Chapter 33 Olivia
The light blinds me. The heat sizzles, burning the moisture off my flesh almost immediately. Only my long hair remains soaked, spread over the flat rock.
There’s a noise above me. The sound of scrambling. Loose bits of gravel fall from the clifftop and explode at velocity on the flinty surface beside me. The tiny bombs jolt me upright.
“LIV!!! LIIIV!!!”
A scream. A yell. My name. Over and over. From high above me. A voice from the heavens. I twist my naked body, raise my eyes to the sky, but the sun bounces off the cliff face, dazzling me. Still, I’d know that voice anywhere.
Jake.
It’s Jake.
“I’m here!” I’m screaming, but it’s only coming out as a croak. I can’t see him, but he’s coming. I can feel him coming. And his footsteps are loud on the clifftop. A shadow passes across the sun — a giant bird come to take me away? It swoops, gains mass, crashing into the water with a huge splash.
Jake.
He erupts through the surface, gasping, wiping his face.
He sees me and his beautiful, beloved face crumples. He sweeps through the water, hauling himself up onto the rock, flinging his soaking body at me. And I’m in his arms. I can’t believe it.
He’s shaking, sobbing, repeating my name over and over. And I realize I’m doing the same.
I hold him close to my prickled flesh, tighter than I’ve ever held him before. I won’t let go. Can’t. Is this real? No. I just flung myself off a cliff — I’m likely dead. And if I let go of Jake, he’ll evaporate into the sun and breeze.
Or, maybe this is heaven.
I’m frowning as Jake lifts his face to me, holding my own between his hands, reaching up to push my wet hair back, searching my eyes as if looking at me for the first time.
“Baby, oh my fucking God. Liv . . . it’s really you. You’re here.”
He kisses me, pushing his lips hard against mine, only to break away again, breathless. “Oh my darling. Jesus Christ, I thought I’d never see you again. Liv. Liv. Where’ve you been, baby? I lost you for so long. I’ve been going crazy. I nearly just killed myself. Fuck . . . Liv.”
His eyes search my face, as if waiting for something. Suddenly, it occurs to me I haven’t said a word to him yet.
Is a dead person supposed to talk to an angel?
I swallow, my ears popping like I’ve been in a submarine.
“Jake?” I manage, the word barely a whisper. “Are you real?”
He half-smiles, half-sobs, nodding, as he pushes my hair back from my face. “Baby. I’m real. You’re real. We’re together, finally. I can’t believe it.” He looks at me closely and I see, with a pang, how thin he is, the dark shadows beneath his eyes. He’s suffered, too.
“My darling, where’ve you been?” His voice is a rasp. “We’ve been searching for you for months.” He can’t seem to stop touching me. But I’m the same. But I can’t answer him. I don’t know how.
“You’re real. And I’m back. That’s what’s important,” I whisper, my fingers against his cheek. He turns his mouth into my palm, his lips warm against my skin, the gesture heart-achingly familiar.
“Yes, Liv, my darling.” His hands run over me, searching, probing. “Are you okay? Are you hurt? Can you walk?”
I glance over my body. Nothing seems broken.
“I’m naked.”
He laughs at this. “Yes, my love. As the day you were born, and the most beautiful thing I ever saw. Ha!” He grins, looking like the Jake I know.
“Oh my God, I don’t care where you’ve been.
You’re back . . . And honey, you know what day this is?
” His azure-colored eyes are alight with love.
“It’s our wedding day, baby. Our wedding day! ”
I gaze back into blue eyes I know better than my own. This is my Jake. I’m really back.
A sob builds in me and shudders through my body, bubbling up in my throat and coming out as a cry. I squeeze him, clinging to his body in my sudden torrent of tears. I have absolutely no idea how I’m going to explain my disappearance to him, or to my family, but I’ll have to find a way.
“Baby, I got you,” he’s saying. “I got you. We’re together now, nothing else matters, and nothing is ever going to keep us apart. I swear to you, Liv. I swear.”
He holds me until the shaking subsides, and I bury my face in his neck.
He smells of himself — saltwater, coconut, and pinewood.
I kiss the soft skin under his jawline, moving my mouth around to meet his, devouring him, blending myself with him until we’re a morphed blur of passion. I need us to become one being.
I break free, holding his cheeks in my hands.
“It’s our wedding day,” I repeat back to him.
He laughs again. “Yes, baby, that’s what I said. It’s our wedding day.”
I lift my head, shriek a laugh up to the sky, and look into his clear blue eyes.
“Then let’s get married.”
* * *
“Just . . . tell me again. I know you told me already, but it makes no . . . Tell me again, okay? From the beginning.” Jake settles down beside me on the couch, turning his body towards mine.
He’s wearing nothing but a pair of grey boxer briefs, given that he immediately stripped out of his wet clothes as soon as we arrived home, after some pretty intense and distracted driving.
I’d had no clothes at all when he found me, so he had wrapped me in a picnic blanket for the drive and I’d had to run inside, laughing, when we made it back to the house. And then . . .
I pull my plush bathrobe around my chest, and tuck my feet underneath me as I sink deliciously into the soft corner pillow. Damn, I’ve missed our home so much.
Smiling at Jake’s still-bewildered expression, I touch his arm.
“I know, I know. It’s impossible to believe.
It’s impossible that it happened. Yet it did.
And I’ll tell you again, the whole story, as many times as you like.
But . . . what time is it now?” I look at the mantel clock, but it’s clearly stopped, its hands at five past seven.
I turn back to him with a smile. “Jake, I still fully intend to make it to this wedding. If being away from you this summer has taught me only one thing, it’s that I’m totally, one hundred percent, certain that I want to marr—”
Jake’s phone cuts me off. He rests one hand on my bare foot as he answers, beaming back at me.
“Jake Johnson . . . yes . . . right . . .” His brow furrows slightly.
“Wow. Is she okay? . . . Oh. Oh, good. Well, thanks for getting them the message. And they’re on their way now?
Awesome. Thank you so much. Hey, before you go — can we trust your discretion on this matter?
We really don’t want the media to get wind of this today, given the .
. . We appreciate that — thanks so much. ”
He hangs up and turns back to me. “Your folks’ hotel, calling me back.
They said your mom was told the news you’d been found while she was on the massage table — apparently she leaped up and immediately passed out cold.
But she’s fine now, they’re already on their way back, and Burt called the officiant, so we’re all set for 4 p.m. Charlotte can be here in an hour, she’s ditching her shift at Zara’s, and .
. .” he checks his phone, “it’s only 12:15 now.
We have some time.” He leans across the couch to kiss my temple.
“Tell me again, honey. I do believe you, I swear — I just need to . . . understand. It’s like .
. . a kind of wormhole between alternate realities?
And . . .” he lets out a perplexed laugh, “you ended up in a world where I’m dating Charlotte’s friend? ”
I chuckle at him, an eyebrow raised. “Oh, yeah, I figured you’d be interested in that part. Yes, you’re even going to propose to her — in fact, I encouraged you to. Well, you know. The other you. She’s actually kinda nice. Anyways . . . from the start. So. After I fell, I woke up in hospital . . .”
* * *
Doing up my dress in our bedroom, Charlotte’s hands are shaking so much she can barely push the tiny buttons through their tight loops. She hasn’t stopped sobbing since she arrived at the house an hour ago.
“Char, I know this is a lot, it’s totally crazy, but we’ve only got thirty minutes before we have to go to Mom and Dad’s. I love you for caring so much, but we’ve still gotta do my hair and face.”
She sniffs inelegantly, managing the last button, and turns me around to hug me for the seventeenth time.
“I love you so much, Liv. I can’t believe we got you back, today of all days.
I have no freakin’ idea what the hell is going on, or where you’ve been all this time — nothing makes any sense. But I’m just so happy you’re here.”
I kiss the top of her head. “Like I said, all that in due time. It’s just . . . really hard to explain.” I laugh. “I mean, impossible. And right now, we’ve got a wedding to get to.”
Jake is outside the bedroom door, speaking loudly and excitedly on the phone to Nicole.
“Right?! . . . Yeah, I know, totally incredible . . . Exactly . . . No, no, we’ll bring your bridesmaid dress to the house — Sara’s too.
Just meet us at the Graingers in a half-hour, forty minutes max, okay?
Ceremony’s at four. And just tell everybody you can get a hold of that they’re welcome.
A bunch of the guests won’t be there because they obviously cancelled their travel plans .
. . But obviously not to let the media know until we tell them later — we don’t want a circus today .
. . Yeah, we can’t believe it either. I know!
So unbelievably happy. It’s a total miracle, and I don’t even believe in miracles .
. . No, and what’s crazy — I mean, it’s all crazy — but .
. . I never cancelled any of the wedding arrangements, it was all paid for already, so it’s literally going ahead just like we originally planned.
Caterers, flowers, jazz band, everything .
. . I even kept our honeymoon to Asia booked, in case I decided to go alone, and now we can still go .
. . I know, right? Okay, I gotta run, and so do you. See you there. Yes!”
Charlotte pulls up my blow-dried hair into a casual bun and fixes it in place, some tendrils falling down the sides. “Will this work? I don’t have time to do anything super fancy.” She twists a pretty wire hair accessory with glass-bead tips around it.
“It’s great, perfect. I don’t want anything too formal.”
I apply my rush-job bridal make-up with a trembling hand as Charlotte slips into her own aqua-colored bridesmaid dress and freshens her tear-smudged make-up.
I rise and hug her yet again, carefully this time, then pull back to look at her shining face.
“Thank you for helping me. You’re the best maid of honor ever.
And I know we have to run, but I want to say something to you first.” I smooth down her rich brown hair.
“You’re also the best sister ever, and one day you’ll be an incredible mother.
Whether that’s some time soon, or whenever it may be. You’ll be wonderful.”
Charlotte gives me a puzzled smile, and another tear forms in the corner of one of her hazel eyes.
“Oh, Livvie. Thank you. That’s . . . just the sweetest. So will you, one day.
When you and Jake are ready — maybe after a bit of traveling, right?
But come on, now, don’t get me blubbering again — we need to get you married. Ready?”
“Yep. We’re as ready as we need to be. Crap, we still have to get all the flowers out to the car. Can you grab Sara and Nicole’s dresses?”
Charlotte stops me as I try to open the bedroom door, listening to Jake making another phone call to his brother. “He can’t see you in your wedding dress!” she exclaims, her eyes wide. “It’s bad luck for the groom to see the bride in her dress before the ceremony.”
I laugh, taking my sister gently by the shoulders. “Screw that. We’ve had enough bad luck for a lifetime already. I’m not letting that guy out of my sight ever again. And you just try telling him to drive to Landfall in a separate car — see how well that goes down.”
She holds up her hands, the draped teal dresses slipping down her arm. “Fair enough.”
Jake is pacing the living area, devastatingly handsome in a cream linen suit and pale-blue tie, chattering excitedly to his brother.
It seems Ed has managed to get hold of their father on the golf course, despite his cellphone being off.
Jake’s dad is best man, and someone from the clubhouse had to run all the way to the 13th green to tell Ted that I’m back and the wedding is still on.
Charlotte passes me the bouquet Jake had rescued from the clifftop and grabs one of the flat flower boxes, juggling the two bridesmaid dresses over her other arm. “Tell Jake to get the other boxes,” she says, scurrying out to load them into her car.
Jake finishes his call and turns to me.
“Holy shit,” he says.
“What?”
He steps towards me, studying my dress, my hair, my face. “You’re breathtaking. An angel. My angel.” He reaches an arm around my waist and tugs me closer.
I kiss him, ever so gently, leaving only a tiny layer of gloss on his lips. “I am indeed your angel. Always.”
He twirls a tendril of my hair around his finger. “You won’t leave me again, will you?”
I reach up to stroke his soft blond crop. “Never again, my love. I promise. As long as you promise not to leave me, given that I obviously sound like a total nutjob right now.”
He laughs, shaking his head. “It’s all pretty wild — I mean, ridiculously wild — but I do know for sure you’re not crazy. I told you that I believe you, and I mean it. That’s what happened.”
I nod. “Thank you. And even though you know the truth, we’ll have to figure out a much more convincing story to tell everybody else about what happened to me.
Including the media, if they’re as interested in me as you say.
But we don’t have time for any of that right now. We have a wedding to get to.”
Jake runs a finger down my cheek. “We do. And I refuse to lose you, ever again. We’ll figure the rest out. It’s you and me, forever.”
I touch my lips to his once more.
“Then let’s go.”
THE END