Chapter 31
His head was pounding again and it was starting to feel like he was underwater, sounds were far away and his vision hazy. Maybe he was having an out of body experience, he had heard about those once on some talk show, when it feels like you are watching a movie version of your life. He could hear himself yelling at Quinn, and he could feel the anger, sense the pain, but it was like someone else was performing the act and he was a bystander. It felt like too much to do to her, she had just gotten out of the hospital she wasn't strong enough. He wanted to tell himself to stop, to pull it back a bit and calm down, but he didn't, he couldn't. This was about his daughter.
Questions had been building inside of him for weeks, strange looks, constant evasions, an unsettling feeling whenever he spoke Quinn's name. So close to the truth, he couldn't stop now, he had to know, what was real, what had happened to Beth, and most importantly find out if it could happen again. There was where his anger stemmed, from the hidden fears he didn't want to voice. Sam knew Quinn had done something, even before she started to tell him about her depression earlier this evening, his gut had been sending him warning signs about her, signs he had chosen to ignore. This time he prayed his gut was wrong, that it had been altered by the coma and his instincts were off, because he didn't want to be right about this. Quinn couldn't be capable of hurting a child, their own daughter.
She was covered in tears, standing in the middle of the room, arms about herself, in her red dress. Red like blood, like the color behind his eyes as he burned watching her, waiting for a response. What was she holding back? Something big, Sam was sure of that.
"Tell me why you tried to hurt Beth?" he finally asked, to get her talking, to drown out the sound of her tears.
"I wasn't trying to hurt her." She sniffled. "I explained this before."
"Yes but your explanation made no sense." How did she forget a child more than once? It didn't seem plausible that she could forget Beth's existence for that stretch of time.
Quinn sat on the bed, tucking her hair behind her ears, staring at her feet. "I've never done much with our baby. I admit it. I let Mercedes take care of her so I wouldn't have to while I drank and obsessed about my depression. I couldn't make myself care enough to be a mother. Beth didn't seem to like me and sometimes I didn't like her much either. I felt like she ruined my lifestyle."
"If you didn't want Beth why not give her up to my parents or your parents?" He knew it was a hard choice, but at times the right one. Quinn could have done the same, if Beth had been too much for her.
"I wasn't giving up my child. I loved her. My emotions were out of whack, I couldn't get myself to care about the right things, but I still wanted to care about them. I just wish I had gotten help sooner, to have avoided all this."
"Me too, because Beth was the one to suffer," he said staring at the broken mobile on the floor, bits of stars were scattered at his feet. Then she appeared, the tip of her shoes invading the stars.
"Sam, this is me." She reached up and caressed his face, drawing him into her dark green eyes. He was powerless to resist her this close. With arms stiffly at his sides, he let her continue to touch him. "You know me. I wouldn't have hurt her. I was sick."
"Quinn I know you were sick, I understand that, I really do, but you left her by herself two times that I know of already. That's too much. It scares me."
She leaned over into the crib and picked up the stuffed bear that sat in the corner. It was blue, made out of cloth like a towel with thread sewn eyes and smile.
Quinn hugged the bear to her chest as she spoke. "I just forgot about her for a little bit, but that was then, before I was on medication, before I was seeing Dr. Hill. I would never do that now."
"How many times did it happen? How many times did you forget?"
She tossed the bear back in the crib. "That's it. You know all," she replied, her eyes settling on his.
"I look at you and I see your beautiful face, you're my Quinn. I know you would never hurt our child. Then I think about the facts, and you did this, and CPS took her away. I don't know how to merge those two sides of you in my mind."
Hesitating between touching her and turning away, Sam fought with himself to let that negative image of Quinn go. She was still the same person, he reminded himself, she was sick at the time, not in a stable frame of mind. He let his finger tangle in a curl at the end of her hair, a compromise of contact.
"Are you like everyone else? Do you hate me now?"
"I could never hate you." He took a deep breath and stepped closer, encircling her with his arms. "I'm sorry I yelled. I just kept seeing Beth crying and hurt in my mind and I lost it."
Feeling powerless was something Sam couldn't stand and all of this with Beth had him at a complete loss. It had already happened, the events long over, there was nothing for him to do, no way for him to protect his child. He couldn't fight the past. Still he was haunted by what should've been, what he should've done to prevent it all.
"She cries in my mind too, in my sleep, I can hear her sometimes. Calling out for me." Quinn held both of his hands. "Sam you've got to know how ashamed and sorry I am for all I've done. Please believe me."
"I do believe you, but something still feels off. I trusted you more than anyone in this world until a few minutes ago. Now I'm not sure what to think."
"You can still trust me. Just as you always have."
"Look me in the eyes and tell me the truth." Her face in his palms, he searched her eyes for the truth, for the answers to all that still eluded him. "Is there something else I should know?" he asked.
"Your parents don't…"
"I don't give a shit about my parents," he said cutting her off. Sam tried to stifle his anger. It wasn't her fault that his parents were controlling. "This is about us. I'm ready to spend my life with you. I'm taking risks for you, breaking my wife's heart for you. I need you to be straight with me. Is there anything else?"
Quinn looked at him, dead on and unflinching. "No Sam that's all I have to say."
He wanted to believe her, to take what she said as the truth and let his doubts go, but there was that one thing that still plagued him. So he had to ask.
"What about the snow?"
Her face grew pale as she turned away. Silent with her back to him for so long Sam thought she would ignore his question, but then she spoke.
"It was snowing that night by the docks. I stood there for I don't know how long just staring into the water, seeing a reflection that I wished was my own. I used to be different. You think I'm the same person you remember but I'm not. I lost pieces of myself over the years, so many that in the end I didn't even feel like me. I was a liar and a cheater, a worthless mother, I had no career, no more dreams. I just existed. That night as the snow fell all around me, covering everything in white, I tried to reach for that person I used to be, that brave girl full of dreams. She was there in the river Sam." She looked at him, eyes wide and shining, so much pain on her face. "You were there, you know?"
"At the river?" He wanted to go to her, take her in his arms and tell her to stop, to forget about that night and snow. But he didn't, he was cemented to his spot, watching a Quinn he didn't really know.
"Yes. In my mind I saw you in the water too, next to that other me. You were young, and handsome, and awake. If I could just reach you, on that other side, then I knew I would be free. I'd be myself again. So I lifted my head toward the sky, and let the snow hit my face one last time, then I jumped."
"Quinn," his voice cracked. He didn't have the words to respond. She had been desperate and in pain, so alone, while he was stuck in that hospital bed.
Quinn was close again, the hint of her citrus shampoo filling the air. Graceful fingers on his cheeks, catching tears he didn't even know he shed. "I finally reached you Sam," she whispered. "This is the other side with you and Beth. I'm going to get strong and I'm going to get better, for the both of you, and for me."
She took his breath away, as he stared into her eyes, stroked her blonde hair. She was everything, the most beautiful light that ever blessed his life. Squeezing her against him, probably way too tight, he thanked God she hadn't drowned that night, grateful she was still here with him. "Quinn I'm so sorry," he said against her hair. "I don't know how I let myself think such horrible things about you."
Leaning back to look at him, she said, "I'm glad you did. Proves what I always knew in my heart, that you are an amazing father, and that you'd do anything to keep our child safe."
"I'd give my life."
"I know you would," she said rubbing his cheek with the back of her hand. Sam caught her hand on his face, enclosing it with his own.
"I need you to understand something Quinn. I am going to do everything I can to keep you out of that hospital upstate but I need you stay in treatment here in Lima."
"I am Sam. I will still see Dr. Hill."
"Good. And you can't be near Beth again. I can't take the risk."
"I know," she said her face falling. "I promise I won't do anything to hurt her again."
"I know you won't, because you'll never get the chance." Sam stated coldly. "I'll have you put away myself if I find out you ever hurt our child."
"Sam," She squeezed his hand that still held hers. "I swear-"
"Excuse me, Mr. Evans," said a voice behind them. Sam turned to see Marcel standing in the doorway with a glass in his hand. "Your juice sir."
"Yes. Thank you Marcel," said Sam as he took it from the man.
"Have you seen Mrs. Evans?" Marcel asked. "I needed to tell her about Beth."
"You can tell me. How is she?"
"She's good sir. She's with your family, going from hand to hand. She's happy now sir."
"That's good to hear. Thank you." Sam gulped down his juice.
"Oh and tell Mrs. Evans, that she loves the music. She always wondered about that."
Sam smiled. "I will be sure to do that. Thank you Marcel."
"I guess we have a musical child," said Quinn after Marcel left. She had been very silent while the nurse was in the room, taking to the corner to examine items on a shelf.
"How could we not with you as her mother?" asked Sam. He wouldn't be surprised if Beth sang her first words instead of speaking them.
"And you too, all those nights on the porch with your guitar."
"You remember that?" Sam was surprised. He hadn't thought about his guitar in years.
"Warm summer nights, the moon so bright it was like a lamp," Quinn mused out loud. "We would sit on the bottom steps of my porch and make up songs."
"I used to love to hear you sing, gave me chills." The world would stop and a spotlight would illuminate Quinn, all his focus on her. There was nothing else when she sang.
"You always were my best audience, so enthusiastic about everything, even though I know you hate pop music."
Sam pulled her over to the bed to sit beside him, knees tapping, his arms around her shoulders.
"I don't hate it when you sing it."
Sweet like an angel, her music was a reflection of her physical beauty, a representation of her soul, Sam would lose himself in her voice, hang on every note, for it was the only time he truly got to see her. The real her, through song she'd shine displaying emotions she rarely shared, so closed was his Quinn, like a jack-in-the-box, only opening up when the music played.
"Do you still play the guitar?" she asked, seeming to look through him, maybe searching for the boy he used to be.
"No I put it away after we broke up. Not much to sing about after that." No stars, no songs, just darkness and a pain that felt like it would never subside.
"That's a shame." Her smile dropped slightly. "You played beautifully. I bet Beth would love to hear it."
"Maybe one day," his voice trailed off, as he remembered them so young and happy, nights filled with music. "I still can't believe you remember that."
"I remember it all from back then, the music, the stars, the dances," she said wistfully, closing her eyes.
Sam leaned into her playfully. "And the kisses," he added.
"Especially those," she smiled. "You made my first real kiss magical, like an old movie."
"I was so nervous, I thought I would miss your lips," he laughed. With Quinn so close he used to lose his train of thought, his pulse would pound in his ears, and his mouth would go dry, it still did. Even now he was so moved by her.
"It was perfect. We were perfect. I keep all of that close to my heart. For always." She brushed her lips across his, eyes open, watching him intently. "You never forget your first love," she said with a smile, letting her head fall against his shoulder.
Sam sighed, completely taken by the woman next to him. She had opened up to him tonight in a way she never had before, letting him into places she normally kept hidden. She looked different now, he hadn't noticed before, but she looked older, the fire in her eyes had dimmed, and her smile a little less bright. Her beauty remained, but it was clouded, perhaps by her current struggles or the pain she had endured over the years.
Maybe she was right, he didn't know her, not as she was now, but he would. They had the rest of their lives to recapture lost time, and create new memories. Quinn had given him her heart and promised him a future with their child, the best birthday gift he could ask for. The way Sam saw it, the least he could do was give her one special night, because he wasn't sure what the future would hold now that he could so clearly see the uphill climb toward their forever in front of them.
"Come on let's go," he said grabbing her by the hand and pulling Quinn to her feet. "We have a party to attend."