Overkill(7)
He’d thought he was done with this, thought that it had been resolved with him more or less at peace with Rebecca’s parents and with himself. But every now and then, a reminder of it would crop up, and it never failed to affect him as gut-wrenchingly as he’d been affected four years ago when confronted with a choice that would have bedeviled Solomon.
Ms. Kate Lennon earned points for allowing him the time he needed to grapple with the fact that the worst, most pivotal days of his life had been conjured.
Memories of them lurked in a deep, dark rabbit hole of his subconscious. He tried to avoid it, because whenever he went down into it too far, it was a struggle for him to climb out. He’d spent every day of the past four years trying. He would make headway, then something, or someone like this angel-faced herald of Hell, would pull him back into the abyss. He had to make her see reason.
He turned around to face her. “Ms. Lennon, what you don’t seem to understand is that Rebecca and I had a bitter breakup. Before all was said and done, we couldn’t stand the sight of each other. We wanted nothing to do with each other. Nothing. Especially not…” He indicated the POA again. “Neither of us would have entrusted such important decisions to the other.”
“Then you should have had superseding documents instated.”
“I did. Immediately after filing for divorce.”
“But Rebecca didn’t.”
“Through our attorneys, I kept reminding her to.”
“To no avail, it seems.”
“She signed the divorce papers quick enough, though. She had a boyfriend waiting in the wings. Not that I cared. I just wanted out, so I paid what her dragon of a divorce lawyer demanded. Not over time, either. I didn’t want to drag the thing out, so I paid her in one lump sum, and was done with it.
“After that, we had zero contact. Zero. Zilch.” He paused and looked aside briefly before coming back to her. “Not until five years later when I was on vacation in the Caymans and was suddenly summoned to Atlanta and confronted with a dire responsibility that I didn’t want, and knew damn well that Rebecca wouldn’t want me to have, regardless of what she’d specified otherwise, which, at the time she did it, was out of sheer spite.
“You know what happened when I arrived at the hospital. Her father’s very public rebuke of me said it all, don’t you think? ‘God, and only God, will call Rebecca home when it’s her time, not you.’”
He stopped and took a breath. “Her prognosis was as bad as it could be. Tragic. Despite the recommendations of every doctor who examined and analyzed her, I went by that,” he said, again indicating the document, “as her parents insisted that I do. Then I gladly left the rest of the decisions up to them.”
Kate Lennon inhaled deeply and held her breath for several seconds before exhaling. She patted the document. “This can’t be revoked verbally, Mr. Bridger. If you were willing to relinquish your responsibility and resign as Rebecca’s agent of record, you and her parents should have filed a petition with the court that would have legally transferred her guardianship to them.”
“I wouldn’t have contested it, but things were crazy, nuts, and going to court, all that, was unnecessary because I didn’t buck her family’s wishes.”
“Then this document remains in effect.”
“Okay, but I just told you that the Pratts and I came to an understanding. So what’s the problem?”
She stood up behind her desk, as though about to make a pronouncement. “There’s been a development, of which Mr. Pratt has been made aware. I wanted to tell you in person.”
“Why?”
“Because you may wish to reverse the decision you made four years ago. You may decide that taking Rebecca off life support is in her best interest after all.”
Chapter 3
At her suggestion they walked across the square to a cutesy coffee shop called Wholly Ground. Zach had noticed it, but it wasn’t his kind of place, so he’d never been inside. She ordered something with decaf, skim milk, and vanilla flavoring. He, regular black coffee.
Other customers included a pair of seniors who were working a crossword puzzle together, a trio of women in workout clothes, and a scattering of young people with earbuds and laptops who were probably students at the community college.
Kate Lennon fit right in, but he felt conspicuous in the small-scale environs. Though thank God he wasn’t recognized. He was in no mood to sign an autograph, or pose with a stranger taking a selfie, or answer questions about what he was up to these days.
At the moment, he wanted to know what Kate Lennon was up to.
She insisted on paying, and he let her. As she passed him his lidded cup, she asked if he minded sitting outside. He nodded and motioned for her to lead the way. They went through a door that opened onto a patio paved with mossy bricks and enclosed by ivy-covered walls. No one else was out there.
“We won’t be overheard out here,” she said as they seated themselves at a wrought-iron table smaller than most pizzas.
As he sat down, his spindly chair rocked on the uneven bricks. “We wouldn’t have been overheard in your office.”
She set her shoulder bag down beside her chair, near her feet, which were shod, as expected, in high-heeled pumps. The bottom half of her suit wasn’t another slim skirt, but a pair of narrow slacks that fit her compact figure just as well.