Every Time You Go Away

by Beth Harbison

  He laughed.

  Half an hour later, their moms pulled up. The greeting scene happened. High-pitched, lots of hugs, compliments all around. Kelsey turned down the music from her phone in her back pocket when her mom told her it was way, way too loud. He laughed at Kelsey’s cringe. Jamie’s mom was looking at him when he laughed. She was looking a little too knowingly.

  He acted normal.

  The yard, he decided as he surveyed it instead of looking back at his mom, was about ready to be mowed. That big, satisfying moment that he’d been looking forward to, for whatever reason.

  The three of them went inside. He mowed the lawn. It was as immensely satisfying as he’d hoped it would be.

  Once inside, he saw all three of the girls sitting in the living room chatting. He didn’t listen full-on as he washed his hands and dug under his fingernails to get the dirt out. What he gleaned was that Kelsey had broken up with a boyfriend a couple days ago, and finished her summer-school class and was tired of her best friend who was constantly hanging out with her boyfriend and had no concept of the third-wheel effect.

  So he kind of listened.

  He grabbed a bottle of water and stood in the kitchen drinking it.

  “Jamie, come in here!” said Kristin.

  He downed the rest of the water, tossed it, and grabbed another one.

  Kristin scooted over. “Take a seat. Not, you know, too close.”

  He sat down directly next to her. “Sorry, am I sweaty?”

  She cracked up and pushed at him with her elbow. “Good lord, you’re slick.” He popped up onto the armrest of the couch, and gave Kristin a wink. They always had that give-each-other-as-much-shit-as-possible relationship.

  “So how’s the job?” she asked.

  He shrugged. “It’s pretty good. Good in that it’s really easy and they give me free wings every day.”

  They offered him beer too, once so far, which he’d taken them up on. He didn’t mention this.

  He glanced at Kelsey, who almost seemed to know what he was thinking. He narrowed his eyes at her and she smiled.

  “I’m just an expo, so I run the food from the kitchen to the tables. I get tipped out and make hourly. Apparently it’s a couple steps up from where I could start at a restaurant. I’m not a dishwasher or a busboy. They said they might want me barbacking.”

  “Any talk of serving?” asked Kristin.

  “Nope.”

  She shrugged. “I don’t know, maybe you can’t even serve when you’re under eighteen. Can’t remember the law; anyway, you may not be able to.”

  “Not sure.”

  “So, wait,” said Kelsey, “you’re staying the rest of the summer?”

  He glanced at his mom. Shrugged again. “No reason to go home, really, got the job, so I guess I’ll see.”

  His mom tried not to look glad he was considering staying. She pressed her lips together in a thin line and looked elsewhere in the room.

  Kelsey looked angrily at him.

  “What?” he asked.

  “You’re staying. I’m jealous. Going home sounds awful.” She looked at Kristin. “No offense, Ma, just everyone at home is so…” She took a deep breath and lay back.

  “You’re welcome to stay as long as you want or your mom will let you,” said Jamie’s mom. “But I’m putting your skinny ass to work, you know that.”

  She sat up. “Wait, are you serious?”

  Jamie wanted to ask the same thing.

  Both of them were looking at her now, and Kristin was looking at Jamie and Kelsey.

  “Y-yeah? I mean, if you want to stay here while the house is still ours, might as well get some more use out of it. And I could use the help. The company would be nice too, you’re always a pleasure, Kelsey.”

  Kelsey gaped and then said, “I would literally shave my head to stay here with you guys for the whole summer.”

  Jamie’s mom looked at him. They hadn’t intended to stay any determined amount of time. But he didn’t want this plan to get cut down. It would be awesome to hang out with Kelsey again. She was like a guy. No pressure.

  Willa looked away from Jamie and then said, “I get the feeling you’d shave your head for fifty bucks.”

  Kelsey looked wryly at her. “Don’t tempt me unless you’ve got a buzzer in the house.”

  “Are you serious?” asked Kristin. Jamie expected the question to be directed at Kelsey, but it wasn’t, it was directed at his mom.

  She shrugged. “I don’t know, I guess—why not?” A look passed between them that Jamie didn’t get. “I think I’m not putting a necessary finish date on the house fix-up. Definitely by the end of the summer. But not like this week. Plus Jamie’s got this job! It’s sort of perfect. One last summer send-off.”

  “Actually,” said Jamie, sort of hoping to hammer in the last nail, “my job asked if I knew any girls who might want a job.”

  Kelsey raised her eyebrows and then lowered them and looked around the room, putting her hands on her thighs. Gesture of Well, that settles it.

  Their moms exchanged another look. There was no telling what it meant, but the look itself was unmistakable.

  Jamie got the feeling everyone in the room had stronger feelings about this than they were letting on.

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  Willa

  When we’d gotten back to the house, Kristin was delighted to find Kelsey there, and I was even more delighted to see Jamie looking so happy to be talking with her. He hid it, of course, wiping the excitement from his expression the moment I arrived (because he knew I’d see it) but it was still a relief to see. He needed some fun, some normal conversation. Something that wasn’t a whiny, moody girlfriend.

  Kelsey certainly fit that bill.

  We had a pleasant dinner together, and then played a game of hearts, which I am hopelessly bad at. I can never remember what the trump is, or what the last person’s move was. So, naturally, I lost three games in a row before Kristin announced she was exhausted and I took the opportunity to grab my laptop and tell everyone I was going to go upstairs and do some work on next year’s curriculum before hitting the hay myself.

  The kids looked at each other like something suspicious was going on, so I added, “I’ll be up for a while, probably in and out of the kitchen, so let me know if you need anything.” It sounded like I’d be checking up on them, but the truth was I just wanted some alone time and I was grateful that everyone had each other now so that I could sneak off by myself without leaving anyone alone and lonely.

  The truth was, I was hoping to see Ben again.

  I followed Kristin to her room and asked, “How’s it going in here? You doing all right?”

  She looked at me, her expression completely unassuming. “Great, yeah, no problem. It’s really nice to wake up in here and see the sea and sky. When I’m in my house I’m glad that the neighbors are close so they could hear me scream if I needed them to, but there is a lot to be said for having some privacy. I could walk straight out buck naked here and no one could see me.”

  No one except the ghosts, I thought.

  * * *

  An hour later I was in my room when Dolly suddenly lifted her head from her snore spot on the bed and started staring at a spot where I could see nothing. Her hackles went up.

  “Ben?” I asked quietly, and moved in front of her to see if there was a cold spot.

  There was. I shivered.

  “Ben? Are you here?”

  A warmth came over me. Not a physical warmth—the spot was still cold—but more a feeling of well-being.

  He was here.

  And a moment later, he was. I could see him. Relief flooded me. Apparently that spread to Dolly as well, because as suddenly as she’d been on alert, she put her head back down and closed her eyes.

  “It’s almost time,” he said.

  “Time for what?” But I knew. Without him even saying it, I knew he was saying he was going to leave for good.

  “You know.” He gave a nod
. “I love you, Willa. You’re doing a great job with Jamie. He’s a good kid.”

  “He misses you.” Something frantic was building in me, trying to make a case for him to stay.

  “But he has you. And you are enough for him.”

  “I haven’t been!”

  “You have to be.” His voice grew firm. “I know it’s not what you signed up for, but life is unpredictable.” He splayed his arms and gave a wry smile. “Witness.”

  A lump rose in my throat. “This is too hard. It’s not fair.” God, I hated the whininess in my voice. More, I hated the whininess in my heart. My inner toddler was stamping her feet and saying, No! I won’t go on! Not until I get my way.

  But my way was impossible.

  “It seems unfair,” he agreed calmly. “But you have a lot more ahead of you. Great things that you can’t even see or imagine are right in front of you if you just open yourself up to them.” He eyed me. “There are people you have yet to meet who will make you so happy.”

  My heart gave a jump, but I honestly couldn’t say whether it was because the words were encouraging or discouraging because he wasn’t jealous or possessive of me. That he didn’t think we were the only people for each other. In short, I guess, that he didn’t love me with all the romance of Lord Byron or Shelley in death.

  “People aren’t meant to be alone,” he said. “You in particular are not meant to be alone. You’re at your best in a relationship, and I want you to have that again. You’ve been incredibly strong on your own, and like I said, you’ve done a great job with Jamie, but no one should have to do all the stuff of life alone.”

  I put my head in my hands and felt deep sobs coming on. I held my breath and tried to keep them back, but they came anyway.

  Dolly raised her head again and looked at me. I put a hand on her and felt myself calm down marginally.

  Even in his otherworldly state, Ben seemed confused by what was happening. Another strike against eternal romance. I would have thought he’d understand everything, be able to read my every thought, but instead he was as lost as he’d ever been with me.

  “What’s wrong?” he asked. “What did I say?”

  “Don’t you miss me?”

  He cocked his head. “Miss you?” I could tell he was playing for time. He always cocked his head like that and repeated my last words back at me when he was trying to stall for an answer.

  My heart broke fractionally more. “Yes, miss me. You’re gone, you’ve been gone three years, don’t you miss me?”

  “I love you,” he said, as if that were compensation.

  “But—”

  He put up a hand. He knew what I was saying and he wasn’t going to make me struggle for it. “Do I wish we could be together like before? Yes. In that, I wish I could show you everything I see, feel, hear, experience now. But there’s no sadness here. Missing someone implies that there’s an uncertainty about ever seeing them or being with them again, and I don’t have that because I know I’ll see you again and that we’ll be together again.”

  My throat tightened. “You know it?”

  He smiled. “I absolutely know it. Of course I know it.” He moved closer to me. “I have a few advantages in this regard that you don’t have.” He touched my nose, or at least made the gesture. I didn’t really feel it except as a swipe of cool air.

  I looked at him longingly. I could feel the desperation on my face, in my expression, the pleading in my eyes, but I couldn’t control it. “When?” I pleaded. “When will that be?”

  “A hundred years for you is the blink of an eye,” he said. “Soon enough. And you need to enjoy your life in the meantime. Your purpose is not fulfilled.”

  “And what is my purpose?”

  He shook his finger at me. “No, no, no, I can’t tell you that. No one can. You have to figure it out for yourself.”

  I frowned and ruffled the dog’s fur. “Great. So you know the big secret of my life, but you can’t tell me because it’s my little journey to figure it out.”

  “Actually, it’s a big journey, and no, I don’t know.” He was as patient as a saint. “I don’t know any more about your path than anyone else could tell you, which is primarily that you still have our son to live for, take care of, and set a good example for.”

  I felt shamed by his words, not because of the way he said them or even the fact that he said them, but because I knew it to be true and I’d been giving myself too much of a pass by indulging in my grief when I should have been setting an example for Jamie by living. Not dying along with the dead.

  “You’re right,” I croaked through a tight throat and tears I was trying to withhold. “I should go talk to him right now, tell him how sorry I am for not stepping up to the plate.”

  “Whoa.” Ben put his hands out. “Right now is not a good time. He’s hanging out with Kristin’s kid. That’s good for him.”

  “You have no idea,” I scoffed. “Or do you? Did you ever see his ex-girlfriend?”

  “Not really. When I’m around, I can feel you guys but not watch you like you’re on TV or something.”

  “I don’t get it.”

  “I know you don’t.” He chuckled. “And I can’t explain it better than that. Most of the time I just don’t have a clear view of your day-to-day life so much as what’s in your heart.”

  “Okay.”

  He looked skeptical. “Okay?”

  I nodded. “I mean, I don’t really get it, but I’m trying.”

  Before he could answer, there was a knock at the door.

  “Mom?”

  I looked to Ben quickly, hoping this glorious moment of overlap would result in Jamie getting the chance to experience him.

  But he was gone.

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  Willa

  Instead, he’d probably heard me talking—vehemently, no less—to “myself” in here and was worried I’d lost my mind. I looked around and my view landed on my cell phone on the bedside table. I picked it up and said, audibly, “Hold on,” then, “Come on in, Jamie!”

  From somewhere, I swear I could feel Ben’s amused gaze on me.

  “I heard you talking to someone,” Jamie said, coming into the room. Dolly lifted her head and thumped her tail at him.

  I held up a finger, stalling for time in my own way, and said into the phone, “I’ll have to call you back. Okay. Right. Bye-bye.” I pushed the home button and hoped he didn’t see the phone illuminate to the home screen and no extinguished call.

  “Who was that?” Jamie looked puzzled.

  “A friend from work.” I thought frantically and could only come up with the scene in The Brady Bunch where Jan made up an imaginary boyfriend named George Glass. “Georgina,” I said, as a little joke to myself in honor of the Bradys.

  “Never heard of her.”

  “Yeah, we’ve gotten closer in the last couple of months. She’s trying to get me ‘out there,’ as they say.” Might as well use this opportunity to run Ben’s ideas past Jamie, particularly here in front of him, since I was pretty sure Jamie would acknowledge that it was too soon for me to feel the pressure to start dating.

  “What, you mean like going out with guys?”

  “Yeah, isn’t that nuts?”

  “No.” Jamie breathed what sounded like a sigh of relief. “Shit.” He looked at me sheepishly and corrected himself, badly. “Hell, I’ve been thinking the same thing.”

  I felt like I hadn’t gone low enough for the limbo stick and had snagged my neck on it. “What are you talking about?”

  “You’ve been mourning Dad for years now. It’s time for you to get a new, maybe not husband, but at least a boyfriend.”

  It’s hard to express how much my heart ached at that moment. I had just been “with” Ben, and Jamie was right in front of me, yet I had never felt more alone in my life. Never felt less understood. How could they both think I could just move on and forget?

  My grip tightened on the phone I was still holding. “I don’t need a boyfr
iend,” I told my son. And my husband, by default, if he could still hear me.

  “But I know you’re lonely,” Jamie said. “You spend so much time alone. Until this … this Georgina came along, it was like Kristin and I were your only friends.”

  That was an additional blow I could have done without. Not that he had intended it as one, or as anything other than truth, but basically Jamie was pointing out that I was a lonely loser.

  And, worse, that I was slightly less of one now that I had an imaginary friend.

  “Jamie,” I said calmly. “I’m fine. But I really do appreciate your concern.”

  He nodded, his brown curls bobbing their need for a cut. “Okay, but I just want you to know that I’m cool with it. If you get a boyfriend, I mean. I know Dad’s not coming back.”

  Emotion caught in my throat. I knew Ben wasn’t coming back too, even though he was right here. Jamie couldn’t detect him one bit. If I’d had any lingering hopes that now that he’d appeared Ben could stay and wait out my life with me in some approximation of normal, they were gone now. It was a silly notion, even though I was spending time with him now. He was still just an echo of himself.

  As he had already said on several occasions, I couldn’t understand. I wasn’t going to understand and he wasn’t going to be able to explain it to me. That much was clear.

  It wasn’t that I was reluctant to get it. Although I think I kind of was. But it was more that I just plain wasn’t capable; my human mind just couldn’t wrap itself around these metaphysical concepts. There is just so much more to life than we can ever understand—every religion tells us that, and in much the same way. It’s all about faith and trust, two of the hardest things in the world to conjure when you need them most.

  They say God is found in foxholes, but I have felt it was the opposite—whenever I was in a foxhole situation, that was when it was hardest for me to maintain faith. I hoped like hell, but I was scared to death there was nothing.

  I guess from now on I wouldn’t be able to say there was nothing out there—I had seen Ben and interacted with him and I believed that wholeheartedly.

  But, damn it, I wasn’t sure it was fair. I wasn’t sure any of it was fair or that it ever would be.