The Moment Keeper

Our lives are often connected in ways we never would have imagined…

Two babies; two very different upbringings.

First there is Sarah: raised by her loving grandmother, but neglected by her own father who views her as the instrument of her mother’s death. She will lead a hard life, searching to belong and to be loved.

Then there is Olivia, surrounded by love, nurtured and adored by her parents, a golden child with a golden future.

When Sarah’s life is cut tragically short and she is assigned to record the moments of Olivia’s life as her moment keeper, their lives become intertwined.

Sarah is able to overcome the heartbreak of her own lost years and Olivia is able to deal with a future that isn’t nearly as golden as what she had planned – or is it?

Copyright

HQ

An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd.

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

First published in Great Britain by HQ in 2013

Copyright © Buffy Andrews 2013

Buffy Andrews asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

E-book Edition © November 2013 ISBN: 9781472054777

Version date: 2018-09-19

BUFFY ANDREWS is an author, blogger, journalist and social media maven.

She leads an award-winning staff at the York Daily Record/Sunday News, where she is Assistant Managing Editor of Features and Niche Publications and social media coordinator.

You will find her on a plethora of social networking sites, from Twitter and Facebook to RebelMouse and NewHive. She loves social media and loves to connect with her readers via the various platforms.

In addition to her writing blog, Buffy’s Write Zone, she maintains a social media blog, Buffy’s World.

She is also a newspaper and magazine columnist and writes middle-grade, young adult and women’s fiction.

She lives in southcentral Pennsylvania with her husband, Tom; two sons, Zach and Micah; and wheaten cairn terrier Kakita.

I’m not even sure where to begin. There are so many people who believed in me and my work. Just thinking about all their support and encouragement brings tears to my eyes. But there are a few people who I need to especially acknowledge.

God, who gave me this gift and listened to my prayers and showed me the way. I am grateful for his love and his many blessings.

Beth Vrabel, my awesome friend and fellow author, who reads everything I write before anyone else does. We started this journey together, and I could not have made it without you.

Robin Bohanan and Kris Ort, my forever best friends. Thank you for listening to me talk about my characters as if they were sitting next to you at our Saturday breakfasts. I love you girlfriends!

Sharon Kirchoff, my biggest cheerleader, who carried my dream in her heart and inspires me to be a better person every day. Definitely soul sisters!

My editors, Helen Williams at HQ Digital, and Alison Tulett, who fell in love with the book and helped make it the best it could be. Thank you for this incredible journey.

My sisters Dawn Beakler, Cindy Andrews and Tania Nade, who know me better than anyone and, despite this, love me anyway.

And, lastly, my husband, Tom, and my sons, Zach and Micah, who have given me the absolute best moments of my life. I love you guys more than you can ever imagine.

In memory of Wendy, who always believed.

Contents

Cover

Blurb

Title Page

Copyright

Author Bio

Acknowledgements

Dedication

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Epilogue

Endpages

About the Publisher

Chapter 1

“But you promised. You promised you’d be there for me,” says Olivia, tears exploding from her swollen eyes.

Cole runs his fingers through his dark, curly hair. “I know what I said. But. It’s just that I’m supposed to go to college and…”

“So college is more important than me?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“You didn’t have to.”

“Look, Lib. I love you. You know that. I’m just not ready for this.”

“And I am?”

“I didn’t mean it like that. We’re both not ready.”

“Well, it’s a little too late for that realization. You should have thought about that two months ago when you convinced me to have sex with you.”

Cole punches the bed and stands up. “Damn it, Lib. That’s a cheap shot. You’re not going to pin this all on me. You wanted to do it, too. It’s not like I forced you.”

“Just leave. Leave.”

“I don’t want to leave you like this. I want to talk about our options.”

“Options? There are no options. I’m pregnant. With your child. You don’t want it. You’ve made that clear. Look, this is my problem. Not yours. So just go. Now.”

Cole grabs his varsity jacket and takes two steps toward Olivia before she backs away. “Look, Lib. I can’t talk to you when you get like this. Can we talk later? When you calm down.”

“There’s nothing to talk about. We did it once. Once. And I got pregnant and you want out. Well, I’m giving you your out. There’s the door.”

“Lib, if I could go back in time and change that one moment I would.” Cole walks out the bedroom door and Olivia throws one of Daisy’s squeaky toys at him. The rubber bone hits Cole in the back but he doesn’t turn around.

Olivia flops on her bed and pulls her boney knees up to her heaving chest. Tears soak her blue satin pillow. Her cries feel like a knife twisting in my heart. I want to comfort her. To hold her in my arms and tell her that things are never as bad as they seem. That I understand her pain and that she needs to be strong.

But I can’t.

All I can do, all I have ever been able to do, is watch and record the moments of her life as they unfold. I’m her moment keeper. It’s my job to record her life story, to capture and hold every moment she ever lived so that when she dies I’m able to play them back for her, one after another.

Olivia spots her purple fuzzy bathrobe draped over the footboard of her cherry bed. She pulls the belt out and sits up, wrapping it around her right hand. I know what she’s thinking. I always know. It’s part of being her moment keeper. I always know what she thinks and feel what she feels. Her joys and sorrows and fears become mine.

Of all of the moments I’ve recorded in Olivia’s life, this is the most difficult yet. She’s thinking about killing herself, about using her bathrobe belt, wondering if it’s strong enough or if she should use one of the leather belts in her closet.

It takes me back to the day my life ended – the day I killed myself.

The moment I pulled the trigger, I knew it was a mistake. But it was too late. I was dead and there was no turning back.

I had thought about the moment forever. Pictured it in my mind again and again. Like it was some damn movie that never ended. Just played over and over and over.

I thudded to the floor, sinking in a pool of blood. Someone reached for my hand and told me to come. She wasn’t talking talking but thinking what she wanted me to hear. Her name was Wendy and she knew that my name was Sarah.

She was iridescent and flowing and not well defined. Sort of shaped like a person but not quite. More like a ghost. Don’t ask me how, but I knew she was friendly. I knew that she wanted to help me.

She was pulling me, pulling me. But it wasn’t me, me. That me was bathed in blood on the cold bathroom floor where I shot myself just seconds before.

We flowed away from the blood-splattered bathroom toward a vertical thin line of light. Wendy told me I had a job to do. Job to do? I almost laughed. Can a dead person laugh? Maybe not quite.

I heard voices and looked back. The Ace of Hearts Grandma gave me floated in the expanding pool of blood.

I felt Wendy tug and I turned to see the vertical thin line of light widen and suck us in like a strong vacuum before sealing completely.

I was surrounded by hundreds of iridescent beings and then I realized that I was one, too. We stood, er, floated in the middle, surrounded by all of these beings or spirits or whatever they were. Wendy put her hands on my head and held them there.

A tingling coursed through me as I heard Wendy in my mind. She explained that I, like her, was a moment keeper. She told me that she would show me the moments of my life, moments she had collected since my birth.

What I saw brought me great pain and joy. There were days upon days spent in Grandma’s arms or by her side. And days upon days of my dad coming home smelling like he’d bathed in whiskey. I begged Wendy to stop when a moment was too painful, but she just kept going. I began to see how one moment was tied to another and another and how they intertwined to form the tapestry of my life, a life that ended much too soon at my own hands.

Wendy said it was my turn to be a moment keeper, my turn to record the moments in someone’s life just as she had recorded those in mine. She was moving on to a place where time didn’t exist, a place where only happy moments were allowed and the bad ones were left behind.

I pleaded with Wendy to stay, to help me. How was I to know how to do this moment-keeper thing? What if I screwed it up? Missed recording a memory? But she just wrapped me in her warmth and somehow I knew I would be all right. She had given me one last gift – the confidence and understanding I needed to do what I had to do. And when she released me from her embrace, she was gone and I was on earth beside Olivia.

Chapter 2

“Oh, Tom, isn’t she the most beautiful baby you’ve ever seen? Perfect in every way.”

Tears pull in Elizabeth’s chocolate eyes as she kisses the head of the sleeping infant in her arms.

Tom sits down beside her on the burgundy leather couch. “So what do you want to name her? How about Hope because she’s everything that we had hoped for?”

Elizabeth looks up at Tom. “Can we give her my grandmother’s name? And Hope for her middle name?”

“So Olivia Hope?”

Elizabeth nods.

“That’s perfect,” Tom says. “Olivia Hope Kennedy.”

Watching this tender moment made me feel warm. That’s what happens when a moment keeper records a good moment, a happy one. Our spirit bodies feel warm. We can’t cry or turn red or show any of the outward physical signs a living human would, but warmth courses through our spirit bodies when a moment is joyful and a razor-sharp chill when it’s not.

I felt jealous while I was recording this moment for Olivia. The day I was named was painful to watch when Wendy had shown it to me.

“Christ, Mom. I don’t know how to care for a baby.”

“Matt, I’ll help you. But I’m begging you to get help. I know that you’re angry.”

“Damn right I’m angry. Sue should be here. Not her.”

“Going through with the pregnancy was Sue’s decision. It’s what she wanted.”

“Yeah, and it killed her.”

“You need to give her a name, Matt.”

“You name her. I gotta get out of here, Mom.”

“Matt, stay away from that bar. You’re drinking too much.”

“No, I’m not drinking enough!”

I watched as Matt left, slamming the door behind him. Grandma cradled me in her thick arms and sang me a sweet lullaby. She kissed my forehead and named me Sarah, after her favorite woman of the Bible. “It means princess,” she said, “and that’s what you are. Grandma’s little princess.”

I always thought Matt resented me, but I never knew why. I knew my mom had died in childbirth, but I never knew from what. Grandma, who raised me, never wanted to talk about it. And Matt, well, let’s just say he wasn’t in the running for Father of the Year Award. He spent most of his time on a bar stool at the local watering hole around the corner from our house. His drinking got so bad that Grandma eventually kicked him out and she became my legal guardian. The day I became Grandma’s was the happiest day of my life. Ever. I finally belonged to someone who loved me, really loved me.

“Oh, Tom!” Elizabeth says. “Not another one. You’re going to spoil her. We’ve only had her for three days and you’ve already brought home four stuffed animals.”

Tom picks up Olivia. “How’s Daddy’s little girl today?” and kisses her chubby pink cheek. “Tell Mommy that daddies are supposed to spoil their little girls.”

Elizabeth walks over, bags under her eyes and hair thrown back in a lopsided ponytail. She puts her arms around Tom and Olivia.

“How was your day, Liz?” Tom asks.

“Despite not getting enough sleep and hanging in my pajamas most of the day because I didn’t have the energy to shower, I’d say things are going pretty well.”

“It’ll get better,” Tom says. “Every new parent feels the way you do.”

“I know,” Elizabeth says. “Don’t get me wrong, I’m happy that we have the family we’ve always wanted. Just happened so fast and I wasn’t as prepared as I thought I’d be.”

“You’re doing just fine, Liz. Don’t beat yourself up.”

“But I want to do everything right for her. I want to be the best mommy I can.”

“And you are,” Tom says. “You love her. That’s what’s most important.”

Tom kisses Elizabeth on her forehead and she leaves to order pizza — the night before it was Chinese — because she’s too tired to cook. Tom rocks Olivia and tells her about his day in the ER.

“And then Daddy had to stitch a woman’s hand because she cut it while slicing a bagel. And next, a mommy brought in a little boy who had swallowed a tiny Lego piece he had found while crawling on the floor. And that was Daddy’s day, Libby Love.”

And he kisses her forehead and places his index finger onto her tiny palm. Olivia’s fingers curl around his, hugging it so tightly her knuckles turn white.

So Olivia’s dad’s a doctor. I had learned while recording an earlier moment that her mom was a nurse. Reminded me of what a deadbeat dad I had. I tried to forget the day Matt lost his job, but Wendy’s montage of my life included this moment.

“Just look at you,” Grandma said. “You smell like the bottle and you look like an unmade bed. No wonder you lost your job, Matt. You’ve got to pull yourself together. No one’s going to hire you looking like that.”

Matt punched the brown frayed chair he stood next to. “Just take care of her. Don’t worry about me.”

I hadn’t realized until I saw my life moments one after another how seldom, if ever, Matt referred to me by my name. I was always “she” or “her” or “the baby” or “that girl” or “that kid”. There were very few times when he said “Sarah”. I wondered if he avoided saying my name because it made me seem more human, more difficult to blame and hate. As he would any enemy, I think he preferred to keep me at a distance.

Elizabeth walks into the room. “You hold her so much you’re going to spoil her,” she tells Tom, who is still rocking Olivia.

Elizabeth walks over to Tom and lightly brushes Olivia’s tiny head. She doesn’t have much hair and what she does have is so light that she looks bald.

“I love watching her sleep,” Tom says. “She looks so peaceful.”

Elizabeth smiles. “Makes you wonder how something so beautiful can come out of so much ugliness.”

Ugliness, I thought. You haven’t seen ugly until you’ve seen Matt come home drunk and wreck our home.

“Matt, stop,” Grandma yelled. “Stop or I’ll call the police.”

Matt just laughed and held a lamp in his hand. “You won’t call the police. You never call the police,” he said, his words slurring together so you couldn’t tell where one stopped and the next one began.

Grandma carried me, then three, into her room and locked the door. I heard glass breaking and Matt cursing. I heard what sounded like furniture flipping over. Then I heard a knock on the door. It was the police.

I buried my head in Grandma’s chest. I loved being so close to her heart. Its beating always soothed me. We watched as the police led Matt away. The house was a disaster. That was the beginning of the end. That was ugliness.

Chapter 3

“Wait until I tell Daddy that you got your first tooth,” Elizabeth says as she changes Olivia’s diaper. “And guess what today is? Your six-month birthday! That’s half of a year.”

Elizabeth pulls pink pants over Olivia’s diaper then slips a pink top with brown polka dots over her tiny head. She picks up a basket filled with hair wear and slips a pink stretchy headband over Olivia’s head, positioning the flower on the right side, toward the front. “You’re getting so big. Yes, you are.”

Elizabeth picks up Olivia and twirls her around, and Olivia giggles. Elizabeth stops and pulls Olivia into her chest and kisses her cheek.

“I love you so much, Princess Libby. You’ll always be my princess, my little girl.”

A tear slides down Elizabeth’s cheek and her smile swallows her creamy face.

“Look, Matt,” Grandma said as he walked into the kitchen.

I sat in the metal high chair giggling as Grandma pretended the spoon was an airplane and made airplane noises as she flew the spoon toward my mouth.

“Coming in for a landing,” Grandma said. “Open wide.”

I opened my mouth and Grandma slid the spoon in, scooping up the cereal that slid from my rubbery lips onto my chin.

Matt walked over. “What did you want to show me?”

“Sarah’s got her first tooth. See it there? On the bottom? That little piece of white poking through her gum.”

“Yeah, so what? She’s got a damn tooth. I have a mouthful.”

“Matt, it’s your baby’s first tooth.”

“She’s more your baby than mine,” said Matt, pouring a cup of coffee and walking away.

He paused when he got to the door and turned around. “The tooth is nice.”

“Where did you find that?” Elizabeth asks Tom as he walks in carrying a stuffed tooth about the size of a grapefruit.

“Where I buy all of her stuffed animals,” he said.

“The store at the mall?”

Tom nodded. “They have everything there.”

Elizabeth smiles. “Yeah, and pretty soon we’ll have it all here.”

“Gotta celebrate the milestone, Liz.”

Tom shakes the fuzzy white tooth and it rattles. “Lookie what Daddy has, Libby Love.”

He walks over to the playpen and picks up Olivia. He shakes the tooth and Olivia laughs. Slobber slides down her chin and onto her pink bib embroidered with “Daddy’s little girl”. Tom gives Olivia the rattle and she shakes it and giggles. As always, Elizabeth snaps photo after photo. Her camera and video recorder are never far from her.

“Where are you going?” Grandma asked Matt.

“Out.”

“Out where?”

“Just Out.”

“Matt, this has got to stop. Drinking every night. Your grandfather died a drunk and I swore I would never bring up a child in the same house as a drunk.”

“I’m not a drunk. I just need to get away at night.”

“Then go to the gym instead of that bar. It’d be better for you.”

“My friends are at that bar.”

“Friends? You call them friends?”

“Yeah. Friends.”

“They’re losers, Matt. A bunch of deadbeat dads and worthless husbands. If Sue were alive she’d…”

Matt whipped around. Fire-engine red flooded his scrappy unshaven face. He hammered the air with his arm, using the movement to emphasize his words. “Don’t. You. Ever. And I mean never. Bring Sue up. She’s gone. Died and left me with her.”

He pointed to me in the playpen.

“Don’t blame Sarah for Sue’s death, Matt. That little girl is the best of both of you.”

“Well, then take her. Celebrate her first tooth and leave me the hell out of it.”

Matt walked out the door and Grandma picked me up and held me and cried me to sleep.

“Are you sure you want to go out tonight?” Elizabeth asks Tom.

“We haven’t been out alone since we got Libby. As much as I love her, I want to take you on a special date. Don’t worry. Your mom knows what to do.”

Elizabeth hugs Olivia before putting her in the playpen so she can finish getting ready.

“Do you think I’m getting fat?” she asks Tom, turning around in the black silk dress she bought at the new boutique by the bank.

“Yeah, as a matter of fact I was just thinking how much you’re starting to resemble a pregnant hippo.” Tom laughs.

Elizabeth picks up the hairbrush on her vanity and throws it at him. “I’m serious. Do you think my butt’s getting fat?”

“No, Liz. Your butt’s beautiful.”

“What about my thighs?”

“They’re perfect, too.”

“My boobs?”

“Not that I wouldn’t mind it if they were fatter, er, bigger, but they’re the same size they’ve always been. And they’re perfect.”

“There has to be some part of me that’s not beautiful or perfect,” Elizabeth says.

“Well, now that you mention it, you do have a little wiry hair that grows out of that mole beside your lip that looks a little witchy. Sometimes, I just want to pluck it but I’m too scared to touch it. I think it might attack me.”

Elizabeth chases Tom around the room and wrestles him to the ground and Libby starts to cry.

“You’re making her cry,” Tom says.

The bell rings.

“Lucky for you, Mom’s here,” Elizabeth says.

Tom opens the door and Cindy walks in carrying her bag of knitting supplies.

“There’s my little princess,” she says, putting her bag on the antique cherry table.

She takes Olivia from Tom. “It’s just me and you tonight, my little Libby Love.”