Firefly Lane (54 page)

He stared down at her, and the love in his eyes was the most beautiful, heart-wrenching thing she'd ever seen. "Between us, nothing will change. It doesn't matter how you look or feel or act. I'll love you forever, just like I do now."

The emotions she'd worked so hard to submerge floated up again, threatened to consume her. "Let's go," she said quietly. "While I've still got the nerve."

Hand in hand, they walked out of their bedroom and went downstairs, where the kids were supposed to be waiting for them.

The living room was empty.

Kate could hear the television in the family room. It blared out the
bleep-thump
of video games. She let go of her husband and went to the corner, by the hall. "Boys, come on out here."

"Aw, Mom," Lucas whined, "we're watching a movie."

She wanted to say,
Keep on watching; forget it,
so badly it actually hurt to say, "Come on, please. Now."

Behind her, she heard her husband go into the kitchen and pick up the phone.

"Downstairs, Marah. Right now. No, I don't care who you're talking to."

Click
.

Kate heard him hang up. Instead of going to him, she went to the couch and sat down, perching stiffly on the cushion's edge. She wished suddenly that she'd put on a heavier sweater; she was freezing.

The boys rushed into the room together, fighting with plastic swords, laughing.

"Take that, Captain Hook," Lucas said.

"I'm Peter Pan," William complained, pretending to stab his brother. "En garde!"

At seven, they were just beginning to change. The little-boy freckles were fading; baby teeth were falling out. Every time she looked at them lately, some baby trait had been lost.

Three years from now they'd be almost unrecognizable.

The thought scared her so much that she clutched the sofa's arm and closed her eyes. What if she weren't here to see them grow up? What if—

No bad thoughts
.

It had become her mantra in the past four days. Johnny came up beside her, sat down close, and took her hand in his.

"I can't believe you picked up the phone," Marah said, coming down the stairs. "That is so totally an invasion of my privacy. And it was Brian."

Kate counted silently to ten, calmed herself enough to breathe, and opened her eyes.

Her children were in front of her, standing there, looking either bored (the boys) or irritated (Marah).

She swallowed hard. She could do this.

"Are you gonna say something?" Marah demanded. "Because if you're just gonna stare at us, I'm going back upstairs."

Johnny started to come out of his seat. "Damn it, Marah."

Kate put a hand on his thigh to stop him. "Sit down, Marah," she said, surprised to hear how ordinary she sounded. "You, too, boys."

The boys plopped onto the carpet like marionettes whose strings had been cut, landing in side-by-side heaps.

"I'll stand," Marah said, flinging her hip out and crossing her arms. She gave Kate the old you're-not-the-boss-of-me glare, and Kate couldn't help feeling a pinch of nostalgia.

"You remember when I went into the city on Friday?" Kate began, feeling the acceleration of her heartbeat and the slight breathlessness that accompanied it. "Well, I had a doctor's appointment."

Lucas whispered something to William, who grinned and punched his brother.

Marah looked longingly up the stairs.

Kate squeezed her husband's hand. "Anyway, there's nothing for you to worry about, but I'm . . . sick."

All three of them looked at her.

"Don't worry. They're going to operate on me and then give me a bunch of medicine and I'll be fine. I might be tired for a few weeks, but that should be about it."

"You promise you'll be okay?" Lucas said, his gaze steady and earnest and only a little afraid.

Kate wanted to say,
Certainly of course,
but such a promise would be remembered.

William rolled his eyes and elbowed his brother. "She just said she'd be fine. Will we get out of school to go to the hospital?"

"Yes," Kate said, actually finding a smile.

Lucas rushed forward to hug her first. "I love you, Mommy," he whispered. She held on to him so long he had to wrench free. The same thing happened with William. Then, as one, they turned and went to the stairs.

"Aren't you going to finish your movie?" Kate asked.

"Naw," Lucas said. "We're going upstairs."

Kate glanced worriedly at her husband, who was already rising. "How about a game of basketball, boys?"

They jumped on the idea and all went outside.

Finally, Kate looked at Marah.

"It's cancer, isn't it?" her daughter asked after a long silence.

"Yes."

"Ms. Murphy had cancer last year and she's fine. And Aunt Georgia, too."

"Exactly."

Marah's mouth trembled. For all her height and pseudo-sophistication and makeup, she looked suddenly like a little girl again asking Kate to leave the night-light on. Wringing her hands together, she moved toward the sofa. "You'll be fine, right?"

Stage four
.
Already spread
.
Caught it late
. She put a lid on those thoughts. They could do her no good. Now was a time for optimism.

"Right. The doctors say I'm young and healthy, so I should be fine."

Marah lay down on the couch, snuggled close, and put her head in Kate's lap. "I'll take care of you, Mommy."

Kate closed her eyes and stroked her daughter's hair. It seemed like only yesterday she'd been able to hold her in her arms and rock her to sleep, only yesterday that Marah had curled into her lap and cried for their lost goldfish.

Please God,
she prayed,
let me get old enough that someday we're friends
. . .

She swallowed hard. "I know you will, honey."

The Firefly Lane girls . . .

In Kate's dream, it is 1974, and she is a teenager again, riding her bike at midnight with her best friend beside her in a darkness so complete it is like being invisible. She remembers the place in vivid detail: a meandering ribbon of asphalt bordered on either side by deep gullies of murky water and hillsides of shaggy grass. Before they met, that road seemed to go nowhere at all; it was just a country lane named after an insect no one had ever seen in this rugged blue and green corner of the world. Then they saw it through each other's eyes . . .

Let go, Katie. God hates a coward
.

She woke with a start, feeling tears on her cheeks. She lay there in her bed, wide awake now, listening to a winter storm rage outside. In the last week she'd lost the ability to distance herself from her memories. Too often lately she returned to Firefly Lane in her dreams, and no wonder.

Best friends forever.

That was the promise they'd made all those years ago, and they'd believed it would last, believed that someday they'd be old women together, sitting in their rocking chairs on a creaking deck, talking about the times of their lives, and laughing.

Now she knew better, of course. For more than a year she'd been telling herself that it was okay, that she could go on without her best friend. Sometimes she even believed it.

Then she'd hear the music. Their music. Yesterday, while she'd been shopping, a bad Muzak version of "You've Got a Friend" had made her cry, right there next to the radishes.

She eased the covers back and got out of bed, careful not to waken the man sleeping beside her. For a moment she stood there, staring down at him in the shadowy darkness. Even in sleep, he wore a troubled expression.

She took the phone off its hook and left the bedroom, then walked down the quiet hallway to the deck. There, she stared out at the storm and gathered her courage. As she punched in the familiar numbers, she wondered what she would say after all these silent months, how she would start.
I've had a bad week
. . .
my life is falling apart . . .
or simply:
I need you
.

Across the black and turbulent Sound, the phone rang.

And rang.

When the answering machine clicked on, she tried to marshal her need into something as small and ordinary as words. "Hey, Tul. It's me, Kate. I can't believe you haven't called to apologize to me—"

Thunder echoed across the sky; lightning flashed in staccato bursts. She heard a click. "Tully? Are you listening to this? Tully?"

There was no answer.

Kate sighed and went on. "I need you, Tully. Call me on my cell."

Suddenly the power went out, taking the phone connection with it. A busy signal bleated in her ear.

Kate tried not to take it as a sign. Instead, she went back inside and lit a candle in the living room. Then, on this day of her surgery, she did one special thing for each member of her family, a little reminder that she was here. For William she found the DVD of
Monsters, Inc
. that he'd misplaced. For Lucas she put together a sack full of his favorite snacks for the waiting room. She charged Marah's cell phone and put it by her bed, knowing how adrift her daughter would feel today if she couldn't call her friends. Finally, she found every set of keys in the house, tagged them, and set them on the counter for Johnny. He lost them almost daily.

When she couldn't think of anything else to do for her family, she went to the window and watched the storm die. Slowly, the dewy world lightened. Charcoal clouds turned to a gorgeous pearlized pink. Seattle looked shiny and new, huddled as it was beneath the rising sun.

A few hours later, her family began to gather around her. The whole time they were together, having breakfast and packing their things into the car, she found herself glancing at the phone, expecting it to ring.

Six weeks later, when they'd taken both her breasts and poured poison into her blood and irradiated her flesh until it looked raw and burned, she was still waiting for Tully to call.

On January second, Tully came home to a cold, empty apartment.

"Story of my life," she said bitterly, tipping the doorman, who carried her bulky designer suitcases into the bedroom.

When he left, she stood there, uncertain of what to do. It was nine o'clock on a Monday night, and most people were home with their families. Tomorrow, she'd go back to work and be able to lose herself in the daily routine of the empire she'd created. In no time at all she'd let go of the images that haunted her during the holidays, had even followed her to the ends of the earth last month. Literally. She'd spent Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year's in the frozen south, huddled around their heat source, singing songs and drinking wine. To the naked eye, and the ever-present camera, it had looked like a good time.

But too often when she'd crawled into her down sleeping bag, wearing her hat and mittens, and tried to sleep, she heard the old songs banging around in her head, making her cry. More than once she'd wakened with ice on her cheeks.

She tossed her purse on the sofa and glanced at the clock, noticing that the red numbers were flashing 5:55. The power must have gone out while she was gone.

She poured herself a glass of wine, got out a piece of paper and a pen, then sat down at her desk. The numbers on the answering machine were flashing, too.

"Great." Now she'd have no idea who had tried to call her after the outage. She hit the replay button and began the slow, arduous task of going through her messages. Halfway through, she made a note to speak to her assistant about voice mail.

She was barely paying attention when Kate's voice roused her.

"Hey, Tul. It's me. Kate."

Tully sat up sharply and hit the rewind button.

"Hey, Tul. It's me. Kate. I can't believe you haven't called to apologize to me."

A loud Click. Then: "Tully? Are you listening to this? Tully?" and then another click followed by a loud busy signal. Kate had hung up.

That was all there was. It was over. There were no more messages on the machine.

Tully felt a disappointment so sharp it actually made her flinch. She played and replayed the message until all she could hear was the accusation in Kate's voice.

That wasn't the Kate she remembered, the girl who'd promised all those years ago to be friends forever. That girl would never have called to taunt Tully like this, to berate her and then hang up.

I can't believe you haven't called to apologize to me
.

Tully stood up, trying to distance herself from this voice that had invaded her home, tricked her into hoping. She hit the erase all button and backed away.

"I can't believe you haven't called
me,
" she said to her empty apartment, trying not to notice how thick her voice sounded.

She went to her purse and burrowed through the mess inside for her cell phone. Finding it, she scrolled through her huge contact list for a name she'd added only a few months ago, and hit send.

When Thomas answered, she tried to sound flirty and light, but it was hard to pretend; a weight seemed to be sitting on her chest, making it hard to breathe. "Hey, Tom I just got back from the icy beyond. What are you doing tonight? Nothing? That's great. How about getting together?"

It was pathetic how desperate she suddenly felt. But she couldn't be alone tonight, couldn't even sleep in her own apartment.

"I'll meet you at Kells. Say, nine-thirty?"

Before he even said, "It's a date," she was on her way.

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

Two thousand six saw
The Girlfriend Hour
rise even higher in the ratings. Week after week, month after month, Tully created magic with her selection of guests and her rapport with the audience. She had definitely reached the top of her game and seized control of the board. No longer did she let herself think about what she didn't have in her life. Just as she'd done at six and ten and fourteen, she boxed all that negative stuff up and put it in the shadow box.

She went on. It was what she'd always done in her life when disappointment set in. She tucked her chin, squared her shoulders, and set a new goal for herself. This year, she was starting a magazine. Next year it would be a retreat for women. After that, who knew?