Light Through Fog Read online

“Since Sam died.”

  “The vomiting and abdominal pain, too? The bloating?”

  “No, the vomiting and pain both started not long after the funeral. The bloating and the having to go to the bathroom all the time are more recent.” She said “Ouch,” as he pressed his fingers into her lower abdomen. “All the symptoms have been getting worse.”

  “You’ve already had blood drawn and we’ll screen that for cancer markers. Your ovaries aren’t enlarged,” he told her, “but I want to do an ultrasound of your uterus. It’s bigger than it should be. You might have fibroids. They’re not that unusual for a woman your age who’s had children. And you have no family history of cancer, Sarah.” He gave her a reassuring smile. “So don’t assume the worst.

  She nodded. She’d spent time on the internet researching symptoms. The only things she could figure out that it might be were ovarian or uterine cancer. But Dr Gruber was right. It was easy to assume the worst when diagnosing yourself on the internet. She would let him tell her.

  Beth, Dr Gruber’s nurse, came in to be present while he did the ultrasound. Sarah winced at the cold gel, and watched his face when he turned the screen away from her.

  Beth stood beside her. “Just relax,” she said. “And breathe.” Beth held Sarah’s hand, but she didn’t say, Everything will be OK.

  Because, Sarah thought, it wouldn’t. They could just look at her and see something was wrong, that she was dying.

  Sarah couldn’t see the screen, so she kept her eyes on Dr Gruber’s face, which was why she saw his fleeting expression of shock and dismay before he schooled his expression to the careful neutrality she guessed doctors practised in front of mirrors when no one was looking.

  “How bad is it?” she asked.

  His eyes were fixed on the screen, while his hand moved the ultrasound probe over her lower abdomen in tiny, tiny circles.

  “How bad?” she repeated.

  He didn’t look at her. “It’s not cancer,” he said softly. “And it’s not fibroids.”

  “It’s worse?” she whispered, still seeing that shocked expression that had flitted across his face, and wondering what could be worse than cancer.

  He still wouldn’t look at her, and her breath caught in her throat. Instead, he stared down at the floor. “You’re pregnant, Sarah.”

  She was so startled, she laughed out loud, and he turned to stare at her. “Pregnant?” She shook her head. “Twenty years you’ve been my doctor, and that’s the first funny thing I’ve ever heard you say.”

  But he didn’t smile. His eyes didn’t meet hers.

  “Wait. You’re serious? You think I’m pregnant?”

  “I know you’re pregnant,” he told her. “I can see the heartbeat. I can see the baby. You’re about two months pregnant.”

  Dr Gruber kept one hand fixed firmly on her abdomen, and carefully turned the ultrasound around so Sarah could see the screen. She knew what to look for, and she didn’t need to have the baby pointed out to her. She could see the tiny heart beating, could see the blurry curved shape of the child within her.

  She was pregnant.

  He did a screen capture, took the ultrasound, and then handed her a towel to wipe the gel off her belly. “Thank you, Beth,” he said.

  Beth let go of Sarah’s hand, nodded and left.

  When the door closed behind her, Sarah stared at the picture Dr Gruber printed out, brow furrowed. “This is impossible. Sam had a vasectomy. And there has never been anyone but Sam.”

  She looked up to find him watching her, his expression distant. “I did the vasectomy,” he said. She heard the coldness in his voice. “This happened right when he died, Sarah. Could have been a few days before, could have been a few days after.”

  She sat up and pulled the paper examination gown down, not liking the tone in his voice or the flat disbelief in his eyes. “There has never — not once — been anyone but Sam. Not for any reason, not for one minute.”

  Dr Gruber looked at her. “Then how do you explain the pregnancy?”

  “You screwed up the vasectomy.” She wasn’t smiling when she said it.

  “A vasectomy that worked just fine for you two for . . . what, ten years? Vasectomies have sometimes reversed themselves,” he admitted. “But the odds of Sam’s doing so and of you getting pregnant at the exact time that he died, when there are so many simpler explanations ...”

  Her hands knotted into fists. “There are no simpler explanations. There are no other explanations at all. I fell in love with Sam in eighth grade. I never dated anyone else, I never kissed anyone else and I sure as hell never slept with anyone else. So unless you’re going to try to convince me that immaculate conception is more likely than a vasectomy reversal, or that people really do get pregnant off of public toilet seats, then we have one, and only one, theory to work with.”

  He dropped it, changed the subject. “Your third pregnancy was bad. It nearly killed you. This one could finish the job. You’ve had a recent trauma. You’re not handling this pregnancy well. You need to consider terminating. For your sake, and for the boys’ sake.”

  She slid carefully off the exam table, tucking the paper gown tight around her backside. “Thank you for letting me know that I’m not dying. And thank you for ruining the first good thing to happen to me since Sam died.”

  On the way home, she bought a pregnancy test, and she checked for herself. Yes, she had the ultrasound picture, but the blue stripe on the stick was the ritual. It was the way she should have found out.

  She still had her stick from Mike, she still had her stick from Jim — both carefully labelled with the names she’d called them when they were still unknowns. Aloisius. Bob. She still had the stick from the miscarried baby, too. Sam.

  She should never have put the baby’s real name on the stick. But they had found out early she was going to be a girl. They had decided to name her Samantha. And Sarah hadn’t been able to resist putting the real name on that stick.

  Now Sarah had a fourth blue stripe, and the stripe on the stick made the pregnancy more real than the ultrasound had.

  She was going to have a baby.

  She had to sit down, and not because she was queasy, or because she was exhausted. She had to think.

  There had never been anyone but Sam.

  And Sam had a vasectomy after they lost Samantha, and after Sarah nearly died, too.

  But ...

  But ...

  But ...

  She closed her eyes. She had one night she couldn’t explain. One night out of an entire lifetime where she was not sure what had really happened. The night of the funeral, up in the tree house, with fog thick on the island and Sam holding her in his arms, they had made love.

  She knew it hadn’t been real, except she was pregnant.

  And what if?

  What if, the day he’d talked her into him going to pick up the boys, she had prevailed and she had gone? What if, in that moment, something had twisted in the universe, so that both possibilities actually happened? In one, Sam lived. In one, she lived.

  It could have happened the same way after the miscarriage. In his “if, she’d had the surgery and had her tubes tied. In her “if, he’d had the vasectomy.

  And when he had died in her world, and she had died in his, something connected them together again, out on the island, beneath the tree. Some need, some desperation, some call between them.

  And now she faced being pregnant alone, knowing that the pregnancy could kill her. She was going to have to tell her mother and father, she was going to have to tell the boys, she was going to have to tell her friends. All of them were going to be horrified. They were going to point out that she had almost died last time.

  Her parents and Sam’s parents and her friends would worry about her, remembering the disaster of the last pregnancy. They would tell her to abort, to think of the boys and what would happen to them if they lost their mother too.

  They would have a point.

  But the baby was Sam
’s baby.

  The last piece of him she had.

  She was keeping the baby. She would take vitamins and eat plenty of fruit and rest whenever she needed it and she would take care of herself and not do too much. She would let her family and friends do things for her, and for once she would not try to be Superwoman.

  Somewhere close enough that she had touched him, Sam was still alive. They were having a baby.

  And, oh God, she needed him.

  That night, she tucked the boys into bed and she locked up the house. She walked through the backyard, over the bridge and onto the island. The air was crisp with the first autumn chill, the flowers and their stands were gone, the urn sat at the base of the tree on the little pedestal she’d bought for it. She didn’t do more than glance at it.

  She leaned against the tree, her forehead to the rough bark, and she whispered, “Sam, I don’t know if you can hear me. I don’t know how to reach you. But I’m here, and I need you. I need you so much.”

  She waited, but he didn’t come.

  She felt sick. The pregnancy, her fear and her need for him all weighed on her. She’d promised herself that she would stay all night if she had to. But she didn’t have the strength to spend all night leaning against a tree, and the cold was biting into her.

  If she climbed into the tree house and he came, he wouldn’t know she was there.

  But they had the lanterns.

  She climbed into the tree house, stopping twice to catch her breath, and made her way from the balcony into the interior. She went to the cabinet where they stored the lanterns, pulled one out and lit it, then hung it in the window that faced the house. He might see it if he looked out of the kitchen window; he might as he came over the bridge. If the magic let him.

  She sat on the futon, a blanket wrapped around her and she rested her hands on her belly, on the baby. She prayed that he would see the lantern. And she waited.

  “Who’s up there?”

  The voice sounded far away, but it was shouting and angry. Sarah woke and realized she’d fallen asleep. For a moment she was confused. She wasn’t in her bed. She was in the tree house, the lantern was still burning and tendrils of fog were curling around the windows.

  But her hands were still curved over her belly, and she remembered. Her breath caught in her throat. “Sam?” she shouted.

  “Sarah?”

  She heard feet on the ladder and, an instant later, he came through the door. Sam. Sam alive, with the fog swirling in behind him. They held each other, and wept, and kissed. But this time neither of them hurried to turn the futon into a bed. This time, they had to talk, and both of them knew it.

  “I saw the light from the house, coming through fog on the island,” he said. “But ... it was real? You’re real?”

  “I don’t think I can prove I’m real to you. I know you proved you’re real to me. I’m pregnant.”

  He stared at her. “After Samantha, you had your tubes tied.”

  “Samantha?” she whispered. “We lost Samantha. She ... I had a miscarriage almost five months in, and nearly died. She didn’t make it. You had a vasectomy a month later.”

  He thought about that for a long time without saying anything. That was Sam. She watched his face, watched him working through the different connections, how all the pieces fitted, the same way he’d designed houses and office buildings. Carefully, methodically, he was putting things together, visualizing how they worked, seeing actions and consequences. She waited. As she’d always waited.

  “So you’re pregnant and I had a vasectomy. And there are going to be people who know you who know that.”

  She nodded. “Dr Gruber tested me today because I thought I was dying: ovarian cancer, uterine cancer, something like that. He found out I was pregnant, and when I told him it could only have been you, he didn’t believe me.”

  “He doesn’t matter. How are you?”

  “Lots of morning sickness and I’ve lost weight.”

  “I noticed. Let the kids ... let the boys help you out.” He rested his hand on her belly, and pressed his face against her hair. “We’re still us, Sarah. You and me. But different. Slightly different pasts, very different futures. You’re gone in my world, and the kids are lost without you. I’m lost without you.”

  “I know. I can’t sleep at night.”

  “But . . . where you are ... I left you taken care of?”

  She nodded. “Everything’s paid for. The investment accounts are still growing, the college trusts are fine, the passive income’s fine. We’ll be all right. But, Sam, it’s like I can’t breathe without you.”

  “How can I be here for you? I’ve tried to get back to you every night since that night. This is the first night I’ve made it. And I don’t know why I made it, what I did, what you did, how to make it happen again.” He took her hands in his and said, “If I could, I’d bring the kids here and hire someone to deliver food and I’d never leave this place again.”

  “I know. But could we bring the kids? Could they meet themselves?”

  “I doubt it. I can’t figure out how we can both be here. I can’t figure out how this works.”

  “We’re supposed to be together,” she said. “We were always supposed to be together, and we both knew it.”

  “We still know it. Maybe that’s the . . . the magic that makes this work.” He closed his eyes. “Or maybe you were supposed to have Samantha, and you got this second chance, and once she’s born you’ll never be able to get back here again.”

  Sarah said, “I don’t want to think of that.”

  He hugged her. “Sarah, know that whether I can touch you or not, whether you can see me or not, I am with you every minute of every day. And I can’t leave the kids alone every night, but I’ll come out here for a little while and light the lantern. Look for it at twilight. If you can see it, and if you can get out here, come.”

  She buried her head in his chest and he wrapped his arms around her. And finally they did fold down the futon and they made love.

  The pale pink of dawn woke them both. He lay looking at her, tracing his finger along the tiny scar on her chin. “Where you fell off your bike,” he said. “When you were twelve.”

  “Before we met.” She ran her hand over the surgical scar on his left knee. “The end of your budding hockey career when you were seventeen.”

  “So much is the same,” he said. “I know you. My heart and soul know you, and you’re not some different Sarah. You’re you. Only . . .”

  “Only in your world I’m dead, so I can’t really be your Sarah. And in my world you’re dead, so you can’t really be my Sam. I’ve been asking myself the same question you’re asking yourself. Am I cheating on you with you? Is being here with you wrong?”

  He touched the wedding band on her finger. “I gave you that ring,” he said. “I promised to love and honour and cherish you until death parted us. And you’re right here, not dead. So am I. I meant it then, Sarah, and I mean it now. How might matter to your family, or mine, or to our friends, but I don’t give a damn about how. We found each other, we’re together the way we should be and I’ll do whatever I can to be with you as much as I can.”

  When, hand in hand, they stepped onto the bridge together, he vanished again, and again her heart cried out.

  But this time was different. This time she knew he’d been real. And if she was alone in her world, she still had him in their world, tiny as it was.

  Her mother said, “You’re pregnant! How could you?” Her father turned away from her, shame and disgust on his face. Her friends, knowing about Sam’s vasectomy, asked her, “Who’s the father?” and eyed their own husbands with sudden distrust. She told them the truth and they didn’t believe her. When she refused to have an abortion, her parents stopped speaking to her and her friends suddenly had their cell phones turned off.

  The boys were supportive, if a little stunned, when she told them.

  Every night for five months, Sarah looked for the light in the
tree house window, and every night it wasn’t there.

  She took pictures of the boys, had them take pictures of her and her swelling belly, and she put the pictures into scrapbooks. She made no secret of the fact that she was storing the pictures in the tree house. “To keep them close to your dad,” she told the boys. When Sam came again, she wanted to be able to show him.

  She didn’t tell them that.

  She had a hard time with the pregnancy, but not as hard as she’d had with the baby she lost. She managed to gain a little weight.

  She had never been so alone.

  But she was sleeping nights. Sam was with her in spirit, and she went out to the tree and sat by the urn and talked to him. She told him about the boys. She knew that he was telling her about them and about Samantha, who in his world had lived.

  Sometimes Mike and Jim went out and sat beside her while she talked. Sometimes one or the other would go out to the tree alone.

  “He’s always with us,” she told them. “He will always love us.”

  Sarah made it through the long days and the lonely nights. He was out there. He was with her. She did not doubt him, and she did not lose faith.

  She was standing sideways at the kitchen sink, washing the dishes around the huge obstacle of her belly, when she looked out the back window and saw the light in the tree house.

  It was too early to send the boys to bed. It was, however, Friday night. She told them, “I’m going out to the tree house to talk to your dad for a while. You two can watch TV until midnight, and then go on to bed.” She looked them in the eye. “I’m counting on both of you.”

  Mike hugged her. “We won’t let you down. Or Dad. You’re not alone, Mom.”

  Jim nodded agreement.

  She hugged them. “Thank you. Thanks for being people your dad and I can both be proud of.”

  The boys locked up. She hurried out the door and across the bridge and into the fog. “Sam?” she called.

  He burst out onto the balcony. “You’re here!”

  “I am. But I can’t get up the ladder any more.”

  “I’ll come down.”

  He touched her belly, and held her as close as he could. The baby kicked him, and he said, “I knew you’d see the light tonight.”