Playing it Kale (The McCain Saga Book 4) (20 page)

I give a small smile.
 
“I like that.”

He reaches over with a shaky hand and
takes mine in his.
 
Lake got his
hands.
 
They’re large and well
weathered.
 
Meant for
hard work and comfort.

“My son has been on a huge roller
coaster up and down for the past five years of his life.
 
He’s had friends who tried to drag him down
into their pit of bad mistakes.
 
He’s had
parents who just wanted the best for him, but didn’t understand how to support
him in his dreams.
 
Then he rocketed to
the top and everyone wanted a piece of him.”

He coughs, and I am ready to have to call
for help, but it’s just twice and he settles back down.
 
“Kale has always looked happy on the
outside.
 
He’s got that confidence like
nothing can ever touch him.
 
He loves
life and he makes the most of it.
 
But a
father knows when there’s something hollow inside your child.
 
When there’s a void where
true happiness should be.”

He squeezes my hand and I’m surprised at
the strength there.
 
“You came and filled
that void in him, Whitney.
 
He’s hurting
right now, and if I had to guess, he’s going to be hurting for a while after I
go.
 
But you filled something in him that
was missing.
 
And I wasn’t sure he’d ever
find something real like that.
 
So even
if he doesn’t seem like himself for a while, don’t let him go.
 
Because he’s going to come out of it all
sometime, and he needs you there waiting for him.”

My eyes have welled hard and a few tears
leak out onto my cheeks.
 
“Thank you,
Robert.”
 
Another tear falls to my face
and I absentmindedly brush it away.
 
“I
love your son.
 
I haven’t been able to
tell him yet, but I know that now.
 
I
love him with more than I thought I was capable of.
 
And I’m going to be there as long as he needs
me.”

Robert smiles and squeezes my hand once
again.
 
“And that’s all a father can ask
for his baby son.
 
Take care of him.
 
He just needs love.
 
That’s all he’s ever wanted his whole life.”

“I can do that,” I promise him.

“Thank you.”
 
He coughs once more and I know this is as
much time as I’m going to get.
 
And I am
ever so grateful for it.
 
I stand from
the bed, lean over, and press a kiss to his forehead.

“I hear he finally got some sleep, but
would you mind going and getting him for me?” Robert asks with no regrets in
his eyes.

“Of course,” I say as I open the door.

“Remember,” he calls.
 
“He just needs love.”

“I will.”

Kale goes in to talk with his father for
a long time.
 
Longer
than anyone else got.
 

Robin goes in last.
 
She’s in there for twenty minutes is
all.
 
Everyone waits
in the living or dining room, like we’re collectively holding our breath before
one final giant sob at the end.

The mother of this amazing family comes
out at ten in the evening.
 
She informs
everyone that Robert is still somewhat coherent, but he’s fading fast.
 
She wants everyone to come in for a big
family prayer.

The look she gives me when she says
everyone
tells me I’m expected there,
too.
 
And I’m so grateful for that.

We all stand around his bed and Robert
gives us a weak smile.
 
Sage holds one of
his hands, Robin the other.
 
And we all
hold each other’s hands.
 
Kale to one side of me, Paisley on the other.
 
There’s Julian, and Lake, Riley, and
Drake.
 
Lucian, Quinn
and Afton.
 
And Kaylee offers a
prayer.

It’s beautiful.
 
It’s simple.
 
It’s full of gratitude and love.

At twelve-forty-one, Robert McCain
passes into the next life.

CHAPTER
TWENTY

“Do you think he’s watching us up
there?” Kale asks.

I look up at those stars above us and
pull myself tighter into Kale’s side.
 
It’s freezing cold out here.
 
We
lie on an extremely outdated trampoline in the back yard.
 
We’ve got a nest of pillows and blankets
wrapped around us, but it’s still the latter half of October and this is Washington,
after all.
 

“I don’t know if he’s up there,” I say
quietly as I gaze at the stars.
 
“But I
think our loved ones stay with us.
 
Somehow.”

“Yeah,” he says.
 
He rubs a hand up and down my back absentmindedly.
 
“I think so.
 
I didn’t think about it much before now.
 
But I think that somehow he still knows what we’re doing.”

“I think so, too.”

The funeral was yesterday evening.
 
Friday.
 
The attendance was huge.
 
Largely staff from
Woodinville High School.
 
He’d
been there so
long,
he made a lot of connections and
friends.
 
And there were so many of his
past football team members.
 
And, of course, all the family.

Everyone spoke of Robert McCain’s quiet
strength.
 
Of his wise
words.
 
Of his
firm and helping hand.
 
There were
so many tears, but there was also laughter and smiles.

It’s hard to only cry at the goodbye of
a well-loved, wonderful man.

And now here we are.
 
Saturday night.
 
Everyone has gone home.
 
Drake and Kaylee took the kids back to their
beds.
 
Sage and Julian back to
Bellevue.
 
Riley and
Lake to the ranch.
 
So now it’s
just Kale and I here with Robin.
 
She
went to bed an hour ago.
 
We checked on
her before we came outside.
 
She was fast
asleep.

“I wish I could have gotten to know him
better,” I sigh, still staring at the stars.

“Yeah,” Kale breathes out.
 
He runs his hand over my back again.

Kale is right here with me, holding me
and keeping the chill away.
 
But it feels
as if he’s a million miles away.

And that’s okay.
 
I’ll just be waiting here, for when he comes
back.

“If I get a chance, I’ll be back,” I say
as Kale drives Tony and I back to the airport the next morning.
 
“I don’t know if Elysium will let me, but
I’ll try.”

“Okay,” Kale says as he stares out the
front window, at the light traffic ahead.

I wait for him to say anything else.
 
To say that he’s still
planning on going on that first week of the tour with me.
 
To say that he’ll meet me back down in LA,
maybe a few days after the album releases.

But he doesn’t say anything.
 
And I feel selfish that it scares me that he
doesn’t.

I have to go back to LA.
 
With the release of the album only nine days
away, Elysium is freaking out about my being out of touch.
 
There aren’t even serious repercussions if I
don’t come back now.
 
It isn’t a feasible
option to
not
come back.
 
It’s down to do or die.

This is my life now, and they own me.

I don’t want to go.
 
I want to be here, helping Kale, helping the
McCains
in any way that I possibly can.
 
But it’s becoming clear that there isn’t much
good I’m doing.

Kale is just quiet and stoic.
 
He doesn’t talk much, and I don’t have the
right abilities to pry anything out of him.

So maybe what he needs right now is just
some space.
 
At least, I’m going to hope
that will help.
 
That and time.

“I’ll call you when I land?” I ask.
 
And I hate that I form it as a question, like
I’m unsure if he wants me to call him or not.
 
Cause I’m not.

“Yeah,” he says as we pull up to the
curb at the drop off area.
 
“Do that.”

“Okay,” I say, trying to feel
relieved.
 
I lean over the center console,
and he does give me a quick kiss.
 
Not
the kind I want, but it’s his lips on mine.
 

There’s
a million more words I feel I should offer.
 
I write songs at the drop of the hat.
 
The words just come out like turning on a valve.
 
But right now?
 
How do I express my grief and my fears and
every uncertainty I’m feeling right now?
 
There just aren’t the right words.

So, when Tony calls for me, because he’s
unloaded our bags, I just climb out of the car.
 
I wave goodbye.
 
And just like
that, Kale drives away.

“Do you think he’s going to come back to
me from this?”
 
I don’t mean to say the
words out loud.
 
But there they are, put
out for
all the
world to hear how scared I am.

And it’s like a knife to the heart when
Tony doesn’t say anything.
 
Not a single
word of
reassurement
.
 

Monday.
 
Tuesday.
 
Wednesday.

I shut off everything that normally
makes me Whitney.
 
The
silly nature.
 
The
search for something beautiful and different.
 
The awkward charm.
 
I turn it all off.
 
And I’m just get-it-all-done Whitney.

I am a model of an employee.
 
My bosses tell me what to do.
 
Hadley.
 
Matt.
 
Veronica.
 
The executives.
 
Elysium.
 
The whole freaking world.
 
I do what they want.
 
I smile.
 
I talk.
 
I greet people.
 
I stand in front of a camera.
 
I go to an awards show to show my face.

Cause I don’t want to think about
anything.

Anything.

Because the second I start being me
again, I start feeling sick.

So this is just easier.

“Are you okay?” Hadley asks as Tony
drives us home Wednesday night.
 
“You
don’t seem like yourself.”

“I’m fine,” I say without looking at
her.
 
I put on that fake smile I’ve been
practicing, but I don’t turn to face her.

“Are you sure?” she asks.
 
The concern rolls off her in thick,
suffocating waves.
 
“I mean, it’s okay if
you’re not okay.
 
That was a pretty hard
blow.
 
How’s Kale, by the way?”

My heart skips a beat or two before
giving a painful twist.
 
“He’s good.”

But it’s a total lie.

Because he picked up the phone when I
landed and called him.
 
It was about like
talking to a wall.
 
A
really flat one.

But that’s the only time he’s answered
this entire time.

I try to tell myself that he just needs
that space everyone talks about.
 
He just
needs some time to deal.
 
That in a few
more days, he’ll call me out of the blue and he’ll say he just couldn’t cope
but now he’s ready to come back to LA and be with me.

But it’s been a long stretch of silence.

And…

And just…

“I’m fine,” I say to the car’s
window.
 
“We’re fine.”