able to get away with anything. It was her darned guilty conscience.

  Suddenly feeling close to tears, she asked her friend, “If Jason loves me so much, why doesn’t he ever say it?”

  “Oh, honey,” Miranda said, sounding more like herself than she had in months. “You’ve got to talk to him about it.”

  “I’m afraid to. I’m afraid of what he’ll say. Or what he won’t say. What if he doesn’t love me and it’s just sex to him?”

  “No, it’s more than that.”

  “He did tell me that he would never get married, never have kids. Have I just been assuming that his feelings have changed? That he wants those things as much as I do? And if he does want these things, too, how do I know he isn’t going to die on me in six months?” Losing Jeremy had been hard, but losing Jason would destroy her.

  “And how does he know you won’t die on him? You could get hit by a bus or eaten by a shark.”

  Holly couldn’t help chuckling. It was nice to be the one being cheered up for a change.

  “Life is a crapshoot,” Miranda said. “You can’t go through it afraid. What would you be teaching your boys? To let fear run their lives? That’s dumb. And it’s incredibly selfish. They deserve better than that.”

  What Miranda said made too much sense. “What if I tell him I love him and he doesn’t love me back?”

  “At least you could say you tried. And if it’s not Jason, it could be someone else. You can’t just give up.”

  She could if she was scared.

  “Say you’d never met Jeremy. You were never married and never had kids. Then you met Jason and he asked you out. Would you go out with him?”

  “Yes.” There was no doubt in her mind about that. She would have been drawn to him instantly.

  “Would you break up with him if you found out he’d had a transplant?”

  She could see where Miranda was going with this. It was a question she had asked herself a million times. “But the thing is I was married to Jeremy, and he did die on me. It’s a fact that’s never going to change.”

  “I’m a little confused,” Miranda said. “Are you worried that Jason doesn’t love you or that he’s going to die? Are you saying you do want him or you don’t want him?”

  “Of course I want him. I love him with all of my heart. When he’s in the city I hate it. Even though we text and talk on the phone, I miss him so much. He is the most amazing man I’ve ever met. But when I think about losing him I can barely stand it.”

  “So don’t think about it.”

  “That’s easy for you to say.”

  Miranda’s brows rose and the look on her face made Holly feel like a big fat jerk. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean that. I don’t know what’s wrong with me. Why can’t I just let myself be happy? Things really are going great. Why can’t I just accept things the way they are and enjoy it while it lasts? Whether that’s a year or ten years.”

  “Because as women we need to know where we stand. We need to hear the words. I swear sometimes I wish I was born a man.”

  “It would make things easier.”

  Miranda laid a hand on her arm. “Honey, I’m not going to tell you want to do, it’s not my place. But if it were me, I would talk to him. For your own peace of mind. You deserve to get what you want. We both do.”

  “What if I don’t know what I want?”

  “Well then maybe it’s time you figure it out.”

  * * *

  Despite her good intentions, two weeks passed and Holly still hadn’t been able to bring herself to confront Jason about their relationship. And it was beginning to wear on her. He gave no sign that he saw their relationship as anything but a permanent one, yet those times when it would have been natural to say I love you, all she ever got was silence. She loved him. She loved him more than she thought it was possible to love another person. Not the way she loved her boys, of course. There was no love, no greater connection than that of a mother and child. She would happily lay down her life for them. They were a part of her, an extension of herself, and that would never change. But that didn’t mean her love for Jason was any less intense, any less real. The question was did he share that love? As much as she wanted to know, she was still afraid to ask.

  They never talked about the future. Once, in an attempt to introduce the subject, she’d asked him where he saw himself in ten years. He had laughed and said, “Hopefully alive,” making a joke out of the question. He liked to keep things light and not bother her with anything regarding his health.

  Then she’d found out that he saw his cardiologist on a monthly basis, when he was in the city on business. And until she saw Jason swallow literally a handful of pills one morning, she hadn’t even realized he took that much medication. It was a reminder that although he was healthy as a horse now, there might come a time when he wasn’t. But as difficult as that would be to accept, she was in this for the long haul. Sick or healthy, she loved him and wanted to be with him.

  In early September Jason coaxed her into leaving the boys with Faye for a long weekend and flying with him to his condo in Mexico.

  “I want us to have a special weekend together,” he’d said. “Just you and me.”

  Of course her first thought had been that he wanted to get her alone so he could propose. But to spare her heart the possible disappointment, she’d tried to convince herself she was making assumptions. Once the seed of the idea was planted, it began to grow out of control. Then this morning, on the day before they left, he’d told her that when they were in Mexico he had a big surprise for her. What else could it be but a proposal?

  She and Miranda went shopping for a few last minute items such as summer clothes that actually fit, and with the summer clearance sales, Holly got them for a steal. She kept telling herself that she needed to get up off her increasingly expanding butt and exercise. And lay off the potato chips. But she couldn’t work up the enthusiasm. According to Jason, he liked her body a little fuller, and she was sexy no matter what size. But sexy enough to marry?

  “I have some good news,” Miranda told her while they were having lunch.

  Miranda had finally worked up the courage to confront Lewis about their marriage, and told him to man up or get out. And Lewis had said he wasn’t going anywhere. Since then things had been steadily improving, and Miranda was back to being her cheerful, positive self. They had even begun the process for foreign adoption. The last Holly had heard, they had completed the application and were waiting to do a home visit with the agency.

  “Did you get an appointment for your home visit?” Holly asked her.

  “Not yet, but it’s looking as if we might not have to.”

  “You haven’t changed your mind?”

  “No, not at all,” Miranda said, a huge smile crossing her fire-red bow lips. “And we might be getting a baby a whole lot sooner than we thought.”

  Holly blinked. “How?”

  “One of the partners at Lewis’s firm has a granddaughter who is pregnant and looking for a couple to adopt her baby.”

  “No way!”

  “She’s eighteen, she graduated high school top of her class and plans to attend college in the fall. Pre-med at USC. The pregnancy was totally unexpected, of course, and Lewis’s partner said she wants to do right by the baby.”

  “What about the father?”

  “Still in high school and definitely not ready to be a dad. His parents are all for the adopti
on.”

  “That’s wonderful! When will you know for sure?”

  “We talked on the phone and they both seem like extremely levelheaded kids. We’re meeting the expectant mother and her boyfriend and their parents tomorrow. I’ve never been so excited or so nervous in my life. If they don’t like us—”

  “Miranda, they are going to love you. I can’t think of two people more deserving or more qualified to be parents.”

  “They want an open adoption, meaning we would send them occasional letters and pictures, and they might even meet the baby in the future, which freaks me out a little, but they would leave that up to her to decide.”

  “Her?”

  Miranda smiled, barely able to contain her excitement. “She’s having a girl. Four weeks from now I could have a daughter!”

  “Oh, my gosh! That is soon.”

  “But I am so ready. If this does work out and we sign the agreement, I only have a month to get everything I need.”

  “It sounds like we’ll be having that baby shower after all,” Holly told her. Which wouldn’t give her long to plan, but she would manage.

  “I’m afraid to get my hopes up, but I just have a really good feeling about this. We offered to reimburse her for all her medical and living expenses, but she doesn’t want money. She just wants to know that her baby will go to people who will love and take care of her.”

  “In that case it sounds like a perfect match.”

  “I really hope so.”

  As they finished their lunch the talk turned to baby matters such as which was the best brand of diapers and what color to paint the baby’s room, pink or gender nonspecific.

  After lunch they were walking back to Miranda’s car when they passed a boutique with bathing suits on sale. “I should really get a new one,” Holly told Miranda. The one-piece that had been so loose on her in June was now scandalously small. Not only was her butt expanding, but her breasts were, too, so much so that she’d gone up an entire bra size.