A Man on an Island Ch. 03

She looked down. There was a large envelope on the table. It was addressed to him, but it was from a law firm, she could see. She also noticed some drops of liquid on the table top, and there was one on the envelope. The envelope was open, so she pulled out the thin sheaf of papers, scanning quickly.

It was Cale's will. She looked through it, and found that he had updated his will that morning. She was shocked to read that, aside from his Harley that was to go to his brother, Cale had left everything in his name to her, and made her his executrix.

She touched one of drops and looked at the bead of moisture on her fingertip. Water. What was water doing on the table? Nobody had been here all morning, she thought. She tasted the drop and felt her world shift. It was cool and worse, it was salty.

Emma suddenly had to sit down.

She tried to put all of this together. The most probable answer was the most horrific one that she could imagine. For whatever reason, he had made the changes to his will. She knew him well enough to know that he would tell her what he had done soon afterward. She knew that he had just had his annual physical, and he was as healthy as a horse, so he probably had just done this because he thought it was best for her. So, if he had come to give her the will .... her heart froze. She remembered that he had sent her a text message a little after eight o'clock this morning – on the road from this phone.

Cale must have walked in while she and Arlene ... God, no .... And then he must have begun to cry. Cale could be such a hard man to the world, but she knew there was one thing – one person in all the world maybe, who could crush him without effort. Emma somehow knew that she had done just that. Emma had done it without a thought.

She burst into tears herself.

Fifteen minutes later, Emma began to pull herself together. She savagely pushed her guilt aside. She was likely going to have as long as she would ever want to feel sorry for herself. She tried to think clearly.

Where would he have gone? He was supposed to be working this afternoon. She knew that he was most likely out of the shop, but she called there and asked for him anyway. The receptionist sounded odd, and a bit put-out to speak with her. Finding that Cale wasn't there, she was about to hang up when the receptionist asked her to hold the line. A moment later, she heard a male voice.

It was Bob, the owner of the company. He asked Emma who she was, and Emma told him. "I thought it might be you," he said, "I remember Cale introducing us at the company dance last fall. Look Emma, I'm not really supposed to say anything that concerns our employees to outsiders, but Danielle told me that you're looking for him?"

"Yes, I need to find him, quickly if I can. I wouldn't bother anyone there if it wasn't important," Emma said.

She heard Bob draw a breath, "He came in here a few minutes ago to see me. He was supposed to head right out to a job that he was leading. He told me that he needed an emergency leave for two weeks. Cale hasn't taken any time off in a long time, and I wanted to give it to him, but I need him on that job so I turned him down.

Emma, he handed me his resignation and walked out. He's the best man I've ever had here, but he just quit on the spot. Now I'm going to ask you to do me a favour if you can in exchange for what I'm about to tell you, alright?"

Emma was stunned. Why would he quit his job like this? She recovered, and told Bob that she'd try if she could.

"If you can find him Emma, would you please tell him that I'm going to hold his job open for as long as I can. I don't know what's gotten into him, but I'm assuming that it's something to do with the two of you. I want him to know that there's no hard feelings at this end, and if you can get him back here as soon as possible, I'm willing to pretend that nothing happened. Now, Cale has a brother. He said that he was going to visit him one day soon."

Cale had never mentioned his brother to her with more than just a few words, but Emma knew that unless it was top of mind for him, he was far more interested in her life than his own. Emma remembered Cale's will, "His brother? Ok, that's more than I had. Where is his brother, Bob?"

"All I know is that Cale told me once that his brother is a soldier and that he's often out of the country. But every year, he takes his vacation leave to go and help out at a cattle ranch or something in a little place not far out of Santa Fe. Cale said to me that he was thinking to go there. He hasn't seen his brother in a long while. That's all that I have for you. Good luck I guess, Emma."

She thanked him and hung up. Emma only dwelt on it for a second before jumping up to drive to Cale's house. On the way, she tried to figure out what was looking like irrational behaviour on Cale's part at the moment. He was the most rock-steady man that she'd ever met. Obviously he was that way to most of the people who knew him, yet he'd quit his job just like that? She tried to put herself in his shoes. Even allowing for the upset, it made little sense. As she pulled into his driveway, she noticed that his car and truck were there.

Emma got out and walked up the driveway. She laid her hand on the hood of what was now her very favourite pickup truck in the whole world. She could feel the heat still coming through the metal. She knocked on the door, and after getting no reply, she let herself in with her key. Emma ran through the house, looking for him and calling his name but there was no answer.

She went out back, and saw that he wasn't there. Walking back into the kitchen, she saw a mug on the table. It still had a few drops of coffee in it, and the mug wasn't cold yet. She touched the side of the kettle, and had to pull her hand away quickly. So he'd been there within the last twenty minutes, she assumed.

Emma walked slowly through the house and noticed a few things here and there that spoke of a quick departure; clothes on the bed that were taken from the dresser drawers, but rejected in favour of something else, maybe, and she saw that his toothbrush was missing, along with his razor.

She walked out of the house, and then headed to the garage. It was locked. Cale never locked his garage, she knew. On the keychain that he'd given her was a garage key. A quick look inside, and she knew that he was traveling on his bike. Emma locked it up, and then went back inside. She had no idea now where to look, and she'd just missed him by minutes.

Emma sat at the kitchen table and cried.

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Cale sat comfortably on his bike, the big V-twin rumbling contentedly between his legs. Today- right now – there were only two features that he was interested in. It wasn't bad to sit on and it could eat miles with ease.

For all of that, Cale still felt like crap. He was back on his island, but the pain in his chest was still too raw to be assuaged. He'd really thought that finally he was having his turn – his shot at happiness. He shook his head.

Still an idiot after all these years.

He was pissed at his boss, too. He never asked for much, but whenever he wanted time off, he was just too important to be able to spare.

Right...

Cale hadn't had a vacation in years. Well now he had one, he thought, for as long as it took – or until the money ran out.

He was pleased to a tiny degree that he'd been able to make his getaway clean. Cale didn't want to talk to anybody. He knew that Emma would be wondering about him in a few hours, and if she put it together, she'd be upset. But it couldn't be helped. He never should have hoped for her heart in the first place. What the hell had he been thinking?

He should have just let her take her damn pictures, and let that be it. He wished for a moment that he'd never agreed to the other shoots, but then told himself that he'd had more than six months of the most intense love that any man could expect to have a right to have. Or to survive, he smiled.

He sighed sadly; he knew he was badly hurt. He felt like he was bleeding as he rode, but with that said, he knew that for once in his life at least, he could say that he'd really been loved. He blinked away the stinging that the thought had brought to his tired red eyes.

Cale pulled into a large motel fairly close to the border and checked in. He got his gear to his room, and then walked back out to lock down his bike, remembering the lock for the disc brake rotor. He went to eat a featureless meal in the dining room and then went back to his room and sat on the edge of the bed and just let the hurt wash over him. At last he thought he could maybe sleep and suddenly thought of his phone. He was certain that it was probably clogged with messages from Emma.

He sighed. This had started out to be such a hopeful day. He and his brother Josh didn't see each other enough, but Cale had finally figured out that this time every year if he could, Josh spent his vacation time in New Mexico and after a little careful prodding, he and Josh were exchanging text messages and emails. He felt great about that and he really wanted to see his kid brother again. It had given Cale an idea.

He'd done a little prep work, and wanted to suggest to Em that they take a ride to see his kid brother, a real comfy easy-going vacation. Just like the lovers in her photos would do, he thought. Just like two friends who had become lovers and then gotten married. That was what he had hoped for. Then it had all turned to crap.

Just like everything in his life always seemed to be able to do.

He realised that he couldn't find his phone. He backtracked his day to the last place that he knew that he'd had it. Emma's place, he'd left his phone at Emma's. So between his phone and the copy of the will, she'd know that he'd been there.

Poor Emma, he thought. He turned out the light.

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Her shift at the hospital was pure hell, but she got through it. During the drive home she tried to summarize what she had. It wasn't all that much, she realised. At home, she grabbed some paper to begin making notes. Emma only knew that she had hurt him badly, but if this could be saved, she was determined to do anything to get her man back. She knew that this love had started out mismatched, star-crossed, and just plain fucked up, but that she'd never been happier in her life.

No matter how this ended, Emma now knew that Cale was the love of her life. She wanted to cry some more, but held it off. She wasn't going to give in to misery yet. She could sit here and weep, or she could do something. She had no real idea what, but was willing to go to any length for Cale's love, and if it couldn't be saved, then at least she'd be able to tell herself that she'd tried, and most of all, she wanted to apologise to Cale in person. He deserved that much.

She turned on her computer, and tried to find out something about New Mexico and the Santa Fe area. Half an hour into that, she had a brainwave, and dove for the lawyer's envelope. There it was. Mr. Joshua Taylor, and there was even an address, one in New Mexico, since Cale never knew where Josh could be posted to next. Now, how long does it take to get to Santa Fe on a motorcycle? She figured on Cale just wanting to get there to give herself a short timeline. She guessed that if she was driving there on a vacation, she'd take about a week. She gave Cale five days or less, considering that he was Superman on vacation. She smiled sadly at the thought as she got ready for bed.

Going to the bathroom, she noticed that she has started her period and frowned – oh, this just keeps getting better, she thought. She found herself desperately searching for some article of his clothing that he might have left there. She found a sweater of his, and took it to bed with her. She really wanted to smell him again.

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Cale lost a little time the next morning looking for a pay as you go phone. He was stuck for a minute when they asked him what area code he'd like. He wondered for a second if he ought to transfer his old number onto this phone. He figured that Emma wouldn't be using it, so that's what he did. He had little trouble crossing the border, and then just settled in and let it roll.

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Emma sat at her table sipping her coffee. She was thinking of herself and Cale. She had often thought of them as the two lovers in her photographs, still so much in love, and yet so comfortable with each other. She wondered what the woman would do in this circumstance, and then snorted angrily.

That woman would never have done what she had done, she knew. That woman would have known what she had, and would have done her part to protect their love, just as the man would have done. You don't mess up a love like that; you just enjoy it and work at keeping it strong. Emma almost cried again at the thought. How much more stupid could she have been?

Ok, she thought, grabbing the pad of paper, let's run over this again. She wrote down the address and thought some more. Four days until he maybe makes it there. She figured she had some time. A little light bulb lit up in her head. Cale's computer! Maybe she could learn more from his email. She felt a bit sheepish about it, but quickly discarded that notion. She grabbed her car keys, and as an afterthought, she stuffed Cale's phone into her bag.

Cale hadn't set any passwords on his PC, and Emma thanked him silently for that. Reading through the past few day's mail brought a lot of tears to her eyes. She saw the few that they'd sent each other, and picked over the mail between Cale and his mysterious brother. She almost jumped for joy when she found the directions that Josh had provided from Santa Fe to where he was staying. Emma was careful to go through both the inbox and the outbox.

It was just too much – Cale had mentioned to Josh that he was planning to ride out with her, but hadn't asked her yet, since he wanted to change his will and he thought that in that time, he'd have worked up the courage to ask Emma to marry him.

She hung her head and bawled.

She turned on the printer and ran herself hardcopies so that she could glean what she could anywhere she was. She sat back for a minute. She doubted that it was a possibility, but if she could somehow pull this mess out of the fire, she vowed to make Cale just as happy if she could. She allowed herself a small smile if she imagined that the woman in her pictures had made only one mistake, just one...

She pulled out his phone, just to hold onto something of his. She looked closely. The phone couldn't find a network. That wasn't possible. She put it in her bag with everything else and went to work wondering about it. When she had a chance, she went outside and looked at the display on the phone again.

Same thing, she thought. She quickly used Cale's phone to dial her own cell, and got nothing. She turned his phone off and went back inside. She saw one of the hospital IT techies and asked him about it. His answer gave her a thrill.

Back at home that night; she looked at his phone again. So he had cancelled this phone once he'd figured out that he'd left it behind. That must mean that he's still using the same number on a new phone. She almost dialled from her cell, but realised that he'd recognise the number. She looked at her land line phone. Should she dial now? He'd be on the road most of the time anyway, but she decided the call him during the next day and leave at least a message. She went to sleep holding his sweater again, feeling at least a little hopeful.

In the morning, Emma thought about what she wanted to say. There was no guarantee that he'd even listen to it, she knew. He'd spot the area code no matter what, and maybe guess, but she knew that she had to try. She wrote it out on her pad, not wanting to mess this up.

Cale felt only a little better today. The problem was that he knew that he wasn't healing. He knew that he wasn't going numb, either. He felt ... he felt more like his heart was dying, but he wasn't. The more he rode, the more he came to grips with the thought that he'd had his one love, and it was just a long slide into his grave from here. With a sudden stinging in both of his eyes, he knew that he wasn't ready for more life on his island. He didn't think that he could handle another few decades of this. He felt empty, but he wanted to see his brother one more time.

He stopped for a smoke as he was leaving Missouri. Out of habit, he pulled out his phone, and wondered what he'd done it for. He almost put it back when he saw there was a voicemail on it. He was going to ignore it, but remembered that he had a couple of quiet customers that he'd stolen from his asshole boss. They were clients who were fed up with the company that he worked for, but loved Cale. He hadn't told anyone that he was leaving for a time. He figured that he ought to at least take the message, and call them back. He just couldn't place the number, but then it had been a bitch of a week so far. He dialled his access code and listened.

"Hello Cale. Please, please don't dump this message. I've figured out that you must have seen what I was doing. I don't expect you to believe me, but it was the only time, and ... and I don't even know why I allowed it to happen. But I knew it was wrong and I asked her to leave soon after you must have seen us. I'm so sorry that I hurt you Cale. I'd give anything to make it early in the morning on that day again when you kissed me as you left. I know that you're on your bike, so please be careful. I love you very much, Cale, and I always will."

Cale knew that he couldn't ride. He stood there on the side of the road with a phone in his hand. The wind from the tractor trailers whipped up the dust that swirled around him.

That afternoon, Emma went into work early and booked some of her vacation and sick days that she hadn't used. Her supervisor agreed that she was looking pretty worn out and agreed to the request. Emma was saddened on the way home later as she thought of the likelihood that Cale would rebuff her, but decided that if she didn't try, then she must not be worth him, and that helped her resolve a lot.

As Cale ate his late evening meal in a restaurant, he heard his cell go off. He silenced it and looked for a moment. It was the same number, and he also had a text message. He put the phone in his pocket, not daring to check the messages here. When he got back to his room, he called Josh and chatted for a bit. Josh noticed something in his tone, but let it slide, figuring that Cale was just road-weary, and glad that he was finally on his way. After he hung up, Cale tried to ignore the thought of his phone, but finally listened.

"Hi Cale. I don't know where you are, but I worry for you. I guess I'd better get used to not knowing, huh? I'd like you to do something for me when you get back – if you ever get back. Please change your will again, and leave everything to your brother. I sure don't deserve what you did for me. That would be something that the man at the homestead would have done for his woman. But that woman would never have hurt him. I like to think that you're really that man. I don't think of myself as the woman anymore because of...because of what I did to you. I hurt so much, Cale. I can't even imagine how you must feel. I don't even know if you'll hear this. I'm still your friend, or I'd like to be. I'd like to be your anything, Cale. I love you."

He almost went looking for a liquor store right then, but just sat on the floor in his room and looked at the wall. He'd saved the messages. He hoped his kid brother could come up with a way to copy them. Listening to them tore his heart out, but he loved to hear her voice. He checked the text message.