Love You Still

by Kat Bammer

  Peter’s probing eyes didn’t waver, but she turned and left the kitchen through the door to the hallway. The same eyes that had followed her into her dreams. Eyes that made her want to forget their messy past.

  Lisa shook her head at her own silliness. No, being confined in a car with Peter Fisher wasn’t a good idea.

  She fetched her shoes and her purse at the main entrance of the Inn. When she passed the giant mirror that had hung there, for as long as she could remember, she glanced at herself and came to a standstill. She didn’t look flustered, or not-yet-awake. She somehow looked worse than yesterday. Never a good idea to skip sleep for three nights in a row and then go to bed with wet hair. And just who would be there to witness? Perfect.

  She stepped out the door and leaned down to pet Cookie who basked in the first rays of sun. Cookie was a Chinook mix. Huge, but sweet-natured and almost shy. When Lisa left, she was only a few months old and had followed her dad everywhere. Now, she was an ancient lady. Lisa relaxed, but this relaxation lasted only until she turned the corner and arrived at the parking lot. There, Peter leaned against his truck, his lean body perfectly outlined in jeans and a white T-shirt.

  “Hey, Princess, I don’t want to burst your bubble, but if you don’t want to take the bus to Whitebrook, you’re stuck with me.”

  Lisa pressed her lips together. Princess… God, the nerves this man had. Then the words sank in and she stumbled. Her mother’s car! She’d left it there. They took Peter’s truck to the sheriff’s station, and home, as well.

  “Oh God, where’s Mom’s car?”

  Peter shrugged his shoulders. “Don’t know, but I’ll find out while you visit with your father.”

  A twitchy feeling settled in her throat and she clenched her teeth. Then she marched to the passenger side of his truck.

  “Can we at least not talk on the way?” Lisa settled into her seat and looked at Peter from the corner of her eye.

  Peter shook his head. “No can do, Princess.” The low pitch of his voice rolled hot over her.

  “I want to apologize, and we should talk about yesterday.” He put the car in reverse and glanced over his shoulder. When his eyes skimmed over her body, her skin pebbled.

  “Why?”

  “I can only guess, but there’s a chance yesterday’s pictures are bouncing around in your beautiful head. You may have questions too. Better to get it all out in the open.”

  They left the parking lot and drove along the one-lane street that ended at the Inn.

  He was right—a lot of questions about yesterday swirled around in her head. But that wasn’t what caught her attention. “No, I mean, yes, I have questions, but why would you want to apologize?”

  “You know why.” Peter looked sideways for a second but immediately turned his eyes back to the road.

  Did she though? Why would he feel the need to apologize? “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Your animosity toward me at the airport yesterday tells a different story.”

  Lisa’s cheeks tingled, and she crossed and uncrossed her arms when realization hit her. He wanted to talk about their past. About their night together and his shitty behavior afterward. “It’s okay, it was a long time ago.”

  Peter scratched his neck. “Doesn’t matter, I still owe you an apology.”

  Lisa blew out a noisy breath and turned toward Peter. “Look, we were kids. We made love, you ignored me and then left, end of story.”

  “That’s not right—”

  “Okay, had sex then—”

  “Would you shut up for a second!”

  Lisa snapped her mouth shut.

  “Sorry, I didn’t mean—” Peter took a deep breath. “Look, it was the right thing at the wrong time. I wasn’t in a good place back then, but I should’ve treated you better than I did.”

  “I felt pretty…”

  “Pissed off? Angry?”

  Lisa’s lips tightened in a quick smile. All of those. But then as the pain had dulled, as realization had settled in that he wouldn’t acknowledge what had happened between them, loneliness had been the one thing she had battled most. But that was silly. How could she feel lonely after one night with a boy? An intense night, she could give herself that, but their encounter had been too brief to evoke those intense feelings. “I think you made this bigger than it was. At least for me.”

  “Well, it was…” Peter hesitated while he searched for the right word. “Profound—at least for me.”

  “Okay.” Her chest tightened. Maybe profound was a good description. But it was half a lifetime too late for this chat. “Why do you want to talk about this now? I thought guys don’t like to talk about their feelings.”

  “I don’t.” Peter clutched the wheel until his knuckles turned white.

  Lisa rolled her eyes. “Could’ve fooled me.”

  There was a deafening silence in the car after that. And not a comfortable one. Lisa replayed the conversation in her head. Multiple times. Was she being petty? Yes, it had been a shitty move on his side. But he’d been a teenager, in what must have been the shittiest moment of his life so far.

  “Look”—Peter didn’t move his head or eyes off the street in front of him—“this is just an apology, but I see, it isn’t wanted. Obviously it meant more to me than it did to you. So, I’m sorry I bothered you.”

  Heat flushed through her body and her head jerked toward him. “It meant a lot to me, and you blew it—but now? Thirteen years later? It’s like waaayyy too late for this shit.”

  Why her eyes stung with tears, if it really was way too late for this shit, was a mystery to her.

  He watched her briefly before his eyes turned back to the road. After a while he raised his hand as if he wanted to touch her but put it back on the wheel. Minutes passed and she watched the countryside of her youth fly by. Now he knew. He knew just how much his actions had affected her.

  After a while he cleared his throat. His voice came out soft and deliciously low. “Can I just apologize for what I did? And can you maybe just accept my apology, please? I know I behaved like an ass. I knew right away. And I regretted it. A lot.”

  Lisa exhaled deeply. Why was she so riled up about this? They’d been young, there had been other men in her life, and it had been just one stupid night. Time to get over herself. “Okay, apology accepted. Can we move on now?”

  “Move on to being friends again?” Peter’s signature grin showed a dimple on his right cheek.

  Lisa’s heart flipped, and she looked away. The effect he still had on her body was astounding…and annoying. “God, you are needy.”

  A gleam entered Peter’s eyes. “No, just interested.”

  “In what?”

  “You.”

  Lisa stiffened. Okaaay. Totally not what she expected. “No.”

  Peter kept up his grin but didn’t look over to her anymore. “No to being friends or being interested in me?”

  Lisa squeezed her hands together. God, was he delirious? She wanted to get out of this car ASAP. “I think I’m getting claustrophobic with you and your over-inflated ego in such a small space.”

  That just made him chuckle, which rolled over Lisa like a silky wave. Not taking himself too serious had been one of his best traits as a teenager. Lisa stared at his mouth, the same mouth that, murmuring against her ear had soothed her yesterday and entered her dreams last night. Then again, dreaming about his mouth had been way better than the more disturbing pictures that loomed in the outskirts of her mind.

  Yep. Just an avoidance tactic. Definitely not because of the almost electrical feeling upon being near Peter Fisher.

  “How long to the hospital?” They had entered Whitebrook a few minutes ago, so it couldn’t be long.

  “Just around the corner.”

  The grin on his face annoyed her. Did he have these gorgeous dimples when he was younger? “Thank God.”

  “Well, sure nice to have you back—great company, polite too.”

  Lisa rolled he
r eyes. He sure as hell wouldn’t get a reaction out of her.

  He parked his car right next to the entrance of the hospital and she exited the vehicle as fast as possible. Well, that had been strange. The fact that he regretted his actions, that their encounter had impacted his life, as well, made her almost giddy. She needed to talk to Claire about this. Claire would help her make sense of all of this.

  “Hey, Princess, call me when you are ready; your mom has my number.” Peter had exited his truck and stood in the bright sunlight. Illuminated and grinning. Like an ancient northern god, ready for everything.

  9

  Karen met up with Lisa right in front of the glass doors of the ICU. “Mom’s in there right now, and it’s our turn right after,” she said.

  Lisa grabbed her sister’s forearm. “Did something happen? Did he wake up?”

  She shook her head but her sad expression turned into a strange little smile. She pulled Lisa into a hug and after a deep breath, released the hug and squeezed Lisa’s face with both her hands. “It’s good to have you back, little sister. I missed you so much.”

  They made their way to the ICU and settled on chairs right next to the glass doors of the ICU.

  “How was the night? Did you enjoy being home? Your last visit was some time ago.”

  “About five years since I’ve been home.”

  “Wow, that’s a long time. I always wanted to ask you this. Why did you leave in the first place?”

  Lisa looked down at the folded hands in her lap. “You know why.” She hesitated. “Mom and I never got along, and it became worse after you left for college. It was just time, you know. To get out. I always wanted to see the world.”

  “Bullshit,” Karen scoffed, “you loved it back home. You always wanted to take over the Inn, didn’t you? Something happened after the funeral. You changed.”

  “Well”—Lisa shrugged—“plans change. Especially when something like this happens. I just had the urge to forge my own path, make my own decisions. You know you can do anything over there when you are eighteen. Drink, drive, live your life.” She may have jumped on the chance, as well, because it was as far away from her mother as humanly possible.

  “Did you do all those things?”

  “Yep,” Lisa said.

  “But why Turkey? It’s the other side of the world and dangerous.” Karen looked at her with a total lack of understanding.

  “I got a job there; Marty got me an internship at a friend’s diving base in Turkey. I got to work and finish my dive master there. It was a great crew too. Lots of folks from Europe and Great Britain. I made friends there. And don’t get me started on dangerous—” Lisa stopped. Was she even allowed to talk about yesterday evening? She had to ask Peter.

  “And the Fisher boy?” Karen leaned closer to Lisa and her voice dropped to a whisper. “You had a crush on him, didn’t you?” She stared at Lisa and bumped shoulders.

  “No.” It hadn’t been a crush per se—maybe a little infatuation with the star hockey player of her high school that was crushed by said asshole. “Peter left Moon Lake a few months before me.”

  The glass doors slid open and their mother, accompanied by a nurse, came out of the ICU. Lisa and Karen stood up and accompanied their mom to the waiting room. She looked frail with clear signs of tears visible on her cheeks.

  “Who’s next?” the nurse said while their mother slumped down on a chair with a heavy thump and took a shaky breath.

  “You go first,” Karen said to Lisa and sat down next to their mother.

  Lisa turned to the nurse who was waiting at the entrance of the waiting room.

  “There are a few steps, before you can go in.” The nurse, whose name according to her name tag was Rosa, accompanied her to a small room and gave her a pack of clothes. “Dress up.”

  Lisa was lightheaded and sweat gathered on her forehead when she finished dressing in a gown and gloves and a surgical cap. Then she stepped into the room, greeted by the multitude of beeping from the machines, positioned around the bed. The pump of the ventilation machine drew Lisa’s attention first before she glanced at all the other machines and finally looked at her father in the bed.

  She didn’t recognize the man in the bed. Maybe it was a mistake, and she was in the wrong room. Lisa nibbled on her lips and glanced at the nurse who was still with her.

  “People can look very different when in a coma.”

  Rosa obviously had encountered her reaction before. “You can go to him, touch him, and talk to him. Just be careful around the tubes.”

  Three stumbling steps took her to a chair on the side of the bed where she plunked down just in time before her knees gave out.

  Her heartbeat raced, ready to explode. She took a closer look and saw the familiarities: his bushy eyebrows, the thin lines of his lips that usually turned into a grin so wide you couldn’t help yourself but grin back. But they weren’t grinning. And everything else looked nothing like her father. He had always been a bear of a man. Not frail, white as a sheet, old, and haggard.

  The nurse checked on some things on the other side of the bed.

  “How’s his score today?” Lisa remembered her conversation with Alan the day before.

  The nurse looked back at her sorrow visible in her eyes. “You have to talk to a doctor about his score. All I can tell you is that his overall condition hasn’t really changed.”

  Lisa swallowed—the pain in the back of her throat made it difficult to do so. Tears pooled in her eyes when she turned back to her dad, and then her vision blurred. Once again in her mind she saw the great man he had been—a great father. Her hero. The antidote to her mother’s criticism. Full of support and a deep trust that she was perfect just the way she was and that she would make her own way.

  Lisa took his hand into hers. It was cold, his skin soft even though it looked like parchment paper.

  A heavy weight settled in her chest and silent tears streamed down her face. Then she started talking; she told all kinds of stories of the last few years. Things she had seen under water, people she had met. But inside she mourned the wasted time. Time they hadn’t seen each other, because she wasn’t home.

  Some time later Rosa gently guided her out of the room. Her time was up, and she needed to swap places with Karen.

  Back in the waiting room, she sat next to her mother, both lost in their own thoughts.

  After a while of sitting in silence, Lisa’s mom spoke. “We had plans, you know. We wanted to see the world. Travel to all the places you’ve been to. Your father was so proud of you. I was too and a little jealous. I always wanted to get out of Moon Lake.”

  Lisa’s eyebrows nearly touched her hairline. Her mother opening up like this wasn’t something she could ever remember.

  “We also talked about what we’ll do with the Inn if something happens health-wise to one of us.” Her mother looked up at her expectantly.

  A slight chill made Lisa stiffen. “What?” Why was her mother looking at her this way? Nobody had ever talked to her about any of this.

  “If we can’t do it together anymore, we either sell it or you or Karen take over.”

  Lisa nodded. Sure, it was reasonable for them to have plans like that.

  “I talked to Karen already—she doesn’t want it. She doesn’t want to take over the Inn. I can’t blame her; she has made her life in Whitebrook. And you?”

  Lisa’s muscles tensed as she pressed her hands together. “Mom, you talk like Dad is dead. He could wake up any minute and everything could be the same again.”

  Her mother looked at her with so much compassion. Tears sprang into Lisa’s eyes.

  “Baby, I talked to the doctors. There hasn’t been a change in Carl’s medical condition. It hasn’t gotten any better. They think there’s a strong possibility that he’ll never wake up again. And if he does wake up, he’ll most likely not be his old self. His brain just didn’t recover in the last few days.” Her mother’s voice hitched, and tears streamed down her own cheeks
.

  A sob wedged in Lisa’s throat. It just couldn’t be true. Why the hell would this happen? Her dad was so good, to everyone, always. Helped, when he was needed. Minded his own business when you needed him to leave you alone. But she needed him right now. She wanted him to walk her down the aisle one day. Show her children how to build a wooden boat, or sword or anything else in his small workshop. Pictures of them together: fishing with their small boat, sitting on the high seat in the woods watching the deer.

  Lisa couldn’t bear the thought of never again having a chance to talk to her dad. Ask him one of the hundreds of questions that always popped in her head at the strangest moments.

  Her mother embraced her and made calming unintelligent noises.

  “I know we had our problems in the past, Lisa, but if you want to take over the Inn, now’s the time to step up.”

  Her throat closed off. Losing the Inn. Not having this last connection with her dad. All of her memories were at that place. It was her childhood dream. “Can’t we wait, until there is certainty? I’m not ready; I don’t know how. I have a completely different life waiting for me. Why do we need to make this decision now, Mom? We can wait a few weeks, see how Dad is doing by then.”

  “It’s okay. I know this is too sudden. But we don’t have the luxury of time. We have guests booked. It’s summer. We can’t just not decide. I want to be with your dad and Mary has her own life. She can’t pitch in for weeks. We need someone to take over immediately. Business was slow this past winter. A new hotel opened right at the slopes at Sheep’s Mountain. They took a lot of the usual business. We barely made enough to keep going, but we have bookings all through summer. We can’t afford to lose this business. I’m really afraid we have to make a decision, either way.”

  They released their embrace and her mother flattened her clothes before her hands fell into her lap while Lisa pressed two fingers to the sides of her forehead and closed her eyes. She could feel a headache coming on.

  “There’s someone who has been interested in acquiring the Inn; I’ll just give him a call.”