Page 75 of Parallel
I think about us being separated constantly too. My reasons are probably different than his, but maybe not…maybe some residual memory tells him he has reason to worry because we’ve been separated before. I place my hand over his. “I’d come find you,” I tellhim.
“Yeah?”
“Unless you stopped being hot,” I amend. “In that case, the jury isout.”
His hand slides over my hip, down my bare thigh. “Hot, huh? You’ll have to warn me when I’m in danger ofslipping.”
“You’re in no danger,” I say, but the words end on a gasp as his fingers slide between mythighs.
“I wasn’t too worried.” He laughs low in my ear. “If you don’t come find me, there will never be a time when I won’t come findyou.”
He rolls me on my back and for a brief time, I forget my fears, but later, when he’s sound asleep, his breathing deep and even, they all reemerge. I look at his face in the moonlight—the boyishness of those long lashes and full lips offset by the sharp jaw, already in need of ashave.
Should I tell him everything? I can’t. It will sound insane, and he’ll never believe me. I figured out the truth months ago and I hardly believe it myself. But I can’t lose himagain.
“I’m not going to let her separate us,” I promise him quietly. “Not thistime.”
* * *
My mother knockson the door, waking me. I’m so stunned by the dream I don’t even respond the first time she calls my name. I waspregnant.
“Quinn,” she says, more urgently. “I’m starting dinner. Are youup?”
I blink rapidly. “Yeah,” I reply. “I’ll be down in asecond.”
I was pregnant. I remember the feel of a baby kicking as I watched Nick sleep. Less like a kick than a bubble popping against my side, repeatedly. I can still feel the warmth inside me as I placed my hand there. I loved that child and now I miss her—I feel certain it was aher—almost as much as I miss Nick. We were a family, and I made him promises—that I’d find him, that I wouldn’t let her separate us again. How could we have been so much in that life and so little in thisone?
I go downstairs, distress weighing heavily on me. My mother seems to interpret it as repentance. “Nothing’s been done that can’t be undone, honey,” she says softly. “It’ll be fine. Everyone knows you’re going through alot.”
I lay my arms on the table and rest my forehead against them. “I haven’t changed my mind,” I tell her. “I’m justtired.”
She sinks into the chair across from me with a glass of wine. I wonder how many she’s had. Either way, it means the tears will start shortly. “I wish you would think this through,” shesays.
My jaw falls open. “What on earth would make you think I haven’t?” I demand. I’ve tried to be patient with her, but this is getting ridiculous. “Why are you in Jeff’s corner so much? I’m the one you’re related to, nothim.”
Her lips go tight, a flat line that makes them nearly invisible. “It was your father’s dyingwish.”
A small ping of guilt. I ignore it. I’ve had this conversation with myself enough times. “Mom, he never encouraged it until he discovered he was dying. He just wanted to know I’d be taken careof.”
She is quiet, wrestling with something she’s not sure she should say. “You know things,” she says, her voice barely audible. “You always have. You know things youshouldn’t.”
I can feel my heart tapping, far too fast, at the base of my throat. We’ve never, ever discussed this. It’s how we both wanted it and I have no idea why she’s changing the rules now. I swallow. “I was just a weird kid,” I reply. “I had an imagination. Why are you even bringing thisup?”
Her eyes meet mine. Sayingif it was merely your imagination, it was a shockingly accurate one. “Sometimes your father knew things too,” she says, her gaze falling to the table. “Things about you. And the way he insisted at the end…it was like when you were a kid and he was so certain about your allergy before you’d ever had shellfish. He was certain about this too, and that’s what makes me think you should listen to him. Because it’s possible he knew something youdon’t.”
It’s the same theory I suggested to Caroline yesterday, but now that I’ve made my decision, I don’t want to hearit.
“Jeff can’t protect me from a brain tumor,” I say softly. “Maybe Dad did know something, but what I’m certain of is that Jeff is no longer enough for me, and he’s not how I want to spend the time I haveleft.”
My mother knows what I’m saying makes sense. Yet I see in the way she swallows, tips her chin in a barely visible nod, that she still thinks my father wasright.
* * *
Dinner is painfully quiet.My mother drinks throughout. She looks at me each time she pours herself a new glass, daring me to say something. I won’t, of course. Her five glasses of wine will hurt no one but herself. My decision this morning hurt tons ofpeople.
Her cell rings during dinner and she glances at it. “It’s Abby,” she says, not looking at me as she speaks. “She called earlier too. She said you were refusing to take Jeff’s calls. Please tell me that’s nottrue.”
I rub my forehead. I napped all afternoon, but this conversation makes me want to go straight back to bed. “Mom, I said everything there was to say this morning.” She gives me a baleful look and I sigh. “Let me listen to the 400 voicemails he’s left and maybe I’ll call afterthat.”