Follow the Stars Home

by Luanne Rice

  He swallowed his fear. He had gotten the call, and he’d come many miles by land and sea to be there. He had done right this time-now they could forget about Newport and Nova Scotia. Tim had shown up. Did they have any idea what this did to him, walking through a hospital, into an ICU?

  He felt like all eyes were on him. He was probably green. The nurse smiled, leading him past a bunch of cubicles. Tim’s heart was in his throat. He felt as if he were riding through a hurricane, fighting thirty-foot waves. Dianne was in one of those beds. Tim was about to see the woman he had once loved.

  “Here she is,” the nurse whispered.

  Tim was speechless.

  Dianne lay under white sheets. Her face was cut, black and blue, but she was an angel. She was the girl he had married. The years melted away, and he could see her standing there in her workshop with the playhouse Tim would deliver to Alan. He gazed down at her now, wanting to give her courage. That’s what he had come here to do.

  But she wasn’t moving.

  Tim pulled over the single chair. He sat there, pushing his long hair back from his eyes, just staring. Her long blond hair was nowhere to be seen. Her light lashes brushed her bruised cheek. Both hands lay outside the sheet, and something made Tim touch her ring finger, where her wedding band had once been.

  Dianne opened her eyes.

  Tim’s mouth dropped open. He saw the shock on her face. As if she had seen a ghost, or as if she’d been expecting someone else. He thought of the little girl saying “Dr. McIntosh,” and he didn’t want to go through the same thing again, the humiliation of trauma-induced mistaken identity. So he shook his head and made himself speak.

  “Hi, Dianne,” he said.

  She just stared, her eyes widening.

  “I didn’t have time to get to a barber,” he said. “I know I look like hell.”

  Her mouth opened and closed, forming words she couldn’t speak.

  “The hospital called me by mistake,” he said. “I was on my way to Florida. You had some old pocket-book with the Aphrodite’s name in it. It was a total fluke that they got me. I saw the kid down the hall, and I thought she was Julia. God help me, Dianne. I came here wanting to help. I thought she was my daughter.”

  Dianne’s eyes glistened with tears, and Tim McIntosh let all the years of pent-up emotion flow out. With his head resting on Dianne’s pillow, right next to hers, he broke down crying.

  She cleared her throat.

  Tim let himself cry. He could hear her speaking, tiny words almost impossible to hear. She was probably thanking him, letting him know she understood the pain he was in, how hard this was for him. Finally he raised his head and wiped his face. She was staring across the pillow, straight into his eyes. He’d been right: She was trying to speak.

  “What?” he asked, inching closer, touching her bruised cheek with his fingers. “I can’t hear you, baby.”

  “I said get your filthy head off my pillow.”

  He jerked up, pulling his hand back as if she’d scalded him. Her voice barely croaked. Her lip was cut, and there were stitches over one eye, across her cheekbone, and along her jaw. Was she delirious?

  “I came to help,” he said, shocked.

  She just stared, blinking as if each movement of her eyelids represented great effort.

  “It is,” she said, “impossibly hard for me to see you.”

  “I’ll leave,” he said, sensing trouble and ready to go.

  “Knowing that you rejected our daughter. Not just when you walked out on us,” she said, her voice weak but rising.

  “Hey, Dianne—”

  “But in Nova Scotia too.”

  “Hey, I came to make up,” Tim said. He couldn’t understand why people talked to him the way they did. Malachy last summer and now Dianne. He was doing his best; he’d always been doing his best. His intentions were good.

  “Her name is Julia,” Dianne said.

  “Hey, lower your voice,” Tim said, feeling nervous and looking around. She was squirming around in the bed, trying to get enough of a grip to hoist herself up.

  “She’s a beautiful, amazing child,” Dianne said. “She’s so good, she puts up with so much, Tim, and you’ve never even seen her.” The nurse came hurrying over. She tried to ease Dianne back onto the pillows, but Dianne wouldn’t lie down. She had gotten strength from deep down, and she had to finish this here and now.

  “Look. Hey. You’re hurt,” Tim said. “You don’t know—”

  “I do know,” Dianne said, and her eyes were clear and focused.

  “I think about her,” Tim said. “I know her name. You act like I don’t—”

  “You’re dirt to me, Tim McIntosh,” Dianne said.

  “I came all the way—”

  She leaned back on her pillow. He could see that she was exhausted, that she had been in a bad accident, but it was those last five words that did it. Tim said them, and he watched her collapse. Her skin was ashen, and she was shaking her head. When she spoke again, her voice was nearly gone.

  “You’ve missed her whole life.”

  “Sir, it’s time for you to leave …” the nurse said.

  “Dianne, you might not believe this,” Tim said, suddenly realizing he was going to walk out the door and probably never see her again. His mouth was dry, and his knees were weak. “But I never meant to hurt you or her. Never. That’s the truth.”

  Dianne was lying on her back. Her eyes were closed and tears were running out of them into her ears and the bandages around her head. Being on his boat was one thing. It was easier to justify his life out at sea. But seeing Dianne like this reminded Tim of everything he had ever thrown away.

  “My mother says I should forgive you,” she whispered.

  “Just understand.”

  She moved her head-a violent movement. Her eyes were squeezed tight so she wouldn’t have to look at him.

  “I’ll forgive you,” she said, her voice full of tears. “But I can’t understand. I don’t even want to try. Now leave us alone.”

  Tim opened his mouth to reply, but the nurse had noticed a change in Dianne’s blood pressure. She adjusted the machine, and then she signaled for one of the doctors to come over. Dianne’s blood pressure had dropped, and Tim heard them sounding concerned about internal bleeding. The overhead lights were bright, and several nurses came hurrying. Pushed aside, Tim turned away from Dianne. He walked away from the nurses, and he left the ICU.

  Alan bumped into Tim coming through the heavy door to the ICU. The two men faced each other, ten feet apart. Alan had expected Tim to be gone by then. He had made the call, summoned Alan, so why was he still there? Alan’s body ached. He tensed at the sight of him, wondering what he’d been saying to Dianne, and at the same time he felt old ties of brotherhood.

  “The doctor’s with her,” Tim said, his blue eyes steady. “She’s taken some kind of turn.”

  Alan didn’t wait to hear more. He burst through the ICU doors, saw a huddle of activity in a cubicle down at the end. Running through the unit, he was stopped by a nurse and two doctors.

  “That’s Dianne,” he said. “I’ve got to see her—”

  “They’re working on her.”

  “I’m a doctor!” he said, raising his voice.

  “Out, please,” one of the doctors said, insistent. “You can’t help right now. You’re going to have to wait outside.”

  Alan backed away. He felt helpless.

  Tim met him in the hallway.

  “Did she say anything?” Alan asked. “Did she seem conscious?”

  “She was conscious,” Tim said.

  “How did she look?” Alan asked. His voice broke. He had caught only a glimpse of her from across the ICU. Her face was so pale, covered with bruises.

  “She’s hurt,” Tim said.

  “God help me,” Alan said, holding his head, pacing in the small hallway. Driving down to New York, he had held it all inside. The fear came pouring out now, flooding out of his body, the pent-up terror of los
ing Dianne. “Jesus, help me, help us….”

  “Alan,” Tim said.

  Alan’s eyes were wild. He couldn’t catch his breath. He had witnessed families at the ICU a thousand times, and now he was one of them. Dianne was in there. He shook his head, choked down a sob. His brother stood there, sweaty and filthy with hair that hadn’t been combed or cut in a month. He looked just like the little boy Alan had taught to fish, had taught to swim off the sands of Cape Cod.

  “I’m leaving,” Tim said.

  “Tim,” Alan said, paralyzed with fear. He realized then he didn’t want his brother to walk away.

  Tess Brooks hung up the phone. Amy had been hit by a taxicab. She was hurt, lying in a big hospital. She had nearly bled to death! Tess was breathing so hard, she thought she was going to pass out. The house was empty and dark. She walked in circles, tearing at her hair.

  After what Buddy had done to Amy! Being dragged into his car, watching him try to drown the dog, nearly drowning herself. And now this! Tess howled out loud. Her daughter had been hit by a car! Oh, what a lousy mother she was. What a crummy, selfish woman.

  Tess strode through her small house. In and out of rooms. Her bedroom, the living room, the kitchen, Amy’s room. As she did, she saw flashes of the past. Amy’s baby shoes, Russell’s fishing boat, her wedding dress. Tess had heard of people whose lives flashed before their eyes, but didn’t that happen on deathbeds? Why was it happening to her right now?

  In Amy’s room she stopped before Russell’s shrine. Well, that’s what it was: Amy had assembled a collection of memorabilia, Tess didn’t even know where she’d gotten it all. Russ’s portrait smiling out with that honest joy he’d always had. He could have sold a million cars…. Hanging from the picture was a fishhook, a cardboard cutout of the Ford logo, a plastic dolphin, and a drawing of a sand castle.

  Sand castles were significant to Amy. Tess had never known why until she’d read Amy’s story. Tess had gotten all bent out of shape that the mother had looked like Dianne, and because of that Amy had never even turned her story in for the contest. With Tess’s life flashing before her eyes, she saw the hard truth: She had dashed her daughter’s dream yet again.

  “Depression rots, Russ,” she said, sitting down in front of his picture. “Why’d you go and leave me?”

  No answer.

  “I’ve tried to do it on my own, and look where it’s gotten me.”

  No answer.

  “Just look!” she said again, catching sight of herself in the mirror. She had wide, intelligent eyes, a sad expression on her mouth. She tried to smile, but her daughter was in the hospital.

  She sighed, staring at Russell’s picture again. Photos didn’t talk. Drowned husbands didn’t return from the deep to console wives who’d screwed up their lives. Or to wait by the phone to hear the latest update on their daughter. Feeling shaky, Tess walked into the kitchen. She opened up the junk drawer, and there it was. Amy’s story.

  Imagine-her story stuck in the junk drawer.

  The corner was glossy with peanut butter grease. Tess tried to blot the oil stain out. No luck, but she could still read the typing. She didn’t want to read the words. They still hurt her too much. But Amy had put such effort in, the way she did everything, the way she did life.

  The least Tess could do …Suddenly she found herself pulling on snow boots. She tugged on an old jacket. The car wouldn’t start, she’d need a jump, but there wasn’t anyone she wanted to call. Besides, the snow had stopped and the night was clear. Amy was out of danger, and Tess would catch a train to New York in the morning.

  She’d walk to the train station, starting now. She rummaged through her junk drawer a little deeper, found her envelope of mad money. That should cover her ticket. Tucking Amy’s story in the pocket of her coat, she was glad the train station was so near the library.

  The deadline had passed. Amy’s story was late being turned in, it was coated with peanut butter, it didn’t have a fancy folder. But maybe if Tess called Mrs. Robbins, she could ask that Amy be granted an extension. She could try anyway.

  Trying was new for Tess. But she had to start somewhere. Leaving her dark house, she walked out into the cold, starry night.

  The night was long. Alan walked the halls. He sat with Amy. He held her until she went to sleep. He read her chart, conferred with her doctor, adjusted the angle of her traction. He telephoned Lucinda. Julia was fine, she told him. She was sitting up with Lucinda, more alert than she had been in weeks. It seemed, Lucinda said, almost as if she knew that Lucinda needed her comfort.

  Alan asked Lucinda to put the phone to Julia’s ear.

  “I love you, Julia,” he said.

  “Daaaa,” she said back.

  Alan returned to the hallway outside the ICU. Tim had fallen asleep in one of the chairs. He had been ready to go, but Alan had asked him to stay. Their resentments were deep and ferocious, and they’d stared at each other so long, as if they were squaring off for a fight.

  Alan looked down at him now. It felt strange to see his younger brother age. There was gray in his blond hair, deep lines around his mouth and eyes. He slept with his arms crossed across his body, in a position of self-protection and defense.

  Sitting down beside him, Alan gazed at the ICU door. Everything worth knowing was happening in that room. His eyes narrowed behind his glasses, staring as hard as he could. He pushed his glasses up, he took them off, he put them back on.

  “I used to think they were magic,” Tim said gruffly.

  Alan glanced over.

  His brother was awake, but he didn’t look too alert. Arms still crossed, legs extended, he disguised a yawn.

  “What were magic?” Alan asked.

  “Your glasses. When we were kids and you had to wear them, I used to think you had special powers. They made you smarter, faster, stronger.”

  “Dorothea used to say I ruined my eyes from reading in the dark. That’s about it. The rest was just me being your older brother.”

  “Yeah, well, I thought you ruled the world.”

  “I tried,” Alan said. “More being the older brother, I guess. Life on a pedestal seemed like a good idea.”

  “I sure liked knocking you off,” Tim said.

  “Hmm,” Alan said, staring at the ICU door.

  “She’s not just your sister-in-law anymore, is she?” Tim asked.

  “She never was,” Alan said, “just that.”

  “You’ve gotten involved with her again?”

  “I’m going to marry her.”

  Tim was silent for a long time, but he was definitely awake. He sat up straight, shook his head as if to clear his mind.

  “I’ve loved her all along,” Alan said.

  “What about my daughter?”

  “Julia,” Alan said. It felt strange to hear his brother, this other man, call her “my daughter.” That was how Alan saw her. Coming from Tim, he knew they were just words, but they tightened up his stomach anyway. “I’m adopting her.”

  “I could fight that,” Tim said, staring at the lighting fixtures. “I wouldn’t, but I could.”

  “I appreciate that you wouldn’t,” Alan said.

  “Eleven years old,” Tim said. “Julia’s eleven years old.”

  “She is.”

  “I was on my way when you got here,” Tim said. “On my way back to the boat.”

  “You said you were leaving,” Alan said carefully. He didn’t know what had gone on between Tim and Dianne, and he was almost afraid to find out. The old jealousy was strong and deep, and it came back fast. “I appreciate that you stayed.”

  “Yeah, well,” Tim said.

  “Well,” Alan said.

  “You want to have it out with me?” Tim asked. “About what a scumbag I am?”

  “Malachy told me about you being in Lunenburg,” Alan said sharply.

  “Told you and told Dianne, I guess,” Tim said. “She hates my guts.”

  “She said that?”

  “She said she forgi
ves me,” Tim said, leaving out the rest of what she said.

  Alan closed his eyes. His throat ached. Dr. Bellavista was in with Dianne. The ICU door had neither opened nor closed in quite a long time. Alan burned to know what was going on in there. Sitting out here, talking to Tim, felt strange and upsetting, as he thought of everything they had once been to each other back in their Cape Cod youth. He thought about how they both loved the same woman, how Alan was about to legally adopt his brother’s child, how Dianne had looked at him with hate in her eyes.

  “What’s she like?” Tim asked.

  “Excuse me?” Alan asked, lost in thought.

  “Julia,” Tim said, his voice catching. “What’s she like?”

  Alan took out his wallet. He had her baby picture inside, and he took it out. Handing it to Tim, he watched his brother close his eyes, gather his strength, and look. Alan had sent him Julia’s baby picture a month after her birth, but he could tell that Tim had never seen it before.

  “Oh, God,” Tim said, starting to cry.

  “What’s wrong with you?” Alan asked. “She’s beautiful.”

  “She’s deformed.” Tim wept, holding the picture right up to his face.

  Alan stared back at the door. Dianne was inside, and it didn’t take much for him to spin back in time to the night of Julia’s birth at Hawthorne Cottage Hospital. Tim had sailed away, and Dianne was still lost in shock and disbelief. Lucinda was in the waiting room, a team of doctors was on board. Everyone knew the baby had problems, but they didn’t yet know the extent.

  Dianne lay on the delivery table. Alan was her partner, her birth coach. He was a pediatrician, and he believed he would be ready for anything. Dianne had lain there, going through labor, doing everything she was supposed to to deliver a healthy baby. Breathe, the obstetrician had told her. Push. Breathe. Don’t push.

  Alan had held her hand. She had the most amazing grip. Clutching his fingers, he wished she might never let go. Her hair flowed down her face, sweat ran from her neck and body. During the early stages she had continually glanced at the delivery room door as if Tim had changed his mind and might come charging in.