by Gina Holmes
Larry whispered, “Recognize your protégé?”
I studied the kid as he preached. “My what?” I looked a little closer. He had more hair on his face now and less on top, but I was pretty sure it was him. “Angelo?”
Larry just smiled. “Listen to him. You won’t believe it’s the same kid.”
So, there we sat, shaking from the poor condition of the road and poorer condition of the bus’s shocks and listened to Angelo give a sermon that would have made Billy Graham proud. I noticed the young woman dressed in the waitress uniform listening intently.
He finished by holding up the cross one more time. “Who can tell me what this is?
“The cross,” Larry said. “The symbol of Christ.”
“Crucifixion,” the toothless musician called out.
“Forgiveness,” I said.
The bus pulled to a stop and let out the twentysomethings and a middle-aged woman. Angelo and everyone else remained silent until the doors whooshed shut again and the bus began to move.
“What I see when I look at this is a crossroad,” Angelo said. “I see a place where anyone can turn and take a different path.” He looked at me and smiled. “Like I did. You know what else I see?”
“What?” the musician asked.
“When I look at the cross, I see a t for truth. God is truth. Satan is the father of all lies. The Bible says you will know the truth and the truth will set you free. It also says whoever the Son sets free is free indeed. Who here wants to be set free?”
He said a little more after that, but I didn’t hear another word. I zoned, looking out the window, thinking about what a surprise Angelo turned out to be and all the stuff he’d said. I began to think about what the cross meant to him and what, if anything, it really meant to me.
When the bus had made its full rounds and had dropped us back off where we started, Angelo didn’t move. I imagined he was preparing himself to speak to the next group of passengers.
“You did good, Angelo,” I said as we passed him.
I put my hand out to shake but he hugged me instead. “I’m going to be an urban missionary,” he said.
I smiled. “Looks like you already are.”
Larry and I walked back to where we parked. The streetlights made buzzing sounds above us, and the highway roared with traffic just behind the bend.
“Wow,” I said. “I didn’t see that coming.”
“God’s amazing.” He looked over at me. “You just never know what a person has in them. His parents are mad because he quit community college. Can you imagine that? You’ve got a preacher for a son and you’re mad because he won’t become a paralegal.”
“No.” I thought of Benji. “I can’t. I’m surprised that bus driver didn’t make him stop.”
“He’s an elder in our church. He’s the one that encouraged Angelo to do it. I don’t think he likes the job much anyway.”
I laughed. “Well, that’s one way to get fired. Hey, thanks for taking me to hear him.”
“No problem.” He slid into the front seat of his Jimmy. “Couldn’t have my best friend believing he can’t do anything right.”
I felt myself choke up. “Thanks,” I whispered. “I needed that.”
He gave my shoulder a quick squeeze. “We all do sometimes.”
Thirty-Five
As I lay on Larry’s couch, light from the nearly full moon streamed through the part in the curtains and across my face. I should have gotten up and pulled the shade, but I was warm in my blanket, and walking all the way across the room seemed like a ridiculously far distance at one in the morning.
Racing thoughts, along with the blaring music from the tricked-out Jeep parked outside the rental house beside us, had kept me tossing and turning for the last hour. I would have liked to yell for the punks to shut up, but again, that would have taken effort, especially if they decided to yell back.
I flipped to face the wall, but still couldn’t get comfortable. I missed my bed. More than that, I missed lying next to Kyra in it. I wondered how long it would take for someone to take my place there.
Men were like vultures when they sensed vulnerability in a woman. As I stared at a scuff on the wall, I hoped she wouldn’t fall prey to the bombardment of seduction attempts she was sure to have to endure in the coming months, when word got out about our divorce.
The thought of another man in my bed, touching my wife, made me insane with jealousy. The fact that the punishment fit the crime only managed to make me feel worse.
I reminded myself of her strong moral character and that whatever she did from now on was really no business of mine. According to her, we were no longer an us. We were a used to be, a should have been, and if I hadn’t been such an idiot, a would have been.
Laying there on my lumpy pillow, listening to AC/DC shake the neighborhood, my mind ran amok. I thought of just how much like my father I turned out to be. Just like him, if I died tomorrow, what I had done to Kyra and our family would be the legacy I’d leave behind. If he’d lived, he would have had all his life to make amends. I considered, for the first time, that he might actually have tried. I hated it for him, and me, that he’d never had the chance. I hated that my forgiveness for him had come only now, four decades after he’d died.
I also thought of Angelo and how brave he was to preach on the metro like that.
Who would have dreamed that a shy kid with a chip on his shoulder had that in him? I mulled over the Scriptures he’d quoted about truth and being set free. Freedom was exactly what I needed—from my sin, from my guilt, and from the web of lies I had spun around myself and my marriage. I thought about what my own preacher had said years earlier—that if we confess our sins, God is faithful and just to forgive them. I’d never given that promise much thought, but as I lay there covered in the filth of my guilt, I found myself clinging to it.
There was nothing left to do but take God up on His generous offer, and so I confessed it all. With each sin that I admitted came a release from guilt, until I felt nothing but the freedom I’d been promised.
It couldn’t have been more than a few minutes, since the same song was playing on the car radio outside when I finished, but it felt like hours as I admitted to every sin I could remember ever committing. I’m sure I left out a lot of them, but still I felt like I’d thrown off a boulder.
He is faithful and just to forgive us. . . .
Lord, I’m holding You to that.
I truly believed that I had His pardon at that moment. Down to my marrow, I felt it. Now I just needed Kyra’s. How stupid I’d been to think I could throw a few shallow gestures at her and expect her to absolve me from what I’d done. She wasn’t stupid. She could see as well as anyone through the superficiality of a person.
I thought of the waitress clinging to Angelo’s every word and wondered if she had been carrying a burden as heavy as mine and if she was able to throw hers off like I did. I hoped so.
This, in turn, led me to think of the toothless musician and how happy he looked strumming that guitar of his, which then led me to think of Kyra and her desire to be a lounge pianist, and Benji’s to be a fisherman. When had I gotten it in my head that money equaled happiness? It certainly hadn’t worked out that way for me.
How different might our lives have turned out if we had stayed in Braddy’s Wharf? Somewhere along the way, my family had sacrificed not only the home they loved, but their dreams for mine. No wonder Kyra stopped wanting to make love to me. How attractive is a person who belittles your aspirations every chance they get?
Too bad the epiphany hadn’t come to me before I’d dragged my family to Rolling Springs and into Danielle’s bed. Looking back, moving here was really the first nail in the coffin, and while sleeping with Danielle might turn out to be the last, there were plenty of others along the way: too many nights working late and put-downs, cancelled vacations, hours spent watching TV while pretending to listen—the list could go on forever.
It seemed my whole life played
out in my mind as I lay there staring at the wall, but the thought that revisited the most was Alfred’s advice to apologize. I knew Kyra deserved at least that much. Not one of my halfhearted attempts at half-truths, but an apology for what I had really done.
I knew if I had to look her in the eye while doing it, there was a good chance I’d chicken out, so I decided to put it in writing. She might never forgive me, but maybe coming clean would eventually help me forgive myself.
Since I couldn’t seem to fall asleep anyway, I figured now was as good a time as any. Tomorrow was my last day of vacation and then I’d likely be caught up in the whirlwind of either being promoted or else teaching Larry everything I knew so he could be. I would deliver the letter tomorrow and let the chips fall where they may.
I rolled out of bed and pulled out a legal pad and pen from my briefcase. Sitting at Larry’s desk, I put the pen to paper and prayed that he was right—that the truth would somehow set me free.
Dear Kyra,
My dearest Kyra,
It seems like yesterday I was watching you play the piano at Sophia’s. Even then I knew you were too good for that place. Too good for me.
You were, and are, the most beautiful, talented, and wonderful woman in the world. What I did was bad, honey. So, so bad. I don’t just mean with Danielle; I mean telling you that my idea of a life well spent was more important than yours. You should be able to play at restaurants if it makes you happy. I’m sorry I tried to make you feel bad about wanting that. What you enjoy is what you enjoy, and you shouldn’t have to justify it to me or anyone else.
You could have made me feel bad about wanting to sell cars for a living, but you didn’t. Instead you let me uproot you from a place you loved, a job you loved, and friends you loved, so I could follow my dreams. (I realize now just how small they were in the grand scheme of things.)
Kyra, my love, my soul mate, my best friend, we’ve gotten so far offtrack, but I believe your accident was God’s way of giving us a second chance. It’s up to us what we do with it.
Words are inadequate to describe just how in love with you I am . . . and how very sorry. If you somehow find the grace to forgive me, there will be no more lies, no more omissions of truth, and no woman on the face of this earth that will tempt me away from you again. You promised in Milan that you would never leave me no matter what. I know it wasn’t fair of me to ask that of you, but fair or not, I’m begging you to find it in your heart to keep that promise.
Darling, I am the thief on the cross beside Jesus, the woman at the well, and the man who loves you more than his own life.
Even if you can’t forgive me, I’m going to spend the rest of my life trying to make this up to you.
Love always,
The man who used to be your samurai
I read and reread the letter. Maybe it wasn’t great, but at least every word was the truth for a change.
* * *
The next day, I slid on a pair of dress pants and light sweater, shaved, combed my hair, brushed my teeth, and even polished my shoes. I had never been so nervous in my life. I checked myself in the mirror, rebrushed my teeth and hair, and checked myself again.
I tilted my head back and pinched a drop of Visine into each eye. Looking at myself I realized I still looked every bit as worn out as I felt.
“You need a miracle,” I said to my reflection, and so he prayed for one.
Letter in hand, I pulled up outside my house to find Kyra, dressed to kill in a black skirt and silk blouse, getting into her car. She didn’t even throw me a glance as she shut the door.
I looked up at the rain clouds strewn across a gray sky, and a raindrop hit my windshield, followed by another. I smiled and rolled down my window.
“The drought’s over,” I called to her.
The look on her face reminded me that ours wasn’t.
I inched my vehicle forward so that my window met hers. “Where are you headed?”
She pulled the rearview down and dabbed at the lipstick at the corner of her mouth. “I have another job interview.”
“Piano?”
“Yes, I am a pianist, Eric. At least I was until I married you.”
She pushed the mirror back into place. “What do you want?”
I started to open my door.
“Don’t get out. I’m in a hurry.”
“Kyra, please,” I said.
She turned the ignition. “Please what? Please forget that you want to make out with someone half your age under the northern lights? Isn’t that what you promised her in that e-mail?”
I picked up the envelope from the passenger seat but then set it down again. I couldn’t give it to her right before an interview. Instead, I said, “Good luck, sweetheart. I hope you get it.”
I watched her car turn the corner, then pulled into the driveway of my soon-to-be ex-home. Rain soaked me as I hurried up the walkway. When I stepped into the house and closed the door, I was drenched. Benji was lying on the couch staring at a black TV screen. “Is it raining?” he asked looking at me.
“Can’t you hear it?”
Unless he had more than one pair of sweatpants stained with ketchup on the right thigh, he was wearing the same pants as when I’d last seen him. I held up the letter I’d written to Kyra. “Can you please make sure your mother gets this?” I laid it on the table by the door.
“Mom tell you she’s auditioning at Sal’s?”
I sat beside him. “Yeah.”
“You know how much that stupid job will pay, and that’s if she even gets it?”
I shrugged.
“Straight tips. Guess she’ll be living on alimony.”
“How are you?” I asked.
He laid his head on the armrest. “Good, I guess. I started filling out college applications.”
“Do you actually want to go to college?”
He opened his mouth to say something but closed it again.
“Go ahead,” I said. “Tell me the truth. This is your life, Ben, not mine.”
“I can’t think of anything I’d rather do less.”
My heart sank, but I did my best to hide it. “That’s okay. College isn’t for everyone. You still thinking you might want to make a living from the ocean?”
He looked at me a long time, then said, “I was thinking that I could maybe get a job as a sales associate and work my way up like you did.”
“No,” I said so gruffly that I think it shocked the both of us.
He sat up. “Why not? You make good money.”
“Money isn’t everything.”
“Since when?” He kicked his bare feet against the base of the couch and looked over at the envelope I’d laid down. “Is that divorce papers?”
“If your mother wants a divorce, she’ll have to be the one to do it. It’s just a letter.”
“She’s so mad at you.”
“I know.”
“She probably is going to divorce you, you know.” There was vulnerability in his tone and I hated it for him. Hated it for all of us.
“I hope not.”
“Me, too.” He scratched at the ketchup stain. “Mom says we’re going to sell the house.”
Hearing it made me sad, but it didn’t surprise me. “She did?”
“Yeah. She said she hates it here. She wants to go back home.”
“To Braddy’s Wharf?”
He gave me a sad look. “She’s just talking. She wouldn’t leave us here.”
“She’d leave me,” I said.
“If she were serious about moving, she wouldn’t be applying for jobs here.”
“I hope you’re right.”
“So, will you get me a job at Thompson’s?”
I hated the thought of my son spending his adult years the way I had, but I reminded myself that they were his to do with what he wanted. “Is that what you really want?”
He shrugged. “Will you?”
“Sure, but Benji, money really isn’t everything, which is good because you won�
�t be making a whole lot of it in the beginning.”
“That’s okay,” he said. “As much as I like money and love the ocean, working at Thompson’s would give me a chance to spend time with you.”
“I’d like that,” I said. “We’ve never gotten to do much of that, have we?”
He shook his head.
“Ben, I’m sorry I didn’t spend more time with you when you were growing up. I want you to know that I regret that.”
He looked at me for a long time. “Me, too,” he finally said.
Thirty-Six
My first day back to work I felt completely disoriented, but then I hadn’t been off more than two days in a row for years. I suppose it made matters worse that two of our regular employees were now gone, and Thompson kept me from getting anything significant done by calling me into his office every five minutes. It might have given me confidence if he hadn’t been doing the same thing with Larry.
I had no idea what he was talking to Larry about, but in my case, it was mostly just a lot of questions about operations. At first I assumed he was doing sort of a stream of pop quizzes just to make sure I knew my stuff before he made up his mind, but then I caught him taking notes, which made me wonder if he was trying to extract as much practical information as he could just in case I decided to quit.
The funny thing was, for the first time since I had started working for Thompson, I didn’t feel like the world would end if I didn’t get the promotion. If I did, great; but if I didn’t, well, that would just mean that Larry had. I actually found myself wanting it for him as much as I ever had for myself.
Despite feeling a little disoriented at being away so long, dealing with the tension over who Thompson would pick to succeed him, and the avalanche of paperwork that had built up on my desk in my absence, being at work felt more comfortable than it had in a long time.
It was a relief to not have to deal with Danielle anymore. Santana, on the other hand, I kind of missed. He was the only other guy on the lot with a sense of humor that mirrored Larry’s and mine.
