Message in a Bottle - Nicholas Sparks [98]
Catherine.
It couldn’t be.
He shook his head. At this distance he couldn’t tell if he was mistaken or not.
She started to walk away again just as Garrett called to her.
“Catherine—is it you?”
She didn’t seem to hear him above the noise of the street. Garrett glanced over his shoulder and spotted Theresa in the shop, browsing. When he looked back up the street, Catherine—or whoever she was—was turning the corner.
He started toward her, walking quickly, then he began to jog. The sidewalks were becoming more crowded by the second, as if a subway had suddenly opened its doors, and he had to dodge around throngs of people before he reached the corner.
He turned where she had.
Once around the corner, the street grew steadily—menacingly—darker. He picked up his pace again. Though it hadn’t been raining, he felt his feet splashing through puddles. He stopped for a moment to catch his breath, his heart pounding in his chest. As he did so, fog began to roll in, almost like a wave, and soon he couldn’t see anything more than a few feet away.
“Catherine—are you here?” he shouted. “Where are you?”
He heard laughter in the distance, though he couldn’t make out exactly where it was coming from.
He started walking again, slowly. Again he heard the laughter—childlike, happy. He stopped in his tracks.
“Where are you?”
Silence.
He looked from side to side.
Nothing.
The fog grew steadily thicker as a light rain began to fall. He started moving again, unsure where he was going.
Something darted into the fog, and he moved quickly toward it.
She was walking away, only a few feet in front of him.
The rain began to fall harder now, and suddenly everything seemed to be moving in slow motion. He began to jog… slowly… slowly… he could see her just ahead… the fog growing thicker by the second… rain coming down in showers… a glimpse of her hair…
And then she was gone. He stopped again. The rain and fog made it impossible to see anymore.
“Where are you?” he shouted again.
Nothing.
“Where are you?” he shouted, even louder this time.
“I’m here,” a voice said from the rain and mist.
He wiped the rain from his face. “Catherine?… Is it really you?”
“It’s me, Garrett.”
But it wasn’t her voice.
Theresa stepped out of the fog. “I’m here.”
Garrett woke and sat up in bed, sweating profusely. Wiping his face with the sheet, he sat up for a long time afterward.
Later that day, Garrett met with his father.
“I think I want to marry her, Dad.”
They were fishing together at the end of the pier with a dozen other people, most of whom seemed lost in thought. Jeb looked up in surprise.
“Two days ago, it didn’t seem like you wanted to see her again.”
“I’ve done a lot of thinking since then.”
“You must have,” Jeb said quietly. He reeled in his line, checked the bait, then cast again. Even though he doubted he’d catch anything he wanted to keep, fishing was, in his estimation, one of life’s greatest pleasures.
“Do you love her?” Jeb asked.
Garrett looked at him, surprised. “Of course I do. I’ve told you that a few times.”
Jeb Blake shook his head. “No… you haven’t,” he said sincerely. “We’ve talked about her a lot—you’ve told me that she makes you happy, that you feel like you know her, and that you don’t want to lose her—but you’ve never told me that you love her.”
“It’s the same thing.”
“Is it?”
After he’d gone home, the conversation he’d had with his father kept repeating itself in his mind.
“Is it?”
“Of course it is,” he’d said right away. “And even if it isn’t, I do love her.”
Jeb stared at his son for a moment before finally turning away. “You want to marry her?”
“I do.”
“Why?”
“Because I love her, that’s why. Isn’t that enough?”
“Maybe.”
Garrett reeled in his line, frustrated. “Weren’t you the one who thought we should get married in the first place?”
“Yeah.”
“So why are