The Opposite of Never Read online

  THE OPPOSITE OF NEVER

  Copyright © 2018 by Mary Kathleen Mehuron

  All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever.

  Published by SparkPress, a BookSparks imprint, A division of SparkPoint Studio, LLC Tempe, Arizona, USA, 85281

  www.gosparkpress.com

  Published 2018

  Printed in the United States of America

  ISBN: 978-1-943006-50-2 (pbk)

  ISBN: 978-1-943006-51-9 (e-bk)

  Library of Congress Control Number: 2017958341

  Formatting by Katherine Lloyd, The DESK

  All company and/or product names may be trade names, logos, trademarks, and/or registered trademarks and are the property of their respective owners.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental..

  There is a special kind of person that can make me laugh so hard the muscles in my face ache. Not surprisingly they are also who helped me become the woman I was meant to be. Love as always: Carol K., Joe S., Andrea B., Doug S., Janet H., Carol W., Tom M., Irene M., Jamie T., Tammy L., Michele T., Marion H., Chuck M., and my siblings Sheila, Jim, Barbara, and Mike.

  One

  “My mother had a great deal of trouble with me, but I think she enjoyed it.”

  —Mark Twain

  Spencer Paquette was certain he looked like a warrior in his new lacrosse helmet. He had adjusted it so the visor sat low on his forehead and nearly covered his eyes, but he could covertly peer out through his chrome facemask to survey the crowd gathered for his game. It had just ended. His team, the Falcons, had crushed their opponents by a score of 19–8, and Spencer had scored the majority of the strikes.

  At the moment that he was certain they were victorious, he didn’t give a thought to the fact his uniform was saturated with sweat. He grabbed his teammates and hugged them so energetically that he lifted each of them off the ground. Some of the guys, those he was particularly fond of, he smacked on the back too. He not only felt like a star athlete, Spencer felt like a stud.

  Six months before the game, he’d told his mother, Yvonne, he was not going to indulge in her lasagna and baked goods anymore.

  “Why not?” she asked as she placed her hands on her hips. Yvonne was widely known as a great cook, so she was a bit insulted by his proclamation. “You’re still a growing boy. You need to eat.”

  “I’m cutting down on the carbs, Mom. Can you make me meat and fresh vegetables? I’m starting a new training program to build muscle.”

  “Oh no. Not one of those performance enhancing things you read about.”

  “Don’t be so dramatic, Mom. I’m talking about strength training, protein powder, and a paleo diet.”

  “A paleo diet? I don’t know anything about all that. Can you write down some recipes?”

  “Mom, you can just Google it.” Spencer turned his head and hid his smile from her so she wouldn’t realize he was laughing at her, but he thought, Really! She is pathetic when it comes to technology. “There’s tons of information on the Internet. I’ll tell you what; I’ll send some links to your email account.”

  “Only send the meals you think you will actually eat. And honey? If they have pictures, it will really help.”

  Spencer was already on his cell phone swiping his way through windows of food pages. “You know, Mom, this will be good for Dad, too. He needs to lose some belly fat. They say when old people gain weight around the middle, it can be very unhealthy.”

  “Old? You better not let him hear you say that. He’s going to turn sixty next year, and I expect there will be months of brooding before he does. There’s no point in setting him off early on.”

  Spencer’s new diet changed him from a tall, lanky boy into a strapping young man. In five months’ time, he had a flawless six-pack of abdominal muscles. He was so proud of it that, without even realizing he was doing it, he took every opportunity to remove his shirt and admire the results of his hard workouts. He felt alive in a way he had never known before, and he was fully aware the girls at his high school noticed he was bulking up. Two friends of his, girls he had known since preschool, kept wrapping both their hands around his biceps and saying, “You are getting huuuuuggggge.” Yvonne teased him about how much time he spent looking in the mirror.

  Spencer took off his helmet and scanned the thinning crowd. He was looking for his mother; he already knew his father wouldn’t be there because he had to work. When he spotted her, he noticed she was standing with her good friend Georgia Best. It was not uncommon for Yvonne to ask Georgia along for a ride, as she didn’t like to drive anywhere alone. Today’s game took place in the city of DeGranit, which was about forty winding miles from the small Vermont town of Greenfield, where they lived.

  To his surprise, standing behind his mother, perhaps twenty feet away, he caught sight of someone who stopped his heart. Spencer was shocked to find he couldn’t take a breath. His ears roared. All his blood seemed to rush to his head—and another body part, as well.

  The person who had thunderstruck Spencer was a girl with long, jet-black hair so lustrous that it shimmered in the afternoon sunlight. He couldn’t take his eyes off her, and he started walking her way. Because of the coincidence of their placement, he was headed in his mother’s direction as well. Nearly in a trance, he greeted his mom and Georgia when he reached them as if nothing were happening.

  “Hey, guys. Thanks for coming.”

  Georgia sounded excited. “Well, that game was thrilling. Just thrilling. You must feel very proud, Spencer.”

  Spencer’s coach taught all his players that humility is much more attractive than bragging. “Thanks, Mrs. Best. The whole team put in a great effort today.”

  “Spencer, you can call me Georgia now. I think you’re old enough—don’t you, Yvonne?”

  “Of course. It’s just a habit because he had you in school as a teacher. I do it myself when I refer to you sometimes. I’ll say to him, ‘Mrs. Best is dropping by for tea.’”

  “I really appreciate you coming all this way, Georgia,” he said earnestly, but his eyes soon shifted away to find an older man had joined the black-haired girl. He assumed the man was her father. Spencer could almost make out what they were saying to each other.

  The changing breeze caught their voices and carried them to him on the wind. “Zelda, do you want to get a maple creemee? You know I can’t resist an excuse to have one up at the Neal Farm.”

  Zelda visibly stiffened. “I was going to go with my friends, Kenny.”

  The man hung his head, clearly disappointed. Spencer felt sorry for him. “I’ll tell you what, I’ll meet you kids up there. Explain to your friends that it’s my treat.”

  “Kenny . . . Dad, can you just give me some money? We’re not children anymore.”

  The man hesitated, but wound up handing her some bills, and she sauntered away.

  Spencer redirected his gaze from Zelda’s backside to his mother’s face and smiled brightly. “Are we going for creemees, Mom?” His mother was obviously delighted he had asked her to join him. His strategy was to project himself to Zelda as the loving son; therefore, a good guy she would be willing to talk to.

  He looked right at Georgia and asked, “Do you have the time to spare?”

  “For a maple creemee? Are you kidding me? I’ll make time.”

  The three of them chuckled.

  Yvonne said, “Spencer, do you want to go in one car and then pick yours up on the way back through?”

  “No thanks, Mom, I’ll take my own car. I’m no
t sure what the guys are doing after. The other team invited us to a party.”

  “Okay, honey. We’ll see you up at the farm.”

  Kenny stood alone, looking around for a distraction from his profound sadness. The last thing that he wanted to do was cry, but he felt heartbroken that Zelda refused to give him a chance. He had been told many times by other parents that teenagers could be cruel. Zelda went far beyond that. She had withdrawn from him to the point that he felt he barely knew her. His teary eyes landed on the small group that stood nearby. A tall boy wearing the uniform of the opposing team stood with a woman who was, quite obviously, his mother. They had the exact same eyes, and they were engrossed in conversation with a second woman. She was exceptionally lovely—not that she had perfect features, but she was radiant. Kenny felt pleasantly diverted by the animated expressions and gestures she made as she talked. The mother and son laughed at something she said just as they broke away from their little circle.

  At the same moment that the trio separated and began to walk toward and around him, Georgia, the radiant one, turned her ankle on the soft turf and went flying into him. He caught her by her forearms and held her upright.

  “Oh, my goodness. I’m so embarrassed. I’m sorry, I didn’t have time to change my shoes after work today.” They both looked down at her brown suede dress pumps that were now smudged with dirt and matted with clumps of grass. “Good lord, I’m a klutz.”

  “It’s not a problem.” When he looked into her face he felt even more intrigued by her. Why can’t I ever meet a woman like this one? She had wavy auburn hair and eyes that were a golden butterscotch brown. He realized he was still holding onto her tiny wrists at this point, and when he glanced down at them, he noticed a wedding ring on her left hand. He thought, Bummer. She smelled delicious. Reluctantly, Kenny released her.

  “Thank you for catching me. I’m Georgia.”

  “My name is Ken. Maybe I’ll see you again at one of these games.”

  “Maybe. I came to see my friend’s son play, so I can’t promise to be at all of them.” Yvonne was absorbed in conversation while she walked with her son and hadn’t even seen Georgia stumble. “I have to catch up with my friend. Enjoy this beautiful afternoon, Ken.”

  Restlessly, almost feverishly, Kenny found himself scanning the crowd at every lacrosse game that spring. He rationalized his perfect attendance as a way to keep an eye on his stepdaughter, but he also hoped to run into Georgia again at some point. After a few months, his memory of her waned and blurred to the point where he wondered if he would recognize her if he saw her. Maybe she wasn’t as engaging as I recall. I’m building the encounter up in my mind. But for years he continued to dream of her at night, though his only remembrance was the laughing sound of her voice and the glow of her auburn hair.

  Two

  “There’s only one great evil . . . Despair.”

  —Evelyn Waugh

  Georgia Best always found it strange that her body anticipated that a hot flash was coming on before she was consciously aware anything was amiss. Without warning, in the middle of the previous night, she’d abruptly awakened thinking, What’s going on? The sensation that followed was one she imagined she would feel if she had swallowed the sun. As the core near her diaphragm became a pulsing radiating sphere, she grew progressively alarmed and pleaded, No!

  Now Georgia thrust her right leg outside her covers and turned the top corner of the comforter down, exposing her torso and shoulders. When it became obvious this wasn’t working to cool her, she threw the comforter off completely, but it was already too late. Each time this happened, she prayed to be spared the searing flush. In fact, she prayed out loud to the Virgin Mary to be delivered from it. In a split second, though, a white heat swelled and burst outward as if it were coursing through her veins. The sheets beneath her legs, arms, and back were instantly dampened and her cotton nightgown was drenched. Abject and wretched, she lay still, her heart pounding, too drained to move.

  When she was certain it was over, when she was shivering from her now-cold sweat exposed to the cool night air, Georgia felt around for the spare nightie she kept neatly folded on her bedside table. In the darkness, she pulled one gown off over her head and slipped the dry one on. She flung the sodden garment into the blackness toward the door of her bathroom and spent the next three hours pretending to fall back asleep. This sequence of events had been going on for many months.

  The past week’s seasonal change had sprung time ahead by one hour, and the dead dark of winter gleamed brighter. Morning sunrise with its harbinger glow appeared at four thirty across the horizon, and began inching its way over the mountain ridge across the valley from Georgia’s house. Yet, she stayed in her bed, weary, even when the light was high enough to shine through the narrow openings around her wooden shades and directly into her field of vision. She put a pillow over her head and periodically flipped from one side to the other with her eyes squeezed shut. The pillow across her face made it stuffy underneath, and she couldn’t breathe very well.

  Still clenching her eyelids together, she reached over to her bedside table and opened a drawer where she fished out a pink terrycloth facemask. She felt around but couldn’t find the elastic that secured it around her head. She peeked with one open eye, as she was convinced that once both of her eyes were open, any possibility of dozing was over. When she had the mask in place around her temples, she lay on her back and took slow breaths, visualizing a dream state. She tried as hard as she could to fall asleep, but it became clear it was an exercise in futility. Georgia had never been able to snooze in daylight, even if she were home sick with the flu or a cold. Finally, and with great disgust, she surrendered to the fact she might as well get up.

  An endless cycle of sleep deprivation had started when Georgia’s husband, Jack, had a heart attack and died in their foyer. The weather was fine that morning as she stood before him, wishing him a good day. He abruptly and spastically clasped at the fabric of his jacket with his right hand, let out a thunderous groan, and his legs simply gave way. She called 911 immediately and gave him mouth-to-mouth until the volunteer ambulance squad came twenty minutes later. While she was grateful that part of her teacher training had included a class in CPR, the workshop had also taught her enough to know that Jack was dead before he hit the ground. Yet, she’d carried on pumping his chest and then breathing into his lungs until the paramedics arrived. Her arms and shoulders were sore for a week.

  During the first moments she attempted resuscitation, she willed her life force into him, convinced that he would start breathing on his own. After fifteen minutes, she was exhausted and certain she was expanding the lungs of a corpse. By the time the EMTs relieved her, she felt numb. So much so, that during the ride in the ambulance, the pronouncement of death at the hospital, and even after telling her children the shocking news, she hadn’t cried at all. She’d spoken in an even tone her kids told her sounded falsely calm and somewhat disturbing.

  Georgia’s daughter, Margot, admonished her. “Mom, stop talking like that. You could be announcing the network news instead of telling us Daddy just had a heart attack. You’re scaring me. It’s like, any minute, you’re going to crack apart and go flying off in a million pieces.”

  At the hospital, Jack’s body was covered with a sheet. Georgia and her three children—Margot, Christopher, and Sebastian—stood in a group hug at the foot of his bed. They were clasping onto each other sobbing when the cardiologist came into the room with a clipboard and a grim look on his face. He looked so young Georgia couldn’t believe he had graduated from college, let alone medical school. Her thoughts strayed, He would graduate from high school at eighteen, college at twenty-two, med school at twenty-six if he got in the first time that he applied, and it probably took him a few years to complete his residency.

  She questioned him, “Excuse me, Doctor . . .”

  “Harris.”

  “Dr. Harris. I was wondering how long you have been practicing cardiology.”
>
  “Five years.”

  Five years? This boy could not be in his thirties. Could it be that he went to one of those convenient Caribbean medical colleges?

  “Where did you go to school?”

  “Cornell.”

  Georgia was stunned he’d gone to an Ivy League university and obviously had put in the requisite amount of time to earn his degrees. His face seemed practically as smooth and pink as a child. Am I getting so old that everyone else seems young to me?

  There was an uncomfortable pause as the doctor looked around the room and tried to assess how he should proceed. “I am so sorry about your husband. So terribly sorry.” Georgia saw that the young man had tears in his eyes, and she felt touched by his empathy. He went on, “There was nothing any of us could have done differently. Mrs. Best, I heard you started and continued CPR until the emergency team got there. That kind of courage is inspiring. Just please know there was little else you could have done. These are your children?”

  “Yes, this is my son Sebastian, daughter Margot, and this is Christopher.”

  “My deepest sympathies to all of you. I’m so sorry for your loss. This kind of heart attack is really a worst-case scenario. They are called widowmakers for a reason, as the chances of surviving are less than five percent. There was nothing that could have saved him.”

  In that second, Georgia had a moment of clarity. It struck her that this particular myocardial infarction had made a widow out of her, but she had no time to take the moment in because Margot became hysterical.

  “Daddy! Noooo! Noooo! Noooo!”

  Georgia and Margot’s older brother, Christopher, held onto her elbows to support her as she wailed, and so they missed what happened when Sebastian, the baby of the family, hit the floor with a thud.

  Georgia’s head jerked down, but the doctor was already on his knees hovering over her son and taking his pulse.

  She whispered close to Margot’s ear, “Honey, my arms are worn out from doing resuscitation on your father. I don’t know how long I can hold onto you. Sit on the bed with me. Just rest a minute. Oh, sweetheart, I promise we’ll get through this. I don’t know how, but it’s my solemn promise. We will get through this.”