Every Breath Read online

  He took a few long breaths, as if gathering his strength for a final push.

  “When they finally took the hood off, a flashlight was shined in my eyes. I couldn’t see a thing. But he was there. The Colonel. He told me that I had two choices: I could either leave Rhodesia the following morning, or I could die in the cellar, handcuffed to the pipes, without food or water.”

  He turned toward Tru. “I’d been in war. I’d seen terrible things. I’d been shot—got myself a Purple Heart—and there’d been times when I wondered how I’d survive. But I’d never been more scared than in that moment, because I knew he was a stone-cold killer. You could hear it in his voice. The following day, I got in my car and didn’t stop driving until I reached South Africa. I caught a flight back to the States. I never saw or spoke to your mother again.”

  He swallowed.

  “I’ve spent my life knowing that I was a coward for doing what I did. For leaving her with him. For vanishing completely from her life. And not a day has gone by when I haven’t regretted it. I mean…I love my wife, but I’ve never felt for her the deep, burning passion that I felt with your mother. I left Evelyn with that man, and I know in my heart that it’s the worst thing I’ve ever done. You should also know that I didn’t come here for your forgiveness. Some things can’t be forgiven. But I want you to know that if I’d known about you, things would have been different. I understand those are only words and that you don’t know me, but it’s the truth. And I’m sorry for the way everything turned out.”

  Tru said nothing, realizing that it wasn’t difficult to reconcile the story he’d just heard with the grandfather he’d known. It left him disgusted, but more than that, he felt it give rise to a piercing sorrow for his mother, and pity for the man who was sitting beside him at the table.

  His father motioned toward the briefcase. “Would you mind handing me that?”

  Tru reached for the briefcase and placed it on the table, watching as his father opened the lid.

  “I also wanted to give you some things,” he said. “I put them in my trunk on the day I left Rhodesia, and over the years, I completely forgot about them. But when I saw your photograph, I had one of my sons find the trunk in the attic and bring it down. In the event you didn’t visit, I was planning to send them to you.”

  Inside the briefcase was an envelope, set atop a stack of drawing paper that had yellowed at the edges. His father handed Tru the envelope.

  “One of my friends back then was a photographer, and he used to bring his camera with him everywhere. There are a couple of shots of the two of us, but most of them are of your mother. He tried to convince her to become a model.”

  Tru slid the photographs from the envelope. There were eight in total; the first he examined showed his mother and father seated together in front of a river, both of them laughing. The second was also of the two of them, staring at each other in profile, similar to the drawing he’d been working on of Hope and himself. The others were all of his mother in various poses and outfits, with clean backgrounds, a photographic style common in the late 1940s. His throat tightened at the sight of her, and he felt a sense of sudden loss he hadn’t expected.

  His father handed over the drawings next. The first was a self-portrait of his mother staring at a reflection of herself in the mirror. Despite her beauty, her darkly shadowed expression gave her a haunted quality. The next was a drawing of his mother from behind. She was draped in a sheet and gazing over her shoulder, making Tru wonder whether she had used a similar photograph as inspiration. There were three more self-portraits and several landscape scenes similar to those that Tru created for Andrew. One of them, however, depicted the family’s main house before the fire, with imposing columns gracing the veranda. He realized that he’d forgotten how it had looked then.

  When Tru finally set the drawings aside, his father cleared his throat.

  “I thought she was good enough to open a studio, but she wasn’t interested in that. She said that she drew because she wanted to lose herself in the process. At the time, I wasn’t sure what that meant, but I spent many afternoons watching as she sketched. She had a charming habit of licking her lips whenever she was working, and she was never completely satisfied with the results. In her mind, none of the drawings were ever finished.”

  Tru took a sip of water, thinking. “Was she happy?” he finally asked.

  His father held Tru’s gaze. “I don’t know how to answer that. I like to think she was happy when we were together. But…”

  His father trailed off and Tru mulled the implications of what his father had told him earlier, the words still left unspoken. About what had really happened in that house when his mother was growing up.

  “If it’s all right with you, I’d like to ask you a question,” his father said.

  “Yes?”

  “Is there anything you want from me?”

  “I’m not sure I understand the question.”

  “Would you like to keep a line of communication open? Or would you prefer that I vanish after I leave here today? I’ve already told you that I don’t have much time left, but after all these years, I thought it best for you to be able to make the decision.”

  Tru stared at the old man seated next to him, considering it.

  “Yes,” he finally answered, surprising himself. “I’d like to be able to speak with you again.”

  “All right.” His father nodded. “How about my other kids?” he asked. “Or my wife? Would you like to speak with them?”

  Tru thought about it before finally shaking his head. “No,” he said. “Unless they’d like to speak with me. We’re strangers, and like you, I suppose I have no desire to add further complications to any of our lives.”

  His father offered a half smile at that. “Fair enough. But I do have a favor to ask of you. Feel free to say no, of course.”

  “What is it?”

  “Do you happen to have a photograph of my grandson that I could see?”

  * * *

  His father stayed for another forty minutes. He said that his wife and children supported his decision to make contact with Tru—despite their confusion about a relation they’d never met, someone sprung from a past that predated any of them. When he added that the drive back to Charlotte was a long one and that he had no desire to worry them further, Tru knew it was his father’s way of saying that it was time for him to go. Tru toted the briefcase and held the umbrella over his father as they descended the stairs to the car that had been waiting in the driveway.

  Tru watched the car as it pulled away, then walked to the cottage to let Scottie out. Despite the storm, he wanted to walk the beach, needing open space and time to think.

  It had been a surprising encounter, to say the least. Never had he imagined his father as a family man, someone married to the same woman for decades. Or that he’d fled the country in fear for his life because of Tru’s grandfather. As he pushed through the sand, Tru couldn’t shake a mounting feeling of revulsion for the most dominant male figure of his childhood.

  There was also the family he’d never known about—half siblings, three of them—and though he’d declined to meet them, he did wonder about them. Who were they? What were they like? He doubted that any of them had felt the need to leave home the moment they’d turned eighteen as he had; their lives had surely been nothing like his. For a while he tried to picture what his own life would have looked like had his mother and father found a way to be together, but it felt too far-fetched and he soon gave up.

  Staring out at the churning surf, he thought to himself that there were still too many unanswered questions, too many things he would never learn. Even about his mother. All he knew was that her short life had been even more tragic than he’d imagined, and if his father had brought her any joy at all, he was glad for that.

  Tru found himself wishing that this meeting with his father had happened years earlier, when they would have had more time to get to know each other. But some things were not m
eant to be, and as the sun began to set, he turned back toward the house. He walked slowly, absently keeping his eye on Scottie, weighed down by the afternoon’s revelations and an ineffable sense of regret. It was nearly dark by the time he got back to the house. He left Scottie on the back porch while he showered and put on some dry clothing, then gathered up the photographs and drawings that his father had left.

  At Hope’s place, he took a seat at the kitchen table, examining the images. He wished that Hope were with him; she would know how to help him make sense of things, and without her, he felt on edge. To soothe himself, he returned to work on the drawing of the two of them while the rain continued to fall. Beyond the windows, lightning flickered, mirroring his own roiling emotions, and he thought of the odd parallels between himself and his father.

  Harry had left his mother in Africa and returned to America; in a couple of days, Tru would return to Africa, leaving Hope here in the States. His father and mother couldn’t find a way to be together, but Tru wanted to believe that he and Hope could be different. He wanted the two of them to make a life together, and as he continued to sketch, he wondered how to make that happen.

  * * *

  Exhausted, Tru didn’t realize Hope had returned from the wedding until he felt her slip into the bed beside him. It was past midnight and she’d already undressed, her skin hot to the touch. Without a word, she began to kiss him. He responded with caresses of his own, and when they began to make love, he tasted the salty tang of her tears. But he said nothing. It was all he could do to not cry himself at the thought of what the next day might bring. Afterward, she curled into him, and he held her as she fell asleep with her head on his chest.

  Tru listened to the sound of her breathing, hoping it would settle him, but it didn’t. Instead, he lay in the dark and stared at the ceiling, feeling strangely and entirely alone.

  No More Tomorrows

  Tru woke at dawn, just as the morning light began to stream through the window, and reached for Hope, only to realize that the bed was empty. Propping himself up on his elbow, he wiped the sleep from his eyes, surprised and a little disappointed. He’d wanted to spend the morning lingering in bed with Hope, whispering and making love, staving off the reality that this would be their final day together.

  Rising from the bed, Tru threw on the jeans and shirt he’d been wearing the day before. On the pillowcase he saw smudges of mascara, a remnant of last night’s tears, and felt a wave of panic at the thought of losing Hope. He wanted another day, another week, another year with her. He wanted a lifetime of years, and he was willing to do whatever she needed so they could stay together forever.

  He mentally rehearsed what he would say to Hope as he headed toward the kitchen. He smelled coffee, but to his surprise Hope wasn’t there. He poured himself a cup and continued his search, poking his head into the dining room and family room to no avail. He finally traced her whereabouts to the back porch, where he could see her beyond the window, sitting in a rocker. The rain had stopped, and as she stared toward the ocean, Tru thought again that she was the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen.

  He paused only slightly before pushing the door open.

  Hope turned at the sound. Though she offered up a tentative smile, her eyes were rimmed with red. The exquisite sadness of her expression made him wonder how long she’d been alone with her thoughts, replaying the impossibilities of their situation.

  “Good morning,” she said, her voice soft.

  “Good morning.”

  When they kissed, he felt a hesitancy from her he hadn’t expected, and it suddenly rendered moot all the speeches he had rehearsed. He had the sense that even if he said the words, she was no longer ready to hear them. Something had shifted, he realized with foreboding, even if he wasn’t sure what.

  “I didn’t wake you, did I?” she asked.

  “No,” he answered. “I didn’t hear you leave the bedroom.”

  “I tried to be quiet.” The words sounded rote.

  “I’m surprised you’re even awake, since you got in so late.”

  “Sleeping in wasn’t meant to be, I guess.” He watched as she took a sip of coffee before going on. “Did you sleep okay?”

  “Not really,” he admitted.

  “I didn’t, either. I’ve been awake since four.” She motioned with her cup toward the rocker. “I dried your seat, but you might want to give it another wipe just to make sure.”

  “All right.”

  Grabbing the towel she’d left on the seat, he ran it over the wooden planks before perching on the edge of the rocker. His insides were roiling. For the first time in days, the sky showed patches of blue, though a quilt of white clouds still trailed out over the water, the tail end of the storm receding in the distance. Hope turned back toward the ocean, as though unable to face him, saying nothing.

  “Was it raining when you woke up?” he asked into the silence. Small talk, he knew, but he wasn’t sure what else to do.

  She shook her head. “No. It stopped sometime last night. Probably not long after I got home.”

  He angled his rocker toward hers, waiting to see if she would do the same with hers. She didn’t. Nor did she speak. He cleared his throat. “How was the wedding?”

  “It was beautiful,” she said, still refusing to look at him. “Ellen was glowing, and a lot less stressed than I thought she would be. Especially considering her phone call the other day.”

  “The rain wasn’t a problem?”

  “They ended up holding the ceremony on the porch. People had to stand shoulder to shoulder, but that made it more intimate, somehow. And the reception went off without a hitch. The food, the band, the cake…It was a lot of fun for everyone.”

  “I’m glad it went well.”

  She seemed lost in thought for a moment before finally turning to face him. “How did it go with your father? I’ve been wondering about that since I left yesterday.”

  “It was…” Tru hesitated, searching for the right word. “Interesting.”

  “How is he? What’s he like?”

  “He’s not what I imagined.”

  “How so?”

  “I suppose I was expecting more of a roguish figure. But he’s not like that at all. He’s in his midseventies and he’s been married for almost forty years to the same woman. He has three adult children, and worked for one of the big oil companies. He reminded me of many of the guests from America who visit the lodge.”

  “Did he tell you what happened between him and your mother?”

  Tru nodded, then started at the beginning. For the first time that morning, Hope seemed to emerge from her shell, escaping in the moment the prison of her dark thoughts. Mesmerized by his account, she couldn’t hide her shock when he finished.

  “And he was sure your grandfather was the one who kidnapped him?” she asked. “He’d never met him, so it wasn’t as though he could recognize the voice.”

  “It was my grandfather,” Tru said. “There’s no doubt in my mind. Just as there wasn’t any in his.”

  “That’s…terrible.”

  “My grandfather could be a terrible man.”

  “How do you feel about it?” Hope probed, her voice gentle.

  “It was a long time ago.”

  “That’s not much of an answer.”

  “It’s also the truth.”

  “Does it make you think any differently about your father?”

  “In a way,” he said. “I’d always assumed he just ran off without a care for my mother. But I was wrong.”

  “Would you mind sharing the photographs and the drawings?”

  Tru went back inside and fetched them from the end table. Handing her the stack, he took a seat in his rocker again and watched as Hope began to examine them.

  “Your mother was very beautiful,” she commented.

  “Yes, she was.”

  “You can tell she was in love with him. And that he felt the same about her.”

  Tru nodded, his thoughts focuse
d more on Hope than the events of the day before. He was trying to memorize everything about the way she looked, every quirk and gesture. When she finished with the photographs, she lifted the first of the drawings, the one of his mother staring at her reflection in the mirror.

  “She was very talented,” she said. “But I think your work is better.”

  “She was still young. And she had more natural ability than I do.”

  When she finished examining the stack of drawings, she took another sip of coffee, finishing the cup.

  “I know you just woke up, but are you up for a walk on the beach?” she ventured. “I have to take Scottie out soon.”

  “Sure,” he said. “Let me get my boots.”

  By the time he was ready, Scottie was already standing next to the gate, his tail wagging. Tru opened the gate, allowing Hope to lead the way, and once on the beach, Scottie took off, racing toward a flock of birds. They followed slowly, the morning cooler than it had been on previous days. For a while, neither one of them seemed to want to break the silence. When Tru slipped his hand into hers, she seemed to hesitate before her hand finally relaxed. Her defenses were going up, and it registered as an ache.

  They walked in silence for a long time, Hope glancing at him only now and then; mostly she seemed to be focusing on something in the distance or out over the water. As it had been most of the week, the beach was empty and quiet. There were no boats, and even the gulls and terns seemed to have taken flight. Confirming his earlier feelings of dread, he now sensed with certainty that something had happened, that there was something she was afraid to tell him. He had a strong premonition that whatever was on her mind would both surprise and hurt him, and he felt his heart sink. Desperate, he thought again about all he wanted to tell her, but before he could speak the words, she raised her gaze to his.