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The Truth We Bury: A Novel

Page 27

by Barbara Taylor Sissel


  Instead, she was sitting on the front porch swing, across from AJ and Shea, who were in the rocking chairs near the front door. She and Shea had made lasagna, and it was baking in the oven. Her dad was napping. Something he did a lot of now. Maybe it was from actual need, but it might also be out of a wish to avoid dealing with his part in the mess that had been made. In Lily’s mind, emotional illness was no different from physical illness. It required rest to recover.

  AJ had only wakened and joined Shea and her a bit ago. They had changed his dressing earlier, and they’d both remarked how much better the wound looked. It was no longer as red and swollen as it had been. His ankle, too, while it was still discolored and sore, looked much better now.

  “You may actually be able to stand long enough to marry your bride tomorrow,” Lily said, teasing him.

  He grinned. “I think I already said this—if I have to crawl.”

  “You did.” Shea took his hand. “I hope we get another nice day.”

  While they weren’t holding a rehearsal, they had decided to go ahead with the wedding. In all the chaos, nothing more had been done about canceling it. There hadn’t been time to think about it, or the will to deal with how. The social protocol . . . who knew what it was in a situation like this? They would gather in Dru’s garden at the hour appointed on the invitations and let matters take their course. Right or wrong, that was the decision they’d made.

  What Shea and AJ wanted.

  The breeze sharpened, lifting Lily’s hair, slipping cool fingers beneath her collar. It ruffled the lawn that, since the rain last Thursday, was thickly patched with a wave of late-blooming bluebonnets, a sprinkling of Indian paintbrushes. Later there would be monarda, fire wheels, milkweed, and Blackfoot daisies, mixed with the grass. When Lily was small, five or six years old, she had helped her mother seed the lawn, making it into a meadow of native wildflowers. They had stood on the porch one day when the seed had begun to sprout, and her mama had held Lily’s hand. “They’ll come back every year,” she’d said, “like hope.”

  Lily looked over at AJ. “I have something to tell you. It’s—it’s upsetting, and I’ve been waiting for the right time. I wanted to be sure you were okay.”

  AJ’s gaze on Lily’s was intent and gave her the odd sense that he knew, or at least suspected what she was going to say, but when she said it, “Your dad and I are getting a divorce,” he looked blank.

  “Should I leave?” Shea asked.

  “Absolutely not,” Lily said. “You’re a member of the family, or you will be.”

  “I’m not that surprised.” Now that he’d grasped her meaning, AJ seemed reconciled. “I’ve never thought you and Dad were very happy together.”

  “Really?” Lily was dismayed. She hadn’t realized he’d noticed. “He’s found someone else,” she said, and then she looked away, because somehow it shamed her, although why she should be ashamed when it was Paul who’d been unfaithful, she didn’t know.

  “Who?” AJ asked.

  “Jerry Dix’s wife—or ex-wife, I should say—Pilar.”

  “Are you kidding me? Isn’t she, like, thirty? Didn’t she just have a kid?”

  “Twins. She has three-year-old twins.”

  AJ snorted. “Dad doesn’t even like kids.”

  Lily toed the porch floor again, setting the swing in motion.

  “Are they getting married?”

  “You’ll have to ask him.”

  “I never felt that close to him.” AJ found her gaze. “To either of you, really. It was always, like, every man for himself in our family.”

  For a moment, Lily felt only the sting of regret, but as it dawned on her, the depth of AJ’s isolation growing up, she became furious. This was Paul’s fault. He was the one who had caused their son to feel abandoned when, in the days following AJ’s near-drowning, he had taken the care of her baby out of her hands.

  But she had let him.

  God forgive her, she had let go of her own child, let the string of nannies Paul had hired stand in for her. How could she have done that? It sickened her now to think she had been so easily convinced of her own ineptitude as a mother. Before she could reconsider, she went to AJ, and, kneeling before him, she took his hands in hers. “I know how you feel, and I know why, and I have no excuse. There’s nothing I can say to change it, but if you can forgive me, I’d like a chance to start over. I’d like for us to know each other, if it’s not too late.”

  He looked away.

  She couldn’t see his expression. She sensed disdain, perhaps, or disgust. Certainly he would have doubts. Maybe he suspected her of attempting to manipulate his emotions, the very thing she was trying so hard to avoid. Of course it was too late. He was a grown man, not a child. She couldn’t woo him with promises, cajole him with treats. She started to rise but sank back to her knees when she saw that his eyes were glazed with tears. Reaching up, tentative, gentle, she thumbed them away, unsure of what to say, how to begin. “There are things I should—that I have wanted to tell you—” She paused, thinking, No. This wasn’t the right time to talk of the past—Jesse, and the ordeal at Monarch Lake—and all that those events had cost her and, ultimately, AJ as well. “I love you so much,” she said instead. “From the day I knew you were conceived . . .” Her throat narrowed, closing off further speech.

  He slumped toward her, balancing his forehead on her shoulder. His breath warmed the hollow beneath her chin, and when he spoke to her, when he said, “Mom?” his voice was low and broken.

  She closed her eyes. “I’m right here, honey.”

  “I really need your help,” he said. “There’s a lot of stuff I have to work through, not just what happened with Erik, but you know, when I was overseas, Afghanistan—going through all of that—it kind of screwed me up.”

  “Oh, AJ.” For a moment, her grief for him, for his pain, was so overwhelming; it was all she could say. She fumbled her arms around him. “I’m here, right here,” she repeated, and she held him as best she could. He was so much bigger than the last time she’d embraced him. It was clumsy, and she was struggling, too, with the weight of her sorrow and her regret. But inexplicably now, joy came in a rush that opened her heart, and somehow it was as if the years of misunderstanding—all those years she’d kept herself apart from AJ—were falling away.

  A light settling of fingertips on her shoulder caused her to look up, and she saw that Shea was touching AJ’s shoulder, too, a benediction, a blessing. They smiled at each other, blinking through their tears, and Lily loved Shea instantly and without reservation in that moment.

  AJ lifted his head, wiping his eyes, under his nose. He looked around at them. “What a bunch of saps,” he said.

  “A family of saps,” Shea said, and they laughed.

  It was after midnight when Lily, seeing a light on, went downstairs and found her dad sitting at the old marble-topped island. She slid onto the stool next to him.

  “You can’t sleep, either?”

  She shook her head. “If it’s all right with you, I’d like to stay on here until I can figure out what I’m going to do with myself.”

  “You don’t need permission, Sissy.”

  “Dad?” Lily set her elbows on the island.

  “Hmm?”

  “I’ve been wondering—do you think I’m too old to go back to school? Veterinary school?”

  He looked sidelong at her. “AJ and Shea are going to need somebody to doctor their livestock when they get their business running.”

  “I hadn’t thought of that.”

  “Hasn’t been a good large-animal vet in the area since old Doc Forsythe died.”

  “Oh, Dad.”

  He patted her hand. “Maybe we’ll both end up working for AJ.”

  Lily laughed.

  Her dad didn’t. “I’m lucky he doesn’t hate me.”

  Lily felt lucky in that regard, too.

  “He wants to understand, wants me to explain,” her dad said. “I don’t know if I can. Not in a
way that’ll make sense.”

  Lily met his glance.

  “I don’t want it to come between us,” he said.

  “Then you’ll have to find a way to talk to him about Winona and Erik—the same as I have to find a way to talk to him about Jesse and Phoenix.”

  “It’s a lot to pile on the kid, especially after all the shit he’s been through.”

  “He—we talked earlier—about Afghanistan. He kind of opened up to me.” Lily looked at her dad. “I’m just so glad, you know? Not about the war. I hate it, how it’s affected him, but if I can help him—if he’ll only let me—” She broke off. Then, picking up after a moment, she said, “I want so badly to have a relationship with him, to have his forgiveness, his—his respect.”

  “Most anything worthwhile in this world takes time, Sissy.”

  “I told him about the divorce.”

  “How did he take it?”

  Instead of answering, Lily spoke in a vehement rush, saying the things that were uppermost in her mind. “We need to be finished with secrets, Dad. We need to be strong enough to tell the truth and take the consequences. We need to own our mistakes. I don’t want AJ’s children growing up with a lot of pretty little lies that we tell them about our family because we’re afraid of losing face, losing authority. We’re human, fallible”—she used Edward’s word—“and life is messy. Kids need to know that. They need to know we grow up; we don’t grow perfect, and no matter how old we get, we never lose our need, or our capacity, for compassion and forgiveness.”

  “You’re right,” her dad said.

  “I wish I’d told AJ the truth from the beginning. I wish I’d known the truth.”

  Her dad rubbed circles on her back. “I’m sorry, Sissy. I wish I’d had the guts to tell you.”

  She bent her forehead toward him, resting it on the ridge of his collarbone.

  “You know,” her dad said over her bowed head, “in spite of everything that’s happened, he seems calmer and more at peace. Have you noticed?”

  “It’s the Shea effect,” Lily said, straightening. “I love that girl. She’s so good for him. So good, period. I’m even warming up to her mom.”

  Her dad shot her a look.

  “Dru is so completely herself. She’s honest about who she is—take it or leave it.” Lily shifted her glance. It was how she wanted to live her life from now on, too. She didn’t want to compromise herself. Not ever again. Not for anyone.

  “They’ve transferred Erik, did you hear?” her dad said after a moment. “They’ll try him in Dallas for Becca’s murder first.”

  “Clint told me. He said Erik’s on suicide watch. Win’s taking it hard. He won’t see her, won’t see any of us.” As far as Lily knew, Erik wasn’t talking to anyone except the police and, possibly, his attorney. He hadn’t wanted to be represented by anyone, and, in fact, before a lawyer was assigned to his case, he had made a full confession, admitting to both Kate’s and Becca’s murders and to the attempt to frame AJ. There was speculation that Erik had waived his right to a trial and asked for the death penalty. A court-appointed psychiatrist had certified his sanity, but Lily questioned that. Sane people didn’t commit murder. The act itself must require you to become insane, if only temporarily.

  “I never realized it meant that much to him—calling me Dad.”

  It should have, Lily thought, but what was the point of saying it now?

  “I doubt Win’ll forgive me,” her dad said. “Not that she should, not that any of you should.”

  “Give it time, Dad.” Lily picked up a stray napkin, running it through her fingers.

  “I loved her—I still do love her. I loved your mother, too. I just—after she was gone, it felt—I don’t know—somehow disloyal to remarry—”

  “But it was all right, conceiving a child, I guess, one you had no intention of claiming.”

  “I was wrong. I’ll spend whatever time I have left regretting how I handled it.”

  Lily folded the napkin. She would never have imagined hearing Jeb Axel say those words: I was wrong.

  “I guess if it takes me the rest of my life to make it up to her, that’s what I’ll do. I’ll try, anyway.”

  They exchanged a glance.

  Lily said she would heat up some milk. “You want some? It might help you sleep.” She stood up.

  He caught her hand. “I’m sorry about you and Paul, Sissy. Not just the divorce.” He paused, searching her eyes, perhaps searching his mind for whatever it was he wanted to say.

  Lily found it hard to hold his gaze—it was so openly vulnerable, so naked in its appeal. It almost frightened her, seeing him so unmanned.

  He let go of her hand, her glance. “I couldn’t talk about it when your mother died. I knew you needed me to; you needed me to remember her with you, but it just hurt so much—so damn much.” He looked up, blinking. “It’s no excuse—”

  “It’s all right, Dad.” Lily wasn’t sure that it was, but she wanted an end to the suffering, to any further recriminations. “I caused you a lot of trouble, and I’m sorry for that.”

  “When all that happened—you know, in Phoenix—Paul was—he knew the right people. He knew what to do. He promised to give you a good life. I thought he would know better than me how to keep you safe.”

  Lily put her arms around him. “If I hadn’t married Paul, we wouldn’t have AJ, so how can we be sorry for it?”

  “You still want to heat up some milk?” he asked, pulling free, wiping his face.

  She said she did.

  “I’ll get the brandy,” he said.

  26

  It wasn’t ideal weather for an outdoor wedding. Fifteen minutes before the ceremony was set to begin at six o’clock, the daylong immaculate blue sky had been consumed by an imposing presence of majestic, but glowering, thunderheads. Beneath them, the light was silver, the color of tarnished coins. The tiki torches Paul and Shea’s dad, Rob, had lit a while ago flickered in a capricious breeze.

  “Nervous?” Lily smiled up at AJ. She and Paul, whom AJ had asked to be his best man in place of Erik, were standing with him in Dru’s garden, to the right of the peaked arbor that would serve as an altar. The knotty juniper posts were buried in the lush, deep-red blooms of an old rose, and the scent perfumed the air.

  “I just hope the rain holds off,” AJ said. “It’ll kill Shea if it rains.”

  “It may blow over.” Paul examined AJ’s shirt collar, giving it a little tug.

  Thankfully, he had come without Pilar. Lily hadn’t known what to expect, and asking might have given the impression that it mattered. Lily didn’t want it to; she thought it mostly didn’t.

  “I’m surprised so many people from Dallas made the drive.” Paul ran a satisfied glance over the assembling crowd. He nodded at a man and wife just taking their seats on the groom’s side of the aisle and went to greet them. Lily recognized Millie and Harvey Kramer and gave them a half wave. The uncertainty of her future daunted her, but knowing that after today she might never cross paths with the Kramers and their ilk again was pure relief.

  “There are Kate’s parents,” AJ said. “Shea and I wondered if they’d come.”

  Dru approached the couple and embraced them. Even from a distance, their pain was evident but also their courage, Lily thought. Kate’s mother pulled tissues from her purse, one for herself, one for Dru, and they dabbed their eyes. Lily swallowed.

  “I feel so bad for them, and for Becca’s parents, and for Win.” AJ was tight-jawed, blinking. “It seems wrong to be this happy.”

  Lily took his hand. “I know,” she said. “I feel it, too, but—”

  “No, Mom.” He took his hand away, keeping her gaze. “Why didn’t Erik kill me, too? Why didn’t I die in Afghanistan like so many of my buddies?”

  She stared at him. His sudden misery had come from nowhere seemingly, but she recognized it. She knew from researching that survivor’s guilt was a natural part of the whole PTSD package. “I don’t know, honey.” It was hard
, elbowing the words past the knot of her alarm, her concern for him—that he would feel this way today of all days—but he deserved her honesty. “I want to believe there’s a purpose to everything, and if your life was spared, there’s a reason, but I don’t know if that’s true.”

  He searched her gaze, and she had the sense he was hunting for meaning, an answer that would bring him a measure of peace.

  She went on, haltingly. “I want to believe that given time, all wounds have the capacity to heal—if we are patient and kind to one another, if we can forgive one another and tell the truth, if we keep love in our hearts. Living in this way won’t alter the past, the terrible losses, but the pain you feel, that we all feel, won’t be as sharp.”

  He looked away at some point over her head. “Thank you,” he said, bringing his gaze back to hers.

  “For?”

  “Not handing me platitudes, not telling me it wasn’t my fault that I lived and they died. Not saying I was lucky and I should be grateful I made it.”

  “Well, I’m grateful you did,” she said, fighting for composure.

  That made him smile, and when he slipped his arm around her shoulders, her heart eased.

  Paul rejoined them, and if he noticed traces of leftover emotion on Lily’s face, or in the air between her and AJ, he didn’t remark on it.

  “Dad,” AJ said, moments later, “I think it’s time.” He nodded toward the house, where Dru, who was filling in as Shea’s matron of honor, was waiting for the best man to escort her to the altar.

  Lily was scanning the crowd when she caught sight of Edward standing at the back of the seating area. He smiled when their eyes met, and she felt a wave of pleasure, even of anticipation, and then she thought she had no right to feel either one. She wondered what he was doing here, who had invited him.

  AJ touched her elbow. “I asked Edward to come,” he said as if he’d divined her bewilderment. “I figured the guy who made my wedding day possible ought to be present.”

  She looked at him, still mystified.

  “If it wasn’t for Edward, I’d have been sitting in a prison cell on the day I met Shea.” He held her gaze. “You don’t mind, do you?”

 

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