Coming Home to You (20 page)

Ray and I were sitting silently in the car, the soft idling of the engine the only soundtrack for all of the unspoken thoughts that hung heavily in the air.

I couldn’t stand it anymore.

I looked at Ray, assessing his face and body language as he sat in the driver’s seat.

“Ray,” I said finally. It sounded loud to my ears after the long silence. “What
was
that?”

He shook his head helplessly, looking down at his hands.

“I don’t know,” he said quietly. “I never expected to see her here.”

“
Her
as in Sara?” I asked.

He looked at me in surprise. “So you recognized her?”

“Yes, Ray, I recognized her,” I answered. “So. Sara. I know who she is, Ray. Or
was
, I guess. But you still haven’t told me anything except that she’s Neil’s ex, and they didn’t leave things well.” I shifted in my seat to get a better view of Ray’s face. “What happened?”

“That is one
loaded
question, Zoë.” He glanced at his watch. “And one that we don’t have time to go into right now, as much as you want an answer.”

Ray reached for his seatbelt and buckled it, signaling his intent not to start a conversation that he couldn’t finish. He put the car in gear and pulled out of the parking space, his jaw set in deliberate concentration.

I turned to face the road ahead of us, letting out a frustrated sigh. There were so many things that I wanted to ask, and now I was still having to wait. I didn’t want to have to wait anymore, and I certainly didn’t want to have to go back to work with my mind so occupied by all of the questions.

“So when
are
you going to tell me?” I asked as patiently as I could manage.

“I can see I’m not going to get a moment’s rest until you get all your answers, so if you have a free evening tonight, pencil me in. I’ll bring dinner.”

I nodded. “Deal.”

We let the conversation lapse until the car pulled into my office parking lot.

“See you tonight,” I said, getting out of the car.

“Tonight.”

I watched as he pulled out of the lot, leaving me standing there, alone and full of curiosity.

Chapter 19

I was peeling the cheese off of my pizza while Ray stared at me, perplexed beyond words.

“What?” I asked, looking up at him.

“
What?
You’re sitting there, picking the cheese off of your pizza, and you ask me
what
? I should be the one asking
what
, not you. Or, actually,
why
? Why would you
do
such a thing? It’s unjust. It’s un-American. It’s just plain
wrong
,” he thundered.

“It’s
mine
,” I replied breezily. “Which means I can deface it anyway I please.”

I grinned and offered the skin of cheese to him, holding it by two fingers. “Ya want it?”

Ray looked from the cheese to me, shaking his head sadly.

“Dear, sweet Zoë. You have no idea, do you?” He picked up his plate of pizza and extended it to accept my cast-offs.

“Oh, but I do.” I took my index finger and started scraping the tomato sauce from the crust.

“Mmmmm,” I said, shoving a sauce-covered finger into my mouth.

“You need to be in therapy,” Ray said in horror. He picked up the cheese I’d given him and folded it so that it would all fit into his mouth at once.

“This from the man who refrigerates cookies,” I shot back, getting another finger full of tomato sauce.

“Dork.” Ray chewed his cheese.

“Nice retort.”

“That’s just how I roll,” he said with a grin.

“Uh huh. Well, roll this way: what happened today?” I asked as I wiped my hands on a paper towel.

“Ooh, the interrogation begins.” Ray shoved the last bite of his pizza in his mouth and leaned over the table, inspecting the contents of the box to find the best-looking pieces.

“Well,” he said, swallowing as he mulled over the box. “Where do you want me to start?” He looked up at me.

“How about from the beginning? The
very
beginning,” I said, pulling my denuded pizza crust apart into strips.

Ray raised an eyebrow but said nothing.

“The beginning…” he repeated, trailing out on a puff of air.

I wasn’t sure whether it was one of those
wow-this-is-a-long-story
kind of puffs of air, or if it was his way of politely dispelling a burp.

I sniffed the air discreetly: maybe a little of both.

“Let’s see,” he said, searching the ceiling. “You know that Neil and I have been best friends since we were little. But what you don’t know about is the time that we
weren’t
.” He paused to look at me.

“There was a span of about four years that Neil and I didn’t talk. Not at all. And it had nothing to do with the fact that he was in the military and busy and off in other places. He’s moved around a lot, to a lot of different bases; and it was kind of just one of those cool things that he actually ended up back here again. But those four years of not talking were because of Sara.” Ray’s narrative was suspended as he finally selected three more slices of pizza to pile on his plate and then took a large bite of one of them.

I pondered as I chewed doughy pieces of topless crust, wondering if maybe Ray was going to tell me that he had been in love with Sara. Sam’s face floated to the fore of my mind, and I felt a sudden pang of guilt. Maybe I was bringing up something that was painful for Ray to talk about.

“Are you okay to be talking about this?” I asked quietly.

Ray shot me a confused look. “Yeah, of course. Why?”

I shook my head. “Never mind. Go on,” I encouraged. I might decide to explain later, but right now, there were other issues more pressing.

“Well. Sara was…Perfect. In every way that seemed to count, Sara was the ideal woman. Neil met her in Colorado, when he was stationed out there. They met. They fell in love. They were inseparable. And when Neil was reassigned, Sara came with him. They were married in every way except on paper. And as strange as it may sound, Sara was the one who wanted it that way. Anytime Neil brought up getting married, they would have an argument.” He ate more pizza, then took a long pull on the beer that had started to form sweat rings on the table.

“It was hard to watch. Not really watch, I guess, since he was in Colorado for the better part of their relationship, but…” He shook his head. “It was hard for me, knowing that my best friend was going through all this crap and all this pain because of a woman who really wasn’t good for him.”

I looked at him questioningly.

“She seemed perfect, as I mentioned. At first. But when I met her, there were things that just really didn’t sit right with me. She was controlling and calculating and manipulative. Not right there in your face; but if you watched from the outside, it was easier to see it. And she didn’t like that I could see it. So Neil’s friendship with me was another bone of contention. Things deteriorated, and then we just stopped talking.” His face was grim as he remembered. “Four years went by without a word.”

“Wow.”

He nodded. “Yeah. Wow.”

“So then what happened?”

“Well, like I said. Neil got stationed out here, and Sara came with him. By that time, we hadn’t been in touch for about three years. And then Sara got pregnant.”

I felt my eyes widen. The woman I had met earlier that afternoon really hadn’t seemed the mommy type. And I hadn’t see any signs of a child at Neil’s house.

“Pregnant?”

Ray took another pull on his beer and then set the nearly empty bottle back on the coffee table.

“She didn’t tell Neil, though. She wasn’t ready for that kind of complication in her life. She was determined to have her career and her independence, and she saw a baby as a threat to all of that.”

I felt sick. I could tell where this story was headed, and I didn’t like it.

“Sara went on what she told Neil was a business trip; and by the time she came home, the baby was no longer an
issue
. Until it was. Somehow, one of Sara’s girlfriends let something slip that made Neil ask questions, and the whole story came out. The baby, the abortion, all the lies.”

As I sat there, cross-legged on the coffee table with my paper plate in my lap and Ray across from me on the couch, I was struck by the realization of how many lives had been changed by one decision. Sara had taken away Neil’s chance to be a father, had robbed him of the opportunity to love and raise a child. She had killed her relationship with Neil and any hope that one day they might be a real family.

Maybe that was the wound I had seen shadowed in her face, left by the understanding that she had sabotaged her own chance at happiness and the bitterness that comes from misdirected regret.

“I take it she didn’t recognize you when we went into her office today because she really hadn’t had that much contact with you,” I ventured after a few moments.

Ray nodded. “That, and the fact that the few times she’d seen me, I’d never had a beard. I didn’t grow this impressive display of masculinity until last year,” he said, fingering his bearded jaw proudly.

“Ah. So when exactly did the baby and the break-up happen?” I asked.

“Two years ago,” Ray replied, turning back to the pizza he’d momentarily neglected.

“Hmm.”

“
Hmm
? What’s
hmm
?”

“Nothing. I’m just trying to get the whole timeline figured out in my head.” I balled up my paper towel and dropped it onto my empty paper plate. “So I take it Neil’s not involved with anyone else now. Does that mean he’s not over Sara?”

I wasn’t really sure I wanted to know the answer, but I also knew there was a bigger part of me that was dying to find out everything I could about Neil Epstein.

Ray snorted. “Oh, he’s over her. She guaranteed that, I think.” He finished the last of his pizza and tossed his plate onto the coffee table in front of him.

“He’s told you he’s over her?” I asked.

“Neil would be a fool is he wasn’t.” He said it with determination, his eyes steely as he stared at something only he could see.

“Ray?”

“Mmm?” He looked as though I’d shocked him out of a trance. “Sorry. I was just thinking,” he said slowly, pursing his lips and furrowing his brow.

“Should I be worried?” I asked, trying to lighten the mood that had grown so heavy.

“Ha ha.” Ray tossed his crumpled paper towel in my face, then got up from his place on the couch. “Well,” he growled, stretching his arms above his head. “It’s getting late, I’m getting tired, and I have a fiancée who’s expecting me to call her before I go to bed.”

He bent to kiss the top of my head and shuffled toward the door. “I’ll give Kate your love,” he said over his shoulder, not waiting for me to unfold myself and get up from my perch on the table. He seemed in an awfully big hurry to bolt.

“Wait, wait!” I squealed, trying to catch him.

“Get to bed, young lady. I’ll talk to you later,” he said, finally pausing long enough to let me give him a hug before he got all the way out the door.

I nodded, puzzled at his behavior but not wanting to ask too much, too soon. Ray would tell me whatever it was that was on his mind when he was ready.

I watched him pull out of the driveway, my brain buzzing with details that hadn’t been fully digested and questions that weren’t fully formed.

I closed the door, turning back to the room and the house of a man whose own life had been so irrevocably changed by one person and one day.

Maybe we had a few things in common, after all.

Dear Neil,

I met Sara today. Honestly, she was the last person I’d have ever expected to meet in the course of my day—but there she was. Ray took me for a surprise trip to the realtor’s office so that I could start looking for a new apartment, and we ended up sitting in her office.

She’s changed a lot from the fresh-faced woman who went to Paris with you. She’s harder and more worldly, a harsher version of her former self. She didn’t recognize Ray, which meant that the entire thing was much less uncomfortable than it might have been; but I know it was still a huge shock for him to see her there.

Hopefully no confidences were betrayed, but Ray told me everything—about the lies, about the baby. I had so many questions already, and meeting Sara in person only raised more. How could I not be curious to know what has caused such a drastic change in one person?

Ray insists that you’ve moved on, that you’re completely over her. But I can’t help wondering if there isn’t at least some small part of you that still loves her. You shared years and history, and I know that you wanted to marry her. That’s not a hope that is easily let go, no matter how determined someone might be to move on. Still, I can’t imagine how angry and betrayed you must have felt, knowing that the woman you loved had taken something so precious as a child away from you.

I think a lot about what I might be doing, where I might be in my own life right now if Paul hadn’t died. Do you ever wonder about the child you might have had with Sara, the different path your life might have taken if you’d been given the chance to be a father?

How have you changed from that man in the picture? Sara seems angry and embittered by what I can only assume is regret. I wonder if she realizes all the joys she robbed herself of, or if she places the blame somewhere that it doesn’t belong. Whatever the case, she seems haunted. She seems driven by a need to prove that she’s strong and independent and indestructible.

It’s funny, isn’t it, how facing the pain in your own life can open your eyes to the signs of damage in other people? Which brings to mind more unanswered questions…

What secret is it that Ray holds so closely that no one is allowed more than a glimpse? He cares so much about other people and gives so much, so readily. But there’s something that he’s holding back. I keep hoping that he’ll tell me what it is; but the minute he seems as though he might, he shuts off again.

I know he’s your friend, and you’re probably very protective of whatever knowledge you have of that part of his life; but he’s marrying my best friend. Secrets damage a relationship, and I’d hate to see Kate in pain because of whatever secrets Ray is keeping.