In a Heartbeat (18 page)

“Well, the nurse said not to stay long. One visitor at a time. And your dad is waiting to see you. I just wanted to say that seeing you made me feel a connection,” Scott said.

“I know what you mean. I feel like she’s part of me now, and I’m going to live for both of us.”

He turns toward the door. “Believe me, Amelia. You got a strong heart. It’s not going to give out on you.”

“Thanks for the flowers, Scott.”

He leaves. Amelia sighs and closes her eyes. I want to follow Scott, but something is keeping me here.

“She needs to talk to your mom,” Miki says.

“How can I help her? Nobody can see or hear me. I can’t talk to anyone.”

“Wanna bet?” she says.

“But how?” I ask.

“I’ll show you.” And she pulls me away.

Ask anyone who’s died and you’ll get the same answer: the best way to talk to someone still living is in their dreams.

My parents waited for me in their dreams, hoping that if they found me, they could somehow keep me from leaving again. Dreams let them pretend. So much easier than facing real life.

Mom had dreamed of me as a little girl. In that dream I was still alive, and she was upset when she woke up and realized I was dead. It was as if she’d lost me all over again. That dream led to uncontrollable sobbing in the middle of the night.

I came in the faint early morning light after she’d had a restful night’s sleep and was ready to hear what I had to say. Her mind was unusually clear. Mom’s arm was tucked under her pillow and her brown hair was disheveled. She’d kicked off the bedspread earlier and now had drawn her body into a fetal position in search of warmth.

In this dream she knew I had died. She was sitting at the kitchen table and she saw me as I looked the day of the accident. I had on my warm-up pants and a sweatshirt.

I stood at the other side of the table, my hand resting on the back of the chair. I was quiet until I knew she’d seen me. I didn’t want to scare her.

“Hi, Mom.”

She looked hard at me, not sure she could trust her eyes. “Eagan? Is that really you?”

I nodded.

“How could you leave me like that?” She said it as if I’d broken her heart on purpose.

“It’s not like I wanted to leave,” I said.

She shook her head, both in her dream and in real life on her pillow. “I need you,” she said with tears in her eyes.

“I’m sorry, Mom,” I said in a softer voice. “You’ll have another child. She’ll be a comfort to you until you see me again.”

“But she won’t replace you.”

“Good,” I said. “I wouldn’t want her to.”

Then I changed form. I don’t know how I did it. Maybe because it was a dream and in dreams you have that ability. I became that other girl, Amelia. Mom stared at me. Her eyes widened in panic. “Eagan!”

“I’m right here, Mom.”

She stared at me, at this other girl I’d become who had the same voice as her daughter’s.

“You’re not my daughter.”

“No. But maybe Amelia can show you where I am.” I paused. “I love you, Mom.”

“I love you.”

“I don’t fear the worst anymore. It’s all good.”

Then Mom dreamed about the baby, whispering softly to her about her big sister. I could tell Mom was going to wake up differently this time. No more sobbing. She’d remember this dream and would keep it close to her heart.

I waved as I faded from her dream. “Be happy, Mom.”

Mom nodded at the thought, and she smiled at me, both in her dream and on her pillow.

36

Amelia

I stared out the window at the Milwaukee skyline. If I leaned just right, I could see Lake Michigan. The whitecaps reminded me of the froth on the top of a root beer. I had on the same jeans and shirt I’d worn to Eagan’s house. It had felt weird to lie in bed with my clothes on. But I didn’t want to sit in the chair. So I perched on the edge of the bed, waiting for Mom and Dad to take me home.

They were downstairs talking to reporters at a press conference that the hospital had set up. It was national news that I’d had an episode at the home of my donor. Reporters kept coming to the ward, asking to see me. Dad said that someone from CNN had called. Mom kept them all away. I just wanted to be left alone.

My levels are good now. The danger has passed. What if I’d died in her house, right on Eagan’s bed? Now that
really
would have been news.

How would the reporters react if I told them how she’d changed me? Would they believe that Eagan gave me a sense of humor and a feisty mouth that seemed to spill out thoughts that came from nowhere? Would they believe that she’d told me her nickname was Dynamo? That I knew she was a figure skater? That I knew about the rocking chair she’d hidden in her closet?

As I watched the waves splashing against the shore, I remembered watching the video of Eagan on the ice, her body effortlessly flying through the air. I’d heard her laugh, watched her move with a confidence I couldn’t imagine having. She might have died, but at least she knew how to live.

All I had were my drawings. Pages of that magnificent horse from my dream, the one who’d led me here. I’d tried over and over to capture the image on paper, but each effort came up short.

Someone behind me cleared her throat. I turned around, thinking the discharge nurse had more instructions. But a woman stood just inside the door.

“May I come in?” she asked. I recognized Eagan’s mom from pictures at her house. She was short but carried herself in an upright, almost regal stance. Her curly hair was pinned up. She smiled at me, but her pointed chin and high cheekbones made her seem less inviting than the smile intended.

My heart skipped a beat. “Mrs. Lindeman?”

She walked to the other side of the bed. “You’re going home today?”

I nodded. My throat felt dry.

“That’s wonderful. We’ve been praying for you.”

Was she here because she felt guilty? She seemed so restrained, like I imagined the Queen of England would be if I met her. It was then that I noticed her round belly.

“You’re pregnant,” I blurted out.

She put a hand on her stomach. “Yes. I’m due in April.”

I shook my head. “Eagan didn’t know.”

Mrs. Lindeman took a step back. “How did you know that?”

“I don’t know,” I stammered. “I just knew.”

She tilted her head to one side and softly rubbed her stomach. “I tried to tell Eagan the day she died.”

That was something I
didn’t
know.

“Scott told me about the chair. He said you knew about that too.”

“Yes,” I said in a whisper.

“I had a dream the other night,” she said. “Eagan was there. It was . . . strange. When I awoke, I wasn’t sure if I’d dreamed it or if it really happened.”

I knew all about strange dreams.

“She came to me in the dream. But she looked different.”

I held my breath and closed my eyes as a cinnamon and rust–colored horse galloped through my mind. “What did she look like?”

Mrs. Lindeman walked around the bed and stood in front of me, studying me. “She looked like a girl I didn’t recognize. It wasn’t until I got up close that I realized she was my daughter. I thought, ‘How silly.’ How could a mother not recognize her own daughter? Then she spoke to me. I heard her voice, but it was coming from this other girl.”

“Who?” I whispered. Her eyes held so much grief that it was hard to look at her. Was that how my mom would have looked if I’d died?

“You. She looked just like you.”

I blew out a breath, letting her words sink in. “I’m so sorry,” I finally said, because there was nothing else I could say. I wished I could take away that pain. I held back the tears in my own eyes as hers flowed down her cheeks. Could she ever forgive me for taking her daughter’s heart?

Mr. Lindeman was at the door. He watched his wife from behind her, his hands held out in a way that looked as if he was ready to run and catch her if she collapsed.

She sighed. “We had a . . . difficult relationship. I’m not sure she always knew how much I loved her.

“She was strong,” she said. “Not only physically. She had this focus when skating that was amazing. I don’t know how she made that mistake and hit her head. But Eagan always knew something the rest of us didn’t. I believe she knew she’d die young.”

Mrs. Lindeman put her hand out and leaned forward, hesitant. “May I listen?”

I nodded.

She touched my heart for a few seconds, then put her ear on my chest and listened. The fragrance of her stiff hair spray and her soapy skin smell made my heart quicken. After a moment she pulled back, cocked her head, and nodded as though she recognized the beat.

“Yes,” she said. “That’s her heartbeat.”

She looked up at me. “I’m sorry I couldn’t see you sooner after you drove all that way.” She kissed her palm and laid it on my heart again. “And I’m sorry for any pain I caused you, my darling.”

Finally, she reached out to me. I hugged her, feeling the weight of her growing child press into me. The tears that I’d been holding back came anyway.

When she let go, Mr. Lindeman pulled his wife into his arms. She sobbed silently. “Eagan knew that you loved her, Cheryl,” he assured her in a quiet voice. “She always knew.”

I was released from the hospital later that afternoon, and we headed home to Minnesota shortly after that. I leaned back in the seat and closed my eyes as the Milwaukee suburbs thinned out to farmland.

I’d thought Eagan had sent me here to help her mom get through her grief. But maybe it was for me. I had to learn to accept her precious gift. I was learning to bear the guilt over the fact that someone else’s tragedy had become my good fortune. And there was a price to that good fortune. I’d always feel a responsibility to make my life worthwhile.

Someday I’d come back for another visit. Mrs. Lindeman had invited me. She’d given me a picture of Eagan. But when I got better, the first thing I planned to do was to learn how to skate and ride horses.

Mom and Dad talked softly in the front seat. Their voices felt like a warm blanket, reassuring and comforting. Soon I was asleep.

I was galloping across a grassy pasture on the horse from my dream. Eagan was with me. This time she was right behind me, holding on to my waist as we rode together.

I
was leading us now, on this magnificent horse that I knew I’d spend years trying to capture on paper. I would draw us on the horse, riding through woods and prairies and over high mountains and into the future.

My eyelids fluttered as I heard Mom’s voice carry to the backseat. “I can’t believe the nerve of that reporter at the press conference. He asked me if we’d known all the problems in store for Amelia, would we still have gone through with the transplant.”

“What’d you say?” Dad asked.

But it was me who answered him. “In a heartbeat.”