Second Chances

by Nicole Andrews Moore

  Madge didn’t want to leave. Quite frankly, she was worried about Mr. Meyers’ state of mind. She worried what he would do left to his own devices. The small taste of that kind of freedom had gone badly the other night. Still, she left…reluctantly. And then she did something she never dreamed she’d do. She called his mother.

  Unbelievable. He owned a house…a really nice big house. He owned a boat. He had land and lake rights. And he had nowhere to sleep. Apparently Hannah had the right idea. She left. He couldn’t leave. And even if he did, there was nowhere he wanted to go.

  Instead he was wandering around his house assaulted by memories, unable to find comfort in any room. Even his study, that had once been his solace, the one place that India had never decorated, the one room she never entered…had partially become Hannah’s domain. They shared that space every evening. He no longer found comfort there, just emptiness. The patio had really comfortable furniture, but he and Hannah had spent the night in it. There went that idea. He couldn’t sleep on the sailboat. All those locations held memories of Hannah. Even his bedroom, a room she had never entered, seemed closed in and stuffy, he couldn’t breathe there. All he could think about was that Hannah should have been upstairs above him, lying on that bed. Having left the house to restock his liquor cabinet, he now went back to his office to make sure the trip wasn’t for naught.

  Just before noon the doorbell rang. Gavin didn’t even consider getting it. No good had ever come of answering that door. The door bell rang more insistently two more times. Then silence.

  Minutes later, he heard the front door open, and then his office door. He didn’t even lift his head. If he was getting robbed, he didn’t care. If he was getting attacked or murdered, he welcomed it.

  “Honestly, would it kill you to answer the door?” Bitty stood over him with her hands on her hips. She glanced about the room. “And did you have to crawl into a bottle?” She was moving about the room, muttering in disgust. Just as Madge had done, Bitty opened the curtains, threw open the door. She left the room, leaving the study door open, and headed to the kitchen.

  It didn’t take Bitty long to figure out where everything was. She made a big pot of coffee, grabbed two big mugs, and returned to the study. In her absence, Gavin had only managed to sit up and hold his head in his hands. With a sigh, she walked purposefully down the hall to his bedroom, opened the door, and walked straight into his bathroom to the medicine cabinet. This looked like it was going to require some extra strength pain reliever. They were well past the two aspirins stage.

  “Take these,” She said shoving her open palm of acetaminophen at him.

  Without arguing, Gavin reached over and took the offered medicine, the small cup of water, and even started to accept the coffee when he paused. “Not that mug.”

  Bitty looked at it. “What’s wrong with this mug?”

  “It’s Hannah’s,” he explained. He looked at his other option. “Pass me that one.”

  After doing so, Bitty spoke. “You need to pull it together, Gavin. You have a lot of responsibility. You don’t have time to fall apart. Since when do you fall apart over a woman?” She studied him for a reaction. His face was blank; his hands were holding the mug, betraying nothing.

  “I don’t want the responsibility. I don’t want the company.” He growled angrily. “I’ve wasted my life trying to make our father happy. And he was never happy. I’ve tried to make him proud, carry on after the accident. I don’t remember him ever being proud of me. Do you?”

  “Sure,” Bitty shrugged. “You were the favorite.”

  “Well, he never let on, believe me.” Gavin sighed and drank some coffee. He loved the way the warmth trailed down his throat until it hit his stomach. “I don’t suppose you want the company?”

  Bitty looked at him. “What do you mean?” She asked slowly. “I’m going to need you to spell it out for me.” Her eyes narrowed. She leaned in seriously.

  “I want to be happy. Doing everything I was supposed to do has never made me happy. Look at my life.” He paused to see that Bitty was listening. “You love the company. You were always better at the business. The only reason father didn’t want you to have it is one of the lamest reasons of all.” He stared into his mug for a moment. Then a thought occurred to him. “He’s not why you’re a lesbian, is he?”

  For the first time in a long time, they were talking again like siblings should. It felt good. They should have done this all along.

  “No, I would still be a lesbian,” Bitty said with a chuckle.

  “Oh. I thought maybe the thing with India was to get back at me.” He smiled and shrugged.

  “Oh, well, that was. Or…that’s how it started any way.” She stood up and walked to the fireplace. “I hate to admit this now, but the truth might as well come out.” She sighed before turning to face him. “India was supposed to be my revenge on you for stealing the company. I wanted to make you pay for getting something that I wanted. I wanted to hurt you. Only…I fell in love. I guess India did, too.” She sat down on the couch in front of him. “So, I can’t even look at you and say that I never meant to hurt you…because I did. I’m sorry for that. And I’m sorry that you are suffering now.”

  Gavin stared down at his mug. Slowly, he raised his face to look at her. “Well, it seems we have more in common than I would have thought.” And he smiled sadly as he explained to Bitty everything she had missed. And when he finished, he said simply, “And I don’t know how to fix it.”

  “Let’s put our heads together, Gavin. I’m sure we can come up with something. But we’ve got to get you cleaned up. Hannah can’t see you like this.” She stood and put her hands on her hips.

  Gavin smiled at her. There was that hope thing again.

  The beach had always been therapy for Hannah. She had spent the first two days with her family sleeping on and off. She hadn’t interacted with them or even with the twins. And finally by Sunday she felt ready to face her life again.

  “So, the mind is healing,” her mother commented. “Let’s see what we can do for that soul.”

  Hannah smiled weakly while she sipped her hot tea. “What do you recommend?”

  “Let’s go walk the beach, see what we find. The girls would like that and you need it.” She seemed confident in her decision.

  “I don’t know,” Hannah said. She wasn’t sure she was ready to face the world again.

  “Yes.” Her mother said. And that was it. It was an edict, a command.

  Studying her mother, she realized that she was going to the beach. Her mother was not going to back down. “I guess I’ll go get ready,” Hannah said quietly.

  In the end, she was glad she went. She had planned to merely sit and stare at the waves while the girls and her mother walked around with a bucket collecting any manner of debris that interested them. And so she found a spot and sat. She ran her hands through the sand, enjoying the feel of the moist abrasion against her skin. Then she started looking at some of the shells and stones and sea glass she touched.

  A black jingle shell first captured her imagination. She held it up and saw it, saw it as it could be, wrapped in wire, dangling from a ribbon or chain. She saw sea glass earrings. She pictured stone anklets. And suddenly, Hannah was filling her hand with the raw materials for a new project.

  From a distance, her mother saw this and smiled. Hannah was going to be just fine. And with that, she was able to focus once more on Rory and Zoe.

  The drive back seemed longer. Hannah smiled to herself. She always felt that way. And part of her impatience stemmed from a desire to create. When they had gone back to her mother’s house after the walk on the beach, she had started designing some new pieces. She played with some wire. She played with some ribbon. She was so glad that her mother had once dabbled in jewelry making.

  For the second time that trip she was disgusted with herself for letting her emotions keep her from taking the SUV Gavin bought her and the phone that she had found so useful as of late. For example
, if she had it with her, she could have already loaded those new jewelry pieces on her site.

  Hannah smiled as she realized that she was well on her way to healing. It wasn’t just the beach. It wasn’t the outlet for emotions through jewelry making. It was also a talk she had with her mother that last night after the girls and her father had gone to bed. Her mother had found her staring out at the dark night sky and announced that they needed to talk.

  Sitting down, Hannah knew that somehow this discussion was going to be important. She wasn’t disappointed.

  “Did you know that I wasn’t your father’s first choice?” Her mother looked at her with a smirk.

  “No, I didn’t,” Hannah said surprised. The way they looked at each other, the way they acted together, she had always believed that theirs was a tale of true love.

  “My friend asked me to double date with her and her boyfriend. Apparently he had a friend who was lonely. I had nothing better to do, so I agreed to go.”

  Hannah smiled. That sounded right. Her mother was ever practical.

  “So we went out to dinner and a movie. I didn’t like this guy from the start. Oh, but I did like the looks of her boyfriend.” She chuckled. “I was terrible to my date. I ordered the most expensive items on the menu. I had an appetizer, and a dessert. I made him pay.” She leaned back in her chair, smiling at the memory of it. “Your father was my friend’s boyfriend.”

  Hannah’s eyes widened. “You stole someone’s boyfriend.” This sounded nothing like her mother.

  “We weren’t friends so much as we worked together. And by the following weekend we weren’t friends at all.” She looked Hannah in the eye. “You may find this hard to believe, but I was quite attractive in the day.

  “No, I don’t find that hard to believe at all,” Hannah said truthfully. “I’ve seen pictures.”

  “Well, did you know that your father was in the Coast Guard?” She gave Hannah a look, almost a challenge.

  “But you hate boats!” Hannah was shocked.

  “Yes, so I made him quit.” She leaned back and smiled at her daughter, waiting for her to understand the meaning behind the story. “Boats were your father’s life, his livelihood. Then he met me and was willing to do anything to keep me. People change. Motives change. And situations…can change.” She stood and walked to Hannah. “Good night, my darling. See you in the morning.”

  It was all Hannah could think about all night. People do change. Gavin had changed in the short time that they were living together. So had she. She was happy. She had been happy. Maybe if she could figure out how to forgive, she could be happy once more. She just wasn’t sure if she could ever trust him again. And without trust…there was nothing.

  The vehicle pulled into the driveway around 3pm in the afternoon. Passing each girl their travel bag, she ordered them to their room to unpack. Then she grabbed the remaining bags and headed into the house. Gavin was there, waiting in the foyer. He looked…nervous. He looked…scared. He looked like he was hurting, too. And for some reason she took some pleasure in that.

  He opened his mouth to speak, but Hannah stopped him. “If you are about to lecture me about common courtesies, save it. I just want go upstairs, unpack. We can talk after if there is something you just are dying to tell me.” Then she marched up the stairs.

  When she closed the bedroom doors behind her, she felt badly. What had happened? One minute she was in the car, mentally prepared. The next minute she saw him and all that hurt and anger just flared up again. Her head and her heart were in serious conflict. If only she didn’t feel so much.

  Downstairs, Gavin had retreated to his study to think. She had snapped at him. Hannah took one look at him and just snapped. He deserved it. He sighed. At the same time, at least she was speaking to him; at least she had offered to speak with him later, too. Hope. More hope.

  Gavin didn’t want to wait until after the girls went to bed to speak with her. He had waited four days already. And the wait was killing him. So he decided to be patient enough. He waited for her to come back downstairs. He waited for the girls to come down in bathing suits begging to go sailing. And then, he asked the first question he had intended to ask that night.

  “Hannah, can we just go for a sail before we have to all get back to work in the morning?” He waited quietly for a response. The girls wanted to go, too, so he had that working in his favor.

  She looked down at the girls, wearing their bathing suits…and their pleading looks. Both girls had their hands laced in front of them, and kept mouthing the word ‘please’ over and over again. She hated to disappoint them. There would be disappointment enough when they realized that they were moving out. And she still had no idea where they were going to go. All she knew for sure was that she wasn’t going to dust off her ad and try to find a new man to take care of them. This had been disastrous. Lesson learned.

  “Fine. Let’s go sailing.” She went upstairs to get ready while Gavin and the girls headed out to ready the boat. As organized as she was, she came back down and they were off about fifteen minutes later.

  Quick to realize that they had forgotten food, Gavin shook his head. “I’ve got it under control. I didn’t want you to have to cook tonight so I ordered take out.” Then he smiled as they sailed over to a nearby marina. There was a delivery guy waiting for them. Gavin smiled.

  “You have got to be kidding,” Hannah said shaking her head.

  The girls swam later. And after that they went below to play. Gavin took that as his cue to talk to Hannah. The talk should come easily, since he had been practicing it for two days. Bitty had helped him with that. She had given him the idea. And as much as he hated to admit it, he was glad that she had come over. They had a lot to work through, but their time together over the weekend was a great start.

  “Listen,” he began slowly. “I’ve been thinking. And I know that you have turned in your written notice. I don’t suppose you decided to rescind it over the weekend?”

  Hannah shook her head. “I’m afraid not, chief.”

  Ah, so they were back to that. He liked ‘handsome’ better. Gathering his courage, Gavin continued with what he had rehearsed. “So, I’m thinking that you are probably no better off now than you were when you first moved in. Would that be an accurate assessment?” He could see she was hesitant to answer, worried about where the conversation was going. “You don’t have to say anything yet, just hear me out.”

  Hannah leaned down and looked through the hatch to check on the girls. They were oblivious to the intense conversation taking place topside. And she intended to keep it that way.

  “Whether you choose to believe it or not, Hannah,” he said, “I care about you. I don’t want anything to happen to you or Rory or Zoe.” He swallowed hard. “I really do love you.”

  Hannah’s breath caught in her throat and it sounded like she was trying to choke back a sob. She had turned away so he couldn’t see her eyes. And he let her have the time she needed to pull herself together before he continued.

  “I can’t just let you leave and worry about how all of you will survive. That’s not the man I am. I’m not Brett. I can’t just leave you to your own devices and move on with my life.” He shook his head. “I have no idea how I’m ever going to move on from this. Seriously. But I am going to do my best…for all of us.”

  Hannah’s head cocked to the side. “What do you mean? What are you getting at? Just say it.”

  “Okay,” he smiled shyly. “I have a proposition for you.”

  “Great.” She rolled her eyes to the heavens.

  “Here’s what I propose…” He waited to make sure she was listening. When she faced him again, he started. “We’ll keep doing everything as we had been. We’ll have our breakfasts together and our dinners together. We’ll go sailing. We’ll have our story time. We’ll keep everything nice and pleasant…for the girls…for all of us. We’ll share the study in the evenings. We’ll talk. And in a week and a half, we’ll spend the last two weeks of
the month sailing in the Caribbean.”

  “So far this sounds like a wonderful deal for you. Why should I go along with it? And at the risk of sounding mercenary, I’m dying to know what’s in it for me, other than a peaceful co-existence.” She crossed her arms over her chest.

  “Well, since you mentioned it, I would give you an incredibly generous severance package that would help all of us sleep better.” Gavin stretched. He hadn’t realized how tense he was until that moment.

  “You are asking an awful lot. Just how generous are we talking?” She stared at him, clearly unconvinced that any of this was really working out in her favor.