The Purple Heart (15 page)

The pain ruptured my heart almost as
quickly as the fleeting vision of him had come to me. I felt like
he had died. Having no way to speak, text or email him, it felt
just like he had. No widow could reach out to a lost loved one, and
here I was with no way to reach out to Aiden.

I had no idea where he was or who he
was with. I had never given him Cheryl’s friend’s information. I
thought about calling the base, but losing my job was not on the
list of things I wanted to add to my misery right now. All they
needed to do was get wind that Aiden was living here and I would be
gone in mere moments. My performance record would be wiped clean. I
deserved it. I had failed him. I had failed him in more ways than
work.

I was only a shadow of myself now.
There was no happiness and I felt there was no reason to exist like
this. If I weren’t so afraid of what awaited me in the afterlife, I
would consider throwing myself off a bridge. I laughed at myself
for even thinking about suicide. It wasn’t the first time I had
entertained the thought in the past twenty-four hours, but it was
something I could never bring myself to do. I was a strong woman
and certainly not a quitter. I knew it was my own way of feeling
sorry for myself. I shouldn’t, though; I should feel sorry for
Aiden. What I had done to him was so cruel and heartless and I
wouldn’t blame him if he never tried to contact me
again.

I wandered around my house like a lost
soul, looking for anything that remained of him. There was nothing,
not even a wrinkle in the comforter on his bed. It has been
perfectly made so you could bounce a quarter off it. He had left
nothing for me to hold, not a shirt or even a stray sock. I knew
this would be the case, but actually experiencing it was quelling
me.

I sat in the dreary light of the gray
morning, my arms encircling myself, just so someone was holding me.
I remained like this for hours, staring at nothing or crying
hysterically. I continued to wait for him. He never came home. He
never came back to me. I kept expecting the phone to ring or a
knock on the door, but Aiden had completely vanished from my
existence.
How was I going to live without him?

Time was passing by so slowly. Sitting
there in the silence of my house, I could hear every tick of every
clock there was in the house. The clocks clicked at different
times, causing a dissonant cacophony. I could count the seconds in
my head.
One. Two. Tick. Tock.
I looked at the clock and
only a mere hour had passed. When Aiden was with me, time always
seemed to fly by. There weren’t enough minutes available in the day
when it came to being with him.

I started to pace around the room,
straightening a book here or picture there. I wanted to touch
anything he had touched. Even if his fingertips had just grazed
something, I wanted it. I found myself sitting on the stairs,
knowing we had climbed them together, only to wander back to my
spot on the couch to pay more vigil for his return.

Every so often the heat would come on,
but it never warmed me. Nothing made a difference. Everything just
seemed so lifeless.

I hadn’t eaten a single crumb since
yesterday’s lunch with the girls. The thought of food made my
stomach lurch and only made me think about my last meal with Aiden.
I had ruined that as well.
Why was I constantly sabotaging my
own happiness?

I sat and thought about that for a
while.
Why did it matter to me what Aiden’s past was? What
difference would it have actually made? He wanted to be with me,
right here, right now. I didn’t know of any girlfriend or wife
waiting for him, looking for him. Why couldn’t I just be happy with
what we had and who he was? No, instead I had to badger him for
information; accuse him of hiding things. If anyone had the right
to break up in this relationship, it was him. Which probably made
it easier for him to walk out the door.
He didn’t beg me to
stay, did he?
But he had. He had asked me not to send him
away. He had pleaded with me not to do it. I thought I was doing
the right thing. I had forced him to go. What if he was only
concerned about having a place to live? I don’t even know if he had
money for a motel. I was a disgrace. I was a heinous excuse of a
human being.

I could no longer sit and needed to do
something. I turned on the TV, hoping to occupy myself with
mindless nothing. I flipped through the channels, stopping on a
news report focusing on a Marine killed that morning from my local
region.

“
Another one for Cheryl.
Such a shame.”

I listened as they gave the details of
his bravery and demise. Happy pictures of him with his wife and
child flashed on the screen.

“
He had a family. They
wanted him back and he’ll never be able to come home. I had a man I
could have spent the rest of my life with, and I sent him away. And
here I am, acting like a selfish bitch, crying over my own
stupidity, and feeling sorry for myself. That poor woman, she has
the right to feel like she lost someone. I threw my someone away,”
I said aloud to the empty room. I winced at hearing my voice
slightly echo.

I guess I should just suck it up, shake
it off, and get back to the life I had
before
Aiden. It
should be an easy adjustment. It’s not like we’d been together for
years, for God’s sake. It had only been days.
What was wrong
with me? Was I obsessed with him or something?

I gathered my strength, plucked myself
from the couch, and hauled myself to the kitchen. I turned on the
tea water and scrutinized the contents of my fridge. Nothing jumped
out at me. I decided to make toast with cashew butter because I
needed comfort food.

I dropped the bread into the toaster
and went for the flatware drawer. I removed a paring knife and
began trying to cut the seal off the cashew butter lid. I must not
have been paying attention because the knife slipped and plunged
into my palm only inches from my wrist.

“
Son of a bitch!” I
screamed and pitched the knife into the sink.

The sharp pain that ensued brought a
different kind of agony to my body. It made everything feel real. I
saw the amount of blood streaming down my wrist and knew it was a
deep cut. Good thing I had been a nurse before a poor excuse for a
case manager. Blood didn’t bother me in the slightest. I wrapped a
clean dishtowel around my hand, collapsed onto the floor and began
to turn on the waterworks again. It wasn’t because it hurt, either.
My hand
was
throbbing, but not enough to surpass the ache in
my chest. I wished Aiden were here with me. Had he been, he would
have been using the knife. He was, in his own words, a master in
all forms of weaponry. I laughed through my tears, which only made
me break down more.

The phone rang and I nearly jumped out
of my skin. I waited to make sure it wasn’t a figment of my
imagination. It rang again. It sounded out of place, almost
surreal. I jumped up and literally dove for it, praying it was
Aiden. Hoping it wouldn’t stop ringing before I could get to it. My
aching hand was temporarily forgotten.

“
Hello?”

No one replied. I could hear a strange
noise in the background, but I couldn’t quite place it. White
noise? Did white noise even exist anymore with the age of digital
we presently lived in?

“
Aiden? Is that you?” I
questioned, and then under my breath, “Please say something. Please
be Aiden. Please. Please say something, anything.” There was no
response. I was reminded of my dream and Aiden’s lack of response
there, too.

The phone line went dead and the house
returned to deafening silence.
Was my existence destined to be
bleak?
I somberly placed the receiver back on the base, and
decided I’d better attend to my hand. The towel was quickly
becoming saturated with blood. I probably needed stitches. I’d
decide once I cleaned the wound and could evaluate it better. I
still had my nursing kit on the shelf in the closet, so maybe I’d
just do it myself. It wasn’t likely I’d be taking a trip to the
hospital. Could this day get any worse? I bit my tongue after I
said it. I probably just jinxed myself.

The upstairs bathroom had the best
lighting, so I headed in that direction. Something was happening
outside, but I couldn’t tell if it was rain or wind. I peered out
the front window. Rain. Yes, the day just got much
drearier.

When I unwrapped my hand, the blood
continued to flow freely from the gash. I ran lukewarm water over
it and tried to gauge the depth. I had done a pretty good job on
myself. Maybe I should have been doing covert missions on
my
tours. I was apparently deadly with a knife. Had I actually been
trying, I could have done some major nerve damage.

I grabbed disinfectant and triple
antibiotic cream, cleaned it up, and began working on
steri-stripping it closed. Not an easy task to conquer using only
one hand, which is why I had opted not to stitch it
myself.

When I thought it was adequately done,
I bandaged it back up and sat down on the bowl. From this vantage
point I could see Aiden’s empty room. It was completely dark except
the pinpoint light shining from the bathroom, which caused an arrow
effect right to his bed.

“
Well, Aiden, if you had
just made love to me, we’d probably still be in bed right now. But
no, you had to go and tell me you loved me. I’d do anything to hear
you say those words to me again right now.” Again I found myself
talking to no one, although I swear I had seen movement in his room
from my peripheral vision.

Where was he? Who was he with? Was
he thinking about me?
I had no idea what the answer to any of
those questions might be and they kept running through my head over
and over again.

“
Aiden, you said you loved
me, yet you left me so easily. Where are you?” I screamed out to my
non-existent roommate. My voice boomed through the empty house. It
was now a cemetery and I was the widow, forgotten by
everyone.

I was still sitting in the bathroom,
probably for hours, when I heard a knock on my front
door.

“
Aiden, you came back.” I
flew down the stairs and flung open the door only to find Gina and
a bottle of wine waiting for me.

“
I won’t be insulted that
you don’t look happy to see me. I’m guessing you thought I might be
someone else?”

“
Oh no, honey, I’m always
happy to see you. How are you feeling, Momma? Come on
in.”

“
Apparently a lot better
than you,” she said, gently taking a hold of my injured hand.
“Trying to end it all but missed?” she said.

“
Not really, but thanks for
the idea.”

“
Oh stop it. See, that’s
exactly why I told Cheryl I needed to come over today.”

“
Don’t you have classes?” I
certainly didn’t want her missing work on my behalf. I wasn’t worth
it.

“
Don’t you worry your
dispirited
little head about it. I have
one of my other teachers covering for me. You’re what’s important
right now. I can’t have the Godmother of my child a wistful mess
and sitting here desolate all day, now can I?” Gina tossed in my
direction.

“
Godmother?” I said
excitedly.

“
Of course, Sweetie. Who
else would we want to be the Godmother? There’s only one choice and
it’s you.”

“
Well, no one else seems to
want me.” It didn’t take long for my depressed attitude to
return.

“
And again, stop it. Cher
warned me you were all about the drama today. Here, I brought you
this to take the edge off. We’re going to sit and work this all
out. Okay?” she exclaimed.

“
But you can’t drink,” I
scolded her.

“
It’s not for me, honey,
it’s for you, the whole bottle. From what I can tell after only a
few minutes, I should have brought a whole damn case with me. Now
inside, get a glass, and meet me on the couch!”

I did as she commanded and sat down on
the couch with glass in hand. She already had the bottle open and
waiting, and began to fill my glass to the rim.

“
Okay. Take a deep breath,
a large sip, and spill it. All of it,” she demanded.

“
Everything is a fucking
mess. I really screwed things up. I doubted him. He told me he
loved me and I didn’t say anything back. I told him to leave. He
reached for me and I turned my back on him. I made him cry. I suck!
I’m the suckiest person I know. Now I don’t have any way to reach
him. I have no idea where he is or who he’s with. I deserve to live
alone in hell,” I rambled.

“
Good. Get it all out
there. Feel any better?”

“
Are you fucking serious?”
I just glared at her. Her warm smile spread across her face and she
giggled.

“
No. I was only kidding. I
know you don’t feel better. We haven’t solved anything yet. But at
least you put it all out there on the table. I know exactly what I
need to ask you to help.” Her voice was soft and cheerful, as
usual.

“
There’s no way to solve
this. I have no way to find him,” I told her.

“
Let’s start at the
beginning. Yes, everything is a fucking mess. I have to say fucking
because soon there’ll be a governor on my cursing and I need to get
it all out of my system. Fuck. Fuck. Fuckity. Fuck. Fuck. Now how
is it that you feel you screwed things up?” I just kind of stared
at her in disbelief. I had never heard Gina sound like a truck
driver before.