Chapter 33
Chapter Thirty-Three
Jack spent the next two days walking every hole of the course at Camp Lejeune, making notes and taking mental snapshots. The greens were poorly contoured, the fairways flat and featureless, and the routing lacked any sense of rhythm or visual drama.
He could turn this into a fantastic course if he could only concentrate without regretting the way he left Alice or worrying about getting back to Baltimore for the funeral on Wednesday.
Drafting a landscape plan was a major undertaking and finalizing an accurate budget was essential.
Given enough time, he could transform the place into something exceptional: a course that honored its military roots while offering a memorable and dynamic playing experience.
The problem was timing. His proposal was due Friday, and attending the funeral on Wednesday meant he’d have to do a rushed job. Military timelines didn’t bend, budgets had to be airtight, and the proposal format left no room for improvisation.
Jack managed to keep his meeting with the base’s facilities engineer on Wednesday morning, then hopped in his truck for the seven-hour drive to Baltimore.
He arrived at the chapel a few minutes after the celebration of life had begun and slipped into one of the open seats in the back pew, carefully propping his crutches beside him.
An older man was at the front of the chapel, recounting how Frank answered his call for help in the middle of a stormy night. The man’s sump pump had failed and water was backing up into his basement.
“Frank didn’t even know me. I’d just moved into town, but I’d heard good things about him at church, and that he was a plumber.
He drove through the worst thunderstorm in memory to help a new guy out at two in the morning.
When he learned my wife was expecting a baby, he didn’t even accept payment for it.
That’s the kind of guy Frank Latimer was. ”
Heads nodded throughout the chapel. Another lady stood up to talk about how Frank used to play Santa Claus at Christmas parties, and how the kids would shriek with laughter when he “accidentally” pulled out carrots or broccoli instead of candy.
He’d act confused, make a big show of checking his list twice, then make the kids bargain with him to swap the veggies for some candy.
The story triggered a round of warm laughter.
Weren’t services like this supposed to be sad and serious?
He’d never been invited to a celebration of life, so maybe this was normal.
A glance around the chapel showed happy faces.
Happy! Maybe Frank’s lingering illness had been so long in coming that his passing wasn’t a shock, but this sort of sentimental fellowship was astonishing.
He glanced down at the memorial card, a photograph of his dad on the front. Jack never saw his dad look like this: clear-eyed and healthy with a grin that tilted up at one corner.
Jack had the exact same grin. The same hairline and shape of nose.
Odd. He’d never realized how much he and Frank looked alike. What else had he inherited from his dad? So much was lost. So much he would never know about the man who did an about-face in middle age and changed the entire trajectory of his life.
Sophie was in the front row with two blond young ladies beside her. They were his half-sisters. Those two girls were the only living relatives Jack had on this earth, and yet, they wouldn’t know him if he passed them on the street.
Who would come to his funeral? Not that Jack cared, but it was a depressing thought.
Soon it was all over and the guests were funneling out of the chapel. To his surprise, Sophie intercepted him before he even reached the lobby. He managed an awkward hug despite his crutches.
“Thank you for coming,” she said. “Please tell me that you’ll stay with us. Courtney is bunking in with Jessica, so we’ve already freed a room for you.”
Curiosity tugged. What sort of house had Frank managed to provide for his second family? What were his sisters like? Staying with Sophie would answer those questions.
“Thank you. I’d be grateful.”
Following the reception, he headed out to the Latimer house. It was a modest, two-story home filled with family pictures, high school trophies, and two lumbering old mutts that left their dog beds to sniff Jack’s fingers when he arrived.
Jessica and Courtney, his half-sisters, were curious and eager to spend time with him.
Surprisingly, they knew all about him. They led him to a hallway crowded with family photographs on both walls.
Frank had led a full life with his new family .
. . horseback riding, sailing, and church picnics.
Jack startled when he saw a photo of himself, probably five or six years old, sitting in the saddle of a fiberglass horse on a merry-go-round.
His mom and dad stood on either side of him, holding him on the brightly painted horse.
Even then, his foot was in a boot. A merry-go-round was one of the few rides at an amusement park safe for a hemophiliac.
“What’s it like to have hemophilia?” Courtney asked. “Will you bleed to death if you get a papercut?”
He chuckled and answered the infamous question, grateful his sisters would never have to worry about the disease.
It was passed down through the maternal line, so Jack got the gene from his mother, and neither Courtney nor Jessica would ever be touched by it.
Still, they were curious and listened as he explained some of the challenges of the disease.
He continued walking down the hallway, letting the girls explain their life that was so alien to Jack.
Envy clawed. What would it have been like to have had summers on the beach? Building sandcastles and sailing and picnics by the sea?
“Jack, come sit down,” Sophie urged. “Take the weight off your feet.”
He nodded gratefully, and the girls followed. They sat on either side of him, plopping a photo album in his lap, showing him more glimpses into Frank’s life over the past twenty years.
Photos of his dad looking tanned and healthy as he pushed the girls on a backyard swing. Christmas mornings and an Elf on the Shelf. One showed the girls when they were little tykes, gazing at Frank in adoration as he carved a pumpkin. Every page triggered a rush of painful joy.
His dad wasn’t a failure. He built a happy family and had been a good husband and father to his second family.
It was hard not to wonder how things would have turned out if Jack had accepted one of the million phone calls when Frank tried to mend fences.
The fact that Jack never became a part of this new family was his fault, not his father’s.
It was almost ten o’clock before the family turned in and Jack could retreat to Courtney’s bedroom, where he tugged up the window. Alice’s love of fresh air must have gotten to him, because he had a hankering for the soothing sounds of the crickets and evening breeze.
Except … Mingled with the rustle of leaves came the sound of muffled sobs.
He peered outside, into the backyard. Sophie sat on a bench beneath the trees, her face buried in a dish towel.
Had there ever been a more heart-rending sight?
It wasn’t so much the sight of her alone in the garden, it was the keening wail of grief she struggled to hide.
The dish towel covered her face, but the long, endless sobs leaked through it anyway.
Sophie had been brave all evening, but this sort of crippling grief … it was hard to even hear, let alone offer her comfort.
He should go down to offer his shoulder, but what would he say?
It didn’t matter. Comforting Sophie is what his father would have wanted of him. He shut the window quietly, shouldered his crutches, then made his way downstairs.
Once outside, he propelled himself across the lawn. Sophie startled and looked up, and he didn’t look away. She stood as he approached, unsteady on her feet. He didn’t say a word—just opened his arms. And that was all it took.
She collapsed into his arms, sobbing, her small frame shaking in his embrace. He held her tightly, letting her cry, letting himself cry, too. Quietly, but without shame.
He hadn’t known he could feel this much. It was awful. And beautiful, too. He wouldn’t abandon these people again. His sisters needed him. And so did Sophie.
Becoming a decent son was the one gift he had left to give his father.
And he meant to give it.
Jack left before dawn for Camp Lejeune the following morning. With luck, he’d be able to complete the budget and get the proposal turned in before the five o’clock deadline on Friday.
But first, he needed to give himself a regular infusion.
Once the sun had risen, he pulled into a McDonald’s parking lot.
He bought a cup of black coffee and headed to the outside dining tables, glad they were empty so nobody would have to watch the distasteful medical procedure.
Cars zoomed by and the parking lot smelled of crumbling asphalt, but it would suffice to take care of business.
He spread a disposable pad on the picnic table, then opened his insulated bag of infusion supplies.
A note lay atop the vials of life-saving clotting factor. It was written in Sophie’s handwriting. He opened the note and read.
Thank you for coming. I wasn’t the best hostess for you, but I hope you can still become part of our family. Will you come for Christmas? You will be warmly welcomed.
He set the note aside, pensive as he opened a packet to disinfect his arm and the tops of the vials.
The medicinal smell of alcohol floated in the air while he laid out the syringes, butterfly needle, double-ended needle, and the filter needle.
Ironically, the longest part of the process was bringing the factor and solution up to room temperature.
He rolled both vials between his hands, urging them to warm faster as he thought about Sophie’s invitation.
Some people thrived in a family setting, others were best off on their own, and Jack always knew which camp he belonged in.
For the past twenty years he spent Christmas in a hotel room binge-watching whatever football games were scheduled.
The easiest thing would be to revert to his normal routine, but Sophie’s note tugged at him.
He should probably go, but first he had to win the contract at Camp Lejeune.
Once the vials were warm enough, he mixed the contents into a reconstituted solution, then tied a rubber strip around his bicep. He flexed his hands until a vein in his forearm rose into prominence beneath his skin, then held his breath as he inserted the needle and began the infusion.
Now all he had to do was sit and wait.
And think.
Alice had nudged him toward reconnecting with his father from the very beginning, and as with most things, she’d been right.
Alice. What a frumpy name for such a magnificent woman.
Alice was beauty and humor and indefatigable resolve.
She was gingham dresses and warm apple pie.
Her daffy idealism was as delightful as it was frustrating.
She was clever and funny and could deploy a battering ram of smooth Southern charm.
He teased her for living in the past, for pretending she lived in a Jane Austen–inspired world.
Except it wasn’t pretend. Alice created a world that embodied kindness and beauty and refinement. It was real, and it was who she was. She deserved so much more than he could give her.
The level of fluid in the vial slowly lowered as it drained into his arm. He wished it would drain faster so he could get back on the road and crank up the radio with a wall of hillbilly music to banish these memories about Alice.
Once the infusion was complete, he began packing up the supplies when a blue Toyota Prius swung into a parking space. He froze, not quite believing his eyes as the door opened and a woman with long dark hair stepped out.
Alice? Had she somehow followed him here? Put one of those tracking devices in his golf bag? A thrill ran through him, because all of a sudden the only person on the planet he wanted to see was Alice Chadwick and she was here and it was a miracle.
“Alice!” he called out across the parking lot.
The woman glanced his way but kept walking toward the restaurant.
A teenager. Not Alice.
The momentary flash of joy evaporated, and he was back in a bleak parking lot.
Why was he always happy when Alice was around?
He never should have let his guard down with her.
Alice was his kryptonite, his Achilles heel.
She was the one person on this earth who had slipped beneath his defenses and made him believe he could have something besides this life of loneliness and constant travel.
He would get over her eventually. Just like all the other times he pulled up stakes and moved on, he’d soon heal. The faster he could get to Camp Lejeune, the faster he could get back to work and the life he had chosen for himself.