“That’s great news!”
He was old enough to be her father. “I hope your wife gets better.”
He nodded. “Me too. I’ve been praying all night. You’d think after you’d been married as long as we have, you’d just feel grateful to have had all the years together. But she’s my whole life, I can’t imagine going on without her.”
She nodded. “I’ll pray too.”
When he was summoned in to join his wife in critical care, she thought to call Cynthia, explaining briefly what had happened and that she was waiting for a report from the doctor.
“I’ll be right down,” Cynthia responded, sounding subdued rather than elated.
She’s afraid it’s not good news, Lynne knew. Cynthia, having left Betsy in the care of her nanny, was at her side by the time the doctor finally came out to talk with them.
His expression was so grave as to belie his cheerful words. “He is awake,” he said, “a little dozy, but awake just the same.”
Cynthia drew in a sharp breath. “I can’t believe it.”
“You’re his sister,” the doctor said.
Cynthia nodded confirmation, than introduced Lynne as his girlfriend. It seemed to Lynne a childish word to describe their relationship.
She sat quietly, taking in everything the doctor said, and at the same time floating in a kind of numbed cloud. Most of it wasn’t good news. The doctor said with the damage to his brain from his injury, Moss’s prognosis was very uncertain. He still might not survive and if he did, he might never be himself again.
“With severe head trauma of this sort, he may have lost years or his whole memory. He may have the intellect of a child and his personality could be very different. Beyond doubt, he will never quite be the man you knew before. Right now he’s in a confused and disturbed state, but that’s not surprising considering everything he’s been through. In fact you might say he’s lucky to be alive.”
That was a funny way to say it, Lynne thought, then comprehended the meaning behind his words. She’d so often heard people say it after a tragedy, say ‘he wouldn’t have wanted to live in that condition. It was a mercy that he didn’t survive.’ Had she done something terrible in pushing Moss to remain alive and stay with her?
“No!” She refused to think that way. He was alive and would get better.
“Can we see him?” Cynthia asked quietly, almost as though she hoped to be refused.
He nodded. “It might reach something inside him to see familiar faces. Just don’t expect too much.”
They got up then and went into the room. Moss’s forehead was lined with pain and a nurse was injecting something into his IV tubes. The respirator hid much of his face, but those familiar eyes stared at them without recognition.
Cynthia stood, silent with shock, but Lynne managed a smile. “So good to see you again, Moss,” she said.
“Yes,” stiffly Cynthia followed her lead. “Welcome back to the land of the living.”
Chapter Nineteen
The days began to turn windy and cold as the time she was supposed to spend researching in Oklahoma for her mother’s book ended. Pleased, her mother urged her to come home and take on another project, but Lynne kept stalling.
She didn’t want to leave Moss, who though healing physically and cooperating with the therapy being given him, still seemed blank and silent. It was as the doctor had warned them, the real Moss had not come back and this gentle, uncomplaining man was a stranger to her.
When she’d invited Cynthia to bring her daughter and nanny and move back into her own house, Cynthia had happily complied. She hadn’t said anything negative about the motel in town, but Lynne guessed she didn’t consider it the best of living arrangements for her young daughter.
Now that the research was finished, their days fell into a pattern. They breakfasted, did a bit of housecleaning, and then went riding with Betsy. Cynthia who had grown up in the tony British school of riding was much more skilled than Lynne, but the girl from New Jersey still enjoyed the outings and the company.
They drove into town for lunch and then went to the hospital for an afternoon visit with Moss. At first they’d left Betsy at the ranch with her nanny, but after she’d begged to be allowed to go along on visits to the ‘man who made funny faces,’ her startled mother had agreed. And of the three of them, she seemed most comfortable with Moss, perhaps because she had no built-in expectations for his behavior.
For the first time since they’d met, Lynne found herself tongue-tied with Moss. His face seemed ironed of any emotion other than pain and, at first, he hadn’t remembered his own name or even a vestige of his history.
They counted it gain that now, on this first day of October, he knew who he was and remembered his parents and little sister and his childhood. It had been painful to watch as he had to be told that his mom and dad were gone, their deaths as new to him as on the days they’d occurred. He’d grieved, mostly in silence, and began to reattach to the little sister who to him should still be a little girl. He’d thought at first they were telling him that Betsy was his sister and had frowned, saying that she didn’t look at all like his brown haired sister with her golden curls.
Doctors warned that his memory, which now seemed to be unfolding like a biography as he aged, might stop abruptly and never advance further. Experience lost to head injuries was sometimes permanently erased. Most regaining of memory occurred in the first year after the injury. Three months had passed since that day when he’d hit the truck.
Someone in her family called each day as though they passed the duty around. They’d given up urging her to come home and seemed to just want to touch base and make sure she was all right. She’d missed her sister’s wedding with regret, but had known she could not leave Moss at this critical time.
Dad and Mom offered money and sent checks, but with no expense for housing and having given up the rental car, she’d been able so far to live on her slender savings. The money was running out however, and soon she would have to make other choices.
This afternoon she drove into the hospital with Cynthia and Betsy. Moss could breathe on his own now and no longer had to be connected to lifesaving devices. He hobbled around on crutches as his bones healed after repeated surgeries. Cynthia teased him that for the rest of his life he’d be able to predict the weather by reactions in those damaged parts of his body.
Thin and pale, he was beginning to be restive with his limited lifestyle and after greeting Betsy and Cynthia warmly and Lynne with formal politeness, he told his sister he was ready to go home.
She smiled and kissed his cheek. “I’m meeting with your doctor in a few minutes. We’ll know more after that.”
“How are you feeling today, Moss?” Lynne asked, aching inside. Once she’d been the center of this man’s life and now he didn’t even know who she was.
“Much better,” he gave his usual reply. “How are you, Lynne?”
She nodded. “Fine.”
Cynthia had told him that Lynne was an old friend. Lynne had asked her not to say anything more. In her heart she was hoping that the same qualities that had attracted them to each other initially would kick in and even if he couldn’t remember their time together, he would fall in love with her all over again.
It didn’t seem to be happening. He was closed in and guarded now, conscious of his own limitations. She doubted he really gave her much thought while all she could think about was him. Now that he was solidly here in the flesh, she was less close to him that when they’d only been able to brush past each other without touching.
They sat, listening to Betsy telling her uncle about her latest adventures on the ranch. The child was absolutely flourishing in her active outdoor life, lovingly cared for by her mom, her nanny and, of course, Lynne.
“And then Lynne slipped right off his back and landed plop on the ground,” this time the misadventure she was recounting was Lynne’s own. “But she wasn’t hurt,” she hurried to reassure him.
Moss smiled politely at
her. “I’m glad you weren’t hurt.”
“The horses belong to a neighbor, a Mrs. Walsh,” Cynthia told her brother. “But she lets us ride them.”
When Cynthia went to meet with Moss’s doctor, Lynne and Moss were left alone with only Betsy as chaperone.
She made several attempts at conversation that seemed to go nowhere. He answered politely, but made no attempt to keep the talk going.
Trying to talk to him was like running into a stone wall. He’d say ‘yes’ or ‘no,’ and then lapse into silence. Finally she gave up and simply sat in silence, listening to Betsy’s chatter.
Moss felt like a man emerging from a long silence. When he’d first wakened from the coma, he would find only emptiness when he reached into his mind for knowledge of his own life. Gradually, sometimes slowly, sometimes in great gulps, it was coming back. He could remember his little sister, though it was taking some adjustment to recognize that this grown woman was little Cynthia. In his mind, she was still eight-years-old.
It was as if he’d been going to high school last week. And his mother and dad had been there and now, at moments, he forgot that they were both gone. He wanted Mom to come and made a fuss over him the way she always did when he was sick. He wanted to go fishing with Dad.
He wanted to see his girlfriend, but when he asked for her by name, they told him she was gone too. How did that happen? Seventeen-year-old girls didn’t just fall over and die.
He lived in a crazy, mixed-up nightmare of a world and barely noticed more than that his sister’s friend was kind of cute.
When Cynthia came back, she looked flustered and pleased at the same time. “Moss,” she said. “You’re going to be transferred to a recovery center where they’ll help you get back on your feet with therapy.”
He frowned. “I want to go home.”
This was good news, Lynne told herself, though in a way she had dreaded this moment which meant she would be separated for him. She could hardly find reason to trail along after Moss and Cynthia when she had no real claim to them.
“You will be going home soon,” Cynthia reassured him.
For an instant, Lynne thought of him going back to the ranch where he’d first met her. Maybe he would remember her then.
“I’d love to see the ocean,” he said with a sigh and she was brought abruptly back to the knowledge that home to him was back on the California coast.
Cynthia now turned to Lynne. “I thought we’d have him flown to a facility in California,” she said almost apologetically. “We’d be happy to have you go with us, Lynne.”
Moss frowned as though he disapproved of this idea. She couldn’t help feeling that it made him uncomfortable to have her around.
It was the hardest thing she’d ever had to do. “Guess I’d better be heading back to my own home,” she whispered the words.
“Oh, no!” Betsy protested. “You’ve got to go with us, Lynne.” She threw herself at Lynne, wrapping her in a rough, six-year-old’s hug.
“We really want you to come with us,” Cynthia assured her.
Moss didn’t say anything.
A week later when Moss and his sister and niece flew to California, Lynne used the last of her funds to go home to New Jersey. She didn’t have the option of going anywhere else because she was out of money.
She hadn’t told them she was coming and when her taxi pulled up in front of the two-story white house in Bound Brook, it looked strange that no cars were parked in the driveway. After she paid the cabby, she had less than twenty dollars in her purse. Her credit cards were maxed out from the expenses of the last few months.
She had no choice but to go home, though right now home felt like that ranch house in the red hills of northwestern Oklahoma.
Lana’s room had been turned into an office for Dad long ago, and David’s old room converted into a playroom for the little nieces when they came to visit. Even Loy had been on her own long enough so that everybody now called the spot she’d occupied the guest room, but the familiar bedroom that had belonged to Lynne her whole life was still hers, a large upstairs room with a big bed, a dresser with mirror, and big rose plush chair with a matching foot stool, and the old desk that had once belonged to her grandfather. The room welcomed her, its furnishings folding around her with warming familiarity. Even though she had left Oklahoma reluctantly, she was so glad to be back in the safety of her family home that she nearly cried.
When everything else went wrong, home was the place where you went, she told herself, or the place where they had to take you in. Vaguely she remembered something from a Robert Frost poem, which had expressed the feeling a whole lot better. This was the place where she had no doubt of her welcome and the love that had once seemed smothering now seemed reassuring. She couldn’t wait to see Mom and Dad and all the rest of the family. How had she managed to stay away from them for so
long?
Chapter Twenty
Sometimes his memory inched along, gaining a bit in a month or two. By Christmas he was back home at the house where he’d grown up, Betsy was attending first grade at the same private school her mother had attended, and things were almost back to normal.
Normal, at least, for when he’d been a teenager. The last Christmas he could remember had his when he was eighteen and he’d been impatient to get away from the family Christmas at home and spend time with his girl and other friends. Now he’d give anything to have that holiday back to give it the conclusion it deserved instead of the disaster that actually occurred.
So it was with some sense of sadness that he helped Cynthia and Betsy decorate the tree. The nanny Julie had been sent to her own home for a two week vacation and the staff of the big house was working short hours so they could celebrate with their families, so tonight they’d eaten a catered meal and were enjoying having the house to themselves.
“We got a Christmas card from Lynne today,” Cynthia was saying as she draped silvery rope over the live green tree. The scent of the fir rested deliciously in the air, seeming to stir memories within his head. He’d been afraid lately that his mind had gone as far as it could in recovering his past, but now he was hoping that more was about to unwind.
He didn’t want to go on like this, being only part of himself. He couldn’t lose sixteen years of his life. Maybe tonight more would be revealed.
Lynne? Oh yes, Cynthia’s friend. He’d met her at the hospital. The cute little girl with curly brown hair. “She doing okay?” he asked politely.
“Doing good.” Cynthia nodded.
“I wish she’d come see us,” Betsy said. “I love Lynne.”
“I’m rather fond of her myself,” Cynthia said with deliberate understatement. “She almost feels like a sister to me.”
“I’m glad you have friends,” Moss encouraged his sister. “You’ve spent too much time looking after me.”
He was always saying the wrong thing these days and he could tell by the look on Cynthia’s face that he’d done it again. He tried to make up for it. “What is Lynne up to these days? Still staying at the ranch?”
The ranch meant little to him. It had only been the place they’d stayed overnight before coming home. Cynthia had explained it was actually his, that it had been left to him by some old family member that he’d never actually met.
The funny look on Cynthia’s face, kind of a mixture of sadness and chagrin was still there, but she sounded normal enough when she said, “No, she’s back with her family in New Jersey. In fact, she’s got a great new job and has leased her own apartment.” More softly she went on, “I hope she’s getting on with her life.”
What a strange thing for Cynthia to say. His thoughts drifted away from his sister and her friends as he watched his niece hang a crimson ornament on the tree. He could remember his mother hanging that same ornament and he missed her with a sudden sharp pain.
Cynthia seemed to catch his change of mood as she so often did these days. “Let’s play some Christmas music,” she said, getting to her fee
t and going over to press a button on the player that seemed too high tech and new to Moss, who had lost touch with technology these days.
The songs were old favorites, the same ones to which his parents had listened. Betsy hummed along with Bing Crosby as he sang the nostalgic words to White Christmas.
The next song was equally familiar. He recognized it immediately.”I heard the bells . . .” he listened to the singer, trying to think who it was and then, abruptly, he was no longer in this Christmas Eve with his sister and niece beside the tree.
It was 1996 and another Christmas Eve and he’d just munched a stolen candy cane. The taste of peppermint was still in his mouth when his father came into the room. He was wondering if he’d get that new game system he’d requested when the family came down to the tree in the morning and didn’t pay much attention to Dad until he cleared his throat and started speaking. “Moss,” he said, “I’ve got some really bad news.”
That was when he’d been told, as gently as possible, that Jennifer was dead. Now he believed it, now he remembered and grieved her loss all over again.
“Moss,” Cynthia called. “Moss, what’s wrong?” He didn’t hear her, but was lost in the past as his memory began to unfold into the terrible times that had ended his youth. It was not so much remembering as living through it once again.
Christmas Eve at the Hallam household was much like it was at most homes across America. The festivities began at six p.m. with a special dinner. This year Lynne brought her own contributions of two apple pies. Mom and Dad had roasted the turkey and made dressing, gravy and mashed potatoes.
David brought the rolls, purchased from his favorite bakery, Lana a homemade cranberry salad and two pumpkin pies she’d made herself. Loy, whose new husband had turned out to be a fine cook, brought a stacked cake that was a traditional dish made in his family.
Tomorrow Lana and Loy would spend Christmas day with their in-laws, but tonight still belonged to the Hallams.
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