Page 25 of Broken Hearts

“I am glad for that, Hal. I can only imagine how horrible they had to be. They were downright frightening from the outside looking in. I always knew you would figure it out though. You are so smart, Hal, and you have always been so brave. I know that you don’t think you are, but I bet that would have broken most people, but not you. No one can break you.”

I sighed and asked her why it sounded like she was saying goodbye to me. She had tears in her eyes and none of it made sense. Where was she going? I had thought that maybe there was a chance for us. Was I wrong?

“Well, I know how this ends. You will leave. That is how it always ends with the two of us, so I will make sure that our daughter knows all the good about you. I still have pictures of you, and I might have taken a couple since we were together. It will have to do. I don’t want you to be miserable with us. I know that you want to be on your own. I will never hold you down, Hal.”

Why did her words hit me so hard? I moved toward her and brushed my lips against hers slightly. My whole world was in this one room, and she needed to know it. “Marilyn, I’m not going anywhere. My family is right here.”

She looked up at me, my hands holding her arms. She was mere inches from my face. I pulled her in for a kiss, but it was short. I had something to say.

“I mean it, Marilyn. Don’t you ever think that again. I may have left you in the past because I thought it was for the best, but now I know better. It’s just me, you, and Amelia, and that is all that matters. You are the family that I never thought I’d have, and there is nothing more that I want than to know what it is like to wake up to you for the rest of my life. I have wanted that since we were in high school. Nothing has changed, except I love even more what you’ve become. I always knew that you would be something great and I was right. Motherhood will be just the same. I know that you’re going to be a great mom, Marilyn, and I want to be there for every second of it.”

His mouth was on me after his declaration. He was pushing for more tongue, more teeth, and I could feel my body molding against his. This wasn’t how it was all supposed to go, but I couldn’t think of it going any better. Hal had quieted all of the voices in my head that were doubting us. Now, I knew that this was how it was supposed to be. This was it.

21

Marilyn

It was going to take more than a few words for Hal to convince me that he wasn’t going to leave when things got hard. It was what he had done in the past and, of course, I worried about it. I knew that there was going to be something that I couldn’t explain. The feeling that I had, the one where he just took off, was one that I felt in my soul. He had left me before, so naturally I worried that he would do it again. It put fears in me that I didn’t know how to calm.

Amelia got stronger by the day and although it was complicated between Hal and me, with her it was different. She was the number one priority, so that meant that we got along by default. I wanted Hal to show me how he cared, and he did. I was afraid of what it meant to fall for him a third time and to be pushed away again. I didn’t think my heart could take it this time around, if I was completely honest with myself.

Since Amelia was staying at the hospital, Hal and I were there basically all the time. It was hard for the two of us to get close with so many people around, but it didn’t mean that Hal didn’t try. He was in a good mood mostly, but there was still a side of him that I didn’t understand. I still didn’t understand why he had left the times before, so how could I know that it wasn’t going to happen again? I tried to get to know him more, asking him questions while we would grab a bite to eat together. Sometimes the doctors needed Amelia for tests to make sure she was growing as she should. It was then that I would try to put the pieces together, but I didn’t seem to be that much closer to an answer.

“You know, Marilyn, you always do this, and I feel like you are disappointed every time with the answers I give you. Are you sure that you are asking the right questions? I mean, what do you really want to know?”

I asked him to repeat himself because I wasn’t listening. I was too wrapped up in my own head, which wasn’t helping anything. I wished that there was something that I could do to be clearer. I didn’t know how to say it though, without it sounding bad. I didn’t want to offend him. He had been there for me more than anyone else recently. I couldn’t help but think of the past though. I couldn’t help but think of the moment when Hal told me again that he wanted nothing to do with me. It was one of the worst moments in my life and I didn’t want to do it again.

“What are you looking for, Marilyn?” Hal asked me gently. I had no way to give him an answer without revealing my biggest worry. It wasn’t at all what I wanted to happen. I wanted to tell him, but I didn’t want to tell him with all of the emotions that I felt. How could I do one without the other?

“I just want to know that you’re not going to take off like you always do.” My words were clipped, my tone was rude, and it came out with just the emotions that I knew it would. It was hard to pretend like I wasn’t mad about it, still after all this time. In truth, I was already mad at him for leaving again, Amelia too, even though he hadn’t. Yet. That was how I felt about it too, that I was just waiting for the inevitable. It had already happened twice. What was to stop it from happening again?

“I didn’t take off from you, I never have,” Hal insisted. He got a bit of a tone as well and that worried me. Were we about to fight about this? Would he leave now? I didn’t realize until that moment how much I was afraid of it. I had gotten used to him again, and I was afraid what would happen when he left and I was lost once more.

I scoffed and told him that he didn’t quite get how things worked. “I was in love with you, Hal, and you always chose everything else instead of me. Not once, but twice I was ready to give everything up, but it wasn’t what you wanted. I am not what you want.”

He denied it, said that he had just done what he had to do. That sounded crazy and I told him as much. It was an excuse, that’s what it was.

“What does that mean?” I wanted to know. He made no sense, but my stupid heart wanted things to be the same between us. I wanted to trust him; I still loved him. To say that I’d fallen in love with him three times was probably wrong. The truth was that I had never stopped loving him. I had loved him since before I was eighteen and now, the way we’d been together, our daughter, I loved him even more. That would never change.

“It means that I only did what I had to do. I had to let you go back when we were teens, so that you would leave for the college you were supposed to go to. It couldn’t have gone any differently. Look at all the good you have done, and we both know that none of it would have happened if you would have stayed in Coloma.”

I couldn’t believe that he thought to say that. He had broken my heart and changed the whole trajectory of my life. How dare he! I didn’t like the way he said it like it was all what he wanted. I didn’t like that he made it like it was a favor to me. It didn’t feel like a favor. It felt like a death sentence. That’s what it felt like back then and now.

“And when you broke up with me while you were in the hospital? Was that to help me as well?” I asked him angrily. Those were the two worst moments in my life, and I wanted to know why he thought that they were my fault. It was bad enough that he wanted to pretend like they didn’t happen, but to then say that it was for me! That was too much.

Hal hung his head, his blue eyes hidden from me, and all I could see was the top of his head. I didn’t like the way he acted. I wanted to know what he had to say for himself. He told me that he didn’t have much at all to say in his defense. He looked beaten by it and while my heart constricted from his demeanor, I still had to know. We were too far in to back out now.

“I don’t think that I have an excuse for that. It was just me being a coward. I didn’t want to face you after I acted that way in the hospital. You were afraid of me, of what I’d done, and I didn’t want to see it.”

It was a simple answer, but it made me feel bad when he said it like that. I didn’t know what to say in response. It had been a hell of a time. The situation in the hospital was intense and though I was momentarily freaked out, I didn’t think I was ever afraid of him. I was more devastated when he told me that he didn’t want to be with me. Pushing me away was part of his knee-jerk reaction to dealing with me. His explanation wasn’t easy to hear, but it was honest and that’s what I’d wanted. I couldn’t fault him for that at least.

“So, what happens when I am too much again, and you have to ‘deal’ with me?” I asked.

Hal just shrugged and said he had no idea how any of it was going to work. He knew that he wanted to be with me and never wanted us apart. “You’ve never been too much, Marilyn; I’ve just never felt good enough. I always wanted you to have a better life than I could give you. It killed me when I wasn’t enough, but I knew that I had to be honest. You were better off going to college and becoming a lawyer. I wouldn’t have forgiven myself if you would have stayed in Coloma to be with me.”

I shook my head and said that he didn’t get it. I always wanted a family above all. I love my career and all, but I wanted our baby and his love, way more than I needed a pat on the back from my coworkers. I tried to make it matter, helped as many people as I could, but there was always something missing when I went home at night. I’d known that it was Hal all of this time, I waited for him after all, but I could have just as easily lost everything. I was still on the fence if I was still going to.

“I thought that you would feel trapped and one day you would hate me for it. I also knew that you would do great things. You were always so brilliant and so willing to help everyone. It’s a gift you have, to see the good in everyone. I didn’t want you to lose that staying here with me.”

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