Nights in Rodanthe - Nicholas Sparks [60]
She would plump his pillows before sitting beside the bed, then take his hand and talk. Most of the time she filled him in on recent events, or family, or how the children were doing, and he would stare at her, his eyes never leaving her face, silently communicating in the only way he could. Sitting beside him, she would inevitably remember her childhood—the smell of Aqua Velva on his face, pitching hay in the horse stall, the brush of stubble as he’d kissed her good night, the tender words he’d always spoken since she was a little girl.
On the day before Halloween, she went to visit him, knowing what she had to do, thinking it was time he finally knew.
“There’s something I have to tell you,” she began. Then, as simply as possible, she told him about Paul and how much he meant to her.
When she finished, she remembered wondering what he thought about what she’d just said. His hair was white and thinning: His eyebrows reminded her of puffs of cotton.
He smiled then, his crooked smile, and though he made no sound, when he moved his lips, she knew what he was trying to say.
The back of her throat tightened, and she leaned across the bed, resting her head on his chest. His good hand went to her back, moving weakly, soft and light. Beneath her, she could feel his ribs, brittle and frail now, and the gentle beating of his heart.
“Oh, Daddy,” she whispered, “I’m proud of you, too.”
In the living room, Adrienne went to the window and pushed aside the curtains. The street was empty, and the streetlights were circled with glowing halos. Somewhere in the distance, a dog barked a warning to a real or imagined intruder.
Amanda was still in the kitchen, though Adrienne knew she would eventually come to find her. It had been a long night for both of them, and Adrienne brought her finger to the glass.
What had they been to each other, she and Paul? Even now, she still wasn’t sure. There wasn’t an easy definition. He hadn’t been her husband or fiancé; calling him a boyfriend made it sound as if he were a teenage infatuation; lover captured only a small part of what they had shared. He was the only person in her life, she thought, who seemed to defy description, and she wondered how many others could say the same thing about someone in their life.
Above her, a ringed moon was surrounded by indigo clouds, rolling east in the breeze. By tomorrow morning, it would be raining at the coast, and Adrienne knew she’d been right to hold back the other letters from Amanda.
What could Amanda have learned by reading them? The details of Paul’s life at the clinic and how he spent his days, perhaps? Or his relationship with Mark and how it had progressed? All of that was clearly spelled out in the letters, as were his thoughts and hopes and fears, but none of that was necessary for what she hoped to impart to Amanda. The items she had set aside would be enough.
Yet once Amanda was gone, she knew she would read all of the letters again, if only because of what she’d done tonight. In the yellow light of her bedside lamp, she would run her finger over the words, savoring each one, knowing they meant more to her than anything else she owned.
Tonight, despite the presence of her daughter, Adrienne was alone. She would always be alone. She knew this as she’d told her story in the kitchen earlier, she knew this as she stood at the window now. Sometimes she wondered who she would have been had Paul never come into her life. Perhaps she would have married again, and though she suspected she would have been a good wife, she often wondered whether she would have picked a good husband.
It wouldn’t have been easy. Some of her widowed or divorced friends had remarried. Most of these gentlemen