Sundays at Tiffany's - James Patterson [7]
His legs weakened and his eyesight blurred. Why now? Why Jane? Why him?
“You’re nine now,” he forced himself to say. “You’re a big girl. And so . . . and so — I’m leaving you tonight, Jane. I have to go.”
“I know you do. But you’ll be back tomorrow. Like always.”
Michael swallowed. This was impossible. It was breaking his heart.
“No, Jane. The thing is, I’ll never be back again. I don’t have a choice in this. It’s a rule.” Just saying the words made him feel worse than he ever had. Jane was special. She was different. He didn’t know why, he just knew she was. For the first time, the rule about when to leave a child struck Michael as stupid and unfair. He would have rather died than cause Jane this much pain. But it was true that he had no choice. He never had.
She didn’t cry, didn’t move a muscle in her face — just like Vivienne. She looked Michael squarely in the eyes and said absolutely nothing. There was an awful stillness about her that he’d never seen.
“Jane, did you hear me?” he finally had to ask.
There was a pause that seemed to go on forever.
“I’m not ready for you to go,” she said, and large tears started to roll down her cheeks again. “I’m really not ready.”
When she grabbed a tissue to wipe her nose, he saw that her small hands were shaking. And that just killed him. Those delicate little hands trembling uncontrollably. It was unbearable.
Damn it, he thought. Then an idea came to him, but this was something he’d never done before, not with any other child.
“Jane, I’ll tell you a secret. It’s a secret I’ve never told anyone, and you can’t ever tell anyone either. It’s the secret of imaginary friends.”
“I don’t want to hear your secrets,” she said, her voice wavering, but Michael kept going.
“Children have imaginary friends to help guide them into their lives. We help children feel less alone, help them find their place in the world, in their families. But then we have to leave, have to. It’s always been that way, and it will always be that way, Jane. That’s just . . . how it works.”
“But I told you, I’m not ready.”
Michael let her in on another secret. “Once I leave, you won’t even remember me, sweetheart. No one ever does. If you ever think of me, I’ll just seem like a dream.” It was the one thing that made any of this acceptable at all.
Jane grabbed his arm and held on tightly. “Please don’t leave me, Michael. I’m begging you. You can’t — not now, not ever! You don’t know how important you are to me!”
“You’ll see, Jane,” he promised her. “You’ll forget me, and it won’t hurt tomorrow. Besides, you said it yourself: Love means you can never be apart. So we’ll never be apart, Jane, because I love you so much. I’ll always, always love you.”
And with those words, Michael began to fade out of the room, in imaginary friend–style, and as he did he heard sweet little Jane’s last words.
“Michael, please don’t go! Please don’t! If you go, I’ll have no one. I’ll never forget you, Michael, no matter what. I’ll never forget you!”
Which brings the story to today.
Not an imaginary today either.
The real one.
PART TWO
Twenty-three Years Older, but Not Necessarily That Much Smarter
Eight
ELSIE MCANN LOOKED as pale as the froth on a latte, panic-stricken, and possibly close to a fatal stroke. So what else was new? After all, Elsie had been the dragonlike receptionist at my mother’s production company, ViMar Productions, for twenty-eight long and stressful years, and here she was, still breathing, if not exactly breathing fire anymore.
“Oh, thank God, you’re finally here, Jane,” she said, relief flooding into her voice.
“It’s barely ten o’clock.”
“I don’t know what’s wrong, but Vivienne’s been out here a hundred times, asking about you.”
“Well, tell her I’m here now.”
But Elsie wouldn’t have to. I could already hear Vivienne’s stiletto heels clicking down the corridor.
“Where have you been, Jane-Sweetie? It’s practically noon,” she asked, a split second before she actually came into view.
“It’s ten o’clock,” I said again.
“And where have you been?” she said, then kissed me on the cheek, as