All For Anna (15 page)

Irony was standing here
with Kai, questioning if I really wanted those extra hours or not. I had just
agreed to the compromise with Dr. Crane yesterday, but yet spending time with
Kai seemed even more appealing than work. No one would be more surprised by
that internal revelation than I was.

“Hmm…well that poses a
bit of a problem. It might be kinda hard for me to get to know you better if I
can’t spend time with you?” He laughed, and then focused on me again, as if
remembering something important. “Are you free Thursday
evening by any chance?” 

“I think so. Why, what
did you have in mind?” I looked at him suspiciously, unsure why he suddenly
looked nervous.

He hesitated.

“There’s this work
function, actually. I hadn’t decided if I was going to attend yet, but if you’d
be willing to go with me…I’d be happy to take you,” Kai said.

“What sort of work function?”
I asked, mirroring his look of uncertainty.

He laughed again and
cleared his throat.

“It’s an annual
fundraiser for the firemen, EMTs, and paramedics of Collin, Denton, and Dallas
counties. It’s a pretty formal dinner, but afterwards there’s dancing, karaoke
and an auction. Most of my station will be there.”

“And you weren’t sure
if you were going?”

“It’s uh...it’s not as
fun to go solo,” he said.

I couldn’t make sense
of him. Here he was: smart, kind, funny, and
gorgeous
. Why would he
not
have a date? I would be willing to bet there was a line of women just
waiting for Kai to notice them.

“Hmm...that does sound
like a predicament,” I said, torturing him a little longer. “I suppose I could
work something out. I’ll just have to black-out Thursday evening on the on-call
schedule. What time should I be ready?”

Kai smiled, confidence
returning in spades. We walked toward Stacie’s car where I’m sure she sat
waiting for all the juicy details. Details she’d be sure to ask me the second
my car door was closed. 

“Let’s say five? And,
it is formal. I hope that’s okay?”

“I do own more than
scrubs, ya know.”

My insides were
flipping wildly with nerves at just the
thought
of dressing up for this
event.

“Great, I’m really
looking forward to taking you, Tori. Can I call you this week?”

I stared at him.

What was happening to
me?

“I think I’d like
that,” I said.

“Well I
know
I’d
like it,” he said smiling, “Until then, Tori.”

Kai winked at me before
walking away.

Stacie looked like she
might explode from excitement as I opened the car down and sat down inside. Her
smile could have spread across the United States. It was embarrassing.

“Just drive Stacie...I’ll
tell you everything, I promise.”

**********

The way out to my
parent’s house was like a high school slumber party. Stacie wanted every detail
of my time spent with Kai. Though it was my nature to hold back information, I
wasn’t sure I wanted to—not with this.

I hadn’t felt
happy
in a very long time. I wanted to marinate in it, to allow it to saturate the
sad and lonely places that had taken up residence in my heart.
Happy
was
short-lived. It wouldn’t last, I knew that. But I would be a grateful host for
however long it chose to stay.

Good feelings were
fleeting.

“So what did he say
after you told him to just forget about it?” Stacie asked. She practically
dripped with curiosity.

“He...he told me he
liked
me. He said I was special.” I blushed at the admittance.

Did that really happen?

Stacie squealed in
delight.

I told her then about
the upcoming dinner on Thursday evening. She was beyond excited, immediately
discussing plans for my attire. Apparently, she had that part under control.
When she started describing the different fabrics and color options, I started
to fade out, allowing today’s events to flood my mind instead.

What am I even doing?
The girl Kai thinks he knows is a fraud.

If he knew my past…what
would he really think of me?

I pushed the depressing
thoughts away and tried to focus on what was directly ahead: lunch with my
parents. Unexpectedly, the mental picture of them at church flashed in my mind.
What had been the cause for such a dramatic change in their church demeanor?
And why had they really switched churches? 

“Stace?” I asked,
interrupting some new rant about how beige pumps could make a woman’s legs look
longer.

“Yeah?”

She shook her head
slightly, as if coming out of a fashion-fog.

“Why did Dad and Mom
really
change churches?” 

Stacie was quiet for a
minute. She seemed to be thinking hard about her answer. While never one to
beat around the bush, she always tried to be careful with how she worded
things—especially the important things.

“That’s a difficult
question for me to answer, Sis. It would be better coming from them I think,
but I can say that a lot has changed with them since you left. I’ve seen things
in both of their lives that have been hard to watch...but ultimately, those things
have grown them as people, and as parents.”

Stacie’s voice was low
and smooth. She concentrated on each word she spoke.

“
Grown
? What do
you mean?”

“If you really want the
truth...then I’ll tell you. It just might be hard for you to hear, and I want to
be sensitive to that.”

I nodded at her, but I
was suddenly filled with dread. I didn’t think there could be anything more
difficult left for me to hear in this life, but maybe I was wrong about that. I
swallowed hard, waiting for her to go on.

Stacie took a deep
breath.

“Tori, after you left I
know I told you Dad and Mom were okay—that they understood after you had called
them from Phoenix, but that wasn’t the whole truth. I was afraid to tell you
everything because you were already dealing with so much. I didn’t want to add
to your suffering, so I tried to tread lightly.”

I was surprised at how
much she sounded like me.

“When you left without
saying goodbye, it was
very
painful for them. I saw them cry many times
over that—over you. They even went to counseling, trying to process through how
to deal with their loss.”

How to deal with their
loss? Was she joking?

Anger rolled off me in
droves.

“I didn’t
die
Stacie, don’t exaggerate!”

“You might as well
have. They were beside themselves for weeks—months even. Their daughter had
completely pushed them away while in the midst of a horrible tragedy, and they
couldn’t help you! You wouldn’t even let them
try
,” she snapped.

“They couldn’t help me!
No one could help me! What were my options really
,
Stacie? Stay here and
suffocate under all their pity?
Force them to look at a daughter who
overnight had traded a promising future for...the guilt of a
child-killer
?
No way! I didn’t need that reminder from our mother—I live with it every single
day!”

Stacie drew in a sharp
breath at my words. I had never allowed myself to be quite so honest. My
internal thoughts as
post-accident Tori
were still too raw, too real. No
one could understand them. Stacie pulled into my parent’s driveway a minute
later, parking several yards away from their front door. Silently, she put her
head on the steering wheel. For a second I thought she might be in real
physical pain. I felt my hard expression soften as I thought about the baby. 

Is she having a cramp?

Stacie lifted her head
and looked at me, tears streaming down her perfectly made-up face. In a voice
barely above a whisper, she spoke.

“You can’t possibly
think that, Tori. Please tell me you don’t really think you
killed
that
little girl? All this time I thought you were angry
because of the
accident. Because it had altered your life plans, robbing you of the joy of
some of your best accomplishments. I never, ever saw it as
guilt
though
—
until
now. I...I don’t even know what to say to that."

I sat quietly.

I didn’t know what to
say either. I wished I could rewind time and erase my last big blurt. But it
had happened. Stacie now knew a portion of the shame that I had tried to keep
hidden. I could no longer deny it.

“I’m sorry, Stacie. I
shouldn’t have upset you.”

“Stop it! Stop it right
now, Victoria! I am sick and tired of you trying to protect me. That’s
NOT
your
job!” Stacie hit the steering wheel hard with the heel of her hand, “I am
your
big sister, and at the moment I feel like a pretty crummy one. I guess we’ve
both been trying to protect each other over this last year and a half, but look
where it got us? Nowhere. Starting today, I want the truth from you, no matter
how painful or ugly it is. I can promise
you that it will stay between
us, but I can’t promise that I will always say what you hope to hear. Can you
agree to that?”

I was leaning on the
arm of the passenger side door when she asked. I had only seen Stacie erupt
like that a few times over the course of my childhood, but never had it been
directed toward me. The reality of her words hung in the air between us like heavy
smog. I had a hard time seeing through it, much less taking a breath.

This week had been
determined to choke-me-out.

It had started that
first day in Dr. Crane’s office. Dissecting the details of Anna’s death piece
by piece had been brutal, but learning I was at the root of my parent’s odd
behavior was just absurd. Now Stacie wanted to make an honesty pact with me?

She doesn’t know what
she’s asking for.

“I don’t know if I can
do that, Stacie.”

She sighed and took my
hand.

“We’ll do it together, then. You’re not alone
in this anymore.”

Sunday lunch was
interesting, to say the least. My
honesty pact
with Stacie had come
about unexpectedly, but it had also opened up a whole new set of issues. I found
myself watching the way my parents interacted with each other, and with me. I
was on edge, waiting for the other shoe to drop at any moment.

With each question they
asked me, that sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach grew. It was difficult
to look them the eye. The knowledge that my absence had been difficult for them
was one thing, but the fact that it was at the root of several major changes in
their lives, was quite another. I tried to wrap my mind around what Stacie had
said. I wondered about their counseling sessions, had their marriage been in
trouble?

It would have hurt them
more if I had stayed—I did the right thing.

During lunch, my dad
gave me an update on the family business. He told me all about the new
marketing plan that Stacie had been developing, and the properties my mother had
recently sold. My parents were a well-known couple throughout the region, their
faces on billboards all over the city. 

Sales Real Estate was
definitely a household name. Their long history of success was based mostly off
referrals, an old-fashioned approach in today’s economy. They had made it
through the troubled years, worked tirelessly through the boom of the
first-time home buyer’s era, and were now strong, steady and growing.

Before I was accepted
into nursing school, my dad had taken me to lunch. He had asked me to consider
joining the family in the real estate arena, but he knew I would decline his
offer. My heart had never been in business; I belonged in health care. I had
known it since I was a child. Though he accepted my answer graciously, I knew
he was disappointed.

Little did he know that
was just the first of many disappointments to come.

My one recognition by the
Sales Real Estate team however, was the slogan I came up with as a senior in
high school, “Let the Sales guarantee your satisfaction!” My dad had beamed
with pride. He had called to order new posters and signs that very day. It’d
felt good to contribute, however minor. It had also eased my guilt of
turning down his offer.

If only slogan-writing
could do that for me now.

**********

I continued to watch my
parents throughout the day. They worked side by side cleaning up the lunch
plates, telling us to go enjoy the pool. Neither Stacie nor I felt like
swimming though, so we sat together on the deck, drinking sweet tea. Our mom
joined us when she was done. She had that look on her face again, the one I
couldn’t quite place. It made me uncomfortable.