by Drew Banton
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Sheila felt Barry’s arm around her and could sense that he was still awake even though he would have to be up and working in a few hours. She concentrated on breathing with a slow evenness so that he would think she slept. She couldn't listen to him talk about Denny anymore, at least not tonight. She didn’t begrudge Barry his grieving, even in the curious form it had taken, but if she were to be the one to help him through, to keep the details of living in some sort of order until his pain eased, then she would have to be careful that her own reserves weren’t drained.
Barry shifted once again and then the balance of the bed was altered as he sat up on the edge of the mattress, his feet on the floor. He rose, gathered his clothes with extreme care, and left the room. Sheila let him go without speaking. It was better for them both if she got a few more hours sleep and he got to wander. He was too physical a being to lie motionless while his thoughts twisted and squirmed.
She could follow Barry in her mind as he padded down the stairs. Carrying his boots she guessed, because there was a pause before she heard him crunching along the gravel driveway towards the back of the house. She could hear him no more as he reached the grass behind the house and she knew he was heading for the fields beyond. He’d probably climb to the top of the hill to look at the stars. The hill was not quite impressive enough to merit a name but there were no others close by and so it allowed a broad view of distant mountains and more distant stars. She and Barry had courted there and drank beer with friends and on a moonlit night she remembered well, made love for the first time. On an impulse she bounced from the bed and looked out the window that overlooked the rear of the house. The moon was on the wane but she could clearly make out Barry’s form as he strode across the near field in the direction, as she had guessed, of the hilltop. He had his hands in his pockets and was hunched against the evening chili as he walked, looking to her eyes exactly like the fourteen-year-old she had fallen for. She realized, almost with surprise, that she still loved him.
She returned to bed but the sleep she needed would not come. There had been only one man in her life since her fourteenth summer when her family had left the Land of Well-tended Lawns for a vacation in Vermont. Her parents liked Barry but hoped she’d find someone more like themselves. She’d suffered high school to reach the summers and finished college to appease her parents but all she ever really wanted to do was be the wife of the farmer's son. And then, after twelve years of marriage and two children, she had taken Denny as a lover.
Denny seemed to understand things about her that Barry simply accepted with a cheerful shrug. He had displayed directness and wit where Barry showed simplicity and a good disposition. Barry was unflagging in his love, but from Denny she felt passion. For a few months she thought she might leave the husband for the friend. But when she spoke of this to Denny, a slight tightening of his arms as they encircled her, a change only a lover would discern, told her she had misjudged him. He kept calling and trying to see her, but from then on he was her husband’s best friend and nothing more. She didn’t regret the affair on her own account. Some very good memories lingered. But she had been afraid that Barry would find out somehow. She didn’t fear losing him, she felt sure he would forgive her, but she didn’t want to see him hurt, not in that way, not by her.
Now the only other person who had known was dead. She could recall warmly the things that had attracted her towards him- his consideration for her pleasure, the way he had of speaking her thoughts just before she did, his scent. And she could admit to herself that along with her sorrow for his loss, and her sharing of Barry’s pain, she felt relief. Barry’s memories would be of a good and true friend. It was better that way. Warm tears pooled in her eyes for the two men she loved.
