Every Breath

She thought back to Tru’s family history. It felt epic and dark, almost Shakespearean. “That’s terrible.”

“It was. And still is, even for the people who received the land. They didn’t know what to do with it, didn’t know how to maintain the equipment or the irrigation methods, and they didn’t rotate the crops correctly. Now nothing is being grown at all. Our farm turned into a squatters’ camp, and the same thing has happened all over the country. Add in the currency collapse, and…”

When he trailed off, Hope tried to imagine it. “It sounds like you got out just in time.”

“It makes me sad, though. Zimbabwe will always be my home.”

“What about your half brothers?”

Tru drained his glass and set it on the table. “Both are in Tanzania. Both are farming again, but it’s nothing like it was before. They don’t have much land, and what they do have isn’t nearly as fertile as the old farm. But the only reason I know that is because they had to borrow money from me, and they’re not always able to make the payments.”

“That was kind of you. To help them, I mean.”

“They had no more ability to choose the family they were born into than I did. Beyond that, though, I think it’s what my mum would have wanted me to do.”

“What about your biological father? Did you ever see him again?”

“No,” Tru said. “We spoke on the phone a couple of weeks after I returned to Zimbabwe, but he passed away not long after that.”

“How about his other children? Did you ever change your mind about meeting them?”

“No,” Tru answered. “And I’m fairly sure they didn’t want to get to know me, either. The letter from the attorney informing me of my father’s death made that clear. I don’t know their reasons—maybe it was because I was a reminder that their mother wasn’t the only woman our father loved, or maybe they were worried about an inheritance, but I saw no reason to ignore their wishes. Like my father, they were strangers.”

“I’m still glad you had a chance to meet him.”

He turned his gaze toward the fire. “I am, too. I still have the photographs and drawings he gave me. It seems like so long ago,” he said.

“It has been a long time,” she said quietly.

“Too long,” he said, taking her hand, and she knew that he was talking about her. She felt her cheeks flush, even as his thumb began to caress her skin, his touch achingly familiar. How was it possible that they’d found each other again? And what was happening to them now? He seemed unchanged from the man she’d once fallen for, but it made her think again how different her own life had become. Where he was as handsome as ever, she felt her age; where he seemed at ease in her presence, his touch triggered another wave of emotion. It was overwhelming, almost too much, and she squeezed his hand before releasing it. She wasn’t ready for that much intimacy yet, but she gave an encouraging smile before sitting up straight.

“So, let me see if I have this straight. You were in Hwange until…1999 or 2000? And then you moved to Botswana?”

He nodded. “1999. I was in Botswana for five years.”

“And then?”

“I think, for that, I’ll probably need another glass of wine.”

“Let me get it.” Taking his glass, she retreated to the kitchen before returning a minute later. She got comfortable beneath the blanket again, thinking the room was warming up nicely. Cozy. In many ways, it had already been a perfect afternoon.

“All right,” she said, “what year was this?”

“2004.”

“What happened?”

“I was in an accident,” he said. “A rather bad one.”

“How bad?”

He took a sip of wine, his eyes on hers. “I died.”

DYING

As he lay in the ditch by the side of the highway, Tru could feel his life slipping away. He was only dimly aware of his overturned truck with the demolished front end, and of the way one of the tires was finally rotating to a stop; he barely noticed the people rushing toward him. He wasn’t sure where he was or what had happened, or why the world seemed blurry. He didn’t understand why he couldn’t seem to move his legs, or what was causing the relentless waves of pain throughout his entire body.

Nor, when he finally woke in a hospital he didn’t recognize in an entirely different country, would he remember the accident at all. He remembered that he had been returning to the lodge after spending a few days in Gaborone, but only learned later from the nurse that an oncoming supply truck in the opposite lane had suddenly crossed into the path of his pickup. Tru hadn’t been wearing his seat belt, and in the collision, he’d rocketed through the windshield, cracking his skull and landing forty feet away, which caused eighteen more bones to break, including both femurs, all the bones in his right arm, three vertebrae, and five ribs. He was loaded into a vegetable cart by strangers and rushed to a temporary NGO clinic that was offering vaccinations at a nearby village. It had neither the equipment, medicine, or supplies that Tru needed, nor was a doctor even present. The floor was dirt, and the room was filled with children who had learned to ignore the flies that swarmed over their faces and limbs. The nurse was from Sweden, young and overwhelmed, and had no idea what to do when Tru was rolled into the waiting room. But people expected her to do something—anything—so she moved toward the cart and checked for a pulse. There was nothing. She checked the carotid artery. Still nothing. She put her ear to Tru’s mouth and checked for breathing. She heard and felt nothing, then raced toward her bag for a stethoscope. She placed it on his chest and listened carefully for the faintest murmur without hearing anything before finally giving up. Tru was dead.

The owner of the vegetable cart asked that the body be placed elsewhere, so he could go back and retrieve his vegetables before they were all stolen. There was an argument about whether he should wait for the police, but the owner shouted the loudest and his opinion carried the day. He and the father of one of the children lifted Tru’s body from the cart. The bones clicked and made grinding noises as Tru was placed on the floor in the corner, and the nurse draped a blanket over his body. People made room for the corpse, but otherwise ignored it. The owner of the vegetable cart vanished back onto the street and the nurse continued to administer injections.

Sometime later, Tru coughed.

He was brought to the hospital in Gaborone in the bed of someone’s truck. From the village, it took more than an hour to get there. When he was admitted, there was little the emergency doctor thought he could do. It was a wonder Tru remained alive. His stretcher was left in a crowded hallway while the hospital staff waited for him to die. Maybe minutes, they thought, no more than half an hour. By then, the sun was going down.

Tru didn’t die. He survived overnight, but soon an infection set in. The hospital was short on antibiotics and didn’t want to waste them. Tru’s fever rose and his brain began to swell. Two days passed, then three, and still he lingered somewhere between life and death. By then, Andrew had been contacted through his listing as next of kin on his ID, and had flown from England to be with his father. Alerted by Andrew, Kim also flew in from Johannesburg, where she was living at the time. An emergency medical flight was arranged, and Tru was flown to a trauma hospital in South Africa. He somehow survived that flight, too, and was given massive infusions of antibiotics while the doctors drained the fluid from his brain. He remained unconscious for eight days. On day nine, his fever broke, and he woke to see Andrew by his bedside.

He stayed in the hospital for seven more weeks while one by one his bones were reset, casted, and healed. Afterward, unable to walk, fighting double vision, and constantly plagued by vertigo, he was moved to a rehabilitation facility.

He was there for nearly three years.

At the cottage, the firelight flickered in Hope’s eyes like candles, and Tru thought again that she was as beautiful as she’d been so long ago. Maybe more so. In the soft lines near her eyes, he saw wisdom and a hard-won serenity. Her face was full of grace.

He knew the years hadn’t been easy for her. Though she hadn’t spoken much about her marriage to Josh, he guessed she was avoiding the subject to spare not only Tru’s feelings but her own.