“No. Not ignore. Move the memories to a separate place where they are safe while you continue with your life.”
“Sure.” He moved away from her and leaned against the wall. “That’s what the experts tell me. According to them, it’s been two years. I should be recovering from the trauma.”
She gave one brief, mocking laugh. “The experts? What do they know? It’s a rare and wonderful therapist who can view each individual’s behavior as his or her own. They don’t want to think they don’t understand. They want to put everyone in a box. They give you a list of how you should recover from grief, from pain, from broken hearts and broken dreams and a mind so shattered by what you’ve seen you can never forget it.”
“I didn’t see anything. I only … heard. I only … imagined.”
“Whatever. About this I am the expert, and right now I tell you—you recover when and how you can.” She was a warrior in the same deadly battle, and she recognized his reality. She spoke to his reality. “You have guilt for the young lives lost. If you weren’t a good man, you would tell yourself it wasn’t your fault. Not your responsibility. But it was your responsibility. You know that.”
“You’re the first person to admit that. To admit that what I feel is valid.”
“They are your feelings. Of course they’re valid. Now you have to find a way to live with them.”
His voice firmed. “There is no way.”
“There has to be a way. Your comrades are dead in horrible conditions, tortured to entertain a psychopath. You owe it to those young men and women to continue in your course to become a better man, a charitable man, a kind man. It’s up to you to make the loss of their lives worth something. No one else can do it.” She caught her breath. “Wait! That’s not right. No one else owes it to them.”
He choked up again, and when he could speak he asked, “What if I can’t? What if I can’t move on and become that better man?”
“Then you are truly beyond repair. You are ruined.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
Jacob cried again, but for a different reason. This woman who everyone believed to be mad … she had listened to his confession, comprehended his emotions, and saw what he could not see, that he owed his kids not his death but his life.
He had to live? With his shame, his grief, his memories? He had to use them to build character, to help others, to be a shining example in the eyes of God?
He used the cloth in his hand to muffle his sobs.
He knew now that when he stood on the precipice above the ocean preparing to leap, he would remember that Maddie in a few words changed his guilt to obligation—and that deep in his heart, he agreed with her.
No one else owed his kids for the losses of their lives and their innocence. Only him.
But he was too weak. Life was too painful. He couldn’t stand it. He couldn’t do it.
Yet Maddie leaned against him, warm-woman-scented and soft textured, running her hands through his hair and murmuring nonsense about his strength and courage and her belief in him.…
When he slowed down with the pathetic crying, she took his hand and put it on her breast.
Just like that. On her breast. Which was bare.
It was at that moment he realized the cloth he’d been sobbing into was her T-shirt, and although he’d had little experience with boobs since his return from Korea, he recognized that small, plump, soft flesh and the thrust of a nipple.
She pressed her fingers over his fingers and acted as if holding this boob were the one thing in the world he needed and wanted.
Women! How did they know these things?
Later, Jacob would be embarrassed to remember how he reacted. Because he launched himself at her, frantic, reckless, wild with wanting. He had needed more than her understanding. He had needed sex: hot, sweaty, desperate sex. He knocked her over on his floor. All because of her breast.
She clawed at his T-shirt.
He fumbled for the zipper on her jeans and at the same time worked to get her naked from the waist down. He needed more than two hands, but he made do with what he had.
When he wouldn’t lift his arms to let her pull the T-shirt over his head—c’mon, priorities!—she dug her fingers into the material of his shirt and ripped the cloth to bare his chest. He heard her mutter something about “So old you could see through it.” He guessed she was casting aspersions on his favorite T-shirt. But he didn’t care because she put her mouth on his nipple.
Good idea! He did the same to her and simultaneously managed to strip her pants off completely. Took both hands and one leg, but by God, he did it.
And this was all in the dark. Took damn near a miracle to find and remove those garments with no injuries to either of them.
When Jacob suckled on Maddie, she moaned and made a move on his shorts.
He was so skinny they slid right off his hips, and his underwear with them.
With one hand she found his erection. He would have come right then, but she giggled.
Wrong!
She said, “Let’s do this thing, big boy.”
Big boy. Right. They would do this thing.
And they did.
Fast. Too fast.
When he was sprawled on top of her, trying to recover his breath, he was dimly aware he should apologize. For everything. Blubbering. Jumping her bones. Coming like a teenager on his first time and leaving her behind.
But she was hugging him and touching him like she still liked him.
So he blurted, “I’ll be ready again in a few minutes.”
“Then I’d better make the bed, because this carpet is thin and hard on my butt. Come on.” She wiggled out from underneath him. She groped for his hand and pulled him to his feet. She pushed at him. “Go shower. And hurry.”
That phrase—“And hurry”—motivated him as nothing else could. He groped to the door. He opened it and glanced back.
She was peeling back the aluminum foil on his window to let in the feeble glow of light from the alley.
He supposed she could do that.
He broke speed records getting naked (he had to remove the shreds of his T-shirt). He leaped into the shower, washed everything once and the important parts twice, and jumped out. He toweled off and quickly discovered there was a thin line between drying himself and stimulating himself, so he hung the towel on the rack—military training was hard to break—and took a breath. He vowed, “I will go slower this time. I will make her happy.” He hustled back into the bedroom.
She had found sheets and made the bed. She reclined in the middle of the mattress, her head on the one pillow. Her arm was behind her. The top sheet draped her. She smiled when she saw him, and smiled wider when she saw his erection. She said, “You weren’t kidding. You are ready in a few minutes.… I like a man who keeps his promises.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
Jacob woke up. He woke up.
He had slept.
Now he woke up. In his bed, in his bedroom with a window that was open and uncovered. He felt … normal?
It was very weird to feel normal.
No. Good. He felt good.
Because … last night he had confessed. He had admitted to Maddie that because of his fundamental flaw, his ultimate failure, his brainiac kids had died.
Yet Maddie hadn’t been repulsed.
He had burst into tears like the world’s biggest tittybaby.
She hadn’t laughed at him.
He had cried for what felt like hours, loud, snorting, gasping sobs. Tears and guilt had flowed in torrents.
She had hugged him. She had given him her T-shirt to cry into.
He’d had sex.
Maddie had made it a celebration of life.
This morning, he was proud to recall he had kept his vow to go slow. The second time, and the third time, too, he had spent long moments and hot kisses making sure she was satisfied. If he remembered anything about women—and that part of his memory seemed to be intact—he was pretty sure he had
succeeded. He guessed making love was like riding a bike. Once you knew how, you never forgot.
Making love to Maddie was like riding a bike … down a steep hill, pedaling hard, wind in his face, grinning madly, and screaming with terror and exaltation.
Of course … she wasn’t in bed with him now.
He leaped up, started out the door, caught a glimpse of sunshine streaming into his wrecked house, ducked back, grabbed a pair of shorts and pulled them on, decided they were going to fall off if he wasn’t careful, scrounged around on the floor until he found a belt, cinched it around his waist, and headed out.
Maddie was bending over, rummaging through his refrigerator.
Nice ass. She had put her clothes back on, but still … very, very nice ass.
He didn’t think she knew he was behind her, but she said, “I was going to fix you breakfast, but you don’t have much in here.”
His gaze traveled around his empty living room. The construction crew wasn’t here yet, therefore … “It’s Monday morning. Grocery delivery tomorrow.”
“Oh.” She straightened. She turned and came right over to him, slid her arms around his waist, and hugged him. Turning her face up to his, she asked, “How are you?”
When most people asked that question, it was perfunctory. With Maddie, How are you? was a solid inquiry with concern and affection behind it, and she truly wanted to know the answer.
Since he truly wanted to see her form more words with that sinful mouth, he said, “I might live. I might … want to live.”
She watched him still, waiting for him to expound.
So he did. “I feel empty, like I had been filled with horrible things and now only the stains are left.”
“You cried. You washed the bad things away.”
She had beautiful eyes and she watched him as if she liked him, understood him. He didn’t deserve her … but he kissed her anyway.
She kissed him back.
He started walking backward toward the bedroom.
She dragged her feet. “Jacob, I can’t.”
“Why not?”
“I have a deadline. I have to go work.”
“This won’t take long.”
Maddie laughed. “Is that supposed to entice me?”
“No, this is.” He kissed her again, deeply, lovingly, putting all his heart and soul into telling her without words how much he—
The damn phone rang.
She pulled her head away.
He murmured, “No, no, no. It’s not important.”
“Not important? How do you know until you answer?”
“It’s my mother.”
“How do you know?”
“She’s the only person with my phone number. I don’t know how she got it. She has connections.” He paused. “Or she blackmailed someone.”
“You don’t want to talk to your mother?” Maddie seemed shocked. She eased out of his arms.
“Mother is a difficult woman. Opinionated. If I talked to her, she’d tell me what to do. It’s better if I don’t—” He got distracted watching Maddie’s ass as she walked away.
She said, “I’ll take care of it,” and answered the phone.
“No!” He made a lunge for the receiver.
Maddie avoided him. “Jacob’s place. He’s busy right now. May I take a message?”
Jacob flopped into the recliner and covered his eyes. His mother was accustomed to talking to Moore. He could only imagine the look on her face now.
“My name is Maddie.” She kept her voice bright and cheerful. “I’m Jacob’s neighbor. I ran into him a few weeks ago in his house.”
Jacob uncovered one eye. I ran into him a few weeks ago in his house? Really, Maddie?
Maddie continued, “He’s great. He’s a little thin, but he liked my cookies.”
He uncovered the other eye and glared. Her cookies?
“Just last night. He was having a moment, so I stayed. I’ll have him call you when he gets out of bed.… Um-hm … Um-hm … Okay, I’ll tell him. Nice to talk to you, Mrs. Denisov. I hope to meet you someday soon!” Maddie hung up the phone and put it on the cradle. “There!” she said to Jacob. “I helped.” She turned to go.
He sat up straight. “Wait a minute! What did she say?”
“Oh.” Maddie turned back, faking surprise that he cared. Or maybe she was surprised that he cared. “Your mother said not to worry about calling her, to just enjoy yourself.”
“She thinks we’re sleeping together.”
“We are sleeping together. And she sounds very relieved.”
Jacob stood and wandered toward her. “I’m relieved, too.”
“Relieved?” Maddie didn’t know whether to laugh or be insulted. “Is that what you are?”
“Rejoiced? Reborn? Reinvigorated?” He smiled at her. Simply smiled at her. And he was right. He was reborn; all the bitter, troubled lines of his face had somehow been rearranged to show interest and delight … in Maddie Hewitson. He offered his hand. “Come with me?”
She extended her hand, then curled her fingers into her palm.
When monsters disrupted the night and sad ghosts haunted the day, discipline became the lodestone of Maddie’s life. Two thousand words a day, every day; that schedule ruled her life. “I’ve got to get in my words.”
“Words? How about these?” He deepened his voice. “Come live with me and be my love—”
“Oh, not poetry.” How did he know she loved poetry?
“And we will all the pleasures prove—”
She put her hand over his mouth. “Stop that right now.”
His eyes pleaded and cajoled. He kissed her palm, took her hand away, and laced his fingers through hers.
Life rewarded the disciplined.
Yet Jacob stood there skinny, barefoot, and bare-chested, his head recently shaved and his cheekbones taut against his skin, and all she wanted to do was go live with him and be his love. For the first time since Easton had been murdered, she had connected with another human being.
No, more important, she had helped another human being. That alone had given her satisfaction and a sense of worth, and those emotions would have been enough. But Jacob had amply rewarded her with passion and pleasure.…
Temptation beckoned, and for this moment, she knew she would yield.
He watched her too closely, knew her too well, saw her surrender, and moved quickly to take advantage. He led her into the bedroom and she shut the door behind them. He scooped up a blanket and guided her onto the enclosed back porch.
She glanced around at the ancient washing machine and the plastic pots of dead violets on the windowsill. “Um, Jacob?”
He opened the back door and walked down the rickety wooden steps into the narrow, fenced backyard. He turned to look up at her; the green, sunlit grass grew as high as his knees. He said, “Mrs. Butenschoen insinuated my yard is an overgrown disgrace.”
“She did, did she?”
“I believe if there’s one thing that would annoy and perturb Mrs. Butenschoen more than an overgrown lawn, it’s illicit pleasure enjoyed in broad daylight on the overgrown lawn.”
A smile tugged at Maddie’s lips. She looked around; unless a neighbor actually looked over the fence—and the chance of that was tiny—she and Jacob could make love out here unobserved. Of course, even that small chance added a piquant element to the idea, and the thought of Mrs. Butenschoen’s horror made the concept almost irresistible. Or perhaps merely … irresistible. “Are you sweet-talking me?”
“I hope so.”
“Then I’ve heard enough.” She launched herself off the porch into his arms.
He caught her, fell backward, and rolled.
She wrestled with him, laughing, the scent of grass wild with summertime and with love.
Skinny though he was, he was still stronger. She landed flat on her back. The blanket was gone, lost in the tussle. The tall, damp grass closed in around them and the whole world was nothing but blue sky, green grass, and Jacob D
enisov warm and strong above her.
That was enough.
* * *
Jacob brushed at the green stain on Maddie’s bottom. “When will you come back?”
“When I get my words written,” she said firmly. “The sooner I start, the sooner I can return.”
He gave her a gentle push. “Then go.”
She pouted over her shoulder at him.
Pulling her back, he kissed her, then pushed her again.
She walked down the stairs, across the street, and into her house, dropping grass seed like Hansel and Gretel dropped bread crumbs.
He stared into space and thought about his mother, about her very real concern for him, about how much she must be worried. Then he thought about her talking to Maddie and realizing he’d been doing the wild thing with his neighbor. He thought about the struggle his mother must be facing between her Old World morals and her belief that men were so shallow, sex cured their every problem.
He imagined the look on her face when she spoke to Maddie.
And he laughed. A single, loud, hoarse bark of laughter.
The sound surprised him. The urge surprised him. The emotion … surprised him. He hadn’t laughed in … he didn’t remember the last time he had really laughed. And what was more … he laughed again. Out loud. That stark bark of laughter grew into a long, donkey-like bray that shook his whole body. He picked up one of those ugly flowered sofa pillows, placed it over his face, and laughed until his belly muscles hurt. He collapsed into the recliner, pillow still pressed to his face, and laughed, and at some point he stopped laughing and simply sat, and thought about Maddie, his family, his life, and most of all his kids, his brainiacs, living and dead. Because really, it all came down to them.
Three of his brainiacs had forgiven him. Brandon had told him that. Repeatedly, he had said that three of them had forgiven him.
One would never forgive him.
Two did not live long enough to have the chance to forgive him.
For two years, Jacob had been determined on one course—penance while looking for peace. Then when peace proved elusive … suicide.
Maddie had called on him to live for his fallen comrades and his wounded friends.
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