Danielle Steel - Full circle

“I can't. I'll be in Gstaad.”

“Shit.”

“I don't think you should go.”

“I didn't ask you.”

But when the time came, she was in bed with a fever of 102 degrees and a virulent flu. She tried to get up and pack the night before, but she was just too sick, and she called Sharon at the Blake' home in Washington, and Freeman Blake answered the phone.

“You've heard the news, then.…” His voice sounded as though it came from the bottom of a well, and it was filled with gloom.

“What news?”

He couldn't even say the words. He just sat there and cried, and without knowing why, Tana began to cry too. “She's dead … they killed her last night … they shot her … my baby … my little girl.…” He was totally unglued and Tana was sobbing along with him, feeling frightened and hysterical, until Miriam Blake came to the phone. She sounded distraught but she was calmer than her husband had been. She told Tana when the funeral was. And Tana flew to Washington, fever and all, on the morning of Christmas Eve. It had taken that long to get the body home, and Martin Luther King had made arrangements to come and speak about her.

There was national news coverage, press pushing their way into the church, flashbulbs going off in everyone's face, and Freeman Blake was completely undone. He had lost both of his children now, to the same cause, and afterwards, Tana spent a little quiet time with them, with close friends, at their home.

“Do something useful with your life, child.” Freeman Blake looked bleakly at her. “Get married, have kids. Don't do what Sharon did.” He began to cry again, and eventually Dr. King and another friend led him upstairs and it was Miriam who came to sit beside Tana then. Everyone had been crying all day, and for days before, and Tana felt wrung out both from the emotions and the flu.

“I'm so sorry, Mrs. Blake.”

“So am I.…” Her eyes looked like rivers of pain. She had seen it all, but she was still on her feet and always would be. She was that kind of woman, and in some ways Tana admired her. “What are you going to do now, Tana?”

She wasn't sure what Miriam meant. “Go home, I guess.” She was going to catch a late flight that night to spend Christmas with Jean. As usual, Arthur had gone away with friends, and Jean was going to be alone.

“I mean when you finish school.”

“I don't know.”

“Have you ever thought about going into government? That's what this country needs.” Tana smiled, she could almost hear Sharon speaking to her. Here, her daughter had just died, and she was already back at her crusades. It was frightening in some ways, and yet admirable too. “You could go into law. You could change things, Tana. You're that kind of girl.”

“I'm not sure I am.”

“You are. You've got guts. Sharon did too, but she didn't have your kind of mind. In some ways, you're like me.” It was a frightening thought because Tana had always found her cold, and she didn't want to be like that.

“I am?” She looked a little stunned.

“You know what you want, and you go for it.”

Tana smiled. “Sometimes.”

“You didn't even skip a beat when you got kicked out of Green Hill.”

“That was just lucky a friend suggested BU.”

“If he hadn't, you'd have landed on your feet anyway.” She stood up with a small sigh. “Anyway, think about it. There aren't enough lawyers like you, Tan. You're what this country needs.” It was a heady thing to say to a twenty-one-year-old girl, and on the plane home the words echoed in her head, but more than that, she kept seeing Freeman's face, hearing him cry … hearing things Sharon had said to her at Green Hill … the times they had walked into Yolan … the memories flooded her, and she dried her eyes again and again to no avail, and she found herself thinking constantly of the baby Sharon had given up four years before, wondering where he was, what had happened to him. And she wondered if Freeman had been thinking of him too. They had no one left now.

And at the same time, she kept thinking of Miriam's words. This country needs you … she tried the thought on her mother before she went back to school, and Jean Roberts looked horrified.

“Law school? Haven't you been in school for long enough? Are you going to stay there for the rest of your life?”

“Only if it does me some good.”

“Why don't you get a job? You might meet someone that way.”

“Oh for chrissake, never mind.…” It was all she thought about … meet someone … settle down … get married … have kids.… But Harry wasn't much warmer to the idea when she tried it out on him the following week.

“Jesus Christ, why?”

“Why not? It might be interesting, and I might be good at it.” She was getting more excited about it every day, and suddenly it seemed like the right thing to do. It made some sense, gave some purpose to her life. “I'm going to apply to Boalt, at UC Berkeley.” She had already made up her mind. There were two other schools she was going to apply to also, but Boalt was her first choice.

Harry stared at her. “You're serious?”

“Yes.”

“I think you're nuts.”

“Want to come?”

“Hell, no!” He grinned. “I told you. I'm going to play … just kick up my heels.”

“That's a waste of time.”

“I can hardly wait.”

And neither could she. In May she got the word. She'd been accepted at Boalt. They would give her a partial scholarship, and she had already saved the rest.

“I'm on my way.” She grinned at Harry as they sat on the lawn outside her dorm.

“Tan, are you sure?”

“Never more so in my whole life.” The two exchanged a long smile. The road would part for them soon. She went to his graduation at Harvard in June, and cried copiously for him, for herself, for Sharon Blake who was no more, for John F. Kennedy who had been killed seven months before, for the people they had met, and those they never would. An era had come to an end, for them both. And she cried at her own graduation too. As Jean Roberts did, and Arthur Durning had come along. And Harry sat in the back row, pretending to make conquests among the freshman girls.

But it was Tana his eyes were rivetted to, his heart leapt with pride for her and then sank as he thought of their going separate ways. He knew that inevitably their paths would cross again. He would see to that. But for her, it was still too soon. And with all his heart, he wished her godspeed and, that she would be safe and well in California. It made him nervous to think of her so far from him. But he had to let her go for now … for now … tears filled his eyes as he watched her come down the steps with her diploma in hand. She looked so fresh and young, the big green eyes, the bright shining hair … and the lips he so desperately longed to kiss and had for almost four years … the same lips brushed his cheek as he congratulated her again, and for an instant, just an instant, he felt her hold him close, and it almost took his breath away.

“Thanks, Harry.” There were tears in her eyes.

“What for?” He had to fight back tears of his own.

“For everything.” And then the others pressed in on them and the moment was gone. Their separate lives had begun and Harry almost felt her physically torn from him.

The ride to the airport seemed endless this time. Tana took a cab, and Jean insisted on coming with her. There were endless silences, pauses, staccato bursts of words, like machine gun fire at the enemy as it disappeared into the brush, and then finally they were there. Jean insisted on paying for the cab, as though it were her last chance to do something for her little girl, the only chance she'd ever have, and it was easy to see she was fighting back tears as they checked Tana's bags in.