Home Again

She smiled gently. “You don’t fool me anymore.”

He moved a little, immediately winced in pain. Grimacin

g, he dragged the bed’s remote control onto his lap and pushed the button. Click, grind, the bed eased upward. Breathing hard, he stared at Madelaine. “What does that mean?”

She was surprised by the intimacy of the question. For a second she remembered so much about them, the little things, the tiny moments, the things they’d said to each other, promises they’d made in the dark of the night. Until I met you, Mad, I wanted to die….

And her answer, so naive and afraid, Don’t say that, Angel, don’t ever say that.

“What do you mean?” he demanded.

She pushed the memories away and stared down at him. “When we were kids, you used to tell me that you wanted to die.”

There was a long pause, and she didn’t even realize she was waiting for his response until he answered. “That was a long time ago.”

It struck her suddenly how different they both were, how, over time, the same words could take on such different meanings. As a young girl, his death wish had seemed wildly romantic, a gauntlet that she alone could pick up. But no more; now she saw the words for what they were—selfish and stupid. And a waste, such a waste. “You’re a coward, Angel DeMarco, and you always were.”

“Fuck you.”

“Go ahead, swear at me. It doesn’t change the truth that you’re afraid to live.”

Anger flashed in his eyes. The heart monitor beeped a warning. “Quit acting like you know me. You don’t.”

“I know who you were once, Angel, and frankly, I don’t see much change. You never knew when to compromise, when to really try. What you knew how to do was run. Well, you’ve tried running and drinking and hiding. And you’ve ended up here, right where you began.”

He stared at her a long, long time, until the anger faded from his eyes and was replaced by a worn resignation.

Finally he spoke, and when he did his voice was reed-thin. “I don’t know how to change.”

She felt something in that moment that surprised her, a sudden connection with this man, as if, for the single space of a breath, the past had never died, and she’d never watched him ride out of her life on a brand new Harley-Davidson motorcycle. She remembered in that second the why and how of her love for him, the tiny chinks in his armor that had drawn her in, the bruised vulnerability she’d always seen in his eyes. She thought of how alike they’d once been. “I know how hard it is to really change. But you’re home now, that must mean something. Francis is here, and I know how much he loves you, how ready he’d be to help you. You’re home, Angel. Maybe if you look around, you’ll find a reason to live.”

He gave a weak smile. “I think it was Thomas Wolfe who said, ‘You can never go home again.’”

“I don’t know,” she said slowly, meeting his gaze. “Home is part of us. It’s in the scars we have on our knees and elbows, in the memories that surface when we sleep. I don’t think you can ever really leave.”

He started to respond, but before he could speak, Madelaine’s beeper went off. It was a message from Allenford. She reached immediately for the bedside phone and punched in the four-digit extension.

Chris picked up on the first ring. “Allenford.”

“Hi, Chris,” Madelaine said. “What’s going on?”

“DeMarco. I think we have a heart.”

Angel had thought he understood fear. He’d known the sweaty palms, the knot in the pit of the stomach that tightened with every breath, the metallic taste on the tongue. Once he’d almost overdosed on drugs, and even that—waking up in the emergency room with a dozen faces peering over him—even that was nothing compared to this.

Fear was a living, breathing presence inside him, pushing at his skin, seeping from his pores in foul, salty beads of sweat.

He closed his eyes and knew immediately that it was a mistake. The images were there, waiting in the darkness like macabre specters—the accident that would bring him life, the “donor” who would never open his eyes again, never smile at his wife or hug his children. He saw blood—his, the donor’s, the mingling of the two….

He twisted slightly on the narrow bed, his hands curled talonlike around the warm metal rails. A groan slipped up his throat and released as a sigh. Slowly he opened his eyes and stared sightlessly ahead, until the white ceiling blurred into the silver fluorescent fixtures.

He wanted to pray, needed to pray, but it had been too long, and he knew that no one would listen. Oh, he knew he could seek absolution from a priest, from his own brother, in fact, but it was too easy, too pat. He couldn’t believe in a God that was so forgiving. He knew that he deserved to suffer.

And he was suffering. Sweet Christ, he’d never been so afraid in his life.

“Angel?”

He heard Madelaine’s throaty voice, and for a split second he remembered it all, every second they’d been together, every touch they’d shared. The memories brought an aching, bittersweet sense of loss. He wondered suddenly what it would have been like, that road not taken, the life he’d run away from.