But I knew she’d want to do it, at least in the long run. So I didn’t tell her what and who she was meeting.
“Do you think that’s them?” Blake whispered at my side.
I followed her finger to the corner where a very beautiful young woman, and a little boy were playing in the corner.
“She said she’d be sitting in the corner and she’d be wearing red. I assume that’s her. The little boy that she said would be there is there too.”
“It’s her, honey. Go over there and talk to her,” I urged, giving her a slight push on the back.
She gave me a wide eyed look, but nonetheless started walking towards the table.
Selene Reynolds saw us when we were three tables away.
Her dazzling smile showed us just how happy she was that we’d come.
“Blake…Blake Rhodes?” Selene asked hopefully.
Blake nodded.
“Yes, that’s me. Nice to meet you!” She said politely, offering her hand to Selene.
Selene smiled. “And this…is this your boyfriend you spoke of?”
Blake turned her smile on me, dazzling me with its brilliance. “Actually,” she said. “As of two days ago, he’s my fiancé.”
Selene beamed.
“That’s wonderful! Congratulations! Sit down, sit down,” she urged.
We sat on the side of the booth opposite of her and her son, scooting and moving until we got comfortable.
Which meant Blake was under my shoulder, and her hand was resting on my thigh.
We were touching from shoulder to knee, as we liked to do.
We small talked for a while, but it wasn’t long before I could tell Blake was getting anxious. Extremely so.
She’d never been the best at waiting.
And right now, with her foot tapping on top of mine, I knew she was near her limit.
“Selene,” I said, interrupting her question about what we were getting to eat. “If you don’t mind, could you tell Blake why you called? I don’t know how much longer I can keep her curiosity contained.”
Blake shot me a glare, but Selene only nodded in understanding.
Turning her gaze solely to Blake, she started speaking.
“I don’t think you really realize what all you’ve done for me,” Selene whispered, looking over at her son with her whole heart in her eyes. “But I had to tell you. Had to thank you.”
“Thank me for what?” Blake asked in confusion.
I tightened my arm around her shoulders as Selene continued.
“A couple of months ago I called 911 because my son was having a seizure. And you were the one to get the medics there. You were the one who spoke to me, calmed me down enough to get my head on straight,” she whispered.
Blake looked over at the little boy, and smiled. “I remember that. I had wondered how he was.”
She nodded. “Well, he started out really not well. He was born with a disease where his kidneys don’t do their job right. Over the next few years, we’ve been using all sorts of medications in a vain attempt at helping him, but then he had a setback, and all of a sudden he had renal failure. He was put on a donor list, but we never thought he'd get that bad…but it did.”
The woman smiled at her son as he interrupted her, holding his page up for Selene to see.
“It’s beautiful, honey. So beautiful, Holden. Will you draw me another one, please?” Selene said to her son.
Holden nodded, and dutifully got to work on his newest creation.
Selene waited a moment, watching her son with such love in her eyes that it made my heart long for the same.
Finally, she turned from her son, looking back at the two of us before settling her gaze back on Blake.
“Then, a little over a month ago, I got a call in the middle of the night.” A lone tear slipped down Selene’s cheek. “They said,” her voice cracked. “They said they had a match for Holden, and that I needed to get him to the hospital within an hour.”
She took a deep breath before continuing.
Blake’s hand on mine tightened.
My guess was that she saw where this was going, and was bracing herself to hear what she knew was coming.
“I got him there in twenty. Rushed him up to the floor, practically shoved him at the nurse, and urged her to hurry,” she sniffled. “It wasn’t until much, much later…about four hours into Holden’s surgery, that I heard how we’d come to get the kidney.”
Her eyes closed, and her words practically cried out her pain as she said, “It was a police officer that’d been in a shooting. He’d been the one to give my baby boy another chance at life. “
Blake’s breath caught as she started to cry, and I pulled her into my chest, kissing her temple as she wept.
They were happy tears, though. That I could tell.
“He’s…he’s alive because of my dad?” Blake croaked.
Selene nodded. “Yes. Yes he is. And healthy once again. Something I only dreamed about.”***“Do you think my mom would want to know that?” Blake asked me quietly as we were driving home an hour later.
I glanced at her, and reached for her hand before saying, “I think she’d like it. Yes, I think you should tell her.”
Blake’s mother was a bone of contention for us.
Blake really would rather not have much of anything to do with her since she’d treated Lou so badly before he died, yet I felt that she’d suffered enough.
No one would know if they’d have been able to work it out, because fate stepped in and changed the course of every one of our lives.
“Okay,” she agreed. “I’ll call her in the morning.”
“Good,” I said, looking back over at her again to gauge her mood before I breeched the next topic. “You hear about David?”
She blinked and turned to me, the hue of the red light clouding her face in red shadows.
“No,” she scrunched up her nose. “What about him?”
I turned back ahead as the light turned green, and accelerated through the intersection.
“He’s leaving, effective two weeks from Monday. Got a job up north somewhere,” I informed her.