Chapter 24

ADA

I look up at Alex seated beside me at the restaurant table. The Space Needle has rotated a full 360 degrees, and now it’s turning our view toward Elliott Bay, where a ferry is sailing out of the harbor, perhaps to Bainbridge Island to the west. Alex’s eyes are big and attentive, and he waits for me to speak. I don’t know if I feel brave enough to tell him, but somehow I know I must. I hear Joanie’s and Dr. Evinson’s voices in my ear. I hear James’s and Ella’s voices, too. I feel that they’re near. Alex waits patiently.

Two years prior

I’m sitting on the bed in our room at the Waterbrook Inn, typing on my laptop. I have two hundred more words to write and I’ll have a first draft, and then I can finally play a little on this working vacation. James and Ella have been saints, keeping busy with trail walks and other activities while I work. Sunrise sent us here to scope out what is quickly becoming known as the hottest family destination on the East Coast. With its enormous property and access to the falls, I’ve decided that it definitely lives up to the reputation, and the article is shaping up to be a favorable one.

Ella bounds into the bedroom and leaps onto the bed. Her pigtails are lopsided, so I straighten them. That dark, silky hair. She’s an Italian beauty, like her nonna. “Mommy,” she says, smiling to reveal a missing front tooth. “Daddy says we can go out for ice cream.”

“Oh, does he?” It’s only an hour past breakfast, and I feel a little annoyed with James. He spoils her, and he has no plans to change his ways. I love this about him, and yet at times I feel like the odd woman out—the naysayer, the party pooper, the one who’s always eschewing fun for the practical. I sigh. So what if he says yes to ice cream more than I’d like? At the end of the day, I know that Ella’s the happiest little girl in the world because James is the kind of daddy who says yes. And I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Ella nods and jumps up and down. Her pink tutu flounces beneath her. “I want chocolate,” she says. “With sprinkles.”

I save the draft of the article in progress, then turn around to face her again. “Sprinkles, huh?”

She pulls my arm. “Come on, Mommy. Let’s go.”

I shake my head. “I can’t. I have to finish this article.”

“Mommy,” she whines. “You always have to finish an article.”

She’s right. And I feel the familiar pang of guilt that I’ve felt since the day she was born. The one that sneaks up whenever I’m doing anything but being her mom.

“Just give me twenty minutes,” I say. “I’ll finish this up and we can all go out together.”

James appears in the doorway. He’s wearing a long-sleeved white T-shirt. A recent trip to Mexico has turned his skin a deeper shade of olive, the way it did on our honeymoon in Italy. He grins at me. “You coming?”

“Give me fifteen?”

Ella runs to James and he scoops her into his arms. She’s small for her age, petite in stature but not spirit. “Mama said I can have sprinkles,” she says.

I fold my arms. “Did I say that?”

Ella smiles, and James sets her back down. “Wait, I have to go find Aggie.”

When Ella was three, she saw an old carved wooden sailboat in an antiques store in Monterey, on a press trip I’d been invited to. We had no idea why, but she fell in love with the little boat. Its varnish had long since worn off, but red lettering on the side remained: “Agnes Anne,” now “Aggie.”

She wouldn’t let it go, so James bought it for her. She slept with it that night, and every night after that. “Aren’t little girls supposed to love dolls, or teddy bears?” James asked. We had to stifle our laughter while watching her cuddle the boat on that first night. “It could have been worse,” James said. “She could have fallen in love with your curling iron.”

Ella isn’t like other little girls. She’s inquisitive and curious, with a heart that senses others’ emotions with the precision of Doppler radar. She drops coins from her piggy bank into the outstretched hands of the homeless in Times Square, frets over the plight of hurt animals on the roadside, and two Christmases ago, organized a coat drive at her school when she saw a little boy shivering on the playground.

“You know,” James says, “what in the world are we going to do if she ever loses Aggie?”

I sigh. “We’ll have to find another one.”

“There is no other Aggie,” he says. “Have you seen the way it’s carved? It’s an original. It was all hand-done. There’s no way it could be re-created.”

“Well,” I say with a smile, “then we can’t lose her.”

James nods as Ella returns with the little sailboat under her arm. “I’m ready,” she says, looking up at her dad.

“Let’s give your mommy a few more minutes,” he says. “Then we’ll all go together.”

I finish the article as planned, just as my cell phone rings from the bedside table. I groan. It’s my editor. “Hi, Suzanne,” I say, motioning for James to shut the door.

“Oh, good, I caught you,” she says. “The photographer we hired for the shoot bailed. Did you bring a camera?”

I glance at James’s camera on the desk across the room. “Well, yeah, but—”

“Then you can add another piece to the story,” she says. “We just need some candids of families near the falls. Kids and parents hiking together, out in nature, that sort of thing.”

“Suzanne, I’m a writer, not a photographer.” I recognize the annoyance in my own voice, but I don’t apologize or try to mask it. Suzanne already assigned this trip at the last minute—the week of Ella’s birthday, no less. I had to cancel a party at Princess Beatrice’s Tearoom. And there were tears. Lots of tears. And now Suzanne is asking me to bring back photographs, too?

“Oh, don’t be such a diva,” she says. “They don’t need to be perfect. Candid is fine. Remember, that’s what Juan likes. The type of stuff people post on MySpace. You just take some snapshots. He’ll make it work.”

I sigh.

“Hey, aren’t you there with your husband and daughter?”

“Yes,” I say reluctantly. I can almost hear the wheels in her mind turning.

“You could photograph them together,” she says. “In front of the falls.”

“I’ll see what I can do.”

“Great,” she says. “I know you won’t let me down.”

I hang up the phone and throw on a jacket, then tuck James’s camera into my bag and walk out to the front room, where James and Ella are playing a game of Uno.

“Ready?” James asks, looking up.

“Yeah,” I say. “But we have a slight detour before ice cream.”

Ella groans.

“Suzanne needs me to get some family shots of the falls.”

James smiles. “Good. We can walk up that trail we found yesterday.”

Ella folds her arms across her chest. “Do we have to, Mama?”

“Sorry, love,” I say. “I promise, it will be quick. And you and Daddy get to be my models.”

She grins and runs to the door.

The waterfall is farther away than we thought. By the time we get to the ninth switchback, James and I are winded.

“C’mon, you guys!” Ella calls out from ahead. “I can hear the waterfall!”

We catch our breath, then trudge on. “It’s beautiful out here,” James says to me. He stops and reaches for my hand. “You know, we wouldn’t be getting to see all of this if it weren’t for you.” He kisses the top of my hand. “Am I married to the greatest woman on earth, or what?”

I smile. He’s never complained about my career, choosing only to see the positive side of all of it. I love that about him.

“Look!” Ella calls from around the bend. “I see the waterfall!”

“Ella!” I shout. “Be careful.”

James and I jet ahead and find Ella standing precariously close to a rickety railing that looks like it might have been constructed in 1892. “Honey, come back here, right now,” I say.

“Oh, Mama,” she says in a voice that tells me she has the potential to be quite the teenage drama queen. “I’m fine.”

“It’s my job to worry about you,” I say, wrapping my arm around her shoulder.

“Can we go for ice cream now?” she asks.

“Soon,” I reply, digging the camera out of my bag. “OK, let’s get a few pictures first.” I point to the railing, with the waterfall just beyond. “James, don’t let go of her,” I continue. “I don’t trust that railing.”

He grins, scooping Ella into his arms, before dangling her upside down. “You mean I can’t hold her over the edge?” She giggles and he puts her down.

“OK, you two crazies,” I say, looking through the viewfinder. “Stand together now. Smile like you’re having a good time on vacation.” James and Ella simultaneously stick out their tongues.

I frown, thinking of Suzanne’s reaction. “Please?”

They grin, then smile properly just as the flash goes off. “Perfect,” I say. “Let’s just get a few more, just in case. James, can you turn toward the falls, maybe, and point like you’re showing her something?”

James nods and takes a step closer to the railing. He steadies himself for a moment when his foot gets caught on uneven ground. “I’m fine,” he says, kneeling down and pointing up toward the waterfall.

I notice it for the first time through the lens, and it is truly majestic. Such power. Such force. I snap a picture, then another, then key through the images on the camera. “These are good,” I say, grinning at the way Ella smiles at James in the final frame, but I freeze when I hear Ella’s scream. I look up just as it happens, the moment the world goes from a beautiful dream to a horrific nightmare. The railing has given way, and Ella is falling backward. James turns to reach for her, and he slips forward.

I run toward the edge, where the two most precious people in my world have disappeared. The voice that lurches out of my lungs is shrill and high-pitched. “James! Ella!” I can’t breathe. I can only hover over the edge. It pulls me like a magnet. I want nothing more than to join them, to throw myself into the moist, foggy air, to be with them for eternity. I close my eyes, doubling over in terror, shock, when I feel a firm grasp on my arm. “Miss,” a man says. He’s wearing a brown park ranger uniform. “I saw what happened. I’m so very sorry. Let’s get you down and we’ll call an ambulance.”

My eyes brighten momentarily. “Yes,” I say. “James is a great swimmer, and Ella has had swim lessons since she was three—”

“No, ma’am,” he says gravely. “I’m very sorry. There’s no way anyone could survive that type of drop. I’m calling the ambulance for you.”