The Healing (36 page)

chapter forty-five

Karen was working in the garden when Lori brought Jerry Doyle home to meet Mike. She heard the crunch of gravel and rose from her crouched position, clapping the dirt from her gloves and whisking the loose strands of hair off her face with her arm. At first she didn't recognize the black Chevy that pulled into the driveway, but then she saw her daughter in the passenger seat and the familiar young man who was driving.

Lori's smile was tentative, but she was evidently dredging up the necessary courage to allow her life to unfold. “Hi, Mom!” she called when she spotted Karen walking toward them. “You remember Jerry.”

Karen slapped her hands on her denim shorts in case any loose soil was clinging to them, and she extended her hand to her daughter's tall, lanky beau. “Nice to see you again, Jerry.”

“Same here, Mrs. Donnelly.”

“Is King Farouk inside?” Lori asked.

Karen smirked, and a little warning twinkle lit her eyes. “If you mean your father, yes, he's inside. He was keeping me company out in the back for a while, but it got a little too hot for him.”

“I wanted him to meet Jerry,” Lori said. “Is it okay to go inside?”

“Sure. If the watchdog is dozing and you happen to wake him up, just make sure you don't go near his teeth.”

Jerry, who was already bobbing from one foot to the other, flashed Lori an alarmed look. “Watchdog?” he repeated dubiously.

“She's talking about my father,” Lori told him. “And it's just a joke . . . I think.”

Karen winked at her daughter and led the way into the air-conditioned living room, where Mike was sitting comfortably in the recliner watching the midday news. Not only had his quality of life improved with Karen's attention, but he enjoyed greater mobility and comfort because Raymond was able to move him around from one place to the other without too much duress. He wasn't confined to just his wheelchair or the bed.

“Mike,” Karen began, watching her husband closely as the young stranger stepped into view. “Lori wants you to meet someone.”

She watched as Mike looked from his daughter to the loping youth who resembled an overstretched rubber action figure. And his eyes narrowed.

“Daddy? This is Jerry Doyle.”

Mike held the young man's gaze and raised a shaky hand. Jerry leaped forward to grasp it, pumping it up and down a little too vigorously. “Pleased to meet you, Mr. Donnelly.”

“Doyle, eh? You Irish?”

“That's right, sir.”

Mike's straight brows arched up at the word
sir,
and Karen had to fight the urge to laugh. The kid was trying way too hard. “At ease, soldier,” Mike said. That old gleam of challenge ignited in his eyes. “I left my five-star cluster pinned to my other shirt.”

“Oh, Daddy,” Lori said. “Don't be mean. Jerry's just being polite.”

Mike grinned at her, but the gleam in his eyes didn't abate. “I know that, baby. I didn't mean to hurt his feelings.” Then he added in a very obvious whisper to Karen, “Was I being mean?”

“Yes,” she replied flatly, but it seemed to fuel his rather condescending humor. He must have sensed how refreshing it was for his wife and daughter to see him behaving like his old self, and it only egged him on.

Karen glanced at Jerry and saw him bristle, but she was glad he knew enough to oblige the alpha male with a good-natured laugh. Lori's new boyfriend actually held up under the pressure with great finesse, passing Mike's odd little test of character. What Jerry Doyle didn't know was that he was already in like Flynn. If Jerry knew the truth about Lori, saw her at her worst, and stuck around because he thought a relationship with her was worth the gamble, Karen wanted him around for a long time. She knew Mike felt the same way.

“You'd better be a Yankees fan,” Mike said. Then he winked at Lori.

“The Yankees rule,” Jerry agreed wholeheartedly.

“What, are you trying to get on my good side now?”

Karen slapped a hand to her forehead. The test had gone far enough.

“Can I say one more thing?” Mike asked. “Just so you know where I stand right from the start.” He caught himself. “Or where I
sit,
as the case may be.”

Jerry stood up a little straighter and kept the smile on his face. Karen almost wanted to cheer the kid on and let him know the painful little interrogation would be over soon.

Now Mike turned serious. He pointed at Lori. “That is the most precious thing in the world to me. And if you don't do right by her—if you mess with her in any way—I'll kick your ass.”

The silence sizzled. Were they supposed to laugh? Take him literally? Berate him for talking like a macho idiot when he couldn't even stand up?

Karen broke the spell. Because where Mike ended, she began. “And if he can't, I will.”

Lori just looked at her boyfriend and shrugged. “I told you they were nuts.”

Karen balanced the bowl of ice cream as she settled on the bed next to Mike. She didn't want to be thumbing through a magazine in the kitchen or sitting on the porch with a book. It felt good to reclaim her place at his side after temporarily relinquishing it to his disease.

She fed him a bite of his favorite flavor—mint chocolate chip—and then took a spoonful for herself. Mike forgot all about the movie he had been watching on TV. “So what do you think, babe?” he asked Karen. “Do you like this Jerry kid?”

Karen didn't have to think about her answer. “I think he's a keeper.”

“A
keeper
?”

She fed him another bite. “Yeah, a keeper. A guy you want to keep, to hold on to. For life.”

“Was I a keeper?” he asked.

Karen still blushed a little when Mike made her talk about her feelings for him. “You were a shackle-him-to-my-wrist-forever keeper.” She ate her next bite of ice cream off the spoon with playful seduction.

Mike smiled at her, his eyes shining. “So your female intuition is telling you that Lori's new sidekick has the right stuff?” he asked.

She loved seeing him so alive. “So far Lori has had pretty good taste in boyfriends, despite all of her problems. Don't you think?”

“I don't know. She hasn't had one in a while.”

“Well, Jerry was wonderful with her the day she went into the hospital,” she said. “And that was enough to scare off the faint of heart.”

Mike's eyes dimmed, and Karen knew he was recalling how broken their daughter had been the night she went to the hospital. “That was enough to scare off even the
sturdy
of heart.”

She could only look on the bright side. “But Jerry stuck by her,” she said. “He even convinced the manager at the Bayview Inn to take Lori back. Otherwise she would've been out of a job.”

“I guess the kid's all right,” Mike said.

Karen doled out the rest of the ice cream and set the bowl down on the tray. She slipped her hand into Mike's and put her head on his shoulder. They sat in quiet contentment for a while, lost in their own thoughts and not really paying attention to what was on television.

“See what else is on,” Mike said when he finally focused on the mindless drivel coming from the screen.

Karen sat up, but she didn't go for the remote. “Do you want to watch a movie? Lori just bought a couple of new DVDs.”

“Sure. Pick one.”

With childish enthusiasm, Karen scrambled off the mattress and started rummaging in the cabinet under the television. “Chick flick, chick flick, chick flick—”

Mike grinned. They hadn't watched a movie together in ages, but Karen knew her husband's cinematic tastes didn't include relationship analyses, tearjerkers, or social commentaries. At the same time, Karen didn't really enjoy action adventures, war movies, or spy dramas. But most of the time they could agree on a good comedy.

“Here's one.” She finally made a selection. “This movie is supposed to be hilarious. Lisa told me she fell off the couch.”

The next two hours were worth more than a year's supply of medicine, physical therapy, and support group discussions combined. Mike laughed so hard he was exhausted by the end of the movie, and the mere sound of his laughter made Karen euphoric. The tears that flooded their eyes, for once, weren't tears of anguish or frustration. She kept glancing at him as if she couldn't believe what she was seeing—her old Mike enjoying life. Laughing.

It was quite a sight.

Karen was eager to tell Grace about Mike's miraculous transformation. She also wanted to hear what Grace had to say about alternative medicine and other nontraditional forms of healing, since Grace had promised they would talk about it after Mike was out of the hospital and settled in.

But when Karen tried to call her over the next few days, there was no answer. She even passed by the house while out for her walk, but Grace wasn't home. At first, Karen wasn't alarmed. More than likely it was bad timing on her part, and Grace was probably out at the store or on one of her jaunts around town. But when an entire week passed and there was no sign of her at the house on Terry Lane, Karen started to worry that something might have happened to her. The last time they spoke, Karen had told Grace that Mike was coming home, and Grace had been relieved. She said she would see them in a few days.

“Where could she be?” Karen asked, pondering out loud as she sat down at the kitchen table for lunch.

“Who?” Mike asked.

“Grace. I can't reach her,” Karen replied, and fed him his first bite of pasta. She had found that Mike ate more when the food was soft and accommodated his preferences whenever she could. He also ate more when Karen ate with him, so for every forkful she fed him she threw one into her own mouth as well.

“Mmm. That's good,” he said.

“Vodka sauce.”

“No wonder.”

“And get this. Fresh parsley from the garden.”

“You can't take credit for the parsley,” he said. “I watched Grace plant it.”

Karen grinned wanly but then sighed, feeling Grace's absence like a spiritual hunger pang. “I'm worried about her, Mike. She lives by herself in that big old house, and I don't even know who I can call to ask.”

“Look in her mailbox,” he said. “If she went away, she would have asked someone to collect her mail or told the post office to hold delivery.”

“Good idea.”

Later that afternoon, Karen took a walk and checked Grace's mailbox. It was full—but not stuffed. And still there was no sign of Grace.

She asked at the market, but nobody had seen her. She passed by the house again and peered inside the ground-floor windows, but she saw no one. Short of breaking and entering, there was no way Karen could be certain Grace wasn't lying dead in her bed or drowned in the bay.

She only found out by accident that Grace was indeed alive and well. When Karen decided to go to church on Sunday morning, it didn't occur to her that anyone there would know her friend's whereabouts. She should have realized, after seeing the little prayer room in Grace's house, with its crucifix and candles and makeshift kneeler, that the church was one place where Grace might not be viewed as the town eccentric.