One to Tell the Grandkids (14 page)

Taryn didn’t answer. She didn’t look at him. All she did was scoot over, taking his hand and pulling him down beside her. He didn’t resist. When she put her arms around him, he didn’t pull away.

For almost a minute, he was tense under her hands, but then all the air seemed to go out of him. His breath began to stutter, and he wrapped his arms around her waist, letting her hold him.

He didn’t cry. He ducked his head so his breath came in sharp puffs against her neck, but he didn’t cry.

Neither of them let go for a very long time.

Chapter Thirteen

“I
t’s called Huntington’s Disease.”

Caleb sat across from Taryn at a diner around the corner from his sister’s hospital. It was the kind of diner where you ordered at the counter and they left you alone. He had his hands cradled around a cup of hot apple cider, which he spun around and around and around as he told his story. “Some call it Huntington’s Chorea. Chorea is what they call those spastic movements. I think I remember someone telling me it means ‘to dance.’ ”

He huffed, shaking his head and tapping his fingertips against the cup. “Things like that really get under my skin. Annie—she loved to dance. This isn’t dancing.” His voice was rough, angry. “Dancing is graceful. What’s happening to Annie is the antithesis of that.”

Caleb jumped when Taryn’s hand closed over his. He let her loosen his fingers from around his cup, watching as she stroked his palm. It was a soothing motion, and he found it calmed him.

“I think I remember hearing about it. Like on a TV show.” She looked up at him. “I remember it was genetic.”

He understood immediately what she was asking. “It is. When a parent has the disease, their child has a fifty percent chance of having it.” She looked pale, and Caleb hurried on. “I don’t have it. I can’t pass it on to my children.”

Taryn’s hand stilled over his, her fingertips brushing the inside of his wrist. Caleb took a deep breath before he spoke again.

“My mom was in an accident when I was eighteen. Ann was twenty-five. The accident was strange. My mother was walking. She was on the sidewalk when she tripped on nothing and fell in front of a moving car. She died of her injuries at the hospital before I could get to her.”

“That’s horrible. I’m so sorry.”

Caleb nodded his thanks before he continued. “Because of the nature of the accident, there was an investigation. Her blood work tested positive for Huntington’s. That was when we found out, and that was likely the cause of the accident. A lot of people with this disease die from falls or choking. Things like that.”

One by one, he wrapped his fingers around her hand. He didn’t squeeze but let the small weight put walls around the overwhelming emotion that rocked him. It was just a remnant—left over traces of the terror he’d felt at the time.

“It’s a death sentence.” His voice was tight in his throat. “If you have it, there’s no cure at any stage of the disease. It’s a promise of a slow death. To put it simply, your brain is eaten away. You lose control of your emotions, your body, yourself. There’s nothing you can do to stop it.” He swallowed hard. “When we found out, I didn’t want to get tested. I was so afraid.”

“I can understand that.” Taryn pressed her free hand against her belly beneath the table. She looked just a shade paler than usual, and he knew without asking what she was thinking. Her sister had died of a genetic disorder. Her baby had a chance of having the same disease. It wasn’t a large chance, but having lived through it once, the idea must have hung like a weight around her neck.

He flipped his hand, comforting her now. She smiled at him. “I’m sorry. Please go on.”

At first, he took a moment to study her, to make sure she was really okay. Then he went on. “Ann got tested right away. I can’t say I blamed her.” He breathed in deep, trying to buoy the sudden heaviness around his heart. “She had a baby. A boy. My nephew, Spencer.”

Taryn tilted her head. “You have a nephew?”

“Technically.” There was a bitter taste in Caleb’s mouth. “I haven’t seen him since he was a baby.”

Confusion and then horror spread across Taryn’s face. Caleb looked down, flexing his free hand into a fist. “Ann tested positive, of course. Not only that, she was already in the early stages of the disease. That’s fairly rare for a woman as young as she was. See, with Huntington’s, most people can live a normal life to a certain point. The disease is dormant. You probably won’t show signs and symptoms until you’re fifty. Young, but not young enough that you didn’t get to enjoy a good portion of your life. That was the way it happened with Mom. She raised us just fine, had a normal life, and never even knew she had the disease.

“But once Ann’s boyfriend realized what we were in for, that Ann would deteriorate, that instead of her being his son’s mother, she would eventually have to be cared for like another child if not worse, he bailed. He took Spence with him.”

“Oh shit. Oh damn.” She took his hand in both of hers, holding tight. “That’s horrible. I wish I had something better to say, but . . . yeah. Horrible.”

Caleb took a handful of moments to steady his breathing. The injustice of the situation still rankled. “I thought it was despicable of him. Ann said she understood. It broke her heart, but she didn’t want Spence growing up watching her die.” He paused, his heart aching so much in that moment, he couldn’t breathe.

“It’s a shitty thing, but now, I think I understand. I was there. Of course, I’ve been here the whole time. In the early years, when Ann could still walk and talk, she fell so much. What if she had dropped him? And then those fits. Like what you saw, sometimes she would fly into completely incoherent rages. It didn’t matter who tried to calm her. I can’t tell you how many times she hit me, scratched me. There was no rationality there.”

Taryn looked somewhat green around the edges as she took in his meaning. “You think she would have hurt Spencer?”

“Not on purpose, but because she couldn’t help it? Yeah. It happens in other families. Sometimes, that’s what brings on the diagnosis. My mother’s mother divorced my grandfather because of it. She had no way of knowing he was ill.”

“She just thought he was an abusive asshole.”

Caleb nodded. “Exactly. It’s an ugly disease, just terribly ugly, and it only gets worse. There’s nowhere to go but down.”

“And Spencer? Does he have the disease?”

“I really have no idea. His father didn’t get him tested before he took off.”

He watched Taryn work her jaw, processing. Her eyes were glassy, but she didn’t cry. “So what’s the deal with your father?”

Caleb exhaled in a noisy gust.

“I’m sorry,” Taryn said. “None of this is my business. I shouldn’t have asked.”

“Well, I wish you hadn’t seen us before. I guess you’re kind of in the middle of it now.” He rubbed his hand over his chin, trying to tamp down his anger before he answered. “In all honesty, I don’t give him enough credit. He went at it on his own for a while, in the early years. They lived together—he and Ann.”

“And you lived in LA.”

“Yes.” Caleb pushed away the twinge of guilt he felt. “It broke his heart, seeing his daughter fade away like that. My father . . .” He struggled. “He’s not the kind of guy who could handle that kind of helplessness well. He started talking about putting her in a home. It was inevitable. I always knew it was inevitable, but not then.”

“That was when you came back here from LA.”

Caleb nodded. “My father moved in with his girlfriend, his wife now, and left Ann and me the house. I took care of her.” The lump in his throat choked his words.

“Until the inevitable.”

He looked at her, suddenly desperate for her to understand. “She needed more care than I could give her.”

“Of course she did.” Her fingers were stroking his arm now, the rhythm gentle.

They lapsed into silence, and Caleb knew he should change the subject. How could he expect Taryn to know what to say? What was the correct response to his story?

“Do you think . . .” Taryn began. She puffed out her cheeks and hurried on, stumbling over her words. “I’d like to come with you when you visit. If you don’t mind.”

“What?”

“I’d like to get to know Ann. And I’d like to keep you company.”

“You can’t possibly want to—”

“I wouldn’t be asking if I didn’t want to.” Her hand pressed against his skin with a reassuring pressure. “I don’t think anyone should go through this alone. Not Ann and not you.”

Though he knew he had to be looking like the world’s biggest, gape-mouthed idiot, Caleb continued to stare incredulously. Once upon a time, he had loved a girl with all his being, and she had claimed to love him. That girl would never have done this for him in a million years.

It was a different emotion that choked him then, a gratitude so overwhelming, he wanted to cry. He breathed in through his nose and swallowed several times until he was in control again. “You have no idea how much that would mean to me.”

Chapter Fourteen

A
fter the whole debacle with his sister, Caleb and Taryn had made it to LA very late Saturday night. That Sunday, she’d gone to Slate’s mother’s house as planned. Now it was Wednesday. Caleb had a meeting outside LA, so he and Slate had dinner together.

“It was embarrassing, ya know?” Slate rubbed the back of his neck, his cheeks tinting with the memory. “The first thing Mom asks is how long we’ve known each other. Taryn had the exact answer, if that doesn’t beat all.”

“Why is that embarrassing?”

“I’d already told her exactly how far along Taryn is. Taryn told her exactly how many weeks ago we met. Well, she’s two weeks further along than the time we’ve known each other.”

Caleb hissed in sympathy. “It’s the pregnancy math, right? And your mom is a nurse. She would be able to work that equation in a heartbeat.”

Slate pointed at him. “Got it in one.” He slumped back against the booth, sighing as he stared at the ceiling. “But it wasn’t bad, really. A few awkward questions. Mom likes Taryn a lot.”

“There’s a lot to like,” Caleb murmured, only half paying attention to what Slate was saying. Most of his mind was preoccupied with the memory of Taryn meeting his sister. She’d been so sweet, talking to Ann like she was any other human being capable of rational discussion. She’d held her hand like it was the most natural thing in the world to do.

“Tell me about it,” Slate went on, oblivious to Caleb’s distraction. “Mom was all over me after Taryn left. ‘An older woman is exactly what you need.’ ” He mimicked his mother’s inflection well. “ ‘She’s a nice girl, Slayton. Don’t you want to end up with a nice girl? And you’ve already knocked her up. Do you know how hard it is for a gal with a baby to find a nice guy?’ ” Slate rubbed his eyes. “Like everyone in the world should want a girl like Taryn just because she’s nice. Like anyone could fall in love with her just because.”

Caleb rankled, and he looked over at Slate with sharp eyes, paying attention then. “Why not?”

Slate raised his head from where he’d been resting it on the back of the booth. “What?”

“There’s nothing wrong with her. She’s a good person, a great person. Anyone would be lucky to have her. She works hard, and she has a very open, compassionate nature.” He could have gone on. He’d been thinking about it a lot—how lucky Slate was. How Slate, for all his bumbling, had found a great girl. But if he wasn’t going to appreciate her, well, Caleb had a few things to say about that. “She—”

“Whoa.” Slate threw his hands out. “Jeez. Are you my mother all of a sudden?”

“Well, what do you expect when you talk like that?”

“Like what?”

“Like she’s not worthy of love. That’s such a—”

“I didn’t say that. When did I say that? Dude, are you on crack? What the hell is going on right now? I didn’t say she’s not worthy of love. I said I tried to love her, and it didn’t work.”

“Well, why the hell not?” Caleb chafed at the idea, pissed on Taryn’s behalf.

Slate stared at him as if he’d grown another head. “What, you think I have an answer to that? You think I have any more control than you do over who I fall in love with? Even if I wanted her—and I’m sorry if it makes me a shitty person, but I really don’t—
she
doesn’t want
me
.”

“How do you know?” It sounded an awful lot like Slate was trying to make excuses for himself, so he wouldn’t have to feel guilty for playing with her heart. “Did you give her a chance to—”

“She told me. We talked about it.” Slate crossed his arms over his chest and hunkered down in his seat looking like a scowling child.

“When did she tell you that?”

“The day after your birthday.”

Caleb opened his mouth to argue, but his thoughts stuck as he tried to make sense of what Slate was saying. “But you were kissing. I saw you.”