Pleasure in the Rain (4 page)

“Hello, Macey,” I say.

“But then if ex-girlfriends weren’t invited, I don’t guess I would be here either, would I?”

“We should go,” Mama starts. I raise a hand to stop her. I think some part of me wants it all out in the open, the fact that I had hurt Beck.

“The only difference being, of course,” Macey goes on, “that my exit from his life wasn’t voluntary. And if you hadn’t stepped into the picture, we might have gotten back together the way I had hoped we would.”

Tears well in my eyes, but I forbid them to fall. “I’m sorry.”

“Yeah, well, that hardly does any good now, does it?”

The last word breaks on a sob, and I feel sorry for her. It’s clear that she really did care about Beck.

“It’s time for us to go,” Mama says, wheeling me down the brick walkway.

“I have my own regrets to live with,” Macey calls out behind us. “But I’d sure hate to have to live with yours.”

♪

ON THE DRIVE
into Nashville, I sit in the back seat with Hank Junior. Patsy is up front in the passenger seat next to Mama.

Hank has his chin planted so firmly on my lap that I don’t think he ever intends to move it just in case I decide to leave him again.

“He really missed you,” Mama says, glancing at me in the rear view mirror.

“I missed him, too,” I say, rubbing his soft ears.

Patsy whines, and Mama reaches over to give her head a reassuring pat.

We drive on in silence for a few minutes. I watch the Tennessee countryside rolling by outside my window, my thoughts stuck in neutral. I don’t want to think about the past. I can’t think about the future.

“You can’t dwell on anything that girl said, honey,” Mama says, her voice soft and compassionate. “She’s just lashing out in anger at a loss she didn’t expect.”

“But she’s right,” I say in little more than a whisper.

“About which part?” Mama asks in a way that tells me she’s prepared to reason this out with me.

“That I’ll have to live with doing something like that to him right before-”

“CeCe. You didn’t plan any of this. You’re not to blame for what that man did there that night.”

“I know.” And I do. My logical mind accepts this. But as for hurting Beck? I am to blame for that.

“I just wish I could take it back,” I say, not even sure I’ve spoken the words out loud.

“But what would that really mean? Don’t you think you owed him honesty?”

I nod once, looking down at Hank. He’s staring up at me with his liquid brown eyes. I lean over and kiss the top of his head. “Why can’t love be as simple as my love for Hank?”

“The love between a man and a woman is never simple,” she says. “It can be wonderful but never simple.”

I’d like to deny it, but I can’t.

We’ve just reached the city limits when Mama says, “If I’ve learned anything in my life, honey, it’s that we shouldn’t put ourselves in the position of having something to regret. If there’s something we need to act on, then we should. Otherwise, we’re going to have to live with the results of not doing so somewhere down the line.”

“I know what you’re doing, Mama.” I stare out the window to avoid meeting her gaze in the mirror.

“I’m trying to say the things you need to hear.”

“And make me feel better. I don’t want to feel better.”

“Because you think you should punish yourself?”

“Maybe.”

“And what would be the point of that?”

I don’t have a logical answer, so I continue staring out the window.

“All any of us can do is what’s right when we have the opportunity to do so.”

I look up then, meet her knowing gaze. “What do you mean?”

“Thomas and Holden. That you didn’t go see them before we left the hospital.”

I feel a physical pain at the sound of their names. “I wasn’t up to-”

“I know,” she says, kindness in her voice. “But you are leaving yourself open to another cause for regret if you don’t go see them.”

I try then to let myself think about the fact that either one of them, or both of them, could have died. An immediate black wall erects itself at the end of that thought, and I can’t get past it. Life without Holden and Thomas? That is an unimaginable place.

But then I think about Beck, and that is unimaginable as well.

It feels as if everything that has happened is still sitting on the surface of my comprehension, none of it really having seeped in yet. It’s like an enormous rainstorm that falls on sunbaked ground, the soil so dry and hard-packed that the water cannot penetrate. Instead, it begins to stream in whatever direction allows it to flow, flooding anything in its path. I guess that’s where I am right now. Drowning in everything I’m trying to process.

I put my mind back in its neutral place, not looking back and not looking forward. For now, this is all I can manage.

♪

THE CLOCK ON MY
nightstand blares 3:12 A.M. The minute slot flips to three, and it’s now 3:13 A.M. It seems as if I’ve watched every minute change since I went to bed several hours ago.

Now that I’ve let them in, my thoughts refuse to move beyond fear for Holden and Thomas. I want to know how they are. I need to know how they are, but I am terrified to ask. What if the answer is something I’m not prepared to hear?

Hank shifts beside me, his back pressed up against my left side, his head resting on the pillow beside mine. He’s snoring softly. Patsy is curled up in a ball at the foot of the bed, her snores even louder than his.

I wrestle with my fears for another hour before reaching for my phone on the nightstand. I don’t let myself consider what time it is, not even daybreak yet. I just need to take advantage of this moment where I’ve worked up the courage to call him.

I tap the phone symbol on my screen. It rings twice before a woman answers the phone, her voice groggy and a little surprised. “Hello?”

“Hi. I hope I’m not calling at a bad time,” I say. “This is CeCe MacKenzie, Thomas’s friend.”

“Oh, CeCe. Of course, dear. This is Thomas’s mother, Ophelia.”

“Mrs. Franklin, I’m so sorry to be calling at this hour.”

“No, no,” she says. “Thomas has been so concerned about you.”

“How is he?” I ask.

“He’s out of the ICU. We’re so happy about that.”

“Thank goodness.”

“Yes. Would you like to speak with him?”

“I shouldn’t wake him up.”

“Let me,” Mrs. Franklin says. “I know it will do him good.”

I wait, hearing her say his name softly from the other end of the phone and feeling ridiculous that I called in the middle of the night when I could have waited or better yet already called before now.

I consider hanging up, but what kind of cowardly thing would that be to do? I hear a rustling sound and then, “CeCe?”

His voice is hoarse and a little disbelieving.

“Hey, Thomas,” I say. “How are you?”

He coughs once and says, “I reckon I’ve been better, but I’m still here. Are you okay?”

“Yes. I’m all right.”

“Where are you?”

“I’m back home. In Nashville.”

“In Nashville?” He sounds confused. I can hear the pain medication in his voice.

“I’ll be back in a few minutes, honey,” I hear Mrs. Franklin say.

“Okay, Mom,” he says.

We’re both quiet for a moment. He speaks first. “Mom hasn’t been willing to tell me too much since I started coming back around. She said Holden is still unconscious. Have you seen him?”

“No. I. . .I haven’t.”

He draws in a deep breath which I can hear through the phone. “What about the others?” he asks.

“Case is pretty messed up, but they say he’ll be okay with time.”

“The band? Beck?”

I can’t answer for several moments during which my heart pounds in my ears. “I. . .he didn’t make it, Thomas.”

“What?” The question is barely audible.

“That’s why I came back to Nashville. To go to the funeral.”

“No,” Thomas says. “That can’t possibly be.”

“They said he’d lost too much blood,” I say softly. “He died before they could get him to the hospital that night.” My voice breaks on the last word. A sob spills from me. I am suddenly crying full out as if I have not actually stopped since the last time this grief hit me.

“But he’s just nineteen years old.”

And then Thomas is crying, too. It overwhelms him the same way it has me. “This isn’t right,” he says, the words broken and raw. “This isn’t right.”

“No,” I say. “It’s not.”

♪

CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN

Holden

I recognize the voice.

I know the voice is talking to me, but I can’t place who it belongs to.

“How long exactly are you planning on staying in this bed? And how many days am I gonna have to wheel this chair up to your room and ask you the same questions? Dying is not optional, so wake the heck up, Holden. You die, and I will personally kick your butt all the way to Heaven. By the time you get there, you’ll wish you’d never checked out of this hard as a board hospital bed.”

The name that goes with the voice surfaces then. Thomas. I try to open my eyes, but they feel so heavy. It’s tempting to give in again, as I have the other times I felt the pull toward coming fully awake.

He’s still talking when I finally manage to push my lids open far enough to see him. He’s sitting in a chair at the side of the bed. He’s probably lost twenty pounds.

“You’re wearing pajamas,” I say, my voice low and hoarse.

Thomas jerks his gaze from the window, staring at me as if he’s sure he’d imagined my speaking. He shakes his head and then, “Beats the heck out of that sissy nightgown you’re wearin’. Wait ‘til you get up and go to the bathroom. I’ve decided the budget cuts around here must not have included fabric for the backside.”

I feel myself start to smile, but then I remember why I’m here, why he’s here. Everything comes crashing in, and my smile dissolves. My thoughts freeze altogether because I don’t know which one to let in first.

Thomas reaches over and takes my hand, “You made it, buddy. I sure am glad.”

We look at each other for several long moments. I see him processing what I’m processing. Tears start to leak from the corners of his eyes. He wipes them away. “For a while there you had me thinking you weren’t going to.”

I’ve never seen Thomas come even close to crying, and the sight of it shakes me. “What day is it?” I ask.

“Today’s Friday. You’ve been this way for two weeks.”

At first I can’t make sense of that. “Like what?” I ask.

“In a coma.
They couldn’t tell us if you were ever going to wake up.”

I raise a hand to the bandages on my chest. My thoughts don’t seem to be in any particular order. I try to place what happened to put me here, to put Thomas here, but it’s just out of reach.

“You don’t remember, do you?” Thomas says.

“I’m not sure.”

“Maybe I oughta let the doctors talk to you first.” Thomas rolls the chair toward the door of the room. “They’ve been waiting for you to wake up. I’ll be right back, okay?”

“Thomas, wait,” I call out, my throat parched and dry.

But he’s gone, and I try to force my thoughts into some kind of order, but they’re slippery and hard to grasp.

He wheels back in, a pretty woman in a white coat right behind him. She stops at the side of the bed, looking at me with a pleased smile.

“You’re back,” she says. “We’re so happy to see it. How do you feel?”

I touch my temples. “Fairly bad headache,” I say.

“That’s to be expected.”

“What. . .why am I here?”

“Do you remember anything about what happened?” she asks, her voice soft.

I grapple for the answer, but it remains just out of reach.

“There was a shooting,” she says. “You were shot. I’ll be honest, you’re very lucky to be here at all.”

I glance at Thomas and see that he agrees with her. I notice his bandages again, and it occurs to me that I haven’t asked what happened to him.

“Were you shot, too?”

“Yeah,” he says.

“Where were we?”

“It was after the concert at Case’s party.”

“Just you and me?”
I ask.

Thomas is silent for a moment and then shakes his head.

“Who else?”

The doctor takes a step back and says, “I’ll let you two talk for a couple of minutes. I’ll be back with the other doctors involved in your care. We’d like to check you out, okay?”

I nod and say thank you, before looking back at Thomas, waiting for him to answer.

“Case and Beck,” he says quietly.

“Are they okay?”

“Case should be all right.”

I wait for him to include Beck in the statement, but he doesn’t.

“What about Beck?”

Thomas glances out the window, his grip on the arms of the wheelchair tightening until his knuckles are white.

“He didn’t make it, Holden.”

I try hard to process what he just said, but it won’t compute. How could that be? It doesn’t make any sense. Beck, dead? No sooner have the words made their way through my consciousness than her name races in right behind them. “CeCe.” I say, fear instantly flooding through me.

“She’s okay,” he says.

The relief hits me so hard that I go weak beneath its weight. I want to ask him where she is, why she’s not here. I can’t. My head is pounding. I close my eyes tight to block out the pain.

I don’t even realize I’m crying until I look at Thomas’s face and see that he is as well.

“It’s gonna be all right, man,” he says, putting his hand on my shoulder and squeezing hard.

I hear the raw edges in his voice, and I know that he’s not sure whether there’s any truth at all to what he has just said.

♪

CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT

CeCe

For the next five days, I don’t get out of bed except when Mama runs me a hot bath at night and insists that I get in.

She waits in my room just outside the bathroom door as if she’s afraid I might do something unexpected. Fall or maybe hurt myself intentionally. She brings me food on a tray at regularly spaced intervals, refusing to let me get away with not eating at least something that’s on the plate.