To Have It All(71)

Lifting his head, he wrapped his arms around me. “I’m just wondering what the point in all of this was.”

“What do you mean?”

Moving beside me, he leaned on the railing and stared out at the water, clasping his hands in front of him. “I mean,” he sighed. “Why did this happen; the switch? I have to believe there’s a reason . . . a moral to the story. What could it be?”

I moved my gaze to the water, wishing I knew what to say, but I didn’t. I had no words, no wisdom to offer. There were a million ways I could paint this situation in happy hues of yellow and pink, but to what point? I could’ve offered happy endings and silver linings all day long, but what good would they do him?

“I slept here a few nights,” he mumbled, his gaze casting down to his hands, shame capturing his features.

“On the pier?”

“Yeah,” he answered, twisting his neck and jutting his chin toward a bench a few hundred feet away. An older woman sat on the bench staring out at the water, petting what looked like a stuffed cat in her lap. Her mouth was moving as if she were speaking, but I couldn’t hear what she was saying from where we stood. “Right there on that bench,” he continued.

I pressed my lips together as I imagined Liam, his true physical self, curled up on a bench trying to sleep. How lost and lonely he must have felt.

“I had nothing,” he continued. “I was nothing.”

Wrapping my arm around his, I lay my head on his shoulder. “That’s not true.”

“That’s how I felt,” he argued. “When anyone looked at me, if they even bothered to look at me, all they saw was a worthless, dirty, bum. But not Pearl,” he finished.

“Pearl?” I questioned. Who was Pearl?

“That’s Pearl,” he cast a quick glance toward the woman petting the cat.

“You know her?” I questioned, confused.

“Met her on the street.” His gaze cast down at his hands again. “A couple of punks were messing with her, trying to take her bag. I intervened.” He scratched the back of his neck. “I was hungry, and she was so grateful. She shared her food with me that day, and every week after.”

I observed the woman, my frown deepening. “Does she still live on the streets?”

He nodded. “I brought you here for a reason,” he explained as he twisted toward me, leaning his hip against the railing, keeping his back to Pearl. “I need you to help her. If something . . .” he paused, his mouth tightening as he worked on forming the words. “If I die,” he finally finished, “I need you to help her. She has some,” he motioned his hand around his head, “issues. She’s the sweetest woman you’d ever meet and harmless. She’s just a little . . . out of it. With you being in social work I thought maybe you could get her the help she needs.”

As he looked over his shoulder back at her, I watched him, how his features seemed to droop. My chest tightened as I absorbed how genuinely concerned for this woman he appeared to be. Here he was, his life possibly about to end in less than twenty-four hours, and he spent part of his last day trying to make sure Pearl would be taken care of.

“Do you want to speak with her?”

He shook his head adamantly as he faced me again. “No. I tried, and she lost her mind on me. She saw Max leave me for dead—she hates . . . him.” He pointed at his face.

Taking his hand in mine, I squeezed it. “I’ll make sure she gets help,” I promised him. I knew it wouldn’t be as simple as me just picking Pearl up and getting her into a psych ward; it would take some time, but I would do it, come hell or high water—for him.

“Thank you.” Pulling my hand to his face, he kissed it. “How did a worthless bum like me get so lucky?”

“Liam,” I began. “Maybe you felt that way, but you were never worthless. You just hit a hard spot. A really hard spot,” I added. “We’ve all hit hard spots.” I knew this better than anything. I may not have ended up on the streets, homeless, but I knew what it was to hit rock bottom and wonder if I’d ever rise.

Again, I struggled for words. It was the classic tale of the nice guy finishing last. The usual explanations came to mind; God doesn’t give us more than we can handle, sometimes we have to hit rock-bottom to work our way back up. No matter how much I wanted to, I couldn’t bring myself to speak them.

I’d started falling for this man in the most inexplicable of ways; he was trapped in my ex’s body. That certainly hadn’t made it easy. But did that not speak volumes about him . . . about his character? In the last week, I’d come to know a kind man, with real passion and a heart big enough to love a little girl that wasn’t his. I’d heard tales of a brother that had always gone above and beyond and had been the lifelong confidant of a doting sister. It wasn’t fair. I was an awful person for not coming up with something to say to him, but the truth was . . . I needed a why as well. Why did the man I’d fallen for have to be in Max’s body? Was I being punished? Or was he?

“Liam?”

“Yeah.”

“Can I ask you a question?”

He chuckled. “No,” he jested. “No questions allowed.”

I rolled my eyes. “What happens if you stay in Max’s body?”

Turning his head, he kissed the top of mine and rested his mouth there for a moment before he spoke. “I don’t know,” he answered. “From the outside, it probably seems like it would be a win-win in some ways.”