Seventy-Two Hours (25 page)

I watched as he got himself back in check.
To his credit, he did remarkably well.

“I’m willing to do whatever it takes to fix
this, Jen. Just tell me what I can do to make it up to you,” he replied as he
approached me. His eyes searching my face the entire time he stood in front of
me. “We could go into counseling. Would you consider that maybe?”

I regarded him closely as doubts kept popping
up. Could Chris change? We had reached rock bottom. Could things still be
salvaged? Even with him recognizing and accepting his share of the blame,
could we overcome?

“For counseling to work, it would require
both of us to be present. How will you do that with your work schedule?” I
tossed at him.

“Our marriage is more important. I’ll make
the time. I won’t lose you. I’m nothing without you.”

I bit my lower lip fighting the urge to throw
my arms around him. I’d waited so long to hear him say that to me. While I
was going through radiation treatments, I used to imagine what it would have
been like having him alongside me. Those days when I was wrung out and every
bone ached and my thoughts were consumed with the fear of things to come.

“What are you thinking?” he asked as he took
my chin into his hand and drew my face up so I had no choice but to look at
him. “Talk to me. Please.”

“I want to believe you.”

“Good. That’s a start.” He seemed to relax
his shoulders, but his eyes were just as intense. “Trust me, baby. I want
this more than anything. I’ve had so much time to think this weekend and I
know I need to change, but I can’t do it alone. You need to change, too.”

“Me?” I regarded him warily.

“Yes, you. You have to get after me. I’m
going to do my best to be a participant in our marriage. But I also need you
to be patient. And stubborn. This is new to me. I’ll mess up. Get caught up
at times and I need you to remind me,” he explained with humility. “I know I
can be single-minded. Focused on one thing so much the other things around me
disappear into the peripheral. You have to make me see the entire picture.”

While he was offering his plea, I decided to
deliver my own. “Christopher, I understand what you’re asking. I do. But I
want to state, for the record, I refuse to turn into this waspish, harpy wife
in order to get your attention. My concession is we meet in the middle. You
have to make a concentrated effort. I will not go back to how things were
before. I deserve better than that. I truly do.”

“Absolutely. I agree with you
wholeheartedly,” he said as he reached out to tuck a tendril of hair behind my
ear.

His hand lingered and I leaned into it.
Closing my eyes and relishing his touch. I was torn. There was still a large
percentage of my dignity that wanted to cut my sentient losses and run.

“I don’t ever want to hear through my mother
again that you’re going to her with our problems. You should come to me.”

“You’re right.”

“I know I’m right, Christopher.” With all
the points I was making with him, I knew I’d subconsciously made up my mind
even if it were only truly sinking in with me at that moment.

“You are my priority. From this day forward,
you come first,” he promised as I met his eyes. “It’s my promise to you.”

Chris was steadfast. I was more than a
little awestruck by his conviction. And despite my misgivings, I believed him.

I nodded under his gaze. “Okay.”

He seemed momentarily stunned by my answer.
“What?”

Staring at him squarely I replied, “Yes, I’m
willing to give it a try.”

He gathered me up and pulled me tightly
against him. I could literally feel the tension leave his body as relief
washed through him. The change was immediate. An almost from head to toe
progression. After kissing my brow, he sighed heavily. The ER doctor had been
so right about stress and the physical impact it had on a person’s body. We’d
both been on edge for far too long. The weekend had taken the stress to an
even higher level. It was no wonder I felt drained. Not just mentally
drained, but physically. As my tension, too, abated, I wrapped my arms around
his trunk and rested my head on his shoulder. It was nice. Something I had so
very missed.

“Christopher, I said I’d try. It’s going to
take a lot of work on both our parts to work through this. It won’t be
overnight,” I said as a gentle warning.

“I know, but it’s a start.”

I prayed his optimism wasn’t for nothing. Only
time would tell.

October 5, 2012 - East Smithfield, PA

I finished packing last minute items into the
back of my minivan (or “mom van” as my children called it.) Moving in was so
much work. Something I had forgotten with living in the same house for almost
twenty years. I stood back amazed at how I was able to get everything inside.
At least I hoped I’d gotten it all. I made a list. Teachers always made lists
and most of us were overly organized to the point of being borderline OCD. My
eyes scanned over a box labeled bathroom linens. Another for bed linens. Who
would have thought I’d be setting up another home at 42? It was kind of
exciting!

I looked back at our two-story Victorian
farmhouse with gingerbread trim giving myself one more chance to mentally go
room by room to see if there was anything else I needed. Drawing a blank, I
got in the driver’s seat and headed onto a new adventure.

Clinton’s choice in music came on as his Rage
Against the Machine CD blasted over the speakers at ear-splitting decibels. I
promptly turned it down so that the interior of the van was no longer vibrating
to the beat of the music. My youngest was in a rush to get in as much driving
time as he could since his friend, Dean, was the first of his friends to get his
license. I’d never had someone so willing to join me for the most mundane
errands and such just to accumulate the remainder of his 65 hours of vehicle
operation time. This time, his CD was playing from our trip home from school
two hours ago since the two of us carpooled.

We were six weeks into the new school year.
As luck would have it, the curriculum hadn’t changed from one year to the next
so I could use the same lesson plans. I always inserted current national and
international news events into my lessons for group discussion whenever
possible. Students seemed to do better remembering historical events when they
could relate them to current topics. It stayed with them.

Clinton completed his tenth week of weekly
therapy. Per his therapist’s recommendations, he underwent educational testing
in Rochester. The developmental pediatrician and educational testing
specialist concluded he had Attention Deficit Disorder. After the diagnosis,
he started medication the second week of school and already his teachers were
reporting a noticeable improvement. He still had catching up to do in his
academics. Because of that, he was meeting once a week with a tutor, fresh out
of college, to keep him motivated and to assist him in improving his
organizational skills while helping him play catch-up. The outside tutor was a
godsend. I only wished I’d done it sooner. Clinton worked well with Cameron.
Their sessions were successful because the two of them could still do their guy
thing while getting the necessary work done. They’d talk cars and sports and
joke which had built an instant bond between them. Whereas, when he and I
attempted working together in the past, we’d only managed to lock horns. I was
impatient and he was stubborn and defiant. Those traits disappeared with
Cameron.

It bothered me immensely that I didn’t see
his disorder sooner. So much so, I’d scheduled a few sessions with his
therapist for myself. While she didn’t breech my son’s confidences, we did
discuss my frustrations and guilt. I shared my sense of failure with her.
Naturally, through lots of mom tears. She permitted me to get everything off
my chest before offering up her professional analysis. She saw me as a loving
mother, involved in her children’s lives while balancing career and family
life. Clinton was the youngest of three boys. Three active and busy boys.
She told me it was completely natural for parents to lose some of their
parenting anxiety with each subsequent child. We’d matured as parents. With
that maturity and experience, we were more relaxed. Had Hudson been the one to
have the disorder, in all likelihood, both Chris and I would have recognized it
at a much younger age and taken earlier measures to have it diagnosed.
Instead, it was child number three. Add our busy lifestyle into the mix and
you have the situation we were in now with Clinton. I felt relieved when she
assured me he would get the help he needed to catch up with his peers. She
recommended several books and papers, for parents, written on the subject of
teen children with ADD and ADHD.

Clinton and I were both going through a
metamorphosis of sorts. Each with our own struggles. If anything, it brought
us closer together. Chris as well. Our son was no longer opposed to our input
and we no longer expected less from him simply because he was Clinton and
that’s the way he was. With the diagnosis came understanding and patience.
Mutual respect as well. Clinton’s struggle wasn’t his own making. There was a
reason for it. Now, we worked together to rebuild our relationship and
overcome what happened in the past.

Having been lost in my thoughts while
driving, I’d arrived to my destination on autopilot or so it seemed. I pulled
into the driveway and parked under the trees. Getting out of the van, I took a
deep breath of the earthy air and felt a mixture of peace and contentment. It
had taken work to get there. I knew there was more work to do to maintain it.
Nevertheless, the results to date were a welcomed relief. So much had been at
stake.

“Are you going to stand there all evening or
are you going to get to work unpacking?”

I chuckled and found my husband standing on
the front porch, hands on hips and smiling at me. “Just taking it all in.”

He closed the distance between us, stopping
right in front of me. “Happy about it, are you?”

I reached out and cupped his cheek. “I think
giddy with joy sums up what I’m feeling.”

“You just took me back saying that. All
fresh-eyed and young. Like when we bought our house.”

“It’s not every day a woman moves into her
dream vacation house. You know the one; nestled in a grove of trees, beside a
gorgeous lake, and at the foothills of a rolling vineyard?”

Once our offer to Curt was made, it had taken
six weeks for our closing date. That happened the previous Monday.

“As a matter of fact I do.”

“Location. Location. Location.”

He laughed and offered, “Do you know what
makes it a perfect location?”

I turned my head coyly and replied, “Beyond
what I’ve already pointed out? You tell me.”

“Your being here makes it the perfect
location,” he said huskily before gathering me up into his arms and kissing me
breathless.

I shrieked with laughter as he swept me up
and began carrying me towards the cottage. “I say we take a break from moving
in and christen the master bedroom. Something I’ve dreamed about doing for a
long time with you.”

“A break? I just got here, Christopher!” I
teased as I got the door for him.

“Too dedicated to your job to leave early like
I did. We’ll have to see what I can do to make sure that doesn’t happen next
time.”

“What did you have in mind, Mr. Gardner?”

“Lots and lots of experimentation with my
wife on this Columbus Day weekend. I am a scientist after all. We like to
experiment.”

I giggled, “And I love that about my mad
scientist.

That familiar stir of excitement came to life
in the pit of my stomach and I felt myself twitch with anticipation from a
place lower in my anatomy. Who would have thought that after all we’d been through,
we’d be able to return to what we used to have? In some ways, it was even
better. Coming so close to losing everything we had only made our relationship
grow stronger. We fought to save it.

On the threshold of the master bedroom,
Christopher murmured, “Prepare for me to razzle dazzle you, Mrs. Gardner.”

“Likewise, Mr. Gardner.”

Successful marriages were a work in
progress. Not something that could be settled into and left to its own
devices. It needed to be nutured. We each made a concentrated effort to mend
and grow. Counseling helped, but as the counselor pointed out, during our very
first session, without our mutual desire to save it, no amount of therapy would
help. And he was right. My husband and I wanted nothing more than to make it work.
That meant forgiving each other for past behaviors. Not holding them against
one another. And, ultimately, forgiving ourselves for them as well. Guilt
wouldn’t rebuild a healthy relationship. Forgiveness would.

I still needed to give my husband gentle
reminders from time to time when he was overly engrossed in his work. He was
good natured about it and would set things aside to engage in family life. It
was such a relief having someone to share the workload of home and family
with. So much so, I was a better teacher for it. I had renewed energy at
work. My involvement as co-advisor of student council increased to a level I’d
always wanted it to be, but had fallen short before. My new freedom had
permitted me to engage more in student activities and I loved it. Student
government was the greatest tool for getting them interested in community
outreach programs and turning them into civic-minded individuals. Maybe even
future community leaders and beyond. A history teacher’s dream.