Pull it together! I commanded myself. You’re acting ridiculously. But then I felt a little relieved as well. At least he thought I was scared, as if there was a reason to my sudden hyperventilation. “Come on, let’s get you going home.” I allowed Buck to pull me to a standing position out of the booth. He tossed some cash onto the table, and we walked together out of the diner. He stayed very close behind me, I guessed he thought maybe in case I would faint from fear or something.
The car ride home was mostly silent. Buck didn’t know what else to say to comfort me, and my mind was still trying to wrap itself around the situation at hand. I had gotten what I wanted, an answer to my question, and I knew I should truly feel fear. I had gotten absurdly close to an alleged killer, but for some reason, the shock of hearing the reason of why Emry was in jail was not because I was afraid of him. I felt sorry for him. This all had to be a mistake, but murder wouldn’t be treated lightly. This wasn’t just something he could walk away from and be released from jail, not any day soon, at least. This was a real mess, and I felt a hollow feeling forming in the pit of my stomach. Why was I being so harsh toward Buck for being an emotional mess? I was the one who was acting like a drama queen with my ups and downs. This was not something I felt I was capable of helping Emry with. This was beyond me. I was too insignificant to help Emry. I was helpless, I thought.
Surely there was more to the story. I had to start digging up Emry’s past. How would I ever start to do such a thing? I felt determination again, a purpose to all of this madness within myself. It was the only thing that helped make the void slightly disappear and somewhat bearable. I had to redirect my thoughts once again. I was going to have to become more focused or else Emry would be lost to me forever in the lifetime of a prison sentence.
“Just great!” Buck shouted out. My eyes flittered upwards to look through the windshield towards the foggy road in front of us. I couldn’t tell where we were as I hadn’t been paying attention. Buck pulled over to the side of the road.
“Do you feel that?” he asked me.
I looked toward him and then back to the road as the car came to a complete stop. “Feel what?”
Buck took a deep breath. “Flat tire.” As he jumped out of the car, I felt the sudden rush of cold air hit my face from the open door. I pulled the handle of the car door on my side and slipped out into the afternoon air as well. The fog was thick, settling a few inches off the ground. I had trouble seeing my own feet as I looked down at the road. Buck was already bent over the culprit tire trying to see how much damage had been done.
“How bad is it?” I walked over and stood behind him. I could see the tire sagging. “Do you have a spare?”
He huffed as if suddenly irritated with himself. “You’d think I would, but you know, I don’t. I don’t even have a donut.” He kicked at the tire with his boot. “I can call someone. It shouldn’t take too long for us to be picked up.” He crossed his arms in front of his chest. “Sure is getting colder, huh? We’d better get back in the car and try to keep warm.”
I saw him eye me slightly, and I realized he was thinking he could keep me warm until someone showed up. Would he offer me his coat or put his arms around me in the car? I wasn’t sure what he had planned, but I nervously started straining my eyes to try to look through the fog.
“Hey, we’re on Livingston Street, aren’t we?” I asked, taking a few steps away from Buck and a few closer toward the open field across the road.
“Yeah, I think. Why?” “Mrs. Anderson lives on this road, and if this is the field,” I said, crossing the ditch and hopping into the field, “her house should just be right up there.” I pointed for him. “We could stay there until someone picked us up. It’d be warm there.” It would get me away from having to be that close to Buck. I didn’t want to give him too much of the wrong impression. Friendly, yes, but not that friendly.
Before Buck could object to my little scheme, I started walking through the field toward where I was almost certain the house would be.
“Anna, wait up!” Buck yelled out from behind me. “I have to get my phone!” I slowed my pace a little but continued to walk. He could catch up. And he did. My boots trampled the frozen ground beneath my feet. It must have rained while we were in the diner. Ice seemed to be covering everything. Every few steps I would feel my boots slip, but then I would steady myself before falling down. We walked like this side by side for a while, our breaths exploding into miniature clouds in front of our faces as we went along.
“You know Mrs. Anderson, don’t you?” I asked him.
“Oh, yes. Mrs. Anderson is a … nice lady.”
He said it strangely. I wasn’t sure what he meant about it. Buck seemed to say everyone’s name in a weird way though. It’s like he held grudges or something, knew something about everyone. “She’s always calling my father for one thing or the other. Usually it’s her son that calls though.” “It’s not like she’s that old,” Buck commented as if I had meant she were elderly or incapable of taking care of herself. “No, she’s not.” I hadn’t really thought much about it before. Mrs. Anderson had always seemed older to me because her kids were at least a good ten to fifteen years older than myself, but really, she was around the same age as my parents. She had just had her kids at a young age. I wondered why I had never really thought about that before. “She’s been through a lot though.”
“You mean with her husband’s death and then Ernie’s?” Buck asked. “It’s actually been a long time since both of them passed.” He said it without a hint of sympathy.
I slipped on the ice again, but this time I felt Buck grab hold of the back of my arm, steadying me. “Thanks.” He didn’t release his grasp but continued to keep a firm hold on me to make sure that I wouldn’t be able to slip again.
Mrs. Anderson had had some troublesome hardships to deal with in the last decade or so. Her husband had suddenly killed himself. Mrs. Anderson was the one who found him hanging by a rope in their bedroom. No one knew why he had done it, and nobody liked to mention that it had happened either. Suicide was a very difficult thing to deal with. Not only had that loved one died, but we believed that his soul would be damned as well. That’s what we were taught in the church. I couldn’t really ever remember seeing Mrs. Anderson’s husband. I couldn’t picture his face in my head.
And then around five or six years later, Mrs. Anderson’s middle child, Ernie, died in a fishing accident. He had been at the lake by himself and campers found him face down in the water, drowned. I didn’t know her well, but she was probably an emotional wreck, devastated by the loss of those around her, and rightfully so. She never came to church, but she seemed to need extra guidance from my father, and if she was really depressed, her son, Lauren, would call my father to try to help her. Lately, it seemed like a regular occurrence. Mrs. Anderson, the unstable widow of Seneca. She had turned into ‘the creepy lady’ to the little kids who wanted nothing to do with her and would double dare each other, especially around Halloween, to walk down her long driveway and catch a glimpse of her in her house, as if she were a witch or something, like her house was now haunted by the ghost of her dead husband.
“She just needs a little more spiritual help than others,” I finally said, trying to defend the poor lady. “It may have been awhile, but who knows how long it takes to get over some of the things she’s been through.”
“You’re right.” Buck sounded sympathetic now, more towards me catching him being heartless rather than judging Mrs. Anderson. The field was coming to an end as I could see trees directly ahead and then the opening that was the entrance of her long, narrow driveway. The fog seemed to have lifted a little in this area, and I looked around me and really saw that everything was truly covered in ice.
“Must’ve rained.” Buck was having the exact same thoughts. “Hey, hold on for a sec.” He abruptly stopped and pulled his cell phone out of his pocket as it was humming on vibrate. “Hello? Hey, Frank.” He turned around and started having a conver
sation with one of his buddies. I guessed he had given someone a call while we were still at the car. “Yeah, if you wouldn’t mind. Um, it’s Livingston Street. Well, that depends. Do you want to change a tire in the cold or would you rather hook up the car to a tow truck in the cold?” He chuckled. “Okay. Sure. Thanks. See ya.” He snapped the phone shut and smiled as he headed back to where I stood. “Help’s on the way.”
He said it as if we were in danger. We began walking again down the driveway and rounded the corner. Mrs. Anderson’s house would be within sight soon. My eyes skimmed past the fading fog toward where I knew the porch would be. Suddenly, my crunching steps came to a halt.
“Anna, what the …?”
“Shh!” I hissed at him, squatting down behind a bush to hide myself so I could observe more closely. Buck automatically hunched over next to me. I could see Mrs. Anderson’s house clearly now in the distance. She was outside standing in her yard with a pretty white lace shawl wrapped around her head. Pieces of her brunette hair were sticking out of the sides. She laughed suddenly, the sound echoing over to where we were, and then she lightly touched the side of a man’s face who was standing in front of her. I squinted a few more times to confirm who exactly it was.
“Pastor James?” Buck mumbled, just as surprised as I was. Pastor James, my father, was standing there in the yard not seeming like a pastor but simply an ordinary man now, a man that was uncomfortably close to another woman, a woman that was not my mother.
I watched the two of them obviously conversing, but I couldn’t hear what they were saying to each other. Then suddenly Mrs. Anderson took a step up on the wooden porch stairs and turned with an outstretched hand toward my father. He stood there for a moment before stretching out and taking her hand in his own and together the two of them walked up the stairs to the front of the porch together. My heart felt like it was going to leap right out of my chest. I gasped and then covered my mouth as a shrill, piercing sound had started to escape.
My eyes were glued to the front of the house. I couldn’t move, feeling as if my feet were cemented to the ground. They conversed for a few more minutes in front of her door, and then suddenly my father bent downwards and kissed her hand. He held it for a moment longer before she gave him a kiss on the cheek. He then turned away to head toward his car. Mrs. Anderson watched him leave before removing her white shawl and going into her house.
What in the world was going on? Had I really just seen what I thought I had? My father, the loving, respected, honorable Pastor John James was having an affair? I felt that familiar lump return to my throat. My entire body felt heavy and weighed down. Clenching my hands together, I could feel the nails digging into the palms of my hands. Fury overtook every emotion as the strongest now. I wanted to stand up and scream at the top of my lungs.
“Anna,” Buck whispered. “That wasn’t what it seemed. It couldn’t have been. Anna? Anna?” I wasn’t listening to what he was saying. I could only feel the rage overwhelm me as the tears began to sting my eyes and rush furiously down my cheeks. I found the strength to stand up, turn and start running as fast as I could down the driveway again.
“Anna!” Buck called after me. “Please wait!” I couldn’t turn around and face him. I couldn’t look at him and have him see the shame in my eyes, shame for my hypocritical father’s actions. All this time, all these calls to our house and him running over here, all for this. I wanted to throw up. This couldn’t be happening. Not to me. Not to my family. Somebody else’s, but not mine. This wasn’t how things were supposed to be.
I ran even faster, my boots skidding lightly over the hardened ground beneath each step. Before I knew it, I was in the field again. My lungs were burning from the sprint, but I barely noticed it. The ache in my heart was so great. And then suddenly my legs gave out on me, and I crumbled to the cold ground in the field, the tall, thick weeds sticking out around me, and I began to sob violently and threw my face into my hands on the ground and just surrendered to the sadness that filled every aspect of me. I had never felt so betrayed in my entire life. My own father, the one who had raised me to be different, to follow the Bible, was committing such a sin as adultery.
What was to become of my family now? How could I go back there and face them all? Was I going to tell my mother and brother, or would I just go on about my life as if I had never been there, never seen that? My mother wouldn’t be able to go on. My father and the church were her life. Our reputation would be ruined. It was ruined. Buck now knew, too. I couldn’t face any of it, didn’t have the strength to. This was too much for even me to bear.
I heard Buck rush to my side, felt his hand on my back as I still had my face buried in my hands as the tears freely flowed. “Anna, please,” he begged.
He wanted me to get up, to look at him, to talk to him. There was no way that I could. I couldn’t get up and go home. I wanted to stay here on the ground and freeze to death in this field. “Leave me alone,” I cried. “Please, just go.”
“Don’t be silly.” He wrapped his arms around my back and gave me a gentle hug. “Just look at me for a moment, will you?” What other choice did I have? I was so completely humiliated. I tried to calm down, the pain so agonizingly deep though. I couldn’t inhale properly, and my breaths were coming as short gasps. I turned to face him, standing up with his help, but I couldn’t bear to look him directly in the eyes. “Anna, I know what you’re thinking, and you’re wrong.”
“She kissed him. They held hands!” I yelled out in disgust, another sob escaping along with the words.
He hugged me tight then, my face pressed against the shoulder of his coat. “Listen to me, you have to calm down.”
“And then what? You’ll just take me home.” “Yes,” he said. “You have to go home. I don’t want to tell you what to do, but I don’t believe what I saw. I don’t believe it for one moment, and I don’t think you should be so quick to doubt your dad either.”
He was lecturing me now? I pushed him away and began stomping back toward the car “Where are you going now?” he asked, not in such a hurry to catch up as he was before.
“To the car. Take me home!” I shouted, wiping my wet face and runny nose with the back of my hand. A peculiar, numbing sensation took the place of the rage, and suddenly I was a little calmer and no longer crying. I just felt empty all over. My heart throbbed with an ache I had never felt before.
I saw Buck’s car up ahead. I didn’t bother to turn around to see where Buck was in relation to me. I opened the door on the side of the car and slammed the door shut, closed my eyes and leaned my head against the headrest. I tried to picture Emry in front of me. There was no plastic screen between us. There was no one else around us. There was just me and him together and alone at last. He was staring at me with those big blue eyes and smiling with a dimple suddenly appearing in his cheek. I let the memory of him overcome everything else flittering recklessly around in my head, and for that exact moment, I felt some peace in my soul.
Chapter 4
My father wasn’t home when I got there. I was thankful for that. I hadn’t said another word to Buck and didn’t even say goodbye when I got out of his car. He sat in front of my house though, waiting to make sure I got inside okay. I had hoped that most of my tears had dried by the time my mother would see me, but I was sure my face was slightly puffy from my recent breakdown.
I attempted to open and close the front door as quietly as I possibly could so she wouldn’t come running over to me right away. I even made it up to my bedroom and changed into my pajamas and collapsed on my bed in the darkness before anyone noticed I was home.
“Anna?” My mother pushed open my door a little, the light from the hallway making the room glow, but not enough to get a good look at my face. “I didn’t hear you come in. How was it?” she asked. “Did you have fun?”
“I had a lot of fun,” I answered in a flat tone.
“Buck’s such a gentleman, isn’t he?” She stepped into the room a little closer to me.
I didn’t answer. My mind was still going a million miles an hour. I found it difficult to concentrate on giving my mother the kind of responses she wanted.
“Are you hungry?” she asked, realizing I wasn’t interested in talking.
“No, we ate. I’m actually feeling really tired. I think I’m just going to go to bed.” My mother sat very still on the edge of the bed for a moment hoping I’d change my mind and want to give her more details about my date with Buck, but I didn’t. She got up and headed toward the door. “Okay, honey. Goodnight.”
“Night. Oh, mom?”
She turned around.
“Where’s dad?”
“He’s at a meeting at the church right now. He’ll be home soon. Why? Did you need to speak with him?” she asked in a more quiet tone.
“No, just wondering,” I quickly said, watching her shut my bedroom door.
I laid there in the dark for a while, trying to sort through all the different emotions I was feeling at the same time. I turned onto my side and curled my knees up to my chest and hugged myself into a tight ball on the bed. The tears came on again as I pictured my father hand-in-hand with Mrs. Anderson. I tried to squeeze my eyes as tightly shut as they would go to make the images disappear, but they wouldn’t.
I tried to make the sudden sobbing stop, but then I realized that I could let it all out here. I didn’t have to pretend to pull it together for Buck or hide the barely dried tears on my face from my mother. No one could hear me as I buried my face in my pillow. No one could see me. I could let it all out. I needed to release all the tension somehow or I was going to explode.
The hours on the clock continued to turn, and I realized that it was very late into the night. My father had probably come home and was asleep now. Everyone was asleep. Everyone but me. I felt physically exhausted all of a sudden and flipped my wet pillow over to the dry side. I laid very still in the darkness for a few minutes longer just inhaling and exhaling routinely. That numbness had returned, and I was grateful to have gotten rid of some of that stress. I closed my eyes and this time I did fall fast asleep and didn’t wake up until the sun had come up again.
Strange in Skin Page 5
