Hate (36 page)

“Me too. Really, I’m honored.” I hesitated, considered whether or not I wanted to mention something. “But didn’t you want to ask your mom to come?”

“She comes every year, once a year, on the actual anniversary. She doesn’t like to come any more than that, and I didn’t think I could do it on that day.”

“Fair enough,” I conceded.

It wasn’t my place to tell him he should have made her come anyway.

“What?” he asked with a tilt of his head.

“What what?” I really didn’t know what he was asking.

His eyes narrowed almost comically. “I can see it, boiling under the surface.”

“You can see what?”

He laughed, stating, “Your desire to tell me that I’m wrong, maybe even call me an asshole.”

“No,” I protested, shaking my head.

“Yeah,” he said with a nod of his. “You think I should have talked her into coming anyway.”

I shrugged. Opened my mouth and closed it. Tilted my head to the side and scrunched my lips and admitted, “Maybe.”

“Come on, say it like you would normally say it if you weren’t worried that this was a sensitive situation.”

“This is the kind of thing that you should do with your family.”

His eyes tapered just a touch. “What if I told you that’s what I already thought I was doing?”

My heart flipped over in my chest. “Well, I’d probably take just a minute to be wistful about how sweet that is, and then I’d tell you that we should have brought your mom too.”

He laughed, shaking his head. “Should we just go home, come back some other time?”

“No,” I told him seriously. It'd taken a lot out of him to decide to come. No way was I going to let him back out because of me.

He bit his lip and nodded, turning to head for the subway station.

But as we walked, I couldn’t help but add, “But you should come back on the eleventh with your mom.”

Time stood still around us, amidst one of the busiest cities in the world, as he wrapped me up in his arms, brought his lips down on mine, and bent me all the way back over his arm.

When he set me back on my feet, he told me something I already knew. “I love you.”

“I love you too.”

STANDING AT THE MEMORIAL, THE cascading water of the reflecting pools seeming to sing in the background, he carefully ran the tips of his fingers over the rough etching of his father’s name.

The footprint of the South Tower dwarfed us, vying for supremacy only with the notability of its absence.

I stood invisible, letting him have his moment, but available for whatever he might need.

When he spoke, his voice was quiet. Reverent. “Even without him, I still have more than most.” He forced the air from his lungs. “He told me he loved me that morning. He told me he was proud of me every day. And he made sure I knew, no matter my mistakes, I was the man he wanted me to be.”

Blane’s words penetrated the years of cynicism that coated my skin, the reality that a man who had literally lost so much could see himself as a man who held onto even more almost enough to bring me to my knees.

“Baby,” I started shakily, the tremor of the truth racing from my vocal chords to my lips, “You’re the kind of man anyone would want you to be.”

Reeling me into his arms slowly, he hugged me tight to his front but didn’t let me hide my face in his throat or chest. To my horror, sitting there staring at his handsome face, a tear managed to fight its way free.

He laughed, an actual soul-filled chuckle, even as the cascading water in front of us made the absence of his father’s life all the more obvious. “Look at you. Now you’re crying because I’m awesome. What am I gonna do with you?”

“I still blame you for this,” I said with an accusing point, moving my loaded finger to clean up my face.

He shrugged. “Maybe it’s just that you have things that are worth crying over.”

Man, he was really something.

Running my hand through his hair, I looked into his eyes and let it all in. The love and heartache, the unswervingly powerful character. It was all there, bright and brilliant and ripely awaiting my taking.

I hoped his dad could see us there, thinking of him and thanking him for his love and wisdom.

I hoped he could feel the pride that pulsed out of Blane like a life of its own as he reflected on the names that escaped the same memorialized fate thanks to his father.

And I hoped that when Blane tipped his head back and looked up the at the imposing presence of the Freedom Tower, his dad knew that Blane had done a remarkable job of picking up right where he left off, fighting for everything that magnificent building represented.

Freedom. Liberty. Life.

Love in the face of hate.

WHEN WE WALKED BACK INTO the house after being gone all day, the place was absolutely buzzing.

As tentative as I’d been to leave the house now, right in the middle of everything I’d hoped would never happen, I’d done it for Blane. And it was hard to find any regret in that.

My mom and dad zigzagged across the kitchen working together to do God knows what as Gram sat comfortably in the living room watching a marathon of Soap Operas.

It seemed that as the time with all of her craziness neared the end, my mom realized that maybe Gram should be allowed to cause a little bit of drama.

“Oh yeah!” she yelled out, her enthusiasm as obvious as her failing health. “Slap that bitch.”

I laughed a glance at Blane as he settled his hands onto my hips from behind, his smile hard to miss.

Thankfully, the last week with Gram had been good. She fell more ill every day, the fact that she told me at the last possible second undeniable. But her thoughts seemed to be her own, and she still recognized each of us individually and together as her family. She joked, teased, and laughed often even as I watched the brightness of her light fade slowly out of her eyes.

I went straight to her, pulling Blane along with me, and sat down on the couch next to her, not hesitating to snuggle my body into hers. Blane dropped into the chair across from us, his body facing us rather than the TV. Apparently, he knew where to find the real show.

“Catch me up,” I instructed as I tucked my knees deep into my chest, eager to find out how the whole Patrick, Robin, Sam love triangle was going to play out on General Hospital.

So far I knew that Sam and Patrick had joined forces when Patrick thought Robin (Patrick’s wife) was dead. Of course, she wasn’t and was instead working to restore life to a sleeping Jason (Robin’s best friend) who’d been frozen in some sort of coma in a cryogenic holding tank. Or something. Upon news of Robin’s being alive, Patrick was eager to reconnect, but Robin wasn’t able. Robin was being held captive, forced to lie to Patrick as to the nature of her whereabouts, and ineligible for release until she not only found a way to revive Jason, but also the evil Helena and Stefan Cassadine. Pushed to her last resort, Robin was forced to ask Patrick for a divorce in order to create distance and uphold her lies.

“Alexis suggested that Sam date Patrick to get over Silas. But Patrick, old buddy, withheld information from Sam about their investigation. Sam was obviously hurt, and thus the possibility of them getting in each other’s pants has been delayed. Kiki learned that Sonny and Carly slept together again, so it’s only a matter of time before she tells Franco.”

“What about Robin?”

“Still captive.”

“Wow,” I breathed, the speed with which these shows moved almost painfully slow and cyclical. I stopped watching over a decade ago, and things were basically the same as they were when I left off. Sonny and Carly had been having an on and off love affair for the past twenty-five years. Or something close to that.

As the music crescendoed into a commercial, I glanced at Blane before asking the question that was really on my mind. “How are you feeling?”

“Well, to be honest, I’m a little shocked to see that men still hook up with Carly expecting that she won’t eventually sleep with Sonny again.”

I rolled my eyes. “That’s not what I meant.”

“No shit.”

“Gram.”

“I’m comfortable,” she lied by omission.

“Gram.”

“It’s going to be soon,” she whispered with conviction.

I held her tighter, leaning more of my body to connect with more of hers.

But this time, following her and Blane’s advice, I didn’t try to stop the manifestation of my sorrow as it cascaded down my face.

IT WASN’T A FULL TWO days before I found myself doing exactly what I’d thought was a ridiculous thing to do.

I stood in my kitchen, rolling little crescent roll bikinis and burkas around mini hotdogs while my mom kept my grandmother company in the bedroom, a hole nearly chewed clear through my lip.

Gram was determined that today would be her last, and if I
had
to find the positive spin of it all, it would be that she still had her spunk.

I hoped to God she had it up until the very last second.

Blane’s arms came around my waist, and his lips settled into the crook between my shoulder and neck.

Resting my weight on his body, I breathed him in.

He’d been in charge of welcoming guests for her party at the door, everyone from his mom to Roger from the shelter. Cynthia was there with her kids running around, and Tony was talking to one of the administrators from the hospital.

Thankfully, everyone had been super understanding about my extremely extended vacation from work.

This, the Passing Party, was a hell of a first outing for my new friends, but they were all being good sports, their theories about the party much the same as Blane’s.

It might be out of the ordinary, but it wasn’t morbid or creepy. It was the celebration of a long, unforgettable life.

Soft music buzzed in the background, a mix featuring the theme songs from all of Gram’s favorite Soap Operas and other easy listening that a certain tall, handsome man had made for me the night before.

“How you holding up, pretty girl?” Blane asked against my neck, his hands giving each opposite hip a squeeze, his arms crossing each other on the front of my body.

“I feel like I’m in an alternate universe,” I admitted. One where people threw parties to celebrate their death and invited not only all of their family, but their friends and acquaintances.

“Is it at least a cool place?” he teased, replacing his lips with his chin, obviously stooping down to my height to do it.

“Well, it’s not too bad. I guess it’s better than the normal way these things go. And it’s drama. Which, you’re right, is perfectly her.”

Looking at the pigs over my shoulder, he offered solicitously, “How about I throw those in the oven while you go sit with her and your mom?”

I shrugged, lifting his chin off of my shoulder as I did.

Emotion choked me. I didn’t know if I could do it.

Reaching around me he took the cookie sheet out of my hand and ordered, “Go. Your dad and I will handle everything out here. It should be the three of you in there.”

I forced a rapid and jerky nod, stepping into his chest and wrapping my arms around him before I went. His lips rested on my head, and he dropped the pigs on the counter behind me so that he could hug me back.

“Go, baby.”