“Actually, I think she just wants to move on too.”
“Yeah, that’s what she told me, but she’s still hurt, and she’s the only family I have left, and even though we weren’t close as kids I would like us to be close now. Especially with the two of you together, you’re my brother and she’s my sister, we’re family, and it’s time to start acting like it. So I brought her a gift.” Night held up the box.
“You two want some time alone together?” he asked, although he didn’t want to leave Abigail for long, Night was right, the two of them did need time to reconnect.
“What did I just get done saying?” Night grinned. “We’re family, I want you to know this too. Besides, you know she wants you back in there, and if I go in there alone all she’s going to be doing is thinking about you and where you are, so we may as well bring you along and get her to focus.”
Night smiled again, but he couldn’t hide the worry in his eyes as they opened the door to Abigail’s hospital room. Both she and the doctor turned as they entered and the doctor nodded at them.
“You can take your girl home this afternoon, Mr. Flynn,” the woman said as she set Abigail’s wrist down on the bed and patted her shoulder.
“Home,” Abigail said with a content sigh as she rested back against the pillows piled behind her. “That sounds pretty good.”
“I’ll give you one last examination before I sign your release papers this afternoon, Ms. McNamara,” the doctor said as she departed.
“I missed you,” Abigail said, holding out her hand to him as he crossed over to her bed.
“I was out of the room for less than three minutes,” he said as he clasped her hand and brought it to his lips and kissed it.
“You saying you didn’t miss me?” she asked.
“That would be a nope.” He stooped and kissed her quickly, then sat beside her and hooked an arm around her shoulders, carefully easing her against him without aggravating her cracked ribs. “Night came by for a visit, he wanted to check up on you.”
Night was hovering by the door looking anxious, but when Abigail smiled at him he relaxed and came to join them, pulling up the chair and setting it beside the bed. “I brought you two things.”
“Yeah?” Abigail eyed the box.
“That’s the second,” Night said.
“Then what’s the first?” she asked, clearly curious.
“An apology.”
“For what?”
“What I did to keep you and Spider apart,” Night said.
“You already apologized for that.”
“Yeah, well I wanted to do it again. I really am sorry. I guess since I always idolized Dad it was just automatic that I do what he asked without even bothering to find out why. That wasn’t fair to you and it wasn’t fair to Spider, and once I found out what my best friend had been through and how I added to that, I went to a bar to drink away my guilt, and let’s just say I did something really stupid that I also haven’t forgiven myself for.”
Abigail reached out with her broken arm and touched her fingertips to her brother’s hand. “Eric, it’s okay, forgive yourself. I wish you hadn’t done what you did, but Ryder and I are back together now and everything’s okay. Please, for me, let go of the guilt. It’s time.”
“Yeah,” Night said in a way that made it clear he hadn’t decided to move on.
“So thing number two?” Abigail glanced from Night to the box he held and back again. “What is it?”
“Something to help you forgive Mom and Dad,” he said, holding it out to her.
She took the box with curious fingers, set it on her lap, and pulled off the piece of tape holding the two sides closed. When she pulled out what was inside her brow furrowed at what she held. “I don’t understand.” She looked to her brother for clarification.
“Mom and Dad made mistakes with you, Abs, I’m not denying it, I did too, you were different and we didn’t make enough of an attempt to understand the things that were important to you, but I don’t ever want you to doubt again that they loved you. I’m not condoning what they did, messing with your life, but they did love you.”
“These are all programs from the competitions that I did when I was a kid, there are dozens in here.” She rifled through the box. “It looks like every competition I was ever in.” She opened one, flicked through it. “It has my scores written in here. Were they there? They never came to any of my dance competitions.”
“They did, they just didn’t want you to know,” Night corrected.
“Why?” Abigail asked as she started to cry. “Why would they keep that from me?”
“That I don’t know,” Night replied. “I wish I could tell you but I never even knew that they went. I found the box when I was cleaning out the house after Mom died. I wanted to give it to you, but I wasn’t sure you would want to know. Now it just seemed like the time was right.”
“Thank you, Eric, you’re right, now the time is perfect. This makes me question everything about them and I hate I can’t ever get answers, but it’s nice to know that in their own way they cared.” Abigail was crying openly now, and Spider curled an arm around her and held her close. “I want to start fresh, all three of us today, right now, as a family.”
“I’m going to be a better big brother to you, Abs,” Night promised.
“I love you, Eric, I always did even when we weren’t close, and now, maybe just like Ryder and I are getting a second chance you and I can have a second chance too.”
“I’d like that,” Night said, taking her outstretched hand.
Spider had lost his biological family, been given a second one with the McNamara’s that he had also lost, but in a different way by the betrayal of the only positive father figure he had ever had. Now he had a third family and this one he was never letting go of.
4:17 P.M.
“Lavender,” Abigail grinned as Ryder carried her into her apartment and she saw her friend closing the oven door. “What are you doing here?”
“I just made you guys some dinner, I heard you were coming home today,” the pretty redhead replied.
“How’d you hear?” Abigail asked, pushing at Ryder’s shoulders to get him to put her down so she could go hug her friend, but he ignored her and carried her over to the couch where he deposited her.
“Eric called, said you might like some of my awesome homemade vegetarian lasagna,” Lavender answered, walking over to hug her.
Lavender worked as a waitress at her favorite restaurant, they’d met nearly four years ago when Lavender had first moved here after a particularly difficult time in her life. The redhead was a few years older than Abigail, but they had quickly formed a firm friendship. Lavender was outwardly confident, but she had the saddest gray eyes and an air of melancholy that she tried to hide. As hard as Abigail had tried, she hadn’t been able to breach that barrier Lavender had erected around herself.
“Thank you so much,” she said, squeezing her friend. “I do love your lasagna and it was so sweet of you to make it and bring it over.”