The Color of a Promise (The Color of Heaven Series Book 11)

by Julianne MacLean

  Thankful. The rational part of my brain knew he was right, but I was not concerned with my future in that moment, for nothing seemed the least bit relevant outside the tremendous pain I was in now. Not just the physical pain, but the knowledge that Paul, who had been my closest friend over the past two years, had not survived the accident. Nor had the other two soldiers who were driving in the Hummer with us. I was the only one they had been able to pull from the wreck.

  Naturally, I wondered why.

  Why me, and not them?

  o0o

  “Why are you here?” I asked Aaron after the doctor left us alone in the private ICU room.

  I hadn’t meant to be rude, nor was I trying to pick a fight with my brother. I simply found it odd that he, of all people, was the person who had come.

  “Mom and Dad are on their way,” he explained. “They got on the first flight out of Chicago as soon as they heard, but I was in Amsterdam. I was closest.”

  My brother owned a successful boatbuilding company based in Maine, with offices and factories all over the world, so he traveled a lot. He was known mostly for his champion racing schooners, and he was a multi-millionaire, married to the woman I had once wanted for myself.

  That was Katelyn. The one who had the cycling accident, whose life flashed before her eyes.

  “Is Katelyn coming, too?” I asked, hoping the answer would be no, because I didn’t want her to see me like this.

  I told myself it was not because I was still in love with her. I had worked hard over the past two years to accept that she and Aaron would always be together, and that I had to move on. But she was the reason I had requested this long-term assignment in Afghanistan—because I couldn’t bear to watch them together, so unbelievably happy.

  I believe Katelyn was well aware of my reason for leaving. Aaron didn’t know about this, but when I left the country, she rushed to the airport at the last minute to see me off and hug me tight. She had cried and told me to take care of myself and stay safe. She never wrote to me after that. I believe she knew I needed time and space to forget her and move on.

  I imagined she was feeling pretty guilty right now.

  “No,” Aaron replied. “She can’t fly.” He gestured with his hands, indicating the size of her belly. “She’s due in a month.”

  I breathed deeply, while my heart thumped heavily in my chest.

  “Listen, Jack…” Aaron said, bowing his head and slowly shaking it. “I’m really sorry this happened to you. When I got the call, I was scared you weren’t going to make it.” His eyes lifted, and in them, I saw a look of regret. A desire to say he was sorry for all the times we fought—both in this life and in others.

  Strangely, I felt nothing as he spoke. No sudden wish to bury the hatchet. No burning desire to become best friends with him, at long last. As far as I was concerned, nothing had changed. There was simply too much water under the bridge, too many horrendous conflicts in the past that could never be erased. Things I couldn’t even speak of now.

  “I know we’ve never been close,” Aaron continued, “and we’ve been at each other’s throats for most of our lives, but you’re still my baby brother, and I want you to know that I’m here for you…whatever you need. We all want you to come home, Jack. Katelyn wants that, too. You know she thinks the world of you—she always has—and she’d like for our children to know their uncle. I want that, too. If we could just…”

  I was afraid he was going to bring up those old conflicts and try again to work things out, but there was no point. There was nothing he could say to make me understand where he was coming from. And hadn’t we agreed, years ago, not to talk about it, because it was another life? We were not the same people.

  Thankfully, he didn’t go there.

  “If we could just…start over,” he said.

  Even with the heavy dose of morphine I had been given, the physical pain in every part of my body had not abated, and for that reason, I could not feel sympathy for Aaron’s regrets—if that’s what they were—nor could I make any decisions about my future. I simply could not think. I was too focused on enduring the throbbing agony in my leg, my arm, and the burns on my left side.

  Although…for Aaron to say that we had never been close was the understatement of the century. I closed my eyes, supposing that my accident had been a wakeup call for him, too. It had forced him to consider how fragile life was. Obviously, he wanted to mend what was broken between us. But the last thing I wanted was to return home to the United States in this mangled condition, with a great deal of suffering ahead of me, and have to watch, up close, his perfect life with the woman I had always wanted.

  Always.

  “I appreciate the sentiment,” I said, clenching my teeth and feeling the weight of this conversation take a toll on me, both physically and emotionally, “but I need to rest.”

  The burns on my side were excruciating, and all the cuts, bruises and swelling on my face made it difficult to speak.

  “Of course,” Aaron replied, sitting back in his chair. “I’ll leave you in peace.”

  Peace? I wished there could have been peace, but there was only the constant hammering agony in my body and troubling thoughts of my friend Paul and the two American soldiers who had perished, while I, for some reason, had been spared.

  I was no stranger to loss, but I wish I had known, in that moment, about the extraordinary events that were looming just over the horizon, and the miracle that was about to touch my life. It might have made the pain of those first few days easier to bear.

  Chapter Nine

  My parents arrived in Germany that night and came straight to the hospital from the airport. They cried when they walked into the ICU and saw me in bed with my arm in a cast, my leg in traction, and a face looking like someone had taken a sledgehammer to it.

  I tried to assure them that I was fine and my wounds would heal. “It’s not too painful,” I lied.

  My mother said, “Your guardian angel must have been watching over you.”

  My guardian angel… Maybe that was so.

  After the initial shock wore off, my parents sat down next to Aaron and began to chat with me about everyday things, obviously trying to cheer me up and make me feel as if my life would soon return to normal. Mom told me about her garden at the summer house in Cape Elizabeth. She said things like, ‘Just wait until you see my cucumbers, Jack. You’ll be amazed.’

  Dad spoke about Great Aunt Norma and her new flame. He was a younger man—only eighty-two. I tried to laugh politely when they called her a cradle robber, but it hurt too much.

  Then Mom and Dad fell silent for a few seconds and exchanged a look, as if silently consulting about whether or not they should tell me something in particular.

  “What is it?” I asked.

  When they continued to hesitate, I said, “Seriously, after what I’ve been through, I can take anything.”

  My father inclined his head and raised an eyebrow. “I don’t know, Jack. This might freak you out a bit. It’s nothing bad…”

  I gestured with a hand, and felt very aware of the oxygen monitor clamped to my forefinger, and the tubes dangling everywhere. “You can’t say something like that, Dad, and not tell me what it is.”

  My father glanced at my mother for direction, and she merely shrugged, as if to suggest they had no choice but to confess. “He’s going to hear about it eventually.”

  Dad sat forward in his chair, rested his elbows on his knees, and cupped his hands together. “She’s right, so we might as well spill the beans.”

  He glanced at Aaron, who shrugged a shoulder and said, “Go ahead.”

  Dad looked at me. “All right, Jack. Here it is in a nutshell. At this moment, you’re probably the biggest celebrity in the United States of America.”

  I frowned. “What do you mean?”

  Dad struggled to find a way to explain. “Well…you see… The roadside bomb has been the top story on every news station for the past two days. CNN especially, s
ince you’re one of their journalists. Everyone’s grieving for the soldiers who died, and the whole country has been praying for you to come through. They’ve been replaying a number of your segments about the war, going over your career. Remember when you saved that injured woman who was covered in blood? You dropped your microphone and risked your life to carry her away from an explosion. And remember the time you intervened when that young girl was being beaten by her father in the street? How you shouted at her father and you didn’t back down? They’ve been playing all of it, and they’ve even been talking to people that know you from high school. I don’t know how those pictures got out—we certainly didn’t share anything—but they have images from that Shakespeare play you were in, where you played Romeo.”

  “Oh, God.” I rolled my eyes. “That was eleventh grade.”

  “You were so wonderful in that,” Mom gushed.

  Inside, I didn’t know what to make of all this. Whatever was happening in the United States felt like fiction to me. All I knew were the four walls of this hospital room and my constant pain. I could barely respond.

  “Jack?” Dad said. “Did you hear what I just said?”

  “Yes,” I replied. “But I’m sure it’ll all blow over when the next big news story hits. That’s how it works. They’ll forget about me in a few days.” And that would be fine with me. I just wanted to be left alone to recover.

  Mom, Dad and Aaron shared a look.

  “Even if they do move on to another story,” Mom said, “isn’t it nice to know that so many people are praying for you right now? I wish you could see it, Jack. There’s been such an outpouring of love.” She pointed at the window. “And the press is here. They’re outside the hospital right now, waiting for news about you.”

  Dad spoke up. “It’s all over the Internet. The constant prayers… Millions of people, Jack. It’s truly unbelievable. Would you like us to set up a laptop so you can see what’s happening?”

  Mom shot him a look and spoke quietly, as if I wouldn’t be able to hear her scolding him. “Stan. Not yet. I don’t want him seeing those images from the bombing. Let’s wait until tomorrow.”

  Part of me didn’t want to see them either, but because I was a newsman, I told Dad to open his laptop.

  o0o

  It wasn’t easy to look at—the disturbing images of the smashed-up, burned-out Hummer. All I could think about was that three lives had been lost, and the wonder surrounding my survival. How was it even possible? Had I been thrown from the vehicle somehow? How had I escaped the horrors of what the others must have endured?

  I devoured every detail I could find, needing to know exactly what happened, while praying that Paul and the other two soldiers had not suffered in their final moments.

  No wonder this was getting so much coverage back home. My survival did feel like a miracle.

  Mom then showed me a few clips about candlelight vigils over the past twenty-four hours, as Americans prayed for me. My colleagues at CNN interviewed doctors and experts, where they discussed the extent of my injuries and the likelihood of a full recovery. All of this was interspersed with images and information about my professional and personal life. It was never ending, along with the homage paid to the others who had died.

  I then clicked on a recent link that showed my doctor outside this very hospital, letting the reporters know that I was conscious and no longer in critical condition. He answered questions about my injuries and asked that our privacy, as a family, be respected. He thanked everyone for their interest and their prayers…

  An hour later, the phone rang next to my bed, and it turned out to be a very surprising call.

  Chapter Ten

  I don’t remember much about the conversation outside of the main points. I wish I had been a bit more coherent, but the morphine was still powerful in my system.

  When I hung up, I blinked a few times and let my head fall back on the pillows, wondering if I had just dreamed that.

  “Who was it?” Mom asked, recognizing that it was something significant.

  I lifted my head off the pillow. “It was the president of CNN. He wanted to tell me personally how sorry he was about what happened.”

  “Isn’t that nice,” Mom said, reaching for Dad’s hand and squeezing it.

  “What else did he say?” Dad asked, knowing there was more.

  I cleared my throat and let out a breath of disbelief. “He just offered me my own show. A full hour during prime time. He wants me to cover the hottest news stories of the day and go on location for the big stuff.”

  “No kidding!” Dad said. “Jack, that’s incredible.”

  “He said I’ve been on their radar for a while, and that my interviewing skills were top notch, but with all the publicity I’ve been getting, he thinks now’s the time to launch me. He also asked if I’d be interested in being part of a documentary about what happened to me in Afghanistan—the bomb and my recovery.”

  “What would that involve?” Mom asked.

  I was still thinking about whether or not I wanted to do it. I wasn’t sure.

  “A camera crew would come to the hospital and start right away, to interview me and stay with me over the next few weeks. I’m not sure about that part, because who would want to see me groaning? But he said the world wants to know me. And he wants me to start the show as soon as I’m able. But they’re willing to wait, however long I need.”

  Mom got up, approached the bed and kissed me on the cheek. “No matter what you decide, it’s a wonderful compliment. I’m proud of you.”

  “Will you do it, Jack?” Dad asked. “Will you take the job?”

  “I told them that I’d think about it, but what’s there to think about? The last thing he told me was the salary.”

  Mom’s eyebrows lifted. “Will you get a raise?”

  I laughed and realized it was the first time I’d cracked a smile since I woke up. “He said there’s room for negotiation, but that it won’t be less than seven figures annually, plus perks, including an apartment in New York until I find my own place. He said I’ll be impressed with the view. Oh…and a full time driver.”

  Dad began to nod his head with a smile. “That all sounds pretty awesome.”

  I nodded in agreement. “Yes. It makes me want to get out of this bed right now and get back on my feet.”

  My dad stood up from his chair, approached the bed, and squeezed my hand. “You always were a fighter, Jack. I’ve never been more proud.”

  Aaron stood up as well and said with a nod, “Congratulations, Jack. Well deserved.”

  It was probably the first time in my life that I actually felt the past slip away and disappear completely. In that moment, Aaron was just my brother. Nothing more.

  o0o

  That night, after my parents left the hospital to check in at their hotel, I went to sleep thinking about what my mother had said when she first arrived—that my guardian angel must have been watching over me.

  I couldn’t help but float backwards in my mind to when I was just a boy of thirteen. I thought of Millicent Davenport and the year we spent together, and how my life was forever altered by our friendship.

  We were never able to watch that movie, Audrey Rose, because when we returned to her house after building the first wall of our clubhouse, Millicent learned terrible news—that her grandmother in Arizona had just passed away.

  I stood in the Davenport’s kitchen, feeling like an intruder as they all wept and held each other. But then Millicent turned to me, strode across the floor, and threw her arms around my neck. She cried on my shoulder, and I held her tight.

  The next day, I rode my bike to her house to say good-bye before they left for the airport.

  “Remember your promise,” she said to me in her bedroom, as she zipped up her suitcase. “You won’t finish the clubhouse without me. You’ll wait for me to come back.”

  “I will.”

  I couldn’t believe she was going to be gone for two whole weeks. How would I l
ive?

  A short while later, I walked with her out the front door, carrying her suitcase for her. She paused on the sidewalk next to their minivan, put her hands on my shoulders and whispered in my ear, “Remember yesterday, when you said that you thought everyone was reincarnated?”

  I nodded.

  “Does that mean you think that I am, too?”

  “Probably,” I replied as I set her suitcase down on the curb.

  She glanced over her shoulder at her younger sister, who was already buckled into the back seat. Millicent leaned closer and whispered in my ear again: “Did we know each other in a past life?”

  I drew back and frowned at her for a moment, straining to remember. “I don’t know,” I replied. “I only remember little snippets of things every once in a while, but I kind of feel like this is the first time we’ve met. I don’t feel that ‘familiar’ thing with you.”

  “Oh.” Looking disappointed, she lowered her gaze. “I thought maybe we were soul mates or something.”

  I felt a rush of exhilaration at the suggestion, followed by the same flutter of nervous butterflies I had felt with Jeannie Morrison the previous fall. Suddenly, I found myself admiring Millicent’s wavy, golden hair and thinking of how much I loved the dimples on both sides of her mouth when she smiled. Although she was not smiling now.

  Not wanting her to leave town feeling disappointed, I said, “Maybe we are. Or maybe it’s just new, and we’ve only just met for the first time.”

  Her sad eyes lifted, and she smiled at last. My heart pounded faster, and I wished she weren’t leaving. All I wanted to do was go back to the clubhouse and talk to her about things I never talked about with other people.

  “Yes,” she said, “it must be new.” Then she kissed me quickly on the cheek and turned away, picking up her suitcase to throw into the back of the van.