Feels Like Falling - Kristy Woodson Harvey Page 0,111

car crash before it happened, and there wasn’t anything I could do about it. I couldn’t be mad, because I had pushed him away.

But when he walked onto that deck holding the hand of a beautiful blond girl, who probably wasn’t a minute over twenty-one, it took my breath away.

“Hi,” I said brightly, taking a sip of my wine so that I would have something to do with my hands and mouth. I set down my glass, patted June’s hand, and turned to Andrew and said, “Just catching up with your mom, but I need to be going now.”

“Gray, I…” Andrew looked at me, and then the girl, whose hand he had abruptly dropped.

“Thanks, June. I always love seeing you.”

I bolted through the house and out the front door. I probably should have cried, but I laughed instead. Because the world was as it was supposed to be.

I decided that I wouldn’t cry. I would take some deep breaths instead. I drove slowly, calming myself, realizing that my life wasn’t over. He was a wonderful man, but there would be others. And if there weren’t? Well, then that would be fine too. The past was in the past, and I had to move on. I thought about stopping by Greg’s to see Wagner for a minute, but I decided that a glass of wine might be more appropriate right now. Hell, maybe even a cigarette.

Diana was leaning on the kitchen counter, cup of coffee—decaf, I’m sure—in hand when I tore through the back door. She handed me a cup too. I kissed her on the cheek.

“Gray, I…”

Her face was white. My first thought was the baby. This was Diana’s biggest fear. But nothing could have prepared me for what she said next.

diana: the ends of the earth

I’d always wished that I’d got to go to my momma’s funeral, that I could have thrown a handful of earth on her grave, and then I wouldn’t’ve had any lingering questions. But I guess there was a good reason I hadn’t gone: she hadn’t had a funeral.

“What’s wrong?” Gray asked, out of breath. “Are you okay?”

Before I could answer, Charles tore in through the back door, into Gray’s kitchen. “Diana, I wasn’t trying to spring her on you.”

“Then what the hell were you trying to do, Charles? Did you think I’d laugh and squeal and hug her neck? She’s dead, Charles,” I screamed. “Dead!”

Gray was white as a sheet. “Who’s dead?”

“No one,” Charles said. “No one is dead. Everything is fine.”

They looked at each other like they thought it would be nice to introduce themselves but knowing this maybe wasn’t the time.

“Should I leave?” Gray asked.

I said, “No,” as Charles said, “Yes.”

I could feel myself getting kind of hysterical, and it was like all those years were just flooding back to me. The getting left, the being alone, Charles trying to raise us, all those hellacious foster families, Charles trying to get me again, that not happening. The only way I could make it right in my mind, the only way I could move on even a little, was telling myself that my momma was dead, and she couldn’t help it, and if she could have, she’d have traveled to the ends of the earth for me. She couldn’t be alive. She just couldn’t.

Gray was trying to calm me down, but I couldn’t even hear what she was saying. She pulled me into the living room and sat me down on the couch and rubbed my back in these long, slow, even strokes. I guess it must’ve worked, because I caught my breath, and I was still crying hard, but I could hear again.

“Diana,” Charles said. “I wasn’t trying to upset you. Let me explain.”

“Diana,” Gray whispered. “You have to calm down. It isn’t good for the baby.”

“The baby?” Charles asked.

Shit.

“I’m so sorry,” she said, covering her mouth. “But, seriously. This is bigger than that. You have to calm down.”

“What baby?” Charles asked.

Gray, she got up, and she said, “Look, I don’t know who you are, but you’re upsetting Diana. Yes, she’s pregnant. I’m sorry you found out that way, but I think it’s best that you go now. Being this upset is dangerous for her.”

She led him to the door, and I felt torn. Because, on the one side, I wanted my brother. I wanted him here to comfort me. On the other side, he’d brought her back into my life with no warning, no preparation at all, and I wasn’t ready