“You can’t make me,” I repeated. Did He not hear me? I was done. No one could make me change my mind. No one needed me anymore. Sam had Robert. Annabelle had Diane and that boyfriend. Jay. Jay rhymed with betray and Adrian had betrayed me. He had. He wasn’t so perfect after all, with his tricks and secrets. And worst of all, he’d left me. He’d left me to spend the rest of my life alone, and I’d decided I didn’t want to do that, and so I wasn’t going to.
“You can’t make me.”
The scream of a siren rose above the howl of the wind. It hurt my ears. I couldn’t see it, but it was getting louder, so, so loud. I put my hands over my ears. The road between the sound and me turned against a big outcropping of the rock. I tried to see around the corner, but how could I? There was a big rock in the way. I stared in the direction of the sound, but I didn’t see anything but that rock. And a white butterfly.
White butterfly. Was that the kind I saw in that store in town? White butterfly, white skin. I walked into the road, following it. The white butterfly had long wings like me, and claws. I wanted to touch it, but it was getting harder to see. The sky had turned off the light, and it was swallowing the butterfly. There it was, just a little farther around the corner of the rock. I stepped toward it as the noise screamed in my ears. “Hush. Stop that,” I whispered. The noise grew so loud that I forgot all about the white butterfly. My throbbing knee buckled, and I caught myself on the ground with my hands. “I’m going to get hit by an ambulance. Good. Then I can stop.” I crouched, pressing my fists hard into my ears. Flashing red beams of light swept over me. I shut my eyes to block it out. Then there was a new sound on top of the siren. BWAHNK BWAHHHHHHHNK BWAHNK. It sounded like the horn on the 4Runner, Adrian’s car before, but Sam’s now. Sam. Sam was waiting in Kailua-Kona with Annabelle. I couldn’t let this happen.
And then over the siren, a woman’s voice screamed, “Jump, Michele! Jump now!”
I jumped to my feet and to the right, jumped away from the noise. I fell to the ground on the side of the road. A squeal. A whoosh of air. I screamed louder than all of the noises. I crushed my face into the dirt and tugged my hair with both hands. I yowled in pain and grabbed my locket from inside my tri-suit and flung it away from me.
A man’s voice shouted, closer to me than the sirens, “What the hell, lady? Are you trying to get yourself killed?”
I looked up into the red lights. I came up on my hands and knees.
“Are you okay?”
I shooed the talking man away with my hand.
The woman’s voice again. “She’s fine. She fell, and I’m helping her.”
“You’re sure? I can call for transport. We’ve got to go though.” He jerked his thumb back at the ambulance. “Severe dehydration, cardiac arrest.”
I bobbed my head along with the siren, RAH-EEER RAH- EEER.
“We’re sure.”
I heard a door slam, and the lights flew past me and the sound faded into the distance. After a few minutes, I stood up. It hurt, it hurt so much. I brushed the gravel and sand off my body. I didn’t get to stop after all. I wanted to, but I had to keep going, and that was all there was to it. I didn’t get a choice.
I did a double take. Green eyes that I could see even without the sun. “It’s you.”
“Hello, Michele. It’s me.”
“Thanks for helping me again.”
She dipped her head in a nod. “What’s the matter?”
“I can’t find my husband.”
The green eyes stared back into mine. “I think you need something to drink.” She had a water bottle in her hand, and she extended it to me.
I drank.
“Go slow.”
When it was empty, I handed it back to her.
“Now eat this.” She ripped open a chocolate Gu.
I did as I was told. I was already feeling better. I sighed. I had a long way to go to get back to Sam and Annabelle. The wind blew a little cooler now, though, and the sun was gone. That was good.
She pointed at my chest. “You dropped something.”
I nodded, slowly. What had I dropped? My butterfly. My butterfly had flown away. The urge to find it overpowered everything, even my pain.
“Where are you, butterfly?” I looked around me, in the air, on the ground. No butterfly, but I caught sight of the woman’s leg. “I <3 MLH.” That was odd. I’d ask her about it when I found my butterfly. I crouched down, close to the ground, and my eyes followed its flight path from minutes before, straight to my left. I got up and walked in that direction, zigzagging over the rocks as they fell away from the road.
“There you are.” My legs trembled as I climbed down. I had to use both hands to help with my descent. There it was. I scooped the butterfly into my hand. “I’ll have to carry you, but I’ll be very careful.”
I scrambled back to the road, using only my right hand for balance, every muscle in my legs screaming in protest.
I held it aloft to show my friend. “I found it.”
No answer. I looked all around me. The woman was gone. Well, I had my locket. “I think I can do this now.” I put the chain over my neck but it fell to the ground. I picked it back up. Well, I would just have to carry it.
So I did, and I ran. It hurt. But I kept going. Full dark fell. I came to the turnaround, and the next aid station. A man handed me a lightstick, and I stuck it down the front of my top to keep one hand free for food and liquid, one hand for my locket.
The volunteer talked to me while I drank red stuff. “Did you see a runner down? Somewhere between here and the last aid station?”
“No.” I stuffed an orange into my mouth, then another and another, and chased them with more red stuff. I felt better than I had since the swim. “Is someone in trouble?”
“We thought so. The SAG wagon couldn’t find anyone, though. Keep an eye out. Stay hydrated.”
“I will.”
And I ran again, my lightstick in one hand and my butterfly in the other. Time ticked by, miles passed, and I ran. I ran until I found the road ahead of me dotted with fireflies bouncing along toward the brighter light of Kailua-Kona. I followed them. A song started in my head and I smiled. “Can I Walk With You?” Who needs a Shuffle? I let it play. It made me think of Adrian, and I missed him, missed him to the center of my being, and I always would. I hated that we hadn’t had Kona together.
Well after nine p.m., I stumbled into town, making my way back down Ali’i Drive the way I’d left over five hours before. I had done it. “There you go, honey,” I whispered. “I’m sorry I couldn’t give you a better time, but you’re crossing the finish line with me.” I reached up for my locket. It wasn’t there. For a moment I couldn’t breathe, then I remembered it was in my numb left hand.
“Are you there, my love?” I checked one more time, but I knew he was gone. It was just me out there, running alone, with nobody in the world aware that at that moment I was about to become an Ironman, that I would complete Adrian’s Kona dream. Nobody except for me.
Me and my kids.
Sam and Annabelle fell in on either side of me when I had a quarter mile to go. Despite my fears, nothing bad had happened to them in Kailua-Kona. I swung my head back and forth to look at them under the streetlights. They were somber. Sam had tears on his cheeks. I wanted to wipe them away forever, to tuck him and Annabelle into my heart where they’d be safe and never scared.
Only I could barely take care of me. I hurt. My thighs, front and back, were cramping. My damn left leg from knee to hip screamed in agony. My right foot felt like a bloody stump. I was weak and dizzy, and I wanted to throw up. I had nothing left.
No, I thought, not nothing. I dug for the last of my strength, that part I hid from even myself, the part I saved just for them. “Let’s finish like Adrian.” I found a smile for them, a real smile. I stuffed my locket and chain into my top one more time. I grabbed their hands, and we ran across the finish line together.
Chapter Thirty-three
“Holy Mary M
other of God” was the first thing I said when I woke up the next day, hurting everywhere.
Annabelle lay beside me in bed. “Shhh.”
Sam was sleeping on his back on the couch with his legs bent over the arm. “Sam, I need your help.”
He didn’t answer, so I threw a pillow at him. Pain shot through my neck and shoulders. We both groaned.
I looked at the time on my Garmin. Eight o’clock. “Sam, I have a book signing and we’re going to be late. Get up and help me.”
Annabelle rose on her elbows. “Come on, Michele.” She slipped out of bed and came around to my side.
“Can you pull me to my feet, then let me lean on you to walk to the bathroom?”
She grabbed my hands in both of hers and pulled. I screamed softly.
“Mo-om, keep it down.”
“He’s no help,” I muttered.
“Tell me about it. If it had been up to him, we wouldn’t be here. When we made our connection in Los Angeles, the gate agent had to call for him on the intercom because he was in a bookstore reading a gaming magazine.”
This got Sam up, and he hollered at Annabelle. “I was on my way.”
Annabelle and I looked at each other, and she shook her head. We shared a smile.
An hour later the kids flanked me and the enormous and completely inappropriate arrangement of lilies sent by my parents as I signed book after book. My right hand was about the only thing that didn’t hurt. Brian hovered behind us, the happiest mother hen on the island. He’d been in cahoots with the kids on their travel plans all along. Both of them had sworn blood oaths to their other parents that I’d asked them to come, and then they’d bought tickets on miles. Brian met them at the airport in Kailua-Kona, and they stayed with him the night before the race. The man was just full of good surprises.
He handed me a cup of coffee and said, “I hope we brought enough books. It seems like everyone on this island wants a copy and a photo with the champ.”
My hand closed around the words “Kona Coffee Café” on the cup sleeve, and a sadness ripped through my core. Adrian. Well, he wasn’t here. I pushed the feeling away.
“I’m happy for you, Brian.” And I really was. I doubted I’d ever make a cent off My Pace or Yours, but if it injected money into Juniper, then it was the start of something great, and was the least I could do for him.
I looked up into a camera lens. ESPN. The producer walked up to me.
“Do you mind if we interview your kids?” he asked. “We talked to them yesterday. Brian said you’d be okay with it, and they really wanted to do it.”
“I’ll bet they loved that. Sure, go ahead. It looks like I’ll be busy for a while here.” I gestured at the line.
“Thanks, Mom.”
The producer motioned to the cameraman and they walked a short distance away with Sam and Annabelle. As I signed, I kept one eye on the kids. Annabelle grew shy in front of the cameras and Sam puffed up. I laughed. “Those are my kids,” I explained to the woman whose book I was signing.
“The girl looks a lot like you.”
I didn’t bother to explain that the fair-skinned, fair-haired beauty wasn’t my blood relation. I looked at Annabelle. “Why, thank you.” Then I froze.
A man had pulled Sam and Annabelle aside. He looked familiar but I couldn’t place him. He had plastic cups in his hands, and he gave them to my kids. Alarm bells went off in my head. “Brian, is he with us?”
Brian looked. “Never seen him before.”
The ESPN producer had come back to my table. “Is he one of yours?” I kept pointing.
He shook his head. “Nope.”
The man put one hand on the Sam’s shoulder, and another on Annabelle’s, and he guided them out of the tent. “You’re not safe. It’s not over,” Adrian had told me. My instincts shrieked in warning. This was it. I knew it was going down on Kona. I’d felt it out on the course.
I jumped to my feet and shouted, “Stop.”
The trio kept moving. I bolted from behind the table, nearly crashing to the ground as my left knee took my weight. The chair fell over in the grass and my table teetered. A gasp rose from the crowd.
“I said STOP!” I was screaming as I bore down on the man leading my kids away.
Three sets of startled eyes fixed on me.
“Mom, what is it?”
I winced and shifted all my weight off my knee. “Him,” I gasped, through the pain. “Get away from him.”
Annabelle clutched her cup in both hands. “It’s okay, Michele. We know him. From yesterday.”
“Now. Please.”
The kids stared at me, but they stepped toward me. The man did, too.
“Stay away from us.” I tensed, ready to pounce.
His head drooped. “Michele, I’m so sorry.”
Hackles rose on my neck. Images flashed through my mind. Bad images. This man, talking to Adrian, a woman in pink behind them. A glass window and a Taurus driving by outside. Pressed Dockers and anxiety.
I threw my arms around my kids and pulled them to me. I felt them squirm. Annabelle whispered, “Michele, people are watching. There are cameras.”
I narrowed my eyes to slits. “Do I know you?”
His breath gushed out. “Oh, shit, you don’t recognize me. I’m Connor Dunn. We met at your book launch. I was a friend of Adrian’s.”
Connor Dunn. The one who sent me the nice letter after Adrian died. The one whose calls I hadn’t returned, who corralled Adrian for a tête-à-tête the night before he died, who Adrian lied about.
“I remember you. I don’t want you near my kids.”
“Didn’t you read my letters?”
“One right after Adrian died.”
He shook his head. “I called you. When I couldn’t get hold of you after what happened to you and Sam, I sent you a letter, explaining. Look, I hate to do this here, but what I said was—”
I hissed at him. “Not another word.”
“It’s about Stephanie, Mom. He used to be married to her.”
The blood drained from my face, drop by drop, leaving a trail of icy cold behind. I started to buckle, but the kids held me up.
Annabelle put an arm around me and started patting. “You should let him tell you, Michele. He told us yesterday. We thought you already knew.”
A little voice inside me whispered, “It’s about the money. It’s about what Adrian did with the money.” I looked up at Connor. He didn’t have horns or a forked tail. I didn’t know what to think, what to do.
Sam made a rolling motion with his hand at Connor. “Go on.” Cheeky kid.
Connor closed his eyes on an inhale and opened them on an exhale. “Stephanie was not well.”
I snorted. “Not well is an understatement.”
“Yes, I’m sorry, you’re right. She had developed paranoid schizophrenia. She self-medicated with alcohol and refused the treatments that could have helped her. I met my wife, Angela, when I was separated from Stephanie.” He indicated a tall, thin woman who had appeared from nowhere. A woman who looked like an Ironman—and then I remembered. Yes, he’d told us she qualified when we met in August. “Stephanie blamed Angela for our divorce until she broke into my house one day and read a wedding card your husband sent me. He had congratulated me on marrying Angela and said he hoped my second time around was a personal best. Stephanie took back her maiden name and became obsessed with Adrian, that he had—in her words—pimped Angela to me and wrecked our home.”
I put my hand over my mouth and talked through my fingers. “Why didn’t you tell Adrian about it?”
“I did, at your book launch.”
I pressed my forearm against my stomach.
“I thought she would harass him, but I never dreamed she could hurt anyone. The police said the person who hit Adrian drove a truck, so it never crossed my mind it could have been her. I didn’t learn what she’d done until she came after you and Sam. You didn’t return my calls, so I wrote to you. I guess you never got it.”
/> There was a tall stack of mail on my counter back in Houston, so maybe I had. I exhaled hard, then with Annabelle’s arm still around me, I leaned close and whispered very softly in his ear. “Do you know if she blackmailed Adrian?”
He stayed close and whispered back. “What? No, I don’t know anything about blackmail.”
“Nothing about any money or payoffs?”
“No. Nothing.”
I took a deep, shuddering breath.
Sam’s eyebrows drew to a peak together. “What was that about?”
I licked my lips and avoided Sam’s eyes.
“See? We told you he was all right,” Annabelle said. She patted me again and squeezed.
I nodded slowly. I wasn’t sure if I felt better or worse. Adrian died because he was a joyful, open person. Because he shared that with a friend, because of his words. Because dark hates beauty and light and will snuff them out if it can.
This man, though, this man wasn’t the dark. My gut told me to trust him.
“Maybe we could start over. How about you introduce me to your wife?”
***
My last blog post was in, the book signing and filming was over, and I didn’t ever have to train again, except for fun. The feeling was bittersweet, but I was determined to enjoy it. Annabelle, Sam, and I decided to spread Adrian’s ashes out on the course. We drove a rented PT Cruiser along the race route searching for the perfect spot.
I smacked my hand on the steering wheel. “Hey. I need one of you to look something up for me on the race site.”
Annabelle rode beside me in the front passenger seat. She had her phone in her hand. “Ready.”
“Okay, go to the place where you can find racers by their bib numbers. I want you to look someone up by her number. She helped me on the swim and bike legs.”
Annabelle’s finger danced on the touch screen. The rental boxcar rolled along silently, and I admired the view of the lava fields from the comfort of the air-conditioned car. “What’s the number?”
“Twenty-two hundred.”
Going for Kona Page 25
