Be My Reason Page 10

  Nate: I’ve tried to stay away, do the right thing, but I can’t. I know the reason you cried that night at the club. I remember the song, too. I remember everything about that night. Brooklyn, I always wanted it to be you. I wish I could explain things, please let me. N

  Damn him. I wish he would stop this. He is making this hard. I’m sticking to my guns. I have to tell him to go away if I want a chance at happiness. I take a deep breath and type out a text.

  Me: Nate, I told Michael everything and he was very understanding. He is the one I love. I don’t want anyone else. I don’t want you. I’m sorry about whatever happened back then that caused you to leave but this is my life now. I can’t have you in it. I’ve made my choice. Don’t contact me again. Please.

  I am shaking as I re-read the text and then I close my eyes and press ‘send’.

  I open a bottle of wine and drink a glass rather quickly. I’m proud of myself for my resolve. I did the right thing. I’m ready to move on.

  My phone chirps.

  Unbelievable!

  Nate: Brooklyn, I promise to respect your request not to contact you again. I just had to send you one final text. Please do something for me, for the old me you knew in high school before I left and screwed everything up. Listen to a song for me. ‘Be My Reason’. It’s my story. It’s how I feel. It says everything I can’t. It says everything I want to. It’s always been you. Nate

  Just like the damn car wreck I can’t not look at, it takes all of about a five-second battle between my conscience and goddess within before I pick up my phone and download the song. I listen closely to the chorus.

  Be my reason . . .

  My cause, my light

  Be my reason . . .

  My purpose, my life

  ‘Cause baby it was always you

  You’re my reason

  You’ve pulled me through

  The song sounds familiar. It is about a man who had hurt a woman and is asking for her help, for her to be the reason for him to change and become a better person. By the end of the song, tears are running down my cheeks. It is a very romantic gesture, one that would have been nice about eight years ago. It might have even worked on me then. This emotion that I’m feeling right now . . . I fight it . . . it’s not real. It is the emotion of that seventeen-year-old girl who I no longer am.

  I pull up the texts he sent me and press ‘delete all.’

  Chapter Eight

  Between studying for exams and all my time at the bakery, due to giving Kaitlyn a much-deserved vacation, the past few weeks have flown by. Life is good. Life is comfortable. Michael and I have been doing some wedding planning. We tasted cakes and listened to a few bands on his rare nights off. If anything, I feel a deeper connection to him than ever before.

  Nate has stayed true to his word and has not contacted me at all. My heart has mostly healed and maybe it was even a good thing that I went to Raleigh with Emma and ran into him. I think I would have carried around that anger and resentment forever. I’ve let it go now. I can even take the shortcut to my parents’ house again which means passing by the entrance to The Bend. I still don’t think I’ll ever actually go there . . . but baby steps are good. I even find myself ordering my favorite treat again—a chocolate shake and fries—whenever we go out. Shame on me for depriving myself of the deliciousness for so long.

  One more night of studying and I’ll never have to crack open a textbook again. For once, I’m glad Michael has a long shift including an overnight. If today were one of his days off I would feel the need to spend it with him since we get so few together. But, luckily, he is there and I’m taking advantage of his quiet apartment to study into the night. Tomorrow morning I will have to visit the campus on the other side of Savannah to take all three exams for my on-line courses. They won’t let you graduate unless you show up in person for the exams. I’m not worried about the exams at all. I know I will pass them. But just like how I had to perfect my red velvet recipe even though my original was good, I can’t go into an exam knowing I will simply pass. I have to know I will pass with flying colors. So I study all the material again and again.

  ~ ~ ~

  I wake up in Michael’s bed surrounded by still-open textbooks and notes scattered all over the bed. I smile knowing this is the last day of school. I’ve got this.

  I punch out a text to Michael and Emma.

  Me: Wish me luck . . . here goes nothing!

  Emma texts me back right away despite the early hour.

  Emma: Lyn, you don’t need luck. You rock!

  I don’t get a response from Michael, but I don’t expect one. When he is working it takes a while for him to get back with me. He will be home, probably sleeping, when I get done with my tests and I have special plans that involve how to wake him up.

  Four hours later I emerge, zombiefied, from my three tests. How can one person regurgitate that much information in that amount of time? I look around at students walking around campus and smile a huge face-cracking smile because I’m no longer a student—well technically not until after they hand me my diploma next month—but I’m not counting that.

  I reach into my purse and turn on my phone again. I smile when I see I have several voice mails, first from Michael and then from Emma and my mom.

  I smile at Michael’s voice. “Lyn, I know you probably won’t get this until after your exams. I’m sure you did great. You are so smart and beautiful and I can’t wait to share my entire life with you. I’m heading home now and I’ll probably be sleeping but I want you to wake me up. We should celebrate . . . any way you want to.” He laughs. “I’ll see you later. I love you, sweetheart.”

  Any way I want to? Yeah, that’s kind of what I was thinking, too. I’m practically skipping to my car as I listen to the next voice mail from Emma.

  “Lyn . . . um . . . I need you to come to the hospital. There’s been an accident and . . . ,” she pauses and clears her throat, “just come to the ER and I’ll be here.” She sounded nervous, excited even.

  I think I know what is going on here. I listen to the next one from Mom. “Honey, I don’t want you to worry and we need you to drive safely, but you need to come to the hospital as soon as you get this message. We will see you soon.”

  I smile. Yup. Just as I suspected. Really, you think he could be a little more original. But I guess when you practically live at the hospital, you do what you have to do.

  I check my watch to make sure I will arrive about the time I told him I might get done with my exams. I don’t want to get there too early and ruin the surprise. As I’m making the twenty-minute drive to the hospital, I recall the last time there was an ‘emergency.’

  “Lyn, you have to come to the hospital right now!” Emma’s shaky voice screamed over my voice mail as I was leaving the bakery for the day. “Michael is okay, but he collapsed at work and he is asking for you.”

  I tried to call her back but couldn’t reach her which is unusual since she practically showers with her phone. I tried to call Michael but it went straight to voice mail. I couldn’t even contact my parents. I was getting worried and made the drive in record time.

  Upon arriving at the ER, I couldn’t find Emma so I told a nurse who I was and she ushered me immediately into a large room and left without saying a word. Looking around the room, I realized it was the same room where I met Michael for the very first time eighteen months before. It was a very white, clinical room with one of those curtain things that separates all of the patients that are in the area.

  I heard someone clear a throat and thought it must be Michael so I went over to the curtain, ripped it quickly to the side and was stunned by what I saw. Standing there with stupid grins on their faces was pretty much everyone I knew. My parents, Michael’s parents, Michael’s brother and sister, Emma, Kaitlyn, a few other close friends and some hospital staff that Michael called friends. Then I looked down to see Michael in front of me, on bended knee, still in his scrubs, holding out a small black velvet ring box.
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  “Lyn, I know this isn’t the most romantic place for this, but I figured if you aren’t used to this by now, you’d have run out that door long ago.”

  I already had tears streaming down my face.

  “I think I fell in love with you the moment I saw you in this very room. You are the best thing that has ever happened to me and I want to spend the rest of my life with you.” The tears started to run down his face as well. “Lyn, will you marry me?”

  I wonder what he is going to do to top that one? I have to admit, planning something today did catch me off guard. I expected something after graduation next month, but not now. And especially not the day after one of his long thirty-six hour shifts. That is probably why he chose today, because I wouldn’t expect it. He is such a sweetheart.

  I arrive at the hospital and park in the ER lot. I know better now than to leave my car in the ambulance bay like last time. It almost got towed away. Not today.

  When I enter the ER, there is a nurse waiting for me. They all pretty much know me by now. She is directing me to a private room. Private room, nice touch. Her eyes are red-rimmed and she is sniffing. Geez, emotional much? It’s just a surprise party.

  As I enter the room, I’m so excited to see everyone there and I skim their faces. Again, it’s Michael’s parents, his brother and sister and their kids. A bit overkill bringing the kids, but I’ll take it. My parents are there. I see Emma, but none of my other friends. Maybe they will jump out and surprise me in a minute.

  Emma plows through everyone to get to me when she sees me enter the room. She has tears running down her face. She almost tackles me into a hug and I can feel her body heave as she squishes me.

  What is going on? Where are the balloons and the cake?

  It’s then when I really examine the faces of everyone in the room. Most are crying. My father is sitting down with his head in his hands. Michael’s older sister, Janie is in the corner with her ten-year-old daughter, Amanda, trying to console the child who is practically in hysterics. Michael’s mother and father are in an embrace and she is shaking and crying.

  Where’s Michael? I frantically look around the room again, sure that I’ve missed him. But he isn’t here. I look behind me into the hallway and don’t find him there but I do see several staff hanging around all crying and hugging.

  “Lyn, I’m so sorry,” Emma hiccups the words. “I’m so, so sorry.”

  What is she sorry for? What has happened? I reach up to stop the tickle on my face and realize that I have tears streaming down my cheeks. “Someone tell me what is going on. Where is Michael?”

  They all look at each other for a second before my father stands up and walks over to take my hands in his. “Brookie,” he says, calling me by a nickname he hasn’t used since I was a small child, “Michael was in an accident on the way home after work this morning. They think he might have fallen asleep. His car went off the highway and hit a retaining wall.” He takes a deep breath that looks like it hurts. “Brookie—”

  No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. “No, don’t say it,” I beg him.

  “Brookie, I’m sorry. It doesn’t look like he’s going to make it.” He pulls me into a hug with Emma.

  “No!” I shout. “Stop right there. Stop talking. He will be fine. Michael is fine. Take me to him. He just needs to see me. Everything will be okay when he sees me. We are in the middle of planning our wedding so he wouldn’t leave me now. No. This isn’t right. This isn’t happening.”

  I try to rip myself away from Emma and my dad but they are holding onto me so tightly that I can’t move. My dad leads me over to a chair and helps me sit down when a few doctors come in the room to talk to me.

  I’m not even here. In this room. I’m not here. I’m out of my body, floating above, looking down on my friends and family as they fall apart. I feel numb. I can’t move. Tears are rolling down my face, soaking the material on the front of my silk blouse. I hear words such as life support and brain death but I’m not really listening. I can’t put together a thought let alone pay attention to these doctors and their technical terms when I know what they are telling me is that my life is over. My love. My Michael. He is leaving me. My stomach turns.

  “I’m going to be sick.” I bolt out of my chair and one of the nurses grabs my arm and runs me to the nearest bathroom just in time for me to lose my breakfast into the sink basin. Footsteps fall behind me and then my mother and Emma are both here rubbing my back and handing me some wet paper towels.

  I sink down to the floor, staying put until I’m sure I won’t throw up again. Emma hands me a stick of gum. She is always prepared. I look around the bathroom. It smells of bleach. I eye the floor and absentmindedly hope it is clean. It is so quiet in here. The hum of the heating system is the only thing I can hear and it is eerily calm. Everyone is waiting for me to do something. I don’t want to leave this place. As soon as I do, nothing will be the same.

  “Brooklyn?” Mom pulls me from my trance.

  I look up at my mother and Emma. “I don’t know what to do. What am I supposed to do? Tell me what to do.”

  My mother, designer dress and all, sits down on the emergency room bathroom floor next to me and grabs my hands. She looks into my eyes and says, “You go say goodbye to him.”

  This is when I start to lose it. I cry hard and loud. My heart hurts so much that I think I must be the only person in the world that has ever felt so much pain. I feel my mother’s soft touch, her hand running down my long hair. She starts at the top of my head and smooths my hair down until she reaches the ends. This is something she did for me as a child when I would skin a knee, or when I didn’t get chosen for the soccer team in middle school, or when my science fair project failed to work.

  Or when your fiancé is dying.

  Minutes later, or hours—I have lost track of time—she and Emma help me up and lead me out of the bathroom. I let them take me because I am a shell of a person. I am a lifeless puppet being led around by others. I can’t feel my legs move, yet I can see that we are walking because we are passing by strangers in the ER.

  I spot a little boy with a twisted arm who is being comforted by his mother while his little sister draws with her crayons on the table next to them. The mother makes eye contact with me and I can see in her eyes that she knows. She knows I will never have a little boy with auburn hair who will fall off his bike and need his mother to take him to the hospital so that his daddy can fix him up. She knows I will never have a grey-eyed girl that will grow up to love to bake just like her mommy.

  As we walk down the hall I see an older lady pushing her husband in a wheelchair that is adorned with ‘get well Grandpa’ balloons and my step falters. Michael will never get to be a grandfather. He won’t grow old with me. He won’t grow old at all. I close my eyes and refuse to look at anyone or anything else.

  We must get on an elevator because I have stopped walking but still feel movement. Just like my heart has stopped beating yet I am still alive.

  “We’re here,” my mother whispers into my hair, still keeping a tight grip around my shoulders.

  I open my eyes and see Michael’s parents outside a closed door. The door that will lead me to my fiancé. The door to the tomb that encases him. I want to go in there with him and never come out.

  I look at his parents, his mom in particular and realize she is just as broken as I am. I’ve never been very close to her, but in this moment we share a bond that nobody else can possibly imagine. We are part of a club that nobody wants to join. We love the man behind that door more than any other women in this world. We move simultaneously towards each other and embrace, both shaking and crying. It is strangely comforting knowing that someone else feels the extent of my pain.

  She pulls away and looks at me. “Lyn, we thought you might like a moment to be alone with him before . . .” She can’t say the words. I can’t even think the words. I look at the door and can’t help but think that as soon as I go through it and he sees me, hears me, smells m
e, he will wake up. Our love is so strong that I will be the one to pull him back from where he is. They will all see that the doctors were wrong. They are wrong sometimes. Michael always tells me stories of how people have these miraculous recoveries that are beyond what science can explain. I have no doubt that he will be one of these.

  I find the words, “Yes, I would like that. Thank you.” I give her one last hug.

  I look back at Emma and my mom. My mother gives me a weak smile and says, “We will be right outside this door if you need us.”

  I turn to push through the door when a nurse grabs my elbow and proceeds to tell me that there are a lot of wires hooked up to him and a machine that is breathing for him so there is a tube coming out of his mouth. She tells me there is a bandage wrapping his head and a few others on his arms. All I can do is nod at her and stare blankly.

  She lets me through the door and closes it gently behind me. I’m overwhelmed by the soft sounds in room. The whooshing and whirring of the ventilator and the beep-beep-beep of the heart monitor echo through the dark room. I try to match my own heartbeat to his but mine is beating too fast.

  I take in his appearance starting with the bandages at the top of his head. I can still see his beautiful face but it is now marred by a gash over his brow and some scrapes on his cheek. He still looks like my Michael. He is wearing a white and blue hospital gown with his arms sticking out and resting by his side. One arm is bandaged almost entirely from shoulder to wrist while the other looks completely unscathed. I sit in the chair pulled close to the bed and take his hand into mine. His hand is much warmer than I thought it would be.

  I bring it to my lips and kiss his unmarred skin. “Michael,” I whisper. “I need you. Don’t leave me.” Tears drop down onto his hand and roll off onto the bed. I sit, rubbing his hand, being lulled by the rhythmic noise of the machines. It is oddly reassuring being enveloped in this sound. Maybe that is why he won’t wake up.