Holly's Story Read online

  four

  AS THE JULY Fourth weekend approached, Holly realized that her summer was going to be a good one. She hadn’t had any major blowups with her parents. She was well liked and trusted at the hospital, and had been put in charge of the annual ice cream social for the pediatric floor. She was learning to sew and with her mother’s help had created a few fashionable (and acceptable) outfits for back to school. And Shy Boy was e-mailing her once again.

  His first note read:

  Hello, pretty Holly. Sorry about my long silence, just know that it was good for me in one way, bad in another because I couldn’t see you.

  While his message was typically cryptic, he’d inadvertently given her a big clue: wherever he was, he was “seeing” her. She answered with a chatty message about her summer so far, and didn’t bother to suggest meeting. Why humiliate herself? If he wanted to meet her, he’d ask. In the meantime, she let her imagination run, conjuring up exciting scenarios. He was a prince, closely guarded by security forces. He was a great athlete busy training for a marathon, or maybe the Olympics.

  Yet for all the secrecy between them, she also liked him. He had substance and depth, features she had begun to appreciate over time. When they got into weighty matters, he often had something to say that she found thought-provoking. When she’d pointedly written, “Do you believe in God?” he had answered, “Of course I do. People need something to believe in besides fate. Or happenstance. Plus I’d hate to think that the here and now is all we have. Too much pain and suffering to make me want to believe that!”

  “Earth to Holly.”

  Hunter’s voice from behind made her jump.

  She spun away from her computer screen. “Don’t sneak up on me. You’re supposed to knock before coming into my room.”

  “I did knock, but you were off in outer space. What are you doing, anyway?” He peered over her shoulder.

  “Nothing.” She quickly hit the Escape key. Better to lose her latest reply to Shy Boy than have Hunter see it.

  His eyes narrowed. “You can’t fool me, sis. You’re somewhere you’re not supposed to be, huh?”

  “With parental controls in place? You must be joking.”

  “Your eyes go all shifty when you lie. Don’t you know that’s how Dad always catches you?”

  She reddened. “Take a hike.”

  He laughed. “First we need to talk. Raina asked me to talk to my boss about donating free candy and balloons for that ice cream social. She said I should check it out with you, if it’s something you want me to do.”

  “Anything you can get for free would be great. Do you think he’ll do it?”

  “Probably. He’s a pretty nice guy. How much of each would you need?”

  “I’ll check with Sierra.” Holly paused thoughtfully. “Actually, I’m thinking about expanding the event for next year.”

  “Expanding? Like how?”

  “Like having a full-blown carnival on the grounds, and asking local businesses to donate prizes. I’d love to have a carousel, a few tame rides, some clowns, a petting zoo—stuff like that for the kids. We can get the community involved, raise some money for the hospital, and the sick kids will have a good time. The ice cream social is okay, but kind of rinky-dink. With a carnival, everybody wins. What do you think?”

  “I think it sounds like a lot of work.”

  “The Pink Angels program can sponsor it and do a lot of the work.”

  “You and Raina are the most enthusiastic two people I know. Others may not be so committed.”

  “Then they’ll just have to get committed, won’t they?”

  He cleared his throat, looking embarrassed. “Raina also wants me to dress up like a clown and pass out any stuff my boss might donate.”

  Holly grinned. “That’s a great idea! If it works, we’ll have you do it again next year.”

  “I’m going to feel stupid.”

  “It’s for charity. And for the kids. They love that kind of stuff. Please do it.”

  Hunter shrugged. “I don’t even know how to do clown makeup.”

  “Leave it to me. I’ll make you look very clownish.”

  “That’s what I’m afraid of.”

  “I’m so glad you’re in love with Raina,” Holly said with a laugh. “She knows just how to pull your strings.”

  Sierra was intrigued by Holly and Raina’s suggestion for a carnival. “There are organizations that specialize in events like this. They set up fund-raising for schools and churches. It would probably take about a year to get such an event arranged. Maybe we could do it in conjunction with the hospital’s seventy-fifth anniversary! That’s coming up next year. It would be a great fund-raiser if we invite the whole community. Let me check into it.”

  Raina and Holly exchanged smiles.

  “Now, how about this year?” Sierra asked. “How’s it coming along?”

  After they gave her their report and the list of volunteers who’d signed up, they headed off to their separate floors and daily duties. Holly was just getting off the elevator when she saw a little boy coming down the hall, walking beside a woman pushing a baby in a stroller. She called out, “Ben? Is that you?”

  The boy looked up and saw her and his face broke into a grin. He began running. Holly knelt and caught him when he threw himself into her arms, shouting, “Holly!”

  She laughed and tousled his blond hair. “You look so grown-up.” He must be close to seven now, she calculated. The last time she’d seen him, he’d been five and just completing his second round of cancer treatments.

  He grinned and she saw that his two front teeth were missing, with one new tooth partially grown in. “I told Mom you’d be here.”

  The woman with the stroller came hurrying up. “Holly? I can’t believe it! All he’s talked about was seeing you again. I told him you probably wouldn’t be here, but he was so sure. And he was right!”

  Holly stood, and with her hand on Ben’s shoulder, she gave Beth-Ann Keller an impromptu hug. “Is this your new baby?”

  Beth-Ann beamed a smile down at the child in the stroller. “This is Howie. He was born last August, just after Ben came home.” The plump-cheeked baby was happily chasing cheese crackers around the tray of his stroller.

  “He’s so cute.”

  “Cute as me?” Ben asked.

  She squeezed him more tightly. “No one’s as cute as you. You still my special boyfriend? Or did you go and fall in love with some first-grade girl?”

  Ben made a face. “Girls have cooties.”

  “I’m a girl.”

  “You’re different.”

  Because of his mother’s difficult pregnancy, Holly had been Ben’s best friend during his chemo treatments. She’d gone with him to every treatment, taking him for ice cream in the hospital cafeteria afterward, a ritual he’d loved despite frequently throwing up every bite once they returned to his room. Her heart seized as a thought struck her. “Why are you here?”

  “Just a checkup,” Beth-Ann said, as if sensing Holly’s fear. “He’s had some blood work done.”

  Ben held out his arm. A bright blue Band-Aid with drawings of Spider-Man stretched across the inside of his elbow. “I didn’t even cry.”

  Holly’s heart melted. “You’re so grown-up.”

  Baby Howie gurgled. Beth-Ann said, “We should be going. It’s a long drive home.”

  “I’m really glad I got to see you,” Holly said. She hugged Ben goodbye.

  “Am I really still your boyfriend?”

  “You are,” Holly said, making him grin more widely. She watched the elevator doors close and turned away, pressure in her chest and good feelings swimming through her. She thought of Shy Boy, then mumbled, “Yes, Ben. You’re still my one and only. But I’ll bet you’ll leave me for a second grader. Oh yes. Bet you will.”

  “What’s wrong?” Kathleen had gone over to Carson’s after work, only to find him angry and agitated.

  “Dad and I had a blowup.” He paced his room, dodging the pi
nball machine and jukebox.

  “About …?” She knew he had a knack for getting into trouble, but so far this summer he seemed to be doing better.

  “He found out I was taking the EMT course.”

  “What’s so horrible about that? I would have thought he’d be glad.”

  Carson gave a derisive laugh. “It’s not real medicine. I told you he’d react badly. That’s why I didn’t tell him in the first place.”

  “But you like the course and you told me you’ve done well.”

  “I have. But Dad considers it beneath the House of Kiefer. He wants me to study traditional medicine. Become one of the Kiefer dynasty.”

  There had to be more going on. Wait for it, Kathleen told herself.

  “Plus I told him I was dropping my college prep schedule for senior year. I mean, why should I suffer through trig and Latin if I’m going to be an EMT?”

  “Maybe he’s not steamed about your becoming an EMT so much as he is about your changing your schedule.”

  He whipped around. “Whose side are you on, anyway?”

  “I’m not taking sides. I’m just trying to help. You know, he might be right about your changing your curriculum in your last year of high school. You’ve come so far and you’re almost there.”

  “That stuff’s hard.” Carson slumped into a beanbag. “I’m not smart like my brother and sister. I have to study really hard and that’s just for Cs.”

  “We all have to study hard.” She dragged another beanbag across from his and flopped down. “Except for Holly. She skipped a grade way back when and she still doesn’t break a sweat over the books.”

  “Well, I do,” Carson said. “Busting my brain isn’t how I want to spend my senior year. But more than that, I don’t want to go to college—at least not for four years. I’m telling you, I can go two years to Tampa Tech and come out with an associate degree and take the EMT test. Becoming an EMT is what I want to do.”

  “Maybe he’ll come around if you do well in school this year.”

  Carson scoffed. “He’ll think he won if I back down.”

  She felt sympathetic, but wasn’t sure how to console him. “Did you tell him how you felt after you saved my mother?”

  “And she wasn’t the only one I saved either,” Carson blurted out.

  “She wasn’t? Who else?”

  His face colored and Kathleen realized that it was something he hadn’t meant to say. She held her breath, waited. He sat still, staring over her head, his jaw clenched.

  “Tell me. Please.”

  “Steffie’s.” His eyes bored into hers. “I saved Stephanie’s life when we were fourteen.”

  five

  “WHAT ARE YOU talking about?” Kathleen’s heartbeat had accelerated the moment he had said Stephanie’s name. Hadn’t she always felt there was some mysterious and perplexing element that linked Stephanie and Carson?

  Carson’s expression went dark as a thundercloud. “No one else knows.”

  She sat very still, hoping he would finally tell her what had happened.

  “If anyone knew, we both could be in serious trouble.”

  “But it had to have happened when you were in like … ninth grade. Isn’t there a statute of limitations?”

  “She could have died.”

  Kathleen’s heart constricted. “You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to, Carson, but if you do, I’ll always keep your secret, just like I kept Raina’s secret about Tony all those years.”

  He laced his fingers behind his head and hunkered down in the squishy chair. “If I tell you, you can’t ever tell anyone, not even Raina or Holly.”

  Kathleen nodded.

  “You already know how Steffie has grown up with absentee parents. Nothing but a few housekeepers along the way.”

  And all the money in the world, Kathleen thought, without much sympathy.

  “My mother felt sorry for her and sort of took Steffie under her wing. Steffie practically lived here from sixth grade to ninth grade.”

  Kathleen knew all this. The girl was way too familiar with Carson’s family and home, yet there had been nothing Kathleen could have said without coming across as a whiny witch, which she was when it came to Stephanie Marlow. So she kept quiet.

  “Mom wasn’t as involved in Dad’s practice in those days,” Carson continued. “She was around a lot more because I was younger and my sister was still at home. It’s only since I’ve been in high school that she’s kept full-time hours.”

  “And so Stephanie adopted your family?”

  “You could say that. She followed me around like a puppy, but I didn’t mind. I mean, she’s always been beautiful. When Steffie was thirteen, the modeling industry noticed her. It was also the first time I saw her mother really take an interest in her. She took her to New York, got her signed with an agency, took her to photo shoots. Steffie did catalog work for a while and was always flying off on weekends and long holidays to Texas or California or New York. When they dressed her up, she looked twenty.”

  And hot, Kathleen thought. The girl was stunning. What guy wouldn’t have fallen for her? She said, “Did she get treated like she was twenty?”

  “In every way.” He rotated his shoulder, massaged his forearms. “By the time she was fourteen, she was into tranquilizers and alcohol.”

  Kathleen’s mouth dropped open. “What did her mother do?”

  “She never noticed.” He offered a sardonic laugh. “Steffie was good at hiding it, though, so no one noticed.”

  “Did you?”

  “She told me. We, um, sometimes drank together.”

  He grew quiet and Kathleen realized that every muscle in her body had gone rigid with tension. His story had taken on a life and she saw it clearly in her head like a noir movie—two kids testing their boundaries. She wondered what else they might have experimented with while they were alone. “Not at your house?”

  “Never. Only at hers. Because by then, Steffie’s mother was no longer interested in her career and was globe-trotting for weeks at a time. Steffie told me that her mother figured she’d launched her into life, gotten her a start in a career where she could make great money, and therefore, her job was done.”

  “Sounds cold.”

  He shrugged. “She was treating Steffie like an adult, except that she wasn’t.” He blew out a heavy sigh. “Then one night, Steffie called me. She had OD’d. My folks were off at a medical conference and I was alone—my sister had already left the nest. I ran all the way to her house and found her semiconscious. She was pretty out of it, but she begged me not to call 911. She said she was sorry, that it was an accident.” He stopped talking abruptly.

  “And you didn’t call,” Kathleen said matter-of-factly.

  “My parents were doctors. I knew what to do. I did it.”

  Kathleen closed her eyes. Her whole body trembled as she realized what a serious and dangerous thing he’d done. “What if she’d—”

  “Well, she didn’t. She was pretty sick, though. I stayed all night and most of the next day too, until she was really okay. I took her to my house because I was afraid to let her out of my sight, and we watched movies until Mom and Dad came home. We waved and told them we were just hanging out. Mom ordered pizza and life went on.”

  Kathleen thought about all he’d told her. “Was it an accident?”

  He shrugged. “She said it was an accident, but at the time, she was pretty unhappy. And by not reporting it, well, it meant she wouldn’t have to see a psychiatrist like she would’ve if she’d been brought to the hospital. But she swore to me she’d never make a mistake like that again—mixing the pills and booze. And so far she hasn’t.”

  And she’s used it to bind you to her all this time, Kathleen thought, but she said, “What if she does?”

  “I’ll call 911, like I should have the first time. But the point I’m making is that I’d be a good EMT. I don’t know how to make my dad understand that.”

  “Maybe all you can do is just k
eep talking to him about it.”

  “Well, we’d better come to an agreement soon. I’ve got to get my schedule changed before August.”

  “Would it be so terrible to take the prep courses? It would make you even more ready for community college.”

  He looked aghast. “And give up partying? Give up messing around with my girl?” The kidding tone she was so used to crept into his voice, and his gaze grew mischievous. He was once again the Carson she knew best.

  “That girl would be me, wouldn’t it?”

  He grinned. “None other.”

  “I’ll give you special permission to study harder and longer.”

  He propelled himself across the space between their two beanbag chairs and fell on top of her. “Never!”

  “You’re squashing me.” She twisted, but she was helplessly pinned beneath him.

  “Should I call a paramedic?” He didn’t wait for her answer; he crushed his mouth against hers. Instantly, Kathleen was lost in a haze of heat, with the throb of her own blood running hot and hungry in her veins.

  “You were a fabulous clown and everybody loved you,” Raina said, standing over Hunter, who sat in a chair in her room having his clown makeup removed.

  “But was I sexy?”

  “Amazingly sexy. To me.” She slathered cold cream on his forehead.

  “Was it my red nose or my big feet that turned you on the most?”

  She laughed and wiped wadded tissue over the melting mess of whiteface. “How could I choose? You’ll just have to wonder.”

  “I think I scared one little girl. She took one look at me and started crying.”

  “You weren’t nearly as scary-looking then as you are now.” She stepped aside, and he looked in the mirror and feigned passing out. “Come on. Sit up.”

  “If Stephen King saw me, he could write a book.”

  “Quiet.” Raina worked until the wastebasket was filled with tissue and Hunter’s face was red and shiny from being rubbed.

  “Is there any skin left?” he asked. “How do you girls take this stuff off every day?”