He crossed his arms. “Kat, this time I’m asking. I need you.”
Brooks never needed me and hearing him ask made everything that I was going through seem irrelevant. I started to stand and he helped me, lifting me the rest of the way. For a moment he looked into my eyes and wiped away my tears. “No matter what she has to say, however it affects us, it won’t change anything for me. If you want space, I’ll give it to you. If we can’t move forward, I’ll accept it.”
I couldn’t give him an answer, because it would have required me to speak and I was too emotional to do it without breaking down.
We held hands as we walked back into the room and sat down across from the woman that was doing a great job tearing our family completely apart.
“Why was my mother in that building, Danica? I need to know.”
“After she walked in on us we didn’t exactly have the words to explain. She put on a pretty face and told me to leave, without saying anything else. I think that hurt me more than anything; the fact that she refused to look at me. I felt so ashamed and regretted everything immediately. I don’t know what they talked about, or how she managed to get through the night without anyone knowing. I went home and made dinner, just waiting for her to confront me. I even called you boys in early that night, in fear of having to leave and spend the night away from the house. Your father was a mess. I’d broken his heart and he wasn’t willing to accept that we were through. The thing is, I never stopped loving him. I just got so caught up in the affair.”
I felt like cringing as she spoke, but instead I squeezed Brooks hand as his mother broke his heart.
“The next morning he left for work and finally was able to call. He said that you were all going to be moving and the house was going to be up for sale within the week. He told me that I was a mistake and that he’d spend the rest of his life making his mistake up to your mother.”
She put her head down and cried harder. “That’s the last time I heard from your father, but not the last time I heard from your mother.”
Danica looked right at me. “Katy, that morning she drove you all to school, and none of you probably caught on that anything was wrong. She was going to meet your father so that they could talk.”
“How do you know that? Because I know she wouldn’t have called to tell you that.”
“The school called me first, letting me know that I had to come get the boys. They asked if you’d be coming home with me, too. As angry as she was at me, I knew you were her first priority, so I called her. When she answered I could tell that it was bad. She didn’t get on the line and start cussing me out, or accusing me of ruining your family. She was calm, almost like she knew what was happening and that they weren’t going to make it. I’ll never forget the words she said to me.” She paused and looked right at me. “Take care of Katy, Dani. Keep her safe and love her forever. Make sure Brooks never takes her for granted.”
I was crying so hard that Brooks was literally holding my body still. I could hear Danica’s sobs, but I refused to open my eyes. It hurt too much to think about. I felt his arms wrapping around my back and him kissing the top of my head. “Shh.”
I couldn’t control my emotions as the pain ripped through me over and over again. I was playing it all out in my head. It was as if I could see her driving to see my father, hoping that they could somehow work through it to keep our family together. I could see her overlooking that betrayal to give one final wish for her only child. After Danica had deceived her and tried to tear them apart, she still wanted her to care for me, because she knew I’d be loved. How could someone, who knew they were dying, swallow their pride and be that brave? My mother wasn’t just beautiful, she was my hero, and she died with the man that was willing to do anything to keep us all together. I wanted to be mad, but it was so poetic at the same time. If I ever had to choose a way to die, in that desperate of situations, I’d want to be with Brooks, because knowing he was at my side would make it all somehow easier.
When I finally opened my eyes and looked in her direction, I was ready to find out why, out of all the times she could have told us, what she was telling us now. “Why now?”
Danica looked at me like I should have already known why. “Don’t you get it, Katy? You can’t move forward with Brooks because you think you were responsible for Bobby’s death. How do you think I felt, raising the daughter of the couple that I killed?”
Then it all made sense.
Everything.
Every single time she’d forgiven me. Every time she looked into my eyes and told me she loved me. Every moment that she spent trying to fix my wounds and comfort me when I was sad.