Waking Up to Love (9 page)

Eventually, Ramona realized that Scott was taking her directly toward his old treehouse, a small wooden structure built in one of the highest trees in the yard. Even though she was an adult now, it still amazed her that Scott's family had been able to build such a big room way up in the branches.

She did notice, however, that some of the boards were broken and the curtain had fallen off. Even the ladder looked like it was about to crumble in two.

“It's … um, seen better days,” Scott admitted.

“It certainly has,” Ramona agreed, her mind drifting back to some of those
better days
. If she squinted hard enough, she could see little Scott McInney pulling himself up the tattered rope hanging from its window. She saw herself leaning out the window, shouting, “Come on, Scott. Faster. Faster!” She saw Scott get momentarily distracted, his eight-year-old body tensing, before he lost his grip and fell all the way to the ground.

He'd come a long way since then.

“Remember when you fell from that rope?” Ramona asked.

“'Course I do,” he admitted. “You bet me I couldn't climb all the way to the top.”

“And guess what?” she said. “You didn't.”

“Yeah, well, I still blame you for that. I don't think my tailbone ever healed completely.”

She nudged him playfully. “Shut up. You told me you didn't feel anything.”

Scott placed his large hands on the rough bark of the tree. He looked like he was reliving the memory. “Of course that's what I said. I was a kid. I didn't want to embarrass myself.”

“So it really hurt?”

“Like hell,” he admitted. “I wasn't going to tell you that. I also wasn't going to mention that I landed on a pine cone.”

“Ouch.”

“But hey, now that we're back here, I think it's time that you honor your part of the deal.” A devilish smile spread across Scott's face, and Ramona knew she wasn't going to like what he was about to propose.

“And what deal is that?” he asked.

“We were both supposed to climb that rope,” he explained. “But after I fell and permanently damaged my coccyx, you conveniently forgot that part. I think it's only fair that you follow through on your agreement.”

“Meaning—?”

“Meaning, start climbing.”

He was serious! Ramona couldn't believe it.

Ramona grabbed hold of the bottom of the rope and looked up. It wound its way around one of the top branches, about twenty feet up. How could they possibly have thought this was a good idea as eight-year-olds? “Naw,” she said. “I'm good.”

Scott didn't take no for an answer. He grabbed her around the waist and raised her a few feet into the air. “Grab hold,” he said. “I'm not gonna let go until you grab hold.”

Reluctantly, she wrapped her arms around the dusty rope. The branch above them groaned audibly. She felt dizzy already.

“You still do yoga, right?” Scott asked.

“Uh-huh,” Ramona muttered. Twice a week.

“Then you'll have no problem hoisting yourself up. I'll be down here, watching.”

Slowly, she reached forward and began to pull herself up. First one hand, then the other. The rope shook underneath her. “What am I doing?” she muttered to herself.

Before she knew it, Ramona was a good six feet over the ground, high enough to feel queasy. This was about the halfway point:
halfway to the treehouse, halfway to a horrible, splattery death,
she thought darkly.

“Wow,” Scott said. “I didn't really think you'd—”

“What?” she shouted, clinging as tightly as the Jaws of Life. “You didn't think you could peer pressure me into doing this? Well, ya did. So, congrats!”

He didn't respond, so she glanced down at his expression. Big mistake. The minute her eyes caught the ground far below her, her head started to spin and she felt the rope twisting underneath her like a snake.

She lost her grip.

For one horrible second, the world blurred into colors and she felt her body whoosh through the air. It wasn't long enough for her life to flash before her eyes, but it was long enough for a single horrible thought to cross her mind:
I'm going to die, and it's all Scott McInney's fault
.

She landed with a thump in his strong, outstretched arms. He held her close, waiting for her to catch her breath.

“See?” she said. “Falling wasn't so bad after all.”

“That's because you had someone to catch you,” Scott said. “The only thing that caught me was a pine cone. And, um, you're welcome, by the way.”

She lay in his grip, feeling the hard surfaces of his chest and arms. She could've stayed there forever. She looked into his eyes, which were crinkled and narrowed onto hers.

“I think my mom's watching us from her window,” he said.

“So what do you suppose we do about that?” she asked.

In response, he leaned forward and kissed her. Or, at least, he tried to.

And Ramona was certainly tempted.

Even though his face was so close to hers, she couldn't see him clearly. The sun was directly behind him. All she saw was the halo around him, the golden outline that framed every curve of his face. She felt the press of his lips even before it happened. She wanted to feel the press of his lips—

But she couldn't.

At the last second, Ramona jumped out of his strong arms and tumbled onto the ground. “Sorry,” she said.

“I'm sorry,” he countered. “I was just putting on a show. I should've asked.”

“Yeah, you should've.” But Ramona didn't really mean that. She liked the way he took charge; she liked a guy who could catch her when she fell. No, it wasn't his fault that she pulled away; it was her own.

Ramona glanced up at Debra's window. The curtains were drawn. She was no longer watching them. They could actually be themselves now, whatever that meant.

Scott stepped a few paces back, trying to get a full view of the treehouse looming above them. He smiled in a far-off kind of way.

“You're not mad at me?” she asked.

Her words pulled him back to reality. “What? Uh, no. I was … just thinking about … everything. We had so many memories up there.”

“I know,” Ramona said. “Remember how you'd tell those ghost stories? I never got scared, but Nessa …” The instant she mentioned her sister's name, she wished she could take it back. They were having so much fun together—they were so
comfortable
together—and she'd just ruined it by mentioning the one person who'd messed up their lives.

“Maybe we should go back inside,” Scott said. He turned toward the house without waiting for a response.

Ramona wasn't ready to go inside, though. Now that she'd mentioned Nessa's name, she had to press the conversation. She just had to. No matter how much Scott hated talking about it, Ramona just had to know. They had gotten so much out in the open during their lunch conversation yesterday, but there was still one answer that Ramona needed. “Um, Scott?” she said.

He didn't turn around. He probably sensed where this conversation was headed.

“About Nessa …”

Scott turned to face her, slowly, calmly. His face was blank. “There's nothing to say. I—”

“Do you regret it?” she asked.

“What?”

“Do you regret marrying her?”

He didn't seem to have an answer, and for one tense moment, Ramona thought he was going to avoid the question.
Just say it,
she thought.
Please. Just tell me how you felt.

She needed him to say something, anything.

Finally, he looked her right in the eyes and said, “Sometimes.”

“Do you love her?” she asked.

“I did.”

• • •

In a way, it was good that Ramona didn't dream, because if she had, she would've dreamed about Scott.

Instead, she watched late-night infomercials and drank hot cocoa. Debra always told her that cocoa would keep her awake at night, but she was already awake. Wide awake. It couldn't do any more damage. Besides, at least she got to learn about an amazing new vacuum cleaner that also doubled as a mop.

The digital clock on the wall said three twenty-seven. She'd have to be up and ready for work in three hours.

She looked at her cell phone on the end table. She thought about calling Scott. It was a stupid idea for three reasons: A) He wasn't going to be awake at three in the morning, especially not after a long day hauling branches and building fish habitats. B) Her phone call would probably wake up Debra. And C) She certainly didn't want him knowing that she was thinking about him in the middle of the night.

Sure, she used to call him at all hours of the day or night, just to talk (or complain). And he was always more than happy to listen (or pretend to). But it didn't feel right anymore.

Stop thinking about him,
she told herself.
Stop it!
But the more she tried to pay attention to the flickering images on the screen—Look! It's a vacuum! Look! It's a mop!—the more she thought about falling into his arms. It felt so natural, just the two of them, together.

Why did he have to love Nessa?
Sure, he'd used past tense. He
did
love her. But that was more about his broken heart than an active change in his emotions. He loved her sister, and there was nothing Ramona could do about it.

Yeah, it was probably a good thing that Ramona couldn't sleep, because if she did, she'd dream about Scott. And if she dreamed about Scott, it would very quickly turn into a nightmare.

• • •

Scott woke up in a puddle of sweat. He could barely catch his breath. His clock said it was after three.

Because he had woken up so suddenly, he couldn't remember anything about his dream. All he could remember was the way it made him feel: scared, confused, achy. Was it a dream or a nightmare? He couldn't tell.

Okay,
he told himself.
No big deal. Whatever it was …

But the more he thought about it, the more he realized that this wasn't a nightmare. It was definitely a dream. And even though he felt scared and confused and achy, he knew it had been a good one.

So why had he woken up in a cold sweat? What could he possibly have been dreaming about?

“Scott?” Debra whispered. She stood at his doorway. Her body leaned against the doorframe, merely a silhouette against the hall lights behind her.

The moment he saw his mother's darkened frame, Scott realized that she had been in his dream.

And Ramona was in it, too.

He and Ramona were up in the treehouse, just like when they were kids, and they were doing—something. He couldn't remember. And then Debra saw them. And then he woke up.

Scott wished he could remember everything, but those images were gone now, shaken out of his brain by such a sudden wake-up.

“Scott?” his mother whispered again.

“Uh, yeah. Come in.”

She walked inside. It was still too dark to see her face clearly. “I heard something,” she said.

“Mom, you're supposed to be sleeping.”

Debra sat on the edge of the mattress. She placed her hand on his knee. “I've slept for months,” she said. “I've done my time.”

That was her excuse for everything, though. Sure, she'd been in a coma, but now was the time for her to heal. Scott couldn't stand to watch her putter around the house like that. She looked like a zombie. He needed her to heal as quickly as possible. He needed his old mom back.

And also—

A dark thought ran through his brain. He didn't want his mom to heal just for her own benefit; he wanted her to heal so that he could finally tell her the truth about Nessa. He wanted his mother to get better for his own damn benefit, too.

He knew it was selfish. But he couldn't stop himself. He wanted Debra to wake up refreshed and healthy and 100-percent rejuvenated, because then he would be free from this fake marriage and all the confusing feelings it inspired.

“I know you're glad to be awake,” he said, “but don't you think your body should be back on a normal sleeping schedule?”

“Oh, pooh,” she answered, which was as close as she ever got to screaming out obscenities.

Scott studied his mother in the dim light. She had bed-head, which was understandable. Her skin was still pale, but her cheeks had a slight blush of pink, as if color was finally starting to reenter her life. The wrinkles around her eyes were pronounced and deep, but she was also starting to get a few laugh lines around her mouth. She didn't look healthy, but she was getting there.

When she didn't leave, Scott asked, “Is something bugging you?”

“I'm worried about you,” she said.

Scott laughed. “You?” he said. “You're worried about me?”

“You were talking in your sleep again.”

Scott's whole body went numb. He hadn't talked in his sleep since he was a kid. And even then, it was only when he was stressed or confused about something. What if he'd said something about Ramona and Nessa? What if his mom overheard everything?

“What did you hear?” he asked. Panic flashed across his face.

Debra raised an eyebrow, as if she suspected something but didn't want to say it out loud. “I couldn't make out the words,” she said. “It was mostly mumbling. But you certainly sounded anxious.”

He still wasn't completely sure if she was telling him the whole story, but there wasn't anything he could do about that now. “I am anxious,” he said. “About you. About your recovery.”

She patted him on the knee again. “Go back to sleep,” she said. “You need your beauty rest.”

The pepperoni pizza smelled delicious. The anchovy pizza, not so much. But hey, it was Jeffrey's favorite.

Ramona passed Scott the box of garlic bread. She could read his mind.

“Shouldn't we wait for Dad?” Jeffrey asked.