Chapter 53

It had been four days since Natalia had made breakfast for Olivia on the roof top of the Beacon. She had taken a step back. As hard as it was, she knew that as much as her persistence would pay off in the end, too much at once would send Olivia running. She planned on a new approach. She was going to try and reestablish a friendship with Olivia, however, she was not prepared for the events of the day to come. They would change her plans; she would need her best friend.

Rafe had come by for food and to talk with his mother. The two were in the kitchen, Rafe making himself a plate. Natalia was trying to get Rafe to move back into the farmhouse. It was empty and lonely without Olivia and Emma there, and she thought it would be good for him to already be there when she did convince Olivia to come home.

Rafe set his plate at the table and sat down. "I know Ma, but I can't come back."

"It's not pressure, I understand. I'm not pressuring you. I was just saying, you know."

"I know Ma, I mean, I really can't come back, not anymore. It's kinda what I came over here to talk to you about. I enlisted."

"Enlisted?"

"In the army, and according to the admissions officer, I leave in about two weeks."

Natalia's face fell. She couldn't believe what she was hearing. So much time had been lost with him and now he was leaving again, going to a place she couldn't visit.

"Ma, would you just eat your food, it's getting cold."

"I don't understand. Are you telling me that you're going away?"

"Ma, it's not like this just came up outta nowhere. Alright. I've been thinking about it for a while. I mean, I need some direction, some discipline, I need some focus. Alright. I mean I wanted to be a cop, that didn't work out, and with my record, the jobs out there are like the one I have now and I'm not gonna stay in the back of a hardware store the rest of my life."

"You know what your problem is, you are impatient, something will happen for you eventually."

"No, Ma, mom, that's the thing, I don't wanna wait. I want it to happen now. Why is that such a bad thing? I mean I can do it; I can come back, I can even go to school afterwards."

"When do you decide this and why didn't you talk to me about it? Who did you talk to?"

"Nobody. I'm a grown man I can do whatever I want. Okay. I made this decision on my own."

"Okay well go ahead unmake it cause you're not going." She slammed her first on the table and stood up, walking to the counter.

"Look I already signed the paperwork; I can't undo it."

"I don't care about paperwork, I'm your mother I should have to sign something. You're too young."

"Mom, I'm eighteen years old okay. Alright. I sign everything now. Not you."

"Is this about me and Olivia, because I told you I wasn't going to give her up?"

"No. Ma. This is about me, what I want. I have to do this."

"No, you don't Rafe."

"Ma…"

Natalia sat back down. "I don't think that you really understand what you're doing."

"No. Ma."

"Because you could get killed."

"Mom, I could get killed right here, being a cop in Springfield, and you were fine with that."

"That is completely different. Rafe you wanted to serve and protect, this is a small town, and it's not the same."

"Ma, I'm gonna do that. I'm gonna serve and protect, I'm just not gonna do that here."

"No. Absolutely not. No, no, no, no, no."

"Ma, look at me. If you cannot respect me, making my decisions, why should I have to respect you making yours? Alright. You have to understand where I'm coming from. I'm sorry. Alright. Come here." He kissed her forehead and walked away "I love you."

As he left, she barely whispered through her tears. "I love you too."

Frank was sitting talking to Marina when his phone rang. Seeing who it was, he asked her to go inside so he could talk to Natalia without having her get angry about him talking to her. He answered the call. "Uh, Cooper here."

"Frank, it's Natalia."

"Uh, are you okay?"

"No, not really."

"Where are you?"

"Uh, across from the post office."

"Okay you stay put, I'll be right there."

Olivia was headed to her suite when she bumped into Josh. "Hey, I'm glad I ran into you, I wanted to talk to you. Um, I wanted to say I'm sorry for the other day, for jumping on you and saying let's have sex now, just to get over Natalia."

"It's okay, I really haven't thought much about it. You know, like the image of you with another woman, it really hasn't crossed my mind."

Olivia laughed. "I shouldn't have said anything about that."

"Seriously, seriously, I hope things work out for you and Natalia, or don't work out, whatever makes you happy. And to be honest, that whole thing with you on top of me, that was kinda the highlight of my day, things kind of went downhill from there."

"So, me wanting to use your body…"

"Yeah."

"Is there worse things that happened?"

"Well, I ran into Reva right after that, at the job sight. She was crying, wearing the dress she was wearing when she buried Jeffery, that was kind of awkward."

"Oh, I was the highlight."

"Yes. In fact, between the two of you, I think I might have sworn off woman."

"I'm right there with ya."

"Yeah."

"Anyway…"

"Olivia?"

"Yeah?"

"Um, if you love her, you might think about giving her another chance, life's too short. I know you Olivia, you're being stubborn and pig headed. Think about it."

"Thanks Josh. Uh anyway, I owe you."

"Yes you do. And you can pay me back right now."

Olivia's eyes went wide but Josh just smirked. He then explained his plan to help Billy romance Vanessa. "So, we finally got Vanessa to Tower's and uh then she said no, she would not marry Billy, something about Billy putting a pillowcase on her head, said she wanted to be courted, so Billy came up with this idea of fifty-two dates. One a week for a year. So, here's the thing, I ran into Vanessa earlier, and she's changed her mind. She wants to marry Billy as quickly as possible. So um, that's the deal they kind of…" He motioned with his fingers.

"Yeah crossed their wires, that happens. So, what can I do to help?"

"Well, they're about to have a date, I mean like now, at the gazebo right here on the grounds."

"Okay."

"So, I was thinking this. If I can get the engagement ring from Billy's uh room, and then take it there, and hide it some place, so Vanessa will find it, then Billy will be forced to pop the question so then they both get what they want. You see what I'm saying."

"Wow you are quite the match maker."

"Yeah and we can sing the song right here, but right now, I'm just wondering if you have your passkey?"

She holds it up with a smirk, as if to say 'really.'

Frank ran up to Natalia. "Are you okay."

"Yeah I'm okay. This is about Rafe. He enlisted in the army. So, he's gonna go away and he's gonna die. He wants to go to war and get killed. So, you have to talk, you have to stop him."

"Whoa, whoa, when did he do this? He never said a word."

"I don't know. He said he's leaving in two weeks. So, you have to talk to him, because he listens to you, and you have to make him not go."

"But Natalia, if he's already enlisted, there's nothing we can do, he's an adult now."

"No, no Frank, he doesn't understand he's…"

"He understands more then you give him credit for. He's not a little boy anymore. You raised a young man, a good man. And he's able to make his own choices now."

"But I don't want him to…"

"But this isn't about what you want. This is about what Rafe wants now."

Natalia could only stare at him before she walked away.

Josh and Olivia entered the gazebo where lunch was set up for Billy and Vanessa. Olivia looked around. "Wow. Billy Lewis, who knew he had it in him."

"Well, we Lewis men are full of surprises."

"Discovering that."

"Yeah."

"So, the ring?"

"I don't know, um…"

"Ooo. The glass. We drop it in the glass."

"That's a lovely idea. But what if she drinks from the glass and swallows the ring? Or worse, what if Billy sits here and you know he doesn't look at anything he eats or drinks. He'll just throw it down; the ring will be gone forever."

"Okay, well you know what we do, we just take one of these flowers, and we put it on her plate, and she knows to sit there." She pulled a flower from the vase in the center of the table and set it on the plate.

"You're really good at this you know."

"I know what women want."

"Ah. Except yourself."

Olivia chose to ignore that remark. "So, what now?"

"Well, first we drop the ring in." He let the ring fall into the glass. "Then we hide, and we wait."

"What?"

"You wanna watch don't you?"

"Well, I do. I didn't think you would."

"Like I said, Lewis men, full of surprises." The two went to hide behind a nearby tree so they could watch the proposal.

Natalia went into the store, grabbing a coffee and drinking greedily. Remy was buying flowers when he saw her and could tell she was upset so he approached. "Natalia."

"Hi." She all but sobbed. "Sorry. I'm fine, I'm okay. I just…"

"I can sit with you for a while."

"It's fine. Don't you have somewhere to go?"

"Yeah, Company, the wife's mad. I thought I'd get some flowers."

"That's really nice." She cried. Thinking of both Rafe leaving and Olivia. "She's gonna love them, they're so pretty."

"Okay, Natalia, I know you, I know somethings wrong."

"Yeah. Rafe enlisted." Remy just looked at her. "Yeah. I'm trying to really grasp it and I'm really scared."

"That's uh, that's a big move. I get it though."

"You do?"

"Yeah. You know when I was his age I thought about enlisting all the time. You wanna prove to yourself that you're strong. It's a guy thing. We have this need to protect."

"Isn't there some other way you can do it?"

"Yeah. Yeah, but there's something about it. You know. When you're a kid, you're always searching for answers. There's something about the discipline of the army that makes sense. You know it's gonna be hard, but you'll be so proud once you've done it."

"That's what he said. He wanted to serve."

"That's a good thing. You should be proud of him."

"Okay. Thanks."

"Okay. I better get going before the wife changes the locks on the doors. It's happened before." He got a small smile from Natalia. "Feel better." He turned and paid for his flowers.

Olivia was standing on the far side of Josh, trying to see what was going on with Billy and Vanessa. "Okay, I can't see."

"Shh, shh."

"I can't see."

"They'll hear you."

"Well, I…"

"Shh."

"Shh."

Billy toasted to Vanessa as she drank and found the ring. Accepting the proposal, he didn't know he was giving but was happy occurred.

Josh and Olivia both smiled. Happy to see at least one couple was happy in Springfield. Josh looked at her. "So, they seem happy. Now, how about you?"

Olivia's eyes went wide. "Joshua Lewis, you stay out of my love life."

"Olivia, I don't plan on getting involved other than to say that you should maybe think about what will really make you happy."

"She left me."

"Yeah, and now she's back."

Olivia only stared at him before kissing his cheek and wondering back to the hotel. As Olivia walked up the hall to her suite, her heart clenched in her chest when she saw Natalia on the floor against her door. She rushed to kneel beside her. "Natalia, are you okay?"

"It's not me. It's not me." She assured. "It's Rafe."

"Okay. What happened?"

"He joined the army, and he's gonna go away, and I can't stop him, cause he's old enough to go, and I came back ready to let him make his own decisions, but I'm so scared. I'm not asking you to fix it, I just, I really need someone. I really need you. I feel really alone, and I feel really helpless, and I need you to hold me and, I really need you to lie to me and tell me it's gonna be okay, and I need you to look into my eyes and tell that I've been a good mother, and I really need you."

Against her better judgement, Olivia sat on the floor and took the crying woman into her arms. Stroking her hair and talking in soothing tones. "Oh sweetie, I can't even imagine what you're going through, but I want to help you, I really do, oh god I wanna help you, but…I can make some calls. I don't know if it will help, but I have some contacts. I will do anything for you, but…" she pulled out of the embrace. "But I can't do this. I can't hold you, and I can't tell you that I love you, because you need me now but what if something happens and you leave me again?"

"No."

"I would do anything in the world for you, as a friend." She hung her head and spoke barely above a whisper. "I will do anything, as a friend, but I can't do anything more than that." She began to cry. "I can't be anything more to you then that."

Olivia looked at the woman who held her heart. She placed both her hands on either side of Natalia's face and pressed their foreheads together in that familiar way of theirs. Giving Natalia that old comfort. Her resolve slipped for a moment and she leaned in, pressing a gentle kiss to Natalia's lips. As is started to deepen, she pulled back and rushed into her room. For Olivia, this kiss, was goodbye.