“So good I nearly died last time I went under the knife,” I say softly.
James sucks in a breath. “What?”
“The anesthesiologist screwed up my drugs, and they couldn’t revive me,” I say. My voice trembles. I’ve never told anybody this. “I was in a coma for three days after. They operated on my heart, sewed me up, and then… because somebody wasn’t paying attention… couldn’t wake me.”
“Celeste,” James says. “I’m sorry. That’s horrible.”
“It’s when Brad left,” I mumble. I can’t look James in the eye. “He got scared. He left me, because he said he couldn’t be with someone who might keel over and die at any moment.”
“Celeste. Celeste, look at me.” James takes hold of both my hands. “I am not Brad,” he says firmly. “You cannot compare him to me. Brad did not love you. If he said he did, it wasn’t a tenth, not a hundredth, of the love I feel for you now.”
He brings my hands to his lips and kisses my knuckles.
“I guarantee—I promise you—that I will get you the best doctors. We’ll have two anesthesiologists watching over you. Three, four. Hell, I’ll hire all the ones on duty at the hospital. Your life won’t be at risk ever again.”
“Oh, James.” Tears start to build in the corners of my eye. “Even if you do all that, even if that happens, even if I go for the operation… do you know the chance of survival I have?”
“No.” I shake my head sadly. “He said that if the tumor is removed, I might live. It’s a big if, James. It’s huge. Enormous.”
“He seemed certain—“
“I looked it up,” I say. My eyes are wet. I hate doing this to him, but if I don’t tell him now, I’m only setting him up for heartbreak in the future. “I looked it up before, James, when I first got the diagnosis. I know the survival rate of cancer patients who go through the procedure he’s proposing.”
“And?” James sounds anxious. “What is it, Celeste? Tell me.”
I look away. “Less than ten percent,” I whisper.
A hollow silence fills the room.
I stare into the corner, and keep staring, and try to keep myself together. I wait for James to speak. For him to say something, anything, a single word…
Before he has the chance, the door squeaks open.
Dr. Robinson peers in. He takes one look at us, and mutters, “Oh.”
“We’re ready,” I tell him. I see James from the corner of my eye. His focus is on the far wall.
The doctor steps in. “You don’t have to make the decision right now,” he tells me. He’s speaking to me directly because James is stoic. “Here.” He writes something down on a card and hands it to me. “That’s my personal cell. I have another patient I have to get to right now. But as soon as you’re ready, when you’ve made up your mind?” He nods at the card. “Give me a call. Day or night, it doesn’t matter. I’ll pick up.” He glances at James. “Professor Landon,” he says, as way of farewell, and leaves the room.
With the door closed, the silence stretches again.
It’s unbearable. I have to speak. “James…”
“Ten percent!” he exclaims as an oath and suddenly bolts up. “I don’t believe it,” he says.
Before I know it, he’s out the door, rushing the way the doctor went.
I pick up my things and carefully push my chair back under the desk. Then I step outside.
At the far end of the hall, I spy James and the doctor in a heated conversation. Their voices don’t carry but James is doing a hell of a lot of gesturing.
I turn to a nearby nurse. “Excuse me,” I say. “Could you direct me to Room 306?”
I have James looking out for me. Summer needs me to look out for her.
27.
I turn the handle and enter Room 306.
It’s dark. The blinds are drawn and the lights are dimmed.
A quiet gasp escapes my lips when I see the bed.
Summer is unrecognizable.
She has bandages covering her face. There are two little eye-holes, and a gap for her nose. I see a line of stitches running along her jaw and a nasty bruise beneath it.
Tubes run into her nostrils, and she’s hooked up to an IV machine. I see the shape of a cast on her leg beneath the blanket. She has a brace round her neck.
She looks rough, in short.
But at least she’s still alive.
I walk up to her softly. If she’s sleeping, I don’t want her to wake.
I hold on to the bed railing and look down at my best friend. I glance at the heart monitor. Her heartbeat is slow but steady.
Thu-thump. Pause. Thu-thump. Long pause. Thu-thump.
I sigh and sit down.
Summer stirs. “Bea?” she asks softly. “Beatrice, is that you?”
I’m back on my feet in an instant. “No sweetie, it’s me. Celeste.”
“Oh,” she says. She sounds… disappointed.
Well, maybe not disappointed, but more than a little bitter.
I don’t take any offense.
“How are you feeling?” I ask. I start to reach for her hand, then stop at the last second.
I’m not sure if she wants to be touched.
“Everything hurts,” she sighs. “But they’re pumping me full of morphine…”
She trails off. Her words are thick and heavy.
Then it hits me, it wasn’t bitterness or disappointment I heard in her voice, but sluggishness from the drugs.
“I’m such an idiot,” she says.
“What? No, Summer, don’t say that.”
“I am, I am, I am,” she continues. “I’m an idiot and a brat and a child and…” she starts to cry. “And now look at me! I can’t even lift my arms!”
“You’re going to make a full recovery,” I promise her. “I’ll help you. You’re going to be all better soon, Summer. It won’t take long—“
“Tell B I’m sorry?” she asks. “Please? Before I go, I want her to know that… that I’m sorry. And I love her, and I’m deeply, truly sorry, and…”
She dissolves into sobs again.
“I will,” I promise her. “I will, Summer. And go? You’re not going anywhere.”
“If I could…” she starts. “If I could, I would. I can’t, Celeste. I can’t speak to her. I only have you.”
“And I’m not going anywhere either,” I swear. “Summer, when I heard you were in an accident, I was so frightened…”
“Shit!” she suddenly swears. “The car! I totally ruined the car! My brother’s going to kill me.”
“No, he won’t,” I say firmly. “He’s going to be thrilled to know you’re alive.”
Speaking of…
“Does he know what happened to you? Why isn’t he here?”
“He knows, and he’s not going to come.” Now Summer sounds bitter. “None of my family’s coming. You’re the only one I have left.”
“What?” I ask. “Why? Why wouldn’t they come, Summer? Do you want me to call them for you?”
I’d always gotten along well with her parents and brother. Even if we haven’t been in touch much, I’m sure they’d take my call.
“No,” Summer says. “We’re not on speaking terms. None of us. My brother… maybe he’d care… but he lives too much under their influence to go against their will.”
“Their will?” I ask. “Summer, what are you talking about?”
It must be the drugs talking, because she sounds crazy. What parent wouldn’t come to their daughter?
“They… remember how religious they are? Forget it. Please, I just want to sleep. I want…”
She trails off.
A few seconds later I hear the steady breaths of slumber.
I sit down with a heavy heart. It’s not hard to put two and two together. If Summer told her parent about herself, as she did to me last night…
Well, that could have formed an insurmountable gulf.
The door opens. James comes in.
I stand up right away and bring
a finger to my lips. “She’s sleeping,” I mouth, then point to the hall, showing James we have to go outside.
He nods but lingers for an extra second to look at Summer. I hear him mutter, “Christ.”
Once outside, James cuts to the chase.
“We need to talk about you.”
“There’s nothing to talk about,” I say.
His eyes darken. “Like hell there isn’t.”
“I told you, I’m not having surgery.”
“Why the fuck not?” he hisses. “What are you waiting for? Do it now while you still have the chance!”
I look away. “You’re not going to convince me.”
He grabs my elbow and jerks me back to him. “I spoke to the doctor. Your chance of survival isn’t ten percent. It’s nowhere close to ten! I don’t know where you got that number from.”
“Oh?” I challenge. “Then what is it, James? Tell me. Tell me what the doctor told you.”
“He said there’s a risk…” James hedges.
“And the number?” I demand. “What percentage did he give you, James?”
“The risk increases if we wait!” he snaps. “If we sit on our asses and do nothing, he said it’s almost certain the cancer will spread. Then what? Then what happens?” He grips my upper arms and directs his focused gaze in my eyes. “You might be fine letting fate do its thing, but I’m not, Celeste. I’m not leaving your health up to chance. If we can do something to make you better, believe me when I say we fucking will!”
I take his hands and ease them off me. “James,” I say softly. “Don’t you think I want to live?”
“With the way you’re acting, I don’t fucking know!” he explodes.
Someone to the side gasps. I look over and see that we’ve amassed an audience.
A nurse steps forward. “Sir, you’re in the recovery ward,” she says. “I need you to keep your voice down.”
James scowls at her, then looks at me, then grunts and spins away. He starts striding down the hall.
“Sorry,” I mutter to her, then step quickly to catch up.
James is fuming. I haven’t seen him this mad… ever.
I’m ready to be pissed, too. This is his fucking fault!
He knew what he was signing up for when he came back for me. I tried to spare him from this.
He refused!
“James,” I say when he gets to his car.
He shoots me a dark look and drops inside. He starts the engine.
He rolls the window down. “Are you coming in, or not?”
“James, I have to stay for Summer.”
“Fine,” he barks. His hand tightens on the wheel. He stares straight ahead. “You don’t know what you’re doing to me, woman.”
“I gave you an out,” I remind him. “You didn’t take it.”
He gives a cruel laugh. “If you ever thought you could get rid of me so easily…”
He shakes his head. “Good night, Celeste. I’ll talk to you tomorrow, once you’ve had a chance to clear your head.”
“I won’t change my mind,” I say.
He ignores me, instead reaching into the glove compartment to pull out two stapled stacks of papers.
He tosses it on the seat.
“Your last essay for my class,” he says. His words are clipped. “And Summer’s. You both passed.”
He revs the engine. “The ad-board agreed to use the marks I assigned. They waived exam requirements. You earned an A. Congratulations.”
He scowls at me. “Take it and go.”
28.
I spend the rest of the day in Summer’s darkened room. A nurse comes in every once in a while to check up on her. We don’t share more than a passing glance.
Summer slips in and out of consciousness. She doesn’t say much when she’s awake. I don’t pressure her.
My mind keeps going back to what Officer Cooper told me. Summer left a suicide note.
She meant to die.
She’d be mortified if she knew that I knew. I desperately want to talk about it, but I won’t trouble her now. She needs her rest.
Eventually, out of boredom more than anything else, I look at the essays James gave me.
There’s a mark on top of Summer’s. Sixty-one percent.
She passed, but only just.
I put hers down and look at mine instead.
There’s not a mark on it. In fact, the entire front page is untouched.
I leaf through it. I get to the very last page before finding the first mark on mine.
But it’s more than a simple mark. James has scribbled all over the margins of my essay in his tight, thin red handwriting.
I squint my eyes and start to read:
Celeste.
I have so many things I want to say to you. But whenever we’re together in person, I’m incapable of voicing my thoughts. I don’t know what it is. Fluency comes naturally to me. As naturally as… well, naturally as fucking.
Even though I’m still mad at him, I blush and smile at his candor. I keep going.
I don’t know where my head’s at right now. I certainly don’t know where yours is. Let me set the scene for you:
Minutes ago, I left you at the hospital. You told me to forget you. You told me to get out. You told me to leave.
Well, I can’t even do the first thing. I can never forget you, Celeste. Nor will I ever try.
You are unique, you are one of a kind, you are unforgettable, and you know what? You made me fall for you when my heart was bitter and cold. You made me yearn for you, you made me lust for you, but most of all, you made me love you.
And I do. I do love you, Celeste. Make no doubt about it, and never question it again. I love you, and I’m ready to stand on the rooftops and declare it to the world: I LOVE CELESTE ADAMS!
Of course, you don’t want me to do that. Not yet. You’re not ready. But I will get you there. We will get there together. If you could make a cynic like me fall in love… well, it’s not something you can do away with in a single burst of anger.
It’s not something you can do away with ever, Celeste.
Look at this—I’ve scribbled all over the page. Do you know why I’m writing you this note, Celeste? Because after you told me to leave, doing it was the only way I could stop myself from coming back. My mind is consumed by you. My heart, my soul, my body—you own it all.
So here I am, desperately trying to reconcile all the whirling emotions you stir in me.
This paper, your essay? It is the only piece of paper I have on hand. It’s quite fitting, actually, that this is where I write my letter.
So here it is.
I love you. You know I love you. You know it, woman, and yet you fight it still.
How can I get you to see that? How can I get you to understand I’ll never leave? How do I convince you that I’m yours for eternity, and—just as importantly—you are mine?
Celeste. I’ll give you space when you need it. Like right now. Right now, when you’re in that fucking hospital by yourself, and I’m stuck in this goddamn car.
I want to be there with you. Why don’t you understand? I need to be with you at all times, Celeste.
I don’t know what you’ve done to me. Or how you did it. You must be a witch.
(That was a joke.)
See, though? Do you see? Even my humor is failing me. When I’m away from you, I don’t know which way to turn. I crave you with every cell of my body. I need you with every bit of the ethereal substance that makes up my soul.
Maybe it’s because we’re so similar. Maybe that was the initial draw. Because our physical condition, our attraction, the magnetism that exists between us? It cannot be denied.
I’m tearing up and I don’t know why. James is pouring his soul out to me, and he’s not even here. It feels… surreal, almost. Surreal and very, very special.
I wipe my eyes and keep reading.
So that was the spark, right? The moment I saw you, Celeste. You were the only one at the party who I w
anted.
As luck would have it, you fell right into my lap.
I had you once, and I thought it would be enough. I thought that before. Before I tasted your delicious skin. Before I feasted on your wonderful breasts. Before my mouth explored the extraordinary folds of your pussy.
But that first night happened… and I felt something in me shift. You aroused something inside that I haven’t experienced in a long time. Maybe never:
Need.
Need, Celeste. It was need. I needed you. I had to have you again. Once wasn’t enough. And oh! You cannot imagine the disappointment I felt the next morning when I woke up without you.
You were gone without a trace. And gone, too, was my first chance at happiness.
I’m being a bit histrionic, of course. I didn’t know that you were tied to my happiness at the time. Maybe deep down, I had an inkling of the idea, the barest formation of a thought, some hint of that all-consuming need…
But it was no more than a glimmer.
So, the real test came in the weeks that followed. I asked everybody I knew about you. None had any idea who the girl with the beautiful raven hair and stunning, shining eyes was, or where she’d come from.
I touch my hair absently. My heart is pounding hard against my ribcage.
James thinks my eyes are beautiful.
I continue:
I searched high and low for you. I was borderline obsessive. I thought, again, foolishly, that maybe one more night together would get you out of my system. Maybe one more taste was all it would take for me to return to my life and move on.
But you were lost. You were gone to me. You were there with me for one night, and then you were gone, like a wisp of smoke on the wind.
My mind could not release you so easily.
So imagine my surprise, my delight, my excitement, when I got my class list and found your face amongst my students. I was ecstatic! I was on top of the fucking world!
(I told you I memorize every student’s view book photograph so I know their names before the semester).
I didn’t know how you’d react to seeing me. But I planned to do to you what you did to me.
Uncovering You: The Complete Series (Mega Box Set) Page 159
