“You had such a crazy day,” Joe said. “What was the worst thing?”
“I don’t know,” she said. “Possibly my mother checking out like she did. And dropping the idea of an older brother existing out there somewhere.”
“Then what was the best?”
Her facial features froze for a moment. “Let me think.” She drummed her fingers on the counter. Then she smiled sweetly. “I held the baby. Chad’s granddaughter. He had never even seen her. She has no real connection to me but I feel like she does. It was also nice that Amy told me, to the best of her knowledge, Chad didn’t have an ongoing relationship with her mother. But he was a cad. He should have told me about Amy and made arrangements to help support her. He helped, Amy said, but it sounds like he really didn’t do his share.”
“I’m pretty sure he was afraid of losing you.”
She laughed. “He could have gotten a lot of mileage out of telling me that!”
“I know,” Joe said. “Are you planning to tell the kids pretty soon?”
“Yes, of course. Not only do they deserve to know they have a sibling but, selfishly, when I die I’m not going to leave behind a lot of mysteries and questions. I’ve always tried to impress on them that the truth is easier and safer. Bess simply can’t lie, Mike hates lies but he has figured out how to say very little and Jessie can be brutally honest but with a strong deference to her own feelings and needs. I never told my children about Chad’s affair. I didn’t think it was pertinent. I thought it was selfish of me to be tempted to tarnish his reputation. But then, I didn’t know about Amy.”
“Now you know.”
“I have one more piece of information to get from her. We didn’t talk about Chad’s will. Surely she’s the ten percent.”
“Hopefully he doesn’t have more families scattered around,” Joe said.
“God help us.”
Joe stood and walked around the breakfast bar. He slowly and casually put his hands on her waist and pulled her a bit closer. “I’m going to leave now,” he said, and his voice had become a bit gravelly. He lowered his lips to hers and kissed her, short and sweet. He noticed she let her eyes gently close, breathing in, breathing out. He pulled her closer and went in for the kill, covering her mouth in a searing kiss, and her lips opened under his. Joe groaned a little bit against her mouth. Their tongues played; their arms tightened and he was feeling aroused.
“I’m going to go now.”
“You don’t have to, Joe.”
“Yeah, this time I do. The next time I stay over, I’m not likely to stay in Mike’s old room and I’m not going to lay beside you after four hours of talking about the mess Chad left behind. Next time, there will be no ghosts in the room with us.”
“I don’t think I could have gotten through these dark days without your support and understanding. But I’m also ready for the dark days to be over.”
“I know that for all his charm Chad hurt you.”
“Over and over,” she admitted.
“What do you want for the rest of your life?” Joe asked. “What would bring you the ultimate happiness? The Supreme Court? Grandchildren? True love?”
“That all sounds fun, but what I’d really like is for someone to love me as I am. I want someone who thinks I’m beautiful fifteen pounds overweight, who wears earplugs because I snore rather than scolding me for what I can’t help or fleeing to another bedroom. I want someone who believes in forgiveness and gives it and asks for it. Asking for it—that’s huge. And no matter what you’ve heard, love does mean you have to say you’re sorry. I don’t know if it’s possible, but I won’t have another relationship unless it can be authentic. I don’t expect perfection and I don’t have it myself but what matters is acceptance and commitment.”
He smiled and gave her a squeeze. “You’re going to be fine, Anna. What you want is reasonable and should be plentiful.”
“It should be,” she said. “We’ll see.”
“If you think there’s any way I can help, please let me know. For now, I’ll text you when I’m home. Thank you for letting me make us dinner. Thank you for everything.”
Joe’s love for Anna was the kind of love that went with close friendship, with great admiration, with pride. He certainly never had a plan in mind, like if Anna was single... But once the worst of his grief and hers had passed, he realized he had always loved her.
Back when his own marriage was falling apart, Chad and Anna struggled through Chad’s affair. It was such a messy ordeal and they flirted with the idea of divorce. At that time the very idea of ever marrying again was sour in Joe’s mouth; he felt he’d failed at marriage. But he did have a moment or two when he thought if Chad was fool enough to leave Anna, Joe might find himself in a very awkward situation.
But now his marriage had been over for almost twenty years, his kids were grown, one married and the young mother of two small children, one in a postgrad program at Berkeley, and he hadn’t even entertained the idea of a second marriage. He’d had a couple of girlfriends over the years, but nothing serious. And now, Anna’s marriage was not only over, she had admitted it had been strained for a while.
A whole new world was opening up to Joe.
EIGHT
Jessie waited at the same sidewalk table where she’d had her first date with Patrick. When he asked her where she’d like to have dinner, she asked if they could come here. It was nostalgic and sentimental to her. She’d been seeing him for just a few weeks and she was dead in love. He was already forty-five minutes late.
He was a busy man, she understood that. His time was very valuable. She was getting used to it, at least a little bit. When they were together, when he was focused on her, she was in heaven.
“Another glass of wine, madam?” the waiter asked.
“I’d better stick to water until my date arrives,” she said.
“Don’t fill up on chips,” he advised in good humor.
“I’ll try,” she said, giving him a smile.
Late, she thought with aggravation. She not only wore her hair down the way he liked it but she’d run by the hair salon and had it blown out, making it full and pretty. She had freshened her makeup and had brought a change of clothes to the office. After a few more minutes she visited the ladies’ room and then upon her return to the table she tried to occupy herself with people watching. A few people still wore masks, a holdover from the pandemic from a year before.
It was right at the onset of the pandemic that she and Jason had run into trouble. With businesses and restaurants closed and the hospital so busy, she became horribly lonely and they argued all the time. That led to him breaking up with her. He said she was a cranky old nag and, being a doctor herself, she should have been much more flexible and understanding.
Those had never been her strong suits.
Her cell phone rang and she lifted it from the table. She didn’t recognize the number, but she answered.
“Dr. McNichol?”
“Yes.”
“This is Cheryl Mattson. I’m a neurosurgery nurse and I work with Dr. Monahan. He asked me to give you a call to tell you he’s sorry he’s running late. He’s seeing a patient.”
“He’s already almost an hour late,” she said a little more hotly than she had intended.
“He was extremely busy and said to tell you that you shouldn’t wait for him.”
“How much longer will he be?” she asked.
“This is his last patient. He should be out of here in a half hour to forty-five minutes. That’s just a guess.”
“Tell him I’m waiting,” she said. And she hung up without saying thank-you or goodbye.