Waiting for the One

by L. A. Fiore

  “The findings suggest that Mr. Cambre’s car lost control on Route 1 just outside of Portsmouth. We believe his car rolled over the cliff, his side taking the brunt of the hit.” Hesitation slows his voice; what he has to say next is not going to be good. “Based on the severe damage to the car and”—he takes a breath—“the amount of blood soaked into the seat, we think he was killed instantly or very shortly after. The tech team thinks a seat belt malfunction is the reason why we’ve been unable to locate . . .” He doesn’t finish the thought; he doesn’t have to. Logan’s body. “We’re officially reclassifying our efforts from a search-and-rescue to a retrieval. I am so very sorry for your loss.”

  At first I think I’m in one of those wicked nightmares that seems so real but isn’t. This belief is dashed with a glance around the room to the devastated expressions staring at the police in horror. It’s slow to penetrate, like a dam breaking, the water a dribble at first until the crack widens and it gushes. Logan is dead, my Logan, my beautiful Logan, is dead. Shaking, I try to stand, but my legs crumple beneath me and I fall to the floor. Amount of blood. A sob chokes up my throat. Logan’s blood. Soaked into the seat. Dead. It can’t be. The thought of him in that car, rolling, crashing over a cliff, bleeding to death alone and in the dark. Did he call out to me? While he was dying, did he call for me? I didn’t tell him I loved him—the last time I saw him, I didn’t tell him I loved him. Oh my God, how could I have not told him I loved him? My Logan, his beautiful body lost at sea, lost to me. A stabbing pain rips through me. My heart splits and the pain is so excruciating I can’t breathe. A tortured sound echoes in my ears and I realize the sound of agony is coming from me. Logan is dead. He’s not coming back for me, he will never come back for me. And in that moment I want to die too, want to follow him and escape the long life I’ll be forced to live without him.

  Logan’s memorial is being held at St. Patrick’s Cathedral on Fifth Avenue. I don’t remember dressing, don’t remembering sitting in the car or being on the plane. The cathedral is packed, standing room only, and as we walk down the long nave toward the altar, I notice the photos of Logan set up on easels. His beautiful face captured for all time in that sexy, mischievous grin of his. In that moment it really hits me that I will never see him again. I will never touch that face or hear his voice. I will never catch him looking at me with love or feel his body against mine. And there isn’t even a body to bury, a place for me to go to mourn and remember him.

  I reach for Broderick’s arm as my tears fall so fast I can’t see. When he looks at me, I see my own pain reflected. I reach for his hand and hold it tightly in my own. Dante is there, taking my other hand, as we walk to our pew.

  Before the actual memorial, one person after another steps up to offer something about David, his skill, his art, but no one is talking about the man. Only the artist. As broken as Logan’s death has left me, this is the only chance I will have to honor him, Logan, the man. I stand.

  “Are you up to this?” Broderick whispers.

  My only response is a slight nod of my head.

  As soon as I step up to the altar, the church falls completely silent.

  “You speak of the artist, and his talent is without question, but he was so much more than an artist. He was funny, but able to laugh at himself. He wasn’t a great singer, though if you asked him he’d say he was Michael Bublé. He could bake a hell of a kelp cake and could grill a mean steak. He rode a motorcycle like it was a part of his body and could move you around a dance floor as if your feet were no longer touching the floor. He completely missed the entire point of the Alien vs. Predator movie, and he could keep a secret better than anyone I’ve ever known. He was generous, donating millions and millions of dollars to organizations dedicated to the protection and welfare of children.

  “He left behind a wonderful family—a family that will have to learn to pick up the pieces from his loss and somehow move on. And as for me, he was the best part of me. He was my lover, my best friend, my heart, and my soul, but now he’s gone. And I am so sorry for you that you will miss his talent, but I will miss the man. In a few years when there’s another to take over for David Cambre, you may think of him in passing, but his family and I will still be missing every single second that passes when he isn’t with us. You had him in life, but in death he belongs to his family and me because we’re the ones who have to bury our son, our brother, our soul mate, and find some way to survive—to live knowing that that wonderful human being no longer does.” I look over at his picture, my heart turning to ash in my chest. “I will love you always and I will miss you every day for the rest of my life.”

  I walk from the altar, but instead of going back to my seat I just keep walking right out onto Fifth Avenue.

  The day after Logan’s funeral, I refuse to get out of bed. I don’t want food or visitors. Lying there, I stare at his picture, tracing his face to memorize it. One day when I close my eyes, his face won’t as easily come into focus. There’ll come a day when I can’t hear his voice in my head or remember his scent or the sound of his laugh. I can’t bear the thought. Nearly frantic, I run to the closet and push hangers around until I find a sweater of Logan’s. His scent is still on it. Holding it to my face, I inhale deeply. Pulling it from the hanger, I carry it back to the bed with me, cradling it close and wishing with all of my heart that it were Logan.

  Three days after Logan’s funeral I’m standing on my back patio, staring at the picnic tables that should have been filled with our friends a week ago as we celebrated our wedding and now only serve to remind me of what I lost. I hate those tables. Grabbing the bench of the one closest to me, I try to drag it to the water, but it gets caught on the table leg. All the sorrow, fury, anger, and frustration bubbles out of me and I start kicking the bench, out of control with my grief. Strong arms wrap around me and I think it’s Logan. Turning into the figure, I see Broderick. Pushing away from him, I run back to my room.

  Five days after Logan’s funeral I wake from a dream that feels so real, I climb from bed and run out of my room looking for him. He’s probably in the kitchen or out back. He’ll laugh at how worked up I am over a nightmare. He’ll draw me into his arms and kiss me and then he’ll take my mind from it by carrying me to our room and making love to me. Calling his name, I search the house but I find only his family and my friends, all of them watching me with sympathy and worry.

  A week after Logan’s funeral, the police release Logan’s personal effects to me, but I can’t look at any of it. I hide the box in my closet.

  Two weeks after Logan’s funeral, I force myself to go to Tucker’s, force myself to start interacting with the land of the living. It’s an adjustment, because I don’t want to talk. I want to lose myself in my head because it is the only place where Logan is still alive and with me. I go through the motions at work, but I am not healing, and this causes my friends to force an intervention.

  I’m standing in front of the bar when Tommy locks the door, then joins Logan’s family, who have trickled in without my noticing. They all look very grave.

  “What?” I say.

  “We need to talk,” Tommy offers quietly.

  “About?”

  Briana says, “You aren’t getting better. You aren’t moving past your grief and you have to. As hard as it is, you have to move on. Logan would not want you mourning him this way—existing, but not living. He will always be a part of you, but you need to let him go.”

  “Have you let him go?” I ask softly, though I want to scream it.

  “I’m trying to, but the difference between us, Saffron, is I am finding joy in life again. They are small things but they’re there all the same. You haven’t moved past the initial phase of grief.”

  My grief boils up and out of me and when I look back at the others, tears fill my eyes and run down my cheeks.

  “How? Tell me how I move past the gaping hole in my chest that the loss of Logan has created? How do I find joy and happiness in life when I’m dea
d inside? I’m sorry that I’m not healing fast enough for you, but I don’t think I will ever recover from the loss of Logan. I don’t want to move on, I don’t want to forget. I want him back, I want him here, I want him to walk through that door and I want this reality to all be some horrible nightmare.”

  I don’t even realize the impact my words are having on the others until I see their tears, their pain and grief, which are as profound as my own. I sink to my knees. “I miss him so much I can’t breathe at times.”

  Briana kneels down in front of me and wraps me in her arms. “Small breaths, Saffron. Take small breaths. He loved you, but he’s gone and you are still here. Don’t die with him. He wouldn’t want that.”

  “I know.”

  “Miss him, love him—no one is asking you to forget him, but you can’t hold on to the grief of losing him. Find your joy. Logan would want that for you.”

  Each day I try to heed Briana’s words by finding something that makes me smile and every day I’m surprised when I actually do: when a smile touches my lips. And then one day, a week after my intervention, I have the moment when I know everything is going to be okay. I’m walking down Main Street and when I pass Logan’s statue, instead of it bringing me sadness, I think of him on that day when I nailed him with the funnel cake. The memory is so clear and, instead of bringing me pain, it makes me laugh. I stand in the middle of the street laughing until tears fall and I know that I will always miss him and love him, but I realize that because of those memories and that love that I can live without him. He’s gone, but he’s still a part of me and always will be.

  It takes me nearly a month after his death to work up the courage to go through Logan’s things. I was surprised to see that many of his possessions were still packed from his move to Harrington, even though he had been living here for almost two years.

  I sit in his bedroom on the floor and go through box after box. Most of the boxes are art supplies, and touching them makes me feel closer to him because only his hands touched these. Another box is full of clothes he never unpacked, but seeing the labels—Dolce & Gabbana, Armani, Burberry—it’s not really a wonder why he didn’t unpack them. In another box I find what looks like a man’s jewelry box, but I can tell the box is handmade and, from the look of it, done by a child. Logan? I run my finger over the carvings and think of a younger Logan with those green eyes intent on the box before him. I open the lid—all of the treasures he’s holding in this box are about me. I lift the black-and-white sketch of me standing on the beach with Reaper looking out at the water. There are the ticket stubs to The Fault in Our Stars that I dragged him to see and the shell I gave him, an imperfect shell, but the color swirled throughout it reminded me of his eyes.

  Pulling out a little notebook, I notice pages of high tide schedules, current and riptide markings, depth readings, and water temperatures. I go through page after page but nothing is detailed, it’s just disjointed notes. I take a moment to run my fingers over his handwriting before I place it back in the box.

  The next day, there’s a knock at my door and, when I open it, a huge vase of flowers is sitting on my stoop: the same arrangement as those at our engagement party. A numbness fills me as I stare at the flowers, afraid to blink for fear that they’ll disappear, that they really aren’t there. My hands shake as I retrieve them and see the card addressed to Saffron MacGowan. Reaching for it, I nearly drop the flowers when I read the three words.

  Love you, brat.

  Receiving flowers from Logan when he’s gone is almost too much. Why? How? Today isn’t anything special, so why the flowers? When did he arrange to have these delivered? I notice the number of the florist on the card—a florist located in Bar Harbor—so I walk to the kitchen for the phone.

  “Monique’s Floral. How can I help you?”

  “I just received a beautiful bouquet from you and I was wondering if you could tell me when the order was called in.”

  “Sure, can I get your name?”

  “Saffron MacGowan.”

  “One minute. Here it is. It’s an ongoing order, once a week, with the first delivery for today. It was paid in full in cash and the transaction date was July third.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yes.”

  “Thank you.” I hang up, but my hands are shaking violently now. Logan’s accident was on July 9. The significance of the transaction date is not lost on me.

  The fire at Dupree House was July 3, the day Logan freaked out at the hospital, told me I was the only one, and left me. He arranged to have flowers delivered to me every week, starting on the one-month anniversary of his death. He did plan this, he planned to fake his death and then took measures to assure me that he was okay after the fact. Anger burns through me. He didn’t fake his death, though, he actually caused it. He took himself away from me and the blinding fury that thought stirs has me hurling the flowers across the room.

  The grand opening of Dupree House has finally arrived. The day before, my friends and partners and I did one last walk-through. Thankfully the fire was in the shed and not the house.

  Dante uncorks a bottle of champagne and fills glasses, handing them around. Raising my glass, I take a minute. This moment is bittersweet. My tribute to Frank and Maggie is everything I hoped it would be, and yet I’m not filled with the joy and excitement the day deserves, because Logan’s absence hangs heavily over all of us.

  “It’s been almost a year since I had the idea for Dupree House. We wouldn’t be standing here had it not been for all of you. Broderick and Dante, to your tireless work in getting all the legal and logistical pieces in place. I truly would not have known where to begin. Josh, for turning this house into a home. And to Logan”—my words nearly get stuck in my throat—“whose encouragement was the catalyst to get the entire ball rolling. Thank you. Frank . . . he would have really loved this.”

  The tightening in my throat prevents me from taking a sip. Placing my glass down, I reach for the package I had sent special delivery. Ripping open the box and pushing aside the bubble wrap reveals a bronze plaque, two feet by two feet, that reads:

  DUPREE HOUSE

  IN LOVING MEMORY OF

  FRANK AND MAGGIE DUPREE.

  SEPARATED IN LIFE

  BUT TOGETHER

  FOREVER IN THE EVER AFTER.

  Eight students will be first to make Dupree House their home. The following morning is move-in day. A little ceremony is given by both the township of Upper Nyack as well as the state of New York. Many of the members of the Board of Directors who approved the idea are in attendance. When the ribbon is cut, I watch with tears as the students eagerly move up the steps and into the house.

  Life goes on, forges ahead despite whether we are willing to move on with it. Logan is gone. As much as I want him back, ache for the time when he was with me, I have to let him go. And so with a heavy heart, at the tribute to the man I thought of as a father, I say good-bye to the man I will always think of as my husband.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  Josh and Gwen and I are sitting around my living room watching Reaper chase his tail. He’s now a full-size shepherd and still he chases his tail like a puppy.

  Gwen is regaling us with stories about Callie’s dance recital when I suddenly sit up, feel nauseated, and just barely make it to the bathroom before I hurl.

  My friends are right there, holding my hair and rubbing my back as I empty my stomach.

  “What did you eat today?” Josh asks.

  I wipe at my mouth. “Nothing that would cause this.”

  “I’m not aware of a stomach bug going around,” Gwen says.

  “What’s the date?” My question is more a knee-jerk reaction because, with everything going on, I didn’t even realize I hadn’t gotten my period in a while.

  “October third.”

  “What?” Josh demands.

  “I’m late.”

  “What?” Josh asks, but Gwen knows.

  “How late?”

  “Late, r
eally late.”

  This is met with complete silence and then Josh jumps to his feet. “I’ll get a pregnancy test. I’ll be back in a jiffy,” he calls from over his shoulder.

  A half hour later the three of us are standing in my bathroom looking at two different tests, both of which are positive. Just a few weeks ago I came to terms with the loss of Logan, but he isn’t completely lost, he left a piece of himself with me. For the first time since he died, I’m looking forward to the future. “I’m having Logan’s baby.”

  I make an appointment at the clinic for the next morning and, when the pregnancy is confirmed, I call Logan’s family and invite them over. Gwen, Tommy, and Josh insist on being there too, so once everyone is settled I just blurt it out. “I’m pregnant.”

  There is complete silence. Boy, do I understand that reaction. Suddenly Rory jumps from the sofa and hugs me hard. “Oh my God.”

  “You’re going to be a granddad.”

  Broderick is almost impatient for his turn and, when he pulls me close, he whispers, “I’m going to be an uncle.”

  It makes my heart hurt to know that Logan will never know his son or daughter. This is a time to celebrate, though, so I force the sad thoughts from my head.

  Dante hugs me so tightly before he quickly steps back and looks guilty, as if he somehow crushed his nephew or niece.

  Briana steps up to me, her hazel eyes swimming in tears. “He isn’t lost to us.”

  Broderick comes jogging up beside me as I walk Reaper on the beach. I haven’t seen him since learning I was pregnant.

  “Hey, what are you doing here?” I ask as I lean in for Broderick’s kiss.

  “I wanted to see you. How are you, how’s my niece or nephew?”

  “We’re good. How are you? I haven’t seen you in a few days.”

  “I’ve been really busy.” He grows quiet and looks down at his feet as we walk along.