Waking Charley Vaughan Part 8

After Francisco's evil twin, or Francisco with a mustache, we were never sure witch, kidnapped Maria, and the show ended with a cliffhanger, Brennan got up from the recliner and stretched.

"Well, seniorita Vaughan," he said in an awful caricature of a Spanish accent-p.r.o.nouncing my name like 'Ba-hawn", "I must be going. I have so many things to take care of before tomorrow, or as we say in my country, Feliz Navidad," I burst out laughing.

"In your country, huh?" I said, still laughing.

"Oh yes!" he said excitedly, still in character, and saying it 'jes' instead of 'yes'. "You did not know I come from Nicaragua? I only here on a work Visa," by the time he hit 'bisa" I was almost crying. It might have just been the medication, but I thought he was hilarious at that moment.

After a couple more minutes of his impressions and my laughter, he said, "Okay, seriously. I'm gonna go. Let me know if you need anything." Then he looked at me and added, "Even though I know you won't, I feel better if I say it."

I smiled. "Thanks, Brennan. Have a good night."

"You, too, Charley," he said, and he held his hand out to shake mine. "Um, Charley," he said, sounding worried. "You're warm."

"Yeah, I think it's a little hot in here," I told him.

"No," he said. "Your skin is on fire. I'm getting the nurse."

CHAPTER 7 SARA.

My mom wasn't exactly pleased with my intentionally late announcement that I would be spending most of Christmas Day with Charley. I hadn't told her about the scam we had going on Charley's parents because it would just upset her for a million reasons. She loved Charley enough that she didn't give me too much of a fight when I told her where I was going. She'd heard stories from me about Charley's mom, and I think part of her was relieved that Charley wasn't going to be alone with them on Christmas.

Part of the deal I'd made with my mother was that I'd stay until noon so we could have our Christmas brunch. It was rounding 9:30 when Matt still hadn't shown. My mom had called him a few times to no avail.

At around 10 o'clock, my phone buzzed from its place on the counter. I was expecting it to be Charley or maybe Brennan, but instead, Matt's name showed up.

"Come pick me up. I'm at my house," the screen said when I viewed the message.

What the h.e.l.l? I thought. "Why?" I texted him back, while grabbing my purse and coat from the table next to the couch. He was a jacka.s.s, but him being there would make Mom happy. So, it was for her that I got up from my comfortable place on the couch, put on my snow boots, (we'd gotten a surprise snow dump this morning, making it a white Christmas after all), and left to go get my dumba.s.s brother. .

"I'll be back in a few," I shouted to my mom as I left, "Matt's car must not want to start again," he had a nice car, but it was a finicky piece of junk if the temperature hit anything below 25 degrees. It was currently 17 degrees, so I really shouldn't have been surprised that he'd needed a ride.

Luckily, his house was only a few miles from our parents' place. I was the one who had made mom cry by moving more than three blocks away from her house. I still spent plenty of time at home though-more than Matt.

I pulled into the driveway of Matt's house. I sat for a minute, mentally preparing myself to try to be pleasant despite how angry I was at him. When he still hadn't come outside after a minute or two, I went up and punched in his garage code. He came running out of the front door. "Don't open that!" he yelled as the door slowly scrolled upward.

It was then that I noticed his car wasn't in the garage. "Where's your car?" I asked him.

"Don't worry about it," he huffed, punching the b.u.t.ton to close the garage and climbing into the pa.s.senger seat of my SUV.

"I'm not worried," I told him, "but if I have to come get you, you could at least tell me what you wrecked into with it," I hadn't been serious, but his eyes got big for second, as if he were ready to defend himself.

"It's in the shop, someone hit it in the parking lot and didn't leave a note," he said defensively.

"Okay," I said. "Calm down, I believe you."

It was silent for just a second before he asked, "Is she OK?"

Oh. That's why he's so upset, I thought, surprised that his anxiety hadn't really been stemming from his damaged car. He loved that thing.

"You could have tried a little harder to find out," I said, bitterly. "You didn't even try to call her."

"Did she want me to call? Does she want to talk to me?" he asked as he dug in his pocket.

"No," I said shortly, "she doesn't want to talk to you, but you could have at least tried," I scolded him.

He pulled his hands out of his pocket, and stared forward. "I don't know what I'm supposed to do here, Sara," he said sadly.

"You made a mess," I said less harshly than I wanted to, "More than you realize," I said, thinking of Charley's bakery.

"That's what you think," he muttered.

By then, we'd arrived at back at our parents' house. I shuffled out of the car and into the house quickly, wanting to make as little contact with the freezing cold air as possible. By the time Matt walked into the house a full 30 seconds behind me, I was already back in my place on the couch, and mom was sitting a cup of cocoa down on the table beside me.

She greeted Matt with a hug and kiss. "Where have you been?" she asked him. This was her standard greeting any time it'd been more than a couple of days since she'd seen us.

Neither of my parents had seen Matt since before Charley's accident. Both my parents had gone to the hospital immediately after, expressing their concern in their own ways. My mom cried, and muttered a lot of words that could not be deciphered. The only ones we could really make out were "poor," and "Charley". My father, known more for his stern approach to tough situations, did a lot of grumbling about how it was "inexcusable," and "unacceptable". He was also directing a lot of the same language toward my absent brother. Dad was pretty upset with Matt. He was a big believer in being a man of integrity. I had a feeling Matt disappointed him in that area on a pretty regular basis.

My brother interrupted my thoughts when he plopped down on the couch next to me. He looked like c.r.a.p. Mom came into the living room and sat down some more mugs of cocoa. She called for my father to come join us as she went into the kitchen. I got up to help her, knowing that with my mom's cooking, there would be plenty of stuff to bring to the table.

"We're going to eat in the living room this year, honey," she said as I helped her gather breakfast items. This was extremely unlike her. Mom always, every year, without exception, made us eat in the formal dining room.

"Why?" I asked, surprise showing in my tone.

"I just think we could use a relaxed atmosphere this year," she said, busying herself with gathering napkins and forks. "I just don't feel like there's need for a lot of fuss this year" she trailed off, and I looked over to find her wiping her cheeks under each eye.

"Mom, are you crying?"

"She just" my mom started, "she made Christmas Day so fun these past few years," she said with a steady stream of tears flowing now. I grabbed a tissue from the counter and handed it to her.

"I know, Mom," I said, trying to soothe her. She was right. Charley loved the holidays. She was like our own little elf, running around and working her hardest to spread 'Christmas Cheer', as she always said. I remember the first Christmas she spent with us. We'd only known her a couple of months, but she managed to make it feel like Christmas with our family was the oldest tradition in the world.

It was sometime around that first Christmas that Matt had decided he was infatuated with Charley. She'd been hanging around a lot, and he kept asking me to put in a "good word" for him. I refused on the grounds that I knew how he treated girlfriends. I'd been pretty honest that first Christmas, and told him he didn't deserve to date her. It was no use. By the next Christmas, they'd been dating close to a year, and things were already serious. Despite his promises to me to be different, from what I saw, he was still the same old Matt when it came to Charley.

By her second Christmas with us, she was coming over early to help with breakfast, and showed up with gifts for everyone, which none of us had expected. Matt had spent the weeks before warning us that Charley didn't have much money, and telling us not to do anything to make her feel uncomfortable. It had always p.i.s.sed me off that he felt the need to tell me something like that about my best friend. He was always quick to dismiss the fact that I had known her first. And that I knew her best.

As it turned out, Matt was the only one who'd done anything to make her uncomfortable. She'd brought each of us a thoughtful, sweet gift: something that showed that she'd really been listening and getting to know us.. She got a mom an adorable, personalized ap.r.o.n, and my dad had received some kind of coffee accessory-they had discovered they were both obsessed with coffee the Christmas before. She got me a beautiful, handmade necklace with a huge, chunky stone on a small leather strap. I had pointed it out on Black Friday when she and I had gone window shopping together. She'd probably purchased it that same day.

Then, there had been Matt's gift. The gift she had spent the bulk of her money on, I was sure of it. It was two tickets to see his favorite band play on New Year's Eve. He had taken a look at the tickets, thanked her, and then asked me if I wanted them right in front of her. Charley just smiled sweetly and insisted that she was just glad they would get good use. Matt hadn't wanted the tickets because the seats weren't good enough. And when New Year's Eve had come, Charley and I had ended up going with the tickets she'd bought Matt, while he had weaseled his way into the front row with some friends.

"It's OK, babe," he'd told her that morning. "The front row stuff is really expensive. I appreciate the effort, but the show is no good all the way back there."

I had really wanted to punch him then. I had actually been sure then that he was going to royally screw things up with her. She seemed to just let it roll off her back, though, so I didn't scream at him in front of her. Both my mom and I had told him he was being a jerk when Charley had excused herself to go to the bathroom. As usual, he was so wrapped up in himself that he had no idea what we were talking about.

Even with Matt's insensitivity in full force, though, that Christmas day had been one of the best our family had experienced in a long time. We all knew it had been because of Charley, and every Christmas she was there, had been even better than the one before. I could understand my mom's sadness.

"Is it awful that I wish we could trade? Even just for today?" she asked me sadly.

I chuckled bitterly, "I wish we could trade for good," I told her, "so your wish doesn't sound so bad in comparison."

She gave me a hug and kissed my forehead. "I love you," she said sweetly.

"I love you, too," I said. Then thought, "Hey, Momwhy don't you come with me after breakfast?"

"I couldn't do that-" she began, "I'd be imposing."

"Actually, you wouldn't," I started, "but I should explain something to you first." My mother looked at me curiously as I began to explain the situation.

A few hours later, my dad and Matt were sitting on the couch, watching a football game while my mom and I loaded up presents and baked goods into the car. She and I had thrown together some of Charley's favorite Christmas things, including a stocking that we'd been working on stuffing for most of the month of December. I was glad it would be my mom and I going to see her. Granted, her family would still be there, but Charley would also have one more person on her side.

My mom had taken my explanation of our little web of lies much better than I had expected. She hadn't yelled, or lectured me on doing the right thing. She had just said, "Charley deserves that Bakery. It's all she's talked about for as long as I can remember. Rebecca has no right to take that from her because of what Matt did."

I made a mental note that my mother was indeed capable of being devious if the situation warranted. That was good to know.

I warned her about Charley's family, explaining in detail how Rebecca's insults worked, and how it was better to offer Charley silent support that to get into a full on confrontation with her family. "Sara, Honey," my mom said, "I don't imagine a full on confrontation would even be necessary. Honestly, even if she is as bad as you say she is, there are more civilized ways to handle things," my mother's tone held a hint of honestly, I raised you better, but I wasn't insulted. She was going to have to meet Rebecca to see what I meant.

"You'll see, Mom," I said was we walked into the elevator that would take us to Charley's floor. "You'll see."

When we walked into Charley's room, I noticed an IV in her arm again. She hadn't been, "tapped," as Brennan called it, for the last few days, so it caught me off guard.

"Charley," I said. "What's with the IV?"

"No worries," she smiled. "I'm OK. Just a little infection."

I looked to Brennan for confirmation.

"She said not to call you, and Dr. Sutherland a.s.sured me it was nothing life threatening. They caught it in time, and they've got her on antibiotics to treat it."

I sighed, and Charley jumped in. "You don't get to be mad at him. I asked him not to call. You needed rest and time with your family. I'm seriously fine," she a.s.sured me. "It just means I won't get to go home until the infection clears up. No big deal."

She seemed sure, but I wasn't. I was overwhelmed for her. It just felt like one more awful thing on the pile of already awful things. I said a silent prayer that our luck would hold in one area, and that the scheme would work. Charley needed a win.

We hadn't been at the hospital visiting Charley for more than half an hour before I could already see signs that my mother, sweet as she was, had listened to almost all she was going to take from Mrs. Rebecca Vaughan.

It seemed like as soon as we arrived, Rebecca was already starting in on Charley-her hair, her nails, her lack of make-up. Charley took it the same way I always remembered her handling her mother's insults-at least outwardly she did. I saw something different in her eyes this time, though. For the first time ever, it looked like she might not believe everything her mother was saying. That was new.

We all exchanged gifts. I was impressed to find that Brennan, the poor soul who had only been dragged into this situation a few days ago, brought gifts as well. He was as good at thoughtful gifts as Charley was. He bought her dad some fancy cigars, some funky and warm looking scarves for her sisters, and a set of gloves for Charley's mother. Of course, Rebecca had remarked that the gloves wouldn't match anything she'd purchased, despite them being ivory and able to match just about anything. Brennan just smiled and he and Charley exchanged a look a few seconds later.

It was funny to see them together. They meshed well-with the ease of a couple who had been together for years, not the awkwardness of two people who'd only met a few days ago.

I liked how Charley was with him. She was more of herself and less how she thought someone expected her to be. Even with me, I know there was part of her that had been held back before. Not intentionally, but there was part of her that went along with whatever I said sometimes because it was easier. The Charley that I saw interacting with Brennan didn't have any of that in her. I didn't know if it was the accident, or Brennan that had caused the change, but I was glad for it, and hoped I would see more of it.

It would take a big change for her to stand up to Rebecca, though. I almost couldn't fault her for that. Rebecca Vaughan was a scary woman. Her own husband didn't even stand up to her. With her, I thought the best solution was to just wait her out. Once she was gone, Charley could be happy-truly happy. She could rebuild her life, and make it better than it had been. I didn't know if Brennan would become a more permanent fixture in Charley's life or not, but I sort of hoped he would.

After all of the gifts were exchanged, we were all sitting around Charley's hospital room making small talk. Brennan, my mother, and myself were all taking turns finding ways to change the subject off of Charley's failings each time her mother brought them up. Her sisters stood mute in opposite ends of the room, but eventually even they came closer to the rest of the group and started helping us with subject changes. That was a miracle considering how much they seemed to hate Charley. She never fully explained why the three of them didn't get along. It had always just come as fact that warranted no further explanation.

The straw that seemed to break the camel's back for everyone started like this: "The Dr. says Charley should be able to go home soon," says Casey, in her second attempt at subject changing.

"She should have been home already, if you ask me," was Rebecca's reply.

"Well, Rebecca," my mother says politely, "She was pretty banged up. The doctors wanted to keep her here to keep an eye on some of her more serious injuries. Not to mention, she now has to recover from an infection."

"I beg to differ, my dear," Rebecca said, "This is what happens when children begin acting like dramatic little princesses for no d.a.m.ned good reason. She got hit because she made a foolish choice to go get drunk and began wandering the streets. That's why they haven't caught whoever hit her. Whoever hit her probably a.s.sumed they were hitting a d.a.m.ned hobo." Rebecca sounded completely indignant. She added, "And, I shouldn't have to add, that the infection never would have happened, had she not ended up in the cesspool of a hospital in the first d.a.m.ned place! This was preventable, and yet everyone wants to sit around kissing her a.s.s when the whole thing is her own foolish fault!"

My mother had lasted as long as she could. She stood up quickly "Excuse me, Rebecca, but you are way out of line!"

"And excuse me, Linda," Rebecca drawled harshly, "But Charley is my daughter, and I will speak to her and about her in any way I deem necessary."

"You're right!" My mom said, bending down to get in Rebecca's face, "If Charley were my daughter, I would make her feel precious, and loved, and tell her every moment how special and wonderful she was! If she were my daughter she never would have moved 2,000 miles away from me!" My mom straightened herself out and added, "And if she were my daughter, I would never in a million years talk to her the way that you talk to any of your daughters. It's despicable, and disgusting, and it makes me sick!" She grabbed my arm and stomped out of the room, pulling me along.

Before reaching the elevator, she turned around, and marched back toward Charley's room, still fuming. I followed her, stopping in the doorway.

I watched as she stormed in, kissed Charley on the forehead, and whispered something in her ear.

When she came back out, I had to ask, "What did you say to Charley, Mom?"

"I told her I was sorry," she said, looking less angry and more ashamed. "And I told her that I loved her. And I believed in her."

I smiled at my mom's predictability. I grabbed her up in a huge hug. She was slightly shorter than me, but when it came to hugs, she was far more powerful. When she finally let go, I pulled my keys out of my pocket.

"Here," I said, handing them to her, "You go home in my car. I'll have Brennan take me home later. I don't want to leave him alone in there."

"I'm sorry I blew up like that," she apologized again. "That woman is just.she's" my mom said, looking for the word before finally spitting, "incorrigible!"

"I know, Mom," I laughed. "I believe I warned you."

"Yes, b.u.t.there's no way to prepare someone for that." My mom said, appearing to try to shake off the bad experience.

I hugged her again. "Mom, you are perfect," I said into her ear as we hugged. "I love you."

"I love you, Sweetie. Tell Charley sorry for me again."

I laughed. "I will, but I'm sure she isn't mad."

I watched my mom get on the elevator and waved goodbye before heading back toward Charley's room. Brennan cut me off in the hallway before I reached it.

"I need a break. I can't go back in there right now. I don't even know that woman and I want to strangle her."

"What did she say now?" I asked him.