The Milestone Tapes (6 page)

“This is as hard for me to say as it will be for you to hear, but Gabe, we both know that—that you’re life is going to have to go on. And I just, I want you to know that I want that for you, I want you to be happy again.” Jenna wiped at her eyes.

“I don’t even want to think about that, Jenna, please ... I don’t want you to think about that,” Gabe choked out.

“How can I not?” Jenna asked. “All I think about is how this is going to hurt you. You and Mia, you’re my whole life. I just want you to know, to be sure of the fact, that I want your happiness more than anything else, so that one day—when it doesn’t hurt as much—you can know that you moving on, that’s what I wanted.”

She heard the scrape of his chair against the floor and felt his arms around her waist, his lips on the side of her throat. Her heart broke.

“J,” he breathed into her ear, spinning her around so that they eyes met, “I love you. You. That’s it. And whatever else may or may not happen someday, this is right now, focus on this—don’t worry about anything else.”

“What if you meet someone?” Jenna leaned into him, resting her head against the strong plane of his chest. Gabe ran his fingers down her spine soothingly. “What if you fall in love?”

Gabe pulled back, holding Jenna’s arms in his hands, meeting her eyes. “That’s what this is about? Meeting someone? Falling in love?” His words were ice, cold and hard in her ears, and his eyes were furious as they bore into hers.

“I thought you understood,” Jenna gaped back.

“This is sick, Jenna, really. I don’t want to think about that, and I sure as hell don’t want to fucking talk about that.”

“Gabe ... ” Jenna yanked herself free, balling her hands into fits and squaring them on her hips.

“No, don’t even do that. Don’t get mad and flustered because I don’t want to talk about other women.” His eyes burned into hers, and he sighed heavily before continuing. “I get it, I really do. You want to tie this life up with a big, neat bow. You want to make sure Mia’s okay, and I’m okay, and life is just good for us ... and I guess knowing that will make it easier on you. And hell, maybe I should pretend, sit here, nod and agree and appease you. But you know what? You’re my wife, but you’re also my best friend, so when you’re … gone … none of this is going to be neat and tidy and fine. That’s not how losing someone you love works—and you know it—so stop trying.”

“Please.” Jenna extended her hand, trying to reach him.

“Jenna, I’m really serious. Okay?” Gabe lifted his eyebrows, his arms still crossed his chest and he lowered his face to meet hers. “I have one focus right now, that’s it—that’s you. I don’t want to think about anyone or anything else. Really. You and Mia, you’re it for me.” He shrugged lightly and ran his hands over his face.

“I just need to know that you know my thoughts on this. I’m not asking you to do anything with them until the time is right for you, obviously ... but I ... I guess, I don’t want you feeling someday like you’re betraying me.” Jenna leaned back against the bookcase; she felt lightheaded and confused.

“Okay, so I know. And now, I don’t want to ever talk about this again. We have so many other things to focus on.” Gabe pulled Jenna again, holding her against his chest so she could feel the pulse of his heart race through his thin T-shirt.

“Dinner?” Jenna asked against the cotton of his shirt.

Gabe laughed, pressing his lips against the top her head. “There’s that.”

“We could order in?”

“That sounds good. Pizza?”

“Sure. Maybe I could rope Mia into helping me with some blackberry cobbler for dessert.”

“She’d like that. Let me finish up in here, and then we can order.”

“Okay,” Jenna stepped up on her tiptoes and pressed her lips against his. “I love you Gabe, and I’m sorry.”

“Sorry?” Gabe leaned back on his heels, puzzled.

“Yeah. Of course. For all of this. I don’t know how to do this.” Jenna closed her eyes, squeezing her hands together.

“Jenna, you have nothing to be sorry for.” Gabe kissed her against, running his fingers over her back.

“I just feel like I’m lost, I don’t know how to do this. There are so many things I want to do, things I need to say ... and ... ” she stopped. Nothing more came to her. She was lost.

“This is new, to both of us. I think we’re both lost, Jenna, and it’s going to take time to be found.”

“I should call Sophia,” Jenna blurted out. Her sister. They hadn’t spoken in months, and before that, it could have been years.

“That would be good, she might be helpful.” Gabe nodded slowly in agreement, ever the peacemaker.

“She hates me,” Jenna moaned, cupping her face in her hands.

“She doesn’t hate you Jen,” Gabe soothed, running his hand over her arm comfortingly.

“She does.” Jenna nodded, a childish pitch hitching her voice.

“She doesn’t know you.”

That was true, even Jenna had to admit. They were five years apart; they had never shared a life together in their childhood home. Sophia had always been the little baby running around after her, a hindrance and an annoyance, and Jenna had always been the big sister, irritated and tired of babysitting. But that wasn’t their problem. It was something much deeper and darker.

Sophia had left at eighteen, fled to South Carolina without a dollar to her name, and no reason to stay. She worked the boardwalks of sleepy coastal towns catering to the upper crust of society, selling home goods she stitched and mended herself where she eventually would met Alex Fledger.

He had been a budding family practitioner, fresh from Ivy league medical school, from a good, solid family with money, eloquence and roots that went both deep and wide. He was straight laced and quiet with good looks, southern manners and a dry, brittle personality. They married shortly after meeting. Alex set her up with a store, and they leisurely had three beautiful sons. She was upper crust now, a boutique owner, a doctor’s wife, and a mother, who traveled in the prim and educated circles of the South.

“She knows me Gabe. She doesn’t like me. It’s bigger than that, it’s our—” Jenna rolled her eyes and held her arms out in wide, empty observance.

“Mom,” Gabe cut her off; he knew the story.“That doesn’t change anything. She’s your sister, your only living blood. She’s going to care.”

“Gabe, it’s not that simple. After my Mom died—” Jenna stopped herself.

When Jenna left home at eighteen, bound for Seattle, she left behind a happy family. Her mother had waved from the curb at the airport, stuffing a few small bills into her pocket with teary eyes and sad words. Her father had patted her back, told her he was proud of her. Sophia had shuffled her feet and swatted away bugs, whining that it was too hot to stand around all day.

When Jenna returned, only a few months later, everything had changed. Her mother had cancer, she was bedridden and worn. Her father spent most of his nights at the bottom of a whiskey bottle, yelling, cussing and stumbling around. Sophia was quiet, different, changed. Her eyes were deadened and her smiles forced and sour. Jenna had run. She loved her mother, her father, and her sister, but she saw what was left of their home and she couldn’t be there anymore.

She had made excuses, school, work or both, to keep herself safely away. And eventually, two years later, it was too late. Her mother was dead, and her father was gone, off to places unknown without a backwards glance. And Sophia was alone, off to live with their cankerous grandmother on a downtrodden farm in the backwoods of Southern Illinois.

Jenna had been only twenty then, Sophia fifteen. Jenna was a Sophomore with nothing of worth to offer Sophia, but she tried. She wrote, called and tried to scrape enough money together to rent a shabby apartment on the wrong side of town, giving Sophia at least the option to come West if she wanted. But Sophia hadn’t wanted that, or anything else that involved Jenna. While Jenna had been running, Sophia had been building. Walls, so thick and unbreakable, around her heart and her life, that nothing touched her now.

“After your Mom died, she changed,” Gabe finished.

“I don’t blame her, it was awful. I left her alone, to deal with all of that, to take everything on ... she was just a kid!”

Time had explained to Jenna what words, pictures and consequences could not. Jenna had been wrong, she knew that now, a coward to run and hide and pretend that putting miles between them would mean that it didn’t exist.

“She turned out okay,” Gabe offered, putting a hand on Jenna’s shoulder. Gabe had always tried to understand both sides without placing blame.

“I don’t know ... I don’t know if how someone turns out is ever a justification for what happened to them.”

“I’m not trying to rationalize this Jen, you know that. All I’m saying is that she’s okay. And I’m guessing, if the situation were in reverse, you’d want to be there—no matter what.”

“Of course I’d want to be there!” Jenna’s eyes grew wide.

“So try. Call her. That’s all you can do, all you can ever do.” Gabe gave Jenna another tight, quick squeeze and wandered back to his desk.

Jenna could hear Mia singing along with the movie in the family room. “I’ll go start dessert; let me know when I should order.”

Jenna ambled into the kitchen. Mia was standing on the sofa, twirling about to the dancing scene on the screen, pulling the hem of her skirt into an awkward circle.

“Mia?” Jenna asked over the music.

Mia plopped quickly onto the cushion, fixing Jenna with an innocent gaze. “Yes Momma?”

“You know you’re not supposed to stand on the furniture.” Jenna walked to the television and clicked it off, waving her finger in protest.

“But they were dancing in clouds!” Mia protested, crossing her arms across her chest.

“That doesn’t mean anything!” Jenna picked up the empty bowl and a few stray kernels littered about.

“I’m hungry.” Mia jumped off the couch and followed Jenna from the room, quick on her heels.

“I know honey. Daddy is finishing up his work and then we’re going to order pizza. Would you like to help me make some dessert?” Jenna asked, depositing the bowl in the sink and wetting a towel to brush off the counter.

“Sure!” Mia smiled a toothy grin, settling onto a tall bar stool beside the counter.

“Let’s make Blackberry cobbler.” Jenna smiled, pulling a tub of plump, juicy berries from the fridge.

“No! I don’t like that!” Mia’s face scrunched up in disgust, puckering and going sour.

“Oh Mia, you’ve never even had it! You should hold off making that face until you’ve had a bite. This was your Grammy Elizabeth’s recipe, and it’s very, very good.” Jenna smiled, pulling a jar of brown sugar from the cabinet.

“I don’t care! I don’t want that! I don’t like it!” Mia’s lower lip jutted out, her eyes lowering to slants of anger.

“Mia, you don’t know if you don’t like it. But, if you don’t want any, that’s fine, but this is what we’re making tonight.” Jenna shrugged lightly and sifted flour onto the counter.

“You’re mean!” Mia screamed, her voice petulant and angry.

“I’m not mean, I’m just not giving in.” Jenna cracked an egg and beat it quietly in a glass bowl.

“I don’t want stupid cobbler!” Mia stomped off the stool and pounded her feet into the foot.

“Then have nothing, it’s your choice, Mia. But I’d like it if you’d at least take one bite,” Jenna continued preparing the crust.

“I want my Daddy, he’s nice, he lets me have what I want and he doesn’t make me eat stupid things!”

“Daddy’s working, Mia,” Jenna reminded her, willing her patience to continue.

“I hate you, you’re mean!” Mia stomped her foot again, screaming.

Jenna stopped. the words slashed at her like a knife. “Mia, it’s not nice to say things like that. You don’t hate me, you’re angry with me and that’s fine. But, you need to watch what you say to people.”

“I hate you!” Mia repeated, her voice loud and high.

“Really? All of this drama over cobbler? Over a dessert you don’t even have to eat, just something I want you to try?” Jenna asked incredulously, wide eyed and stunned.

“What’s going on out here?” Gabe opened his office door and walked into the kitchen.

“I hate Momma, she’s mean and she’s making me eat things I don’t like.” Mia broke into a barefoot run to Gabe’s side, linking her arms around his thigh.

“Jenna?” Gabe’s voice was confused.

“It’s nothing. Mia doesn’t want cobbler for dessert, so naturally, she hates me.” Jenna rested one hand on her hid and the other on the counter.

“Mia.” Gabe twisted away from her death grip and lowered himself to her level. “You can’t say mean things like that. You know that. If you don’t want cobbler, that’s fine.”

“She’s so mean.” Mia’s eyes welled with tears, her nose running, and she thrust herself into Gabe’s arms, burrowing her head into the crook of his shoulder.

“She’s not mean, Mia,” Gabe repeated patiently.

“Gabe, it’s fine. Go back to work. I’ll handle this,” Jenna offered, moving from behind the counter towards them.

“I don’t want you! I want my Daddy!” Mia screamed, breaking into frenzied tears, sobbing hard, pulling back from Gabe.