Excerpt: 'The Life Intended' by Kristin Harmel
Kristin Harmel, author of The Life Intended, shares a favorite scene from her new release.
Kristin: In The Life Intended, a P.S. I Love You-meets-Sliding Doors love story, the main character, Kate Waithman, lost her husband, Patrick, in a car accident 12 years earlier, when they were both in their late 20s. Now 40, Kate is trying to move on with her life and has just gotten engaged to Dan, a man she's been dating for the last couple of years, a man who she believes will be the key to her finally putting the past to rest. But after drinking too much champagne at her engagement party, Kate wakes up, her head throbbing, in a world that doesn't make sense — a world in which Patrick is still alive. Is it a dream? Or is it something more? This was a scene I loved writing, because there was so much emotion beneath the surface. Imagine losing the love of your life … and then suddenly seeing him again a dozen years later, in a hazy world where time seems to have kept moving forward without you. Here's the beginning of that very first dream scene.
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The next morning, as I blink into the sunlight, I have the dim sense that something's off. There's far too much light for our western-exposure bedroom. Dan put up blackout shades when he moved in six months ago, so mornings usually dawn in near pitch-blackness.
Where am I? I squint, my head pounding from what is undoubtedly a massive champagne hangover. I sit up and look around, confused, as my eyes adjust to the light and the room comes into focus. Indeed, this isn't our apartment. The curtains on the windows are white and gauzy; the bed is a teak sleigh queen instead of a burnished black king, and the sheets and comforter are pale blue and soft instead of gray and sleek. The room is oddly familiar, but I can't put a finger on why.
Had Dan put me to bed at a friend's apartment last night for some reason? Had I been so drunk that he couldn't get me home? I struggle to remember, but the last thing I recall is falling asleep in his arms just after leaving the bar.
"Dan?" I call out tentatively.
I hear footsteps in the hallway, then the sound of someone whistling softly. Again, I have a strange feeling of familiarity, but it only unsettles me. Dan never whistles. In fact, he'd told me on our first date that he considers his inability to whistle one of his greatest failures in life. It was the first time he'd made me laugh.
"Babe?" I venture a bit more uncertainly.
And then the person whistling rounds the corner into the bedroom, and my heart nearly stops, because it's not Dan standing there at all.
It's Patrick.
My husband, Patrick.
Who died a dozen years ago.
"Morning," he says with a smile, and the sound of his sweetly familiar deep voice hits me like a punch to the gut. I was so sure I'd never hear it again. This is impossible.
I realize as I gape at him that he doesn't quite look the way he used to. His dark hair is a little thinner around the temples, his laugh lines have deepened, and he's more solid than he once was. It's how I always imagined he might have looked if he'd lived to grow older with me. His eyes are just as brilliant and green and warm as I remember, though, and for a long moment, I forget to breathe.
"What's happening?" I finally whisper, but my voice barely makes a sound. I notice with a start that there's a sort of haze filling the room, the kind of softening of the light that happens when the sun's rays hit particles of dust in the air just the right way. Those gossamer moments have always made me think of fairy dust and wishes come true. I wonder if that's what's happening now, something magical and unreal.
But as I stare at Patrick, something strange happens: my disorientation begins to fade. I look around and realize with a start that I knew somehow that there would be a slender Dyson vacuum cleaner propped haphazardly in the corner; I knew there would be a Word-of-the-Day calendar on the bedside table; I knew there would be a small cluster of yellow roses in a blue vase on the bureau.
This is our old apartment, I realize suddenly, the one on Chambers Street, the one we were living in when Patrick died. The furniture is mostly new, but I recognize the layout, the hardwood floors I'd once loved, the walls I'd once pounded on while I screamed at the top of my lungs, demanding to know how God could have taken my husband away. I can't understand what's happening.
"Katielee? You okay?" Patrick asks with concern, cutting into my confused train of thoughts and bringing me back down to earth.
I can feel tears rolling down my cheeks as I struggle to say something in return, but the only thing that comes out of my mouth is a meaningless string of vowels. A part of me is wondering if this is a dream, but the longer I'm here, the more convinced I am it's not. After all, I've never dreamed this vividly and in this much detail before. Then again, if I'm not dreaming, what explanation is there?
Find out more about Kristin and her books at kristinharmel.com.