“You have no idea what sort of day this was. It was horrible. It was”—she searched for the word—“monstrous. My day was monstrous.”
“Sarah. You make them all that way.”
“Joe. Don’t do this again.”
“You say you are doing all of this for us, but somehow every day ends up being all about you. How hard you work. How tired you are. How nobody understands you. Did it ever occur to you that I have rough days too? Do you know how long it’s been since you’ve asked me how my day went?”
She reached for her desk and turned on the computer, and his insides wrenched tight. The monitor’s indicator light began to swell from faint to bright as if the machine had begun breathing. The screen took on the same backlit gray as predawn.
A burst of lightning flashed through the curtains, and thunder rattled the glass not five seconds later. As rain began to beat against the window, the Apple logo appeared. The cursor raced around the dial as the system booted up. Some program must have needed updating because at that moment the computer spoke aloud in its robot voice. “Excuse me. Your computer needs your attention.”
Joe extended a hand toward Sarah, palm up. “Excuse me. Your husband needs your attention.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” she said, staring him down. “I’ve got to check my e-mail. I’ve got to check my news feeds. I’ve got to post to the commodities trading blog. In case you hadn’t noticed, Joe, I never run out of things I need to do.”
He couldn’t have felt more vulnerable if he’d been standing at the end of a pirate’s gangplank, ready to be shoved off. “Sarah, not now. Please. Not another discourse on how hard you work and how nobody appreciates you.”
For the first time in a long, long time his heart formed a clear, stark prayer. Oh, Father. Put words in my mouth to help me break through to my wife. Joe hadn’t been in church in so long he couldn’t remember the last time, but he felt desperate. Maybe God could help because he sure didn’t know what to do.
With the hand she wouldn’t touch, he took her chin and made her turn toward him. And as quick as that, he knew. “This is what I want to say to you.”
“What?” she asked. “Haven’t you already said enough?”
“This is not about your job, it isn’t about the bills or the kids or any of those things you usually talk about.” Not until he uttered those words did he know how true they were. “This is about you and me.” At that moment Joe realized how deeply he had let Sarah hurt him. He was sadly aware that she had belittled him so much that he didn’t feel like much of a man anymore.
He saw her throat contract. He saw the challenge in her eyes.
Joe dropped his grip and didn’t mince words any longer.
“If I depended on how you treat me to determine my value, Sarah, I wouldn’t think very highly of myself.”
This clearly caught her off guard, this talking about his feelings, this honesty about how he saw himself.
“If things don’t change, I’m not sure what I will do. I want this to work, but I can’t take much more of how you behave.”
She had too much pride to give in. Sarah’s face had gone white, but she still acted like she didn’t know what he was talking about. “How I behave? You can’t take it?” Angrily she called his bluff. “You don’t like my behavior? Well, perhaps you haven’t heard, but there is help for people who aren’t happy in their marriage. It’s called divorce.”
“No, Sarah. That isn’t what I want. Not yet. But you have to get a grip on the reality of our relationship and realize how unhappy I am.”
“What about me?” she asked. “What about me being happy?”
He only shook his head. As usual, the conversation turned back to her and what she needed and wanted.
Chapter Ten
After Joe went to bed that night, Sarah worked until the numbers on the screen began to run together. She worked until she couldn’t remember whether she’d been looking at bullish numbers or bearish ones. She worked until she felt like someone was grinding sand into her eyes.
And then she worked some more.
No matter how she tried to concentrate on the computer screen, she couldn’t forget Joe’s words. Each tap of her fingers on the keyboard restated the cutting words and constricted her chest.
This isn’t about your job. This isn’t about the kids. It’s about you and me.
I want this to work, but I can’t take much more.
You have to know how unhappy I am.
“Oh, Joe,” she wanted to say as she raked her hand through her hair and her shoulders rose and fell with an exhausted sigh. “Don’t the two of us have everything we’ve ever wanted? Why isn’t it enough for you?”
The answer came from deep in her heart, unbidden.
Because he’s your husband. He wants you to give him yourself, and that’s something you don’t know how to do.
Sarah left the desk and went into the family room. Why couldn’t she give herself? Why did she keep hurting Joe even though she really didn’t want to? The storm outside sounded like one of those Midwestern deluges that would settle in for days: the distant roll of thunder, the steady drumming of rain against the house, the water’s refrain as it streamed down the gutters. Lightning still played in the distance, flickering through the curtains, transforming the furniture into eerie, imposing shapes.
When Sarah flipped on the lamp in the corner, the room filled with a soft glow, warm and bright. Without any answers, she stood in the center of the Oriental rug, her eyes dry, her heart a muddle of pain and confusion. Their little schnauzer had awakened and padded in to find out why Sarah wasn’t in bed. He stood at her feet, his nose black as licorice, his sober, fluid eyes asking, “Why aren’t you in bed?” Sarah picked up the dog and buried her face in his wiry fur. She smelled his familiar dog scent, and somewhere between deciding the dog needed a shampoo and knowing she couldn’t keep her eyes open much longer, her answer came.
Because I am afraid if I give myself I will be rejected. Because I hurt so bad that I want Joe to hurt too.
In the wee hours of the morning, she finally slipped in beside her husband. His light snoring stopped, and she winced. She hadn’t meant to awaken him.
She curled into the fetal position to keep from touching him. In spite of her anger, Sarah suddenly ached for her husband to hold her. She’d never been this cold. She might as well be sleeping on a slab of Antarctic ice.
She moved over into his territory, drawn by his warmth, shame rolling through her. But when she found the spot where he’d lain, he wasn’t in it. He’d moved away. She waited there, rejected, furious, unable to cry, until a sliver of sunrise crept over the windowsill. No one had ever told her it would be like this. No one had ever told her she could feel this empty.
Sarah never knew how much she slept that night; she only knew that it was still raining and dreary when she heard the baby stirring. With her head still pounding and her eyes feeling like they had cinders in them, she shoved her feet inside her slippers and trudged to get Kate. She found the baby already sitting up, wide-eyed and gnawing a fist. Sarah balanced the baby’s backside on one hip and wiped drool from Kate’s hand.
Kate reached for her mother’s nose with her tiny wet fingers. In a burst of tenderness, Sarah closed her eyes at the brush of the baby’s tiny thumb, the slight prick of her little fingernails. On this morning of all mornings, Sarah buried her face in Kate’s feathery hair and remembered how good a baby could smell, like baby powder and a touch of last night’s milk, sweeter than almost anything.
That’s when her morning began. Sarah’s cell phone vibrated. It almost toppled off the edge of the coffee table before she could get it. With Kate’s plump little legs dangling, Sarah bent to catch the early-morning text message. Tom Roscoe had a breakfast meeting with Nathan Cornish. Could she join them?
Of course she could.
Into the high chair went Kate. Out came the Cheerios. Sarah lobbed waffles into the toaster and set the handle. She poured Mitch
ell’s milk and set it alongside his chair with the fortitude of an army general making a combat decision. The butter saucer slid across the table. She heard Joe’s footfalls in the hall, and he came stalking in, stuffing in his shirttail, just as the toaster sprang. Sarah flung the waffles onto a plate and shouted for Mitchell to get a move on as if today were any other day.
Joe stood in the middle of the room, his eyes fixed to a spot just above the faucet hot-water handle, while bitterness once again clamped Sarah’s chest tight. In her thoughts she aimed all the hurt she’d carried through the night straight at the man in the middle of the room. What could Joe be thinking, risking their marriage? He was the one to blame for this! What could he be trying to accomplish, saying such hurtful things to her?
How dare he dump this on her?
She made a wide berth around him with her son’s breakfast in hand. “It’s raining cats and dogs out there, Mitchell. Where are your galoshes?”
“I’m eight years old,” Mitchell argued. “Nobody wears galoshes when they’re eight, Mom. Those are for babies.”
“Put on your rain boots,” she said in a tone that left no doubt whatsoever. She seized them from the closet and deposited them on the floor beside his chair with a resounding clump. “Do you understand me?”
Mitchell nodded, wild-eyed.
The little boy departed in the bus that hissed its way up the wet road. Sarah, with only minutes to spare, had yet to get out of her bathrobe. She turned toward Joe, filled with rage, ready to take him to task over this, raring to continue the fight.
Joe turned toward Sarah, his face decisive as stone. He wasn’t budging, and she knew it. If she’d expected him to backpedal or apologize, she’d been sorely wrong.
While the flame beneath the kettle sputtered and popped, the kitchen sizzled with tension between husband and wife.
“I have to go.” Sarah diverted her eyes to read another text. “I told Tom I’d be early.” Her voice so falsely nonchalant she might have been speaking to the schnauzer.
“Sarah, I bared my soul to you. Doesn’t that mean anything at all? After everything I said last night? You’re just”—he gestured toward the front of the house—“out the door?”
The kettle’s lid clattered as she moved it on the stove. “That’s right.”
“So that’s it then.”
“Yes.”
Sarah didn’t look back when she left. As she sped out onto the street, the bruised, foreboding sky suited her mood. Heavy brushstrokes of storm slanted across the Chicago skyline, almost obscuring the high-rises. She drove on with her throat aching, clogged with tears that she didn’t dare cry.
Wasn’t she always busy trying to do what was expected of her? Maybe Joe wasn’t happy all the time, maybe neither was she, but they were surviving. They were busy trying to build a life. Wasn’t she doing what she was supposed to do?
As quick as that, the bottom of the sky dropped out and the storm dissolved into a violent downpour. Guilt besieged her as water pelted the car in fat, wet drops. The windshield wipers couldn’t keep up.
What’s wrong with you, Sarah? You’ve never been able to do anything right, have you?
No wonder you can’t give yourself to anybody. You’re not worth anything.
Water gushed in muddy streams along the curb. For perilous seconds, she couldn’t see the road. The wipers beat back and forth with what seemed like frantic speed, unable to scrape the glass clear before the deluge filled it again, every beat of the wipers punctuating her grief-stricken heart.
Here you are, always messing up other people’s lives. You messed up your mother’s life and now you’re messing up Joe’s, Mitchell’s, and Kate’s too.
She leaned forward, as if that would help her peer out the windshield. She braked. The tires sent up thick walls of spray.
What were you thinking? How far did you think you could push Joe and expect him to put up with it?
When the phone vibrated on the seat beside her, she wanted to chuck it out the window into oncoming traffic. But this phone was her lifeline to her employer, who waited for her at a five-star eating establishment with a demanding client at his side and eggs Benedict on order. He waited while steam rose from the spout of a silver coffeepot and the maîtred’ laid out place settings for three. Mr. Tom Roscoe, whom she hadn’t disappointed, who liked the way she thought on her feet, who’d said she was part of an elite breed, who’d told her he thought she was capable of anything.
His text sounded more harsh than usual.
YOU COMING OR WHAT?
I can’t do this, she cried in desperation to the God her grandmother had once taught her about. You’ve got to fix me. I don’t know what’s wrong, but I can’t go on like this anymore. Nothing’s working for anybody. I’ve tried my best, but I just can’t make it happen.
Gridlock besieged the city. Inbound traffic, the Kennedy, the Ike, the knotted interchange everyone called the Hillside Strangler, all slowed to a crawl because of the rain. Sarah took the first exit ramp she could, flipped on her blinker, steered left around a corner and headed toward the bridge. That’s when she spotted the boat drifting along the river, taunting her with its purposeful glide upstream. Her breath hitched tight in her throat.
Oh no you don’t! Only idiots would set sail in this weather. If you think I am going to get caught with the bridge up while you glide by, you are wrong!
With eyebrows knit and teeth bared at her rearview mirror, she located an unnervingly small space and, without signaling, shoehorned her way into it. The driver behind her laid on his horn. She passed to the right and swerved directly to the middle lane, cutting off a second driver, practically knocking off his bumper because he had the audacity to slow her down.
Red lights would start flashing along the bridge any minute. Barricade arms would begin their slow, excruciating descent to stop all travel in both directions. The bridge would jolt apart and rise as slowly as syrup, gigantic gears screeching in complaint. And so help her, she wouldn’t be brought to a standstill behind that web of rising girders and the trussed arches parting and the road gaping open. Not today.
Her temples began to throb. With one hand she sifted through the contents of her purse in search of aspirin. The CTA bus hissed to a halt directly in front of her. Even one-handed, Sarah was ready. She dodged left, barely missing a bicycle. The cyclist shot her a look halfway between outrage and terror. Behind her he jumped the curb, dismounted on the sidewalk, and apparently chose to walk the rest of the way.
Ahead, the boat struggled to make headway, low in the water, her heavy cargo lashed in place with chains. Water churned in the wake of mammoth propellers. Smoke plumed from one smut-tarnished stack.
If the ninth-floor guys got a kick out of her NASCAR driving, they would’ve been awestruck if they could see Sarah Harper now. Every racetrack-inspired maneuver numbed the icy emptiness of the night before. Every Mario Andretti move kept her from replaying Joe’s plainspoken, painful words. Each Indy 500 tactic gave her license to conceal the hurt behind other long-ago scabs and scars.
Each time Sarah finagled her way into another lane, she was in her very own speed contest, running from the truth.
By the time Sarah gunned her engine and pulled around a delivery truck, the warning lights on the bridge burst to life. The bells started ringing as the barricades began their torturous, slow descent. Brake lights flickered ahead. She leaned forward, as if her body language could inspire the three drivers in front of her to keep moving. “Not yet. Go go go go go.”
For one maddening moment, she thought she couldn’t proceed. Everything ahead seemed to be drawing to a standstill. In slow motion, one compact car passed from the opposite direction. It doused the side of the Lincoln with one fateful burst of spray. Then, nothing in the oncoming lane, only open road.
Sarah saw her way clear. She downshifted and slammed the accelerator to the floor. Her tires squealed on the asphalt, shimmied where they hit rain. The stiff-armed barriers were folded midp
oint like a drill-team captain halfway through a routine. Sarah swept past the idling vehicles blocking her way. She swept past clanging lights and concrete abutments. She slalomed through the barricade, skidding left, veering right, without slowing down.
Somewhere in the back of her mind, Sarah smelled burning rubber. Just let someone try to come after her! By the time they could stop her, she’d be placing a linen napkin on her lap, sipping coffee from a china cup, and discussing commodity-futures prices. In surprise, she saw the gaping mouth of the bridge already yawning open. She saw the huge jaws of its mouth parting to reveal a taunting grin of steel teeth.
She remembered her motto: Life is there for the taking.
Sarah felt the bridge’s iron gearwheels rumbling beneath her feet. She hadn’t realized she was driving steadily uphill. In one swift second, she considered whether to put the pedal to the metal or throw on the brakes. She cataloged the danger and shoved it aside. She could make this.
The speedometer needle nudged eighty. The sky passed in a blur of balustrades and steel. Sarah felt wheels leave the ground and suddenly, horrifyingly, knew she’d been wrong.
Already she heard sirens in the distance. In her wake a bridge-authority operator had thrown an emergency switch. She heard tons of metal shudder to a stop. Below her the ship’s throttle had gone into full reverse, whipping up water. But it was too late. The road ahead had already opened. She had nowhere to go but down.
The bridge’s underpinnings hung in her path. She crooked an arm over her face and braced for impact. The car missed the bridge by inches. For long seconds she hung in an awful void, suspended between all that was behind her and all that was yet to come.
And then she plummeted.
The Lincoln’s nose struck cold water at full velocity. Metal sheered off. She tasted blood. Adrenaline shot through her, numbed her with needlelike precision. I’m in trouble. Her heart pounded faster than it had ever pounded before. When she tried to scream for help, nothing came. Fear clamped her throat, leaving her no voice. The constricted sound that escaped was something between a gasp and a reedy cry.
Any Minute: A Novel Page 10
