Hopeless Romance

Part Eight: Darkness, Light, and a New Tattoo. Chapter Twenty Seven

A month crept slowly by.  With May my life had felt like a rushing river.  Now it was a stagnant, stinky, shallow river. My mind was the slimy murky mush floating on top.

Food tasted like ash.  I added holes to my belt to be able to tighten it enough to hold my pants up.

I’d get fired up with anger.  I’d rush into work wanting to make new strategies and destroy the Racheise.  Then I’d zone out, remembering May, our time together, and someone would gently touch me, full of pity.  I’d get angry and storm out. 

I sat by the Spring for endless hours, blind to the beauty.  All I saw before me were memories.

I screamed at Sophia anytime she visited, bringing my happy babies, trying to cheer me.  I called her names.  I told her she had made me waste so much of the little time I could have had with May.  We hurt May; we were as bad as the Rachiese soldiers.  I said all of this in front of my babies.  They would start crying.  Sometimes Sophia would too.  My babies would clutch at her, trying to get away from a Dad they didn’t know.  Guilt would crack the ice of my heart a little bit, but would freeze over again as soon as they left.  Sophia stopped visiting.

A month or so later I was surprised to hear Sophia’s voice outside my blanket.  “Michael?” 

I ignored her.  Maybe she would go away.  No such luck.

Without an invitation, she lifted my door blanket and came in quietly.  I continued to stare at the wall.  She could come into my room, but she couldn’t make me talk to her.

 “I know you’ve noticed a change in me since Sapphire and Mitch were born.  I feel that I was reborn with our babies’ births.  I found my strength again.  I never realized I had so much power within.  I haven’t felt weak since they were born.  Tired sure!”  She laughed a short nervous laugh.  “I have found my empathy for others.  I still don’t feel everyone’s feelings, but I feel everything Sapphire and Mitch feel.  I cry when they cry, feel real joy when they laugh.  And, you- I love you and that has opened me up to feeling what you do.  I am hurting with you. I cried at May’s funeral because she was so kind to me, and our kids.  I will truly miss her.  But, I cried for you too. I don’t know if you knew that, or how big that felt to me that I could finally cry for someone else.”  A tear slid down her face. 

She sat by me on my bed, looked me in the eyes although I was still pretending I could see through her to the wall.  “I keep crying for you.  Your sadness, your anger, is mine, and our children feel it too.  I don’t want you to feel guilty. I have to protect them though.  I need you to know though that as you try to fight your way out of this darkness, you fight for your babies too, for their lives, their joy.  I want you to be around them, their happiness, because while you are fighting admitting it, you feel their feelings too.  Until I can trust you around them though, until you can trust yourself, I hope just knowing they are still here, still alive, and need their daddy will help you.  They love you.  Follow their light okay?  They saved me. I know they can save you too.  I hope someday to feel the warmth in my own heart when you laugh again, to share joy again with you.  You will feel it again Michael.  I know right now you don’t feel like that will ever happen, but the darkest night always yields to the sun, the coldest winter melts into spring.  Life goes on.”  She kissed my cheek and walked away. 

What did she know?  Her break down was for some acquaintance and his kid.  This was MY kid.  MY WIFE!  I wanted to follow her and scream that to her face.  I was too tired.  I kept staring at the wall.

The feeling of wanting to die too got stronger over the months, not weaker.  I desperately wanted to join May and my baby that looked so much like her.  As much as I had tried to cut myself out of my other children’s lives and hearts though, I knew I couldn’t leave them, not like that.  They wouldn’t grow up knowing I had chosen to abandon them.  Wondering why they weren’t enough to make me stay¸ enough for me to want to live.  Sophia was right.  My kids saved me.  Thinking of them brought me back many times from falling off the cliff edge of death. 

My kids brought me back to life, as did seeing Robert kissing a tall red head in a hallway.  I started hitting him.  “Sure you loved May!  You’ve already forgotten her, moved on.  You think you can just replace her with another red head?” 

He grabbed my arms.  Yelled back, in my face,” She loved you.  I lost her before I lost her, okay?  I still loved her, still love her.  Knock it off.” 

I calmed and he let me go.  I went for him again, a punch straight to the nose making it bleed.  He easily restrained me again, taking out his handcuffs and leading me back to my room. 

The jerk left me there for the whole day, hands locked together in front of me.  It ended up being a kindness.  I sat there, unable to go anywhere, do anything, fight anyone or run from the pain.  I finally cried.  And cried, and cried.  I screamed.  I called for May.  I yelled at May, sometimes I was so angry that she had left me, that she had ignored my fears about the lake.  She had endangered herself and our baby.  I screamed that she murdered our child. 

No one helped me or disturbed me.  Later I found out Robert had stood sentry outside my door.  I don’t know how he didn’t come in and beat me up for the things I yelled at May in my darkest moments.  I remembered how to breathe again, really breathe.  I glimpsed the peace that was there inside waiting, always available to me.  I felt a little hope.

After that I spent hours every day in my room, just breathing, accepting all the feelings that came up, breaking down daily. 

Slowly, I found my center again.  I couldn’t believe it but there was still peace inside of me. 

I knew May would want me to heal.  Sometimes, when May was living, her normally joyful self would turn morbid.  I’d be uncomfortable and distract her, use humor or kisses or a change of subject, anything.  But, when she was doing RR missions she knew she was putting herself in danger.  She’d always assure me she’d be fine, she knew what she was doing.  But, just in case, just in case.  Oh, May, if only you could have known you’d die happily swimming, not doing anything dangerous.  If only you had stayed in bed resting that one day, one time chose not to go.  Go, go, go.  That was asking her to not be May.

In those morbid times she would tell me things.  “I worry about you.  If I die, I worry if you will be okay.  Promise me, look at me… don’t let them destroy you too.  Promise.”  I did. To get her to let it go, return to the woman I knew.  “Live for me.” She would say. 

I knew she’d be disappointed in me.  I had already disappointed her enough in her life; I resolved not to anymore in her death.  I started to try harder to find joy, starting small.  Find one thing to laugh at every day.  Then, two.  Soon, laughs didn’t make me feel guilty anymore; they felt like I was honoring her.  She was always laughing.    

Months passed before I trusted myself with Sapphire and Mitch.  Finally, I went to the library. Both kids were sitting with Sophia on a blanket.  She was reading to them, one of those books with the different textures.  Their little hands would reach up, fingers stretched out, exploring.  They were so much bigger than I remembered.   I began crying in the doorway.  Sophia saw me.  I held up a finger, one second, and went back to the hall. 

Suddenly, she was there, and took me in her arms while I cried, face buried in her soft hair.  I looked down into her warm brown eyes, her lips.  I kissed her and she kissed me back, but quickly pulled away.  “It’s nice to see you again Michael.”

“Sophia, I’m so sorry.  I’ve been horrible to you.”

“Yes, you have.”  Always blunt.  She looked at me a long minute. “I forgive you.  Nothing you said was worse than what I was telling myself.  You know you made May happy most of the time she knew you.  You were good to her.”

“I hope so.  Thanks for forgiving me.  Can I see my kids?”

“Of course.”  We walked in to the library.  At first, both kids looked at me warily- their almond shaped eyes and that look reminding me so much of Sophia when we first met.  After I read and laughed for a while, they forgave me in the easy way kids do.  They knew their daddy was back.  I was amazed that, at just over a year and a half old, they wanted to spend hours reading.  They were my children, mine and Sophia’s.  I looked at her and she smiled at me.  I smiled back.