Loving Donovan

by Bernice L. McFadden

  * * *

  She called him twice. He wasn’t home or was pretending not to be, and then she called his cell phone and still she did not get an answer.

  She paced the floor.

  Her head was beginning to hurt. Visions floating through her mind: Donovan lying next to another woman. Donovan kissing another woman. Donovan touching another woman.

  She grabbed hold of her locks and tugged hard, as if pulling them out at the roots could pull the images from her head.

  The phone rang, and she snatched it up. “Hello,” she barked into the receiver.

  “You called me?”

  No hello or how you doing. Campbell was incensed. “Yes, I did. We need to talk, Donovan. I’m feeling a little confused right now, and I’m very angry—”

  “You always angry.” Donovan’s voice was bored.

  Campbell sucked in as much air as her lungs could hold. She didn’t want to curse—she wasn’t one to really use words like that—but he was taking her there.

  She exhaled.

  “Donovan,” she started, a bit calmer now, “look, I just think we need to get some things out in the open—”

  “Well, I’m listening.” His voice was like ice now.

  That was it for Campbell. A rush of words, some she had rehearsed and others that had somehow found their way into her mouth, came rushing out, and when she was done, her hands were shaking and her eyes were wet and Millie was standing at her bedroom door with a concerned look on her face.

  Campbell put her hand up. Millie backed away and with one last look pulled the door shut.

  Donovan was laughing, he was actually laughing, and in between the laughter Campbell heard things like, “I do know other people.” And, “I can’t be under you twenty-four seven.” And, “What the hell do you want from me?”

  She had responses for everything he flung at her.

  But the last statement, the one she took like a blow to her gut, was, “The last time I checked, Campbell, we weren’t married.”

  It was a silent undoing. No tears, just a total breakdown of her spirit.

  She hung up the phone.

  Seven days come and go, and Campbell tries to keep her mind occupied with the collage she’s working on, the packing, and the swatches of paint she’s considering for her bedroom and the kitchen.

  She wants to call Donovan, needs to call him, but she doesn’t. She knows what a junkie feels like now, because she’s addicted to Donovan and she’s trying to kick him, but it hurts everywhere.

  Was this how it was with Andre?

  No, she didn’t go through anything like this. She had been more angry than hurt. She had left him and for good reason. She had had a reason. What was happening here, what was going down between her and Donovan, made no sense at all.

  On the eighth day he called. His voice was low and apologetic. Campbell had the phone gripped so tightly in her hands, her knuckles were white.

  “I’m sorry, Campbell. I’ve just been going through something. I didn’t mean to take it out on you.”

  She felt relief wash over her. It had been the hardest week of her life. She never wanted to go through it again.

  “I’m sorry too,” she breathed, and then before he could respond: “Can we get together?”

  He was silent, and for one desperate moment Campbell thought he was going to deny her again.

  “Sure. I’ll come by later.”

  Later never came. Instead, she got a phone call two hours after his promised arrival time.

  “Listen, I got caught up. Can I come tomorrow?”

  Campbell bit her lip. “Sure. Tomorrow, then.”

  It took three days for tomorrow to get there, and when he finally did come, Campbell was right back in the state of anguish he had dumped her into two weeks earlier.

  “Donovan, I just need to know, is there someone else?” She blurted it out as soon as she swung the door open.

  Donovan just blinked. “Can I come in first?”

  Campbell stood aside.

  They moved to the couch, Donovan wedging himself into the corner and as far away from her as possible. But he couldn’t escape those eyes, those eyes of hers weighed down with hurt.

  He laughed because he was nervous, not because there was anything humorous about the situation.

  Campbell’s eyebrows flew up, and Donovan raised his hand to halt the fury he suspected she was about to fly into.

  “There’s no one else, Campbell. I’m just going through something is all,” he said, and shifted uncomfortably. “I know I’ve been a little distant, but it’s not you. It’s me.”

  Campbell relaxed a bit. That was good. It wasn’t her; it was him. That was good.

  “I’m sorry that I’ve gotten you all upset.”

  Campbell ran her hands through her hair. She was relieved that they were finally communicating again.

  “Well, I’m sorry I overreacted,” she sighed.

  She wanted to reach out to him, but something in his manner, in the way he remained in that tight corner of the couch, told her that he wasn’t ready for her to touch him. That was fine—she would settle for his presence right now. For the moment, that would have to be enough.

  “So are we still on for St. Martin?” They had settled on that island.

  Donovan hesitated before answering. “Y-Yes.” His response was barely audible.

  Campbell cocked her head. “Are you sure?” If he said no he wasn’t, she would die.

  “Uh-huh,” he said, and stood up. “I’ve got to get up early,” he said, and brushed at his pants.

  Campbell eyed him.

  “Earlier than usual,” he added, and shoved his hands inside his pockets.

  Campbell accepted his reason, even though she felt he wasn’t being completely honest with her.

  When they got to the front door Donovan just said goodbye and started down the steps.

  This was how the other thing began, she thought to herself.

  JULY

  The FedEx package came on the third, and the flowers, large purple blossoms in a mauve vase, on the fifth, his birthday.

  Both deliveries were from Campbell. The FedEx package contained his airline ticket. First class.

  The flowers were embarrassing. Grammy had just made a face at him and shook her head and mumbled something he knew he didn’t want to hear.

  “I wish I could be there with you, Donovan.” Campbell’s voice came across in distressing threads that pulled at his scalp.

  “I know.”

  There had been a last-minute inclusion in an art festival being held in Charleston. She had flown out that morning and would be there until the eighth. They were due to leave for St. Martin on the ninth. “I’ll just meet you in Miami for the connecting flight,” she said.

  “Uh-huh.”

  There was silence, and then they both started to speak at the same time.

  “No, you go ahead,” Campbell said, and pressed her cell phone against her ear.

  “I was just going to ask you how the flight was and if you were having good weather.”

  Campbell smiled. “The flight was fine, just fine.”

  He was sounding a little bit more like himself. This trip would be good for him, for both of them. “It’s so hot down here. But it’s beautiful. Big old houses. We should come back together one day.”

  There was silence, and then Donovan cleared his throat before saying, “Yeah, we’ll have to do that.”

  “Well, I have a two o’clock presentation, so I’m going to go. We’ll talk later, then?”

  “Sure.”

  “Okay, well, happy birthday again. I love you,” Campbell said.

  The “I love you” had come out as easily and as naturally as goodbye and it had felt good to say, Campbell thought to herself as she stuffed her cell phone back into her purse.

  It felt right to say it.

  Donovan moved the phone away from his ear and stared at the receiver.

  His mouth had moved to respond, �
��I love you too,” but the words had clumped up at the back of his throat and he’d nodded instead.

  He’d remained that way for a while, standing there, staring at the phone, trying to clear his throat of the words he’d never be able to speak to Campbell, and after more than twenty minutes and two glasses of water, he placed the phone back into its cradle and slid the plane ticket across the smooth wood of the kitchen counter and into the garbage.

  She stood there long past the time American Airlines flight 44 departed. The agent at the desk announced the final boarding and then called her name.

  She watched from the large glass windows as her bags were removed from the flight, and even when they changed the black-and-white signs on the board that informed the passengers that flight 65 to Chicago would be leaving from that gate, she still remained.

  If she could have walked, she probably would have. But her legs were weak, and she knew that if she took one step away from that window, she would come apart at the seams and crumble right there on that standard gray airport carpet.

  She’d called his house, and the computer voice on the other end advised her that the number had been changed. No further information was available.

  She’d tried his cell phone, and all she got was a constant busy signal. She’d called AT&T cellular service and asked if they could check the number for her, and they did. It had been disconnected.

  So she stood there, and the movie that was her short time with Donovan played over and over in her head, and with each scene, she pressed pause and concentrated hard on his words, his touch, and his eyes, trying to grasp what had happened between them.

  There was nothing, nothing she could see that told her that things would end up like this. Not like this.

  She probably would have remained there forever, hands pressed against the glass, staring at herself, but someone had picked up the phone and called security. “She’s been here for like nine hours. I think there’s something wrong with her.”

  There was something wrong indeed. She had had the rug pulled out from beneath her, the door suddenly slammed in her face—she had spread her arms out at her sides, closed her eyes, and fell backward, more than sure she could trust Donovan to catch her, and had hit the floor. Blam!

  To the two burly looking white men in blue uniforms and guns dangling from their waists, Campbell must have looked like a vagrant.

  The crisp green linen suit she’d donned that morning was creased and so badly wrinkled it looked as if she’d slept in it.

  The oil from her skin had sucked up all the makeup she’d applied that morning. There were remains of the copper-colored lipstick she favored trapped inside the creases in her lips, and dark circles beneath her eyes from that mascara that had been caught in the on-again, off-again tears she’d cried.

  One man asked if she was ill while the other guard smiled smugly and tilted his hand to his mouth in a drinking motion. “Spent a little too much time at the bar, did we?”

  No, she wasn’t ill or drunk; she was just confused and hurt.

  “Sorry,” she’d mumbled, and shuffled around them and toward the sign that said, Exit—Ground Transportation and Baggage Claim.

  DECEMBER

  Campbell stood in the window of her new home. The logs in the fireplace crackled behind her as she sipped her tea and watched her neighbors stroll up and down the streets.

  Five months later, she was just starting to gain the weight back, answering the phone instead of allowing the machine to get it. Smiling sometimes and crying a little less often.

  She supposed the therapist had had a lot to do with it.

  Campbell had been ashamed to go, but she started thinking about Pat, understanding now what that pain must have been like for her and how much she needed to escape it, because Campbell felt the same way, and it scared her to know that there was more of her that wanted to die than to continue living each blessed day in sorrow.

  For a long time it seemed as though there was nothing anyone could do. Not Millie, Macon, or Luscious, but they all kept watch over her those weeks she lay in bed, not wanting to bathe or eat, just sleeping, and in between the sleeping, the tears, so many tears.

  “What happened? What can we do?” they asked, faces heavy with worry, hands busy rubbing her shoulder, tucking the comforter around her, rubbing her shoulder, touching her head for fever, wiping her tears away.

  Campbell had no answers for them. Could she say that this was all because of a man, because of love? That was too trifling a problem to have a total breakdown over.

  But she had.

  When her best friends came to see her, they had solemnly ascended the stairs but hurried to fix their faces with bright smiles outside Campbell’s bedroom door. They rushed in, the flowers and balloons they carried with them making a racket.

  Millie had tried to prepare them. First on the phone and then again when they stepped through the front door.

  Smiles fell away, and their faces were suddenly long and eyes going wet just to look at her. Laverna had to grab hold of the bookshelf to steady herself, toppling the miniature ceramic penguins perched on its top.

  Anita had been the first one to ease herself down onto the edge of the bed and pat Campbell’s thigh. She looked at Campbell and shook her head as she ran her hand over the new blades of hair that were pushing up from her friend’s scalp.

  Campbell had cut off her locks while she was still in Florida. Had stood in front of the mirror weighed down with grief and hollow, her mind wandering on Pat and understanding full well how her friend had felt on that day she stepped off the platform.

  Campbell lightly ran the blade over her wrist.

  Macon came to mind, and so did Millie and Luscious and her friends, and Macon again and Macon, Macon . . . only Macon.

  In the end, she used the blade to cut away her hair, hacking it down to the scalp.

  Anita stroked Campbell’s head and then her cheek, running her finger along the dark half moons beneath her eyes. Those half moons made her look like a cancer patient, and in some strange way, Anita supposed she was.

  Campbell wouldn’t look at Anita or any of the women; she just lay there, motionless, staring at the wall.

  Anita slipped off her expensive silk jacket, kicked off her shoes, and climbed into bed beside Campbell, wrapping her arms tight around her.

  The others followed suit, each finding a small space to rest in and some part of Campbell to hold.

  They prayed.

  They’d all been to some part of that shadowed place Campbell had climbed into. They knew and understood that a man could do this to a woman, and there was nothing trifling or shameful about it.

  EPILOGUE

  Eventually the pain ebbed away, and the grief faded. The anger that followed was cutting but brief, and for that Campbell was thankful.

  The love she had for him never changed, never shifted or waned, just remained lodged inside her, wrapped around her heart.

  She still looks for him behind the smoked-glass windows of Benzes and in the framed rectangular glass of the motorman’s chamber.

  Her heart still hopes when the phone rings and her eyes search for his smile in crowds.

  Campbell has a better understanding of love and the paths God and the universe have laid out for her, and it allows her to muse that perhaps she and Donovan will meet again in another life, on another plane . . .

  . . . she as the sand, him as the sea . . .

  . . . him as moon, she as the stars . . .

  . . . penguins . . .

  E-Book Extras

  Excerpt from Gathering of Waters

  Also by Bernice L. McFadden and available from Akashic Books

  Excerpt from Gathering of Waters

  ___________________

  Chapter One

  I am Money. Money Mississippi.

  I have had many selves and have been many things. My beginning was not a conception, but the result of a growing, stretching, and expanding, which took place over thousand
s of years.

  I have been figments of imaginations, shadows and sudden movements seen out of the corner of your eye. I have been dewdrops, falling stars, silence, flowers, and snails.

  For a time I lived as a beating heart, another life found me swimming upstream toward a home nestled in my memory. Once I was a language that died. I have been sunlight, snowdrifts, and sweet babies’ breath. But today, however, for you and for this story, I am Money. Money Mississippi.

  I do not know for whom or what I was named. Perhaps I was christened for a farmer’s beloved mule or a child’s favorite pet; I suspect, though, that my name was derived from a dream deferred, because as a town, I have been impoverished for most of my existence.

  You know, before white men came with their smiles, Bibles, guns, and disease, this place that I am was inhabited by Native men. Choctaw Indians. It was the Choctaw who gave the state its name: Mississippi—which means many gathering of waters. The white men fancied the name, but not the Indians, and so slaughtered them and replaced them with Africans, who as you know were turned into slaves to drive the white man’s ego, whim, and industry.

  But what you may not know and what the colonists, genociders, and slave owners certainly did not know is this: Both the Native man and the African believed in animism, which is the idea that souls inhabit all objects, living things, and even phenomena. When objects are destroyed and bodies perish, the souls flit off in search of a new home. Some souls bring along memories, baggage if you will, that they are unwilling or unable to relive themselves of. Oftentimes these memories manifest in humans as déjà vu. Other times and in many other life-forms and so-called inanimate objects, these displays have been labeled as curious, bizarre, absurd, and deadly.

  You may have read in the news about the feline having all the characteristics of a dog, the primate who walked upright from the day he was born until the day he died, of men trapped in female hosts and vice versa, the woman who woke one morning to find that she had grown a tail, the baby boy who emerged from his mother’s womb flanked not in skin but scales, the man who grew to the towering heights of a tree, rivers overflowing their banks, monster waves wiping away whole cities, twisters gobbling up entire neighborhoods, relentlessly falling snow blanketing towns like volcano ash.