Stargazing (The Walker Family Book 2)

by Bernadette Marie

  All the better, she thought. She didn’t need anyone to ask her questions.

  Walking into the house, she went straight for the kitchen. She pulled down a mug and filled it with water. There wasn’t time in her mind to wait to boil water for tea any other way than to put it in the microwave.

  She watched it as it went around and around in circles and thought it mimicked her life so much. Short bursts of energy running around and around until everything exploded.

  All of it hurt so bad, she could hardly breathe.

  Inside of her, she felt as though she were screaming in the silent house. Was this bravery? Bravery to admit she needed help? Sure, but cowardly to want to leave and find help. Above all else she simply didn’t want to hurt anyone else in her life. And, she didn’t want to be hurt anymore.

  When the microwave buzzed in completion, she carefully pulled the mug out and inserted a tea bag from the canister on the counter. By now Kent had to know she was gone. If she turned on her phone, she’d probably find a dozen calls from him.

  If he tried to follow her home, she’d be gone before he got there. Right now she was going to head up to her room. Draw a warm bath, drink her tea, and pack her belongings. She’d leave very early tomorrow morning and head to Atlanta. She’d get a hotel room, research rehab facilities, and get her life in order.

  She closed her bedroom door and went to the bathroom to start the bathtub. Undressing, she kicked her clothes toward the door. She’d pack them last.

  She opened the now nearly empty cabinet behind the mirror. Her toothbrush, toothpaste, deodorant, razor, and the bath salts remained.

  Taking the salts, she sprinkled them into the tub. The scent of lavender filled the air and the tension in her body began to ease.

  A few candles would be nice too, she thought. As she turned around, she dropped the container of salts into the tub, splashing water all over the floor.

  Her mood must have lightened slightly, because she actually laughed. She mopped up most of the water that had splashed out onto the floor with the floor mat, put on her robe, and went out into her bedroom to find the candles she had in the drawer.

  She’d kept them in the drawer of the nightstand, next to her bed. She’d bought them in a cute boutique in town owned by a young Italian woman, whom she’d found very charming.

  Bethany pulled open the drawer, saw the candles, and the last remaining bottle of her mother’s pills.

  Clenching her hands tightly, she stared down into the drawer. It was if they were sharp or poisonous. She didn’t want to put her hand inside and pull them out, but she had to. They had to be disposed of—destroyed.

  Taking a deep breath, Bethany reached in and pulled the bottle out of the drawer.

  They were sleeping pills. She should have remembered they were there, but it had slipped her mind.

  Bethany hurried to the bathroom. They had to be flushed. They had to be sent away where she’d never, ever see them again.

  As she walked through the door, she twisted the top off the bottle. The water was near to the top of the tub and she reached over to turn it off. The floor was still wet and the floor mat bunched under her feet, sending Bethany and the bottle of pills backward. Her back hit the side of the toilet and then her head hit. Pills flew all around her as her head bounced on the floor.

  Bethany looked up at the lights which seemed very bright now, meekly she tried to yell for help though no one was around. The lights seemed to fan out and then grew darker and darker.

  ~*~

  Kent sat on the edge of his bed, his phone in his hand. He hated that he’d sent Susan into hysterics when he’d told her that Bethany had rented a car and left without a word. Explaining what had happened and adding the information he’d found about Dez Armstrong online, he was sick to his stomach wondering what the man had done to her once to cause her to have this kind of reaction.

  Susan had promised she’d call the moment she had word on Bethany. They’d been out at the new house. It would take them nearly an hour to get home, but she’d call.

  So now he waited.

  His sister Skyped and thankfully hadn’t given him any crap about Bethany and what kind of woman she was. Instead she said, “I hope she’s okay. Mom is looking forward to meeting her.”

  “She hasn’t done her homework online yet? The Internet hasn’t ruined Bethany for her?”

  “You’re not being nice. Yes, she’s found out a lot about her and she feels sorry for her. She’s not as shallow as you make her out to be.”

  He pinched the bridge of his nose. “I just don’t want people making opinions about her based on what the tabloids or the Internet has said. She’s not that person…really.” He wished he hadn’t added that, but his sister was bound to find out about the true Bethany if he ever found her and got her to agree to stay with him.

  He’d ended the call with his sister, ordered room service, and paced. If he didn’t hear from Susan soon, he was going to jump in the car and…

  His phone rang.

  “Hello,” his voice broke as he answered.

  “It’s Susan,” she said, but her voice cracked. Was she crying?

  “Do you have her? Did she make it home?” He was on his feet.

  “Um, yeah. She was home,” he heard her voice shake again. Something was wrong. This wasn’t a calm oh, yeah she’s home phone call.

  “Susan, what’s going on?”

  Now he could hear the crying. “We got home. She was there. She was in the bathroom. The tub was full.”

  Kent gripped his chest as his heart was already breaking and the pain was excruciating. Did she have to finish the sentence?

  Susan cleared her throat. “She was on the floor. There was blood. She hit her head. And pills. Pills were everywhere.”

  Kent’s throat closed off and he was barely able to muster the words, “Is she dead?”

  Her mother’s tragedy played in his head vividly as if he were there the day Bethany had found her.

  “No. No,” she said again with more vigor. “She’s in the hospital. They won’t let me see her. They let her father in, but he’s the only one.”

  Kent went straight for the closet, pulled out his suitcase, and began shoving things into it as Susan gasped for breath.

  “I didn’t know it was this bad,” she said.

  “I have a feeling that someone from her past might have run into her today and sent her over the edge.” He cursed under his breath. “I thought she gave me all the pills.”

  “I don’t know. They were sleeping pills and they were her mother’s,” Susan confirmed. “She must have dropped them because they were all over.”

  “I’m headed out. I’ll be there in less than five hours.”

  ~*~

  Bethany winced at the lights when the doctor shined them in her eyes.

  “Pupils are looking better. She needs to stay under watch, though. That was a nasty fall.”

  Someone squeezed her hand and when she turned she saw her father there. “How are you feeling?”

  She tried to talk but found her throat was raw. “Horrible.”

  “Bethany,” the other man directed her attention to him. “We’ve done some blood work and as a precautionary measure, since you were unconscious, we pumped your stomach. You had no sign of drugs in your system, but there were sleeping pills found next to you. Did you take those pills, Bethany?”

  Her father squeezed her hand again.

  “No,” her voice was weak. “No. I flushed them.”

  Her father leaned in. “No, honey. The bottle was in your hand and there were pills everywhere. You were in your robe and the tub was full.”

  She tried to move, but her head throbbed. She lifted her hand to feel it, but it was full of wires and lines of fluid poked into her skin.

  She focused on her father. “I went home to relax. I left Kent in Alabama.” She winced. Kent. It was a horrible way to end things, just to leave him as she had. “I came home to pack. I wanted to drive to Atl
anta and check into a rehab center.”

  “Rehab? Why?”

  Bethany turned away. “I didn’t want to turn into my mother,” she said softly.

  “Oh, honey. You’re nothing like your mother.”

  “I need help, Dad.” She turned back to him. “Or I’ll die too.”

  The doctor looked at the monitors. “You didn’t take any of the pills then?”

  “No.” She swallowed to moisten her throat. “I found the last bottle in a drawer. I was going to flush them. I must have slipped and fallen.”

  “You hit your head. We got it stitched up. X-rays didn’t show internal bleeding. Perhaps this afternoon, if your numbers stay up, we can send you home.”

  “No,” she said, wishing she had the energy to sit up. “I can’t go home. I need help. Please help me.”

  The doctor smiled. “I’ll have a counselor come in and discuss rehab options with you.”

  “Thank you,” she said as she eased against the bed.

  As soon as the doctor left the room her father leaned in and kissed her cheek. He’d never done that before, she realized.

  “I’m proud of you. It takes a very strong woman to ask for help like that.”

  “I’m not strong. I’m weak. That’s why I took them. That’s why I don’t eat. I need my life back.” She took a breath. “I want to change my name to Walker,” she said. “I don’t want to be who I was.”

  Now her father was smiling. “Okay, we’ll talk about all of that when you’re all better.”

  ~*~

  Kent rushed into the hospital and stopped immediately. The entire lobby was full of people and some of them he knew. The others he assumed were the rest of Bethany’s family.

  Susan saw him first and ran to him, wrapping her arms around him and sobbing on his shoulder.

  “She’s okay. She’s going to be okay.”

  He eased her back, holding onto her arms. “How many pills did she take?”

  A man walked up next to them. “She didn’t take any. She was trying to flush them away when she fell.”

  Susan stepped back as the man held his hand out to Kent. “Byron Walker,” he introduced himself.

  “Kent Black, sir. I’m a friend of Bethany’s. Well, I’m more than a friend, sir. We’ve been seeing each other. Though I don’t know if we still are. She left me in Alabama, but I love your daughter. I really do. And…”

  Byron Walker laughed and placed his hand on Kent’s shoulder. “She said when you’re nervous you ramble.”

  “Yes, sir. I do.” He swallowed hard. “She told you about me?”

  The man smiled. “She did. She’s not going to see you now.”

  “Oh. Well, I understand.”

  “Let’s take a walk.”

  Kent nodded and followed Byron out the front door of the hospital. Byron stood on the front step and tucked his hands into his front pockets.

  “Everything about this is like her mother,” he said.

  “I’m not sure she’d like to hear you say that,” Kent added, hoping he hadn’t overstepped his boundary.

  “She wouldn’t. But the things I see in her are the good things about her mother. Not the bad things she saw.”

  “Oh. With all due respect, I haven’t heard a lot of good things about her mother.”

  “I wouldn’t suppose you would.” He turned to him and looked him square in the eye. “You love her.”

  “More than anything. I’m just not sure she feels the same way.”

  Her father nodded and then clucked his tongue. “I wouldn’t say that. I think she’s confused and afraid she’ll hurt you.”

  “It hurts knowing she wouldn’t be around me for that reason.”

  Bryon gave him a nod and then began to walk. Kent quickly followed. They were silent until they rounded the side of the building.

  “She asked me to put her in rehab. She said that had been her plan.”

  “That’s a brave thing. To ask for help.”

  Her father smiled, his head still lowered and his eyes to the ground as they walked. “That’s what I told her.”

  “Can I visit her? I want her to know I support her. In fact, on my drive here, I called that producer, the one I think set her off, and told him he could kiss my ass. I’d never let one of my books be produced into Hollywood crap by him.”

  Bryon stopped. “You turned down a movie deal for her?”

  “I don’t know anything about their relationship. Maybe she didn’t even know him, but something told me it was a bad deal. I couldn’t let her be around that.”

  Byron turned to him. “She didn’t say much about him, but I think a lot of her pain stems from him and others like him.”

  “Then my books remain books. There’s no need for people to see movies made by people who hurt people.”

  Her father studied him. “I like you.”

  “Oh, good.” He let out a breath he’d held and didn’t know it. “I just want her to.”

  Byron began to walk again and Kent kept his slowed pace.

  “She’ll be in the rehab center for a month and has asked that no one knows where she is and no one visits.”

  “Okay, though that’s going to kill me.”

  “I think too much of her mother is still following her and she doesn’t need it leaked anywhere.”

  “I understand.”

  Byron ran his hand over the back of his neck. “She wants to change her name to Walker too. She should have been a Walker from the day she was born,” he said with a hint of regret vibrating in his voice.

  “She is a Walker. I see the dynamic the family has. She fits in.”

  “Yes, she does.”

  This time Kent stopped and after a few steps Bryan turned and stopped. “Sir, I think Walker is a fine name. She’d wear it well, but when she’s out, I’d like to ask her to consider changing her name to Black.”

  Byron walked toward him and stood nearly toe to toe with him. Though he was shorter, Kent was horribly intimated by him.

  “You want to marry her?”

  “Yes, sir. That’s been my intent all along.”

  “What if she says no?”

  “Then she should be a Walker. I won’t leave though until she asks me to.”

  The smile resurfaced. “In one month, when she’s out, you let me know what she decides. Either way, I think I’d like to see that name changed.”

  From the first time since Beth had sat down in the corner of the coffee shop yesterday and began to pen her story, Kent smiled. Perhaps this saga wasn’t over just yet.

  Epilogue

  Bethany looked at herself in the mirror of the room in which she’d spent the past month. She was ten pounds healthier and it showed in the bright yellow, flowered dress she wore. For the first time, she didn’t judge herself on that merit. She just looked beautiful, she thought.

  Her hair was brighter too and she gave it a toss over her shoulder. She was glad that Susan had given the dress to her father to bring to her to wear home.

  Over the course of the month, she’d done a lot of growing and a lot of forgiving. Violet Waterbury would have greatly benefitted from such an opportunity. Bethany was grateful she’d been able to take control of her own life. Who’s to say things would have gotten better even though she’d decided on rehab? Maybe if she’d taken that bath and headed out of town, she’d never have looked back. Maybe she’d to be dead now.

  That wasn’t the kind of thinking she was programmed with now though. No, this Bethany had a new outlook on things. She was a positive and successful woman, who would always attend meetings to remind herself just how far she’d come.

  Though through it all she couldn’t help but think of Kent and wonder what he’d ever done after she’d left him. Surely Dez Armstrong had signed his movie deal and things would be moving in a wonderful direction for Kent. He deserved success. He was extremely talented.

  A nurse tapped on her door and she saw her in the mirror.

  “I like that dress, Ms. Wat
erbury.”

  “Ms. Walker, please.”

  “Right.” The nurse walked in and stood by the bed where her suitcase sat. “Are you ready to go?”

  Bethany took in a deep breath and gave herself, and the nurse, a nod in the mirror.

  “I actually think I am.”

  The walk down the hallway was a long one. On the other side of those doors was the world she’d been locked away from for a month. It had been her choice, but the controlled atmosphere inside was easier to navigate.

  “The doctor is going to sign your release forms and send you on your way,” she said opening the door to a conference room. “Just wait in here for a few moments.”

  Bethany walked into the room and set her suitcase on the floor. As the nurse said, the doctor came in a few minutes later, signed the papers, and gave her final instructions.

  “Above all else, you call us if you need anything. Even if it’s just a reassuring voice to get you through a meal.”

  Bethany nodded.

  “I think your ride is here. Let me go get them.”

  Bethany tucked the papers into her purse and stood to gather her suitcase. Her father had been her only contact and he’d promised to pick her up on this, her release day.

  When the door opened, she looked up and felt her mouth absolutely fall open.

  Standing before her was Kent, suit coat, loose tie, and hair much too long. In his hands, he carried a huge bouquet of daisies and a gift bag dangled from his wrist.

  “My sister said these would be a welcome flower. As in welcome out, welcome home, welcome…” He stopped and dropped his shoulders. “Bethany, you look amazing.”

  “Why are you here? Where is my father?”

  “He’s just outside. I can get him. I didn’t know if you’d want to see me or not, so…”

  She didn’t let him finish his thought. She dove at him and kissed him so hard on the mouth they both fell over and into the wall. With a laugh, she pulled back, the daisy petals falling to the ground.

  “Sorry.”

  “Oh, God, don’t be. I guess you’re okay that I’m here?”