Absolution

by Amanda Dick

  “What did he say?”

  “That it wasn’t your fault.” Why did she sound so frightened? She cleared her throat, mustering up the courage to look across the table at him. “He said there was nothing you could have done, that the other car came out of nowhere.”

  He nodded slightly, his expression guarded. She waited for him to elaborate but he didn’t. She seized her chance, before she lost her nerve completely.

  “I want to know why you left like that, if it wasn’t your fault. Was it because of what happened to me?”

  He shook his head and she tried to distance herself from his obvious pain. She couldn’t afford empathy if she was to get through this. She needed answers.

  “Was it? You were gone when I woke up from surgery, Jack. You knew what happened to me. Did you leave because of that, because you didn’t want to be with me? I want the truth. I can take it,” she lied.

  He shook his head, swallowing back tears. “No.”

  “You’re lying.”

  “No, I’m not, I – “

  “You’re lying!” she cried, anger bursting forth.

  “No! I’m not lying, I swear to you,” he insisted desperately, leaning forward. “I left because of me, because of what I did!”

  “What the hell does that mean?”

  He looked like a deer caught in the headlights. Something was going on behind his eyes that she couldn’t read and she frowned, searching deeper.

  “I was driving. It was my fault.”

  “So you left because you felt guilty?”

  “I left because I was scared.”

  “I was scared too – I woke up and you were gone!”

  Breaking it down like that, so simply, hurt much more than she expected. All the things she couldn’t say – the fear that had overwhelmed her and pulled her under and nearly destroyed her – manifested as tears, overflowing and running down her cheeks.

  “I’m so sorry,” he said brokenly, staring at his hands on the table. “I thought you’d hate me… I thought you’d all hate me.”

  “So you just decided to run away instead?”

  He didn’t answer, and anger and betrayal overwhelmed her as his face blurred.

  “I wish I could take it all back – I wish I could change everything,” he whispered.

  “You can’t.”

  “I know. I’m so sorry. I should’ve stayed, I should’ve – “

  “I’m not interested in hearing about what you should’ve done,” she snapped. “I know what you should’ve done, but you didn’t, did you?”

  Jack looked devastated but she couldn’t help the words that came tumbling out.

  “I lay in that hospital bed, counting the holes in the ceiling tiles, thinking about all the things that I would never be able to do again, and I kept thinking that if you were there, it would be okay – that you being there would mean that everything was going to be okay. But you weren’t.” She steadily held his gaze, binding him to her as surely as if she had used ropes or chains. “I hated you for that. I hated you for leaving, I hated you for not even saying goodbye – for not having the guts to talk to me before you left, for being such a coward.”

  Tears spilled down his cheeks, but she wasn’t finished.

  “Why didn’t you call? Or write or email – why didn’t you at least try? Did you even think about me at all?”

  “I never stopped thinking about you,” he whispered, chin quivering.

  It was on the tip of her tongue to call him a liar again, but something was wrong. He stared at her, and for an instant, she saw through the mask. Buried so deep it was barely visible, was the truth, and when she saw it, it took her breath away.

  “I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I never meant for any of this to happen. I was weak and I was wrong and I’m so sorry.”

  She hung her head, her hair falling forward to shield her expression as she swiped a tear off her cheek with a quick flick of her finger.

  “I always meant to come home,” he said. “I just never thought it’d be for Dad’s funeral.”

  Her heart seized at his reference to Tom and the hole in her heart magnified. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw him running a hand down his face.

  “The longer I stayed away, the more I thought you’d hate me. And after a while, I didn’t think that coming home would do any good.”

  The silence mounted around them. She stared at her drink, not having the strength to lift the glass and take another sip.

  “It took me a long time to realise you weren’t coming back,” she said, her hair falling away from her face as she looked up.

  The air around them crackled with words they couldn’t bring themselves to say, or hear. Sometime over the past few minutes, her anger had dissipated. The disappointment and betrayal, the heartache – all of it had gone, withered inside of her. What was left in its wake was an intense sadness, a longing for the lost years and the road not travelled. She wasn’t the only one who had suffered. He had suffered too, she could see that now.

  Jack reached over to lay a trembling hand on hers. Her skin tingled, memories flooding back, stealing her strength and adding to the overall sense of emptiness.

  “I never meant to hurt you,” he whispered. “Please Ally. I’m so sorry.”

  Jack sat at the table and stared at the space across from him that Ally had vacated. The sun had gone down an hour ago, plunging the house into darkness, yet he didn’t move. He could still feel her hand beneath his and he flexed his fingers, longing to touch her again.

  His heart had soared when he had seen her standing outside the church, but from what he had seen since, it was clear that all was not as it seemed. He had been so close to throwing his bag into the back of the car and taking off again. And then he saw a car pull up in front of the house. He felt like a voyeur, watching as she got out of the car, walked up the front path and up the steps. His heart beat so loud in his chest that he thought it might break a rib. Yes, she was walking, but obviously it wasn’t as simple as that. She seemed to have limited control over her body and he desperately wanted to ask her about that, but he wasn’t sure he had the right to – and he was terrified at what she might tell him.

  His self-respect plummeted to an all-time low. He had lied to her by omission. That wasn’t part of his plan. He had planned to tell her the truth, he was going to lay it at her feet and let her decide then if she would forgive him or not. He had not planned to give her half-truths and echoes.

  What have I done?

  After everything that had happened over the past few days, all his noble intentions, his promises to his father, the bargains he made with himself, why lie now? Why not tell her the truth – all of it? The answer seemed simple enough: what if, when she knew the truth, she turned him away? It was as if he had returned to the same crossroads of four years earlier. Stay or go?

  She didn’t want to talk about the accident at all – she barely mentioned it, she said she didn’t remember it. Was that a blessing or a curse? She wasn’t angry about it either, she was angry that he had left the way he did, without saying goodbye. He groaned, berating himself once again. If only he had stayed and talked to her then. Maybe she would have forgiven him. Maybe she would have hated him even more. Maybe she still would, when he told her the truth now.

  He had to make her understand, but the idea was a lot simpler than the reality. He wished his father were here. He longed for his phone to ring, to hear his father’s voice one more time. He needed help to get through this.

  A knock on the door startled him. If Ally had come back, he needed to tell her now, before he lost his nerve. He pushed the chair back and headed for the front door, flicking on the porch light on the way. Readying himself mentally, he opened the door.

  “I thought I made myself clear earlier,” Callum said, his voice laced with anger.

  Jack’s heart sank.

  “I told you to stay the hell away from her, didn’t I?”

  “I don’t want to fight again,” Jack si
ghed. “It’s been a long day. Can’t we just take this up again tomorrow?”

  “What was she doing here? What did you say to her?”

  “She came to me – I didn’t go to her,” he frowned, shifting his weight as he made the connection. “And how the hell did you know she was here anyway, are you stalking me?”

  Callum just raised his eyebrows.

  “You’re stalking me?” Jack was incredulous, his blood boiling.

  “Don’t flatter yourself,” Callum huffed, planting his feet on the doorstep. “I saw her car outside earlier. I want to know what you said to her.”

  “You want to know if I told her about what happened that night.”

  Callum glared at him.

  “The answer is no, I didn’t. But why the hell didn’t you? You were there, you knew.”

  “Because it wasn’t my place to tell her – it was yours.”

  “Jesus, Callum! You just let her think God knows what, all this time?”

  “What the hell do you care what she thought? You weren’t here, remember? I didn’t tell her because what the hell would be the point?”

  “What would be the point?” Jack repeated indignantly. “She would’ve known the truth!”

  “That you were a coward? She figured that one out for herself when she woke up and you were gone!”

  Jack opened his mouth to speak, but Callum cut him off.

  “Don’t you dare come back here and start blaming me or anyone else! No one told you to go – you made that choice yourself! You did the wrong thing then and by coming back now and stirring it all up again, all you’re doing is making it worse. You’re here for your own selfish reasons, not because of Tom or because of her!”

  “I’m trying to make it right!”

  “How?”

  Jack was dumbfounded, knowing that he had asked himself that question a million times and come up empty.

  “She doesn’t need you anymore. The best thing you can do now is just crawl back into whatever hole you crawled out of and leave her alone.”

  “No. I’m not going anywhere, not this time.”

  “That’s your master plan? Seriously?”

  Jack glared at him in silence, his anger mounting.

  “Oh come on – you gotta admit, that’s a reckless statement, especially for you. You disappear when the going gets tough, remember?”

  “That’s not what happened and you know it.”

  “Do I? Because that’s what it looked like from where I was standing!”

  “You know damn well why I left!” Jack blurted out. “You knew what I did – you were there!”

  “Yeah, I knew what you did – big deal! You were trying to save her life, she wouldn’t have blamed you!” he said hotly. “You did the wrong thing, Jack, you should’ve stayed.”

  Jack stared at him, his heart racing. He thought about the relationship they used to have, how close they were. Like brothers. And now this – strangers. Worse than that; enemies.

  “I made a mistake. I won’t make that mistake again.”

  Callum shook his head, eyeballing Jack as he took a step backwards, forcing his hands back into his pockets.

  “Here’s the thing, you made your choice, now you have to live with it, just like the rest of us. You can’t change what happened, and if you stick around you’re only gonna hurt her again. Is that what you want?”

  Jack opened his mouth to reply but Callum wasn’t finished.

  “She was just starting to get her life back together, after everything she’s been through. Don’t rip it all apart again,” he pleaded quietly. “Do the right thing this time – leave.”

  Devastated, Jack couldn’t think of a single thing to say in reply. He watched Callum walk down the steps and along the street to his car, get in and drive away. He was still standing frozen in the doorway, watching the space where Callum’s car had been, several minutes later.

  CHAPTER 6

  “Your future is not determined by others but by your own choices - the choices you make today and tomorrow.”

  - Maori Proverb

  The morning sun splashed columns of light across Ally’s living room. From her place on the floor, she watched the light play across the wooden beams above her and tried to recall every word of her conversation with Jack the day before.

  She spent half the night sitting at her dining room table, trying to imagine just what Jack might have been going through over the past four years. It was clear he was a changed man and, except for that brief glimpse, the fact that she couldn’t see beyond the façade bothered her.

  Callum knelt beside her on the floor, gently manipulating her right leg at the knee before pushing it up towards her hips and then back down again. The usual feeling of detachment gnawed at her. He might as well have been holding someone else’s leg in his hands, for all the sensation she felt. She had a friend from rehab who had sensation below his injury point, although he had no movement. She often wondered if that would be better or worse than the numbness. Her friend suffered with spasms, whereas she did not. Perhaps it was some kind of cosmic balancing act? Either way, facts were facts. Wishing things were different didn’t change anything.

  Should she tell Callum about her conversation with Jack last night? After his heartfelt apology this morning, she wanted to, but now he seemed so withdrawn. She couldn’t blame him. The funeral yesterday was brutal, on all of them.

  He laid her right leg down on the mat and picked up the left, positioning it carefully in both hands before repeating the motion: bend knee, push towards hips, lower leg to mat, repeat. Range-of-motion exercises were necessary to keep her lower body supple and healthy. They were as much a part of her regular routine as massage, swimming, pain meds and everything else. She thought that it would get easier to take over time, just like the other aspects of her new life. Only it hadn’t. It did make it easier that Callum had offered to do them with her, but that didn’t take away the dull ache in the pit of her stomach as she watched him push and pull, rotate and extend. Annoyed with herself, she pushed the self-pitying thoughts away once again. She had fallen down that pit once before. Never again.

  “I saw your car outside Tom’s place yesterday.”

  She looked down at him sharply. He had laid her leg back on the mat and was sitting on the floor at her feet, staring at her. She felt as if she had been caught with her hand in the cookie jar.

  “I came over to talk to you last night, after what happened at the funeral. I wanted to apologise again. I drove by Tom’s place on the way home.”

  “I’m sorry,” she adjusted her arm beneath the pillow, suddenly uncomfortable. “I couldn’t figure out how to tell you... and I didn’t want you to get mad.”

  “I’m not mad, I just don’t get it. One minute you don’t want to see him, the next minute you’re going over there?”

  She blinked back tears.

  His expression softened as he got to his feet. “Come on, we’re done here. Let’s get you up off the floor.”

  She sniffed and sat up, grateful for the distraction. Callum pulled her wheelchair closer and she reached back for it, adjusting its angle to her body and pulling on the brake. Bending her knees and pulling her legs in close to her body, she counted silently, pushing herself upwards on the count of three and aiming her backside towards the seat.

  Callum rolled up the yoga mat and set it down on the table behind him.

  “I needed to see him,” she said, hoping her voice wouldn’t betray her. “I needed to talk to him about what happened.”

  “I get that. It was probably the right thing to do.”

  “Was it?” she murmured, fighting back tears. “I’m not so sure anymore.”

  He walked over to the armchair and sank into it wearily. She turned her chair to follow him, trying to rein in her fears.

  “I thought it would help,” she said, trying her best to put her fears into words. “I thought that if I told him how much it hurt, it would feel better – to have said it, owned it lik
e that. And I thought maybe if he told me why he left, I could deal with it and put it behind me.”

  “Do you?” he asked quietly. “Feel better, I mean?”

  “No. Not really. I didn’t get any answers, either. Just a boatload more questions.”

  “What do you mean?”

  She shook her head, trying to unwrap it all over again and failing miserably. “It didn’t seem to matter that I didn’t blame him for the accident. He still said he felt responsible for what happened, that’s why he left. I kinda guessed that part already.”

  “No surprises there, then.”

  “I guess not,” she said, fidgeting with her grandmother’s ring. “I just get the feeling there’s more to it, that there’s something he’s not telling me.”

  “I’m sure there’s a lot he’s not telling you.”

  She winced.

  “Look,” he said, leaning forward. “Here’s a recap of the situation – he left four years ago and he only came back for Tom’s funeral. Does he feel guilty about that? Sure, why not. But did he even try to call you or me or anyone apart from Tom in the past four years? Did he make any effort at all to come home during that time? No, because he didn’t give a shit. I know it hurts like hell, and I’m sorry, but it’s the truth. I don’t know about you, but I’m all out of second chances. I don’t think he deserves one, not after that.”

  “I know how you feel about him. I know how much it hurt when he –“

  “This isn’t about me, it’s about you.”

  “No, it’s not. It’s not just about me. I wasn’t the only one he left behind.”

  “Yeah, well, you were the only one he left behind in the ICU.”

  She felt as if she’d been kicked in the chest.

  He ran a hand down his face, sighing. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it to come out like that.”

  “It’s okay,” she murmured, trying hard to recover. “You’re right.”

  And he was, but that was only part of the problem. She could feel herself losing ground, the past and present overlapping, getting mixed up in her head. Just a week ago, things had seemed so simple.