I had six phone messages waiting for me when I finally turned on my cell phone after Raul and I returned to Palo Alto. It was after six in the evening, and though I had managed to sleep some in the Cessna, I was bone tired. Two of the messages were from my mother, two from Esperanza, one from Alex Helming. I didn’t feel like listening to any of them.
“You should stay another night,” Raul said, as he took me back to my car.
“I can’t. I have to get back.”
“But you’re exhausted.”
“We can get some coffee. I’ll load up on caffeine. I’ll be fine.”
Raul wasn’t convinced, but he didn’t argue with me. I wouldn’t have minded if he had. I was starting to enjoy his concern for me.
We stopped by a Starbucks and I ordered a venti latte with three shots of espresso. When we got to the hotel parking lot, Raul walked with me to my car. I unlocked the driver’s side door and then we just stood there. I didn’t know how to say good-bye and apparently neither did he.
“Thanks for doing this for me,” I finally said, though I had already said it half a dozen times that day.
“I’m really glad you asked me. I think some good may come out of all of this. It’s kind of cool, actually.”
He stood so close to me, and I still felt such shame for the things I had believed about him. “This isn’t the first time you’ve stepped in for me,” I whispered.
Raul tipped his head, unsure what I meant.
I looked down at my feet, unable to look him in the eye. “Cole said you came to the hospital the other day for me.” I lifted my head, summoned some inner strength, and met his gaze. “You came for me.”
“Yes.” His eyes never left mine.
A sliver of silence passed between us as we just looked at each other.
“I’m sorry, Raul. I’m sorry for every—”
But I could say nothing else. He leaned in and kissed me, silencing my unwanted apology with his lips. For a moment I was back in the clouds, far away from the cursed ground and the messy world. I never wanted to come back down.
When he slowly broke away, Raul lifted his hand to my cheek. I had started to cry again and he brushed away the tears.
“You’re not the person you think you are, Lauren,” he said.
Speechless, I stood, unable to move, as what he’d said echoed in my mind. I wanted to hear it over and over and over.
“Can I call you later to make sure you made it home okay?” he asked.
“Yes.”
He opened my door for me, but I turned to him and wrapped my arms around him. Some of my coffee spurted out of the cup I held and dropped to the asphalt. His arms were at once tight around my waist.
I wanted to thank him again, but I couldn’t, and I knew he didn’t need to hear it.
He kissed me again and stepped away. “You need to go so you can get home.”
I was amazed how much I didn’t want to get into my car and leave.
Raul walked toward his car. “Call me when you get home. Call me if you get sleepy!”
“I will.”
He got into his car and I got into mine, and for a few minutes we shared the same road, our cars just yards apart. Then he honked a farewell and I headed toward the highway and home.
Once on the open road, I relived those last moments with Raul, replaying them in my mind again and again. I felt what Mercy tried to describe in her diary when John Peter kissed her. I knew now exactly what she meant. I couldn’t keep myself from smiling as I drove.
How had Abigail ever turned her back on this? This feeling that swept you breathless into the sky?
I was nearly an hour into my commute before I pulled myself away from what happened in the parking lot to listen to my phone messages.
My mother first called with a progress report on my dad—he was doing well, the chest tubes had been removed—and then called to see how I was. Esperanza called twice to ask the same question—when was I getting back? And Alex Helming called to say Graham had arrived in Santa Barbara and wanted to speak with him. Alex had told Graham it might have to wait until next week. “But I can’t put him off much longer than that, Miss Durough. It would be much easier if Abigail were here. I trust she will contact you before then.”
But I really didn’t think Abigail had any plans to do that. Why would she? She had plenty of money. She could stay wherever she was as long as she wanted.
I eyed Tom Kimura’s book peeking out of my purse on the passenger seat. I had to get that book to Abigail before she did something stupid. I had to give her Tom’s message.
I pressed the speed dial for Esperanza.
“It’s me—Lauren.”
“Did you see him?” she asked, meaning Tom Kimura.
“I did. He gave me a book of poems to give her. And he forgave her a long time ago. But he’s dying, Esperanza. He’s not expected to live much longer.”
Esperanza said something softly in Spanish. It sounded like a prayer.
“Graham is in town,” she said a moment later. “He left messages on Miss Abigail’s phone. I saw him drive by the house twice.”
“Did he see you?”
“No. Arturo dropped me off around the corner, and I went in the back gate. Graham can’t get to the door. He doesn’t know the code for the front gate.”
“Esperanza, we’ve got to figure out where Abigail went.” An idea came to me. “Listen. She might have wanted to be near where Mercy died. Are you at home? Do you and Arturo have Internet access?”
“Sí, sí,”
“Go onto the Web and find as many five-star hotels in the Danvers—that’s what Salem Village is called now—and Boston area as you can, call them up and ask to speak Abigail Boyles. Tell them she’s a guest.”
“But we don’t know if she’s at any of those places.”
“If she’s not, they’ll tell you she’s not registered there. Then you try the next one.”
“Okay. And you will stay at Miss Abigail’s tonight?”
“I’ll be there in a few hours.”
“Graham may drive by and see the lights on in the house.”
“We’ll just let him think Abigail has timers on her lights.”
“He may buzz the gate.”
“I won’t answer it.”
“Don’t let him in, Lauren.”
“I promise I won’t. Call me if you find Abigail at one of those hotels.”
“Bueno.”
I got back to Santa Barbara after eleven o’clock.
I spent the last hour on my cell phone with Raul, talking about everything and nothing. I was prepared to put him on hold if Esperanza called, but she didn’t. He told me more about his dad, his childhood in Guadalajara, what it was like to move to America when he was eight, what it was like the first time he flew a plane. He told me when he knew he wanted to be a heart surgeon—the day his father died of a massive heart attack—and when he knew he was falling for me—the day I found him in the little library looking at all the old books.
I told him what my favorite foods were, what kind of music I liked, what I liked to do when I had nothing to do. I also told him something I hadn’t told anyone before—what it was like to grow up wondering what happened to the son your parents were supposed to have.
“You don’t still wonder that, do you?” he’d asked.
It felt good to tell him I was finally learning not to.
We hung up when I arrived at Abigail’s. The street was dark and quiet. There were no cars parked curbside, and Graham was nowhere to be seen. I opened the gate, drove through, and watched in my rearview mirror as it closed behind me.
Inside, the house was deathly still. When I had stayed at Abigail’s before, the diary had been there. It made me feel like I wasn’t alone. Without it, the house felt like a crypt. I didn’t want to climb the stairs to the guest room. Not with Raul’s kisses still lingering on my lips, reminding me of what Abigail had turned her back on. I grabbed an afghan from the library sofa and went into the sitting room. I knew the morning light would flood the room with warmth, even if the room itself did not look warm.
I curled up on the sofa with one of Abigail’s perfectly plumped pillows and pulled the afghan around me.
On the long table across from me, Abigail’s framed photos stood like sentinels guarding the past. Moonlight danced on the image of Abigail and Dorothea sitting on a sun-drenched porch railing with their matching parasols.
Abigail looked truly happy.
I fell asleep thinking of her that way. Laughing. Smiling. Holding Dorothea’s hand. Spinning her parasol.
Hours later, when dawn spread a blanket of golden light around me, I awoke with the same image in my head. Abigail and her parasol.
I sat up and looked at the photo across from me.
I knew where Abigail was.