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“I love you. I’m completely and utterly in love with you. Please don’t get married.”
Abby Griffin has been a widow for three years when the universe throws her for another loop. A great, big loop that’s so absurd - so beyond anything Abby would have ever imagined for herself - that it’s damn near unbelievable.
It starts like this: the mayor of their small town, Thelonious Jaha, comes to visit the hospital where Abby is Chief of Surgery. He starts with grilling Dr. Griffin about her surgical expenditures, clinical trial policies, and the hospital’s contributions to the community; he ends with Abby’s surprised acceptance of his invitation to a dinner date.
Abby has been acquainted with Jaha for years. Clarke and Wells Jaha have been friends since elementary school, but Abby had dealt mostly with Wells’s mother before that good lady passed away seven years ago.
So Abby goes to dinner with Thelonious, and she has a good time. Thelonious is intelligent and confident without being arrogant; he is aware of his power and the respect he commands, but he’s careful with it.
She enjoys the first date enough to agree to a second, and a third, and a fourth. Her life after the loss of Jake has been so focused on work and her daughter that Abby has forgotten how pleasant it is to be treated like a desirable woman.
Then, on a balmy morning in mid-May, Abby wakes early and heads out to the local Farmer’s Market. Jake had never cared either way where his produce came from, but Abby has always loved Farmer’s Markets and prefers to shop there when she can.
It’s been ages since she’s been to the market in Arkadia. Abby knows a lot of the vendors: some because she’s bought their product often over the years, and some because they’ve come to her in her capacity as a doctor. She greets them all with personal questions - “How’s your son, Hannah?” and “Your daughter hasn’t broken anything lately, Mrs. Monroe, that’s a record”- and the warmth of familiarity.
There are new vendors, too, and Abby marvels at their wares: homemade jams, and soaps (why the hell would anyone want a birthday cake bath bomb? Who wants to smell like a birthday cake?), and a whole array of handmade wreaths and potpourri that proclaim to bring you anything from good luck to “the thing you don’t know you need”.
Abby is studying a wreath that makes that exact claim when a smooth baritone says from somewhere behind her, “That sounds vaguely threatening, if you ask me.”
“I didn’t ask you,” Abby says as she turns, and the words die on her lips.
Marcus Kane smiles warmly at her. “Hello, Abby.”
“Marcus,” she breathes out. She’s too shocked for the moment to say more, but Marcus doesn’t seem to mind.
His hair is longer than she remembers it, dark and floppy as it falls over his brow; he has a thick beard that is starting to turn gray. The look might be foolish on someone else, too unkempt or even silly, but it makes Marcus Kane look distinguished. Overall, he appears exactly the same, and yet wholly different from the man Abby once knew.
“I’m sorry about Jake,” Marcus says finally.
A shadow passes over Abby’s face at the mention of her deceased husband. She averts her eyes for a moment before nodding once and raising them to Marcus’s face again. His expression is kind, but not pitying, and sad.
Jake Griffin and Marcus Kane had been friends long before Abby came into the picture during their freshman year of college. Their friendship had stumped Abby, who could barely get along with Marcus for more than five minutes at a time. He was too rigid and unfeeling for Abby’s tastes, and she too righteous and impulsive for his.
“Thank you.” Abby steps away from the booth and then glances back over her shoulder at Marcus. She doesn’t realize that she wants him to join her until that second, and when he moves to stand next to her she begins a leisurely stroll through the market. “I tried to contact you. For the funeral.”
Marcus nods. “I was upset to learn that I’d missed it.”
“Why did you?” There’s no heat in Abby’s voice now, where once there surely would have been. She’s not the same girl who knew Marcus twenty years ago. Life has seen fit to bring her down a few pegs from those idealistic days.
“I was dying.” Marcus says it with nonchalance, as if he’s saying something as mundane as “I was at the grocery store,” but the words bring Abby’s gaze up sharply.
“Are you being melodramatic?”
The question catches him off guard and he barks out a laugh. The sound is rich and, perhaps, a bit self-effacing. Abby likes it.
Marcus waves a hand in the general area of the left side of his ribcage. “Insurgent threw a hand grenade into my Humvee. We scrambled out and right into a trap. Shrapnel nearly got me.”
There’s no pride in his voice, no wonder or gratitude for having survived in his expression. Marcus relates the facts as if they’re unimportant, and Abby realizes that to this new Marcus, they are; they’re just facts to him. He doesn’t care that he almost died. But there is something there that he does care about, an undercurrent to his words that Abby doesn’t miss.
“And the rest of your unit?” She asks, but she already knows the answer. She can see the truth in the corners of his mouth as it turns down.
“Didn’t make it. Just me.”
Abby doesn’t know what to say, so she stays silent. The day is bright and beautiful around them, and she regrets lingering over such gray memories.
“Why Arkadia?” Abby asks after a short silence.
Marcus shrugs. “My mother left her house to me when she died. Seemed as good a place as any to retire.”
“Retire?” she repeats. “Are you that old already?”
And just like that the shadows of the past recede, and it’s the two of them in the middle of a lively Farmer’s Market on a summer day once more.
“Forty-two is not old, thank you very much.”
Abby smiles and is about to retort when her attention is caught by the airy melody of a wind chime. She turns her head to the booth on her left and is greeted by the sight of dozens of wind chimes. They reflect the sunlight in colorful arcs and delicate patterns. Abby moves closer to marvel at the detail and handiwork of them.
“These are beautiful,” she tells no one in particular. She reaches out a slim finger to touch the bottom of one thin barber pole in a set, and it catches before sliding away to bump against its kin and fill the air with another light chime of sound.
“Uh, there you are,” an unimpressed young voice says.
Abby looks up at the young woman standing inside the booth. She’s young and dark haired, and her attention is fixed on the man standing next to Abby.
Marcus grins at the young woman. “It’s barely been ten minutes, Octavia.”
“That’s easy for you to say, you aren’t standing in here. Every time the slightest breeze comes up it’s like being Quasimodo stuck in the bell tower.”
“That’s a bit dramatic, don’t you think?” Marcus quips.
“No. Honestly, how many of these things are you going to make before you get sick of them?”
“You made these?” Abby asks, stunned. It’s the first thing she’s said since Octavia appeared, and it draws the young woman’s attention as well as Marcus’s.
“It’s a hobby,” he answers.
“An irritating one,” Octavia adds.
Marcus doesn’t mind. “Octavia, this is an old friend of mine from college, Abby Griffin. Abby, this is my daughter, Octavia.”
Abby isn’t sure what sets her reeling more: the fact that Marcus has introduced her as a friend – that he would consider her a friend after their rather serious past of damn near hating each other – or the fact that the surly young woman standing on the opposite side of the table is Marcus Kane’s daughter.
“Hello, and nice to meet you,” Octavia says, and it’s polite but not entirely interested. “It’s my turn for a break.”
Octavia breezes out of the small vendor’s stall and is swallowed by the market crowd in moments.
“Sorry about that,” Marcus says. “Her brother went off to college this year. It’s the first time they’ve really been apart, and Octavia hates being left behind.”
Abby smiles understandingly. “Teenagers are a handful under the best circumstances.”
“Oh, so that surly, ‘I don’t want anything to do with anything’ attitude is normal, then?”
Abby laughs. “Mostly. Didn’t her brother go through the same stage?”
Marcus sighs. The sound is heavy, but she’s not sure why. He pushes a hand through his hair and the movement slides the hair away from his brow. “I wouldn’t know. But that is a long story.”
Another woman steps up to the booth then and starts to ask Marcus questions about the wind chimes, so their conversation is put on hold. Abby doesn’t mind. She listens to the customer ask questions, particularly interested in the way Marcus answers them: he’s all ease and comfort. He listens attentively. It’s all so different from the man Abby remembers – aloof, and efficient to the point of being cold, and so controlled in his movements and words that he made others feel exposed.
Abby steps to the side and feels cool metal brush against her cheek. She moves away from the feeling and searches for its perpetrator: a petite, carefully etched wind chime that hangs from the ceiling. The pipes are striped in alternating silver and rose gold; she can just see the bottom of the suspension platform, where stars have been carved in a pattern that seems vaguely familiar but she can’t place; and the wind sail that hangs below the pipes is a stained glass triquetra, painted a vibrant blue.
A long, masculine arm enters her field of view as it reaches up and unhooks the wind chime from the place where it was secured to the roof of the tent. Abby reaches up with the arm that is not under Marcus’s outstretched one to take hold of the hook when it’s low enough for her to do so.
“It suits you.” His voice makes her want to shiver, but she doesn’t. He’s right there behind her, so close that if she moved even half a step she could feel his chest against her back – but she doesn’t do that either.
“How much –“
“A gift,” he interrupts her. “For putting up with me.”
“Putting up with you?” Abby repeats dumbly. She hasn’t put up with him at all, but thoroughly enjoyed this surprise reunion.
Abby spins on her heel to say something to that effect – to correct him, maybe, and assure him that his unexpected appearance has only made her day more enjoyable – but he’s smiling at her again, and damn if she doesn’t like that smile.
“It’s been an hour and we haven’t fought once,” he tells her.
“I guess old dogs can learn new tricks after all.”
“There you go with the old jokes again.”
A family approaches the counter, and Abby knows that their brief interlude is at an end. Marcus has to get back to work, and Abby needs to pick up the things she came here for the in the first place before the stands close.
The regret she feels is just barely visible in Marcus’s eyes as he says, with true and honest emotion, “It was great to see you again, Abby.”
“You too.”
When Abby gets home she hangs the wind chime on her back porch and leaves the door open so that she can hear it when the breeze picks up.
Her thoughts are full of Marcus Kane.
Abby goes on two more dates with Thelonious before the Farmer’s Market comes around again. It’s a twice a month thing – every other weekend – and as Abby dresses for the day she tells herself she’s not going solely in hopes of seeing Marcus again.
(A part of her that she isn’t interested in acknowledging yet knows that this is a harbinger of doom as far as her fledgling relationship with the mayor goes. Their last two dates haven’t been bad, but she’s spent both of them with Marcus Kane lodged somewhere in her thoughts. She can’t stop thinking that she should have asked him out for a coffee at the least, or gotten his number, or something).
So Abby goes to the Farmer’s Market again and is disappointed. Marcus is nowhere to be found, and his wind chime stand is missing in action as well. She picks up some fresh produce anyway and returns to her car.
She’s short tempered and cross for the rest of the day.
A week later Thelonious asks her to be his date to some official, ritzy party that’s funded by the state and meant to grease elbows and dredge up support for the political party. Abby declines because she hates politics and is a mediocre diplomat at best. Thelonious promises that she won’t be required to do anything more than look beautiful in her evening wear, and he’s very charming, and when he asks again Abby finds herself agreeing.
The day of the gala Abby is swamped at the hospital and has to change in her office. The lacy black sheath dress she’s chosen for the occasion is easy to slip into, and she switches out her sensible boots for heels; she doesn’t have time to do anything with her hair other than unbraid it from its usual style, but that leaves just enough texture to keep it from being completely flat.
She’s just managed to track Jackson down in the emergency room when the front doors slide open, and who should walk through them but one Marcus Kane. Octavia is with him and she’s somehow managing to look both concerned and pissed.
Marcus is talking to his daughter and doesn’t see Abby. “It’s not a big deal, Octavia. I promise.”
“What happened?” Abby demands as she strides across the foyer to them. Her heels are loud in the hallway, but she doesn’t notice. Her eyes are fixed on the hand that Marcus holds just over his head with a dish towel wrapped around it.
“He tried to light himself on fire,” Octavia snaps.
Marcus rolls his eyes. “I had an accident in the shop.”
“Let me see.” Abby motions for his hand. She’s in doctor mode now: thoughts of the gala and her date are thrown out as her compulsion to heal kicks in.
Marcus offers her his hand. She unwraps the dish towel as carefully as she can, but she feels the flinch of pain that runs up his arm when she gets to the last layer and peels it away to see his badly burned hand.
“Second, possibly third degree burns over the palm,” she announces. “Come with me. Octavia, if you’ll check him in at the front desk. We’ll be in that room right over there, come join us when you’re done.”
She says it with all the authority of someone who is accustomed to being obeyed. This, along with the sense of the decision, is what has Octavia doing as she’s told before she’s even realized what’s happening.
Abby leads Marcus into one of the emergency exam rooms and starts collecting everything she needs for burn treatment while Marcus seats himself on the bed with his upturned palm in his lap. Abby deposits her supplies on a tall tray and then loops her fingers around his wrist and gingerly raises his hand and sets it on the tray.
“Rate your pain for me,” she says.
“Six.”
Abby glares at him from beneath furrowed brows. “Octavia’s not here, Marcus. It’s just us, you don’t have to pretend.”
His whole arm jerks on the tray when Abby grazes the overly sensitive skin of his wrist below the burn. “Nine.”
She nods. “These look like second degree burns. There’s some weeping, but that might have happened when I unwrapped the towel. Take this.”
Abby hands him two white pills and a bottle of water that she’s somehow opened without him noticing.
“What are they?”
“Tylenol with Codeine. I have a topical lidocaine spray for immediate relief, but the Tylenol will last six to eight hours.”
“Will they knock me out?”
“Probably, but that’s for the best. I have to clean and treat your hand, and it won’t be pleasant. The less you feel the less you’ll flinch.”
Marcus nods and knocks back the pills with a draft from the water bottle. He sets it down again and reclines on the bed.
“You look nice,” he says after some time has passed. “I hope I didn’t ruin your night.”
Abby remembers with a jolt that she’s still dressed for the date that she’s not going to make (and doesn’t mind missing). She hasn’t even put on her lab coat.
“You didn’t ruin anything,” she tells him, and it’s true. “Are you gonna tell me how this happened?”
The Tylenol is kicking in now, and Marcus is rather tired all of a sudden. He leans his head back against the bed and closes his eyes, humming in answer as he does so. “Hmm, over coffee.”
“What?” she asks in surprise.
“Coffee,” he repeats. “You. Me. Say yes.”
“Yes,” Abby answers, but he’s already asleep.
“I have a kiln.”
“A kiln?”
Marcus laughs at her incredulity and nods. “A kiln,” he repeats.
“We’ve said it too many times. It’s starting to sound weird.”
“Weird how?”
“Like it’s not a real word.”
Marcus hasn’t stopped smiling since he showed up in her office with her coffee and lunch order. He hadn’t heard Abby’s acceptance of his invitation to a coffee date, but he had asked again when he woke to find her checking his hand hours later. He’d heard her answer that time. The plan had originally been to meet at the coffee shop near the hospital, but Abby’s surgery had taken longer than she’d anticipated and she’d called him half an hour after their scheduled time to apologize. Marcus had swept aside her apology and offered to bring her both lunch and coffee.
“Okay,” he says, “I have a – I have one in my shop. I’ve been teaching myself how to blow glass and I had a bit of an accident. Grabbed the wrong pair of tongs, panicked when I realized I’d grabbed the wrong end, nearly tripped, and tried to catch myself by slamming my hand into the hot side of the door.”
Abby pauses with her coffee cup halfway to her mouth and arches a brow at him. “That’s quite the sequence of events.”
Marcus shrugs. “I am not a graceful man.”
Abby chooses not to voice her disagreement on that point. “How’s Octavia? She was pretty worried that you’d permanently damaged your hand.”
“She’s back to being her teenage self. Keeps telling me that I should give up making wind chimes and do something useful.”
“Are you going to? Give it up, I mean.” She’s thinking of the delicate wind chime that hangs on her back porch and sings to her with the breeze.
“No. I spent enough time being useful. Now I just want to make people happy.”
Every so often the ghost of some deep pain will cross over Marcus’s features, like it does now, and Abby doesn’t push but she wonders what it is that’s behind such an expression. Each time it appears she’s struck again with how different this Marcus is from the one she knew two decades ago. He’s so kind and accessible, now, so at ease with being tender and vulnerable.
“I do have one question,” Abby begins after a few beats of silence.
“What?”
“Who the hell just has a kiln?”
His laugh fills every corner of her office and reaches into Abby’s chest to take hold of her heart. Marcus’s eyes crinkle at the corners. Abby smiles; she can’t help it.
They talk about everything from their lives after college – or after Marcus left in his sophomore year to join the military – to their children. Abby smiles wistfully at the family picture on her desk as she tells Marcus of her daughter’s accomplishments and dreams, about the stories of college life that Clarke has seen fit to share with her; Marcus shares a handful of stories about Jake that Abby has never heard before, and she’ll always miss him but it doesn’t hurt to remember him anymore.
Abby learns that Octavia and her older brother Bellamy are adopted, and that they are actually half-siblings. Bellamy was two when Marcus met his mother, Aurora, and Marcus had loved the little boy but been unable to make things work with his mother. He had not learned of Octavia’s existence until three years ago when Octavia herself had tracked him down in the hospital after his near death experience.
“Aurora told her I had died years ago. She didn’t tell Octavia the truth until right before she died. My name was nowhere on Octavia’s birth certificate, and I had no parental rights. I knew I wanted to adopt them both the moment she told me who she was, but I left the decision up to her and her brother. She’d lived thirteen years without me. I wouldn’t have blamed her if she wanted nothing to do with me. Hell, I’d understand if she woke up tomorrow and decided she was better off without me.”
They’re sitting across from one another at Abby’s desk, and it’s impulsive but Abby reaches out and covers his uninjured hand with her own.
“That’s not going to happen. You’re a good man, Marcus. Octavia knows that. Besides, she loves you. I know it’s hard to tell under that crusty teenage exterior, but she does.”
“Thank you.” His voice has dropped an octave, and the sunlight streaming in through her window is warm on her back, and Abby can’t bring herself to look away from him.
She wants to reach out and run a hand over his beard. She wants to know if it scratches against her palm the way she thinks it would.
A knock on her door startles Abby into pulling away from Marcus.
“Abby?” Jackson says as he pokes his head in the door. “You have the OR scheduled in fifteen minutes.
“Thank you, Jackson. I’ll be right there.”
“Back to the grind.” Marcus smiles at her as he stands and collects his garbage to deposit in the waste basket next to her desk.
“Thank you for lunch, and for the company.”
“The pleasure was all mine, Dr. Griffin.”
Abby shakes her head at him and cleans up her mess. “I’ll walk you out?”
He nods and waits for her to round her desk before falling into step beside her. “Will you be at the Farmer’s Market on Saturday?”
“No, Clarke is coming to town for the weekend.”
“Oh, I bet that’ll be great. Does she come home often?”
Abby gives him a plaintive look that makes him chuckle. “Not often enough for me,” she says.
Marcus turns when they reach the elevator and for a second Abby entertains the idea that he’s about to kiss her cheek. The moment passes, however, and instead he tells her, “Enjoy your time with your daughter.”
Abby tells herself she’s not disappointed at the lack of kiss and goes back to work.
“When did we get a wind chime?” Clarke asks.
An hour later Abby has related everything about Marcus Kane to her daughter, from their initial introduction nearly twenty years ago to their lunch in her office on Wednesday. Clarke listens attentively and swings her feet back and forth where she sits on the kitchen counter watching Abby make dinner.
“Dad never talked about him,” she says. “Neither did you, though I guess I can see why.”
“It was a long time ago. He joined the military and left before you were born.”
“And he moved to Arkadia why?”
“His mom died and left him her house.”
“Do we have any pictures of him? Like in dad’s old photo albums or something?”
Abby thinks for a moment. “I don’t know. I’d have to look.”
“Or you could just introduce us.” The words are nonchalant, but when Abby lifts her eyes to her daughter Clarke has raised one blonde eyebrow in a look that she doesn’t recognize.
Abby doesn’t mind the idea of introducing Clarke and Marcus – she likes it, really, but not yet. This is the first time Clarke has been home since the semester started, and Abby wants to spend the weekend alone with her daughter while she still can. Clarke hasn’t said anything definitive about it yet, but Abby has a hunch that the next time she comes home she might be bringing someone with her.
“Next time,” Abby replies. “This weekend it’s just you and your super uncool mom.”
“No one says ‘super’ anymore.”
“My point exactly. Now come mash these potatoes.”
At twenty years old, Abby Griffin never would have believed anyone who dared suggest that two decades later Marcus Kane would be the closest thing she had to a best friend, but it’s the truth.
She doesn’t realize what’s happened until Jackson points it out to her one night in post-op. They’ve just come out of six hours on their feet with their hands in a young man’s chest, and Abby is tired. She’s peeled off her surgical cap and gown, and she can feel the strands of hair that have escaped her braid resting against her cheeks and neck; the skin of her hands feels tight and scratchy from her effusive scrubbing.
Abby knows she probably looks a fright and she doesn’t care. She’s ready to eat dinner and go to bed.
Just then one of her nurses pushes the door open with her hip. “Hey, Dr. G. Dinner is waiting in conference room B.”
Abby’s brows furrow. “Dinner?”
The nurse, Kate, smiles. “Marcus and a few others dropped it off half an hour ago with a note to make sure the operating team got a fresh meal. Half the OR is there already.”
Abby is left staring at the door as it closes, dumbfounded. She completely misses the fact that Marcus has become such a staple in the hospital over the last several weeks that no one questions his coming or going now, or that the wide majority of her staff are on a first name basis with him. Her brain is stuck on the fact that Marcus has apparently provided her and her surgical team with dinner at nearly nine o’clock on a Monday.
Jackson clears his throat. “I could use a fresh meal.”
Abby snaps back to herself. “Right. Let’s go.”
“So,” Jackson starts as they leave the room and head for the conference room, “are you still dating the mayor?”
Abby is caught off guard by the question and does her best to mask the nasty jolt of surprise that shoots down her spine. She hasn’t thought of Thelonious at all since he left.
“Yes,” she answers, and tries not to make it sound like a question, “why?”
“Haven’t seen him around in a while.”
Abby eyes her cohort warily. His words were casual, but she’s known Jackson long enough to know that they’re really not casual at all.
“He left a few weeks ago for some pre-campaign rally.”
Jackson is silent for several strides before he says the thing Abby knows he’s been working his way toward. “Does Marcus know?”
“Know what?”
“That you’re dating the mayor?”
"Yes.” Abby stops in the middle of the hallway and crosses her arms over her chest. She’s too tired for twenty-one questions, and in no mood to field questions that are starting to sound vaguely like they might turn into accusations. “Whatever it is you’re trying to get at, Jackson, just spit it out.”
He puts his hands up in a sign of peace making (or surrender). “I’m not getting at anything, Abby.”
She glares at him. “It sounds like you’re suggesting that I might be doing something dishonest.”
His answer is both expected and entirely off-putting. “Are you?”
“No,” she snaps. “Marcus and I are friends. Thelonious and I are dating. Everyone knows where they stand.”
Jackson nods. “Good.”
Then he resumes the trek to the conference room, and it’s like the conversation never happened.
Until they step into the conference room and Abby sees that Marcus hasn’t just brought them cold cut sandwiches or take-out from a neighboring restaurant: he’s provided baskets of fresh seasonal fruit, and a veggie tray with a label that proudly proclaims it’s compliments of one of the local farms; a homemade pasta salad; a fresh loaf of bread and jam that Abby has personally seen for sale at the Farmer’s Market; and three giant dishes of some kind of casserole.
Abby’s entire surgical team is milling around the room with plates in their hands and smiles on their faces, and it’s hard to tell that they’ve just spent six hours on their feet to save someone’s life.
“Wow,” Jackson breathes out.
Abby doesn’t respond, but she’s thinking the same thing.
Then, “There you two are. Get some grub before it’s gone.” It’s Kevin Bay, the anesthesiologist, and he’s smiling at them. “Oh, and there’s a card.” He points toward the end of the table.
“What does it say?” Abby asks.
Kevin shrugs. “We left it for you.”
And okay, Abby thinks as she retrieves the card, maybe there’s something to the fact that Marcus has a free pass to come and go in an otherwise restricted area even though he’s not an employee, and her staff automatically assumes that anything not specifically addressed to or left for someone else is meant for her, and she hasn’t thought about the man she’s been dating for several months at all in the few weeks he’s been gone …
Abby opens the card. There’s no salutation and no signature, but she recognizes the handwriting.
(Since when is she familiar enough with Marcus’s penmanship to recognize it?)
The message isn’t personal, so Abby reads it aloud. “We thought we’d give you all a break – enjoy the food poisoning.”
The room erupts in laughter, and even Abby cracks an indulgent smile.
“We should get him a thank you card or something,” someone says.
“This food had to cost a fortune,” Kate the nurse adds.
Abby doesn’t mention that she’s certain the produce came from the Farmer’s Market, where Marcus has an extensive network of friends and business contacts, or that she has a very reliable hunch that he made the pasta salad and casseroles himself (though a certain grumpy teenager most likely helped).
Just like she doesn’t read the last line on the card: “Because I know you (and I know you skipped lunch). You can’t save the world on an empty stomach, Abby.”
Maybe Jackson’s concern isn’t unfounded.
Maybe Abby doesn’t want it to be.
Summer fades into fall with startling speed. Thelonious returns from his political schmoozing, and Clarke calls her in a panicked frenzy with increasing frequency as midterms approach, but little else changes in Abby’s life. She’s found a new normal: she works, and goes on the occasional date, and talks to her daughter … and spends a lot of time with Marcus.
Abby becomes as much of a fixture at the Farmer’s Market as Marcus has become at the hospital. Their relationship is easier and comes more naturally to Abby than any previous relationship, save Jake: they remember enough about each other from the time before that it’s more of a reset than a completely new beginning. They bicker and disagree, but it’s not the heated arguments that Abby recalls from college.
Then a series of events unfolds that forces Abby to confront several truths (and also forces her hand).
Event One:
It’s two weeks before Thanksgiving. She’s cleaning her kitchen on a Friday night when someone knocks on her door. Arkadia is a small town and Abby is familiar enough with her neighbors that she doesn’t think twice about opening her door. She’s surprised to find Octavia on the other side, however, and immediately switches into Mom Mode when she takes note of the redness around the girl’s eyes.
“Octavia? Come in. What’s wrong?”
It doesn’t matter that she’s had little private interaction with Marcus’s daughter, or that up until that exact moment Abby has never wondered who the girl has to confide in aside from her father (or that it never once occurred to her that she might find herself on that list). Abby is a mom and she remembers how tumultuous life was when Clarke was sixteen, so she reaches for Octavia and pulls her inside without a moment of hesitation.
Octavia doesn’t respond. Her mouth is turned down and her lips are pressed tightly together in what is most likely an effort not to cry. Abby doesn’t know if Octavia accepts physical reassurance – she’s never seen her hug or touch anyone but Marcus – but she risks putting a hand on Octavia’s shoulder and guiding her into the living room.
Octavia plops ungraciously onto the couch. When Clarke was having a hard time Abby would rub her back and Clarke would lay her head in her lap and unload whatever she was upset about, unless what she was upset about was Abby and then it’d turn into something else entirely. Either way, Abby knew what Clarke needed: she knew when to push, and that if it was something small Clarke would want to talk about it sooner rather than later.
Octavia is an unknown variable, however, so after a few seconds of hesitation Abby sits down on the couch with her. She’s close enough to reach, but far enough that Octavia won’t feel smothered. Then, Abby just waits.
Eventually, Octavia starts to thaw. “I got into a fight with my dad.” Her words are stilted and she sniffles a bit, but Abby stays quiet. Silence seems to be what Octavia responds to best. “Not like one of those little ones, ya know? He actually yelled at me, and he never yells at me, even when he probably should. And I was so mad I yelled back, and that just made it worse.”
Abby thinks Octavia’s going to say more, but the girl suddenly dissolves into tears. She makes almost no noise. Her face scrunches up and she sort of curls her shoulders inward, and Abby can’t sit still any longer. Whether she pulls or Octavia leans Abby’s not certain, but in mere seconds the slight girl is pressed fully into Abby’s side and crying with abandon.
Abby doesn’t know what to say, so she doesn’t say anything at all. She rubs her hand reassuringly up and down Octavia’s arm and holds her tightly, just like she’s done a thousand times for Clarke.
Two hours later, Abby’s arm is asleep as she slides out from beneath a sleeping Octavia. She makes sure to lay Octavia down comfortably on her side and pulls a throw blanket over the girl. Abby hasn’t taken five steps away from the couch when there’s a second knock at her door.
Marcus looks worse than Abby has ever seen him when she opens the door. “I can’t find Octavia.”
Abby steps back from the door and motions him inside. “She’s here. I was just about to call you.”
Marcus steps into the house. Abby closes the door and joins him, but he doesn’t move. His shoulders are slumped and he has one hand on his hip as he stares unseeingly at the floor.
“Marcus.” Abby keeps her tone gentle, but firm. She shucks her head toward the kitchen. “Come on.”
Marcus stops when the couch and his sleeping daughter come into view. Abby keeps going and busies herself with grabbing two beers out of her fridge. She pops the top on both and sets the one meant for Marcus on the counter; he picks it up wordlessly when he joins her in the kitchen.
Unlike Octavia, Marcus needs no prodding. “I don’t know how to do this.”
“Do what?”
“Be a parent.”
“Just like this,” Abby says. He shoots a deadpan expression at her and the corner of her mouth quirks up. “I’m serious, Marcus. This is what it means to be a parent. You argue, and think you’ve failed, and wake up in the morning ready to try again.”
“I was so angry with her, Abby, and then when I realized she was gone … well, she snuck out so I was even angrier, but when I couldn’t find her …”
“You were so scared you couldn’t breathe?” Abby finishes for him.
Marcus nods. He takes a drink of his beer, sighs heavily, and slides into one of the bar stools set up around the kitchen island. Then he sets his beer aside and creates a pillow out of his arms. “If you don’t mind, I’m just gonna …” and he lays his head down.
Abby leaves him like that and finishes up a few minor cleaning tasks. She wakes him up with a gentle shake to his shoulder when he starts snoring and puts him up in the spare bedroom down the hall from her own.
She sleeps ridiculously well just knowing that Marcus and Octavia are in the house, and wakes in the morning to find that father and daughter have worked out whatever was between them (and Abby never asked what that was) and are making breakfast.
Her heart turns over at the sight.
This is the moment Abby realizes that she’s in love.
Event Two:
Abby breaks up with Thelonious Jaha over a nice dinner. To be fair, she tells him that it’s over before the waiter can do more than bring out two glasses of water, so she doesn’t feel too bad about it. He takes it gracefully, because he’s the mayor and Abby has never seen anything unsettle him. There are no questions or accusations. Thelonious doesn’t even try to charm her into changing her mind.
Abby excuses herself. Thelonious had picked her up so she doesn’t have her car, but it’s not cold enough out to be entirely unpleasant. Her heels click against the pavement, and the lights from the shop windows glow golden, and the weight that she had no idea was resting on her shoulders is gone.
Then, because Fate likes to meddle (and maybe knows better than Abby gives her credit for), she hears her name.
“Abby?”
Of course it’s Marcus she sets eyes on when she turns around. Abby would ask what the odds are, but apparently they’re pretty damn good.
“What are you doing out here?” Abby queries as she pushes her purse higher up her shoulder.
“I could ask you the same thing.”
A breeze picks up her hair, which she’s left loose and curled, and blows it into her face. Abby turns her head slightly into the wind and sweeps the locks out of her eyes.
“I was on a date.”
Marcus scowls and does a quick inventory of the street. “Yet here you are, alone. What happened?”
Abby tips her head in an approximation of a nod. “I broke up with him.”
Whatever expression first flits across his face disappears before Abby can get a closer look. He doesn’t offer her platitudes – no “I’m sorry it didn’t work out” or something similar – but he does wave at a parking lot across the street.
“Come on, I’ll take you home.”
Abby nods. They cross the street together. Abby opens her mouth to ask him why he’s downtown so late; the sharp rap of hurried footsteps echoes off the buildings.
The sudden force of something solid smacking into her sends Abby reeling, and her arm pops and burns as her purse is ripped away from her.
Everything happens so quickly that it’s hard to make sense of what she’s seeing, but the fear and adrenaline brings it all into focus: the stranger who tried to mug her has her purse clasped in one hand, but he can’t go anywhere. Marcus has the man’s other arm twisted up behind his back and Abby watches in shocked silence as Marcus runs him damn near face first into the nearest brick wall.
She has never seen this side of Marcus. Abby has always admired the lines of Marcus’s body and the planes of his chest that his choice of tee-shirt shows off so well, but the sight of him apprehending the man who just stole her purse is a sobering testament for how he got those muscles she appreciates.
The stranger is fighting Marcus’s hold, but Abby can hear him grunt in pain as Marcus twists his arm a little higher with each attempt.
“Abby!” His voice is rough and commanding, but there’s a strain of concern (or is it fear?) beneath that.
“I’m okay,” she answers truthfully. Her arm hurts and she might have twisted her ankle, but otherwise she’s no worse for the wear.
Abby watches what happens next as if she’s a million miles away and the world is moving in slow motion. Marcus turns his head in an attempt to see her and gauge for himself the truth of her statement. The motion brings half of his body away from the mugger, so that his entire right side is vulnerable. The other man drops Abby’s purse and reaches in front of him with his good arm. There’s only enough time for her mouth to fall open and then that good arm snaps back, toward Marcus, and his fist collides with Marcus’s inner thigh.
Marcus’s face contorts; he reacts by slamming the criminal into the wall again with enough force to simultaneously break his arm and knock him out; Marcus stumbles away from the man and toward the street.
The beam from a street light catches perfectly on the grip of the knife that’s now sticking out of Marcus’s thigh.
“Marcus!”
Abby rushes forward and catches him by the shoulder as he falls to his knees on the sidewalk. The jolt makes him cry out in anguish; she tries to guide him down onto his back as her eyes trace down to the wound.
By some awful luck or knowledge of anatomy, the man who tried to steal Abby’s purse has stabbed Marcus in the right spot, and with a blade long enough to lacerate his femoral artery.
“Abby.”
“I’m here, Marcus.”
His breathing is ragged with pain. “Pocket,” he says. He licks his lips. “Phone … my phone is in my … coat pocket.”
She lunges for the front pocket of his leather jacket. Her normally steady hands are shaking – this is not a carefully controlled environment where she’s in charge - and she fumbles to free the device from the slippery material of the inner pocket, but she finally gets it free.
“It’s locked.”
There’s a growing puddle of blood underneath his leg.
“Six-two-six-five.”
Abby taps in the code and the screen comes to life. It automatically pulls up the last window that Marcus used: it’s a text message window and Octavia’s name is in the address bar at the top. She’ll think of that later.
Abby dials nine-one-one and everything after that sort of runs together. The EMT’s and police arrive at nearly the same time, and the EMT’s recognize her but the lead officer stops her before she can crawl into the back of the ambulance.
“Mrs. Griffin –“
“Dr. Griffin,” Abby snaps.
“Dr. Griffin,” the officer amends, “we’re not done with your statement yet, and I’m afraid I can’t let you leave the scene of the crime until we’ve finished.”
“Either arrest me, or get the hell out of my way.”
Abby climbs into the ambulance and keeps Marcus talking until the EMT’s wheel him into the ER and the night crash team takes over.
Despite her instinct to take over, Abby knows that she’s in no position to be the hands behind the scalpel. She does go into the scrub room to wait, however, and her eyes scrutinize every move the team in the OR makes as she takes out her cell phone and dials Octavia’s number.
When Marcus wakes twelve hours later it’s to find Octavia passed out in a hospital chair and Abby standing at the window with her back to him. She’s still in her dress but she’s pulled her hair up into a ponytail and her feet are bare.
His throat is dry and scratchy when he speaks. “Are you all right?”
Abby spins on her heel. She nods slowly and she’s caught somewhere between tenderness and a relieved sort of irritation. “That was stupid, Marcus.”
Octavia sits straight up in her chair, startled. “Dad?”
“I’m okay.”
It’s six days before Thanksgiving, and this is the moment Abby realizes that she can’t do this again: she cannot lose another man she loves.
Event Three:
“Abby!” Octavia calls.
“Marcus, sit down.”
“Tattle tale,” Marcus mutters at his daughter.
It’s Thanksgiving and Marcus has been yelled at six times by every person currently inhabiting the Griffin household.
“You’ll pop your stitches if you don’t take it easy,” Clarke chides.
“I can’t believe you got stabbed,” Bellamy says as he sets the pies on the dinner table.
“Believe me, Bell, it’s not something I intended to happen. I didn’t just wake up one morning and say to myself, ‘hmm, what a good day to be stabbed’.”
Clarke and Bellamy share a smile across the table.
Octavia isn’t ready to make light of the situation quite yet, however. “You’re lucky Abby was there. You would’ve died if she wasn’t.”
“But I didn’t die, Octavia.” Marcus squeezes her shoulder comfortingly.
“The Arkadia Chronicle is calling you a hero,” Bellamy informs him.
“Since when do you read the newspaper?” Octavia retorts.
“Hard not to when dad’s on the front page.”
Marcus scoffs. The story of what happened has made its way quickly through the town and he wants to hide out until the clamor has died down, but he knows that’s not an option. He really hates the attention, though. People he’s never met keep wanting to shake his hand or thank him for being an “outstanding citizen”, and Marcus hates that the most. He wasn’t being an outstanding citizen; he was trying to protect Abby.
Abby touches a hand lightly to his back and then leans over his shoulder to set the gravy bowl down on the table. “Clarke, grab the yams. Bellamy, if you’ll grab the butter I think we should be set. We’re just missing –“
There’s a short knock on the front door and then it opens to reveal two young women. “Knock, knock,” the one with dark hair calls out.
Clarke steps out of the dining room with a grin and reappears moments later with both women in tow. “Guys, this is Raven. Raven, this is my mom, Abby. This is Marcus, Octavia, and Bellamy.” She motions to each of them in turn, and Abby and Marcus shake her hand while Octavia and Bellamy wave and nod respectively.
The other woman turns out to be Bellamy’s girlfriend, Gina. Marcus starts to stand up and stops when Abby lays her hand on his shoulder.
“Sit,” she says, and he does.
After another round of introductions everyone settles in, and for the next three hours the table is full of food and the house echoes with conversation and laughter. Once or twice Abby moves her arm in such a way that the recent injury makes it twinge and she has to massage the area around her rotator cuff for a minute; no one but Marcus notices, and neither of them draw attention to it. The kids did not react well to the situation and neither of the adults is in a rush to remind them of it (though Clarke and Bellamy apparently deal by exercising their gallows humor).
As the evening stretches on the kids collectively clear the table of dishes and leftovers. The house is warm so Abby opens the window above the sink in preparation to do the dishes; it overlooks the back patio, and the soft tinkle of wind chimes floats in on the night air.
Abby pauses to listen to the sound. Marcus gave her that wind chime almost seven months ago, which means that he’s been in her life less than a year and yet she can no longer remember what it was like before him. If his recent brush with death has taught Abby anything it’s that she’s going to have to broach the subject of being in love with him – of wanting more than friendship from him – soon. The thought is a scary one, but they have shared enough long looks and loaded silences to give her hope that he’ll be receptive to the idea.
“Mom?”
“Hmm?” Abby turns and smiles at Clarke as she approaches.
“Why don’t you sit down. I’ll do the dishes.”
“I’ll help,” Bellamy volunteers.
“Okay.”
Then Clarke pulls her into a surprise hug, and Abby smiles when her daughter closes her arms tightly around her. “I’m glad you’re okay, mom.”
“So am I.” Abby squeezes her daughter tightly. “Love you.”
“Love you, too. Now go tell Marcus to sit down.” Clarke raises her voice to be sure that it carries into the living room, where everyone else is lounging on the couches.
“I am sitting down!” Marcus yells.
Clarke grins and releases her mom. Abby joins Gina, Raven, Octavia, and Marcus in the other room and, unthinkingly, drops down onto the couch next to Marcus.
“What are we watching?” she asks.
“A Charlie Brown Christmas,” Raven answers.
“Thanksgiving’s not even over,” Abby complains.
Gina grins at her. “Not feeling the Christmas spirit?”
“Not feeling the constant redecorating.”
“Then do what I do,” Raven says.
“What’s that?”
“Don’t decorate.”
Even Octavia cracks a smile then. “Dad loves decorating. Guess Bell and I will have to do it this year.”
“That’s six weeks away! My leg will be fine by then, Octavia.”
“Not if you don’t listen to your doctor and stay off of it now,” Abby states dryly.
“This is ridiculous,” Marcus grouses in mock-indignation. “Isn’t anyone on my side?”
“I am,” Raven quips.
“Thank you!”
“Yeah, I mean, who cares if you pull your stitches and permanently damage your nerves, right? Chicks dig scars.”
“We’re not friends anymore, Reyes.”
No one walking into the moment would guess that half of the household only met six days ago. Abby can barely believe it herself: it feels as though they’ve been this way for years, a happy, blended family.
Clarke and Bellamy return from the kitchen and flop down next to their respective girlfriends. Abby settles further into the cushions and for a while there’s nothing but the sounds from the television and the warm, spiced air that fills the house.
Abby must doze off. One minute she’s watching the television and the next Marcus is softly calling her name and wiggling his shoulder.
“Abby.”
She hums in the back of her throat and opens her eyes. The living room is empty and she’s fallen against Marcus’s shoulder. “Sorry,” she mumbles. “How long was I out? Where did everyone go?”
“An hour, maybe. Bellamy took Gina and Octavia home and Raven and Clarke went to bed.”
Abby rights herself and fails to stifle a yawn. She’s been up since six o’clock in the morning getting everything ready for the big turkey dinner, and the constant activity of the day has finally caught up to her.
“You probably could’ve just pushed me over. I doubt I would have even opened my eyes.”
Marcus shrugs and offers her a private smile. “I was comfortable.”
Abby is still inclined more toward him than away, and the flickering light from the television moves across his face in undulating shadows. Her eyes flit down to his lips. The air between them takes on a sudden charge, and Abby’s heart rate picks up. They’ve been in this moment before, and though each of those times had ended with no resolution, Abby is absolutely certain that this time will be different.
She’s done waiting and biding her time.
They’re moving toward each other with slow, determined purpose, and someone knocks on the door.
Abby is going to kill whoever is on the other side. “Who the hell makes a house call this late, on a holiday?”
Marcus reaches out and sweeps a loose lock of hair away from her face. When he draws his hands back he lets the pads of his fingers brush over her cheekbone, and Abby is two seconds away from saying screw whoever it is and grabbing Marcus.
She doesn’t know that her face has relayed her intentions until Marcus quirks his mouth up into something like a smirk and says, “Go answer the door.”
Abby doesn’t huff, but she thinks about it as she unfurls her legs and heads for the door.
The man Abby sees standing on her front porch is the last person she expects. “Thelonious?”
On the couch, Marcus stiffens at the other man’s name. There are few reasons he can think of that the mayor of Arkadia would show up at a woman’s house at close to eleven in the evening, but he has a sinking sensation that Jaha is not here as a public official, but as the man who loved and lost Abby Griffin.
He maneuvers himself quietly off the couch, careful not to draw Abby’s attention, and gathers their abandoned glasses off of the coffee table in an excuse to retreat to the kitchen and give them privacy.
“What are you doing here?” Abby asks.
“I just got back into town. I heard what happened, and I wanted to make sure you’re okay.”
“What … oh.” The damn rumor mill of a small town – whatever version of events he’s heard is probably only half true at best. “I’m a little sore, but I’m fine. You could’ve called and saved yourself a trip.”
Thelonious shifts his weight and his feet shuffle against the deck; it’s the first time Abby has ever seen him uncomfortable.
“That’s not the only reason I’m here. When I heard that you were attacked – mugged,” he amends when she arches an exasperated eyebrow, “I knew that I had to see you again.”
Abby’s brows draw down. “Why?” she asks in confusion.
“Because I’ve never proposed to anyone before, but I’m told it shouldn’t be done over the phone.”
He offers her a tremulous smile, but Abby is too shocked to react. “You’re … a what?”
“I’m here because I want to marry you, Abby. Murphy told me what happened and I knew. I’m sorry I wasn’t there. But I want to be, and I promise that I will be. Will you marry me?”
Thelonious doesn’t get down on one knee, and he doesn’t have a ring, but Abby doesn’t care about either of those things. In fact, her mind isn’t even fixed in the present moment: it’s too busy replaying the words ‘I wasn’t there’.
No, Thelonious Jaha hasn’t been there for her. They must have gone on a dozen or more dates, but he’d never made himself a place in her life. They’d been more like occasional dinner partners than potential lovers.
Marcus Kane, however; Marcus has made himself such an integral part of her life that Abby knows all the way down to her bones that his absence would fundamentally change everything. In those few seconds of silence, with another man standing before her with an offer of marriage, Abby’s thoughts are full of Marcus.
“No.” Her answer is decisive, but not cutting.
She would never choose to be without Jake, and there will be a place in her heart for him until the day she dies, but that part of Abby’s life is over. The life she wants now – the only life she’s wanted since Marcus first spoke to her in the open air of a Farmer’s Market all those months ago – revolves around her daughter, and a surly teenager, and a young man she’s barely met, and the man she’s left sitting on her couch.
Thelonious’s face falls. His tone is carefully calm when he asks, “Is there someone else?”
“Yes.”
He nods. “It’s Marcus Kane, isn’t it?”
Abby doesn’t hesitate. “Yes.”
In the kitchen, where Marcus is doing his best not to listen but can’t help overhearing bits and pieces of the conversation, he misses the most important part.
What Marcus hears is a marriage proposal – and an acceptance.
He braces himself against the kitchen counter and hangs his head. Abby is not a prize, but that doesn’t stop Marcus from feeling like he’s just lost something valuable, something that he can’t afford to lose. Why would Abby accept, he wonders, when moments ago he was convinced she was about to kiss him? Has he been reading all of the signs wrong all this time?
Has he misjudged and miscalculated so badly?
The front door closes; Abby is alone as she makes the journey to where he stands in the kitchen. Marcus studies her as she approaches: her dark jeans hug her legs, and her pale sweater is a bright spot in the half-darkness of the house, and her long hair hangs over one shoulder. He is struck with the knowledge that this is about to taken from him. The intimacy of family dinners, and quiet nights spent watching television, and Abby asleep against his side; the way she’s walking toward him now as if the next words out of her mouth are going to be, “I’m exhausted, let’s go to bed.”
Abby’s expression changes as she steps around the kitchen island to approach, and everything inside Marcus twists and protests.
“Marcus, I –“
His leg is stiff but he forces it into action as he rushes forward and takes her face in his hands - his thumbs caressing the soft skin in front of her ears and his fingers curling into her hair - and kisses her. Marcus is afraid this is the only kiss he’ll ever get and maybe, when it’s all said and done, this will only make it harder to let her go, but he doesn’t care. He pours all he has, and wants, and is, into the press of his lips against hers. Abby responds with fervor and reaches up to loop an arm around his shoulders and slide her fingers into the hair at the nape of his neck.
Marcus finally pulls away. He breathes heavily into the space that now separates their mouths. One of his hands has moved down to rest against the side of her neck, where he can just feel her pulse against his palm.
His words are soft, and urgent. “I love you. I’m completely and utterly in love with you, Abby. Please don’t get married.”
Abby’s confusion shines clearly out of her eyes. Then, she starts to smile. “If you’re going to eavesdrop, Marcus, at least listen to the whole conversation.”
“What?”
“You missed the most important part.”
“I did?”
Abby tilts her head to the side. “That would be the part where I turned him down.”
“But I heard you say yes.”
“Because he asked me if there was someone else.”
The relief that sets in is short lived because it’s eclipsed by the sheer joy of learning two things at once: first, that he has not misunderstood or lost anything, and second, that kissing Abby Griffin might finally be something that he’s allowed to do.
He tests that knowledge immediately and kisses her again. Through the open window over the sink they can hear the tinkle of a wind chime as a nighttime zephyr dances through the pipes.
“Come on,” Abby says when they part once more. “I’m tired.”
“Where are we going?”
“To bed, if you can manage the stairs.”
Marcus takes the hand she’s holding out to him and smirks. “I don’t know; my doctor might yell at me.”
“I think she’ll let it slide this time.”
Thanksgiving is technically over, and the house is asleep around them, and this is the moment Abby realizes that everything that’s happened in the last seven months – or, perhaps, even longer – has brought them to this exact point in time.
They’re right where they want to be.