Homefires (54 page)

He kissed me, tenderly, with all the love in him. I realized then, that he, too, suffered.

I entered the waiting room like an apparition, white-faced, silent as death. Young women filled brightly colored sofas and love seats, chatting amiably.

Dear God. Let this be over. “Is – ” I faced the girl across from me. “Are you nervous?”

Her young, sculpted jaw rotated on chewing gum. “No.” She snorted softly. “Nothing to it. This is my second one.”

“Are you married?” I asked and hugged myself, feeling my teeth begin to chatter from the chill of dread.

“Oh, yeah.” She filed her nail, then closely examined it. “We aren’t ready for kids yet. Still got two years of college left.” Then she looked curiously at me. “How about you? Any kids?”

“I have four. That is – three. Living.” I could not leave Krissie out.
Would
not.

“Oh? Did you lose a baby?” She snapped her gum and dropped her file back in her purse.

“No.” My dull gaze fell to my pale, clenched hands. “An eleven-year-old.”

“Mrs. Crenshaw?” A cheerful nurse motioned me through a white door, down a white hall, into a white room. So antiseptic.

I paused inside the door. Frozen into place. A masked medical team,
pac men
, stared at me with compassionate eyes. The nurse led me to a dressing room, helped me undress, then assisted and settled me onto the table.

“Please – ” I stretched out a trembling hand to the nurse. “I feel so – ” Pooled tears spilled down my cheeks, into my hair, onto the pillow,
“desolate.”

She took my hand. “I know.” Her voice was kind, caring.

Her face shimmered and floated. “I don’t take this lightly,” I whispered. “I want to die.”

“Oh, no, dear. It will soon be over.” Her fingers squeezed mine. “Just relax.”

I closed my eyes and prayed.
God, you know I don’t want to do this....

The nightmare snatched and swallowed me up – to the
whirrr
of a vacuum’s sucking sting to my midsection – then spit me out onto a cold recovery table, where I lay stuporized. A fetal-curled zombie with no brain and no feeling.

An hour later, Kirk came by for me, his face nearly as ashen as mine.

“You okay?” he asked in a husky whisper, blotting with his palm cold sweat clinging to my brow.

I blinked. “Let’s go home.”

He took my hand and led me away.

Away from the horror. Away from death’s threat.

To my three children, who needed me.

I did not look back. Not then. Not for a long, long time.

I could not and live.

Survive. Because that’s what I did in those coming months. Simply survive.

Healing came so slowly I wasn’t aware of it at the time. Did not recognize it. I needed to go back to school and finish my last two semesters. But I didn’t want to miss a moment with Dawn or Toby. Heather, well, she’d migrated again to peer-land, a place not always open to me. We had our close times, but they became fewer and farther between in those coming months.

Kirk and I never talked about that day at the abortion clinic. It was as if, by our silence, it had never happened.

One day, Anne called, upset. “Oh, Neecy. I wish you lived closer.” She snuffled. “Chuck’s signed a paper donating his body to medical science.”

I gripped the receiver. “So – ” I grasped to understand Anne’s angst. “You’re saying?”

Anne’s furious intake of breath exploded in explanation. “Teresa hassled him into doing it, Neecy. He told me he didn’t want to do it.”

“Then, why did he?” I’d always admired those who nobly gave their remains to the study of medical science but felt it should definitely be the donor’s choice.

“Said she got on her knees beside his bed and pleaded with him to spare her the expense of a burial when the time comes.”

Anger cannon-blasted through me. “How
could
she?” I closed my eyes and clenched a fist. “She has no right, Anne. Chuck’s a human being with rights.”

My stepmother sighed, a long ragged sound from her toes up. “She’s got all the cards, Neecy. Holds ‘em over our heads like a whip.”

“A power trip,” I muttered, disgusted. “That’s what it is to her. A danged power trip!”

“If we want to see Chuck, we’ll have to bow to her wishes.”

I swallowed my fury. “You’re right. We do. But doggonit. I don’t like it one bit.”

There was nothing I could do. Later that night, I told Kirk about it.

Kirk’s face clouded, but he said little. Seemed off somewhere. He never said it, but lately, I’d felt,
sensed
unspoken needs behind that strong mask that rarely slipped. When it did, I glimpsed a look I’d never before seen. One quite like worship, that hitched my breath and stirred my love to new heights.

Yet, my feet still sought solid ground. I was convinced Kirk’s flirtation with Roxie was just that – a flirtation – but its undermining of my security had left ugly scars. Would they ever fade? I harbored deep, shameful emotions I could share with no one.

One was my concern that Kirk felt so comfortable with Callie. Another was her devotion to him that, until the traumas, had pleased me. BR (before Roxie), I’d never had a jealous bone in my body. It changed me in ways I did not like. It was as though, having brushed up against the fiery threat of Roxie, I was driven to protect, at all costs, my marriage.

Jealousy is a terrible, terrible thing, Neecy....
Kirk’s words haunted me. Stopped me, many times, from making a fool of myself.

I took great care to hide my knee-jerk anxiety when, at home one night, after supper, Kirk asked Callie for a cup of coffee rather than me. I later discussed it with Kirk, who chuckled and said, “Neecy, Cal and I are together all the time at the office. She makes coffee for me every day so it’s just a habit.” Then, disappointment filled his green eyes. “Can you understand that?”

I did. But it still bothered me on some level. Kirk’s allegiance to Callie wasn’t unfaithfulness, per se. But
because
of it,
I’d become, again, the invisible person, the unnecessary one. It was not a case of simple jealousy. But then, is jealousy ever
simple
?

I prayed desperately to rid myself of it. Still, over time, my relationship with Callie suffered.

“I’m going to have to move away soon, Neecy,” Callie told me one day in my kitchen. We’d just lunched on chicken salad sandwiches and potato salad left from the night before and faced each other across the oak table. “I hate to leave ya’ll, but Mama’s gonna be needing me.”

She gave me a little smile of regret.

The battle-shocked part of me did not see the plea in her eyes nor hear her plaintive
‘at least make a gesture of protest, Neecy!’
Not then. Not until years later. So, I picked up my frosted glass of iced tea and drew on it with my finger. “I understand, Cal.” I looked at her then. “I really do. You know I love you, don’t you Cal?”

Something sad flickered in her chocolate gaze. “Yeah, Neecy, I know.”

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

 

I didn’t see it coming. God only knows what I’d have done if I had.

As it was, when Kirk woke me up early that Saturday morning – I’d now begun to sleep through the night – kissing me, I was delighted. Somehow, the clamoring in me had begun to subside and peaceful interludes blossomed and burgeoned.

“You’re already dressed,” I croaked sleepily, stretching and rubbing my eyes.

“Yep.” He watched me, with that adoring look in his eyes, for long moments. Then he smiled. “Throw on some jeans and a shirt. Let’s go for a morning drive on the beach.”

In minutes, we were out the door, leaving Toby in the den spooning Captain Crunch into his mouth and watching Scooby Doo – he still loved his ol’ doggie-buddy – while the girls slept.

The sun climbed a silver horizon as our VW made tracks across the damp shoreline, then halted to a rest. Salt air filled my nostrils as sea gulls scattered and soared lazily overhead. I smiled and lay my head back on the rest. “What a beautiful day. I’m glad you thought of this, honey.” I turned my head to look at my husband, who gazed across the water, his face suddenly solemn.

“I’ve got to talk to you, Neecy.” His eyes lighted on me, so full of emotion I was stunned.

“Is something wrong?” I asked, antenna rising from every pore.

He melded into the crook of his seat. Relaxed, yet tense. The mask was gone. Kirk faced me, my Kirk – with vulnerable green eyes pleading with me in some way.

“What is it, honey?” I asked gently.

“Neecy...this is the hardest thing I’ve ever done.” His features morphed into the most desperate composite I’d ever seen.

No!
I stiffened, yet turned completely to face him, knowing instinctively I didn’t want to hear what he was going to say.

But Kirk had already dived in. Now, he struggled to complete his mission.

His face suddenly dissolved into tears.
Oh, God
. This was major.

“Neecy...I’ve got to make it to Heaven. I promised Krissie – ” He wept as he had when Krissie died. Loud, unrestrained sobs.

I knew. Suddenly, I
knew.
“Oh – no
, no, Kirk.”

He lifted his head in shame. Nodded. “It’s true.”

My mouth went dry as cotton matting. “How much?”

“All of it. All you suspected is true.”

I faced the ocean, blood draining, draining,
pouring, gushing
out my toes, my nose, my fingertips until I was nothing but cold numbness. “You had sex with Roxie?”

He nodded. “Yes.”

“Why?” I whirled to face him. “Why, in
God’s name
?”

Kirk tried to brace himself. “It wasn’t what you think. It – she seduced me...while you were away. After Moose disappeared. That night when she claimed to be having a nervous breakdown. She knew what she was doing, Neecy.”

I gave a bitter huff of a laugh, staring unseeing at the silvery rolling surf, thinking how my insides could be so numb yet hurt so. “Why am I not surprised?”

“Neecy – ” His hand moved toward my arm. “I – ”

I jerked my arm away from his touch. Something in me snapped in that instant, breaking me free of my restrained self. He flinched and withdrew, watching me with such humbleness I choked up. I closed my eyes and an image flashed – of Kirk and Roxie tangled in the act of sex. In that instant, the pain of losing the one thing left – our exclusivity – was so sharp I thought I’d die from it. The wail that rose from my bowels crescendoed such that it put my labor sounds to shame.

I heard Kirk’s sobs mingle with mine. “Don’t – ” he moaned, squeezing his hands together to stop from reaching for me, “please don’t, Neecy. It was nothing to me – ”

“
Nothing?”
I shrieked, tears dripping off my cheeks, chin, nose. “Nothing?” I peered at him as I would at a lunatic. “It was
everything...”
I threw back my head and howled, “
Everything! And you gave it aw-a-ay. It was mine!”
I clutched my chest, then beat it. “
It was mi-i-ine.”
When my breath ran out, I glared at him through tears. My voice, hoarsened, now rasped. “You gave away all that was left.” I slumped from the effort of saying
it. “There’s nothing left.” I stared dully at the distant horizon, not seeing anything except my husband and this other woman. Copulating.

“She asked me to forgive her, Kirk.” I looked at him. “Did you know that?” I threw up my hands. “And I did. I gave her peace. She gave me
this.”

“Dear Jesus,” Kirk said quietly, gazing upward. “What have I done? I shouldn’t have told you. You can’t take – ”

“Ha!” I sliced him a look of contempt, ignoring the way he flinched. “Too late. You
did
. And as for my not being able to
take it
, don’t worry about
poor lil’ Neecy. Poor lil’ Stupid Neecy,
to quote the late Roxie.”

I wanted to fight. For the first time in my life, I wanted, could
taste,
hand-to-hand combat.

“I’d kill her if she wasn’t already dead.” I barely recognized my thick, even voice nor the rage behind it.

“Oh, God,” Kirk moaned, rolling his head back, then dropping it forward to rest on his chest, his fingers pinching his bridge. I glared coldly at him, not feeling a shred of pity for him. He’d killed me. As surely as I sat there breathing, he’d destroyed me. All those months of
her
rubbing my nose in the fact that Kirk treated her preferentially.

“The two of you probably laughed at me behind my back?” It didn’t matter. I closed my eyes. Nothing mattered anymore.

“No! I
never
dishonored you, Janeece, outside the – ” Kirk shifted to face me, reached out and seized my resisting hand. “You’ve got to know...I’ve never loved anybody but you. You must believe that. And I didn’t want what happened to happen. It was a trap I fell into – that many, many men fall into all the time.”