Joy Argento - Carrie and Hope (3 page)

“Yes, denial is the first stage, but it’s not that I’m stuck there. It’s that I’m not grieving at all. It’s a really long story but the bottom line is that my husband died after a three-year battle with cancer. I didn’t…um, well, I didn’t…”

Carrie sensed her discomfort. “It’s okay. You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to.”

Hope searched Carrie’s deep green eyes. Something in Carrie’s face told her it was okay to go on. “I’ve never said these words out loud to anyone before.” She paused and took a deep breath. She looked down at the drink in her hand, looked up into Carrie’s eyes and continued. “I was going to leave my husband. I was going to leave him, but he told me he had cancer so I stayed.” Hope swallowed hard. “I had even found an apartment for myself and my son, Derrick. Derrick was sixteen at the time. I was going to sign the lease the following day. My marriage hadn’t been working for a long time and I felt like it was time to leave. But my husband Tom was diagnosed with colon cancer, and I decided to stay to help him through it. It ended up that he didn’t get better, and I stayed and took care of him until he died.”

“Did your husband know that you were going to leave him?” Carrie asked quietly.

“No. No one knew. I wasn’t going to tell him until I had everything for my new life worked out.” Hope sighed. “I didn’t want him to try to talk me out of it. I wanted to be ready to go when I told him. And I never told anyone else out of respect for Tom. I didn’t think it was fair to tell someone else before I told him. So I hadn’t said anything to anyone. He wasn’t a bad guy or even a bad husband. He just wasn’t the person I wanted to come home to every day. I’m not sure he ever was. So when he died my primary feeling was guilt.”

“So, you felt guilty because you were going to leave him?” Carrie asked.

“No, I felt guilty because I felt relieved when he died. I know that sounds terrible. But it’s true. I can’t believe I’m telling you this. I have never told this to anyone.”

Carrie put her drink down on the bar. “I feel privileged that you feel comfortable enough to tell me,” she said.

“I’m sorry to burden you with all this. You don’t even know me, yet you are kind enough to listen to me ramble on.”

“Sometimes the best person to tell your secrets to is a complete stranger,” Carrie said. She picked up her drink again and finished the last sip of it. She held it up to get the bartender’s attention. “Round two is on me,” she said to Hope. “Can I get a virgin screwdriver this time?” she asked the bartender as he took Carrie’s empty glass. “And get my friend here a refill, too. Thanks.”

“You don’t have to stop drinking alcohol because of me,” Hope told her. “I don’t have a problem with it.”

“One is my limit when I am driving,” Carrie answered honestly. She accepted the tall glass the bartender handed her. She pulled a ten-dollar bill from the front pocket of her jeans to pay for the drinks. “So go on,” she said to Hope.

“Well, I don’t think a group for grief is going to help me with the feeling of guilt. It’s not that I wanted him to die, because I didn’t. I didn’t want my son to be without his father for one thing. I never wanted that. I fully expected to stay with him until he got better.” Hope sighed. “Tom would be okay for a while, and I would think he would get better and live. Then he would take a turn for the worse, and I was sure he was going to die, and I would set my mind to accepting it. Then he would get better again and the cycle would repeat. My emotions were like a damn yo-yo. It was so draining. Finally he took a turn for the worse and just got sicker and sicker, and it got harder and harder to take care of him. But I did. I took care of him until the end.”

“You are a very special person to do that for him,” Carrie said.

“I certainly don’t feel special. I did what anyone would do.” She finished her first glass of juice and pushed it towards the back of the wide bar before she pulled the new drink closer.

“I disagree. I think you did much more than most people would have done. I don’t think you have anything to feel guilty about, Hope.” Carrie reached over and patted Hope gently on the hand.

They sat without speaking for a couple of minutes. Carrie broke the silence. “So you have a son?”

Hope’s face lit up. “Yes, Derrick’s nineteen now. He goes to college in Buffalo. He is probably going to go into business like his father. He’s a good kid. I’m very proud of him.”

“It shows.” Carrie smiled as Hope brightened with her talk of her son.

“He’s the kind of kid that never causes too much trouble, you know. Well, if we don’t count the three years he was in middle school and his first two years of high school.” Hope let out a small laugh. “But I hear that happens a lot. Luckily, he seemed to come to his senses when he was a junior. I’m pretty sure I heard a loud pop one-day when his head came out of his ass. Not that it doesn’t go back in every once in a while.”

Carrie nearly spit out her juice trying to suppress a laugh. She managed to swallow the liquid without spewing it across the bar and wiped a drip that escaped down her chin.

“Sorry,” Hope said with amusement in her voice.
“Didn’t mean to make you choke.”
She let out her own wave of laughter.

Carrie smiled at her. “Yeah I can tell by your laugh just how sorry you are.” She shook her head.

“I really am sorry,” Hope said when she finally got the laughing under control. “Oh my God, I haven’t laughed like that in a long time.”

“You should do it more often,” Carrie told her. “It looks good on you.”
    

“Thanks.” Hope sipped her fresh drink. “Okay, enough about me. Let’s talk about you. Married?
Boyfriend?
Kids?”
Hope asked.

The bartender set down a fresh bowl of pretzel in front of the women. Hope reached for a handful and pushed the bowl closer to Carrie.

Carrie shook her head at the silent offer.
“None of the above.”

“Never?”
Hope asked between bites.

“Well, I have had boyfriends if that’s what you are asking. But no, I’ve never had a husband or kids.
And no current boyfriend.”

“How come someone as stunning as you doesn’t have a boyfriend?” Hope said. “Sorry. That didn’t sound quite right.”

Carrie smiled wide at the comment and at the flustered look on Hope’s face. “Thanks for the compliment.” She shrugged her shoulders. “I haven’t had anyone special in my life in quite
awhile
. I just can’t seem to meet a guy that holds my interest for more than a couple of dates, and some for not even that long. My love life is a sad, sad thing.” She grinned at Hope.
“ But
that’s okay. It gets lonely sometimes but I’m happy with my life for the most part. I certainly don’t need a guy to make me happy.” Carrie thought for a moment. Her face betrayed her regret at her choice of words. “I’m sorry,” she said. “That was insensitive of me, considering everything you have been through.”

“Oh stop it. I didn’t take that personally. I don’t want you to have to watch every word you say,” Hope said.

“Okay, thanks.”

“So what do you do for a living?”

“I am a logistics manager at the
Freddrick’s
Company. I’m in charge of the warehouse inventory, transportation, some of the customer service area. I know it sounds glamorous, but not so much.”

“Are you trying to tell me that you don’t get to wear an evening gown to work with three inch heels, and the tiara every day?”

“Oh, well, yeah I do. So if you count that, then I guess it is pretty glamorous,” Carrie laughed.

“Wow, doesn’t your evening gown get dirty in the warehouse?”

“That’s why there are several big, huge men whose only job is to carry me around and keep me away from the dirt.”

“Sounds like a dream job,” Hope smiled.

“Actually, it is a pretty good job. I’ve been with the company for twelve years. The benefits are good and I’ve got about a million days of vacation time built up.”

“A million, huh?
That’s a lot of vacation time. Do you get that every year?” Hope sipped her drink.

“No, I get four weeks a year because I’ve been there so long, but I haven’t taken much of it, so it just accumulates.”

“You don’t ever take vacations?”

“No, not usually.
I don’t feel like going anywhere alone, I do too much alone. I have friends but most of them have husbands or families. I used to take my grandmother to North Carolina every year to visit my brother, but it got hard for her to travel, so we haven’t done that in a while.”

“So what do you do when you aren’t working or visiting your grandmother?”

“I draw and paint,” Carrie said. “I love creating art.”

Hope leaned forward. “What kind of painting do you do?”

“I oil paint…still
lifes
mostly but I occasionally do portraits or figures. In fact I have been working on a series of rough sketches for a figure show in New York City in April that I want to show my work in. I just need to find a model…” she suddenly stopped talking and looked at Hope.

Hope raised her eyebrows waiting for Carrie to finish. “What?” Hope asked.

Carrie cleared her throat. “Um, I was saying I need a model to use for a set of two paintings for this show in New York City…and I was just deciding if I had enough nerve to ask you if you would consider posing for me.”

“And what did you decide? Do you have enough nerve?” Hope smirked.

“No, probably not.
I don’t want you to think I am some sort of weirdo asking you to pose for me when you don’t even know me.”

“Who says I don’t already think you’re a weirdo?” Hope’s smirk turned into a full smile that brightened her face.

“Well, in that case what do I have to lose? Would you consider posing for me? I would pay you, of course. You wouldn’t get rich from it, but I could give you something for your time.” Carrie cleared her throat and watched the look of amusement on Hope’s face. “Have you ever modeled before? I mean, have you ever done modeling for art, for an artist.”

“Actually, I did some modeling for the art classes in college but I was young and beautiful then,” she smiled. “Now I’m old and wrinkly with stretch marks. I’m not sure I would be what you are looking for.”

Carrie smiled back. “You are very far from old and wrinkly, and a few stretch marks won’t hold me back.”

“Are we talking about posing in the nude?”

“Actually we are talking about posing with a narrow sheet of cloth draped wrapped around you covering up
your
…” Carrie hesitated, choosing her words carefully.
“…female parts.
So, I guess the answer would be yes and no. You would need to be nude under the material, but it would cover your womanly parts, so to speak. I’m sorry, this is probably pretty weird, having a stranger
ask
you this.”

“No, not at all.
Strangers ask me to get nude all the time, and some are even willing to pay me for it.” Hope popped another pretzel in her mouth.

“You’re just a smart-ass aren’t you?” Carrie grabbed a pretzel from the bowl.

“Pretty much.”
Hope grinned. “But, I will consider posing for you. How’s that.”

“That would be great. Think about it and let me know.” Carrie found a slip of paper in her pocket and asked the bartender for a pen. She wrote her cell number down on the paper and slid it across the bar to Hope.

Hope took the pen from Carrie’s hand and wrote her own phone number down on a napkin for Carrie.

The bar began to fill up around them, but neither woman noticed as they continued to talk.

Chapter 3

Hope put the bottle of salad dressing on the table. She pulled out her chair and sat down across from her sister.

Marcy’s short hair no longer matched Hope’s chestnut brown color. Hope liked Marcy’s natural hair color much better than the copper red color that now graced her head. Marcy’s eyes were every bit as brown as Hope’s, but lacked the flecks of gold. As usual she was dressed impeccably in a freshly ironed, peach colored cotton shirt and a black pleated skirt that hugged her small hips and butt perfectly. A thin black belt with a gold buckle and a peach silk scarf around her neck completed the look.

Hope’s dining room was elegant but comfortable. An understated chandelier hung over the solid maple dining table surrounded by six matching chairs. Two matching chairs rested against the far wall, and a matching china cabinet stood at attention against the opposite wall.

Hope took the large bowl of salad her sister offered her. Using the wooden salad tongs, she placed a generous amount of salad on her plate and poured blue cheese dressing over it.

Marcy cut two slices of fresh Italian bread from the large loaf on the cutting board in front of her. She handed a slice to Hope.

“Thank you.” Hope said without making eye contact. She broke off a piece of the bread and dragged it through the dressing. She kept her attention on her food until her sister spoke.

“So, you aren’t going to tell me how it went at the grief group last night?” Marcy asked her.

Hope kept her eyes focused on her plate of food. “It went fine,” she said between bites.

“What aren’t you telling me? You did go, didn’t you? Hope, you promised me that you would go to the grief support group.” The sharp edge to her voice made Hope cringe.

“Yes, Marcy.” She finally looked up at her sister. “I went,” she said a little too loud. She looked down at her food again. “I just didn’t stay.”

Hope closed her eyes and rubbed them while she waited for her sister to respond. When her sister didn’t say anything, Hope looked back up at her. She knew that look of disappointment on her sister’s face. It was the same look that she often saw on her mother’s face. Hope wondered if it would be worth the effort to try to explain.

“Marcy,” she started. “It just didn’t feel right. I went but it didn’t seem like I fit with the people there, it wasn’t where I needed to be.” She knew it sounded lame. She looked down at her salad. Suddenly she didn’t feel much like eating.