“Joe, maybe we should find a spot in the shade for you. Clearly, the sun is getting to you.” She said with a frown. The last thing they needed was Joe to suffer from heat stroke.
“I’m outside for five minutes, Debra.” Joe said, sitting down on the lounge chair beside the one she had already claimed. Deb turned around completely, at the sound of her full name and looked at her husband. “Sit down, dear.” He said, nodding towards the lounge chair.
She took a deep breath, unprepared for whatever it was her husband was about to tell her. There were very few times he had taken the initiative when it came to discussing their children. She sat down slowly and met his gaze.
“I know you’ve seen the way the two of them are whenever they are together. I know you’re aware of the way they look at one another. Hell, if I can see it, Stevie Wonder can.”
Deb looked towards the pool, watching as Cara threw her body over Luke and forced him under the water. “Yes.” She said cautiously.
“Our boy loves that woman, just as hard as our other one did, if not more.” He said softly, reaching for her hand.
“Don’t say that. Jake loved Cara with everything he had. It’s not his fault he couldn’t be here to keep her love.” Her voice was rich with emotion even to her own ears.
“It’s no one’s fault. God called him home and there wasn’t a damn thing any of us could do.” Joe looked down at his loafers, blowing out an exasperated breath as he did so. “Every single one of us still wishes he was here, Deb. We lost our son and that void will never be filled, but Luke and Sam, they lost a sibling. They lost one third of the bond they shared. And, well, Cara, she lost her best friend and her first love.”
Deb brushed away the tears that fell as a result of her husband’s words.
“You and I know better than anyone, you can’t control who you fall in love with. It wasn’t that long ago you and I were in Luke and Cara’s shoes.”
“Thirty-seven years ago is a long time.” She said softly.
“It seems like it was just yesterday.” He said with a wink, before he took both his wife’s hands in his and squeezed softly. She looked at him. She looked into the aging eyes of the man she loved and allowed herself to remember when those eyes were just a bit younger, the young eyes of the man who picked up the fallen pieces of her life all those years ago.
“I recognize the guilt Luke has been struggling with since Jake died. I see it in his eyes. He wanted to be able to save his only brother the same way I wanted to save mine. Sure, the circumstances were different. Jake was sick, while Vincent’s life was claimed by a drunk driver. I never intended to fall in love with you Debra. It started out much the same as it did for these kids. I was just trying to do the noble thing, and look after my brother’s girl.” He smiled as the memories washed over him. “I fell in love with you and I fell harder than I ever imagined possible.” He reached up and removed her sunglasses, his smiled widened, looking into her tearful eyes. “It was the best thing that ever happened to me. Vincent brought you into my life, and I will always be thankful to my brother. The life you and I made together was the best gift my brother could’ve ever given me. Our Jake did the same thing for his brother. It’s as if lightning struck twice for our family.”
Deb very rarely allowed herself to visit those early days of meeting Joe Lanza. Sure, she loved her husband with her whole heart. She loved the life they shared and was so grateful for all their blessings. But when she did allow herself the trip down memory lane, she couldn’t help but remember her dear Vincent. The first man she ever loved, the man who had been tragically ripped away from her.
She was much younger than Cara when she lost Vincent, barely twenty years old, when he had passed away. They too had been engaged to be married. Like Cara, Deb never married her first love, she was only left to mourn him and the wedding that never would be. Joe had been a pillar of strength for her back then. They had forged an unlikely friendship and from that friendship a love was born. Her love for her husband was different than the love she had for Vincent and only grew as the years passed them by. It didn’t take away from what she felt for Vincent, the young love of two carefree people.