Page 93 of Smoky Mountain Dreams
“Christopher! Joe!” Jackie’s voice called from the porch. “Whereare you? Dinner’s ready!”
“Coming, babydoll! Be right there!” Joe took another swallowand handed Christopher the bottle. “Let’s do this, bro.” He bumped his fistagainst Christopher’s and intoned seriously, “God help us both. Amen.”
Before hiding the bottle again, Christopher drank to that.
“Hey, Mar-Mar.”
Just because it was Thanksgiving didn’t mean it wasn’tThursday, and Jesse visitedeveryThursday. Yearsago, he’d bring the kids, but Dr. Charles advised him to stop. It just scaredand confused them, and Marcy didn’t know they were there anyway. So beforeheading to the nursing home, Jesse had dropped the kids off with Nova and Tim.Brigid had taken a stack of paper to make cranes while she waited, and Will wasexcited about helping Nova make crusts for the pies.
“You look the same.” Jesse’s voice sounded strange to him,critical almost, like maybe somewhere deep inside he was annoyed by that fact. “It’dprobably surprise you, but since your accident, I haven’t been fond of changes.I’ve kept our life pretty sedate. But change is happening now, Marcy. It’sexciting. But terrifying, too. Not that you’d know it by the way I’m divinginto this thing with him,” Jesse whispered, adjusting her clawed hand,smoothing her hair back from her face, and then going to adjust the blinds.Just like always. Pretending that it mattered to her.
“I guess I should tell you that the date I mentioned? Itturned into this bigthingMar-Mar, and I’ve got feelingsgoing on that I haven’t had inyears. Not since you.And before that, not since ever.”
He sat next to her. Her open eyes seemed to catch his for amoment, but as always it was unsustainable. No consciousness touched his own intheir gaze.
“He’s a singer. I love his voice. I used to go to SmokyMountain Dreams just to see him. Sometimes I went alone even. When he showed upon my calendar at the shop… But you don’t need the whole story, do you?You…wherever the real you is, I guess you already know.”
Still, he wanted to say the words to her. Confession time.
“I think I’m already in love with him. I can hear youlaughing at me for being so reckless with my emotions. It doesn’t feelreckless, though.”
Jesse rested his head on the side of her bed where she wascurled and tried to see if he could still smell her through the nursing homescents. Some days he could, and others he couldn’t. Today he thought he caughta slight whiff, right near the crook of her arm where sweat collected.
“A month and a bit and I’m halfway, maybe more, in love withthis guy. Is it really a surprise, though? Maybe it is. With you it felt like Ifell out of a tree and landed in love with you. This feels like I’m creeping upthe side of a roller coaster—not too slow, but this constant forward motion. I’mat the top and I can see forever, and then it’s going to go over, and whoosh. I’llbe a goner. Who am I kidding? Iama goner.”
Marcy twitched, and drool dripped from the side of hermouth. Jesse sat up and wiped her chin with a tissue.
“Marcy, how does that happen? How do we stop it?” He smiledsoftly. “He’s got amazing eyes. Green. And his laugh is…it just makes mystomach tumble over and I want to hug him. He’s sweet too. And he’s great withWill so far. He wants to be good with Brigid, but she won’t let him.”
He sighed. “She’s got to let him, because I don’t want tolet him go.”
He remembered Brigid’s tight expression when he’d picked herup from school the day before, and the anger and hurt in her voice.
“Why were you gone last night? Were youwith him? Are you going to start leaving us with Aunt Amanda or Grandma so youcan be with him now?”
Couldn’t he have this without hurting her? Did it have to beher happiness or his? Couldn’t she see what a great guy he’d met? Of course not.She was just a child. He couldn’t expect her to understand, but maybe he couldmake it easier somehow. Christopher sure was trying. He’d even bought her somepretty paper at SMD for making cranes, and had said he could help her make abunch on the Saturday after Thanksgiving since he didn’t have to work.
“If you think that’s a good idea,” he’d added shyly,obviously not wanting to do the wrong thing.
“I think that’s a great idea,” Jesse had said, and he’d beenthrilled to present Brigid with the papers that night, hoping she’d see howmuch Christopher wanted to be her friend.
Jesse sighed, remembering how Brigid had stared at the paperand declared it ugly. Only when Jesse said she would thank Christopher for itregardless and be nice to him or face a day of no crane-making at all had sheseemed willing to at least fake being kind. It hurt his heart to see her bemean, even if Christopher wasn’t around to witness it.
“Marcy, I haven’t been honest with you about Brigid. I didn’twant to sit here beside you and say the words. I know you’re not in there, butI still couldn’t tell you that our daughter isn’t happy. She’s mean to Will.She was absolutely awful to Christopher at Halloween. She doesn’t want to hangout with her friends. She’s obsessed with making origami cranes. She’s shutdown. And immature. Way behind the other girls her age. I’m scared that I’mmessing up.”
Marcy made a moaning sound, and if he’d been someone else,Ronnie for example, he might have interpreted it as proof that she could hearhim—that she was worried about her daughter’s pain. But it was nothing. She’dmade sounds before, and the brain scans were all the same. No cerebral functionremained.
“Here’s the truth: she’s mad, Marcy. Really fucking angrywith me for…I don’t know. Is it that I’m bi or gay or whatever I am? Is it thatI’m alive and you’re not? Not in any meaningful way, at least. Is it that bydating him I’m making it real for her that you’re never coming home?”
He rubbed his hands over his eyes. “I’ve talked to Nova aboutit, and she says to just love her and she’ll be fine. But I can’t stop raisingher, can I? I can’t turn a blind eye to the choices she’s making, or the thingsshe does and says. Icareabout how other people seeher. What they think of her.”
He stopped and heard his words again. “Oh my God, I’mturning into my dad.”
The machines beeping and the sound of urine filling the baghanging from Marcy’s bed were the only noises the room.
“Last night, after I texted with Christopher, I lay in bedand thought about how it could be for us. Imagined a family—me, him, the kids.I want something like that, Marcy. I miss being part of a unit, and havingsomeone who loved me; who argued with me. Someone I could ask for advice. Imiss having someone in bed with me at night.
“And please, Mar, forgive me, but when I’m with him, thathorrible feeling I had the longer our marriage went on? It’s gone. I feel sosatisfied sexually and it feels so damnright. There’sno surprise. No thought like, ‘Oh, this actually works?’ Because my thought is,‘Of course this works. This is perfect. This is everything.’
