Serendipity

by Fern Michaels

  “Don’t worry, this will cure me for the next hundred years. It is good for you though, admit it. How’d Woo do today?” Ross asked, to change the subject.

  “It’s hard to watch my feet, breathe, and talk too, Ross,” Jory muttered. “I wanted him to stay in the house so I could help him and watch him, but he wouldn’t. I made up the fires and carried in the logs. I took dinner over. He didn’t seem to want me to linger, so I didn’t. He has the house phone number and can call me if he needs me. I think he was pretending to read a law book. It was nice of you to get him a television. The therapist comes tomorrow. I can call you and let you know how it goes,” Jory said breathlessly.

  “Okay, we’re finished,” Ross said, his voice full of relief. “Sit down and I’ll take off your skates. Should we throw them away now or later?”

  “God, do it now. I want to see you do it, Ross, because I don’t ever want to have to do this again.”

  Ross tossed the skates into a barrel at the entrance to the pond. “I’m sorry, I thought it might be fun, you know, an experience. I wanted to spend time with you. Would you like to go someplace to get some hot chocolate or coffee?” Ross asked hopefully.

  “I’d love some. The dogs miss you. After you left, they kind of scrunched up by the front door. I think they thought you were coming back. They’ve been in the carriage house with Pete since dinnertime. I thought they’d be company for him.”

  “What about you, did you miss me too?”

  Jory chose her words carefully. “Of course. The house seemed very quiet after you left. I allowed myself to depend on you. I shouldn’t have done that. It’s not that I don’t appreciate what you’ve done. I do. If it wasn’t for you forcing me to help myself, I’d probably still be sitting there sucking my thumb. I’m very grateful to you. I wish there was something I could do for you. I’m not a taker, Ross. I don’t like to be beholden or obligated.”

  A long time later, after they’d driven to the house in Chestnut Hill, Jory said, “It was a nice evening, Ross, despite our inability to whiz around the pond. I felt so darn old out there.”

  Ross chuckled softly. They were in front of her door, the soft yellow light of the carriage lamp casting them in golden shadows. He wanted to kiss her, to have her melt in his arms, to whisper words that meant he was to come inside and upstairs. Instead he said, “I wasn’t going to come back here unless I was invited. To see Woo, yes, but I wasn’t going to invade your privacy. Tonight seemed . . . the truth is, Jory, I missed you and the dogs. I allowed myself to feel like I belonged here. I didn’t want to leave this morning. Part of me wanted you to ask me to stay, and the other part of me wanted to trench in and tell you I was staying. I know you feel something for me, just the way I feel something for you. I told you I loved you, and I meant it.”

  “Have you ever been in love before, Ross? You know, that heart-stopping feeling that your world won’t be right unless the person you love is right next to you?”

  Ross stared down at her eyes. “Not till now. That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you. I’m new to this. Heart-stopping is a good way to describe what I’m feeling. My world is almost right-side up. It would be perfect if you were in it. I’m not that same person I was years ago. Thank God for that. Why can’t we act on our feelings? Why can’t we set it all aside and start new? You said you forgave me, but you couldn’t forget. What will it take to make you forget that awful time in our lives?”

  “I don’t know, Ross. I wish I did. I want to trust you, I really do, but . . . I guess it’s my own insecurities. You have to understand, Ross, it was a terrible time for me. I used to walk down the beach in Florida to think and stare at the water for hours at a time. One particularly bad day I told myself I had nothing to live for, so I swam out as far as I could go. I was going to let the tide carry me . . . wherever. I didn’t want to live anymore. But the tide washed me to shore. That’s when I had to take a good, long, hard look at myself. I wish I had a rotten memory, but I don’t,” Jory said miserably.

  “Jesus, Jory, I’m sorry. I—”

  “Look, it was as much my fault as it was yours. I try to put it behind me, I really do. I wish there was another way to say this, but there isn’t. I’m afraid to trust you.”

  Ross cringed. “What you mean is you won’t let yourself trust me. What will it take to make you trust me? I’ll do it, Jory. I’ll turn cartwheels, stand on my head, strip naked in the courthouse at high noon.” How desperate his voice sounded, Ross thought.

  “None of those things, Ross. It’s me. It’s not a physical thing. I don’t know what it is. I can’t hold out a promise to you that maybe tomorrow I’ll feel differently. Maybe next week I’ll look at you and something will happen to me and I’ll rush to you saying I love you, I want you, I need you.” Her voice was full of anguish when she said, “I’ve tried so many times to figure out why I feel the way I do, and the only thing I can come up with is the miscarriage.”

  “And all I felt was relief that you miscarried,” Ross said quietly.

  “I know. Tonight when I saw all those little kids skating on the pond, I thought . . . our child would be five and a half years old. I know I would have made a good mother. Maybe not in the beginning, but later on, when I got the hang of things.”

  “We weren’t ready to be parents then, Jory. God . . . Woo says everything happens for a reason. He says God acts in mysterious ways. If we’d stayed together for the sake of a child, we probably would have ended up with a marriage like my parents’. Our child would have had a childhood like mine. I wouldn’t wish that on anyone. You and I would have hated each other. When you left, I felt like I was given back my life. But Jory, that was then, this is now.”

  Jory was lost in her memories. Then she said, “It’s a beautiful night, isn’t it, Ross? It’s so quiet you can hear yourself think. Isn’t it strange, growing up here, I never felt anything. Too young, I guess. Listen, I can hear the dogs yipping. They must know I’m home. The snow’s almost gone. The air is crisp and cold. A perfect evening.”

  “Are you going to go in and sit by the fire with the dogs and have cocoa?” Ross asked wistfully.

  “Not tonight. I have some work to finish, and one cup of cocoa a night is enough for me. I liked it with marshmallows, didn’t you?”

  “Hell yes.” At that moment he would have agreed to anything she said just to see the smile on her face.

  “ ’Night, Ross,” Jory said, reaching up to kiss him on his cheek.

  “Good night, Jory. Thanks for going skating with me. Tell Woo I’ll call him tomorrow to brief him on our first client.”

  How sad he looks, Jory thought as he walked away. How alone. She couldn’t let him go like this, she thought, not after all he’d done for her. She ran after him, calling his name. “Ross, wait.” She reached for him, took both his hands in hers. “I like you, Ross. I mean that sincerely. For a long time I loved you and hated you at the same time. I’m trying to be honest with you. Hug me, Ross,” she whispered.

  He did.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Jory kept her eye on the carriage house as she prepared lunch for herself. How had Pete made out with the physical therapist? The therapist had left thirty minutes ago; she’d heard his car in the driveway. She’d wanted to rush out, to check on Pete, until she remembered how limp and exhausted she’d been after her first session. She looked down at the sandwich fixings and made two extra. She would take over all three, and if he wanted company, they could eat together. She added a thermos to the grocery bag along with napkins and two Sno Balls for dessert.

  Should she take the dogs or not? No, she decided, Pete wouldn’t be in the mood for the dogs’ hijinks. They yapped their disapproval as Jory closed the kitchen door behind her.

  Jory knocked loudly on the door to the carriage house. “Pete, it’s me, Jory, I brought you some lunch.”

  “Door’s open,” he called.

  “How’d it go?” Jory asked. She didn’t look at him, not wanting to see his h
aggard face, the defeat in his eyes. She busied herself removing lunch from the bag and setting it on the paper plates she’d brought with her. “I have coffee here, but if you prefer soda pop, I can go back and get it. Ross said he was stocking your cupboards, but I didn’t check to see what he got. Knowing him, I don’t think he missed anything. He’s so . . . thorough. I’ve seen beavers when I was a kid at Draper’s Pond who weren’t half as busy as he’s been. He’s so worried about you, Pete. He feels responsible for your accident. Okay, here we go,” she said, setting the plate on a little table next to Woo’s chair.

  “My appetite’s off these days,” Woo said. “Maybe it was the hospital food.”

  “I brought my lunch too, but if you’d rather be alone . . .”

  “No, of course not. Stay, I like your company. How’s the column going? You aren’t sorry you confided in me, are you? I didn’t mention it to anyone. laughed myself silly in the hospital when I read Jasper Landers’s responses. He did a good job.”

  “He certainly did, which just goes to prove anyone can do what I’m doing. I thought I was unique, you know, one of a kind, dispensing advice no one else was capable of giving. I’m grateful I have a job and grateful to Jasper. It’s not what I want to do with the rest of my life, though.”

  “Ross and his father are getting along,” Woo said. “He seems in awe of the whole relationship. Mr. Landers came by to see me, and he seemed to be . . . different. He made me laugh so hard a couple of times with stories about the dogs I almost fell out of bed. He used the word ‘routine’ a dozen times. So I guess you could say that something good and positive came out of the accident. You and Ross are friends. Ross and his father are getting to know one another. Ross opened a business and included me in the partnership.”

  “And what about you, Pete?” Jory asked, biting into her chicken sandwich.

  “What about me? Well, my parents came to see me two weeks ago. I finally realized I had to tell them what happened. My father is very emotional. After all the crying, after all the recriminations, do you know what they said to me?” Jory shook her head. “They said,” Woo said tightly, “Ross will make things right I don’t think I wanted to hear that. They made it sound like this accident was Ross’s fault and it’s his duty to make things right It’s not that way at all.”

  “I know that, Pete. I think Ross would die if he couldn’t help. He had workmen here at dawn making sure everything that could be done to make you comfortable was done. It was all his idea, the new shower to accommodate your wheelchairs—he had them custom-made for you, one for the shower and one for regular use. He said there wasn’t anywhere you couldn’t go in that chair. He said it goes seven miles an hour. I like the whirlpool bath. Maybe sometime when I get stiff and achy I’ll ask to use it. When it’s damp or it rains, I start to ache. When you start going outside you’ll appreciate the ramps.”

  “It’s going to take me the rest of my life to pay him back,” Woo said.

  “Didn’t he give you a thirty-year deal like he gave me? I’m to pay ten dollars a month for thirty years. Listen, Pete, Ross had to . . . it was his way. He’s carrying a very heavy load. Neither of us is ever going to be able to convince him he wasn’t responsible for what happened to you. Like all of us, he needs to be needed. You won’t believe what he did to my house. My roofs been redone, I have a new back porch, a new floor, ramps, and all new windows. Oh, he told me to tell you he’s going to call you today.”

  “He did call,” Woo said, “early this morning, to tell me we had our first client and we made five dollars. His father is going to be doing the bookkeeping and handling the business end of it. Ross said he wanted my approval, so I gave it. Jasper Landers is an okay guy in my opinion.”

  “Yes, he is. When do you think you’ll be going in to the office?”

  “Whoa. That’s a long way off. I don’t even want to discuss it now.”

  As they were talking, Woo had absently reached for and eaten one sandwich, then another. Now he dabbed at his mouth with his napkin. “This was an unexpected pleasure, Jory. It was nice of you to do this. How are things with you and Ross?”

  “I don’t know how to answer that, Pete. Last night he showed up at the house and took me ice-skating. Double runners. Turns out he’s never skated, and I only did it once or twice when I was little. We more or less shuffled around on the ice, and when we were finished, Ross threw the skates away. I’m very grateful to Ross,” she said carefully.

  “Ross is a terrific guy. For a long time he’s had lots of demons chasing him, the biggest being a young woman named Jory. He seems to be coming into his own of late.”

  “Thanks to you, Pete,” Jory said.

  “You too, Jory. Everyone’s life seems to be on an even path but mine,” Woo said quietly.

  “Is that self-pity I hear in your voice, Pete?”

  “Probably,” Woo said curtly. “Have you taken a look at me? A good look?”

  Jory squirmed in her chair. “As a matter of fact I have. I see a man who’s lost forty pounds that needed to be lost. I see someone who is kind, generous, warmhearted, and a true friend. I see a man who is . . . temporarily laid low. A man who, with the help of his friends and the therapists and doctors, will be as good as new one of these days. I still limp, Pete, and I’ve accepted that when I get tired the limp will be more pronounced. There are a lot of things I can’t do as well as I did before. However—and this is the most important part—I no longer think of myself as a cripple. I did for a while. What are these poles with the hooks on them?”

  “Canes. There’s a name for them but I forgot what it is. Those circles or bands hook around my arms, and someday I may be able to walk using them. Actually, the word ‘walk’ is the therapist’s word. You sort of shuffle yourself along with the weight on your arms. The therapist is a very positive person. We do it to music. It makes it a little easier to bear.”

  Jory threw her arms around Woo. “I know you’ll get better. I just know it. God could never punish you like this for doing something so good for Ross. You have to believe that, Pete.”

  How it happened, she didn’t know. His lips closed over hers gently, softly, sweetly, as though he were drinking from a cool spring. Her arms closed around his neck, answering his embrace, her mouth tasting the soft, cool sweetness.

  When Jory lifted her head, she looked into Woo’s pain-filled eyes. There was a curious glistening there. She cradled his head against her breast, then pulled back and gently wiped the tears from his lashes. “Now you have to get better,” she said. In turn, he drew his finger gently underneath her eyes and smiled. “Do you think you can hug me without crushing me to death?” Jory whispered.

  “I can try,” Woo whispered in return.

  “This is probably going to sound strange,” she murmured, “even unbelievable, considering my past circumstances, but I’ve wanted to kiss you for a long time. I wanted you to hug me. Everyone needs a hug sometimes. I haven’t had too many in my life. Hmmm,” she sighed as he hugged her gently. A long time later she said, “Thanks, Pete.”

  Woo stared at her a moment, then grinned. “Anytime,” he said. He watched from the window as Jory walked back to her house. “I’ll be damned,” he muttered.

  He fantasized then, his imagination running wild. He was walking in the rain, in the moonlight, in the snow, through sweet-smelling autumn leaves, a pretty young woman at his side, four dogs trailing behind. He was coming home from work to a house full of fragrant cooking odors, to the same pretty woman greeting him at the door with a smile on her face. A pretty woman who smelled like Ivory soap, lemon, and vanilla, the most heady perfume in the world. He envisioned a picnic with fried chicken, hard-boiled eggs, cheese and wine, ants and a soft blue blanket. The Woojalesky family reunion sprang to life, all the aunts, uncles, cousins, and friends telling him in unison, “You’re homely as a mud fence, how did you get such a pretty girl?” And his laughing response, “She loves me.” A garden wedding under the chestnut trees, he in a dove-gray t
ux, Jory in a long white trailing gown with something old from his mother, something blue from his sister, something borrowed from one of his aunts, and the something new would be from him. But what? A locket? His mother had a locket, so did his sisters. A picture of him on one side? The dogs? Ross? A picture of Jory and himself smiling into the camera, he thought triumphantly. Yes, yes, a locket, a tiny gold one on a fine gold chain.

  A best man. Five brothers would solve that problem. But would it really? Ross should be his best man. Ross was his best friend. It was the kind of friendship they would both carry to the grave. If the truth were known, he loved Ross more than he loved his brothers. Ross was family.

  The reality of his situation slapped Woo in the face, his fantasizing over. There was no way for him and Jory to be anything but friends. He was crippled; that wasn’t going to change.

  Another operation, even two, might give him back his old life. All the therapy in the world wasn’t going to change his spine, his legs. He looked at the canes, his eyes burning unbearably. His mind raced. “Handicapped” sounded better than “crippled.” He brushed at his burning eyes. Think positively, Woojalesky, you still have your mind and your hands and arms. And you can feel. Everything.

  All this from a kiss and a hug.

  “The hell with this,” he muttered. “I can love anybody I want.”

  He wheeled his chair to the sofa, where he grasped the thick padding on the arm and dragged himself onto it. He laid back, his physical body exhausted with the morning’s activities. He cradled his big, shaggy head into the mound of pillows. There was no one to see the glistening tears on his lashes, no one to wipe them away, no one to say, “Shhh, everything’s going to be all right.”

  He slept fitfully, his dreams full of tiny gold lockets that were threatening to choke the life from his body as he twirled his wheelchair into tight, crazy circles to elude the monster chain of lockets.

  He cried out in his sleep, but there was no one to hear, no one to soothe him, no one to whisper, “Shhh, it’s just a bad dream.”