Coming Back To You (25 page)

Spookie lay on the exam table, panting.
Karma’s mom stood beside her, crying. Her tears splattered on the
Formica countertop. This wasn’t good.

“What’s wrong with her?”

Her mom grabbed a tissue and blew her nose.
“They say she has tumors in her lungs.”

“T-tumors?”

Mom nodded, and the tears that had been
balancing on her lower rims fell to her cheeks. “I’m sorry, honey,
but—”

“No. Don’t say it.” Karma began to cry and
knelt down.

Spookie turned her head toward her.

“She’s purring,” Karma heard the telltale
ticking of Spookie’s purr box. “That’s a good sign, right?” She
looked up at her dad.

He shook his head. “She’s purring because she
wants to be strong for us…to let us know it’s okay to…”

Okay to let her die. That’s what Dad had
almost just said. That Spookie knew her time was up and that she
wanted to let them know that she was ready to go. Well, Karma
wasn’t ready. She hadn’t had enough time with her, yet.

Drowning in tears, Karma placed her forehead
against Spookie’s. “I’m not ready to see you go, yet, pumpkin.”

The black furball gave her head a weak
nudge.

“I love you, too, Spookers. Now hang on,
okay. Just hang on for me.” She didn’t care, anymore. If Spookie
made it through this, she would smuggle her into her apartment and
keep her there in secret. Screw the apartment managers.

Then the veterinarian came in. Karma listened
as he explained the prognosis, her heart falling with every
word.

“The tumors have filled her lungs with
fluid,” he said. “We can drain the fluid, but there’s nothing we
can do about the tumors. In a few days, maybe a couple of weeks at
the most, you’ll be right back in here. Her quality of life will
suffer.”

Long story short. It was time to say
good-bye. Karma’s memory flashed back to when Spookie had been a
kitten. A tiny bundle of playful black fur. From the moment she’d
laid eyes on Spookie and vice versa, the two had been bonded.
Spookie had been her constant companion growing up. Her one true
friend when the kids in school teased her. Karma would come home
from school and go to her room in tears. Then Spookie would snuggle
into her lap, purring, and make everything okay.

And now she was dying.

“Can I stay?” If Karma had to say good-bye,
she wanted to stay with her as long as she could and be with her
right up to the very end…to give Spookie all that the little kitty
had given her many times over.

“Of course. I’ll give you a few minutes.” The
vet quietly left the room.

Her mom and dad kissed her on the cheek then
took their leave to wait outside.

As soon as the door clicked shut, Karma broke
down in uncontrollable sobs and picked Spookie up. Cradling her
like a baby, she kissed her furry head and snuggled her close.

“I love you, pumpkin. I wish I could have
spent more time with you, but, like a big dummy, I thought we had
all the time in the world. That’ll teach me to put off what’s
important, huh?” She kissed her head again then nuzzled her tiny
black, triangular nose.

She would never give Spookie nose-kisses
again. This was it. The big good-bye.

Their time together was all too short, and
the vet returned a few minutes later. Karma set Spookie back on the
table, keeping her palm resting against her furry abdomen as the
vet injected the concoction that would send Spookie into
Heaven.

As the life left her little body, Karma broke
down again and could barely see the form authorizing the
veterinarian’s office to cremate her. Her tears filmed everything
in blurriness. Somehow she scrawled her name on the signature line
then turned over her precious baby to the caretaker who came and
took her away.

Now came the long process of coping with her
loss. More of the five stages of loss. Thanks to Jan, she knew what
to expect. She was already well into the anger phase, because she
was mad at herself for not taking more time and forcing herself to
get off her ass sooner to find a new place to live. One that
welcomed pets.

So, yeah. She was in anger. The time for
denial and bargaining was over.

She met her parents in the lobby and waited
for her dad to handle the paperwork with the desk clerk, and then
the three of them trudged out the door.

“You want to come over?” her mom said, her
eyes bloodshot. “We can have a nice dinner…” She dabbed a tissue
under her nose.

“No.” Karma just wanted to go home and cry.
“But thanks anyway.” She sniffled and wiped her eyes.

“If you need anything, just call. Okay,
honey?” Her dad kissed the top of her head. “It’ll get better.”

She knew with time that the pain would pass
and she would move on, but right now, her heart hurt. “Thanks,
Dad.” She hugged him then made her way to her car.

As she sank into the driver’s seat, she
pulled out her phone and texted Brad.

I need to see you.
Maybe they’d had a
rough few weeks, but tonight she needed him.

A moment later, her phone dinged.
Are you
okay?

Long wait.
I’m really tied up tonight.
We’re way behind on this project. Can it wait?

Really? Can it wait? As if she could roll
back the clock and delay the lethal injection that had just sent
her baby across the rainbow bridge.

Brad’s lack of emotional support knew no
bounds, and it was really starting to piss her off.

She sent a reply.
Never
mind. I’ll be fine.

A few seconds later, he
responded.
I’ll make it up to you. Gotta go. Talk
later.

Just this once, couldn’t she be his first
priority? Oh but no. Once more, she was relegated to second place.
Or maybe that was third. Jade was first. Job was second. And Karma
got whatever was left over, if anything.

Was this what it would be like to be married
to him?

She lifted her gaze and stared out the window
as cold realization swept through her. Brad would never be what she
needed him to be. He was nice. He was polite. He was handsome. But
he just didn’t align with Karma’s personality or her soul. She
chuffed and shook her head. A few minutes ago, she had needed Brad,
but just that quickly—with one dismissive text—Brad had gone from
being her fiancé, a man she
thought
she needed, to a
nonentity. Her faith in him and their relationship had finally
shattered. This was the proverbial straw that broke the camel’s
back, and now all she felt when she thought about him
was…emptiness. Where she should have felt love, all she felt was a
cold void. She would never get what she needed from Brad, and she
was done trying.

She took off the engagement ring and dropped
it in her wallet. If her head wasn’t already such a mess over
Spookie, she would return the ring to him now, but she needed time.
Time to regroup and gather her thoughts. Time to grieve. She would
deal with Brad later, when she had the mental fortitude and
emotional strength to officially oust him from her life without
breaking down in tears. She could only handle one loss at a time,
and right now, dealing with Spookie’s death was her priority.

Her phone dinged with a text. She almost
didn’t look at it, because she didn’t want to see what else Brad
had to say.

It was from Mark.

A tiny starburst of warmth bloomed in the
center of her chest.
Mark.
He would never dismiss her the
way Brad had. He would always be there for her when it
mattered.

She nibbled her thumbnail and glanced toward
the vet’s office. She’d just learned a valuable lesson. Never put
off until tomorrow what you should do today. She’d wasted too much
time not spending it with Spookie, and now she was gone. Karma
would never hold her or hear her purr again.

She didn’t want to make the same mistake with
Mark.

With determination—and maybe an ounce or two
of reckless abandon with a side of pissed-off-and-fed-up—guiding
her, she typed out a text.

Within seconds, Mark replied.

Tears trickled down Karma’s cheeks.
We had
to put her to sleep.

Unlike Brad, Mark seemed eager to help. To do
whatever he needed to make her feel better. And not because he
wanted to get with her, but because he was just that kind of man.
Genuine. Caring. Compassionate.

Understanding.

Can you come over?
She hesitated for
only a second before hitting send.

I’m on my way.

He was supposed to leave for his friend’s
wedding, and yet he was willing to come over and give her his
valuable time, which he had very little of right now. That spoke
volumes about his character as opposed to Brad’s.

As one life shattered inside her mind,
another began piecing itself together.

Me, too. I’m just leaving the vet’s office.

I’ll wait for you if I beat you there.

Thank you. This means a lot to me. I know
you have to leave for Chicago tonight. I won’t keep you long.

Don’t worry about that. Take all the time
you need. Now, drive safely.

The minute she pulled in front of her
apartment and saw Mark sitting in his car, she burst into tears
again. She was an emotional wreck. All the way home, she’d
vacillated between sadness over Spookie and anger at Brad, and now
sorrow took over for good as Mark got out of his car and took a
couple of hesitant steps toward her.

His generosity floored her. It was possible
that he wasn’t Mr. Right, but by God, he was at least Mr. Right
Now.

As she climbed out of her car and walked up
the sidewalk, tears streaming her cheeks, he strolled toward her,
his face full of sympathy, his head tilted compassionately to one
side.

“Ssshh.” He collected her into his arms and
rocked her as she huddled against his chest. “Come on. Let’s go
inside, okay?” He pulled back and lifted her face. His warm eyes
beseeched hers.

She let him lead her inside and up to her
apartment, where he helped her out of her coat and draped it over
the arm of the couch with his.

“Want me to make you some tea?”

She nodded and trailed behind him as he went
to the kitchen.

For all his faults—or rather for his
one
and only
fault—Mark epitomized everything she wanted in a man.
He was husband material, lover material, father material. He was
all of it except for the commitment part. But as Lisa had said, did
that really matter? As long as he wanted to be with her, did it
really make a difference whether or not he tied their relationship
up inside a legal document that bound them to love and obey one
another till death do they part?

And Lisa was right about something else. He
wouldn’t be doing all this—taking her to the doctor, putting off
his trip to Chicago, all of it—if he didn’t still feel something
for her.

She stared at his broad back as he filled her
teapot with water then set it on the stove and dug through her
cupboard for cups.

“You know,” he said, turning. “We had this
dog when I was a kid.”

She sat down on one of the bar stools. He
stood across from her.

“His name was Rex. Man, I loved that dog.”
His eyes glazed as if with fond memories. “He was my buddy. He
slept with me, waited with me at the bus stop, met me there when I
got home from school. Rex was my shadow, more like a brother than a
pet.”

She smiled at the wistful expression on his
face.

“One day, Rex got really sick. He’d been
losing weight for a while, but we didn’t think anything of it at
first. We took him to the vet, and they told us Rex had
cancer.”

Tears stung the backs of Karma’s eyes, and
Mark came around the counter. She turned to face him.

“We had to make the same decision you did
today.” He took her hand. “It was hard, but it was the humane thing
to do. But man, I cried for days after that. Took me weeks to get
over losing him.”

“They’re like our children or our best
friends, aren’t they?” She sniffled and cleared the emotion from
her throat.

He nodded. “I don’t think anyone who looks
lightly on the death of an animal has much of a heart.”

She tried to smile but ended up crying again
instead. Mark pulled her into his arms and rocked her back and
forth. “I’m sorry, sweetheart.”

He didn’t try to tell her it would be okay or
that she’d be fine. He just held her and let her cry.

When the teakettle whistled a couple of
minutes later, he slowly let go, returned to the stove, and turned
off the burner. The loss of his warmth felt foreign. She wanted him
back. Wanted to be in his arms again.

Scooting off the bar stool, she approached
him from behind, hesitated for a slow heartbeat, and then eased her
arms around his waist, pressing her cheek against his back.

His body stiffened then relaxed as he let out
a quiet sigh and placed his hand over hers.

For several long moments, they remained like
that in her kitchen, her hugging him from behind, her hold growing
stronger with each passing second. Beneath his shirt, his hard
abdomen felt like ribbed plywood, sturdy and muscular. She opened
her fists and spread her fingers, pressing her palms against his
torso.

His body rose heavily as he inhaled. “Karma…”
he whispered, his voice gruff and filled with confusion.

This felt right. Her with him. Him with her.
She lifted her cheek and kissed his back through his shirt. Just
pressed her lips against him and fell still, absorbing his
warmth.

The rise and fall of his body told her his
breathing had accelerated, and the way he leaned forward and
lowered his head confirmed his interest. He liked what she was
doing. It was turning him on. She remembered the nuances of his
body language enough to gauge how she affected him now, and his
resistant shield was quickly evaporating.