The Hand That Holds Mine by Jennifer Loren
The Hand That Holds Mine
Published by Jennifer Loren
Copyright © 2012 Jennifer Loren
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 0985702923
ISBN-13: 978-0-9857029-2-2
Table of Contents
Overcome
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Other Works
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OvercomeThe sun rises bright and beautiful as if it feels no pain.
It must not see, it must not hear, it can’t possibly or it would not be able to overcome so defiantly.
My bed creaks and whines when I leave it behind.
I don’t know why it tries so hard to hold onto me but yet I continue to try and overcome.
I put on my shirt, my pants that fit me, find my socks and glue my heel back to my boot.
My gloves are lost, my coat is torn but my scarf still keeps me warm and so I continue to try and overcome.
Work has no pride, no place for me but I have no other place to be.
My broken dreams continue to rise, my hopes continue to fade but still I try to overcome.
A broken window and a gas tank on E, it’s not Friday so I have to walk each day for at least another three.
And so I walk while the world cries and pleas and tries to swallow me but still I continue and try to overcome.
My lock on my door only turns halfway, but I don’t have anything to steal anyway.
My fridge is bare but my cabinet still holds three so I continue to try and overcome.
The news haunts me, the weather threatens to rain down on me but another day has gone by.
And I have overcome, I have overcome … I have overcome - the sun has nothing on me.
Prologue
~ Adeline ~
How many blows from life’s fists can one person take before they stop believing?
My name is Adeline Beal, I was born with next to nothing but aspired for everything. The world around me has always moved quickly, and with a darkness that hovers over me like a never-ending storm. My life was set to be like my mother’s, working day and night, caring for children she couldn’t afford and taking care of a dying husband until she had nothing left of herself. She had strength like no one woman could but still … the world beat her down. The world took my parents from me and sent my brothers and sisters to places I could never find. The world has a way of taking more from you than it is ever willing to give. When you are born, no one promises fairness or even hope. The only thing you are given is a life and it is up to you to make the best of it but I wanted to do more than simply - make the best of it. I have never spent a moment not dreaming, not believing in another place, another world, a better world. I refused to believe that this was going to be my life, that - struggle and heartache, were going to be the only life I know.
With what I had learned from my own life experiences and my imagination, I escaped to write my first book - in the backroom of a sandwich shop. My manager was kind enough to allow me breaks long enough to get a chapter a day done. The man I married called it a waste of time, a foolish hobby, an annoyance that he was sick of hearing about. Books and writing, all fantasies that have no place in real life and no security for what he wanted. Two years after I finished my first book, it was published and six years later, I completed my best-selling series and made enough money to live a life I had always dreamed of. I could finally buy a home, have children and a dog to sleep at my feet as I write. A chance to travel to places I had only seen in pictures. My road was becoming brighter and brighter and I felt as if I could almost touch that beaming light at the end of my jagged road. That I could reach out and it would warm my hand and instantly set me free from my past.
In every book I read as a child, it always ended with, “And they lived, Happily Ever After.” Happily ever after? How is that possible? Am I suppose to believe that they never fought? That they agreed on everything - forever? That they never had any concern of any sort? Did they spend every moment of their lives together just being … happy? Well that doesn’t sound all that appealing to me. It’s the twists and the bumps in the road that make the journey so exciting and so much more fulfilling when you overcome them. In my books, it is the ability of the hero to overcome but only with his heroine at his side, battling every step of the way, hand in hand. Together they make a life, by traveling down a long and rocky, but oh so exciting road, making their happiness with each day that they overcome together. My stories may end with a resolution and the hero and heroine may come together but not happily ever after, but happy to journey together, forever. At the end of each of my books I place a symbol, my symbol for happily ever after. The perfect rose encircled by its own twisted, rugged vine. For they may be happy now but they will most certainly run into bumps and twists along their journey, but true love will always help them return to the perfect rose.
That is the life I wanted, not the happily ever after but just like in my books someone to travel by my side and help me return to the perfect rose.
What a beautiful life, a beautiful life that now appears as if it will never be.
Chapter 1
~ Adeline ~
Joshua slips away from his enemies and searches through the darkness to find what he has always wanted, what he has been endlessly searching for …
The golden statue! … no … His hat? - oh, that is so bad. He … is … searching for … his mind apparently, because I got nothing. I have no idea what he is searching for, I don’t even know who he is! AAAHHH! Presumably my last novel and I can’t come up with two sentences that are any good. Two sentences!
“You decided to get started finally, huh?” Jeneba asks me, as she flutters around my room tidying up everything in sight before she has to go.
“I wouldn’t call it a start, it isn’t even an idea. I don’t know how I am supposed to write without an idea.” I say with bitterness.
“You’re forcing yourself, you should do what you always have and let it come to you. You’ll get it in time.”
“I don’t have any time! That’s the one thing I don’t have.” I snap at her. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to take my frustrations out on you.”
“It’s alright, but I would feel better if you would eat some of your food before I go.” Glancing to my side, I turn my nose up at the bland soup and dry bread. I am tired of this diet, I want a pizza - from Italy, or Sushi - from Japan, not … this.
Deb walks in and drops several bags on the floor next to me. “What is that?” I ask annoyed by her abundant mess.
“One bag has all the supplies for knitting, the other has supplies for scrapbooking and the last one has some charcoal and such for sketching.” She says smiling wide at me and not at all appreciating my unenthused attitude over it all. “Oh don’t look at me that way Adeline, I think you need to relax, not frustrate yourself trying to write. It is too much pressure, you are trying too hard to make your last book the best ever. You shouldn’t put so much pressure on yourself, you have accomplished so much. Most people would be more than satisfied with your accomplishments. Jeneba agrees with me.” Deb motions towards a fleeting Jeneba. “Chicken!”
“I am not knitting, sketching, nor am I going to scrapbook! I have nothing to scrapbook anyway. Or at least nothing that doesn’t remind me of him somehow.” Setting my glasses back on my nose I push the screen of my laptop back into position.
“Ok ignore me and continue doing whatever you want to but t
“Love you.” I say with a hard gulp.
“Love you too, sweetheart. Eat some and I will call you later to check on you.” Deb my long time literary agent and my best friend is determined to hold out hope. Jeneba, my neighbor, my good friend and my part-time nurse is more of a realist and maybe that’s why I prefer her to be around. As I stare at the keys of my keyboard, my vision begins to blur and my ears perk up as I listen to my friends discuss my life from a distance they believe is safe enough to do so. Back and forth they talk about a possible cure, and they end their conversation by discussing him.
Mitch Blake - my husband, soon to be ex-husband. He seemed perfect, wonderful in every way, although not overly supportive of my writing in the beginning, he became quite supportive once they started bringing in money. So much so, he was almost annoying he was so attentive and caring. All that ended, when I became sick and became too slow to keep up with him. The memories of our slow demise will always be clear to me. It is so easy for me to see now but then I wanted to pretend that it was all my imagination. I wanted to believe my dreams were still within reach:
“Adeline!” Mitch yells racing through the house, finding me lying down. “What are you doing, taking a nap? We don’t have time for your laziness Adeline, get up and get ready.”
“I am trying Mitch but I just don’t think I can. I am so tired and I …” I say watching him as he checks his hair in the mirror.
“You have to be the laziest woman I have ever met. I suppose you want to stay home again? You know if you don’t start enjoying life a little more … all you are going to have is your made up stories.” Sighing deeply he puts his hands on his hips and looks me over. “If you stay home what are you going to do?”
“Nothing, I think I need some sleep.” I sigh sinking into the softness of my pillow and feeling good about him giving up on forcing me to go with him.
Huffing, he shakes his head at me, “At least write, do something. I spend every day working on making you successful and for some reason you think you can now lie around and let me do all the work? I hope you don’t expect me to stay here with you? I have to bust my butt going to all these parties and schmoozing all the money people and try to get them to invest in my new business.”
Oh gees that stupid business idea, again. No one in their right mind is going to invest money in another, fine dining restaurant - especially one that Mitch runs with all his experience as a fry cook. Mitch gives me an evil glare when he catches me rolling my eyes. “Mitch, I think I am really sick and should see a doctor.”
“So go see a doctor, you know where the hospital is. I don’t have time to play nursemaid to you, Adeline, I have to go out and try to keep us in this nice home. You’re a big girl, you know how to take care of yourself.” Mitch checks his look over once more before he kisses me on the cheek and races out the door.
~
Mitch left me soon after he found out that I have Cancer. He said he shouldn’t feel bad for wanting to live his life to the fullest and not be held back by me. He wants children he said - as if that isn’t what I want too. I would fight for him but I would rather die alone than live my life fighting for a man that so clearly has no love for me.
As of three months ago, the cancer had spread and was beyond what any doctor could do. I could feel sorry for myself but instead I want to put all the energy I have left, into this last novel. The pressure to do so, however, is causing writers block, something I have rarely had. I have a hero but I cannot see him and he has no heroine to fight for. Towards the end of the night I have progressed no further on my novel and I have no energy left to continue trying. When the pain starts to rise, I race to get my pills down before the nausea begins. I don’t make it. Cringing, I hold tight to my towel trying to bear through it. My stubbornness won’t allow any of my friends to be bothered and with my family gone, I face this alone. I have to write, it’s my only escape from the pain. My books are all I have, they give me life when I don’t otherwise. No one understands that. No one believes how they carry me away from my struggles, my lost dreams, and lessen my declining hope. No one understands.
“I understand, Adeline,” I feel a strong hand take hold of mine, instantly startling me, but the warmth and the strength within it, calms me and allows me to sleep, peacefully.
Chapter 2
~ Adeline ~
As the doctor looks me over and declares not much has changed, I wonder why I even bothered coming here but then I remember that he is the only one that can write prescriptions for my pain killers. He decides on something new, something a little stronger but only if I take a multitude of other meds with it. When I finish, Deb treats me to lunch out and allows me to order something I want for a change.
“So what did the doctor say?” She asks with an innocent expression.
“Why do you ask me things that you already know the answers to? I know you talked to him too. If you drive me anymore crazy because of what he said I am not going to allow you to take me to any more of my appointments.”
“I wouldn’t have to if you would let me get you into that special care facility I told you about.”
“Oh that’s what I want, to spend my last days around a bunch of people who are dying.” Before she starts to argue with me I try to think of something that will help change the subject. “I had the strangest dream last night.” I say abruptly earning an eye roll, which I purposely ignore. “I was feeling sick and then I suddenly felt this man take hold of my hand and sooth my pain somehow. It seemed so real, I almost believed that it happened when I woke up this morning.”
“I hope he was hot.” Deb says with a smile.
“Me too, but I didn’t see him to know. He only took hold of my hand and said he understood.”
“Understood what?” She asks stopping eating to look at me.
I usually confide in Deb about everything but this information may be a little much for her to handle. To spare her anymore stress and pain, I shrug as if I can’t recall, “Not sure, I must have been watching too much television. Got an idea in my head about the book maybe.”
“How is the book coming, anyway?” She asks, while I groan into my hands.
“I have a name for my hero and I think he is searching for something, or maybe he is running from something, or …”
“It’s going that well, huh?” Deb laughs.
“Yea, this may end up being my worst book ever.”
“I am sure you will get it, you always do. Maybe some chocolate cake will help.” She says with a smile before growling suddenly. “Maybe we should forego the cake.”
I follow her gaze and see Mitch walking in with a young girl hanging on his arm. “Oh no - this day was actually going pretty well.” Deb touches my hand and I know he is on his way over to our table.
“Hello, Adeline … Deb.” Mitch says kissing my cheek without permission.
“Prick.” Deb says with a smile.
Mitch glances her way but ignores her snide comment. “So Adeline, I was looking over the divorce papers and I am not sure that they are quite right. I had an attorney friend look over them and he came up with a much better scenario I think for the both of us. I think we should get together and go over these new papers he created and get this divorce finalized.”
“I like the way we have them now.” I say refusing to look his way.
“Adeline please, don’t be that way. We have come so far together, let’s not be bitter. I need to make a living too.”
“So why don’t you do that, rather than trying to live off of her money.” Deb huffs.
“Excuse me but I am talking to my wife, not you. And I am working, the restaurant isn’t quite there yet but in time it will be. My restaurant has the best food in the city, and as soon as people realize that …”
“If it is so good then why aren’t you eating there?” I ask him, compelling D
“Kelly is my fiancée, she loves me and I her.”
“She loves Adeline’s money and you love her …” Deb looks over at Kelly sitting impatiently at a distant table. “Well I am sure it isn’t for her brains.”
“Jealous, Deb? Maybe you should go to one of Kelly’s classes, it looks as if you could use a little workout, a lot of working out with them thighs.” Mitch laughs.
“Can I punch him?” Deb asks already fisting her hands.
“Mitch, leave us alone!” I snap.
“Okay, but we do need to talk … alone would be preferred.” He says walking away with a final glare in Deb’s direction.
“Why did you ever marry him?”
“He wasn’t always like that, he used to be supportive and caring. Then I guess he got tired of me and I became less important and more of a bother. Doesn’t matter, I will be rid of him one way or another here soon.” I force a smile but Deb has trouble forming hers.
“I say we stop for something sweet on our way home rather than stay here any longer.” I agree and Deb helps me up and out of the restaurant. As we are leaving, a man walking his dog comes by us and I have to stop and pet the dog, enjoying her wagging tail and over excitement immensely. “Glad to see your smile back, I should get you a dog if it changes your attitude that much.”
“They are so innocent and happy, they are always happy. How can you not smile when you are around dogs? I would get one myself if I thought I could take proper care of one.” Sighing, I smile watching the dog happily walk to the next person wanting to give her attention.