Breakthrough (2 page)

Rick’s relief was palpable even over the phone. He let out a breath he’d obviously been holding. “Sunday, from noon to five. There’s a family therapy session you can come to if you want, but it’s not mandatory or anything….” Rick sounded like he was thinking aloud. “I wanted to see about bringing the kids out here, but Shelley thinks that would be a bad idea. I….”

Jack could understand Shelley’s hesitation. She wanted to keep her kids safe, wanted to make sure their father was ready for them. “Maybe next visit?” he suggested. “We’ll see how this one goes, and I’ll talk to Shelley.” He could tell Rick was biting his lip on the other end of the line. It made Jack smile to himself, remembering those small gestures.

“Yeah.” Rick sounded more thoughtful than disappointed, but maybe he was a little of both. “Maybe that’s a better idea. I… listen, Dad, I know the therapy stuff might not be your thing, and it’s not required, but I’d like it if you came to that too.”

Jack nodded in answer even though Rick couldn’t see him. The idea of therapy sent an uncontrollable surge of dread through him. The thought of sitting around with people and talking about his feelings all day was enough to make him sick to his stomach. If it were anyone else, he’d politely decline and then leave town for the weekend, but he was willing to do anything he could to help his son get through this and get his life back on track. “I’d love to,” he lied. “Any of it, all of it… whatever you want. Whatever you need.” That part was true, at least.

His heart hurt from the surprised sound in Rick’s voice. “Really? You don’t mind? I know it’s a long drive and all, and after everything….”

“I’m just glad you asked me, Son. Am I allowed to bring you anything?”

“No, they ask families not to bring stuff, but there’s a little store here, and the café is really nice.”

“That sounds good. Do you want me to call your mom and see if she can make it?” It had taken them several years, but he and Marie were finally friends. Not like they were before they got married, but she had forgiven him and still asked him to forgive himself.

“No, that’s okay. I’ll call her myself. She probably won’t be able to make it on short notice and all, but….” Rick was quiet for a beat before he cleared his throat and said firmly, “Sorry, I’m supposed to be working on that. I’ll give her a call and hope she can come.”

Jack grinned, feeling a swell of pride over his son’s efforts. “I’m sure she’ll do her best to get out here. You keep up the good work, and I’ll see you Sunday.”

“Thanks, Dad. I’ll give Davey your e-mail so he can send you the details and stuff.”

“I’ll keep an eye out for it.”

“’Kay, I guess I better get off the line. I only have ten minutes of phone time left and I gotta call Mom.”

“Okay, Son, see you soon.”

“Hey, Dad?” Rick was quiet so long after getting his attention, Jack wondered whether the call had been cut short. When Rick finally spoke, his voice was quiet, sincere. “Love you. Just so ya know. And I’m sorry for all this.”

He’d heard the words before, heard his son apologize for a lot of things over the past twenty-five years, but he’d never heard such bare honesty in his son’s voice, such regret. It was enough to choke Jack. “I love you too, Son,” he said gruffly. “Always, no matter what.” The sniffle on the other end of the line made Jack’s heart miss a beat.

“Thanks, Dad.”

HE’D GOTTEN
the generic e-mail from Serenity Meadow the day after the phone call from his son. It included a brief rundown of the itinerary for the day, reminding visitors not to bring anything for the “guests” and asking them to leave cell phones locked in the car along with any other valuables. Attached at the bottom was a short note telling him there would be an opportunity for photos with the facility’s camera and digital copies would be e-mailed later in the week following the visit. Jack couldn’t help but smile at the thought of a picture with his son. It had been years since they’d gotten so much as a snapshot together.

Marie had moved heaven and earth and cancelled two appointments to make it out for the day. She planned to meet Jack there with her new husband, Doug. New being a relative term, considering they’d been married for nearly five years. But she liked calling him her “new” husband, joking that she liked new things—new cars, new shoes, new houses—and if she ever dropped the “new” from his title, he should worry. Marie was funny like that.

Ever since she had relocated to Arizona, right after the divorce, Jack had missed her. He understood her reasons, but it didn’t hurt any less. She had needed to get away from him for a while. She told him once that it killed her to look at him, even to be in the same room with him. He hated knowing he’d done that to her, hated knowing he’d forced her out of an entire state, but he knew she’d done what was best for her, and he was glad she’d found happiness moving back to her hometown.

When she’d made the move, they were both still unaware of Rick’s drug problem. He spent his summers in Arizona with Marie, bouncing back and forth between them for a few years. Looking back, Jack wondered whether that was, at least in part, why Rick had been able to hide his addiction for so long. Of course their son seemed different to them every time they saw him after a long stretch. He grew fast, and he seemed to change every other month. Jack had reasoned at the time that it was simply a normal part of Rick’s development, that Rick was still adjusting to the divorce, still adjusting to his father coming out.

He still wondered—if they had caught it earlier, would it have been easier to deal with? Was it like cancer, where the earlier you got treatment, the better your odds of survival? He wasn’t sure, but he thought maybe that was the case. It made him feel even guiltier when he thought about it, though, so Jack tried not to go there.

Despite their broken, sometimes bitter history, Jack looked forward to spending time with Marie again. They hadn’t gotten together in person for over a year, and it would be good to see her smile and hear her tease him.

He only wished it were under other circumstances.

SUNDAY MORNING
turned out to be a glorious fall day. Jack’s drive to Serenity Meadow was filled with sunshine dappling through the trees on the long, twisting country road. Once he arrived, it took only a few minutes at the front gate for one of the staff to check his ID and confirm he was on the list of approved visitors. Jack parked in the gravel lot next to the main building, where he found Marie and Doug waiting for him.

“How did you beat me here? Did you take a helicopter?” Jack teased, giving Marie a kiss on the cheek before shaking Doug’s hand.

“Our flight landed uncharacteristically ahead of schedule.” She nodded to the driver behind the wheel of the town car they’d hired. “And Lance was a miracle worker with the city traffic. I wish I could bring him home with me.”

Jack laughed at the look on the driver’s face and told Doug, “Better be careful. She’s starting to want a new driver. A new husband can’t be far behind….”

Doug draped his arm around Marie’s slender shoulders and kissed her temple.

Marie teased Jack. “Don’t be such a toad. I’m not in the market for anything newer than the one I’ve already got. You, on the other hand….”

They walked toward the front steps together. Jack kicked a few pebbles under his feet and tucked his hands into the front pockets of his trousers. “I don’t need new. I’d settle for well-used and reliable.”

Marie glanced at him as they walked up the stone steps, grinning wickedly. “You just described yourself, dear.”

He couldn’t offer a retort because Rick was standing there with a few other people. His son’s face lit up when he saw them. “You made it.” Rick trapped Marie and Jack in a fierce hug, squeezing the breath out of Jack.

“Of course we made it,” Marie told him softly.

Rick whispered, “It’s so good to see you guys.”

Jack took a deep breath as he kissed his son’s dark hair, reveling in the clean scent. Rick didn’t even have a trace of cigarette smoke on him, let alone anything worse. He seemed more fit and healthy than he had in years. When Jack had dropped Rick off months earlier, he had been skin and bones, with bad teeth and greasy hair hanging in his blue eyes. Now he was tall and strong and clean—inside and out. When they pulled back, Rick was beaming.

Rick reached for Doug and shook his hand before hugging him tightly. “Glad you could come too, Doug. It means a lot to me.”

Rick had never been one for sharing his feelings or expressing himself—even expressing gratitude came hard to him. Jack hated to admit it, but he and Rick had that in common. Knowing Rick had probably picked it up from him left a bitter taste in Jack’s mouth. Seeing Rick so open and so honestly grateful, so willing to say it, gave Jack new hope for him. Maybe this time all Rick’s efforts would pay off.

Doug beamed at Rick when they pulled back. “Means a lot to me that you wanted me here, Ricky.”

Jack smiled at him, thinking how lucky Marie was. Words fell from Doug’s mouth so easily. He imagined Doug and Marie having long, open talks about their feelings every other day. Sharing and then oversharing, anything and everything. The idea scared the hell out of Jack.

Of course in retrospect, his dislike of all things touchy-feely and emotion-related was probably part of the reason he’d been able to keep his own sexuality under wraps for so long. And if he really wanted to, he could probably trace his lack of emotional expression back to his own childhood. If he wanted to. Which he didn’t.

“Did you guys get a chance to look around at all?” Rick asked. Marie took his arm as the four of them walked over to a set of large glass doors, which led outside to a wraparound porch.

The center looked more like an antebellum mansion than a rehab facility. The people who ran it called it a retreat. It boasted sweeping grounds, trails for walking and horseback riding, morning yoga, massage, and meditation sessions four times a day. It included mandatory counseling, more than twice a day during the first month, and all of that was after a rapid detoxification program, which took seventy-two hours. Serenity Meadow was hailed as one of the best in the business, and their lasting recovery rate spoke for itself.

They were only two hours outside the city, but it felt even farther to Jack. He took a deep breath of the country air and pulled himself out of his thoughts. “Not yet.” He was slow to respond, but Rick nodded and smiled.

“It’s pretty nice here.” Rick stepped out onto the porch with them. “Almost makes me wish I could stay on here, but I’m dying to see the kids again.”

Marie tilted her head up to look at Rick as she said, “Doug and I have a visit planned with Lilly and Casey tomorrow. Shelley is letting us take them for the day so we can spend some time with them before we fly out.”

A hint of remorse flitted across Rick’s face, but he managed to return his mother’s smile. “I bet they’re excited.”

“They miss you.” Marie’s voice hung softly in the air, her words so quiet and so unobtrusive Jack wondered whether she’d meant to say them aloud. She rested her hand tenderly on Rick’s arm and said more confidently, “They talk about you all the time. Shelley has been wonderful.”

Rick’s eyes swam with tears. “I know. She’s great. She doesn’t want them to hate me or forget me. She’s even sent me their letters, and the kids have been drawing me pictures.”

Sighing, Marie hugged Rick’s shoulder, resting her head there. “There’s a reason you fell in love with her.”

Rick had met Shelley during one of his sober periods—not even twenty years old, too young for the responsibility of a wife or a family, but he’d really been trying to keep it together. His sobriety lasted for over two years before he started using again. Shelley knew Rick was an addict, but she hadn’t been prepared for what that meant until she woke up one morning and found out her recovering addict was no longer in recovery. Casey had just been born, and the two of them tried to make it work. Rick went into rehab for thirty days and went to Narcotics Anonymous after he got out, but a few years later, not long after Lilly had been born, he started using again and getting dangerous about it. Shelley finally left him when she found him passed out in a hot car with both of their kids in the backseat.

Ten minutes after Shelley left with the kids that afternoon, Rick found Serenity Meadow online and made calls to both his parents. He still sounded a little drugged on the phone. Marie and Jack talked extensively about whether or not it was worth it, whether or not Rick really meant it, but after discussing it with the director and doing some research of their own, they both decided the possibilities and the hope were worth all the money in the world. Marie offered to pay the entire bill, but Jack wanted to have a part in it. He broke into his “retirement nest egg” and had Rick settled in by the end of the week. The fact that Rick could check himself out at any time had made everyone nervous at first, but things had been looking up ever since. Everyone was hoping Rick had hit rock bottom and was now climbing back up.

“I know why I fell in love with her,” Rick said, a sad smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. “Sometimes I’m just not sure why she fell in love with me.”

Jack wasn’t sure what to say to that, but he tried anyway. “Because you’re a good guy.” He hugged Rick again, and when he pulled back, Rick’s smile was a little less sad. “Don’t beat yourself up over the past, Son. Just move on and let everyone else do the same.”

When Jack looked at Marie, her eyes were so wide with disbelief he thought they might fall out of her head. He realized she had given him the same advice dozens of times over the years. He never took it, and she knew it.

“Davey says the same thing.” Rick pulled back, looking over his shoulder as if he might spot his counselor nearby. “I can’t wait for you guys to meet him. He’s been a lot of help.”

“I’m looking forward to it too,” Jack lied. What was he supposed to tell his son? The idea of meeting the counselor sent a small wave of nausea through him, but he couldn’t let Rick know that.