Embracing Ashberry (47 page)

Harry lunged up, intending to pull the
uncomfortable, choking thing from his mouth, but he did no more
than fight against fabric straps.

Panic welled, the man's soothing cadence broke off,
and Harry heard — actually heard — Shannon speak to him, beg him,
the words thick with tears. "Please," she said, "Please lie still,
Harry. Please."

It had been too long since he'd heard that warm,
pleading voice. He acquiesced immediately, as much to comfort her
overt anxiety as anything else, and then realized how disconnected
he felt. He couldn't speak, he couldn't control his breathing.

Harry focused on her low, intimate
cadence, and felt the warmth of her breath against his ear. How
he'd ached to hear that husky whisper again. Harry had gotten out
of bed and gone in search of her, at a loss to explain her behavior
in recent weeks. He'd been half-angry, frustrated and hurt over her
sudden penchant to leave their bed at first light and the
distant way she'd treated him and 
them
, and he'd had
enough.

He had to know.

Shannon hadn't been in the living room. He'd walked
through it and into the kitchen, and rather than find her there, it
had been dark and cold. Shannon always made coffee first. He'd
leaned against the counter, ready to howl with defeat and call out
loud to her when the odd exhaustion he'd felt for weeks now washed
over him again and he stumbled backward, struggling to stay on his
feet.

She'd been there, then, the light glow of her skin
shining through the dimness. Shannon said his name and he thought
he'd said goodbye, or was that hello?

Either way, she'd screamed but he was fading before
the pain in his shoulder and couldn't respond.

It was a damned hospital bed.

He gripped her hand harder and concentrated on
making his fingers squeeze hers.

She gasped and clasped her second hand around their
intertwined fingers. "Lie still, please," she repeated more
clearly. "There are tubes and monitors everywhere and you're
drugged. It's going to be hard for awhile, but you'll be fine,
Harry."

Harry tried to nod but it was more like a shrug.

"Dad is driving in with the twins; they'll be here
tonight. You know they'll be a ruckus if you're not walking around
and able to put them in their place by then."

Her voice was trembling, and his brain hurt from
trying to follow her but she rushed on, seemingly determined to
reach him.

"Your parents have been in the waiting room all day,
Harry. I think your mom's going to end up in the next bed if they
have to wait much longer for good news."

In desperation, he squeezed her fingers, hard this
time, and then let go. Her fingers slid from his and she made to
take his hand again but he was lifting it, ever so slowly, watching
to make sure it acted as he thought his brain was telling it.
Shaking, he laid it on her cheek and squeezed gently, then
concentrated on setting his palm against her heart. She was still
wearing the ridiculous old law school t-shirt of his that she slept
in. Her face was pale, and the dark smudges under her eyes meant
she hadn't slept.

But she was silent, until one of her hands came back
and covered his.

"I love you too," she whispered and Harry's eyes
closed in relief.

* * * *

She should be sleeping. He should be sleeping. Harry
sat carefully back in the recliner and just stared at her instead,
soaking in her feet crossed at the ankles, the long socks up her
legs over a pair of old peach tights and the long, ivory sweater
dress she'd sleep in tonight because it would still seem
presentable in the clear light of the morning.

Shannon was reading from one of those old books she
was forever bringing home from used bookstores and flea markets. He
knew it would be a love story — something Austen-esque. Her glasses
were perched on her little turned-up nose and her hair fluffed
about her ears.

She’d cut her hair two weeks ago and he already
missed the long curls that used to bounce on her shoulders and
spill over her pillow as she slept. Harry had been shocked when
he'd come home and seen those luxuriant locks missing. It wasn't
that she'd needed to ask his opinion or seek his permission, but he
wished he'd known. Harry would have liked one last night to rub his
face in the fragrant long curls, to wrap his fingers in them and
tug her head back so he could lean down to kiss her.

He hadn't known what to say, of course, and she
hadn't mentioned it, so there the haircut sat on her head, one more
example of what he still thought was a strange rift between them: a
list of things they couldn't talk about for no other reason than
they hadn't talked about them.

She still smelled delicious. She'd said, repeatedly,
that she loved him. She hadn't left him, except to shower and
answer dozens of phone messages, and then only when their sons
stayed with him. She'd held his hand, kissed his forehead, helped
him wash and perform even more painfully personal functions. Her
hands had traced the lines of his face with extreme gentleness as
she'd helped him shave. She'd taken copious notes on his aftercare,
read voraciously about the new diet and a myriad of medications.
She'd taken care of his cell phone, both texts and calls, his
e-mails, his parents, his mail and any other complication that
arose without complaint.

She'd slept very little, but then again, he knew she
hadn't been sleeping before. It was yet another item on the list of
things they hadn't discussed, that she hadn't brought to him. He
ached with the desire to have her on his lap again, her head
snugged against his neck as she poured forth all that she'd pent up
that day into his ears. How many months had it been since she'd
done that? How many more would it be before she could again?

They had to start somewhere. The room was dim, the
nurse not due back for another hour or two. They were both awake.
But where did they start?

She blew out a long breath and chewed her lower lip,
twisting one of the short curls that framed her face now around her
finger.

It was as good of a place as any.

"Why did you decide to cut your hair?" Harry
asked.

* * * *

Shannon dreamed she was in a
birdcage. Frantic, her wings fluttered anxiously and hopelessly,
until she slammed into the metal wires again and again. She was
alone, trapped, and frenzied, and there was no
escape.

In desperation, she flew
harder and faster than she'd ever flown at the catch on the cage
door. To her utter surprise, it flew open and she was ...
free.

Even more desperate, she
flapped her wings in pure panic, screaming for help but there was
no way for her to stay aloft outside of the cage. Shannon fell in a
terrifying, dizzying rush to the floor and laid there,
stunned.

At his bare, beautifully
formed feet.

It wouldn't have taken a pop psychologist two
seconds, she groused inwardly as she sat on the couch in the
hospital room, to see the significance in that dream. She'd tried
to escape from him, and had instead fallen blindly at his feet.
Shannon was consumed with guilt, and she knew it.

What had she missed in her selfish introspection
that had made her not see what was happening? The strange new
tiredness that seemed to afflict him in the evenings she had
assumed to be a new disinterest in intimacy with her. The
occasional, unexplained looks of pain on his face of which he had
not complained? She had taken those to be unspoken irritation with
her as he often had that look when he was annoyed, rather than
actual, inexplicable discomfort in his shoulder and neck. She'd
even dismissed the sudden increase in his consumption of Rolaids to
be a simple effect of aging and had responded by limiting the
garlic in their meals, rather than asking him about it, even when
his apparent bouts with indigestion didn't improve.

She flipped the page absently, less than half her
attention on the book. Shannon had burst out of that cage two — no,
three — weeks ago now. Harry had picked up her little lost soul as
she'd laid on the floor at his feet and soothed it a bit,
metaphorically kissed her forehead and sat her ... where?

The only thing he'd felt he needed
to say, in that horrible moment in the kitchen, was that he loved
her. He'd said it since then, too, and watched her in a way he'd
never had. He was brooding, even now, and a bit grumpily possessive
and protective, even when those two aims are at
odds. 
Shannon, you need a good
night's rest
, he'd
said. 
But to be honest, I want
you here. One of the boys can stay, but they're almost as much work
as being alone. You make everything easier. Better.

Shannon didn't mind. She'd rather be here, honestly,
than tossing and turning in the empty bed at home. Of course, he
was supposed to be sleeping and wasn't. He was staring at her
again, brooding.

"Why did you decide to cut your hair?" Harry asked
her.

Shannon blinked, and looked up at him, blindly
marking the page and setting aside the book. She clasped her hands
in her lap and considered. It had been one of her first acts of
independence, she remembered, determinedly thinking of those
heart-wrenching days after she'd decided he didn't want her. She'd
needed to feel different, new. Shedding eight inches of ebony curls
had been like cutting off her nose, or maybe something more
erogenous. While the scissors had clipped, she'd had visions of
Harry, his mouth buried in the hair at the back of her nape, raw
words of passion in her ear, his hand alternately tracing the locks
and winding his hand in them tightly to move her head where he
wished it.

Why was he asking now? She'd half-expected an
eruption that first night, but he'd simply stared at her for a
minute and turned away when she didn't offer an explanation. Now he
wasn't turning away, he was insisting on an answer. She could
practically feel the intimidation pouring off of him; in another
setting, law clerks and lesser beings would be fleeing in terror
before an impending stampede of commands.

Shannon had always been somewhat immune to that
broadcast of power. And to be truthful, she was infinitely relieved
that his personality and presence were re-asserting themselves so
dramatically, so soon. A small stirring of hope rose up, both that
he was pushing open a door between them and that he might return to
his relatively healthy self.

"I'm waiting," he said, his eyes narrowing at her
even as he infused the quiet words with determination.

At least he hadn't arrogantly adopted impatience, as
he might have done to a recalcitrant witness.

"I-I was-was," Shannon began awkwardly, pausing to
lick her lips before starting over, "I was testing my wings, I
think." She blinked, then hesitantly explained as she looked down
at her hands, "I thought I wanted to be ... different."

"How did it feel?" Harry asked
her. She looked at him puzzled, and he shrugged carefully and
clarified, "How did it feel to declare your independence from me
— 
from us
 — like that, without so much as a word to
me?"

Shannon's mouth fell open and she
gaped at his suddenly stony countenance for just a second before
she slammed it shut. It never had been wise to dismiss Harry's
intellect; he was ruthless professionally and had just applied the
same quicksilver logic to her behavior and arrived at the
conclusion just as instantaneously. Tears welled up and she looked
back at her hands. "It was 
awful
," she whispered. "I felt
as if I was cutting out my heart, or maybe my soul."

"That's because you were carving out my soul, and my
soul is your heart. And your heart is my soul," he said softly.

"You didn't say a word," Shannon said after a
moment.

“I didn't know what to say," Harry agreed, "So I
said nothing. Maybe I should have had a tantrum instead. Maybe I
should have raved about it, spanked you to your senses like bloody
caveman and forbidden you to even think of doing something so
desperate to get my attention ever again. But honestly, I couldn't.
I was too damn tired to do anything more than hurt."

Shannon's throat swelled with guilt and regret. "I'm
so sorry," she whispered in the dim room.

Harry was quiet for a long minute and when he spoke,
his voice was low. "I'm sorry too. I-I-I knew something wasn't
quite right but I kept telling myself it would wait, that I needed
to get past this case or that meeting or some holiday. I'm honestly
shocked you haven't ripped up at me about it yet. You've said you
loved me, but I was wondering if maybe you had succeeded in carving
out that part of my soul."

She bit her lip and choked back a sob. "No, I was
waiting until you healed a bit more and we were home," she
admitted. She bent forward and laid her head on her knees. "So what
happens now?" she asked.

"You let your hair grow back out, and talk to me
before you cut it next time," he said, resting his head against the
back of the recliner. "I never could refuse you anything, as you
well know, and I would hardly upend our marriage over a haircut.
And while your hair is growing, why don't we see about growing my
soul and your heart all back together in one piece?"

He'd sat her back on her perch inside the birdcage
and his hand was still with her, soothing her.

"I'd like that," Shannon said shyly. "How do we do
it?"

# # #

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