Chapter 14
October 7, 2006
Kevin was still at home. Tim and Tracy had talked about it numerous times, but had failed to come up with an explanation. Tim had called Harry, and his suggestion had seemed so far out in left field that Tim had laughed at him.
"Rachel?! He barely speaks to her!"
"Well, I don’t know", Harry said. "You said he wasn’t having anything to do with the kids...so what else could it be?"
"I don’t know, Harry. But definitely not that", Tim chuckled.
Kevin wasn’t exactly sure why he was still in Lexington either. He told himself that for some reason, the house seemed calmer this time. At any rate, he was finding it possible to sit down at the piano and work. And since he could do that, he didn’t see any reason to leave.
He finished scoring the section of the song he had been working on, and closed the lid over the piano keys. The house was quiet, but pleasantly so. He didn’t feel threatened by this quiet. Aaron was upstairs taking a nap, and Jemma was at kindergarten.
It had surprised him when he had learned that she was enrolled at the small private school about two miles from the house. He had grumbled about her safety and questioned why he was paying so much for a housekeeper, if his daughter was in school for a large portion of the day. But his real problem was that he just hadn’t realized that she was already old enough to be going to school. For the first time in a long while he discovered that he regretted his lack of involvement with her. And with Aaron. He shook his head. Why was Aaron always an afterthought? He went looking for Rachel. There was something that he needed to talk to her about.
He found her in the backyard, hanging wash on the clothesline. He grinned. He had to ask the obvious question, but he already knew what the answer was going to be. He walked over to her and, reaching into the clothespin basket handed her one.
"Why are you going to all this trouble? There’s a dryer in the laundry room right next to the washer. Why lug everything out here?"
Rachel took the clothespin from him and smiled. "Because it’s a beautiful day, and I love the smell of clothes dried in the sun...especially bed sheets."
He smiled and shook his head. Almost to the last syllable. Exactly what his mother used to say when he would ask her the same question. "Okay. Let me help you", he said softly.
After her initial surprise, Rachel accepted his offer, and the laundry was up on the line in very short order. Kevin picked up the empty basket and walked with her back into the house. As they came into the kitchen Rachel asked him if he’d like some coffee. He nodded and she set about fixing a fresh pot. He sat at the kitchen table and watched her move about the kitchen. His thoughts drifted back to the night before"
He had been reading in bed and dozing off when he heard it. Jemma screaming. It jolted him up out of bed and he had raced to the door of his bedroom. But as fast as he had been, Rachel was there ahead of him. He could see into Jemma’s room. Rachel had picked her up bodily and was holding her in her arms and Jemma was clinging to her frantically. Rachel had crooned and whispered and sung to her and gradually her little body had relaxed enough that Rachel could put her back into the bed. But she didn’t leave her. Instead, she sat down on the floor next to the bed and held Jemma’s hand. And she sang to his daughter until Jemma’s breathing was soft and regular and Rachel could slide her hand away from Jemma’s without disturbing her. Only then did she stand up and, gently kissing Jemma’s cheek, leave the room.
As she emerged into the hallway and turned to pull the door closed behind her, she looked up to see Kevin standing in his doorway. She suddenly realized that she was wearing only her nightshirt and she blushed. "She’s all right. Just a bad dream", she said softly and slipped into her own room.
Kevin had walked quietly into Jemma’s room and stood looking down at his sleeping daughter. She still looked like Kristin, but somehow the hurt wasn’t so bad now. Maybe it wasn’t impossible after all. "Good night, little girl", he whispered as he bent down to kiss her forehead"
* * * *
"Here’s your coffee, Kevin", Rachel said, placing a mug in front of him. Milk and sugar were already on the table. "Penny for your thoughts."
"What? Oh, sorry. I guess I was daydreaming", he replied. "Thanks." As he stirred the milk into the mug, he looked up. "Last night...does that happen very often?"
"You mean Jemma?" Rachel asked as she sat down opposite him. He nodded. "Not so much anymore. When I first got here, she was having nightmares three or four times a week. Lately, they’ve been pretty rare."
"Any idea what they’re about?" he asked quietly looking down at the table.
Rachel looked at him intently. This was the first time that he had ever asked anything about either of the children. What was going on in his head?
"Well, to begin with they were mainly a reaction to her grandma’s death. She took that very hard. And of course, some of them were just normal four-year-old anxieties. But lately, she’s been very reluctant to share what they’re about with me. I imagine she will eventually, so I haven’t pressed. Like I said, they don’t happen that often any more."
He was still looking down at the placemat in front of him. "How...how long was she...upset...about her grandma?" he whispered.
"I gathered from Tim and Tracy that she started having nightmares right after they took her to their house and I guess it was two or three months after I got here that she finally got past them."
Nine months. For nine months his baby had lived with bad dreams, and he hadn’t known. Didn’t want to know. His hands trembled on the coffee mug, and the hot liquid splashed. He yanked his hands away and the mug tipped over, soaking the placemat. Rachel calmly got up and returned with a sponge and a paper towel and mopped up the mess.
He looked up at her standing next to him, tears swimming in his eyes. "I didn’t know-." He looked so tormented. Rachel’s heart went out to him, and she put a hand on his shoulder. "How will I ever make it up to her? Will she ever forgive me?", he whispered. His arms went around her waist and he buried his face against her shirt.
Rachel hoped he didn’t notice the split second hesitation before she wrapped her arms around him and cradled him just as she had his daughter the night before. "Kevin?", she said softly. "Maybe there is something that you can do-."
He looked up at her. There was no hope in his eyes, but he was waiting to hear what she had to say.
"Could you-would your schedule allow you to come back here for Thanksgiving?" Rachel asked tentatively. "Since I’ve been here, it seems like the only reason you come home is to reverence death." She took a deep breath. "You could do a lot for Jemma and Aaron if you could show them that you want to celebrate life with them too."
Thanksgiving at home. His arms dropped away from her and he leaned back in the chair. Could she have picked anything harder to do? "I don’t know, Rachel. I’ll have to see", he said quietly. He got up and started out of the room.
"Kevin?"
He stopped and turned slowly to look at her.
"Not the den-please?"
Somehow it didn’t surprise him that she knew what he had been thinking. He gave her a thin smile. "Okay", he said softly. "I think I’ll go out for a walk."
"Thank you", she smiled.
As he left the house, Rachel sat staring at the soaked placemat. First step, Kevin. That’s the hard one, she thought.
Chapter 15
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