Читать книгу and I Believe - Jodie Richard-Bohman - Страница 8

It was the beginning of June in 1995, and I had finally graduated from college. A large group of our friends had met at Creekside, a bar in our hometown, to celebrate me getting my first teaching job.

Liz and I were sitting at a table in the back of the bar all by ourselves. She had me laughing hysterically over a funny incident that happened to her earlier this week.

“Oh my gosh,” I said, wiping the tears from my eyes. “I can’t believe that happened to you.”

She looked at me and I back at her. “Yes, we can,” we said at the same time and burst out laughing again.

Taking a drink of my beer, I let out a happy sigh thinking of how blessed I was to have such an awesome best friend.

Just then, in a split second, my eyes were covered with what felt like some sort of fabric. My hands instantly went to my face.

“Liz, what’s going on?” I asked as darkness surrounded me.

“Don’t say a word and just follow me.” It was Liz’s boyfriend’s voice.

“Dan, what in the heck are you doing?” I asked as I tried to remove the blindfold.

“Please don’t. We have a surprise for you.”

“Liz?!”

There was no answer, just a giggle.

“Liz, I’m going to kill you,” I said as Dan led me away from her, my feet carefully shuffling along and my hands gripping his arm tightly.

They probably have a surprise for me since I got a job.

He stopped, picked me up by my waist and sat me down on what felt like the bar.

“Dan?”

The entire place became silent as the volume on the jukebox got louder, joined in with a familiar voice.

“You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin’ ”, my favorite song from one of my favorite movies drifted throughout the bar. Slowly, the blindfold fell from my eyes and in front of me was Aaron singing his heart out.

My heart stopped and my jaw dropped. Then and there, Aaron got down on one knee, and opened a small red velvet ring box with an engagement ring in it.

“Kate Stewart— will you marry me?”

I was speechless and couldn’t answer.

The bar was quiet, everybody waiting in anticipation. Jumping off of the bar and straight into his arms, I yelled, “Yes, yes, yes, I will marry you!”

The months to come were filled with endless decision making, which was exhausting at times, yet also exciting. Soon the church and reception hall were booked, invitations ordered, the caterer, photographer and band selected, and the most gorgeous wedding dress chosen and tucked safely away in my closet.

Aaron and I were madly in love and counting down the days until we would become husband and wife. Just when we thought life was too good to be true, we received the heartbreaking news.

“I have stage three lung cancer.”

We were at Gene and Dorothy’s house for our weekly Sunday brunch, when his grandparents and parents told Carey, Aaron and me about Gene’s illness.

“What, when, how long?” Carey stuttered.

“They say I only have three months, but hell or high water, I will be here the day you two get married,” he said, looking at Aaron and me, his voice stern and serious.

My hand covered my mouth and tears burned my eyes.

“Now we’ve talked this over with your parents and we both agree that Grandma will be better off living in a condo down the street from them once I’m gone, and we would like for you and Kate to have our house.”

What?! He just told us he’s dying, but he wants to talk about us living in their house after he’s gone?

“And for you, Carey, Grandma and I will be paying off your house for you . . .”

His words faded from my mind as I tried to grasp the thought that he was going to die. I had never lost anybody close to me. What was I going to do when he was gone? Suddenly standing up, I went directly to him and wrapped my arms around his already frail, thin-looking body. Within seconds, Aaron was there too, sobbing.

Our wedding day finally arrived and just like Gene promised, he was there to witness Aaron and me become man and wife. He had lost a terrible amount of weight and looked like he was hanging onto life by only a thread, but he was there.

We couldn’t have asked for a more beautiful day. The sun was shining, the flowers were in full bloom, and love was in the air. The church basement echoed with endless giggles and excitement as my sisters, other bridesmaids and I waited patiently for one-thirty in the afternoon to come.

“Girls, they’re ready for you,” Dad said.

It was a quarter after one when he peeked his head in the basement. He hadn’t seen me yet, but once he did, his eyes filled with happy tears.

“Wow, Kate, you look amazing,” he said, walking over to me.

“Thanks Dad!” I said, giving him a hug.

“We’ll see you in a few, Mrs. Turner,” some of my bridesmaids chanted before they made their way upstairs.

“Are you ready?” Dad asked.

“In just a minute.” Walking back into the restroom, I checked myself out one last time. My hair was pulled up with hundreds of blonde ringlet curls spilling over my veil, and my already suntanned face blushed with anticipation and happiness. My dress was absolutely beautiful, and I couldn’t help but to admire how it made me look like a princess. It was a short sleeve white sequence satin dress that was body fitting on the top and flaring out on the bottom.

So this is how Cinderella felt, I thought to myself as I joined Dad.

An hour later, Aaron and I were officially Mr. & Mrs. Aaron Turner and the rest of our wonderful day was celebrated with our family and friends at the reception hall. Gene hung in there like a trooper and stayed until the party was over.

“You look beautiful, my little Katie girl,” he whispered in my ear before he and Grandma Dorothy left.

“And you look handsomer than ever,” I said, giving him a sweet little kiss on his cheek.

“I love you two.”

“And we love you too, Grandpa,” Aaron said back.

As we watched Aaron’s father wheel Gene away in his wheelchair, the thought didn’t occurred to us that those would be our last words spoken to him. Gene passed away before we returned from our honeymoon. Never did a day go by that I didn’t think about and miss him dearly, but I knew he was in my heart and memories forever and one day we would all be together again.

“I’m pregnant!” I shrieked, jumping into Aaron’s arms. Right around our first wedding anniversary, we decided we were ready to start a family.

“Are you kidding me?” he asked, his eyes staring at me in disbelief. We only tried a couple of times and he seemed surprised I was pregnant already.

“No.”

“Oh my gosh! We’re having a baby!” he said in between planting kisses all over my face.

Nine months and a perfect pregnancy later, I gave birth to a beautiful little girl, Jenna Marie. She was a wonderful baby and my life was beyond content, being with Aaron and her every waking moment.

Jenna was almost two years old when we decided we wanted another baby. This time, though, I didn’t get pregnant as quickly as I did the first time. When I finally did, I miscarried at eleven weeks. No words could describe the grief I felt over the loss of my baby. Devastated, I sunk into depression.

“We’ll get through this. I swear,” Aaron tried to reassure me, but to no avail.

“I’m such a failure!” I cried.

“Kate, don’t do this to yourself. As soon as the doctor says it’s okay, we’ll try again.”

Looking up into his blue eyes, I begged and prayed to God that he was right.

Three months later, our doctor gave me the okay to try again. We immediately started, but month after month, there was still no baby. To some degree, I became obsessed with it, researching every possible way to get pregnant. From taking my temperature each morning, to trying every ovulating test imaginable, I did it all.

“I’m ovulating. Is there any way you can come home for lunch today?” I asked Aaron one day.

It was the middle of July and school was out for the summer. Jenna, who was three, was in her room taking a nap, and my test just revealed my egg had dropped and was waiting patiently for Aaron’s sperm to make me a baby.

“I only have half an hour in between my meetings.”

“Please, can you at least try? It won’t take very long.”

“Thanks a lot,” he tried to joke.

“I’m sorry—I didn’t mean it like that. I’m just saying we can do our deed and you can get back to work as soon as we’re done.”

“Okay ,” he finally agreed. “I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

He’s such a great husband. Always doing what I ask of him.

All of my hard work paid off and six weeks later, I was pregnant. We shared our happy news with only our immediate family. Because of my last miscarriage, we were going to wait until I was at least twelve weeks along before telling everyone else. I’m glad we did this because when I was eight weeks along, I miscarried for the second time. Going through two miscarriages in a year’s time, really hit me hard. The weeks that followed were awful, to say the least, and I shut everybody out of my life, including Aaron and Jenna. I could barely pull myself out of bed, until one day when Dad came to see me.

“Kate, I don’t understand what you’re going through, but I do know you can’t go on living this way. You have a little girl that needs her mom and a husband that needs his wife. So I think it’s time you pull yourself together and start being there for your family. You also need to remember that you’re not the only one hurting here.”

The words he said could be taken rather harshly, but they weren’t because Dad always spoke the truth from his heart. So from that day on, I made myself forget about my two losses and concentrate on my two blessings, my husband and daughter, although my heart still yearned to have another child.

In the beginning, after we had Jenna, Aaron and I made it a must to have date night at least two nights a month. Either his parents or mine would watch Jenna, and we would go out to eat or to a movie or just do something with the two of us, which was fantastic. But in time, those dates evolved into Aaron, Jenna and me eating out or visiting family or friends, and our conversations began to center around the same things: work, the house and Jenna.

This is normal for all couples when they first get married and have kids, I convinced myself, although I desperately missed the way it was before we married, when we couldn’t get enough of each other.

Early one night, while Aaron and I were lying in bed, he started rubbing my leg and kissing my neck.

“Have I told you how sexy you are?” he asked in a seductive voice as he tried to remove my shorts.

“Aaron, we can’t,” I said, gently pushing his hand off of my thigh.

A heavy sigh came from his mouth. “Kate, what happened to the days when we would make love four, five, six times a week? We’ve only been married for seven years, but it feels like fifty,” he said in an irritated tone.

“I’m sorry. I miss those days too. It’s just that I don’t want to waste good sperm unless I’m ovulating.”

He winced at my hurtful words.

“I didn’t mean it like that,” I quickly apologized, grabbing his hand to pull him towards me. At first he hesitated, but then he gave in. “I’m so sorry,” I said as I began to undress him.

“I love you so much,” he whispered to me.

“I love you too,” I said, but in the back of my head I was thinking, I really hope we aren’t wasting good sperm on just regular sex.

Two years later, life was great and we were content with our small family of three when an unplanned, but very welcomed pregnancy, surprised us. But once again, my body failed me and I had my third miscarriage. The grief I had buried after my second miscarriage quickly resurfaced, but before I could even go into any sort of depression, Aaron was on the phone with a specialist, Dr. Hanne, to find out what was wrong with me. After many tests, it was concluded that I had a tilted uterus and some scar tissue growing up inside of it. One option Dr. Hanne suggested was we try in vitro fertilization, which Aaron and I both agreed to do.

By the grace of God, I did get pregnant and nine months later gave birth to another beautiful daughter, Mia Elizabeth. Aaron and I were ecstatic, even though Dr. Hanne informed us that I would never bare another child because the scar tissue had spread higher into my uterus. He even suggested I look into having a hysterectomy. The news felt like a blow to the stomach, but as I stared down at my new baby girl, I happily accepted the truth and thanked God for blessing me with not one, but two wonderful little girls of my own.

When Mia was born, Jenna was seven years old and in the second grade, and I had long forgotten about the exhaustion one’s body and mind go through with an infant. Late night feedings and lack of sleep, though, quickly reminded me. But soon we settled into a routine and it felt like second nature dividing my attention between the two girls. Unfortunately, somewhere along the way, “date night” was kicked to the curb and long forgotten about.

But that’s common with all couples, right?