Book of Days: A Novel (37 page)

"Are you with me here? Do you think you'll ever love anyone else again?"

"I can't get her out of my heart."

Ann sighed and pulled a climbing rope slowly through her palm. "I don't think you ever have to get her out of your heart, but what about getting her out of your head?"

"She's leaving my mind. Faster every day."

Ann put on her sunglasses. "Jessie will always have a place in your heart, but as long as you keep holding on to her in your mind, you'll never be fully open to anyone else who comes along. You have to let her go."

"I know, but I don't know how. It's not like a button I can push."

"All I'm saying is if the possibility of love is in front of you, you need to open yourself to see it. And holding on to Jessie too tightly is like walking around with blinders on."

Cameron didn't respond and a few minutes later Ann suggested they head back down. After the seconds hand on his watch whirled around ten times, they stood on red-brown earth. It had been an excellent climb, without anything of note happening except how seamlessly they worked together.

"Good climb. Good call on getting us back up there, H," he said. "Are you glad we did it?"

Ann didn't answer.

The falcon swept by overhead and screeched. Cameron cocked his thumb. "At least he agrees."

Again Ann didn't comment. She picked up one of their ropes and coiled it in swift, tight motions, tied it off, and tossed it toward the car almost violently. He walked over to her and bent down to grab another rope.

"You want some help?" Cameron slid his hand around the rope on top, but Ann yanked it away and walked toward the car, coiling it herself.

It was obvious the thaw on top of the mountain was temporary. And it was getting tiring having her travel back and forth from sun to snow.

"Did I do something? Taking a wild guess here, but I think you're ticked off at me."

"You're a genius. You should write a book on picking up on women's subtle emotional clues. Book sellers would catch on fire it'd sell so fast." She dumped the rope in the trunk and strode back toward him.

"And
why
are you upset with me?"

Ann shook her head as she marched past him.

"Come on. Are you going to let me know what I did, or are we going to have as quiet a ride back to town as we did on the way up here?"

"Do I really have to tell you?"

Yes, she did.

"I'm sorry. You're right. It's not your issue, it's mine. You haven't done anything wrong." She picked up her day pack, strode back to the car, slammed it into the trunk of his MINI Cooper, and ambled back toward him.

"Then what's the problem?"

Ann placed both hands on her hips, and her eyes drilled into him like a laser. "You really and truly don't understand what I was trying to say up there three-hundred feet over your head, do you? You didn't pick up on any clues as we sat looking out over the valley?"

Cameron squatted down and drew circles in the dirt with his forefinger. He had every excuse to say no. Her hints would have sailed over the head of a lot of guys. But deep down he knew. During the past week and a half, her eyes had been saying the same thing they'd said years ago when he first met Jessie and her. She liked him. Wanted to be with him. And then he'd chosen Jessie, and the light in Ann's eyes had gone out. Until now. "Yes, I knew what you were saying."

"But you just let me sail it out there, gave me no response . . . let me feel like a complete fool."

"I'm sorry, I'm just not ready to let go of Jessie."

"You need to consider something, Cameron Vaux."

He looked up.

"Do you think you're the only one who misses her? You're not the only one who lost someone two years ago. She was my best friend. The sister I never had." Ann kicked the ground. "At a certain point you have to get on with life."

"Before I get on with life, I have to know if there's going to be a life to get on with!"

"What's that supposed to mean?"

Cameron rolled his eyes.

"You know what I think? I think you're losing more than a few memories here and there, which all of us do. You've lost a lot. You're terrified this thing will accelerate into losing your mind completely. It's why you cling to the idea of this book, even though you know there's ninety-nine percent chance it's a farce. It's a way to avoid ever really looking reality in the eye."

Ann marched over to a pine tree, folded her arms, and leaned her shoulder against it, her back to Cameron.

"I'm not losing my mind!" Cameron flung his arms wide. "You have no way of understanding what I'm going through. Just because I'm not willing to tell you about all the demons I'm wrestling with, doesn't mean I'm not facing reality. And yes, the book gives me hope in the midst of the nightmare I've lived in since Jessie died—one that I'm living more vividly now than I ever have."

Ann whirled back to face him, her eyes full of fire.

"I know. You gave your heart away to Jessie and life stole her from you. So focusing on the book keeps you from the risk of giving your heart away again. Tell me, if you could do it all over again, would you have still loved her? Still swam in the beauty of that relationship?"

She strode over to him and popped his shoulders with her palms, making him stumble back two paces. "Climbing is life, Cameron. Figure it out. At a certain point you'll have to go beyond climbing 5.10s and risk climbing 5.11s, 12s, 13s. Whether it's with me or someone else."

"What are you saying?"

"Brilliant video producer dies because he can't see the picture right in front of him. Film at eleven." She turned and strode toward the car. "You know exactly what I'm saying."

Two emotions slammed into his heart at the same time. Betrayal, of Jessie; and his growing feelings for Ann. "I'm just not ready to go there with you, with anyone." He rubbed his head with both hands. "I can't—"

"Won't." Ann turned, strode to the car, yanked the door open, and got in.

He ground his teeth together. Nightmare. Wondrous. He couldn't tell which emotion was stronger.

Cameron glanced at Ann as they bumped along the road, his car throwing up clouds of fine brown dust behind him. Was she crying? He couldn't tell with her face turned toward the window. There was no manual in the glove compartment for this kind of problem.

What could he say?
"Uh, I think maybe I could feel the same way about you. In fact I'm sure I do, but you're right about my mind. It feels like microscopic drops of acid are being dropped into my mind burning away my memories. And why would you ever want to be with a guy with that problem? And I'm not over Jessie, but I think maybe kinda sorta want to pursue a relationship with you."
No, would not happen.

After riding in twenty minutes of silence, Cameron said, "I'm sorry, Ann, I—"

"Forget it. My fault." She turned and gave a big smile that didn't reach her eyes. "We're wrong for each other on so many levels. We couldn't ever be together. But I needed to get what I told you out in the open, but now that it is, I'm truly good. Trust me. You and I as friends is the way it's supposed to be, and it's the way we'll go forward from now on forever and ever, amen."

"What do you mean we couldn't ever be together?"

"You know why."

"Enlighten me."

"My whole life centers around Jesus."

"So."

"Yours doesn't at all. It's not exactly a match made in . . . you know."

Cameron rapped his fingers against his steering wheel. "It never was a problem for Jessie and me."

Ann arched an eyebrow and looked at him. "Oh, really?"

"Yes really. We worked through it."

"No you didn't. You worked through nothing." Ann pulled her knees up to her chest and wrapped her arms around them. "You never saw how much it ate at her, knowing she wouldn't see you in heaven."

"How do you know there is a heaven?"

"Don't change the subject, Cameron."

"How can you be so sure heaven is real?"

Ann's gaze bore into him. "How can you be sure it isn't?"

They rode the rest of the way in silence. Ann was right. Friends only would work. He'd make that work. For both of their sakes.

"So are we still on for tomorrow?" Cameron pulled into the parking lot of Ann's hotel and helped her carry her gear to the trunk of her Prius.

She shut the trunk and smiled. "Sure. I have a little more research to do today, and if I find what I'm looking for, tomorrow I'm going to blow your mind."

CHAPTER 35

Cameron sat in the corner of Java Jump Start just before ten on Monday morning, debating whether to order a third latte or go for straight black drip when the bells on the front door jangled. He looked up. Ann. She swept inside, stopped, and glanced to the left then the right.

When her eyes found him, the corners of her mouth turned up a millimeter. She waltzed toward him, as if she knew without a doubt he'd be sitting there ready to hear what she'd discovered.

She twirled in a tight circle and, while still two paces away, tossed a bundle of papers toward him, spinning them like a Frisbee.

"Hey!" Cameron lifted his coffee and leaned back as the package smacked onto the dark walnut table and slid to a stop with a third of the papers hanging off the edge.

"Time to connect the dots." Ann grinned at him, hands on hips, sunglasses dangling from a cord around her neck.

"Apparently you're providing the pencil?"

"I am, and the pencil is a number ten out of ten. I found what I was looking for. And you will like it. A lot." She bounced on the balls of her feet and rubbed her hands together like she was starting a fire.

He looked back and forth between her and the bundle. "You've found something."

"More than something." She plunked down into the seat next to him. "Open it."

He untied the twine holding the papers together and spread three pamphlets and ten or so pages of notes out on the table along with two maps—one of the world and one of the night sky. The world map was marked in seven spots with dots of red ink.

Leaning back in his chair he took a sip of his coffee and gave Ann a little smile. "We know the seven spots on this map are the only seven spots in the world where I'd find a certain kind of stone."

"Right."

He looked from the map of the world, to the map of the night sky, back to the map of the world. "Unbelievable." He rapped his knuckles on his forehead and grinned at Ann.

"What is?"

His hands shook as he drew lines between the dots.

"What's unbelievable?" she repeated.

He looked up and her eyes told him she already knew the answer. "That I didn't think about doing this earlier."

After he finished connecting all the dots, Cameron held up the map and studied the pattern.

"You've already done this exercise, haven't you?"

"Yes. But I thought you'd like the rush of doing it yourself." She smiled.

"Now we look for the constellation that matches the pattern of the stones."

"Go on."

"And once we figure out which constellation it matches, it gives a major clue as to where we're going to find the Book of Days."

"Congratulations, Cameron, you've just won the daily double."

He smiled and compared the pattern to the picture of the night sky. Five minutes later he looked at Ann. "I'm not seeing it."

She had a smug look on her face.

"You're already ahead of me on this, aren't you?"

"Miles."

"And you've enjoyed the last five minutes of me flaying about, yes?"

"Immensely."

"So now that the fun is over, you're going to tell me what you've known for the past twenty-four hours."

"Past fourteen." Ann slid an acetate drawing of the pattern of the stones and laid it over the map of the night sky. "Do you see the pattern of the stones matching any of the constellations?"

"No, that's what I'm saying. There's no match."