Chapter 16
SIXTEEN
Emily awakened to complete silence. Sometime during the night, the storm had ended.
She’d lain in bed as it raged, thinking about everything.
Who was this new version of herself and what did she want in life?
What would her future look like? She’d shed her old life like a worn blanket, but now she wasn’t so sure what she needed to stay warm.
Her wide-open future sent a chill down her spine.
She kicked off the covers; her bare legs holding a thin film of perspiration. The room was muggy and hot. With no electricity, any cold air had dissipated overnight. She turned quietly on the twin-sized mattress. Blair was already awake, staring at the ceiling, and Sienna stirred.
“Morning,” Emily whispered.
“Morning.” Blair ran her fingers through her long hair and piled it on top of her head, twisting it into a knot. “Can you believe what went down last night?” She rolled onto her belly and faced Emily. “It feels like some sort of nightmare.” She put a hand over her mouth and shook her head.
“I know,” Sienna agreed. “It took me ages to relax enough to fall back to sleep. Between that and the heat, I’m exhausted.”
Emily rubbed her aching shoulder. “I finally did fall asleep, but I slept on edge. And I woke up again in the middle of the night. I think Patrick might have actually had a nightmare. Did you hear him?”
They shook their heads, frowning.
“I heard him call out and say something indecipherable,” Emily said. “His voice was so loud I almost shot out of bed.”
“I slept through it. Did you go out there?” Blair asked.
Emily shook her head. “I listened for a while, but there was no other noise after that. In my groggy, sleep-deprived mind, I guessed he was talking in his sleep. He looked really unnerved last night when he came in, though.”
“I noticed too,” Sienna said, rolling over.
Emily chewed on her lip, thinking. Breakfast might be interesting. Did they need time as a family? “Should I check to see if the coast is clear before we all descend upon them? They might want a quiet morning.”
Sienna repositioned her pillow. “We could hang out in here and talk for a while. Then we could all go out together.”
“Maybe we should,” Emily agreed.
“I’m afraid to go out, honestly,” Sienna said. “Patrick looked pretty rattled. And he seemed contemplative even before that.”
Blair propped her chin on her hands, leaning on her elbows. “What did he say when you went out to talk to him earlier last night?”
“Yeah, I’d like to know too. I went to the bathroom to brush my teeth, and you two were so deep in conversation you didn’t even notice. You sure are chummy.” Sienna’s last few words came out slowly, suggesting more than just “chummy.”
“I assure you, it was nothing,” Emily said.
Sienna wadded her sheets and balled them under her, propping herself up farther. “That’s not what it looked like. The two of you were lost in each other’s eyes by candlelight.” She threw a dreamy look at Blair, making her laugh.
“During a tropical storm.” Emily laughed, too, but then sobered. “It wasn’t at all like that. He actually told me something pretty heavy.” She filled them in on the highlights regarding Daniel’s accident, figuring it was safe to tell them anything that had already been published.
“Oh wow,” Blair said, her features dropping in alarm. “That’s so sad.”
Emily stood and pulled the blankets up on her bed. “Yeah. He’s still struggling with it.”
Sienna pushed herself into a sitting position. “Can you imagine if something happened to one of us?”
Emily bit her lip. “No, I can’t.” Her friends were her support system. She couldn’t fathom going through what she was going through without Blair and Sienna.
The loud whine of a drill silenced them, and then the wood covering fell off their window. Sunlight poured into the room.
Emily squinted, trying to acclimate to the brightness. Patrick caught her gaze through the glass. He paused for a second, but his expression didn’t offer any insight into whether his state of mind had improved. He just disappeared, and the drill started back up again.
She barely knew him, but she worried about him.
“Well, we made it through the storm,” Sienna said.
But by the look in Patrick’s eyes just now, Emily thought, he hadn’t yet made it through.
Julia was hunched over the kitchen sink, yawning, when Emily finally entered with Blair and Sienna.
Sunlight streamed into the room, and Emily could finally see the wooded view out the back window.
Trees were down, branches everywhere. The yard had so many leaves in it that it looked more like fall than summer.
“Good morning,” Julia said in a bleary voice, contorting her face to a less-exhausted expression for their benefit.
“Careful on your way to the table.” She pointed to the floor where an extension cord stretched from the counter to the portable power station.
“Coffee’s going, although I know the heat isn’t conducive for it.
But I needed the caffeine.” She handed each of them a mug. “Help yourselves.”
Emily joined her at the counter. “Thank you.”
Sienna filled hers with water and took it to the table.
“Of course. Patrick brought in the small stove. I thought I’d make some eggs for everyone.”
“Where’s the puppy?” Sienna asked.
Julia yawned again, covering her mouth with her forearm. “Asleep in the bed with Winston. I doubt it’s house trained, so I’ll have to check on him soon. Both of them were out for the count all night—not a peep.” She grabbed her coffee from the counter and took a long drink.
“Did Winston say anything more about what led him outside during the storm?” Emily asked, twisting her hair into a knot to keep cool.
Julia set her mug on the counter, steam rising into the air, sending a nutty aroma Emily’s way.
Then she took a stack of plates from the cabinet and put them on the table, along with a wad of forks from the silverware drawer.
“He and Patrick look for strays whenever they do their little hikes together. Winston knew if he could get the dog, he could keep it.”
“How did he hear it in the storm?”
“It was crying pretty loudly, according to Winston. It had its foot stuck in the fence, and the wind was whipping the poor thing everywhere. I checked his legs and they feel okay—no crying or whimpering when I touch them. But I’m going to take him to the vet to get him checked over—if it’s open.”
“It was just the one puppy?” Sienna asked. “No owner or mother to be found?”
Julia shook her head. “He didn’t see anything else.
Although, it’s kind of difficult in a tropical storm.
Patrick went outside and looked this morning, but there was no trace of any other animal out there.
It might have wandered away from the litter.
I’m planning to put some photos online in case he belongs to anyone. ”
The garage door opened, and Patrick walked in. His temples glistened with perspiration, and his shirt had a V of sweat on the front and back. After setting the drill and a small radio on the table, he nodded hello.
“Everything good out there?” Julia asked him.
He wiped his brow with his dirt-speckled forearm. “The storm ended up turning out to sea like they thought, and we got the tail end—we were lucky. We’ve got a couple big trees down. We’re fortunate they didn’t hit the house.”
Julia’s chest filled with a deep breath. “Wow.”
“I’ll get them chopped up tomorrow. You’ll have no shortage of firewood this winter.”
“Want some eggs?” Julia asked him.
“I’m good, thanks,” he said. “It’s too hot. I’m gonna try to survive a cold shower.” He clicked on the radio to a staticky station. “Listen to this and see if they say how the roads into town are. I need to get to the restaurant to assess any damage.”
“The storm came up so quickly,” Sienna said after he’d left the room. “I hope everyone got to where they were going before the worst of it.”
“Yeah, me too.” Blair, who’d been pouring coffee, came to the table with her mug.
Julia took a carton of eggs out of the fridge. “Who wants breakfast?”
When they all nodded she unhooked the coffee maker from the extension cord and then plugged in the electric stove. After cracking eggs into a bowl, she warmed a pan on the burner.
Without turning from the pan, she called over, “Blair, may I ask you something?”
Blair visibly stiffened. She wrapped her thin fingers around her mug. “Of course.”
“What happened with your social media accounts?” She whisked the eggs in the bowl.
Blair’s face lost its color.
There it was: the moment when Blair had to face the one thing she’d been avoiding since she’d lost the baby. How would she handle it? What would she say? They’d had conversations, but as far as Emily knew, Blair had never come up with an answer for her fans.
“I…uh. There was a family emergency that pulled me away, and I haven’t quite figured out how to get back into the swing of things without being forced to explain it.”
Julia left the eggs. “You could always just say that.”
“She worries everyone will want a reason,” Sienna said.
Julia poured the eggs into the pan, a loud sizzle filling the silence. Then she turned around. “Mother to mother, I can guess by your body language, and what I’ve seen since you got here, what that reason might be. And I understand.”
Blair’s eyes filled with tears. “How did you know?”
“Since you’ve been here, you haven’t called anyone about your baby.
Anyone with an infant would have. You haven’t doted over a little one, showing photos and telling stories, which I’m sure you would.
You weren’t outwardly worried about your own fate in the storm last night.
A mother with a small child to raise would be a basket case if she had to endure that without her baby. ”
A tear slipped down Blair’s cheek, and her bottom lip wobbled. “If I put it online, I’ll have to relive it. It’ll be there forever,” she explained.
Julia slid the eggs onto a platter and brought them to the table. She put her arms around Blair. “It’ll be there forever regardless. That loss will remain with you. I get it. I lost a baby a couple years before I had Winston.”
Wetness gathered along Blair’s lower lashes. “You did?”
“Yeah. It was awful. Daniel and I had tried for months, and the test was finally positive. We were so excited. We did one of those cake reveals and everything. It was pink.” Julia swallowed, compassion in her eyes. “I named her Abbey Michelle.”
A sob escaped Blair’s lips, and she quickly covered her mouth with her hand, but she couldn’t hold in the emotion.
“What was your baby’s name?” Julia asked.
“We didn’t know what we were having. We wanted to see the baby first and then decide, but we’d chosen Chase, Joseph, Callie, or Willa.” Her voice broke on the words. “We named her Willa. I’ve never told anyone her name or gender till now.” Tears streamed down Blair’s face.
She was being truthful. This was the first time she’d shared that—even her closest friends didn’t know. It was also the first time Emily had seen her really cry without hiding it. It was as if she could be vulnerable with Julia because of their shared experience.
“How did you ever try again?” Blair said. “Weren’t you afraid?”
“Terrified.” Julia put her hand on her heart. “But I’m so glad we did because I have Winston. And losing Daniel, he’s all I have of the man I love.”
Understanding visibly dawned on Blair. “Oh my goodness. You’re so right.”
“Am I?”
“Yes. I’m wasting all these perfect days being scared—days I could be moving forward, but I’m stuck in limbo because of a past I can’t change.”
“You are allowed to grieve. It hasn’t been that long,” Julia said.
Blair nodded. “I know, but I haven’t allowed myself to live since I lost the baby. It’s hard to do.”
A creak in the doorframe drew their attention.
Patrick had been listening. He lingered in the doorway, clean-shaven with wet hair, and then stepped into the kitchen.
He glanced at Emily. Then he reached around the corner, brought in a large box fan, and plugged it into the power station.
With a twist of the knob, it whirred to life.
Air gusted Emily’s way, immediately cooling her skin. Strands of hair that had escaped her makeshift bun blew into her face as Julia offered her a plate of eggs. Emily salted the dish, her tummy rumbling.
The radio squawked between Emily and the others, making them jump. Patrick crossed the kitchen and reached past them, grabbing the radio. He turned it up and went out of the room.
Julia ate quietly, their original chat dwindling.
“Is he okay?” Sienna asked, nodding toward Patrick’s exit.
“Winston scared him last night,” she said. “He scared me too, but Patrick has a harder time getting over things that make him anxious.”
Sienna nodded.
“He puts a lot of pressure on himself,” Julia said.
Just then, Patrick came back in, and the conversation hushed.
“The roads are blocked, but I think I can get you all home the way we came if you want to pack up after breakfast.” He clicked off the radio. “I can take you on my way into town.”
“I’m sure you’ll want to get back to your luxurious accommodations, instead of hanging out here,” Julia added.
“I should probably return to see if there’s any damage to report to the homeowner anyway,” Sienna said.
While Emily understood what they were all saying, she couldn’t help but feel that Patrick had an ulterior motive.
By his inability to look directly at her, her gut told her he wanted them to go, but she wasn’t sure why.
He was more distant than he had been before the storm, keeping himself busy—not sitting or having breakfast. It was as if he was avoiding them. Perhaps it was best they leave.