On Thursday Mrs. Bennet answered the phone at her home. “Oh hello, dear. No, I haven’t asked them yet.”
Elizabeth and Jane exchanged a look. They were enjoying a quiet dinner with their parents. Both of them could tell by their mother’s tone that Lydia, her baby, was on the phone and probably asking for a favor. Kitty and Lydia were working for their aunt and uncle as nannies over the summer.
“You know, dear, they don’t have much time off,” Mrs. Bennet spoke into the phone. “All right, all right, I’ll ask them.”
“That was Lydia,” Mrs. Bennet said, unnecessarily, as she hung up. “You know how they have been working so hard all summer, and their friends are going to the beach next week, and they wanted to know if one of you could fill in for them, so they could have a little vacation.”
Elizabeth rolled her eyes. Mary was away at the Tanglewood Music Center for an eight-week fellowship, which left her and Jane to cover for Kitty and Lydia. It was pointless for Elizabeth to remind her mother that she and Jane had been working hard for the past four months. She sighed and looked at Jane.
Jane’s expression surprised her. The deep sadness that had shadowed her since Tuesday lifted, and she smiled slightly. “Tell Lydia I’d be happy to go to Aunt Maddie’s.” Jane then looked to Elizabeth and winked.
Elizabeth considered her sister’s hint. She had to admit the idea had merit. Getting away from Mom and spending a week with her aunt would actually be more relaxing. Watching her young cousins would give her something to do besides thinking about Darcy and how she had screwed up with him. “I’ll come too,” she volunteered suddenly.
“Hey,” she said excitedly as a thought occurred to her, “we could go and stay with Aunt Maddie, and when Lydia and Kitty come back next weekend, we could go see Mary at Tanglewood.”
“That is an excellent idea, Lizzy,” Mr. Bennet pronounced. Elizabeth and Jane had been disappointed that they would be back on tour during Mary’s big performance at the end of her fellowship, but at least this way they could share some of the experience with her. Mrs. Bennet called the Gardiner household back to finalize the plans. After dinner, Elizabeth found Jane staring at the two bouquets of flowers sitting in vases in the living room. Both were of pure white roses. One arrived Wednesday, and the second had arrived today. The first card said simply, “I’m sorry”; today’s read, “Forgive me, please.” Neither had been signed, but that was unnecessary. Jane knew exactly whom they were from, as did Lizzy.
“Are you going to call him to let him know where to send tomorrow’s flowers?” Elizabeth teased gently.
Jane smiled slightly. The sadness was back on her face. “I don’t think so,” she answered vaguely.
“Jane,” Elizabeth said, all her concerns expressed in that one syllable, “you have to do something. You are so miserable, and I know Charles is too. I saw him at the De Bourgh party. He looked like he was dying.”
Jane looked up to her sister with gentle reproach in her eyes. “I don’t think it’s a good idea, Lizzy,” she said softly.
“Couldn’t you just talk to him?”
Jane shrugged. “And say what?” She looked away, shaking her head. “No, I made a mistake. I moved too fast, and I trusted him before I should have. Now I have to pay the price.” She held up a hand to stop Elizabeth, who was already drawing breath to protest. “I know; you think I should talk to him and let him explain. But I don’t trust him, Lizzy, and if I don’t trust him, how is anything he says going to make a difference?”
“But you love him.”
Jane closed her eyes for a long time, then she opened them slowly and said, “I thought I did. Maybe I do. I’m just not sure.” With a sad look, she left the flowers and went to her room to pack.
Elizabeth couldn’t be sure whom she felt worse for: herself or Jane. It was a tough call. She sat alone in her room and felt a pang of intense loneliness. She lay down on her bed, arranging the pillows so that, just for a second, she could try to believe she was back in the loft, in his bed, her head resting on his shoulder. She closed her eyes and tried to remember his scent and the sound of his heartbeat, the rise and fall of his chest against her cheek.
The memory failed; the moment faded. She sat up, feeling even more alone. The now-familiar dull ache settled upon her heart and she wished for the millionth time she hadn’t walked out on him, that he hadn’t pushed her so. Was it only three nights ago that she had slept in his arms? It felt like a lifetime ago. She hadn’t meant to hurt him. She really hadn’t, but nothing could change the fact that she had.
She was filled with a deep longing to find him, to make it better. But did he even want to see her? It was so hard to know what to think. Caroline believed he did, but what if she was wrong? What if the time away brought him to his senses and he realized he wanted nothing to do with a moody bitch like her?
She drew her Gibson into her lap. A memory of his words returned to her, surprising her. “My home is yours,” he had told her that morning. His words comforted her, even as she questioned them. Did he still feel that way? Could he understand that she had just needed time? Could she somehow make things right with him again?
As her fingers begin idly picking out a tune, she laughed softly to herself. What exactly was “right” for her and Darcy? The moments when they were together and happy seemed dwarfed by all the times they were fighting or angry. She wished they had shared more good times together, but with a surge of regret, she realized how much of it was her fault that they hadn’t. He had said it; he had loved and admired her for months. How had she missed this? Why had she been so dead set on disliking him, so blind that she missed the warmth he offered her? It was mostly because she misunderstood him. And a moment of fairness made her admit that he was so very hard to understand. But she realized that the fact of the matter was that she had been prejudiced against him from the start.
She felt stupid now. Stupid and unworthy of anyone’s love or admiration, and yet, even as she felt she didn’t deserve it, she craved Darcy’s love more than ever. She longed for the warmth in his eyes when he spoke to her, the dry jokes that made her burst out laughing, and his soft, deep voice saying her name again.
Her hurting and sorrow were too much, and she found herself stringing words together into a song. It was rough and unfinished, but it expressed her feelings better than her heart could.
Tears ran onto the paper on which she wrote the words and chords. On a whim, she created a song file by recording it on her computer. She wasn’t sure what she was doing, but she just needed Darcy to hear her song, to know that she was hurting too, and to maybe feel better. She agonized a moment, questioning her actions. Was she being a fool? The file sat on her desktop for a long time as she stared at it and thought. If she sent it, she would be committing herself. She would have to trust him.
That thought made her stomach turn over. Trusting others had never been her strong suit. She was much more comfortable trusting herself. But then she looked at her small, lonely, empty room and realized that she didn’t want this and that if she were ever going to move beyond it, she would have to trust him. In a rush, she sent the file to Caroline, with a request for her to forward it to Darcy. She bit her lip, wishing she had Darcy’s email address, but this was the best she could do.
Then she sat back on her bed and pulled her Gibson tight. It was done, and she hoped that he would understand.
“Hey!”
Charlotte’s heart lurched in her chest as she recognized the voice on the other end of the line. It was last person in the world she expected to hear from.
“Richard?”
He laughed, a warm, rich, touchable sound. “Don’t sound so surprised, Char. I can dial a phone, you know.”
Charlotte grinned. “I know. So how are you?” she asked, puzzled by his call.
Richard sighed. “I’m good. I’m kind of missing all the company of the tour. You get used to living in the middle of a hive of people, you know? It’s hard to readjust to the quiet when you’re home.”
“Oh, so that’s why you called? You’re lonely for the tour?”
“Something like that, Char,” he said, in a way that let her know that it had nothing to do with his call. “What have you been doing? Keeping busy?”
Charlotte struggled to steady her breathing as she answered him. “I’ve been hanging out mostly. Getting caught up with things at home and going to some of my old haunts.”
“Going out with Lizzy?”
“No, she and Jane have gone off to stay with their cousins for a week.”
“Oh, that explains it.”
“What?”
“Jane,” he explained. “Charles isn’t speaking to Darcy right now, so instead he’s been calling me to moon over Jane every night. He can’t find her.”
“Oh,” Charlotte said, not sure how to take this information. “He’s taking it badly?”
“He’s crushed, Char.” Richard’s voice held sympathy for his friend. “I’ve never seen him like this.”
“That’s too bad,” Charlotte replied. She felt an awkward pause in the conversation and asked, “So what else have you been doing?”
Richard chuckled. “You’re not going to believe this.”
“Tell me,” Charlotte replied.
“I’ve written a song.”
“Really?” Charlotte was surprised. “Can I hear it?”
“That depends on if you come back on tour or not,” Richard said in a deceptively easy way.
“Ooooohh, I see a carrot dangling before me.”
“Char,” Richard’s voice was relaxed and sincere, “the song is not worth you coming back for, but I do hope you come back. I miss you.”
Charlotte’s lip was trembling as she heard him speak. “You do?”
“I do. More than I can tell you. Please say you’ll come back.”
“Richard,” she said, her voice ragged.
“I know,” he hushed her soothingly. “It’s not just your decision. I’m sorry; I didn’t plan on calling you to ask you to come back. It just slipped out.”
Charlotte nodded, even though he couldn’t see her. She pulled herself together and tried to think of something safe to say. She opened her mouth, and her heart defeated all the rational plans her mind had made. “I miss you too,” she whispered.
“Char,” his voice was heavy with emotion. He wanted nothing more than to drop the phone and run to her.
“Richard?”
“I’m here,” he said. He took a deep breath and blew it out. This was so hard, but every second convinced him it was right. “Can you just talk to me a little, Char?”
“All right,” she said, oddly touched. It was so infrequent for him to ask her for anything. “I almost got into a fight Saturday night.”
Richard listened to her dear voice as she talked about her adventure at the local bar. He smiled as he pictured her face, telling her story. He was breaking his promise to himself by calling her, but he had to. He had missed her too much, and he was terrified she and the others would not return to the tour.
He’d promised himself at Hazelden that he would remain celibate for three weeks. He figured that if he could do that, he could then go to Charlotte, tell her he loved her, and ask her, hell, beg her to forgive him. He wished he could offer her more. He was hardly a prize. She deserved so much more. But he had tried to let her go, to push her away, and still she loved him.
What else could he do? He had wanted so badly to tell her how he loved her that last day of the tour. But he couldn’t then. First he had to prove to himself that he could love her, that he could stop sleeping around and be true to her.
But he was weak. Seeing her at the VMAs had been his undoing. She was so beautiful that night. All he wanted to do was hold her and kiss her again and again. Instead, he had been terrified by the idea that LBS might be leaving the tour.
In the end, it didn’t matter. He still would go to her, even if she didn’t come to him. But the fear had haunted him and he had, in a moment of loneliness, called her, to hear the sweetest voice he knew. And now he knew he was hooked. She had told him she missed him!
If his new addiction was phone calls to Charlotte, he could live with that. It was certainly less destructive than drinking or sleeping around, and if it helped him, helped them get back together, he was frankly all for it.
They spent the rest of the evening talking and laughing, until their eyes drooped and reluctantly they said good-bye, promising to talk again.
“Jane, I just wanted to tell you that you got another dozen roses,” Mrs. Bennet sounded delighted over the phone.
“Oh?”
“Yes, these are pale pink. I guess the florist ran out of white ones.” She laughed at her own joke. “They’re really pretty. Exactly the color your hair used to be.”
Jane felt a tightness in her chest. “Could you read the card to me?”
“Certainly, dear; it says, ‘Please call me,’ and there’s a phone number.” Her mother recited the digits. “Hmmm, funny, no name again. Do you recognize the number, Jane?”
“Yes,” she whispered. “Thanks, Mom.”
“Are you okay, Janie?”
“Yes, I just have to go, Mom.”
“You take care, Janie dear. Bye now.”
“Bye, Mom,” Jane replied automatically and clicked off the phone. The number was one she would never forget: Charles’s cell phone. She bit her lip, fighting back tears. It was supposed to be getting easier, not harder. Yet every day she found herself missing him more and more. She seemed to be on the verge of tears all the time, and last night a nightmare, in which Charles rejected her, woke her up and left her in a panic. In truth, she hadn’t been able to relax all day while she waited to see if this day’s flowers would arrive.
Now she knew. The flowers had come, but with what? A request? A command? Jane knew the pink roses had been no accident. She knew Charles picked them deliberately to match her hair color from the night they first met. He was going back, trying to start over and make it right.
Without her knowing quite how it happened, the phone was at her ear again and it was ringing, although Jane could not remember dialing. “Jane?” a desperate voice answered.
“Charles?” she choked out.
“Jane! Oh God, Jane, oh my God! Did you get my flowers?” He was panting with relief.
“I got the message,” Jane said with a weak watery smile. She couldn’t believe how much she missed his voice, or how good it made her feel to hear it again. “You asked me to call?”
“Jane,” Charles breathed. “Jane, could I please, please come and talk to you? Please. I need to try to explain what happened.” He paused. “Jane, I need to see you.”
There was a sharp pain in Jane’s chest and tears were falling down her face unnoticed. “Okay,” she whispered.
“I’ll come right now!”
“No!” Jane exclaimed. “No, you can’t. I’m at my aunt and uncle’s, and now would not be a good time.”
“Tell me when.”
“Could you come tomorrow?” she asked softly.
“Yes, I’ll come anytime, angel.” She could hear the desperation in his voice. “Tell me where you are.”
The Gardiners lived in Kent Cliffs, a small community about forty minutes from the Bennets. Jane gave him directions and listened as he read them back. “I’ll be there, first thing tomorrow,” Charles said soulfully. “How have you been?”
Jane bit back her response. She wanted to tell Charles that she had been horrible and let him comfort her, but she couldn’t. Not yet.
Instead she ignored his question and just said, “I’ll see you tomorrow,” and hung up.
Elizabeth found her, crying helplessly on her bed. “Jane, what happened?”
Jane tearfully explained everything, from the flowers to the phone call. Elizabeth’s heart went out to her sister. Jane was trapped in a world of hurt, surrounded by thorns on all sides with no clear path to get free. Elizabeth understood exactly how she felt. Her own way was blocked with pain too, so she focused instead on Jane.
“Jane, you have to give him a chance. Listen to him. Let him explain what happened.” Elizabeth was adamant. She knew this was the result of a misunderstanding and it hurt her to see Jane in so much pain. “Please do it for me, sweetheart. You know he loves you. He screwed up, but he’s very sorry.”
Jane nodded, her faced closed off. “I’ll try, Lizzy.”
Elizabeth left Jane alone and went to the room she was using. She checked her email and was disappointed to find nothing from Darcy. She wasn’t sure if this was a bad sign, or merely a glitch in the system. She lay down in the darkness and wondered where he was and what he was doing.
Darcy sat with his mother’s guitar in his lap. He ignored the sheet music on the stand before him; it was memorized a long time ago. His fingers flew lightly over the nylon strings, his thoughts focused on his task.
His concentration was not broken by the arrival of his sister. He nodded to Georgiana as he continued playing, until the movement was finished and he turned the CD player off with the remote sitting on the floor beside him.
Then he looked to her, waiting. The young woman asked, “Got a moment?”
“I’m playing.”
“I know,” she replied gently, biting her lip. “But I’m only asking for a few minutes.”
Darcy frowned. He was caught and he knew it. He motioned to the nearby chair and waited. He had tried to hide his mood from Georgiana, but he had clearly been unsuccessful. So instead he had taken to dodging her for the past few days. Now that had failed as well.
“Will, what’s going on?” Georgiana asked softly.
“What do you mean?”
Georgiana took a deep breath, screwed up her courage, and spoke. “I mean that I left you in New York a week ago today, as happy as a clam, and on Wednesday you drove up here a different person. You’ve been moody and sulking all week.”
“I have not.”
“Will, you’re listening to U2!” she told him, gently contradicting him. “If I hear ‘With or Without You’ one more time, I’m going to snap the CD in half.”
Darcy was forced to smile slightly. It was bizarre what his sister gauged to be a sign of his depression, but he couldn’t deny it.
“Will, what happened on Tuesday? Did something happen at the awards? I watched them and you were great.”
Darcy sighed. “Did you see the pre-show?”
Georgiana nodded, unwilling to interrupt her brother once he started talking.
“Did you see LBS?”
“Yes, they’re the group on tour with you, right?”
Darcy nodded. “The guitarist, Elizabeth…”
Georgiana’s eyes got large and round as she stared at him with dawning comprehension. “You? And her? You’ve been dating?”
Darcy nodded, his jaw tight. Then he forced himself to speak. “Not exactly. It’s kind of hard to date on tour. But we have been together a lot.”
Georgiana smiled, excited at the idea of her dear brother having a girlfriend, then she thought about his behavior for the last week and frowned. “Okay, so you and Elizabeth have been together and getting to know each other. So what happened?”
“The Monday that we came back from Europe, she came to the loft.” Darcy’s voice stumbled a moment as he did some quick mental editing. “The next morning, I told her I loved her and that I never wanted her to leave, and she left.” He shrugged. “I guess she didn’t feel for me what I felt for her.”
Georgiana paled slightly as she realized what Darcy had left out. “Will, your problem is you are very black-and-white in your thinking, and you don’t realize that other people aren’t.”
Darcy looked at her coolly. “And how would you know this?”
“Years of therapy, Will. You pick up stuff after a while.”
Darcy sat back in his chair, his eyes reassessing the little girl who had become an adult before his eyes.
“Okay, let’s look at it this way,” Georgiana continued uncomfortably. “Let’s say I was at school, and I met a guy. Say we were in the same dorm and had some classes together.” She hesitated and licked her lips. “And let’s pretend that after a few months I decided that I like the guy and I go to bed with him.” She wasn’t quite able to make eye contact with him, but her point was so important, she pressed on.
“And it’s great. It’s the best sex I will ever have in my life, okay?” she said quickly. “But then, the next morning, he tells me he loves me and he even wants me to move in with him, right away.” She stopped, letting the idea work on him, and then asked Darcy in a soft voice, “Would you want me to move in with him? Even if he was a great guy?”
Darcy frowned and shook his head. “Of course not.”
“Then how could you expect this of Elizabeth?”
Darcy looked away. “It’s just that I was happy. I didn’t want that happiness to end,” he said softly.
Georgiana put her arm around Darcy’s shoulder. “I know. And she probably didn’t either, but that’s really, really fast. She probably needed some time. Did you give it to her?”
Darcy snorted. “She walked out. How could I not give it to her?”
“So what happened next?” she asked gently.
“I got mad, and when she came in at rehearsal for the show, I tricked Charles into playing ‘It’s All a Joke.’”
Georgiana put her head in her hands for a moment then laughed and kissed her brother on the temple. “Only you, Will.”
Darcy smiled at himself. “I might have overreacted just a little bit.”
“Just a bit,” Georgiana agreed. “So then what happened? Did you talk to her?”
“I tried to, but she wouldn’t have it.”
“I can’t really blame her.” Georgiana took a moment to add up everything that had happened. “So what did you do then?”
“We changed our song. We played ‘Feel Me’ for them.”
Georgiana nodded. “I remember. Did it work? Did you talk to her after the show?”
Darcy shook his head. “No, I just left.”
Georgiana lightly slapped the side of her brother’s head.
“Ow!”
“Will!” she whined. “I can’t believe you. You’ve got to give her a chance to talk to you. That poor girl probably doesn’t know what to think.”
“I thought that if she loved me, she wouldn’t have walked out like that.”
She frowned. “Did you ever think that maybe Elizabeth just needed some time to think, and she was going to come back to you? After all, you played this song for her. Don’t you think you might want to see what she thought?”
“I thought she didn’t want to see me again. She said she was done. They played that ‘Good-bye’ song.” Darcy pushed away from his sister and stood up. Slowly he walked to the huge window overlooking the Berkshire Mountains and put his forehead against it.
“But that was before you played your song, right? Will, I really think you screwed up here.”
“You’re right, Georgie,” he said in a defeated voice.
Georgiana put her hand on his shoulder. “Before you make yourself crazy hating yourself, you might want to instead think about what you are going to say to her when you see her again.”
Darcy turned and pulled her into a close embrace. “I will,” he said. “Thanks, you give good advice, you know that?”
Georgiana looked into her brother’s eyes. “So do you,” she smiled lovingly.
Elizabeth looked with sympathy at her sister. Jane had dark circles under her eyes and despite the kind and gentle way she was dealing with the three children, Elizabeth could tell she was deeply anxious.
Jane seemed to be functioning, albeit slowly, as she brushed and braided the hair of the little girl who sat in her lap. “Lizzy,” she said softly.
“Yes?”
“I want you to stay with me when he comes.”
Elizabeth nodded. “When do you expect him?”
“I don’t know,” Jane said, her eyes once again losing focus.
“What are you going to say to him?”
“I guess that depends on what he says to me.”
“What do you want?”
“I want the hurting to stop, Lizzy. I just want to be happy.”
It was at that moment that their cousin, a nine-year-old boy named Erik, came running into the kitchen. “Jane, come here, quickly!” he exclaimed.
Jane and Elizabeth followed the boy into the living room where the television was on. MTV was positioned between Cartoon Network and Nickelodeon, and the children found something that stopped their channel flipping. Jane was on the screen singing “Everything You Are.”
“Jane,” the eldest child said, “Erik said this was you on the TV, but I told him it couldn’t be you.”
“Actually, Steph, it is Jane,” Elizabeth answered cheerfully. “Look, see? There’s me and Aunt Charlotte.”
Jane was watching the TV, a sad smile on her face.
“Oh,” said Stephanie, “I just thought it couldn’t be you. I forgot you are famous.”
Jane smiled and pulled the girl close. “That’s me,” she said, “your famous babysitting cousin.” They laughed and watched the TV some more.
“You look pretty there,” Stephanie told Jane, with the typical honesty of a child.
“Thank you. I had a lot of people working on me to make me look pretty.”
“You know, that’s the third time this morning I’ve heard that song,” a deep voice said. “I’m beginning to wonder if it’s a sign.”
Elizabeth and Jane turned around quickly. Behind them stood Charles, holding the hand of the seven-year-old girl.
“Jane,” said Michaela, “I answered the door. This man was looking for you.”
The color drained out of Jane’s face. “Thank you, dear,” she replied automatically.
“Why don’t you all watch TV, and a little later I’ll take you swimming,” Elizabeth told the children.
The young cousins gave their general assent, and Elizabeth led the adults into the kitchen. Automatically, Elizabeth found herself pouring a cup of juice for Charles, knowing it was his morning preference. She smiled bitterly at the ironic situation they found themselves in, and brought the cup to him, sitting at the table with Jane.
Jane stared at her cup, unable to speak as Charles looked at her nervously. “How have you been, Charles?” Elizabeth asked conversationally.
“All right, I guess,” he shrugged. “How are you? I was surprised to find you here.”
Elizabeth smiled. “You know our glamorous life.”
“We’re giving Lydia and Kitty a week off,” Jane explained.
Charles smiled warmly at Jane, carefully examining her with his eyes. “I’m not surprised. You’re so generous and kind.” Then he paused and looked away.
“How has everyone been?” Elizabeth asked, trying to keep the conversation going. “Caro, Richard, Will?” Her voice was a trifle unsteady on the last name.
“Oh, Caro is fine. Faust is coming back from London tomorrow, and she is going to spend the last week of the break with him. Richard’s been hanging out at his family’s place on the Cape.”
“And Will?”
“I haven’t spoken to him,” Charles said simply. He turned to Jane. “Could I speak to you—alone?”
Jane looked from Charles to Elizabeth. Elizabeth’s eyes told her she would do whatever Jane wanted.
“Please,” Charles added softly.
Jane nodded and moved to the dining room. There they could speak softly without being overheard, but they were still close enough to Elizabeth. Elizabeth kept herself busy by washing the morning dishes, then by finding random chores to do. She wanted to keep her promise and stay with Jane, and the work helped her think. She wished Charles had some news about Will; she was starting to worry about him. Elizabeth set up her laptop on the kitchen table and was disappointed to find there was still nothing in her email box from either Will or Caroline.
“You look tired,” Charles said gently as he sat down at the table with Jane.
Jane’s mouth curled up in what could have been a weak smile or a grimace. “I didn’t sleep well last night.”
Charles smiled gently. “I understand. I haven’t slept well in over two weeks.” His hands were restless. Instinctually, they kept reaching for Jane and he had to keep reminding himself not to touch her, not to hold her the way he wanted. “It’s amazing, isn’t it? How much can change in two weeks?”
Jane looked at him mutely and nodded.
“Did you mean it?” he asked. “When you sang ‘The Longest Good-bye’? Did you mean it? Were… Are you really ready to give it all up? Just like that?” He couldn’t mask the bitter hurt in his voice.
“What else could I do?” she asked, her voice low. “Did you expect me to just sit around? To let you and your friends keep messing with my friends and me? You hurt me. You hurt all of us, and I couldn’t stay there and let it go on.”
Charles looked down at the table and closed his eyes. Her words cut him deeply, and even more painful was the knowledge that she was right, and he deserved it. “Will you let me explain, please?”
“What difference will it make?” she asked wearily.
“It will make a difference because I love you and you love me.” Jane shook her head but he would not be stopped. “No, Jane. I was wrong, completely wrong and I admit that. I didn’t trust you with the truth and I should have. But I know you told me the truth when you told me you loved me. And you may not believe me, but I do love you. I have since the night we met and I will never stop.” His words were fierce and intense. He carefully took one of her limp hands in his own and said, “Please, let me explain. You deserve to know.”
Jane looked at him for a long time. His hair and body were the same, but his face had changed. He looked older, and his eyes were marked by a sadness she had never seen in him before. His perpetual cheerfulness was gone, and looking at him, Jane was hard pressed to remember it; his face was so stricken. Jane squeezed his hand and nodded to him to start.
Charles squeezed her hand back in gratitude and began. “Almost six years ago, my mom was diagnosed with breast cancer.” He closed his eyes against the painful memory. “At first I thought it was nothing. Yes, it meant an operation, but I figured with all the different treatments, she would be okay.” He paused and looked into her eyes. “I was wrong. She fought it, we all fought it together, for nineteen months, but in the end, there was nothing left. She died four years ago this month.”
Jane’s mouth fell open in involuntary sympathy. She reached out to take his hand in both of hers.
Charles continued, “When she finally died, I was devastated, but I was also exhausted. Caro and I had been pushing to finish our degrees, because that was what she wanted, while we were spending as much of our free time with her as possible. I got to the point where I knew the flight schedule between San Francisco and Providence as well as I knew my class schedule,” he said with a quick grin, “but in the end, there was nothing we could do but grieve together, and we did.”
“I’m sorry,” Jane said compassionately.
“So am I. She would’ve loved you,” he told her, his eyes gently holding hers. “Anyway, after she was buried, I found I needed to get away from California. Home had too many bad memories and I just needed a break, so I flew out to New York and spent some time with my best friend, Will.” His voice was thick with memories. “Will was going through a hard time with his band, and somehow focusing on him and his problems made it easier to handle the pain from my own loss.” He looked at her and shrugged. “Well, you know this part of the story. I joined the band, we were a huge success, I got Caro to come out and work with us.
“But I left my father behind,” he said slowly. “I talked to him regularly, but I was busy, busy being a star, and busy working through my grief. I didn’t realize that I had left Dad all alone or that he wouldn’t be able to handle it.” Charles frowned.
Jane could see he was blaming himself for something. “What happened?” she prompted him gently.
“You know, I still don’t totally know,” he said in bitter amusement. “I was doing great, top of the world, and one day I get a call, and Dad’s been arrested.” His face struggled with his emotions. “He was charged with insider trading.” He looked at Jane, his face puzzled, as if she might have an answer. “Apparently he pissed off the wrong people. I don’t know. All I know is that he was alone. Mom was gone and Caro and I were gone, and no one was there for him.”
“Charles, it’s not your fault,” Jane told him, her hand on his arm.
Charles shrugged. “The worst part of it was I still couldn’t be with him. Will was there when this all broke. He was great. He was the clear head we needed. Right away he saw what would happen if the tabloids got hold of the story, so he and Caro worked like crazy to make sure it didn’t happen. That’s where all those crazy rumors about the band came from. Darcy deliberately leaked them, so the press would chase him and ignore me.”
He sighed. “But even still, I couldn’t go to the trial. It was too chancy. Instead I stayed in New York, very publicly, while Caro slipped out to him.” His voice was bitter and tired.
Jane couldn’t believe what she was hearing. Elizabeth had told her it was something bad with Charles’s father, but she had no idea. She was touched by the pain and guilt he felt, and as she held his hand, trying to help him deal with his feelings of guilt, Jane realized something. Charles hadn’t kept the news of his father from her because he didn’t trust her to keep the secret. He hadn’t told her because he was ashamed. He felt guilty and ashamed for his father and for himself, and he was afraid she would be ashamed of him too. Her heart broke with this knowledge, and she knew then that she loved him, that she would always love him.
“He was convicted and sentenced to two years in prison.” Charles’s voice had taken on a strange, emotionless tone that was quite unlike him. “He served for a year, and during that time, I only visited him twice.”
“You should have told me,” Jane said gently, her hand stroking his. “You shouldn’t have carried this all on your own.”
Charles looked at her, his eyes filled with so much despair that it had completely defeated him. “I know. I know,” he told her regretfully. “I still can’t believe it. My dad, he took me on my first camping trip and taught me how to ride a bike and now he’s an ex-convict. I just can’t reconcile… Anyway, two weeks ago was his parole hearing. That’s why I was in California. He was released and Caro and I spent the week getting him settled. When he was convicted, he had us sell his house. There were too many memories there and most of his money was gone with all the fines he was forced to pay. When I bought the place in Muir Beach, I made sure it had a separate apartment on the grounds, so he would have a place to live when he was released. I spent the last week helping him get readjusted to being free.”
Jane’s hand reached up and brushed his soft golden curls. “That was very kind of you. You’re a good son.”
He shook his head slowly. “Jane, if I were a good son, this never would have happened. I would have stayed closer to him and made sure he was okay, instead of running away.”
Jane touched his face, stilling him and bringing his eyes up to meet hers. “Charles, it’s not your fault. He made his own choices.” She stopped and took a deep breath then committed to her course and revealed something she had never told anyone. “My parents, they have a lot of problems too. It’s not obvious, but it’s there. My mom overspends terribly and my dad is…” she sighed, “he’s very hard on her. He hurts her feelings and puts her down all the time. And it’s very hard. You want to help your parents, because you love them, but you can’t. You have to break away and let them live their own lives, because you can’t rescue them every time and you can’t make them change. I’ve tried.”
Charles looked at her eyes, which were open to him, and he saw the truth in her words. He opened his arms to her and she was there, holding him tight, and he wasn’t certain who was comforting who, only that they had a moment of perfect understanding.
“I missed you so much, Jane,” Charles whispered into her hair. “Every day I missed you and every night was a thousand times worse. I can’t tell you how many times I picked up the phone and started dialing you, to tell you to fly out. I needed you.”
“Why didn’t you?” Jane asked.
“Because I’m a fool. Because I didn’t think you would understand. I knew you had appearances and work, and I didn’t… I couldn’t tell you about Dad over the phone, and I didn’t think you would just drop everything and fly out to California because I asked you.”
Jane locked eyes with him. “If you had called and told me you needed me, I would have come. Nothing would have kept me away.”
“I know,” Charles said as he kissed her lightly and pressed his forehead against hers. “I’m a fool, Jane. I’m so sorry. I should have told you.”
Jane found that once she had loosed her emotions, she couldn’t hold them back. “What happened when you came back?”
Charles gave a bitter snort. “You mean when I sunk from fool to moron? I was miserable. I just needed to see you. I don’t know why, but I went to the party and I got drunk. I hated myself and my life and I couldn’t take it anymore, so I got blotto.”
“What about the picture?”
“What picture?” he asked, genuinely confused.
“There was a picture of you in the paper with that girl,” Jane explained, her voice carefully neutral.
“Really?” Charles asked. He shrugged. “I had no idea.” Then he looked at her as a thought passed over him. “You didn’t think that I…?”
Jane shook her head. “I didn’t know what to think, Charles. From your phone calls, I thought you wanted to break up with me.”
“No! Jane, never!” He sighed and dropped his head, “Christ, when I think about what I said over the phone. Oh, Jane, I can see where you would get that idea. I’m so sorry. I had no idea. I didn’t know about the picture and I didn’t know that you were in the theater when I sang ‘It’s All a Joke.’ I was hung over and had sat around waiting for too long, and when Will suggested it, I thought it was just to piss off the MTV people. I had no idea, really.”
Jane believed him. He was holding nothing back, either verbally or emotionally. She moved back, out of his arms, and tried to make sense of her thoughts and feelings. This new information did explain many things, but still, she had been hurt deeply by him. She still wasn’t sure if she could trust in him.
Charles watched her pull away. He understood. “I don’t blame you, Jane. I’m very sorry. I made the biggest mistake of my life, but please believe me when I tell you I do love you, and I’m sorry.”
He stood up and moved to the doorway. “Thank you for letting me explain everything, Jane. I hope you will forgive me someday.” He left then, with a nod to Elizabeth, let himself out the front door, and walked to his black Denali. His limbs felt shaky, like he had just run a mile. He leaned against the SUV as he opened the door and let the July heat escape. He had done it. He had apologized to Jane, but he found that he completely agreed with her. He wasn’t good enough for her and he didn’t deserve her forgiveness.
Jane sat perfectly still, trying to understand what had happened, when an icy coldness hit her. Charles, who had brought warmth and love to her, was leaving, and all she had when he was gone was pain. She got up and ran.
He was swinging himself up into his seat when she burst out the door. “Wait!” she yelled as she ran barefoot to him. Charles was back on the ground when she reached him and flung herself into his arms. “Don’t go,” she cried, as she buried her face into his T-shirt. “Please don’t go.”
“Jane?” he asked, his heart in his throat.
“I know! I know, but when you held me, I felt better than I had in weeks.” Her words tumbled out in a rush. “And then you went away, and all the hurt came back.” She looked up to him, her eyes brimming with tears. “I need you, Charles,” she admitted brokenly. “I need you and I don’t know what to do.”
Charles found himself comforting her, his emotions spun out of control. He rubbed his cheek against her soft blonde hair as her hands clenched in his shirt and she sobbed convulsively.
“Let’s go back into the house,” he said with far more confidence than he felt. Holding each other, they got through the door and as far as the entryway before they stopped and just held each other tightly, their bodies taking mute reassurance from the presence of the other.
Charles pulled himself together first. He gently eased Jane’s face up to his and kissed her tear-stained cheeks. “It’s going to be okay, Jane. We’re going to be okay.”
Jane listened for a second to Charles’s heartbeat pounding against her own chest. It comforted her. Just the return of his scent to her nose eased some of the pain she carried. She opened her eyes and looked at him worriedly. “But there are so many things to work out,” she sighed. “And what about the others? Char and Lizzy?”
Charles kissed her forehead gently. “I know,” he said softly. “It’s a lot.”
“I just wish we could go away together for a while, just you and me.”
Charles looked at her and smiled, his thoughts quickly falling into order. “Why can’t we, angel?”
“But,” Jane murmured, puzzled, her soft mouth left open in confusion.
“I’m sure Lizzy can handle things here, right, Lizzy?” Charles looked up to see Elizabeth exactly where he knew she would be, watching from the end of the hall. He smiled to her.
Elizabeth smiled back. “He’s right, Jane. You go with Charles. I’ll take care of things here.”
Jane looked at Elizabeth and smiled gratefully. “Thank you, Lizzy.” Turning to Charles, she said, “Okay, I’ll go pack.” She hurried up the stairs, leaving Charles alone.
He pulled out his cell phone and dialed his home number and waited for his sister to pick up. “It’s me. I need you to find a place for Jane and me to be alone for a few days.”
“I take it things worked out?” Caroline sounded pleased.
“Well, let’s just say we are in the process of working things out.” He looked down and grinned. “But things are looking good.”
“Where do you want to be?” Caroline asked.
“I don’t care, just someplace nice and close.”
“Okay, I’ll get you something.”
Asking her to call him back, Charles hung up just as Jane was coming down the stairs.
“Will you be all right?” Elizabeth asked her, appearing again from the family room.
Jane felt an odd sensation of dreaminess. She had no idea what was going to happen, but she knew these next few hours were going to affect her for the rest of her life. She looked at Charles, who held her hand, and then back to Elizabeth. “I think so. Thank you.” She hugged her sister, who hugged her back.
“Call me,” Elizabeth said in farewell.
Jane nodded and walked out the door with Charles. He helped her into the passenger side of the SUV and stored her bag in the back before taking his place in the driver’s seat. He put the keys in the ignition, then stopped and looked at her, as if he suddenly couldn’t believe it was real.
Jane looked at him and took his hand. “I do love you, Charles,” she said simply, her smile radiant.
Charles planted a quick, earnest kiss on her lips and started up the Denali. Jane didn’t know where they were going or what was going to happen, but she had her trust back, and that was enough.