I Will Follow You Into the Dark

CHAPTER 33

DUN DUN DUN!

Drum roll, please.........And without further ado.........here's the lady you've been waiting to meet......30+.....scary, huh?



Meredith exhaled deeply as she leaned back against the door of her family's hotel room. She smiled as she heard her kids squeal with delight when they heard Steve tell them they were going to the Zoo. With a wistful expression on her face, Meredith walked down the hallway to the elevator and pushed the button that would take her downstairs. She climbed aboard when the doors opened and enjoyed a solo ride to the lobby. The elevator had been peaceful and quiet, but Meredith didn't notice. She was finally giving in to the echoes of memories long since banished or held at bay.



********

It had been so much easier to distract herself while she was with her family. Now the quiet solitude of her drive to her childhood home was screaming at her. She told herself that it was just a house, just a structure—not part of her any more, but that didn't help. Her palms grew sweaty the closer she got to her mother's house, and she was trembling.

What am I afraid of? My mother is dead. She can't hurt me anymore. The house can't hurt me. I'll just open it up and make sure the cleaning crew and the caterers can do their things. The day of the funeral, I'll walk around and talk to people I either don't know or can't remember. Who cares what they think? I can do this.

But she couldn't shake the eerie feeling that she'd had since she had received the call from the nursing home about her mother's death. Meredith had always sworn that she'd never set foot back in Boston and that she would never talk to her mother again. Fate had ensured that the latter wasn't possible. She knew she didn't even have to do this. But the letter she had received a week ago had shaken her resolve.

My dearest Meredith,

I am nearing death's door. I will not be around to hurt you or trouble you much longer. I have so many regrets. But I won't lay them all out for you now. They are mine alone to bear.

Please forgive me for all the ways that I have failed you. You deserved so much more from me. I am sorry that I let you down.

Please go back to Boston for my funeral. I've made and paid for all of the arrangements. I know that you will not really grieve my loss, and I do not blame you for that at all. But I would be so grateful if you could be there to thank my peers and associates for coming.

One of the doctors here has been terribly kind to me. He took an interest in my case and my life and he taught me to face my faults. Despite the ugliness he saw in the things that I told him, he still stayed here to tend to me. I will leave a request that he attend the funeral. I suspect that talking to him might give you some peace and reassurance. I owe you that and so much more.

Live your life without regrets. Be happy. Love your children the way that a mother should. Do everything the opposite of the way that I did.

I love you,
Ellis

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Even though her heart and all of her instincts told her not to go back to Boston, Meredith found herself unable to forget the letter that held her mother's last request and a more sincere apology than she'd ever expected to receive. She told herself that her mother was gone. She wouldn't have any idea whether Meredith went or not. And it wasn't as if there would be close family friends or grieving family there in need of consolation. There was no one else. Meredith was Ellis' only family and she wasn't overly grieved by her mother's passing. She had grieved that loss years before.

Still, she found herself there--in Boston, doing everything she swore she'd never do. Well, dammit, this is it. I'll just get through this and go back home to Chicago. My life is in Chicago. Not Boston. Not in forever. Not since.......


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As Meredith unlocked the door to her childhood home, her hands trembled. Finally holding the key still enough to insert it properly into the weathered lock, she turned it and opened the door. She walked in slowly, examining each room carefully. Nothing had changed. As she wandered through the house, she realized that she did not feel sorrow for losing her mom. Neither did she feel sadness or nostalgia for her childhood home. So many of her memories in this house were lonely or miserable—not the sort of memories one clung to over the years.

Instead, what she felt with absolute clarity as she climbed the stairs and walked toward her room was an ache so overpowering that she slumped onto her bed and collapsed into sobs. Derek.....she was in agony over the loss of Derek as if it had happened yesterday. Her mind danced across her happy memories of meeting him and learning to trust him and falling in love. Derek was her home. Derek was her happy memory. Derek was her whole world.....Then she trudged back through her memories of losing him--the phone call that drove her mad with worry and her race to be with his family and wait for news that never came.

When she was on the brink of a total collapse, her brain raced forward to the argument with her mother and the last day she had spent in this house.

She cried for all the loss and the heartache that still haunted her. But most of all, she let herself do something she rarely gave herself permission to do. She sat and treasured her memories of Derek. Closing her eyes and lying back on the bed, she was immediately breathless with the intensity of her memories. She remembered every single thing about him--what he liked to eat, where his freckles were, just the right spot to nibble on his ear and make him moan. The way his unruly hair looked first thing in the morning or after particularly rowdy sex. The sparkle in his eyes and the way he could stare into her soul. The way he made her heart stop just by leaning up against a doorframe or wall and looking at her with that love-filled gaze he saved only for her. The way he had worked patiently to earn her trust and the way he got tears in his eyes every time he faithfully pledged his undying love for her.

Her heart raced and her body quivered simply remembering how it felt to have his hands and his lips on her body. Unable or unwilling to stop herself, she lay there and basked in the glow of remembering the feel of his fingertips working their magic all over her. He drove her crazy with desire she had never again experienced in that same way. Pleasure and happiness warmed her body and soul as she let herself feel his presence, his love, his touch. And for just a moment, she was at peace.

When she dared to open her eyes, reality sank in. The flush on her cheeks from the memories of raw pleasure faded into grief. She had lost him. She still couldn't believe it or understand it. Yet she'd never believed that Derek had died. She always felt that she would physically feel different somehow if he were truly gone. But there was no other plausible explanation. He would have come back. He would have found her. He would have answered her letters. Her Derek wouldn't let anything keep them apart. He loved her too much. He was her everything......

Still teary-eyed, she crossed the hall to her mother's room. Expecting to be hit with memories of her mother or her childhood, she was pleasantly surprised. She had no desire to dredge up those memories. Instead, she giggled at the memory of the time she'd enticed Derek in there. They'd been making out downstairs and things were getting out of hand. Suddenly inspired, Meredith leaned over and told Derek to lay completely still—that she had a surprise for him. She raced to the stairs, shedding clothing along the way. A sock here and another there. A sweater dangling over the banister, a t-shirt left in the middle of the floor. A belt hung over the doorknob to her mother's room. Her jeans tossed onto the carpet in her mother's bedroom. Lying in her underwear in the most inviting of positions on her mother's large bed, Meredith waited breathlessly for Derek to arrive. She heard him race up the stairs and pause as he noticed the breadcrumbs she had left for him. Her pulse quickened as she heard him following her trail of discarded clothing. She gasped as he tentatively opened the door.

"Seriously? In here?" She nodded and curled an index finger toward him seductively, using it to reel him in and pull him close.

"It's too creepy. I feel like she's here, watching us. C'mon, let's go to your room," he said as he tried to pull her up and off the bed.

"No," Meredith said pouting. This is the only room in this house that we haven't christened."

"But, Mer......"

She cut him off with a kiss that made any disagreement impossible. Moaning from what she was doing to him, Derek carefully lifted her up and pushed her up against the wall. "Not in her bed," he groaned, molding his lips and his body to hers.

Vivid images of their intense lovemaking left her breathless once again.

But it wasn't just sex. The sex was unbelievable, but there were so many tender, loving memories. Now that her defenses were down, those came flooding back full force.

*******

Meredith's mother had retained a cleaning service to clean the house once a month, so it wasn't in poor condition. They were coming the following day to clean and polish and dust for the reception following the funeral. Then the house would be put on the market.

Meredith considered what, if anything, she wanted to keep from her personal belongings and her mother's furnishings and personal effects. She assembled a pile of things on her mother's bed. Not much. Just enough to fill a few boxes. She'd focused on medical textbooks and videos and things her children might enjoy. After making the rounds one last time, she sighed loudly. She decided that, out of a house full of antiques and things she'd grown up with, all she really wanted was to hold onto her most precious possessions—her memories of Derek.