Infamous (57 page)

“We all thought it was best to let you sleep,” the nurse told him. “Although you
do
know that you can use the futon in Alison’s room …?”

“I didn’t,” he said. “Thank you. That’s … Thank you very much.”

“She’s asking for you,” the nurse told him. “Alison.”

He was instantly awake, standing up and already moving down the hall toward her room. “Is she okay?”

“She seems fine,” the nurse said. “But she says that it’s urgent that you come into her room.”

A.J. quickly ran his fingers through his hair and tucked his T-shirt into his jeans.

The light was on in Alison’s room, and the door was ajar, but still he knocked lightly as he pushed it open.

“A.J.?” she called.

“You all right?” he asked, closing the door behind him.

She was sitting up in bed. Her hair was mussed as if she’d been sleeping, too, but her eyes were bright and clear.

She looked wonderful.

“Yeah,” she said. “I’m fine. But Jamie’s here and … A.J., he says it’s time to go. He wanted to say good-bye.”

A.J. looked around the otherwise empty room. “You can still see him?” he asked.

Alison nodded. “He’s over by the window,” she said. “But he’s starting to fade. He says it’s probably got something to do with his breaking the rules. He’s got to go back—wherever back is. He won’t tell me.” She smiled then. “But he says he’s not too disappointed about leaving—he’s missed Melody. He says he wanted to give you his congratulations on our impending nuptials. Even though I’ve told him that we’re going to take it slowly. One day at a time.” She laughed suddenly then. “I will
not
tell him that,” she said to Jamie.

A.J. sat down next to her on the bed. “What’d he say?” He smiled, imagining just what Jamie might’ve said to make Alison blush that way.

Alison looked toward the window, toward Jamie, and made a face. “Oh, all right,” she grumbled. “But I’m going to paraphrase.” She looked back at A.J. “Jamie claims that I promised we’d give him a great-great-grandchild, while I was in the mine. He suggests that we don’t take more than a year or two to ‘practice,’ but then we need to get busy. His words. He wants us to name the first baby after him. He says Jamie works for either a boy or a girl.” She laughed. “I can’t believe I’m having this conversation. I mean, we haven’t even talked about anything permanent. And God, babies? It’s too soon even to talk about …” She broke off, and when A.J. started to speak, she held up her hand, telling him to wait, and he knew she was listening to Jamie.

God, babies
, indeed. Babies meant diapers and new clothes and new shoes and college educations and one hell of a lot of responsibilities. But somehow that thought wasn’t frightening, not even a little. In fact, it made A.J. feel warm inside—so warm that he didn’t think he’d ever feel cold again.

He took Alison’s hand, and even though she was quiet, listening to Jamie, she squeezed his fingers. When she turned back to A.J., her eyes were glistening with unshed tears. Still, she smiled.

“Jamie said to tell you,” she said, in a voice that she was trying to keep from wobbling, “that he wishes upon you, upon
us
, the same joy that he received from his own children. He says that each one of his kids, from Jim to Adam, brought him great joy. And each of his children gave him grandchildren that he adored, and each of those grandchildren gave him still more children to love.” She stopped, taking a deep breath. Still, when she spoke again, her voice shook with emotion. “But out of all of those wonderful kids, there was one more special than the rest.” She reached up and touched A.J.’s face. “I think he’s special, too, Jamie,” she murmured.

A.J. gazed into Alison’s eyes, letting himself drown in the love that he saw there.

“Tell Jamie,” he started to say, but Alison shook her head.

“There’s more,” she said, and a tear escaped, sliding down
her face. “He wants me to tell you that the great-grandchild he loved so dearly grew into a boy that any man would’ve been proud to call son, and that boy grew into a man capable of breaking free from the darkest reaches of hell, a true man among men.”

A.J. had to swallow. “Thanks, Gramps,” he whispered. “I had one hell of a teacher.”

“I wish I could’ve been there for you longer, kid,” Jamie said.

A.J. could see him!

Jamie was fuzzy, almost transparent, and his voice sounded as if it were coming from way, way off. One glance at Alison told A.J. that she could still see the spirit, too.

Jamie was wearing his favorite horseman’s duster over his jacket. It was a well-worn shade of tan and quite long—it went nearly all the way to his ankles, with a deep split up the back. Even if he were on horseback, the duster would protect his legs from the elements. On his head, he wore his black cowboy hat.

Back when A.J. was a boy, Jamie had called his duster and that particular hat his traveling clothes. Tonight, it was clear, Jamie was intending to do some traveling.

“Write a good book about me,” he told Alison. “Make sure you let folks know I was human and that I made mistakes—plenty of ’em.”

“I will,” she said. “And they’re going to love you as much as I do.”

“Kids, I’ve got to go.”

“I’m going to miss you, Gramps,” A.J. said, looking into Jamie’s familiar blue eyes.

“Likewise.” Jamie smiled. “But you should know, always and forever—I’m not far away. I’ll never be too far away.” He flickered once. “I love you, kid,” he said. “I always will.”

And then he was gone.

A.J. looked at Alison. “Ah, shit,” he said. “Is it okay if I cry a little?”

She was crying, too, and she pulled him close to kiss him.

“Always,” she said. “And forever.”

He kissed her again, because kissing wasn’t as scary as sitting there and letting her see the tears on his face. And she was okay with that, too, just kissing him back so sweetly and holding him close, until he wiped his face on her sheet.

“Sorry,” he said. “I was suddenly ten again and …”

“I know,” she said. “God, it’s going to be quiet without him, isn’t it?”

“A little.” A.J. pushed her hair back from her forehead as he gazed down at her. “I read the diaries,” he told her. “And I … Well, I want to read something to you. I think it’s the part that you wanted me to read and …”

She had the leather bag that held the diaries on the chair next to her bed, and he unwrapped them from their plastic and found the piece of paper that he’d stuck inside to mark the entry.

“Ready?” he said as he angled the book toward the bed’s light.

Alison nodded.

He cleared his throat and began to read his great-grandmother’s words.

A.J. looked up at Alison, who had tears again in
her
beautiful eyes. She nodded. “That was the entry.”

“I can’t give you guarantees,” he told her. “I can’t promise that I’ll never slip or even fall. But I
do
know this. You must promise me, that if I ever drink again the way your mother did, if I ever throw away my sobriety for more than one brief moment, if I leave you frightened and guessing and uncertain, you
will
leave me. You’ll walk away. Or you’ll pick up a gun—after I show you how to use one—and you’ll order me out of our house. Promise me right now that you won’t take that abuse from me or from any other man, God forbid something happens to me.”

Alison nodded. “I promise,” she told him, as she watched him carefully put that diary back.

Then A.J. kissed her, and then he kissed her again and again, each kiss longer, slower, sweeter than the last.

He held her close, turning off the light and lying back with her on her narrow hospital bed, feeling the heaven of their two hearts beating together.

“I love you,” Alison whispered. “And I’m a lot less scared now than I was before.”

“One day at a time,” he reminded her. “I love you, too.”

“I’ll be even less scared tomorrow,” she said. “And the day after that … Maybe, in a year or so, we
could
start thinking about having, you know, a baby. If you want.…”

A.J. kissed the top of her head and smiled into the darkness.

And somewhere, not far away, never too far away, Jamie smiled back.