Title: Reunion
Rating: M
Summary – Henry plots, seethes and muses on his love for Abby as they travel to the island and settle in at the Candlewick.
Feedback: Most definitely please!
Disclaimer: The dialogue in these chapters belongs to the excellent writers of Harper's Island, except for a flashback in Chapter 3. No copyright infringement intended.
If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now put foundations under them. – Henry David Thoureau
Reveal thyself to me and let me behold a favorable dream. – Mesopotamian prayer
Thank God, Henry James Wakefield thought as he watched his life step carefully across the crowded dock.
She'd arrived on time, but had then sat in her cab for exactly thirteen minutes after it pulled up. After he embraced her hello, he'd have to find out why.
He allowed himself to revel in the silent thundering of his heart as they exchanged a goofy wave through the blinding afternoon sun.
Abby threaded her way through Uncle Marty's silly mariachi band, wheeling a large suitcase with a purple carryall on top of it. Henry chuckled at the sight of the massive brown "kitchen sink" bag slung over her shoulder as he rushed down to meet her. Trish favored clutch purses big enough for one Chanel lipstick and two platinum cards – which he was still usually relegated to hold when they went out.
"Hey!" he called softly.
"Hey," she echoed as they finally reached each other.
She warmly clasped her arms around his back as he enfolded her close and smiled into her hair. His internal compass centered itself for the first time since he'd seen her eight months, three weeks and two lifetimes ago.
Henry let out a relieved sigh at having her in his arms and at her first innocent, unknowing step into her new existence as his lifelong bride.
"Oof!" Abby's groan was almost a chuckle as he squeezed her as closely as he trusted himself to and as tightly as he could without crushing her ribs.
Henry's grin just widened – she was exaggerating. Abby was a surprisingly strong little morsel, and he knew from years of experience that he could hug her pretty fiercely with no problem. He was grateful every day of his life that Abby had always been so affectionate with him, even when they were toddlers. He was thankful, too, that he'd had plenty of opportunity to practise and hone the exact pressure and proximity he could safely exert while embracing her.
She'd backed off from him a little physically the summer she was thirteen and had started to develop, but after she'd gotten over the pesky shyness that puberty had wrought, she let him clasp her to his chest all the time.
She'd been an only child – and she still was, his father's revelations be damned – and he was the best and closest of her few friends. Even as a kid, J.D. had been off in his own world, and on the rare occasions when he wanted company during the summer days, he'd hung out with Shane's little brother Trevor, since they were in the same grade.
Abby and Henry's us-versus-the-world trust had immunized them against the usual boys/girls-are-icky nonsense most kids went through, and the hugs they gave each other on an almost daily basis had soothed the gnawing sting of loneliness that plagued his autumns, winters and springs.
She let go years before Henry was ready, but when she stepped back, at least he could get a good look at her face. She was lovely as ever, but there were eggplant-hued smudges under her eyes, and she looked paler than usual. He couldn't blame all this obvious strain on a three-hour flight, even though she hated to fly. Her chronic insomnia was evidently back with a spiteful vengeance, and he knew he was partly responsible.
"I thought you might never get out of that cab!" he told her truthfully.
"Well, I needed a moment," Abby hedged.
Henry could tell she was trying to spare his feelings by downplaying her doubts about the trip. He loved her all the more for her protectiveness, but her reticence piqued him. She should know by now that she could tell him anything.
He frowned at her reluctance to come totally clean, and his hurt was exacerbated by the fact that he had to admit it was karmic payback. After all, his intent to bring her home for good was pure as she was, but the pretence by which he was getting her there was as false as Katherine Wellington's breasts.
This awkwardness, although slight, was why he disliked thinking of some of the upcoming, unavoidable, unpleasant, unlisted items on his nuptial to-do list that she'd never know about. Thomas Wellington's swan song, and the Reverend Fain's impending adieu, for example.
The killing didn't bother him one iota - it hadn't for years, except for the sometimes-simultaneous annoyance of his father's bossiness and the risk of getting caught (Hell, son, are you trying to saturate yourself? Either avoid the carotid artery or stand the hell back!).
However, keeping secrets from his soon-to-be-wife made him feel like a heel.
"Second thoughts?" he asked, hoping his fear didn't show.
"About going home?"
No - about agreeing to this wedding. Tell me I'm making a mistake, baby. Tell me you want me, that you can't bear to see me marry Trish. Tell me you need me…
"You know, I told him you'd come!" a cultured, lightly teasing voice came from the deck. Henry ground his teeth and fought the urge to charge up the stairs and pitch Trish off the railing, ass over teakettle, into the drink. Apparently it was too much to ask to talk to Abby in private for two minutes.
Honestly, jealousy was so unattractive.
Of course, Trish was right to feel threatened by his feelings for Abby, but she would never know just how justified the feeling was, which made it all the more pitiful.
Her envy wouldn't be half so pathetic if Trish would just own up to it. But alas, she was just too entitled and self-possessed to think she could ever take a backseat to meek little Abigail Agnes Mills.
All of Trish's insecurities toward his angel were pathetically, preciously muffled in her constant, solicitous queries about Abby's wellbeing, and her insistence on always speaking to her if Abby made the mistake of calling when Trish was around.
Honey, what's up? You're emailing Abby? How great! Tell her I miss her!
Sweetie, Abby is coming, isn't she? I just don't want you to be disappointed if she can't bring herself to make it…
Henry bear, are you sure Abby is up to going back to the island? I know she'd do anything for you, but she hasn't even spoken to her Dad since…
Last week in bed, Trish had smiled sweetly at him from her pillow and told him they should set poor Abby up with someone nice, especially with her own singlehood to become more pronounced after their wedding. Maybe someone successful from his office…
Henry bit his tongue to stop himself from asking her if he looked like a pimp, or Abby a gold-digger. He nodded, smiled back and gouged his nails into his palms to keep from reaching over and crushing her larynx with one hand around her lily-white neck. Behind his loving grin, he saw her eyeballs bulge and her hair tangle on the pillow as her head thrashed around. He felt her manicured talons dig into his wrist as she tried to pry him off, and heard her choke his name in a final betrayed gasp.
The next morning, there were bloody streaks from his fingers on the underside of his pillowcase. It was too bad Trish would shuffle off this mortal coil without ever learning how close she had come to meeting her Maker that night – and how gravely she had erred by ever suggesting such abomination.
"Trish!" Abby cried. The next thing he knew, his sweetheart had raced up the steps onto the Tarapunga and embraced his fiancée.
"I am so excited!" Abby rhapsodized as they hugged.
Henry could only pray this was a polite white lie. Of course the nuptials – well, to Trish, anyway - would never happen, but he'd rather harpoon himself than think that Abby could stand to see him marry anyone but her.
It was the principle of the thing.
"You look great!" Trish exclaimed.
Thank you, Captain Obvious, Henry thought wildly as he stood next to his girls with a mile-wide, dopey, ain't-we-got-fun grin on his face.
"Oh, no," Abby demurred with her usual modesty.
"How was your trip from L.A.?" Trish asked, as if she cared about anything except her guests arriving bright-eyed and bushy-tailed to pay homage to her at the wedding.
"I am feeling a little shaky from the flight," said Abby with a wan smile, smoothing her hair.
Henry yearned to reach out and hold her again; to stroke her lovely locks in her stead. Abby was the most stoic person he knew. Her admission meant that she must be feeling very jangled indeed. Poor babe.
He'd have to make sure that the yokels didn't bother her once they arrived home. He could just imagine Harper denizens pouncing on her the second they saw her.
They were proud of her, but their only concrete current Abby knowledge was that she was "a bigtime writer in L.A." She'd crawled up the frayed edges of the ropes dangling from the Tree of Woe by the tips of her bitten fingernails and found success in a field where many foundered in obscurity. Island girl makes good.
They didn't blame her for leaving - it had been her father's decision to send her to her grandmother - but they'd been hurt when she never wrote or called, much less came back.
Trish had insisted on sending Charlie Mills a handwritten keepsake wedding invitation – as if the man gave a rat's ass! – and had delightedly informed the Sherriff that his daughter intended to make the journey.
Henry wasn't happy about his betrothed's disclosure, but it was one of the few aspects of the wedding plans that he'd had no control over. Luckily, he was fairly certain Charlie would have told no one about Abby's plans to come except Jimmy – and both of them would be so justifiably nervous that she might back out that they would keep their mouths shut.
Henry was glad no one else knew Abby was coming, but word would spread fast through the thorny island grapevine once they docked home. Folks would insist on dragging her to their house for coffee, or to the Cannery for a draft with Nikki.
Well, not if he could help it - and he could. Being the groom had to come with some perks. He'd whisk her straight to the Candlewick and up to her room so she could have a long, peaceful nap before the welcome dinner, which was starting in four hours and forty-nine minutes, according to the engraved Rolex he'd received as an engagement present. To My Darling Henry: Love Always, Your Trish.
Henry signaled to a waiter to bring Abby a drink, but he was beaten to the punch.
"Have some champagne, Abner. You'll feel better," Sully invited, offering her a flute of Cristal that had probably gone flat. There was a mocking border around Sully's tone that Henry disliked.
But before he could say anything, Abby strode over to the boys, snatched Malcolm's surprisingly tasty home-label beer out of his hand and gulped it down.
Everyone was astonished but Henry. After all, they'd gotten drunk together for the first time the summer she was sixteen and he eighteen.
Henry watched with affection as she expertly chugged down the brew.
"Oh, my God!" Malcolm said with unmistakable admiration, which almost endeared him to Henry.
Almost.
"Well, what do you know?" Abby asked in mock innocence. "I do feel better."
Henry chuckled indulgently at the ebullient cheering this brought from the guys. However, he almost lost hold of the light, bobbing buoy of control he clung to when Sully swept Abby up in a violent bear hug, lifting her clear off the ground the way Henry had ached to and actually cupping her ass.
A wave of rage rushed through him like a swell of icy brine choked with strangling seaweed, and he wished he had a boarding knife or a cleaver handy. Why didn't Sully just stick his palm down the front of her shirt and his tongue down her throat and be done with it?
Henry took a deep breath of sea air, which always calmed him. Eyes on the prize, he told himself. The boys were sure to monopolize Abby for the time being. And as much as it killed him to walk away from her while she was right in front of him, neither did he care to play second fiddle and hang back watching others yammer at her.
Besides, it was time to see about getting the motor running and the journey started.
Geronimo.