Trouble Me (13 page)

Andrew sleeps for most of the day. I keep the boys busy, make them lunch, take them to the pool.

Jeremy holes up in the media room, as promised. He’s on the phone to everyone—all sorts of phone calls. I can imagine Aaronson needs lots of calming, and I can tell several are probably strategy calls to Sandy, the publicist, about what’s going to be said to the press.

Tucker also talks on the phone, but I can’t tell who he speaks to. His conversations are much more secretive. More than once, I think he steps out on to the patio to spare me the details of Andrew’s accident.

At some point late in the afternoon, Jeremy comes out of the media room with my cell in his hand. He wasn’t lying about commandeering all of the phones.

“Kelly?”

“Yeah?”

“This one you can take. It’s your friend? Mari?” He hands the phone to me.

“Hello?”

“Hi, Kelly. What’s going on?” Her voice sounds casual, and I want to snap at her, remind her that there’s a lot going on, thank you very much.

And then I remember I haven’t told her about Andrew yet.

“It’s a little crazy over here. How are you?”

She breathes in a little. “Good, I guess. What’s going on?”

I don’t know how to lie right now. I’m so tired, and the adrenaline of the day is wearing thin. “Tonight’s just not a good time to talk. Can we catch up tomorrow? I might need a babysitter this week. Something’s come up, and I could use your help.”

“Sure, that’s fine. Let me know.” She ends the call.

I feel weariness settling into my bones. I scavenge the refrigerator and make sandwiches for everyone to eat. Beau, ever the helper, takes food to Tucker and Jeremy.

I take dinner into the bedroom for Andrew.

He’s reading Hemingway, holding the book with his good arm. I’ve propped him up with every conceivable pillow I could find, but he still looks uncomfortable.

“Dinner?” I hold up the plate.

He makes a face. “I don’t have an appetite. Maybe some tea?”

“You have to eat. Your body needs to heal. You need fuel to heal up.” I sit on the edge of the bed facing him. I fight the rising uneasy feeling tightening around my chest.

“I promise I will tomorrow. Tonight, I’m just hoping to fall asleep.”

I wonder how he will, with the pain. “I’ll get you new ice.”

“You know what? Just tell me some stories. Tell me about when the boys were born.” He sets the book down.

“I’m no Papa Hemingway.”

“He and Robert Jordan are gearing up to blow up a bridge right now, but you don’t have to try to compete with that. I want to think about what it’s going to be like to see my baby born.”

So, I lie down next to him and tell him all the ins and outs of when the boys were born. He’s able to manage some chuckles, especially when I tell him about mowing the lawn when I was overdue with Hunter.

He eventually falls asleep.

I get back up and check in on everyone, get Hunter and Beau to bed, straighten up the kitchen. Then I come back to Andrew, trying to slip in between the covers as gently as I can.

And then I stare at the wall all night; thank God over and over again.

The sun dawns pale in the sky as I cry silent tears of gratitude.

T
HE
N
EXT
M
ORNING
, Tucker takes the boys out for the day. Bless him. He sneaks them out one of the back freight elevators and down to the parking garage, where they take a car one of the security guys from Apotheosis dropped last night. They’re able to slip out of the building without anyone being the wiser.

Andrew sleeps. The production will “shoot around him,” producer Aaronson declared last night. He won’t have filming stopped, not for Andrew’s injury, not for anything. Jeremy spent a long time last night making sure McDougal could pick up scenes that didn’t involve Andrew for two or three days.

Before he left, Tucker, expert on trauma, gave me a list of to-dos to help Andrew recover on a quiet day alone. “Have him take the ibuprofen for the pain, but also to clear the adrenaline out of his body. It helps the body process it.”

I feel like I’ve been run over by a truck, so I can only imagine how Andrew feels. I want a cup of tea and decide on chamomile and green. I need caffeine, even just a little bit, but I also need something to calm my jagged nerves.

I didn’t sleep. At all. I know this isn’t good for the baby. I will nap later, I promise myself.

I decide to swim. It’s early, but it’s a weekday, so no one should be at the little indoor pool. There aren’t enough people in the building who use it very much. It has an adjoining workout room—gym might be what the concierge calls it, but two treadmills and a couple weight machines might be pushing the definition of
gym
. We might be the only interested tenants. The boys come down to swim and are usually by themselves.

I pull on my suit. What an exercise in total humiliation. The pregnant body in a swimsuit is not a thing of beauty. Wow. I think Jeremy’s remark about tan fat might have been on the mark.

I am careful not to wake Andrew as I leave a note on the pillow next to him. I don’t want him to wake to an empty condo and flip out.

I sneak out and take the elevator to the pool level.

It’s quiet. No one else is swimming. The water laps its blue tongue against old, 1920s-style black and white tiles. The room smells of chlorine, and the humidity curls the hairs at my neck.

As I slip in, the warm water welcomes me. I forgot what a relief this is. My hips thank me immediately, the burden of a spreading midsection off of their bones for a moment.

I warm up with a couple easy laps, the breaststroke letting my shoulders and legs stretch out.

At the deep end, I let down my guard and float on my back. The water fills my ears, and I enjoy the cocoon. I open my eyes to someone standing on the pool deck and jump out of my skin, inhaling water in the process.

“Andrew!” I sputter and cough.

His arm’s in a sling. He wears trunks. “Morning. Thought I’d join you.”

“You can’t swim with your shoulder all torn up.”

“Why not? The sutures are all covered with that thick steri-tape. They said I could shower.” His voice sounds tired.

“Come in, then.” I’m not fighting him today, on anything. The person who was almost run over wins all the arguments.

“No, you’re right. I should probably keep it out of the water.” He walks to the stairs and eases in, careful to come only waist deep. He coaxes his arm out of the sling and puts the sling aside.

“Careful.” I swim toward him. I’m timid. I don’t want to touch him for fear of hurting him.

“I know.” He’s not protesting. I think he’s hurting enough to proceed carefully.

I watch him take another step, a little deeper in the water. He’s still for a moment, testing, keeping his arm close to his body.

“Are you all right?”

“It’s fine so far.” He takes some slow steps, stands a little straighter.

I just want to wrap him in my arms and hold him for the day. Or the week, or the rest of my life. I don’t want to let him go.

I duck my head under the water before the tears come. I don’t want him to see me upset by this. He’ll take it personally, beat himself up for upsetting me, which is ridiculous.

I come up for air, slick my hair back. I’m closer now, and I stand in the shallows next to him.

“Are you okay?” He scans my face for the emotion there.

“I’d be lying if I said I was fine. But I’ll be fine. I just want you to heal, not to hurt too much.” I want to touch his chest, feel his strength, and reassure myself that he’s still strong, still vital. “And I’ve decided: we’re staying here in New York with you, till shooting’s done. Then we’re going, as a family, to LA. We’ll get a tutor for the boys for the semester.”

“Are you sure?” He looks relieved.

“I’m positive. I’m not letting you out of my sight.”

He leans over and kisses me without moving his arms. I am careful to keep my body away from his. When he speaks, his voice is thick with emotion. “I want you so badly. I need to hold you, to lose myself in you.”

He kisses me deeply, hungry and scared. I open my mouth to him, but I try to keep in control. The tears, sobs, are right under my thin skin, and I don’t want to cry. This is my time to support him.

“I want you, Kelly.” He wraps one arm around me, pulls my hips to his, urgently. I kiss him hard, and now my hands go to his neck, almost instinctively.

He jumps. “Careful.”

“God, that hurt, didn’t it?”

He shakes his head. “It’s okay. Kiss me.”

I put my hand on his cheek and kiss him. He breathes heavily against my neck, his good hand grasping the small of my back and pulling me closer.

“I want you.” His arm between us drops without him checking it. He sucks a breath in. “Christ.” He releases me and pulls the arm close to his body. He ducks his bad shoulder, trying to escape the pain, which I’m sure is carving a long, thin line around his shoulder blade.

“That’s it. We need to call a timeout before you pull your stitches.” I kiss him and turn him around to check them. They are angry and red, but still safely intact under the clear, thick steri-tape.

“We should to go up to the condo.” He sounds tired.

I want to salvage the moment. “Wait a second. Let’s just float for a minute. It can’t be any worse than a shower. Hold my hand and lie back.”

He leans back and floats. I hold his hand, float next to him, let the water fill up my ears.

I feel his hand in mine, and I look up at the ceiling, listening to my blood pump. As long as I can touch him, I feel peaceful. I can feel new tears slide down my face, joining the pool water, but they are tears of relief. I could have lost him. I can barely think about it without dissolving into panic. I try to push the what-ifs into the back of my mind. I feel the water lapping over my skin and breathe slowly, calming my thoughts.

I don’t know how many minutes we lie there, floating side by side. It’s sheer peace.

Then I sense a shadow at the door to the pool. I sit up and slide under the surface, swimming under water to the side.

It’s Mari. She’s in workout clothes, wears earbuds, has a towel draped over her shoulder. I smile. She has
The Great Gatsby
open, reads as she walks.

Andrew’s next to me. “We should have left.”

“It’s okay. It’s just Mari. She must be cutting through to the gym.” I wave at her. “Mari!”

She looks up and takes out the earbuds. “Kelly! Hey! I didn’t see you there.”

“Mari, I don’t think you’ve officially met my boyfriend.” I try to sound nonchalant.

Andrew gives me a nervous sideways glance. “I’m Andrew. I’d shake, but I’m soaking wet.”

“And he tore his rotator cuff. Shoulder surgery. Sling and no handshakes.” I swim to the ladder and pull myself up, go get his sling and his towel.

Mari nods. “That sucks. Good idea rehabbing in the pool, though.”

Andrew climbs out at the steps rather than the ladder, and I hand him the towel. He conveniently pulls it over the scar and over his head, accomplishing a hoodie effect.

“I’m headed up. Nice to meet you.” He turns toward the door to leave.

“See you. It was nice to meet you, Andy.” She continues into the gym as we’re walking out the door.

Down the hall, I finally make a comment. “Nice acting. I don’t think she made the connection.”

He looks at me. “Nice lying. You’ve been hanging around me too much. But she knew exactly who I was.”

“Why do you say that?”

“She called me Andy. I introduced myself as Andrew.”

“The Andy Pettigrew giveaway. Very astute of you.”

“Now let’s go upstairs. We were in the middle of something.”

“Tearing out your stitches. You need to lie down and rest.”

“Not my plan.” He stoops a bit and kisses me.

He’s going to be hard to resist, stitches or no.

We board the elevator. Andrew still hasn’t pulled the towel from his head. He broods.

“What are you chewing on?”

“I don’t know about this Mari girl.” He keeps his eyes on the carpet of the elevator as it climbs to our floor.

“What do you mean?” I take a step a little to one side, trying to get a look at his face, read his expression.

He shakes his head, just barely. “I just, maybe it’s because of the accident, all the attention now, the media outside the building.” He leaves off as the doors of the elevator open and walks out into the hall.

“Are you going to finish that thought?” I take two long strides to catch back up to him and walk next to him in the hallway to our door.

“I think maybe you should keep some space between you and her.”

“Why?”

“Because we’re targets now.” He says this, and I feel a chill. The words come through as short, clipped, dangerous.

“What do you mean? You’ve been hurt. I get that. But what could Mari do?”

Now the towel comes off his head, and he stops walking. “She knows who I am. The accident makes us a target. People want in this building. They want information. I just…She makes me feel uneasy.”

I look at his face. He means it. There’s worry in his eyes.

“I hear you. But I don’t see it. I want to trust her. I need a friend here. Maybe now more than ever, Andrew. I don’t see it.” I’m frustrated. I’ve made one friend.
One
. And now I’m supposed to give her up.

He touches my arm, takes hold of me gently with his good hand. “I don’t want you paranoid. I’m not saying that. I don’t know what I’m saying, I’m so exhausted. Can you hear me, though, that my gut says to be wary? Can you at least acknowledge that I’m getting a weird intuition off of her? Humor me a little?”

He’s not ever been one to be paranoid. Or a worrier. That’s my claim to fame. “I get it. I hear you, Andrew. Yes, I’ll be cautious. And I get why we’re a target. I do. Let me be cautious, but let me have a friend. I need someone. But I’ll be smart about it.”

“I don’t want you lonely. But, yes, trust your gut. And mine. Please.”

I reach up and kiss him gently one more time. “My gut tells me Jeremy’s on the other side of that door, and I’m going to want to punch him in under an hour.”

Andrew cracks a smile, the first one I’ve seen this morning. Maybe the first one since he was hurt yesterday. “That’s not intuition, that’s just ears that can hear.”

On cue, I hear Jeremy yell on the other side of the door. “Tucker! Where’s my cell charger? How am I supposed to save the world with a dying phone?”

I’m not lying when I say we spent a minute or two debating going inside.