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“I’ll need to get someone to cover my cases…but it shouldn’t be too difficult.”
“You think your associates will go for it?” She sounded hopeful, and I realized maybe this was what she wanted all along—some help. A little give out of me.
“I don’t know. But they can’t say much…I have the vacation time.”
“So in a few days then?”
I offered a conciliatory smile I was aware she couldn’t see. “Most likely in a few days. By the weekend, if I can swing it.”
Chapter Thirty-Two
Laurel Dunaway
Journal Entry
The little girl feels a sharp pain in her chest, like a knife stabbing her. This is a different pain than the one she felt in the water. It’s suffocating, but it takes longer. She’s afraid as she lies in the dark, too scared to pull the cover up over her head, too scared not to. Her eyes stay fixed on the light underneath her bedroom door. She watches for the shifting of light. She listens for footsteps. She hadn’t realized she could be any more afraid than when her mommy put her in the water, but now she knows she can. She hears the doorknob turning, feels the weight of him stepping into the room.
“Sammy?” the daddy calls. Back then, the girl answered to a different name. “Sammy, I can’t sleep…”
That made two of them.
The girl dared not answer the daddy. She knew better. It was worse if he knew she was awake. “I’m sad, darling. Are you sad?” The daddy lifted the covers and crawled into the twin-sized bed. The little girl curled into a ball. “It’s okay,” he said, soothingly. “You don’t have to be scared.”
The daddy’s tears soaked through the little girl’s nightgown. It was as though a tidal wave had broken through a poorly designed dam. He pulled her close, sobs shaking the bed like an earthquake. He went on crying in hard violent bursts. It wasn’t until he was done that the really scary stuff began. She wondered if it was possible for a person to cry themself to death. She hoped it was. A crack ran down her bedroom wall. The little girl remembered the mommy telling the daddy to fix it. He never did, and now she was glad. It gave her something to focus on when the daddy slipped into her bed. She imagined herself shrinking, shrinking so small, small enough so that she could squeeze through the crack. She imagined other worlds on the other side, entire universes where mommies and daddies didn’t hurt their children. Where mommies didn’t die and daddies never cried. “Thank God,” he said at last, when the force of his crying trailed off some. “She can’t hurt us anymore.”
Dr. Miller wants me to talk about my father’s death in ways that I can’t. She says it’s important that I find an outlet for my grief. If only I could explain the extent of it. If only she knew how very deep it ran.
Then, later, when James advised me to put on something special, I saw it for what it was: an outlet for my grief. The only one currently at my disposal.
As usual, he was the one to set the appointment. But this time was different. There was no unease, no fear; there was nothing, just blank space between my ears and a feeling that I would let it lead me where it would.
If anything, I felt more unease about potentially being left alone. With the creepy stuff and with Dad gone, I was eager for things to return to normal.
I had thought that I’d be anxious to get back to work. But even that moved too slowly to really offer much of a challenge. It didn’t have an edge like the care home, where things were literally life and death. It didn’t hold the same excitement, the kind I’d found on the inside of the affair with Max.
Since Dad’s death, I no longer have an excuse to see him. Knowing that my husband is suspicious means I’m not sure I really want one. Dr. Miller suggested the end of the affair only adds to the grief. She
said that if I don’t find a healthy way to deal with my emotions that it’s possible things could get really bad. Dr. Miller doesn’t understand I have coping methods for days.
“We have to hurry,” James said suddenly, his way of informing me of the party. He left a period of silence afterward that allowed his words to take me back to the beginning, to the people we were when we fell in love. Dr. Miller had questioned me about this during our last session, suggesting that maybe one—or both—of us had outgrown the marriage. It’s possible, I’d told her. She said grief changes a person. It makes life seem more imminent. I don’t know if this is true. Looking at my husband now, it’s clear. We’re the same as we ever were in some ways, but also radically different.
“What do you think?” I asked holding up a few dresses for him to choose from, full well knowing which it would be.
He appeared to mull it over, fooling no one but himself with his deliberation. Finally, he pointed to the little black dress, the one with all the memories. “Definitely that one.”
By the time I was finished getting ready, I had transformed from sad Laurel into more of whom I was once, the hotheaded girl with big dreams and intoxicating power. I found James waiting by the door, a book of poetry in his hand. Nietzsche. No doubt recommended by someone he met. Maybe she’d even mentioned it, and my husband, being the kind of man he is, took a simple suggestion and decided to become an expert. Like most things with him, it was all for show.
I can’t say what I’d been thinking about during the drive, only that my mind was clear, for the first time in a long time. I hadn’t even thought much about where we were going, not until he pulled in the parking garage.
“Here?” I asked, my stomach convulsing.
“Is there something wrong?”
I shook my head slowly. “We never meet at hotels.”
James snorted. “Always and never are seldom correct...”
He placed his hand on mine after killing the ignition. “There’s no reason to be nervous, love. When have I ever let you down?”
