Page 51 of Love Resurrected
The facilitator stands. “Anyone else?”
And before I realize what I’ve done, I find myself at the podium and starting to speak. “Hi, I’m Brad.” I gesture toward Andy first. “I just want to say thank you to Andy for sharing.” More light applause. “Because I too lost the love of my life three years ago, and also to cancer—metastatic—and my friends are encouraging me to date. I promised Kat I would move on. That I wouldn’t let her death stifle me. But I just don’t knowhow.And I don’t even have kids. I only have to worry about me. Andy, I can’t imagine how hard that must be for you, man.”
Andy nods in acknowledgment, a grateful smile on his face.
“I have to admit, part of me is completely okay with being alone for the rest of my life. Because I can’t imagine ever feeling the same way about someone again as I did about Kat,” I admit.
“Brad, if I may interrupt,” the facilitator says. “I think, and this is just my opinion, but I think it’s unrealistic to expect you will ever feel the same way again.”
“Then what’s the point?” I ask, even though, deep down, I already know the answer.
“The point is, that different partners evoke different emotions, and no two will ever be alike. You can meet someone tomorrow and love them with all your heart. It doesn’t mean you love Kat any less. It’s two different loves. Both romantic, both sexual, both emotional, neither the same. Does that make sense?”
I nod, because it does. I’ve heard it before. I just don’t like it.
The facilitator moves to the front of the room and stands next to me at the podium. “I don’t pretend to know how anyone feels. We all have our own grief that manifests in its own unique ways. But what I do know is that the human heart has an enormous capacity for love. Larger than anything we could ever imagine. Opening your heart to another does nothing to diminish what you’ve given in the past. You could love somebody new every day, from now through infinity, and not lessen what your heart has to give. As humans, wehaveto love in order to feel whole. It’s a primal and basic need to survive.”
She reminds me a bit of Nessa. Not in the way she looks or in her mannerisms, but in her word choices and how she says them. It makes me want to believe her.
“The most difficult thing about moving on after the death of a partner,” she continues, “is letting go of the guilt that accompanies the progression. The guilt that wishes it were you that died and not them. Once you can forgive yourself for living, you can continue to do just that. And be much happier for it.”
She gestures to me to continue. “I apologize for interrupting, Brad.”
“No, that’s fine,” I say. “I have nothing to say after that. Nothing I can say.” I return to my seat and the facilitator calls for more volunteers. I’m shocked to see that over forty minutes has gone by. A woman gets up to speak, but I tune her out, thinking instead on whether I want to approach Andy after the meeting.
* * *
Andy and I end up grabbing a beer after the meeting at a place nearby.
“How’d you do it?” I ask him once we find a seat and order our beers.
“Which part? The sex? Moving on? Existing?”
“Yes.” I laugh, not in a cheerful way.
“It’s not easy, man. Not at all. I had to force myself, literally, and I think it’s easier to do that when I focus on the girls, right? And how having a maternal figure in their lives would be good for them. But not a lot of women want to deal with widowers. Let alone widowers with kids.”
“How’d you meet her? The woman.”
“My girls both had her as a teacher. Trina first, and then Tasha. I started talking to her a bit after Maureen passed because I needed her help to deal with Trina. And it just kind of grew from there.”
I feel nauseous as he tells me this.
“It’s true though,” he continues. “The guilt is the hardest part. Sex? That was fucking easy.” We both genuinely laugh at that.
“I’ll be honest.” Andy keeps talking. “The woman is a saint for sticking around last night. I was a one-pump, limp-ass chump the first time. But I think I made up for it after.” He smiles and raises his glass.
“Fuck, I haven’t even thought about if I’d be any good. Can I ask you something personal?”
“More personal than this?” He laughs caustically.
“Did you think about Maureen while you were with this other woman?”
“If the circumstances were different, I’d fucking deck you for that.”
“I don’t blame you.”
He takes a long drink of his beer, finishing over half of it, then sets it back down and looks at it, as though waiting for the beverage to answer my question instead. “I did. There were flashes at first where I kind of confused myself. The same thing kind of happened the first time I kissed Cathy, the woman. And the first time I went down on her—” He stops talking again and looks down at his hand encircled around his pint glass.
