Chapter 55
55
Noah couldn’t tell if he’d made any progress with Gracie or not. While it certainly felt like progress when their lips were all over each other in St. Louis five nights ago, Gracie had been so wrapped up in helping Mona plan for Matt’s wedding ever since that she’d barely had time to speak to Noah, let alone engage in further heart-to-heart discussions about their marriage.
Personally, Noah would’ve settled for a short lip-on-lip session if she didn’t have time for a heart-to-heart, but it seemed Gracie was too busy even for that.
At least that’s what Noah kept telling himself. Loudly. Especially when his other inner voice tried suggesting that Gracie was just avoiding him, plain and simple.
Not even using the memoir as an excuse to spend time together had worked. When he brought it up this afternoon, she texted him a list of questions and told him to make a recording of all his answers.
Yeah, well, he’d done plenty of that already this week. He had a much better idea for how he’d like to spend his afternoon, and it had nothing to do with listening to the sound of his own voice.
Noah rapped his knuckles on the open door to Buck’s hospital room. “Hey, old man. You still alive or should I come back later?”
A low rumbled voice answered. “Noah? Good grief, boy. About time you came for a visit. I was starting to get a complex.”
Noah rounded the curtain and stood at the foot of Buck’s bed. He made a show of scrutinizing him over from head to toe and back up again. “Shoot. The way everybody was talking, I expected to find a corpse in the bed. You don’t look half bad.”
Buck swung a thumb to the window that offered a view of a parking garage. “Must be all the natural lighting.”
“Or the gourmet food.”
“The rubbery meatloaf alone has given me a new will to live.”
Noah tapped Buck’s leg with a rolled newspaper and sat down on the edge of the bed. “How are you? Really?”
Buck adjusted the nasal cannula against his nose. “I’ve seen better days. But I’ve got a feeling you have too.”
Noah scrubbed a hand down his face, his scratchy face already due for another shave. “Five strikeouts. Can you believe that? Another outing or two on the mound and I could’ve set an all-time team record.”
“I wasn’t talking about baseball.”
Yeah, Noah didn’t figure he was. He tapped Buck’s leg again, then hopped from the bed. “So do I need a voucher or something to get you out? I’ve been here five minutes and I’m already depressed. How do we leave?”
“It’s not so bad.” Buck cocked his head to the curtain. “Shorty—he’s at dialysis and boy is he going to be sorry when he finds out he missed you—he and I can spend a day chewing the fat pretty well. But I wouldn’t turn down the opportunity for a change of scenery. Is it nice outside? Last couple of times Matt visited, it rained.”
“You sure do have a crummy view, don’t you? Yeah, it’s gorgeous outside. Let me scrounge up a wheelchair. It’ll give us a little practice for when we break you out of here for Matt’s wedding.”
Buck laughed and started coughing. “Have to give the boy props,” he said when he recovered enough to talk again. “After dragging his feet all these years, he’s sure not wasting any time getting that girl down the aisle now.”
“No, he’s certainly not.” Noah couldn’t help the punch of envy thinking about how stupidly happy he and Rachel both were about this upcoming wedding—even if it was completely insane.
Fifteen minutes later, Noah had Buck situated in a wheelchair. He pushed him outdoors to a path that meandered to a small garden. The flowers had all withered and a cracked fountain in the center sat dry, but the view was still better than anything the inside of the hospital had to offer. Noah parked the wheelchair and sat down on a cement bench next to Buck.
“How often do you get a break from this place?”
Buck shrugged. “Used to get out every Sunday and join the girls for church and lunch. But it wears me out so much anymore. And I know it’s hard on the girls, too. They don’t complain, but I know it’s a burden. Shoot, Matt’s the only one strong enough to get me out of the wheelchair anymore. I’ve gotten so weak, it’s stupid. When you reach the point you can’t get on a toilet without your grandson’s help, you start making excuses to hang back, you know?”
Noah nodded. “Getting old is no fun, but it’s better than the alternative, right?”
Buck leaned forward, his nasal cannula hissing soft oxygen from the portable tank. “There reaches a point when the alternative doesn’t sound too bad. I’m about to that point.”
Noah hated to ask, but he had to know. “You’re not hanging on just to see Gracie remarry someone like Luke, are you?”
“I’m hanging on because it’s the top of the ninth and this game isn’t over yet.” Buck winked, then tugged out a tissue from his pocket to cover his mouth during another coughing spell.
Soon as he recovered, he said, “Am I hoping I’ll get to see Gracie happy again before I go? Sure. Nothing would make me happier.”
“What do you think will make her happy?” Noah kept his gaze focused on the weathered angel in the center of the fountain, not sure he wanted Buck to see the hope in his eyes. The hope that Buck would answer something to the tune of Gracie ending up back with Noah.
Buck took his time answering. “Did she ever tell you about Morris?”
Noah gave a slow nod, trying to figure out how a dead cat was going to factor into the key to Gracie’s happiness.
“Did she ever tell you I tried giving her another cat at least half a dozen times afterward?”
Noah held Buck’s pale-blue gaze. “She failed to mention that part.”
“Because she’s too much like her dad. Stubborn. The girls didn’t know it, but that Merkle lady never stood a chance. Their mother was the love of my life. I never learned how to let go of her. Took me a lot of years, though, to realize I could still hold on to her without holding on to my pain. Gracie’s cut from the same cloth, I’m afraid.”
“That’s why she never got another cat?”
“That’s why she’s never moved on from you. I think, whether Gracie realizes it or not, she’s never stopped clinging to you because deep down she knows you’re one of the best things that’s ever walked into her life. But she’s never figured out how to let go of the heartache either.”
“So what does that mean for me?”
Buck leaned forward in his wheelchair. “Don’t you get it, Noah? You’re Morris. But you want to know the difference between you and that cat?”
Noah could think of a few things.
“You’re not dead, son. Figure out a way to make this marriage work. And soon. I’d like to see my little girl happy before the bottom of the ninth rolls around.”