As though operating outside my control, my hand reaches over and takes Robert’s. He’s surprised, I can tell, even though he doesn’t show it. For a moment he doesn’t respond and his arm goes rigid, but then, just at the point I’m about to pull away, his fingers tighten around mine and he squeezes.
It’s only the smallest touch, but it feels like a beginning; an offering and an acceptance. He glances my way and as our eyes meet the distance between us shrinks, albeit only by a centimeter or two. It’s something though. A start. I banish Nate’s ghost.
Laurie and Dave are at the hospital. Dave hugs me, but as if he’s hugging a thorn tree. Robert, on the other hand, receives a full bear hug. Dave has told Robert all about his involvement with Gene. The three of them have buried the hatchet, let bygones be bygones. So have Laurie and Dave. I’m happy for them. Of course I am, though envious too.
It bothers me that Robert can so easily forgive his son. No matter Gene’s solicitousness of June and his scraping to us like a medieval courtier before his rulers, I can’t forget the fact that everything happened because of him. But Robert can’t handle the pain of losing June and Gene in one fell swoop, I suppose, and so it seems that we’re stuck with one very stubborn wart. I take a deep breath and let it go. I can’t hold on to the anger, or that very small start we’ve made towards fixing things might flounder.
Laurie is beside the bed, brushing out June’s hair. Her cuts and bruises are almost healed; only the cast remains on her leg. She smiles at me and I smile back.
Dave and Robert launch into a discussion about a new app Robert’s developing to help people who are paralyzed use smartphones with voice technology. There’s not much spark to Robert these days, but I see something light up in him when he talks to Dave. We don’t need the money of course, not now, not after most of the people we were suing, including the hospital, settled out of court for seven-figure sums, but his way of dealing with grief is by keeping busy.
So yes, Robert’s been busy, but I’ve been busy too. When I’m not here at the hospital, or talking to our lawyer, or the bank manager and the insurance companies, I’m working on paintings for the show I have coming up. The gallery owner could not be more thrilled at the anticipated turnout, and all the press she’s already been getting. I feel like a fraud, but I don’t say so. I think a lot of people probably feel the same way. And there’s something empowering about being in charge of my own future and contributing financially. I don’t want everything to be on Robert’s shoulders anymore.
Dr Warier comes by with papers for us to sign – patient release forms. He’s humbled, hopeful, takes my hands and says he’ll pray for us. He tells me that he’s sure we’ll get our miracle. I whisper my thanks.
The orderlies follow Dr Warier, wheeling June out of the room and down to the ambulance that is taking her to the rehab center. Dave and Laurie go with her.
‘Is she going to be OK?’ Hannah asks as we finish packing June’s teddy bears and trophies into a box.
I nod. ‘Of course.’ Because what else can I say? What else do I choose to believe? And I don’t want Hannah changing her mind and deciding to stay. She’s going back to New York tomorrow, back to college, and I want her to live life to the fullest and not have to deal with all the fallout and the media vultures still pecking over the grizzly remains of the case.
It will be easier for me too, though I don’t admit it out loud. Now every time I see her, I see Nate. I learned to ignore it when she was little, convincing myself she looked more like me, but her cornflower-blue eyes are his, no mistake. I’m amazed no one else can see it.
Robert starts clearing the Get Well cards from the windowsill, and I pick up the framed photographs from the nightstand. The one of June and Gene and Hannah makes me pause, a bittersweet wave of sadness hitting me before I put the past behind me and drop the photo into the bag along with the others.
‘Everything OK?’ Hannah asks, putting her arm around my waist and resting her head on my shoulder. She notices the photo and pulls it out of the bag, tracing her fingers over it. ‘Look at the face June’s pulling.’
I start to smile but then it dies on my lips. I’m not looking at the face June is pulling. I’m looking at Hannah standing beside her. But not her face – at the sweater she’s wearing. I never noticed it before, even though it was staring at me all this time.
It’s a black sweater with a small red logo in the corner. A mountain lion.
I know that sweater. I recognize it. It’s Nate’s football sweater. He used to wear it all the time when we were dating. I even wore it on occasion, with a pride I now cringe at. I know it’s his because it’s the old Matilija High sweater from the ’90s, not the new one I see kids in town wearing. I stare at Hannah, who is still gazing at the photograph, and it’s as if someone has snatched the veil from in front of my eyes.
Fragments of memory hit me like a spray of bullets, each one impacting with a thud and threatening to knock me to the ground: Nate glancing at Hannah that fateful day at the county jail. Is this your daughter? The curious
