Surrender (4 page)

I'd only had two hours of sleep when I forced my eyes open. With great difficulty, I rose out of bed and dressed, intending to spend the entire day with my son. I sneaked into his room and crawled under the covers with him. Sensing me, he turned and wrapped his little arms around my shoulders, nuzzling his head into my neck.

I kissed the top of his head, sifting my fingers through soft hair the same color as his father's. It was during quiet moments like these that the entirety of our loss hit me, how entire futures can be ripped away in the time it takes a bullet to leave the barrel of a gun and travel across a crowded street.

I wondered what life would be like if Jason had come home as planned, if we'd gotten married and raised Will together. Would Will be a different kid? Would he be more childlike instead of a kid who grew up too soon?

“I'll take care of you, Mommy,” he'd always say to me. “If anyone tries to hurt you, I'll protect you.”

I guess wanting to protect those we love is bone deep, an instinct we'll never be able to unlearn.

—

Will and I went to the movies to see the latest Pixar release. As we sat down, he once again asked why Elsie and Henry couldn't join us.

“They're busy today,” I said. “They have a lot of things to take care of now that they're married.”

“Like?”

“Um . . .” In lieu of a real honeymoon, the Shermans and I had chipped in to get them a suite at the Hyatt Hotel in Carmel, overlooking the Big Sur coastline. No doubt those two were very busy ignoring the ocean view at that very moment. “Husband and wife stuff.”

“Are they having sex?” he asked in a stage whisper.

I choked on my drink. “What? How do you know about sex?”

He grinned. “Billy at school told everyone about it. He said that's how babies are made.”

“What else did he tell you?”

“That the man kisses the woman and then he sleeps on top of her and then she gets a baby in her tummy.”

“I need to have a talk with Billy's mom, then,” I muttered under my breath as the movie started.

—

Afterward, we headed to a frozen yogurt place in Cannery Row. In the middle of choosing our toppings, my phone beeped, letting me know I'd received a voice message. I held my phone up to my ear, keeping an eye on Will to make sure he didn't get too much of the crumbled candies.

“Julie, it's Neal,” said the deep, silky voice. “I was hoping to see you today. Give me a call when you get a chance.”

I turned off my phone, determined to put the guy out of my mind once and for all. It was a fling and nothing more. The fact that I had had an erotic dream about him that morning and had thought about him nonstop during the movie was irrelevant. Our time together was up.

“Mom,” Will said as we sat down at a table.

“Mmm?”

“Are you going to have a wedding like yesterday?” he asked with his sweet, open face. “I think you'd be so pretty in a big white dress.”

I stifled a smile, thinking that it was way too late for me to be in a white dress. Instead I said, “I don't think I'll ever get married again, sweetie.”

“Why not?”

“Because I don't have anyone to marry.”

He chewed for a few moments, then his face lit up. “You can marry Kyle again! You said he was a good dad when I was a baby.”

“He
was
a good dad,” I said, once again regretting the fact that I'd deprived Will of a father figure. But I'd tried. I'd tried to make it work for Will's sake, but the heart can't be told to acknowledge what was never there. And though Kyle was a decent man who loved us, I just never felt anything but platonic feelings toward him. “But I don't think I will marry Kyle again. He and I weren't right for each other.”

“You'll find the right guy,” he said, patting my hand, looking mature beyond his years. “Then you'll marry him and I'll have a dad again.”

I wanted to tell him that it wasn't so easy, that men who wanted an insta-family were few and far between, but filled my mouth with frozen yogurt instead, unable to bear the thought of disappointing him with the truth. “Will, I'll make you a deal: if the right man ever comes along and he wants to be your dad, then I will marry him. But only if you promise to stop waiting around for him. Because, honestly, I don't think he exists.” I swallowed hard. “Aren't you happy with just you and me?”

“I am,” he said quickly. “I just want you to have a Henry.”

I laughed unexpectedly. “Sweetie,” I said, wiping smeared yogurt off his chin, “your dad was my Henry.”

“But that means you'll never get married again.”

“No. Probably not.”

He stared into his empty cup, dejected.

“It's okay, Will. Really,” I said, scooping him up in my arms even though he was already far too heavy. “I love you and I love our little family. Nothing can make me happier.”

To cheer him up, I gave him a piggyback and we laughed all the way to the car.

—

Once we were back at the Shermans', I finally turned my phone back on, wincing as I waited for the messages to pile up. But there were no texts, no voice mails, no missed calls. Either Neal was an extremely patient man or seeing me was not high on his priority list.

So I called him.

“Hey,” he said, the timbre in his voice doing strange and wonderful things to my insides, a reminder of the strange and wonderful things he'd done to my insides just the previous night.

“Hi. I've been out all day and just now had the chance to return your call.”

He was quiet for a moment; in the background, I heard a zipper and a door closing.

“Are you busy?”

“No. Well, I'm packing,” he said. “I'm flying out this afternoon.”

“I thought you wanted to meet up,” I blurted out then immediately smacked my forehead.

He paused. “I figured since I didn't hear from you . . .”

I didn't know why I was feeling so wretched; wasn't this what I'd wanted?

“Look,” he said. “You wanted a fling. I get it. We had a nice time last night and now it's time to go our separate ways.”

A nice time. Ouch.
“It was more than a nice time,” I said, trying not to sound wounded, though not sure I was succeeding.

“Yeah, it was.” He cleared his throat. “Let me be honest: I like you, Julie. I want to get to know you. But that's not going to happen unless you can admit it's what you want, too.”

I couldn't find words to speak. Was he right? Had I gone in too deep with this man? More important, did I want to wade back out?

“You were only supposed to be a one-time thing,” I said, trying my best to brace the walls around my heart.

“But I'm not,” he said. “You and I . . . we were meant to meet.”

“For what reason?”

“I don't know yet. But I was hoping to find out.” When next he spoke, his voice was different. “Come to Las Vegas with me.”

“What?”

“You said you still had a few days before returning to Dallas. So come to Vegas with me and let's get to know each other.”

“I can't do that.”

Could I?

The idea was too crazy, too impulsive. I'd been crazy and impulsive once, but that was a long time ago. I'd forgotten what it was even like to be that girl. “I like my life the way it is. Simple and uncomplicated.”

He didn't say anything for a long time. I got the feeling he was trying to rein in his frustration. I couldn't say I blamed him. “I leave at four thirty,” he said. “If you'd like to do something different for a few days, then come. If not, then . . . 'bye, Julie. I enjoyed our time together.”

After I hung up, I stared at the tan-colored wall in front of me, trying to make sense of my jumbled emotions. My head told me I'd made the right decision; why then were my insides in knots?

I walked down the hall, toward the living room, when I felt a strange sensation wash over me. I stopped in front of Jason's old bedroom, looking through bleary eyes at the things he'd left behind.

The years since his death had dulled the pain, but I suspected I would always feel his loss. I walked inside, my eyes landing on the three black-and-white photo booth strips arranged together inside a wooden frame.

They had been taken a few months after college, when I'd come to visit him in Texas during his Air Force training. We stumbled upon the photo booth in a mall and I pulled him inside, despite his protestations. The first set was of us looking serious, hugging and posing. In the second set we had fun—tongues out, ears covered, bunny ears, fishy faces. The last strip was my favorite: when he turned to me as if seeing me for the first time, then he kissed my cheek, then we were making out. The final image—of the two of us just looking at each other—was the image that held the most meaning.

“Can you be my boyfriend again?” I'd asked him before that final shot.

The camera snapped the picture in the nanosecond between his surprised reaction and his grinning response. “Well, yeah,” was his easy reply.

“This is going to be tough for a while,” he said later as we walked hand in hand in the mall. “I'll be moving again in a few months and you'll be starting work in New York.”

“I don't care,” I said, pulling on his hand to bring him closer, wrapping an arm around his waist. “I shouldn't have broken up with you. I know that now.”

We were happy for a time, until he moved to Oklahoma and I became too busy with an off-Broadway show, and he decided that a long-distance relationship was just too much work.

“I found those in Jason's old things and thought Will would like to see them.”

I wiped my eyes with my sleeves before turning around to face Elodie, who was standing in the doorway. “I haven't seen these in years,” I said.

She walked over and took the frame, smiling ruefully. “You both look so happy.”

“We were.”

“I'd love nothing more than to see you smiling like that again,” Elodie said, looking at me like my mother never did, with warmth and kindness.

“I'm happy,” I said, feeling defensive about the life I'd built with Will. “I don't know why people keep thinking I'm not.”

“I'm sorry. I never meant to insinuate that you're not. It's just . . .” She looked down again at the pictures in her hand. “This is a different kind of smile you're wearing here.”

“That's also a different kind of girl,” I said, placing my hand over the frame. “And that smile is because she was crazy about your son.”

“Well, what about the young man last night? The tall one with the nice smile?”

“What about him? He was nice, but I won't be seeing him again.”

“He just seemed very smitten with you. He didn't take his eyes off you the entire ceremony.”

I felt heat rise up my cheeks. “Yeah, but we live too far from each other. It would never wor—” I stopped, overcome with a sense of déjà vu. I had used the same excuse before, had wasted years pushing away the first guy I'd ever cared for out of some misguided idea that love would destroy my life. Would I have done things differently if I'd known our time would be cut short?

“I like him,” I admitted softly. “But he's leaving today. He asked me to come to Las Vegas with him for a few days . . .”

“So what's the problem?”

“Will,” I said, then quickly added, “Not that he's a problem. Only that Neal doesn't know that I have a son. And I can't just go gallivanting off like I have no responsibilities, like I'm single again.”

“Do you want to go with him?” Elodie asked.

“No.” I sighed in resignation. “Maybe. But I shouldn't.”

“You can leave Will with us,” she said, touching my shoulder.

I glanced up at her in surprise. “I couldn't ask you to do that. Besides, I've never even spent a full night away from him before.”

“Which is all the more reason to go. You're long overdue for a vacation.”

“But Will—”

“He'll be okay. He's a big kid now. He can handle it,” she said gently.

A frisson of excitement wound up my spine but I refused to address it. I'd had my hopes up before and knew firsthand that what comes up will come crashing back down. That was life. Lesson learned.

“His flight leaves at four thirty,” I said, looking pointedly at my watch. “And it's already three. I'd never make it anyway.”

“Honey, we're only ten minutes away from the airport.”

My eyes flew back and forth between my watch and Elodie, still unable to make a decision.

“What are you waiting for?” she asked, clapping her hands together. “Get packing.”

Packing went fast, as we'd been living out of bags for the past two days. I moved decisively, leaving no room for doubt, afraid that if even a little bit crept in, I'd completely lose my nerve.

I froze when the door opened and my son came in. “Grandma said you had to go somewhere?” he said.

I crouched down and hugged him. “Yes, to Las Vegas,” I said, feeling my excitement slipping away. “But I don't have to go. Not if you don't want me to.”

He scratched his head. “I thought you said you always wanted to go there.”

“I do.”

“So you should go,” he said as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. You want to do something? Then do it. Sometimes I wished adults could still live by kid logic.

“You won't miss me?” I asked.

“Yeah, I will. But I want you to have fun, too.”

My sight blurred with tears, though with what emotion, I couldn't tell. I hugged him to me, holding him tighter than what was probably comfortable. He made up my entire world, and I was actually considering leaving him behind.

“Ready?” Elodie asked, coming into the room with her purse and keys in hand.

“Are you sure about this?” I asked Will one more time. “I really don't have to go.”

He smiled, his big blue eyes bright as he nodded. “I'll be fine, Mom. Go.”

—

The drive over to the airport went by in a blur, affording me no time to second-guess myself. After thanking Elodie, I went inside the tiny Monterey airport and looked around for Neal.

But he was nowhere to be found, and only then—as I stood stranded in that building—did it occur to me that he might not be waiting for me after all. I'd told him I wasn't coming, so it stood to reason that he wouldn't wait.

I went up to the ticket counter but the agent informed me there were absolutely no scheduled flights to Las Vegas departing at four thirty. I stepped out of line, swallowing down my disappointment, and stared down at my phone in hopes that a message from Neal would pop up at that very moment.

“You're here.”

I spun around and found Neal beaming at me, holding a duffel bag in his hand. He bent down and gave me a kiss on the cheek. “I thought you weren't going to show.”

I folded my arms across my chest. “There are no flights to Vegas.”

He grinned. “Not on their planes. But Neal Airlines has one departing in thirty minutes.” He took my bag and led me through the airport and out the other side of the building. We walked on the tarmac for a little while until we reached a small hangar.

“Ready?” he asked before opening the side door.

Inside was a small white plane with red and yellow stripes along its thin body, white propellers, and wheels that looked as if they belonged on a go-kart instead of a plane.

“You're going to fly
this
?” I asked incredulously as my heart thumped wildly.

“Yes.” He chuckled as he walked around the plane, running his hands along its shiny body. “What did you think I meant?”

I threw my hands up. “I don't know. Maybe you were rich and had your own private jet.”

“I do,” he said, bending down and pulling yellow wedges from around the plane's tires. “This one. It's a Lancair IV. My dad and I built her from a kit.”

All the blood rushed to my head. “You built this? From a
kit
?”

He pursed his lips, biting back a smile. “You're wondering what the hell you've gotten yourself into, right?”

“Something like that.”

“Well, it's a four-seat, carbon-fiber-composite, high-performance plane and has been certified airworthy by the FAA. I've got over two hundred solo flying hours under my belt and at least a hundred with my dad.” He leaned an elbow on the nose of the plane. “You'll be in capable hands.”

I focused on his earnest face, anchoring my skittering thoughts to the way he'd held me in bed. In his capable arms I'd felt safe and wanted, as if after all these years of standing guard alone, someone finally had my back.

“Okay,” I said, shutting out the little nagging doubts. “But I reserve the right to change my mind at any time.”

He beamed and came toward me, cradling my face in his hands and planting his lips on mine. The kiss, meant to be quick, deepened as I opened my mouth and let him in. His eyes were bright with excitement when he pulled away. “You're going to love flying.”

He helped me up into the cockpit, which was not all that roomy for a four-seater, and climbed into the pilot's seat, putting on a green headset.

Then he reached over and clamped a set over my ears, adjusting the mic in front of my mouth. “So we can talk over the noise.”

I looked down at the piece of metal with a wooden handle sticking up between my legs, then at the identical one in his seat. “There's a joke here somewhere.”

He chuckled. “That's called the stick, and it controls the roll and the pitch of the plane, while the pedals”—he pointed to both our feet—“control the yaw.”

I took hold of the stick. “So can I drive the plane from my side?”

“Sure.”

When he started communicating with the tower and flipping switches, I finally sat back, satisfied that he knew what he was doing. Still, as we taxied onto the runway, traveling faster and faster until the wheels lifted off the ground, I prayed quietly and fervently, asking every deity to keep me safe.

After we reached flight altitude and had been flying for a few minutes, he reached over and squeezed my thigh. “You ready to take over?” he asked, his voice clear in my headset despite the loud and constant noise around us.

I took hold of the stick with some hesitation then immediately let go. “Talk me through it first. I have no idea what I'm doing.”

Neal explained about the difference between the roll, pitch, and yaw, and how each one was controlled.

“I think I got it,” I said, taking hold of the stick and setting my feet on the pedals.

“I'm letting go now,” he said, taking his hand off the stick and folding his arms behind his head.

“Oh, crap,” I said in a moment of pure terror, until a second passed and I realized that we weren't going to crash. “I'm really doing it,” I said, feeling short of breath as I looked out the windshield at the expanse of blue sky all around.

He beamed at me. “You're flying,” he said with a warm gaze.

We came upon a flock of birds and flew alongside them for a few wonderful minutes, but the plane was faster and soon the birds fell behind.

“Thank you,” I said after handing control of the plane back over to Neal, “for giving me the chance to fly with the birds.”

He smiled over at me. “It's my pleasure,” he said with naked honesty. “At this point, you could ask me for the moon and I'd do my best to steal it for you.”

I believed him and his analogy, the sincerity in his voice hard to miss. And as we flew somewhere over the Sequoia National Forest, I realized that I was well beyond the point of no return.