Lone Eagle Part 19

It took Andy half an hour to drive to the hospital where they'd taken her, and when he walked into her room, he was horrified by what he saw. There was a huge bandage on her head, a cast on her leg, and he saw as soon as he entered the room that the sheet across her stomach was flat. She didn't know it yet, but she'd lost the baby in the car. It brought tears to his eyes to see the condition she was in, and he walked over to her and gently took her hand. It brought back so many memories just looking at her. In their early days, there had been so many happy times. And the thought of the first year of their marriage always warmed his heart.

She was still in a coma when he left the room. And when he spoke to the doctor, he told Andy that they weren't sure yet if she'd survive. It was going to be touch and go for a while.

Andy sat in the waiting room for hours, and it reminded him of when Reed had been born and he'd been there all day, worrying about her. This was far worse, and as soon as he'd seen her, he called the baby-sitter in New York and told her she had to get hold of Joe.

"I don't know how, Mr. Scott," she said, bursting into tears. She'd been afraid that something awful had happened to Kate, and it had. She'd had a terrible feeling about it when she hadn't come home. But she hadn't heard the phone when it rang late that night. "Mrs. Allbright has the name of the hotel, I think, but I don't know where it is. He usually calls her. It's easier that way."

"Do you know what city he's in?" It was a h.e.l.l of a way to live, Andy thought, with a husband who was always on the road. But he knew that Kate was willing to do anything she had to, to be married to Joe. She would have done anything and everything for him, and had.

"No, I don't," the sitter continued to cry. "Paris, I think. I think that's what she said. He called yesterday."

"Do you think he'll call today?"

"Maybe. He doesn't call every day. Sometimes he doesn't call for a few days." As Andy listened, he hated him, for what he wasn't doing for Kate. She deserved to have someone around to take care of her, not a traveling salesman running around the world, selling his airline and his planes.

Andy told the sitter what to tell Joe if he called, what condition Kate was in, and the hospital where she was. And he told her that no matter what, day or night, she was not to leave the phone. He couldn't even call Joe's office, because it was the weekend. If they didn't hear from him soon, Andy was afraid Kate would be dead by the time he called. He couldn't have done anything for her at this point, but it would have been nice for her if he'd been there, or if someone knew where he could be found.

"Is... is the baby all right?" the sitter asked cautiously, and there was a long pause.

"I don't know." He didn't think it was his place to tell her that it had died. He thought that Joe should know first.

And after he hung up, Andy called Kate's parents, who were frantic when they heard about the accident. Andy told them he'd keep them aware of any further developments, and they said they'd come down from Boston as soon as they could. And then he called Julie and asked her to drive into town with the kids and pick Stevie up, but to leave the sitter in the city in case Joe called.

"How is she?" Julie asked, feeling some strange bond to Kate.

"Pretty bad," Andy answered, and then went back to Kate's room again. He stayed until after six o'clock. He called New York, and Joe hadn't called.

He and Julie took turns calling the hospital through the night, and they said nothing to the kids. Reed sensed that something was going on, but he had been happy playing outside all afternoon, and his father had told him that his mother had gone away for the weekend. And the following week, he and Julie had agreed to keep him out of school and in Greenwich with them.

Kate didn't regain consciousness all through the weekend, and Joe never called. Her parents were there, looking devastated. Her situation didn't worsen, nor did it improve, she was just hanging there, in limbo, between life and death. From what Andy could see when he returned to the hospital on Sunday afternoon, she was hanging by the merest thread. And still there was no sign of Joe. Her mother cried every time someone mentioned his name.

Andy called Joe's office first thing the next day. He stayed home from work himself. Joe's secretary informed him that Mr. Allbright was en route from France to Spain, and she was sure she'd hear from him later in the day. He explained what the situation was, and Hazel was distraught. She said she would do everything she could to find him in the next few hours.

Andy didn't hear back from her until five o'clock. Joe had changed his plans and left a message in Madrid. No one had gotten hold of him, and she had missed him at the hotel in Paris when he checked out. She said she thought he was going to London, but she wasn't absolutely sure. She had left messages for him at every hotel in Europe where he stayed.

When they finally heard from Joe on Tuesday afternoon, he told Hazel that he had spent the weekend on a boat in the South of France. He had opted not to go to Spain, and taken a day off, which was rare for him. And there had been no way he could have called Kate. He had just gotten to London at midnight on Tuesday, and got Hazel's message at the hotel.

"What's wrong?" He had no idea how hard everyone had tried to locate him, and no suspicion that something had happened to Kate. He thought Hazel was frantic over some business problem that had come up, and he was in no great hurry to find out. He was relaxed and happy after the three-day sailing weekend, and he hated to spoil the mood he was in with bad news.

"It's your wife," Hazel went right to the point, and told him about Kate's accident. She explained that Kate was in critical condition in a hospital in Connecticut, and Andy Scott had called.

"What was she doing in Connecticut?" He hadn't absorbed what Hazel had told him yet. And the question he asked was absurd.

"I think she drove Reed out on Friday night. It happened on the way back and she was alone."

It was slowly dawning on him, as he listened to her. "I've got to get back," he said instantly, but they both knew that at that hour, it was too late for him to catch a plane, and he didn't have any of his own with him. He had been traveling on commercial flights, which was rare for him. "I'll do what I can. I don't think I can get back till tomorrow afternoon. Do you have the number of the hospital?" She gave it to him, and he immediately hung up and called. And after he hung up, he sat staring across the room. He couldn't believe what they had said. She was barely alive, and she'd lost the babies, the nurse explained. She told him Kate had been pregnant with twins. But all he could think of as he sat on the bed at Claridge's was what he would do if she died.

22.

JOE WALKED INTO the Greenwich Hospital at six o'clock on Wednesday night. It had been five days since the accident. Kate was on a respirator, and being fed through a tube. She hadn't regained consciousness, although they thought the head injury had improved. The swelling was slightly down, and they thought it was a good sign. Her parents had gone back to their motel nearby to rest. And Andy Scott was standing next to her when Joe walked in. The two men exchanged a long look across her bed, and Joe could see in Andy's eyes everything he thought of him. the Greenwich Hospital at six o'clock on Wednesday night. It had been five days since the accident. Kate was on a respirator, and being fed through a tube. She hadn't regained consciousness, although they thought the head injury had improved. The swelling was slightly down, and they thought it was a good sign. Her parents had gone back to their motel nearby to rest. And Andy Scott was standing next to her when Joe walked in. The two men exchanged a long look across her bed, and Joe could see in Andy's eyes everything he thought of him.

"How is she?" Joe asked, as he touched her hand. She was so pale, she looked as though she were dead to him, but Andy thought he'd seen a slight improvement in her late that afternoon. He hadn't been to work all week. He didn't feel right leaving Kate alone, and Julie had her hands full with the kids. The sitter had come out from New York to help once they'd heard from Joe.

"She's about the same," Andy said through clenched teeth.

Joe noticed her flat belly immediately, and it touched his heart, knowing what it would mean to her. He had even gotten more excited about the baby recently, or babies as it turned out, but they meant nothing to him now. All he cared about was Kate.

"Thank you for being here with her," Joe said politely to Andy, as Andy picked up his jacket and prepared to leave the room. There was a nurse sitting next to her, watching the two men. She wasn't clear about their relations.h.i.+p to Kate, but it was obvious that there was no love lost between them.

Andy stopped as he was about to leave the room and spoke in a low voice to Joe. "Where the h.e.l.l were you, man? No one heard from you for four days." He had responsibilities and a pregnant wife, two stepchildren. Andy couldn't even conceive of disappearing for days on end like that. He wondered if he'd been cheating on her, but he didn't know Joe. That was the way he was. Kate had gotten used to it, but there were still times when it was hard on her. Joe reached out when he was ready to, and sometimes he didn't call for days. It was inconceivable to Andy that no one had known where Joe was. This was a perfect example of why he couldn't afford to disappear. Andy couldn't imagine doing anything like it to his wife and kids.

"I was on a boat," Joe said coolly. It seemed an adequate explanation to him. "I came as soon as I heard," but even he felt uncomfortable that she had been in the hospital for five days without him. He just didn't want to answer for it to Andy Scott. It was none of his business anymore, all she was to him was the mother of his kids. To Andy, that seemed enough. "Do her parents know?" Joe suddenly wondered. He hadn't even thought to ask Hazel when he called her.

"They're here," Andy explained. "They're staying in a motel."

"Thanks for your help," Joe said, dismissing him.

"Call if we can do anything," Andy said, and left the room, as Joe sat down next to her. The nurse stepped away and busied herself at the sink near the door so that Joe could have some time alone with his wife. And once Andy was gone, Joe looked at her with deeply troubled eyes. He couldn't even imagine losing Kate.

No matter how odd their relations.h.i.+p seemed to other people, he was deeply in love with her, and had been for fifteen years. She was his best friend, his comfort, his mentor, his laughter, his joy, his conscience sometimes, and always had been the love of his life, the only woman he had ever really loved.

"Kate, don't leave me ...," he whispered, as the nurse stood just outside the room. "Please, baby... come back...." He sat there next to her for hours, holding her hand, with tears running down his cheeks.

A doctor came to check her bandages, and at midnight, they set a cot up for Joe. He had decided to spend the night. He didn't want to be at home in the city if she died. But he lay awake all night, and kept glancing at her. And miraculously, at four in the morning, she stirred. Joe had just started to drift off, but the moment he heard her moan, he sat up. The nurse was checking her eyes.

"What's happening?" he asked as the nurse took her vital signs. She had a stethoscope in her ears and couldn't hear what he'd said. And then, Kate moaned again, and with her eyes still closed, she turned her head toward him. It was as though even in the dark caverns of unconsciousness, she knew he was there. "Baby, it's me... I'm right here... open your eyes." But this time, she made no sound, and he went back to his cot. But he had a strange sense in the room, as though someone was watching him. It was as though he could feel her in his own skin, and he was terrified she would die. It made him realize how much he loved her, and he had always known how much she loved him. They just didn't always want the same things. She wanted to be with him, and he needed to roam the world with his planes. But he didn't love her any less because of it, his focus was just different than hers. And he thought she had accepted that. He didn't know why, but he felt guilty about the accident. He wouldn't have admitted it to anyone, but he thought he should have been there. He had had no sense that anything had happened to her, he had spent a wonderful three days on his friend's boat. He was British and they'd flown together in the war. He'd even thought about Kate a lot, and the baby they were going to have. In retrospect, he couldn't even imagine what it would have been like having twins. But that was beside the point.

Joe never went to sleep that night, and at six o'clock he got up and brushed his teeth and washed his face. He had just walked back to her bed to look at her, when she stirred slightly, and opened her eyes. She gazed right into his, and he could barely breathe he was so surprised.

"That's better," he smiled at her, feeling relief wash over him like a tidal wave. "Welcome back." She made a little noise that sounded like a sigh, and then closed her eyes again, and he could hardly wait for the nurse to come in so he could tell her Kate was awake. Before she ever came back into the room, Kate looked at him again, and made an enormous effort to speak to him. She didn't seem surprised to see him there.

"What happened..." Her voice was so faint he could hardly hear, but he bent close to her face so as not to miss the words.

"You had an accident," he whispered back, not sure why he did. He didn't want to overwhelm her by talking too loud.

"Is Reed okay?" She remembered being in the car with him, but not that it had happened on the way back.

"He's fine." He was praying that she wouldn't ask about the baby yet. He didn't want her to know it had died, or that it had been twins. "Just take it easy, sweetheart. I'm right here with you. You're going to be fine." He was praying she would.

She frowned as she looked at him, as though trying to understand what he'd said. "Why are you here?... You're away..."

"No, I'm not. I'm right here. I came back."

"Why?" She had no idea how badly injured she had been, which was just as well. And then instinctively, he saw her hand go to her middle section, he tried to stop her but she got there too soon. Her eyes opened wide and she looked at him, and before he could say anything, there were tears rolling down her cheeks.

"Kate, don't..." It was all he could say as he kissed her hand, and kept it to his lips. "Please, sweetheart..."

"Where's our baby?" She managed to choke out the words and then gave an animal sound, it was like a long keening wail, as she clung to him, and he reached down and held her in his arms. He was careful not to hurt her head. She knew instinctively what had happened, and there was nothing he could do to comfort her. He was just glad she was alive.

When the nurse came back, she brought the doctor in, and they were pleased to see she had regained consciousness, but the doctor told Joe in the hall she wasn't out of the woods yet. She had had a serious concussion and been in a coma for five days. Her leg was badly fractured, and she'd hemorrhaged when she lost the twins. He was antic.i.p.ating a long recovery, and she would have to convalesce for several months. And he was concerned that she might not be able to get pregnant again. The damage in the accident had been considerable, and not just to the twins. But Joe felt that was the least of it, he was far more concerned about her. He didn't want more children anyway, particularly not if it was dangerous for Kate.

She was so upset when she realized she'd lost the twins that they sedated her, and Joe left for New York. He wanted to go to the office, and pick up some things at home, for both of them. He was back in Greenwich at five o'clock that afternoon. Her parents were just leaving her, and Elizabeth Jamison wouldn't even speak to him. There were tears in Clarke's eyes when he turned to Joe.

"You should have been here, Joe," was all he said, as they left the room, and Joe didn't argue the point. But he felt Clarke's words like a knife in his heart. He could understand how they felt. Although it all seemed a little unreasonable to him. It had been sheer bad luck that she'd gotten in an accident and lost the twins. He had a right to go on business trips, after all, although maybe not to disappear on a boat for three days, with a pregnant wife at home. But he had thought she was fine. And his being there wouldn't have changed anything, except that he might not have let her drive to Connecticut. But he couldn't protect her every hour of the day. The driver who had hit her had been drunk, the tests showed. It could have happened anywhere, anytime, even if he'd been driving the car. He was just an easy scapegoat now, he felt, because he'd been gone. But none of it had been his fault or in his control. He was her husband, not G.o.d.

By the end of the week, Joe had Kate transferred to a hospital in New York. It was easier for him to see her there, and he thought it might cheer her up to see her friends if they came to visit her, but she was so depressed, she refused to see anyone. She told him she wanted to die.

He spent the weekend at the hospital with her, and they talked to Reed on the phone, but afterward all she did was cry. She was in terrible shape. He wouldn't have admitted it to anyone, but he was relieved to fly to L.A. for three days the following week. He felt totally helpless with Kate. And this time, he called and checked in every few hours.

It was the end of April when she came home from the hospital. She was on crutches with a smaller cast, and her head was fine again. She only got headaches once in a while, and they took the cast off her leg in early May. She looked like herself again, and had lost a lot of weight. But the woman Joe came home to at night was not the one he had married. It was as though the bright light he had always seen s.h.i.+ning from her soul had gone out. She was tired and depressed most of the time, refused to go out. And most of the time, she sat home and cried. Joe had no idea what to do for her, she hardly talked to him, seldom spoke, was completely disinterested in everything he said. Seeing her like that was driving him insane.

In June, the kids went to stay with Andy and Julie for a month, and it only made things worse when Kate heard Julie was already pregnant again. She knew by then that her babies had been twins, and all she did was mourn what she could no longer have.

"Maybe it's better this way, we're too old for more kids," Joe said awkwardly, trying to rationalize it to her. He didn't know what to say, but it only made her angry at him. "We'll have more time for each other, and you can travel with me more." But she didn't want to go anywhere with him. He offered to take her to Europe, or the West Coast. But Kate just sat around at home.

Joe tried with everything he knew for two months to cheer her up, and then he did what he knew best. He escaped. It was too hard being with her. She was constantly angry and depressed. It was as though she blamed him, just as everyone else did, for not being there, for the accident, and the lost twins. He couldn't take it anymore. The old demon guilt was nipping at his heels again. He took every trip he could, and he needed to, he'd been home with her for a long time, and his empire was starting to show signs of strain. By the time Joe hit the road again, his nerves were raw. And all they did was argue when he called home. It was like a nightmare that just wouldn't end. He didn't want it to be that way, but he no longer knew what to do, or how to find Kate. She was lost somewhere, and the woman she'd become only drove him away.

Joe traveled constantly for three months, and by the end of summer, they felt like strangers every time he came home. She went to Cape Cod with her parents and the kids, and this time he didn't come. He stayed in L.A. He was sure her mother had plenty to say about it, but he no longer cared. She'd been hateful to him for years. And he no longer felt he had to prove anything to her, or even to Kate. He'd come home, he'd been there, he'd done everything he could, and it was no longer ever enough.

He was home for two weeks in September, and hoped by then she'd be in better spirits again, but when he told her he had to go to j.a.pan, Kate had a fit.

"Again? When are you ever here?" She was turning into a shrew, and was already more than halfway there. Joe was sorry he'd come home at all.

"I'm there when you need me, Kate. I stayed home for as long as I could. I have a business to run. You're welcome to go with me if you want." His voice sounded cold and withdrawn.

"I don't." She was restless and unhappy and argumentative, and it only made things worse between them. "When are you coming home?" she spat at him, and for the first time ever he could imagine hating her. He didn't want to, but she was giving him no other choice. Whoever she had once been seemed to be long gone. He knew she was upset about the twins, but she was killing him, and beginning to seem dead herself. And the worst part was that she wanted him desperately, needed him to make it better for her, but she was so lost in her own miseries, she didn't know how to reach out to him. Every time she wanted to, her own despair and the anger it produced only drove him away. They couldn't find each other anymore, and all she wanted was him. She had never stopped loving him, the person she really hated now was herself. She replayed it in her head a thousand times, driving the car, losing the twins, wondering why she had volunteered to drive Reed to Greenwich that night. If she hadn't, the babies would have been born by then. And now she would never have Joe's child. He had been firm with her that he didn't want to try again. She hated him for that too, and when she couldn't find the words to express her pain, she turned her fury on him. All Joe knew was he no longer had a wife. They were strangers and enemies living under the same roof. And he was rarely there.

In October, Joe was home for a total of four days. And the more he stayed away, the worse Kate got. His absences made her feel abandoned and desperate and betrayed, and only fueled her rage, and her mother goading her constantly didn't help. As far as Liz was concerned, Joe was using Kate, he just wanted her as a figurehead wife. Kate was even beginning to think he didn't love her anymore, and instead of loving him to bring him back again, all she did was slam the door in his face. After a while, he didn't approach her anymore. They hadn't made love since her accident, and by late October, it had been six months, and Joe had had enough.

"Kate, you're killing me," he tried to explain as gently as he could. He was only home for the weekend that time, and she correctly sensed that all he did now was run away. He couldn't stand the anger, the accusations, or the guilt anymore. "I can't come home to this every time. You have to get over it. I know it's painful for you, and it's terrible that you lost the twins, but I don't want to lose us." He hadn't seen the woman he loved in six months. All she had become was an angry ghost. "You have two great kids, why can't we just be happy with them? Why don't you come to L.A. with me? You haven't been out to the house in months." He was trying everything he could think of to pull her back.

"I don't want to go anywhere," she snapped at him, and this time he snapped back. He had tried to be patient with her, but it didn't get him anywhere, except angry and hurt.

"No, you don't, do you, Kate? You just want to sit here, feeling sorry for yourself. Well, for chrissake, Kate, G.o.dd.a.m.n grow up. I can't sit here holding your hand all the time. I can't bring those babies back, and who knows, maybe it was for the best, maybe we weren't meant to have more kids. It wasn't our decision, it was G.o.d's."

"That's what you wanted anyway, wasn't it? You wanted me to have an abortion so you didn't have to be bothered coming home more than ten minutes a month. Don't tell me how much you've done for me, or how lucky I am, or whose decision it was to let my babies die... don't tell me a G.o.dd.a.m.n thing, Joe, because you're never here anyway. It took you five G.o.dd.a.m.n days to come home when they thought I was going to die. So where the h.e.l.l do you get off telling me to grow up? You're out there flying your d.a.m.n planes and having a good time all over the G.o.dd.a.m.n world, while I sit here with my kids. Maybe you're the one who needs to grow up!" He looked like she had taken a blowtorch to him, and he said nothing to her. He walked out of the apartment and slammed the door, and stayed at the Plaza that night. And all she did was lie on her bed and sob. She had said everything she hadn't wanted to say to him. But she was so filled with misery and grief, and so lonely for him all the time. And all she had done was make it worse. She wanted him more than anything, wanted him to fix it for her, and she hated him because he could not. He couldn't bring her babies back, couldn't stay home with her, couldn't turn back the clock. She had wanted them so much, and still wanted him, and she knew she was doing everything she could to drive him away, and didn't know why. There was no one she could talk to about it. It was as though she had fallen into a black hole six months before, and couldn't find her way back up. And there was no one to rescue her. She knew she had to do it herself, but she had no idea how.

He came back to the apartment the next day, but only long enough to pack a bag and leave for L.A. And just seeing him pack panicked her. Joe seemed icy cold, and unnaturally controlled.

"I'll call you, Kate," he said quietly. He didn't know what else to say to her. He thought she hated him. And she didn't know how to tell him she hated herself. In spite of all the fire and debris she threw at him, he was still the one she loved. But it would have been hard to convince Joe of that. She had said such terrible things to him, and been so unkind to him that for the first time he was beginning to wonder if they would ever find each other again. And the guilt she had engendered in him only made him want to escape. Joe felt overwhelmed and he had never been as lonely or as miserable in his life.

He stayed in L.A. for a month, and ran the company from there. He even had Hazel fly out so he didn't have to go home. It was nearly Thanksgiving when he finally came back. He opened the door gingerly when he came home, and was startled when Reed flew into his arms.

"Joe! You're back!!" He was happy to see the boy. The children were one of the things he loved most about Kate, particularly these days, and he missed them when he stayed away.

"I missed you, ace," Joe said with a broad grin. And he had missed Kate too. A lot more than he'd expected to, which was why he'd come home. "Where's your mom?"

"She's out. She went to a movie with friends. She does that a lot." Reed was five, and he thought Joe was the best. He hated it when Joe was gone, and his mom cried all the time. She had for a long time. Stevie was only three, and asleep by the time Joe got home.

And when Kate came back from the movies, she was surprised to see Joe. She looked calmer than she had when he left, and he cautiously took her in his arms. He never knew when she was going to attack. They hardly ever spoke on the phone anymore when he was gone.

"I missed you," he said, and meant every word of it.

"Me too," she said as she clung to him and started to cry. She seemed better this time, as though she were slowly coming back from the terrible place she had been.

"I missed you before I left too," he said, and she knew what he meant.

"I don't know what happened to me.... I must have hit my head harder than I thought." She had been through a lot. The accident, losing the twins, it all seemed too much. And her mother was constantly whipping her up. He wished Kate would stop talking to her, but he knew it was something he couldn't ask.

She was much better this time, and they both finally began to relax. They agreed to stay home for the holidays, and not spend Thanksgiving with her parents in Boston this year. He thought it would be more than he could take, but he didn't say that to her. He just said he thought it would be good for them to stay home, and she agreed, which was a huge relief to him. But by sheer bad luck, three days before Thanksgiving he got a cable from j.a.pan. Everything was in a mess there, and they insisted he had to come. It wasn't what he wanted to do, but for the sake of his future dealings with them, he knew he had to go. He hated to tell Kate.

And when he did, she looked shocked. "Can't you tell them it's Thanksgiving here? This is important, Joe." She was near tears when he explained it to her, and they were both trying not to get into a fight. Things had been better for a while.

"My business is important too, Kate," he said in a calm voice.

"I need you here this year, Joe. This is hard for me." She was still upset about the twins, although she was better than she'd been in months. "Don't leave me alone." It was the plea of an anguished child, a child who had lost her father to suicide, and a woman who had recently lost not one, but two babies that she had wanted so desperately. Joe knew he couldn't change any of that, and he expected Kate to be an adult.

"Do you want to come with me?" It was all he could think of at that point. But she shook her head.

"I can't leave the kids on Thanksgiving, Joe. What would they think?"

"That you need to take a trip with me. Send them to the Scotts'." But she didn't want to do that. She wanted to spend Thanksgiving at home with them, and with him. She tried everything she could to talk him out of going, and he kept explaining to her that he wanted to be with her, but he had to go. "I'll come home in a week. No matter what." But that didn't do it for her. She felt as though he was putting his business first again, and putting her last. She looked like a child as she sat in their bed crying the morning he left. "Kate, don't do this to me. I don't want to leave. I told you, I have no choice. It's not fair for you to make me feel guilty over this. Make this work for both of us." She nodded and blew her nose, and kissed him before he left. She wanted to understand, but she was feeling abandoned anyway. Joe had invited her to go with him, and he wanted her to, but she wouldn't. She took the kids to Boston instead.

And in the end, he was gone for twice as long as he said. He came home in two weeks instead of one. He didn't even stop in California on the way home. But when he got back to New York, Kate was icy cold. Her mother had worked hard on her in the two weeks that he'd been gone. She seemed to have a huge investment in convincing Kate that he was rotten to her and didn't give a d.a.m.n. She had never forgiven him for taking five days to come home when Kate had the accident and lost the twins. And she had hated him long before that. She had never approved of him from the first, because he hadn't married Kate, and when he had it had cost her her marriage to Andy Scott, whom Liz loved. It was as though she wanted to destroy what he and Kate had, at all costs. And she was doing a good job of it. In two short weeks, she had turned Kate around again, and they hardly spoke the night he came home.

He didn't apologize to her, he didn't explain it again, he didn't defend himself for having been gone. He was tired of doing that, he had been doing it for months. He played with the kids that night, and read quietly when they went to bed. He wanted to give Kate time to calm down and readjust. He knew that his comings and goings were hard for her, and she needed time to warm up to him again sometimes, particularly if her mother had been talking to her a lot.

He told her about j.a.pan when she came to bed, and acted as though nothing was wrong. Sometimes that worked too, if he didn't react to her. It was hard for him when he was tired after a long trip. But he tried to be as patient as he could. He didn't want things to revert to the way they had been for the six months before he left. Things had improved for a while, and he wanted them to continue to head that way. But he could tell that he'd lost ground with her while he'd been gone. The holidays were a big deal to her and her family, and his not being there for Thanksgiving meant a lot, more than it did to him. To him, it meant a badly timed business trip. To her, it was a slap in the face, or worse, it meant that he didn't love her as much as she'd thought, or perhaps at all. Her mother had tried to convince her of that.

Things calmed down a little in the next few days, and he was home for more than two weeks. He and Kate went to buy a Christmas tree with Stevie and Reed, and decorated it. And for the first time, he saw Kate laugh and smile like the old days. Her spark had finally come back. It had been a tough year for them, particularly for her, but she was finally out of the woods, and he could see light up ahead. And it felt very good to him. It was about time. It had been a very hard time for him too.

Three days before Christmas, he got a call telling him he had to go to L.A. But he wasn't worried about it. He wasn't going to stay long, he only had to attend meetings for a day, and after that he'd fly home. He promised to be home on Christmas Eve. And even Kate didn't react this time. She was so used to his comings and goings. L.A. seemed like a short hop to both of them. She was relaxed and friendly when he left, and for once he didn't feel guilty about a trip. They even made love the morning he left.

Everything went fine in L.A. It was far less fine in New York. It had been snowing since he left, and one of the worst blizzards in history hit the city the morning of Christmas Eve. He was still confident they could land in it and he would be home on time, with any luck. And then they closed Idlewild, and canceled his flight minutes before they took off. The plane taxied back to the gate. There was nothing he could do. He was stuck.

He went back to the house and called Kate, and she understood. Nothing was moving in New York. There were two feet of fresh snow in Central Park.

"It's okay, sweetheart. I understand," she said, much to his relief, and she did. Even Joe couldn't pull it off, and she didn't want him risking his life to get home. He would have had to land as far away as Chicago or Minneapolis and then take the train home. It didn't make sense. She promised to explain it to the kids. And they had a nice Christmas anyway. But when she thought about it afterward she realized that in three years of being married to him, he had missed two Christmases out of three. And when she explained to her parents on the phone on Christmas Day that Joe was stuck in L.A., her mother said, "Of course." It made it hard for Kate. She was always making excuses for him, explaining why he couldn't be there at times that were important to everyone else, and particularly to her. She wondered sometimes if he avoided their holidays intentionally, because Christmas and other holidays had been so depressing for him as a kid. But whatever the reason, she always felt hurt when he didn't make it home for some major event, no matter how good his intentions were or his efforts to be there. The only one who never seemed to mind was Reed. Joe could do no wrong in his book. Or in Kate's most of the time. But she was disappointed anyway.

And as long as Joe was stuck in L.A., he decided to stay and do some work. He came home a week later on New Year's Eve. They were supposed to go out with friends, but when she saw how tired he was, they canceled and went to bed. It didn't seem fair to make him put a tuxedo on and go out. It was just the way their life was. They lived around Joe's trips and his inability to stick to plans. He was always either coming or going or away. She didn't even complain, but somehow it took a toll nonetheless.

They celebrated their anniversary, and then it all started again. He was gone for most of January, half of February, all of March, three weeks in April, and four in May. She complained about it repeatedly and when she sat down and counted in June, they had been together three weeks in six months. And she was beginning to wonder if he was doing it to escape her. It seemed inconceivable to her that anyone had to be away as much as he was. And she said as much to Joe. All he could hear was her criticism, and all he could feel was the guilt that was a primal part of him. She was beginning to seem like a mother he had failed. It was beginning to seem impossible to run his business and meet her needs as well. And she was refusing to understand that it was just the nature of his work, and what he loved to do. He had to be in Tokyo, Hong Kong, Madrid, Paris, London, Rome, Milan, L.A. Even if she had gone with him, he never stayed in any city for more than a few days. She went on a couple of trips with him that year, but she was always sitting in a hotel room waiting for him, and eating room service alone. It made more sense for her to stay home with her kids.