The Life I Now Live (6 page)

I laughed. “Gwendolyn would be pretty, but Gavin and Gwen is like Gavin Rossdale and Gwen Stefani.”

Gavin laughed. “Didn’t think of that. Guess it would be Adelaine then.”

“Enough about us,” Ella said. “Let’s get started on this scrapbook.I bought all the supplies for it.”

“You are too much.”

Ch. 9 | Heidi

Patrick didn’t text me. No calls, no texts, no emails. Every day I wanted to text him and tell him I loved him, but I couldn’t get the rings off. I tried everything and I couldn’t muster the nerve to break them. Everything about it felt wrong. I guess I understood what Pat meant. It needed to be right. But how could it be? How can you fall in love again in a situation like this? Maybe the person is meant to be your best friend simply because you can’t survive life alone. Maybe it’s not meant to be some amazing love story for the masses.

I set my orange juice on the kitchen counter and saw a figure run by the window. I stood on my tip-toes, but couldn’t see anything. A rush of heat went from my head to my feet. Someone was out there. I listened to make sure Riley was still asleep, then looked through every window of the house. Didn’t see anything. I locked the basement door, sat on the couch, and heard a tapping sound in the kitchen. A dark figure stood at the back door. All in black. I didn’t scream this time. Didn’t really care if I died. So I sat there and watched. He tried to open the door, looked around as though someone were after him, then took off his mask.

Photographs of the past piled up in my mind. Stained memories of what could have been. He moved his arms frantically, motioning for me to open the door. I did.

He stood in front of me, out of breath. A day I dreamed about for so long felt more like a nightmare. My heart, as if it could endure more damage, willingly followed him to the bedroom.

I sat on the bed. “What are you doing here?”

“I told you I’d come back if they stopped chasing me.”

“But Andy, you made me promise. I told everyone you died. I told them you wanted to be cremated, just like you said. Even have this stupid thing of fake ashes in our living room. I’ve lived this lie for a year now. You told me you wouldn’t come back. You said for me to move on and live. You made me promise.”

My body shook. I’m not sure if I wanted him to hold me or not. He didn’t. I curled up on the bed and heard Riley cry.

“Is that her?” he said.

I nodded. “I named her Riley, just like you wanted.”

He smiled. “Can I see her?”

“Andy, this isn’t fair. What am I supposed to tell everyone? They will think we are both insane.”

“Look, I have a plan. I want to take you and Riley to Germany. I know someone there. We can start a new life.”

“Germany?” I wiped my face. “I can’t go to Germany. Riley has something called fibular hemimelia. She needs a lot of care from some good doctors down in Baltimore. I need to live close to make sure she gets the care she needs.”

“What’s fibular hemimelia?”

“I can’t believe you’re back.”

“You don’t seem happy about it.”

“I don’t know what to feel. You’ve been gone. I’ve pretended you were dead and started to believe it myself. I met new friends. Started a life without you. I’ve been a single mom. A widow. And all this time couldn’t tell a soul that you were really just hiding. Who knows where. Did you sleep with another woman?”

He touched my left hand, ran his fingers over the rings he gave me when he promised a beautiful life of love and laughter, then pointed to his left hand. “I’ve kept my ring on too. And I’ve kept my promises.”

“Where have you been living?”

“In the woods.”

“You’re kidding,” I laughed, realizing Riley calmed down for the first time without me. 

“I am. I don’t want to say in case they are listening.”

“Andy, I can’t live like this. You’ve created this world of fear and suspicion and it drove me nuts before you left. I don’t want to raise Riley like this. It’s too much.”

He looked around the room. “You’ve done a good job decorating the house.”

I nodded.

He touched my neck and pulled my face toward his. Inches from my lips, he whispered, “I love you. Runaway with me so we can be together.”

I moved back. Away from the lips that wanted to kiss me. Away from my husband. My husband. The one who told me to think of him as dead for the rest of my life. His shoulders dropped. His eyes too. Everything downcast. Including our marriage. I exhaled and shoved my face into a pillow.

“Heidi,” he said. “You realize I did this for you? I didn’t want you to get hurt.”

I tossed the pillow aside and slammed my hand on the bed. “This is torture. Don’t you understand? Mafias and money and banks and scandals. How do you expect me to live in some kind of action movie? I want a peaceful life. I don’t want to live in another country. Why did you have to testify against these people? You should’ve left it alone.”

“Please, Heidi. Come with me. I can’t stay here. I’m on so many blacklists it’s not funny.”

“None of this is funny.”

He sighed. “Do you still love me?”

I leaned back and slipped under the sheets. Without making a sound I gripped the blanket, pulled it over my head, and wept and screamed in silence. Andy touched my leg. Why me? Why me? I thought over and over. And the one image that I couldn’t erase from my closed eyelids was Patrick’s face, smiling at me from across the table. Eyes intent on loving me. In a way the man sitting on my bed, my first love and husband, never did. Because he never could.

Clock said 5:57 a.m. I rolled over and saw Andy’s face. He fell asleep there hours and hours ago, as though he hadn’t slept in years. I played with Riley, put her to sleep, then fell asleep beside him with a severe ache in my chest. I looked at the clock again. A new day. A new day so different than everything I hoped for the day before. I watched him sleep and replayed our memories. So many sweet memories early on, but they were dampened by the most recent ones. He changed. We all change. I know I did too. But some of us risk everything and climb up the mountain while others spend their lives digging their graves. Andy stopped living long ago. He truly died when I was forced to pretend that he did, but his heart was still beating beside me. His lungs still sucked in air and blew it back out. But I feared the darkness that enveloped him. Riley had enough to worry about. She didn’t need this.

He opened his eyes and turned up the corner of his mouth in a half smile.

But . . . it didn’t matter what I wanted. Hasn’t mattered in a long time. Andy was my husband. A wife is to be faithful to her husband. I needed to erase my dreams of Patrick and keep my heart where it had been all along. In my husbands hands.

“This isn’t easy,” I said. 

“It’s like I’ve come back from the dead.” He laughed.

If only that were true, I thought.

“Look, there’s gotta be some way for Riley to get help in another country. Let’s look into it.”

“Maybe, but these guys specialize in it. People travel from all over the world to come here.” 

“I never thought I’d be able to come home.” He rolled to his back. “I thought you’d be happy.”

“I’m a widow. Everyone I know thinks I’m a widow. To be with you I have to leave everything I know and go somewhere new. What if you leave again and I’m forced to do the same thing there? I can’t play these games, Andy. This is my life.”

“Do you love me, Heidi?” He took my hand. Gone were the days of excitement and butterflies.

“You’re my husband. Of course I love you.”

“That’s not what I’m asking. Are you still in love with me?”

“I don’t know who you are. How can I be?”

He exhaled. “I’m still me. Look, yes or no. Do you love me?”

I looked away, then back to his eyes.

“Then why does everyone else matter? You can make friends wherever we go.”

“Real friends? I can just imagine you asking me to change my name and pretend to be someone else. For the first time in my life I feel like I’m getting somewhere. My job is good. Riley has great doctors. I have found friends, true friends, who I admire and want to be around. I like it here. I don’t want to uproot everything because of some unjustified fears you have.”

Riley made sounds from her room. I stood and went to her, then brought her back to my bed, our bed. Andy sat up and smiled.

“Hey, Riley,” he said. “It’s your daddy.”

She smiled and reached for his nose. 

“Wow,” he said. “I didn’t think she would be so comfortable with me so fast.”

“She loves people.”

“She is so pretty. Look at those dark eyes and hair.” A tear made its way to his lips. And another. He sniffed. “I never thought I’d get to meet her.”

I wiped his tears with the back of my hand. He cupped my hand in his and took a deep breath, then tried to speak, but his lips only quivered in silence.

“I can’t believe you kept your rings on.” He let more tears fall. “I’m so sorry, Heidi. I’m sorry for ruining your life.”

I looked at Riley. “You didn’t ruin my life. Look at this little girl. She’s so much like you and she means so much to me.”

“But I don’t mean much to you anymore?”

“Andy, what do you want me to say? I’m sorry, but you’ve been dead to me for the last year and as far as I knew you were never coming back. It drove me crazy. I’ve battled back and forth between moving on or waiting around for you, just in case. All because you had to snitch on some people who like to shoot guns. This is so ridiculous. I’m willing to be with you, but it needs to be here. I’m not moving anywhere. I don’t care if they kill me.”

He shook his head and flopped back onto the pillows. “I like the colors you chose for this room. What made you pick them?”

“Funny you ask. I painted every room in the house to resemble a part of our relationship. I thought it would help me keep you alive and keep myself sane. This room resembles our wedding night and also your fake death that I told everyone was true. It became real to me though. I had to believe you died.”

“What are the colors?”

“Crushed berry and charcoal, I think.”

“It’s nice. How does it symbolize my fake death?”

“Blood on asphalt.”

“Do you think I’m crazy?”

“A little, yes.”

He stood and pulled his jeans over his hips. Had been a while since I saw a man barely dressed. I looked away. Riley wanted to nurse, so I took her back to her room and fed her. So strange to have Andy back. For so long I dreamed of this day. I thought it would’ve been different. Like a mother and child waiting at the airport for their soldier to come home. Instead it felt like the sad ending to the story just got sadder. Maybe I would’ve been happier if it weren’t for Patrick. Maybe I needed to move away and start over.

I cuddled Riley and sighed. Most women would love to bring their husbands back from the dead. Me? I wasn’t sure. Life with Andy wouldn’t be stable.

He came into the nursery and smiled as though life were perfectly normal. I found some strange resemblance of courage and smiled. He knelt down beside me, touched my foot.

“Sweetheart,” he said. “I will do whatever you want. I just want to be with you. Tell me what you want.”

My eyes glazed over and his face blurred. One tear. Two. Three. I didn’t know what I wanted. I loved him. I loved what we had before this mess. Everything changed. Everything confused me. I didn’t know. And why, every time I closed my eyes, did Patrick grace the backs of my eyelids? I was a married woman. I should’ve never let my heart open up to Patrick. 

“Let me think about it,” I said. “Maybe we can move somewhere. I need some time to think through everything.”

He kissed my cheek and slid his hand across Riley’s face. I had a daughter now. Another life to consider. What would be best for her?

“Why do you love me?” I said.

“I can’t answer that. Too many reasons. I love everything about you. Always have.”

“Give me five reasons.”

He thought about it. “You aren’t playing the romantic game again are you?”

“What romantic game?”