by Sally John
As his mom and dad freely admitted their faults, Max began to admit his own. As they told him again about God’s unconditional love and forgiveness, he began to hear them as if for the first time.
And something broke. It hurt. It physically hurt inside his chest. His mother said it was the cracking of the defenses he’d built up around his heart, an icy hardness that feelings could not penetrate.
Well, they were penetrating now.
He fell to his knees and let them come. Fear, anger, remorse, hatred, pain, frustration, pride, doubt. Sobs erupted from deep inside his belly as he regretted every single incident he could recall.
After a time, other feelings came. Love, forgiveness, hope. Faster and faster they came now, engulfing the ugliness. Tears that stung like fiery darts softened to warm, liquid pools that cleansed inside and out.
His knees ached. He smiled at the realization. He was going to be okay.
“Thank You, Lord. Thank You.”
Late that night, Max slipped quietly into bed, keeping a large space between himself and Claire. She was in the same fetal position he’d left her in hours before.
He felt horrendously drained in every way.
“I feel, hon,” he whispered to her back. “How about that?”
It wasn’t what he would call an enjoyable situation. He would give anything to retreat into his comfy, icy shell again.
Almost anything.
After asking God for help, crying with his parents, extending and receiving forgiveness, there was a hint of—corny as it sounded—sunlight in his soul.
He wasn’t so sure he’d trade that in.
Seventy-six
Max awoke to his cell phone’s ring. The tune indicated the call came from Neva. He reached over to the nightstand and grabbed it. The clock read seven ten.
“Morning.”
“Yo, boss.”
Beside him, Claire stirred.
Neva asked, “Are you awake?”
“No.”
“Okey dokey. Call. Soon. It’s a zoo here already. Bye.”
“Bye.” He folded shut the phone. “Sorry, hon.”
“She couldn’t wait at least until eight?” Claire had recognized Neva’s personal ring.
Max exhaled carefully and pushed himself up to a sitting position. “There’s a lot going on in the wake of the fire.”
“Ain’t that the truth.”
Her face half hidden in the comforter, he couldn’t make out her expression. The unusual dusky morning light didn’t help. “How are you?”
No sound from her.
“Go back to sleep if you need to.”
“Please don’t tell me what to do.”
Max shut his eyes. It was obvious how she was. Angry.
He thought about the sweet time with his parents the previous night. They’d communicated as never before in his lifetime. Confessions of wrong attitudes. A clearing of the air. A meeting of minds and hearts. True forgiveness, given and received. Sunlight in his soul.
“Claire, please forgive me for not being there for you through the years. Please give me a chance to make it all up to you.”
“I don’t need another piece of jewelry.”
“I’m not talking about things. I mean I want to be there for you, always, in every way you need.”
“Why didn’t you come?”
“What? When?”
“When do you think? Your daughter and your parents and your wife were almost killed on Monday night. That would be the ‘when.’”
He really wanted a cup of coffee. “I honestly thought you were fine. According to the news, you all were fine.”
“Did you ever think that even if the fire didn’t come our way, we weren’t fine? Your parents are old, and—in case you haven’t noticed—I’ve been a basket case since July.”
“I’m sorry.”
“What on God’s green earth was so important Monday night that you couldn’t take a couple hours to run up there? Football? . . . Oh.” She inhaled sharply. “Were you with her?”
He went still.
He sensed Claire become even more still.
At last he said, “It wasn’t like that—”
“I moved out. I left you.” She threw the covers back and swung her feet to the floor. “In some circles, I guess that gives you permission to see other women. I can’t stay here.” Without a backward glance she hurried toward the bathroom.
So much for sunlight in his soul.
Max avoided eye contact with Claire in the kitchen. It wasn’t difficult given that the television blared and seven other people were fixing themselves breakfast. He made small talk and ate whatever his kids offered. An omelet, a bagel, and fruit made their way to his plate.
Later, while shaving, he realized what a pathetic picture he made of tiptoeing around his wife. In the hopes of delaying her wrath, he behaved like someone ready for the loony bin.
His hand slipped, and the razor nicked his chin.
What was that about sunlight in his soul?
He stuck a Band-Aid on his face, dressed for work, and found Claire alone outside, sweeping the patio.
“Claire.”
“You’re going to the office.” Disbelief filled her voice.
“I have to. We can’t exactly shut down like the public school system.” Too late he heard his snappish tone and swallowed it. “There’s just a lot going on.”
She propped the broom against a chair and looked at him. “There’s a lot going on here, too, with your family.”
“What do you expect me to do?”
“Nothing. That’s what I learned Monday night, anyway—to expect you to do nothing. Then I won’t be disappointed. We can take care of each other like we always have, without you here.”
“Why in the world do you think I go to work if it’s not to take care of my family?”
“That is not the point. I’m talking about things money can’t buy.” She stepped nearer him. “Max.” Her tone grew soft and yet self-assured. “I truly do respect and appreciate how you’ve been our provider. I always have. It’s one reason it was so easy to fill in where you couldn’t. Your plate was full. But listen. Your family is hurting today, and money won’t speak to that. Only your presence—constant and not in between phone conversations—will help.”
He stared at her, at the stranger she had become. It was her confidence now that scared him.
She said, “I lived through the worst night of my life without you. Now I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that I can live through anything without you.”
“Claire, I love you. I need you.”
She picked up the broom and resumed sweeping.
“I’ll be home as soon as I can possibly get away. We’ll talk then. Please, Claire. Okay?”
She looked up, gave him an odd smile, and pointed at her throat. “Hurts to talk much. Good-bye.”
Frustrated, he stomped through the house and into the garage, her words echoing in his head. As he pulled from their drive onto the main road, he heard the finality in how she’d said, “Good-bye.”
She easily could have said, “Have a nice life.”
At a stop sign he hesitated. Should he turn back? Could he be the kind of father and husband and son she wanted him to be?
Then he thought of the chaos at the office, of the loss of stature and revenue for his company if he didn’t take care of certain things only he could take care of.
Behind him a driver honked.
Max drove through the intersection, toward the freeway, toward Beaumont Staffing.
Seventy-seven
Jenna sat on a chair in her parents’ bedroom and watched her mother dig through a dresser drawer. “Mom, I can stay and help you.”
“No. Thanks. I’ll be fine. Nana and Papa will appreciate your help at the hacienda. I’m just not up for going there . . .” Her voice trailed off, and a dazed expression crossed her face.
Jenna’s stomach lurched at yet another sight of her mom falling apart. “Do you want
to see a counselor or someone? You’ve been through a traumatic experience. It wouldn’t hurt Lexi, either, to talk with a professional.”
“Maybe. Later. Right now I just want to rest.”
“Then sit still, for goodness’ sake.”
Claire glanced up. Her face was gray and drawn. “I have no ID, no cell, no credit card, no car. I can’t even remember where I left my purse. House or car? I don’t know. Not that it matters where it burned, but isn’t that crazy?”
At the sound of hysteria in her mom’s voice, panic clutched at Jenna. “It doesn’t matter, Mom. You don’t need any of that stuff yet. We’ll take care of it later this week.”
“I— Oh, good. Here’s my passport. People use passports instead of driver’s licenses, right?” She pulled things from the drawer. “A Visa card. I can rent a car. Great. My old glasses. Not as cool as the Donna Karans—”
“Mom!”
“What?”
“What are you doing?”
Claire shut the drawer, card in one hand, eyeglasses in the other, and sat on the bed. Her cheeks were bright pink now.
“Mom, Dad’s taking care of everything. Why won’t you let him?”
“I can’t.”
“Why not?”
“Jenna, the traumatic experience didn’t change anything between us.”
“Oh my gosh! It did so! It changed him! You should have seen him, Mom. He sobbed like a baby that night.”
“Mm-hmm. So did I. He could have been there.”
“You’re leaving again, aren’t you?”
“Not again. Still. I’m picking up where we left off. We’re sepa-rated. I’m finding my own voice. I’m finding my safe harbor.”
“That night changed things between me and Kevin. We’re each other’s safe harbor.”
“Honey, I know. I’m proud you did the hard thing and told him how it hurt you when he reenlisted. It’s what I should have done at your age.”
“I don’t want to go through life without him, even if he is sent overseas.”
Claire nodded. “I’m glad you’re back together and working things out. You’re becoming a team. Your dad and I should have been one, but I let him take away my identity by not speaking up. I blame me, not him.”
“Then why are you leaving?”
“Because now I’m speaking up, and he doesn’t want to listen.” Jenna bit her lip. “Are you going to Tandy’s?”
“Just to pack my things.”
“Where will you stay? Not in that awful house we rented! Let the owner keep the deposit. There’s no furniture, and there’s rust in the bathroom sink!”
“Well, I could stay there, but since I don’t have a roommate, I think not.” She shrugged. “Tandy will take me to a car rental place this afternoon; then I plan to go to the coast and find a motel room.”
“A motel room!”
“I need to be by myself for a few days. Honey, please don’t cry.”
“Dad’s trying!”
Claire pressed her lips together.
“You could at least give him a chance!” With a sob Jenna hurried from the room.
Her mom had totally gone off the deep end this time.
Seventy-eight
Claire carried her violin case and pulled a wheeled suitcase down Tandy’s hall. Only three more feet and I’m out of here.
If Tandy would ever budge. She had picked Claire up at the house and taken her to rent a car. Claire went to her condo and packed her things. Now ready to leave, she found the exit blocked by her friend, arms crossed, legs wide.
“Claire.” Tandy flicked her fingers beneath one eye, then the other. “You shouldn’t be alone right now.”
“Please don’t go sappy on me.”
“I can’t help it. Forty-eight hours ago I thought you were dead. I thought Lexi and Indio and Ben were dead. So did everybody else. How do you expect us to let you out of our sight already?”
“Me out of your sight? So it’s you who shouldn’t be alone, not me.”
“Same difference.”
“Tandy, give me a break. I just went through this with my kids. I can’t take care of you all!”
“We need to comfort each other. Sort of a group decompression.”
“You know, I’m the one who thought I was going to die. I’m the one facing ghosts.”
“All the more reason not to go it alone. You’ve heard my pastor speak. He’s compassionate and wise. He’d be over here lickety-split if I ask him.”
“How many ways can I say this? I do not want to talk to anyone!”
“Till when?”
“I don’t know till when! I told you, I’ll be at that Villa place in Oceanside. They have telephones. I will get a new cell phone as soon as possible. I am not going anywhere else.”
“I’ll come over and take you to dinner tomorrow night.”
“No.”
“Max needs you.”
“Ha. Right. Ben was telling me yesterday about ‘foxhole epiphanies,’ how fear makes you see things differently. They can help you set things right, or they can cause you to make worthless promises. Max’s epiphany falls in the latter category. He’ll get over it. He already did. He went to work.”
“I really think he’s changed.”
“Tandy! Get off my back!”
She flinched as if Claire had slapped her. “You’ve turned into a selfish witch.”
“Thanks.”
Tandy moved aside.
Claire went to the door, yanked it open, and strode through it without a backward glance. She heard it click shut behind her.
Claire’s throat felt scraped raw.
As it should. She’d shrieked and cried and gotten sick in the gold mine. She’d inhaled smoke and ash for days. And to top it off, she’d just yelled at her best friend.
On the balcony of her hotel room a block from the beach, she pulled on her jacket and settled into a chair. Ash was not falling here. The sky remained overcast, but it was a normal gray, not that ugly yellowish tint. The sound of muffled ocean waves racing to shore reached her ears. Their constancy soothed her nerves. She gulped in large amounts of clean salt air.
Poor Tandy. She’d gotten the brunt of it all after Claire managed to hold herself together with her family.
Jenna’s emotional reaction in the bedroom when Claire searched for money and cards had convinced her she needed to talk to her other kids before leaving the house.
Max was at the office. Of course. Ben and Indio were sequestered in the guest room. Jenna and Kevin disappeared outdoors some-where. Claire approached Erik, Danny, and Lexi on the drive in front of the house. They were preparing to go to the hacienda with their grandparents.
Lexi said, “Mom, you don’t look ready for this.”
“I’m not. Actually . . .”
Danny caught her eye. She suspected he knew already, not because Jenna told him, but because he noticed things better than his sib-lings did.
“Actually,” she said, “I’m not ready for any of this. I guess I’m still shell-shocked. This reunion is wonderful. All of you staying overnight here has meant the world to me. But tomorrow or the next day, you’ll get back to your regular lives.”
Danny said, “Mom, he’s trying so hard.”
She held up a finger. “Let me finish. You should get back to your regular lives. My regular life, three days ago, wasn’t here. I was in the middle of finding my own voice again. I have to—” Her energy gave out at that point. She’d told them she was leaving. It was all she could say.
But Lexi nodded. “You have issues to deal with, like that thing in the gold mine. Abandonment. Feeling safe and secure.”
Grateful surprise flooded through her. Lexi had grown by leaps and bounds through that night. “Exactly.”
Lexi smiled and gave her a thumbs-up.
Claire turned to her eldest.
Erik shrugged. “Do what you gotta do.”
Claire’s throat caught at the defeated expression on his face. The night had done so
mething to him. It had muted him. There he was, living with a great special feature story for his evening news, and he refused to allow any reporter or photographer to interview his family.
Already the news was old. His station and others, as well as the newspapers and People magazine, had gleaned what they needed from Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. She was glad not to be included and trusted that Erik would recover after a time.
“Mom.” Danny’s tone challenged. “Why not give Dad another chance?”
Toxic words spewed forth. “Because he gave up his right to another chance when he chose to work on Monday and spend that night with Neva instead of coming to the hacienda.”
She shouldn’t have said that.
But she had, and it was the truth, and there was no taking it back. Let them discuss it with their father.
Claire shut her eyes now.
Maybe she’d always been a selfish witch, really, deep down inside. If that were true, she might as well stop trying to hide behind nicey-nice smiles and agreeable words.
It seemed she’d already stopped doing those things. She’d spouted off to everyone—everyone she supposedly loved. She’d alienated them. And now there she was, spending a large chunk of her hus-band’s money—which she claimed wasn’t important—on a beach motel and rental car. She would eat at restaurants and buy books and make long-distance calls to her kids. Of course, if they didn’t answer, there’d be no charge.
One person would answer, though. He’d promised he’d be there for her. He’d said his number was listed in the phone book.
Seventy-nine
Alone at last.” Kevin set a gym bag on the floor and shut the apartment door.
Walking toward their kitchen, Jenna threw him a weak smile. She was exhausted every which way. They had spent most of the day at the hacienda with her grandparents, Erik, and the twins. They sifted through the fire’s aftermath, finding very few salvageable items. It all had been too sad for words. Even Papa had wept, more for the loss of chickens and his favorite old horse than for the material things in the house. Nana mourned little—except for the photos, the mementos, the only tangibles of her lost son.
