Diane Chamberlain - Breaking The Silence

He wanted her to look after a woman named Sarah Tolley?

“But…who is she?” Laura asked. “ Where is she?”

His eyes were closed. “Meadow…Wood…”

“Meadow Wood Village?” Laura pictured the attractive, Victorian-style retirement home on the outskirts of Leesburg.

He nodded. At least she thought he did.

“Can you tell me what you want me to do for her?” she asked.

“Take care…”

“Take care of her?” Laura asked. “But I don’t know her, Dad. I’ve never even heard you talk about her before.”

Her father’s paper-thin eyelids fluttered open, and she saw panic in his eyes. “Promise!” he said. In a nearly spasmodic movement, he reached toward her as if trying to grasp her shoulders, but he caught his fingers in the chain of her necklace instead. She felt the chain snap, and the pendant fell into her lap.

Unsettled by his panic, she caught his hands. “It’s all right, Daddy,” she said. “I promise. I’ll take care of her.”

“Swear…”

“I’ll do it, Dad.” She leaned back to slip the scrap of paper into her jeans pocket. “You don’t need to worry.”

He sank back against the pillow, pointing one trembling finger toward her neck. “I broke…”

“It’s all right.” She lifted the necklace from her lap and slipped it, too, into her jeans pocket. “It can be fixed.” She took his hand again and held it on her thigh. “You rest now,” she said.

Obediently, he closed his eyes, their small battle over. Small battles were nothing new between them. Her mother had died when Laura was seven, and her father had been a difficult parent, demanding and controlling, but always attentive. She had been his top priority, and she knew it. He’d instilled in her his love of astronomy, although for him it had been a cherished avocation rather than a profession, and he was responsible for the person she’d become. His methodical shaping of her had at times been painful and contentious, but she was grateful for it.

She sat there for hours, holding her father’s hand as it grew slacker and cooler in her own. Taped to the wall was a picture Emma had drawn for him a few days earlier. It was one of those typical five-year-old’s drawings. Vivid blue sky. Yellow sun. Green tree. A child dressed in blue and purple, wearing a broad smile, the sort of smile Emma herself wore more often than not. Laura studied the drawing, saddened by the incongruity of that happy child with the scene in this room.

She looked out the window again. Aries was gone, but she could see Jupiter near the center of Aquarius. She closed her eyes, and it was a minute before she realized that her father’s breathing had stopped. Sitting very still, she held his lifeless hand in hers, as the room filled with a silence as deep as the sky.

THE EASTERN SKY WAS PURPLE WITH THE APPROACHING DAWN when she arrived home from the hospital. Ray was brewing coffee, wearing his blue terry-cloth robe, a splash of color in the white, uncluttered kitchen. He walked toward her once she was in the door, his arms outstretched, and she could tell he hadn’t slept well. Dark circles marred the skin beneath his eyes, and the stubble of his beard was white. For a moment, she felt the fear of losing him, too. He was sixty-one, twenty-one years older than she, and these last few years had taken a toll on him. When she buried her head against his shoulder, she wasn’t sure if her tears were for her father or her husband.

“He died about an hour ago,” she said, drawing away from him. She wiped her eyes with a tissue, then took the mug of coffee he handed her and sat down at the table.

“I’m glad you got to be there with him,” he said.

“It was upsetting.” She held the mug between her cold hands. “I thought I’d just sit with him while he…slipped away. But he was very anxious. Really wired. He asked me to take care of some woman I’ve never even heard him talk about before, and he made me promise I’d do it. It was as if he couldn’t let himself die until I swore I’d take care of her.”

Ray frowned. “Who’s the woman? And what did he mean by ‘take care of ’?”

Laura reached into her jeans pocket for the scrap of paper, which she flattened on the table. “Sarah Tolley,” she said. “She lives in Meadow Wood Village. You know, that retirement home?”

Ray turned away from her to pour himself more coffee. He was quiet, and she imagined that he, too, was trying to puzzle out her father’s request. His body looked thick and shapeless beneath the robe. Too heavy. It wasn’t healthy to carry around so much weight. She wished he’d take better care of himself.

“And you don’t know her connection to Carl?” he asked finally, his back still to her.

“I have no idea. He said she’s a special friend. Or important. I don’t remember his exact words. He could barely speak.” The conversation with her father now seemed vague, as if she’d dreamed it. “He said, or at least implied, that she has no one else to take care of her. No family.”

“Sweetheart.” Ray sat down at the ancient oak table and rested his hand on top of hers. “I think this was the ranting of a dying man,” he said. “You know he’s suffered from dementia on and off this past week. The medication—”

“I know, but he seemed clear-headed about this. You should have seen him, Ray. It was so important to him. And where would he get this name from?” She pulled her hand from his to touch the scrap of paper. “She must mean something to him. Maybe he had another life we knew nothing about. I’m going to call Meadow Wood Village later today to see if this woman actually lives there.”

Ray’s expression was the one he wore when he lobbied politicians on Capitol Hill. She saw the calculated patience in his face, the tightness in his lips, and knew he was choosing his words with care.

“It’s probably not a good time to discuss this,” he said, his tone even, his hand on hers again, “because you’re understandably upset and feeling pretty emotional about Carl. But I really want you to think about the fact that he ran your life when he was alive and now he’s trying to control it from the grave.”

She knew what he was talking about. Sometimes her father’s love had seemed tied to her achievements, and, no matter what she accomplished, it was never quite enough. But it seemed harsh, almost cruel, for Ray to imply that her father’s deathbed wish was a final act of manipulation.

She leaned toward her husband, feeling tears fill her eyes. “This is the last thing my father will ever ask of me,” she said. “I promised him I’d do as he requested, Ray, and I will. I don’t know what this—” she looked at the piece of paper “—Sarah Tolley was to him, but there is no way I can simply turn my back on her.”

“Damn it!” Ray slammed his mug on the table so hard she jumped, and coffee splashed onto the white place mat. He stood up. “Here you go again, throwing yourself off the deep end headfirst. Don’t you have enough to do? Aren’t Emma and I ever enough to satisfy you?”

Startled by his outburst, she could not find her voice. She stared at her husband while he plowed ahead.

“Why do you always need to have a million projects going at once?” he asked. “Have you looked at your life lately? You just got back from a month of research in Brazil, you drive to Baltimore to teach at Hopkins one day a week, you’re overextended at the Smithsonian, and last week you told me you’re going back to Brazil next summer. What happened to your promise to us, huh?” He leaned on the table, his hands balled into fists. His knuckles were white.

Laura reached out to touch his hand, confused by his sudden, dramatic change of heart. “But you said it was fine for me to—”