Forever

by Rachel Maldonado

  Chapter Seventeen

  Meghan couldn't ever quite put her finger on why Joanna was so different than when they had first met. The first two years she had spent so much money on her trying to woo her with bears, chocolates, and countless deliveries of fresh flowers. But now the days and months and holidays seemed to pass without much notice of special days like birthdays, Valentine's Day, or anniversaries.

  “Today's our ten year anniversary,” Meghan had said one day. “Might you have a special night planned?”

  “It is? I hadn't realized.” Jo sat on the sofa reading her Kindle. She hardly lifted her eyes from the book she was reading. “How about we go to eat at Morton's Steakhouse,” she finally managed to say.

  Meghan sighed. “We always eat at Morton's Steakhouse. Why don't we do something different for once? And why are you always stuck in that Kindle reading books? If it's not that, then it's the television because your sports shows are on or there's something on the Science channel. Why don't you pay attention to me like you did when we met? You're either lost in books and TV shows or passed out drunk on the couch.”

  “What do you mean pay attention like when we met?” asked Jo. She knew that Meghan was referring to the countless gifts she would receive at work and at home, but she didn't have the heart to tell her that those gifts were sent by someone else. She had simply taken off the cards and any indication that they were from another woman and allowed Meghan to believe that she was showering her with gifts. In actuality, they were from that woman she had met at the movie theater long ago while she had been on a date with Meghan. She had read over the countless messages, poems, and cards, and they were always signed by the same person. Alex Hunter. She didn't know the woman, but she despised her for trying to steal Meghan away from her. She would never allow any notes or flowers from Alex to reach her wife. If she could, she would take her secret to her grave.

  After the first two years had passed, Joanna had finally stopped being so paranoid about Alex and all her notes and love letters. She had convinced Meghan to sell her home and together they bought a small country home on the outskirts of town. She no longer had to worry about receiving flowers, changing notes, or throwing away cards. She had convinced Meghan not to leave a forwarding address so that they might start a new life together, and Meghan had agreed.

  Meghan couldn't understand why Jo was always so jealous of Willie. Every time she tried to write to her or use the laptop to video chat, Joanna would have a fit.

  “Why do you have to talk to that woman all the time!? I knew you had a thing for her! Didn't I tell you? I knew it from the day I met her!”

  “I don't know what you're talking about, Jo!” argued Meghan. “I told you that she's my childhood friend. You have no reason to be jealous of her!”

  Jo was though. Jealous of everyone whether they be male or female that ever tried to talk to Meghan. She wasn't allowed friends and Meghan began messaging Willie only when Joanna wasn't home. She felt trapped.

  Not only was Joanna jealous of Willie, but every time she saw Meghan online or writing letters, she wondered if she had finally been in contact with Alex and maybe it had been Alex that she was writing to and not Willie. Meghan tried hard to keep Joanna from being upset or angry.

  Another ten years passed, however, and Jo found that she was unhappy. It had become less about loving Meghan and trying to make her happy than it was about the secret she was keeping. It had started to consume her from the inside. Unlike Sheryl who didn't realize that Alex never really loved her the same way that she had loved Meghan, Joanna knew. She knew that Meghan loved Alex with all of her heart. She had been the one to comfort her to tell her that things were going to be okay. She had been the one to assure her that Alex wasn't any good for her, and she was a total loser for having abandoned her without so much as note to say why she dumped her. She knew that Meghan cried every single night for almost two years for another woman because it was in her arms that she had sobbed. All the while, she kept her secret. She knew that Alex loved her, too, and it was killing her inside. Almost immediately after their wedding, Joanna took to smoking and to drinking and to losing herself in books and TV programs just so she could escape the reality that her wife loved another woman.

  It was on their honeymoon night that marked Joanna's downfall. She had expected it to be special and beautiful, but after she and Meghan made love, Meghan found that she couldn't stop crying. She sobbed until she fell asleep.

  “Please, don't cry,” Jo tried to reassure her. “Everything's going to be okay. I love you.”

  But the more she tried to console her, the more she cried. Meghan didn't say that she was crying for Alex, but Joanna knew. She knew that marrying her meant that she would have to let go of any hope that Alex would return.

  Joanna left the hotel room in Cancun, Mexico, where they were honeymooning, walked down the street to an all night bar and drank until she couldn't feel anymore. She drank until she passed out and Meghan spent the rest of their honeymoon night alone.

  It was after that that she had spent many nights where she drank herself into a stupor or came home late from bars reeking of beer and alcohol. There were several times where Meghan had had to go to the police station to bail Jo out of jail because she had been in a brawl.

  Meghan felt trapped in a marriage that she couldn't escape from and wondered all the while where Alex was. Why couldn't she just show up as her knight in shining armor, ride in on a white horse and rescue her? They could ride away into the sunset together and never look back. She wondered, too, about Willie. Why did she insist on reenlisting? She felt she needed her and didn't have the heart to tell her she was miserable. In her mind, she could hear Willie's voice speaking to her and calling her by her childhood nickname.

  “Keep your chin up, Midge. Things will get better.”

  Meghan kept telling herself that things would improve with time, but they never did. The drinking had started after the wedding and throughout the years had become more and more frequent. Meghan knew that Jo was a functioning alcoholic.

  Late one night, Meghan sat in a hospital room sobbing.

  “It's going to be okay, ma'am,” said the nurse. “She's had a bit of alcohol poisoning, but she will pull through. The doctor wishes to speak with you.”

  Meghan had been horrified to have found Jo lying out in the yard in full view of the entire neighborhood. She reeked of beer and stale cigarettes. When she couldn't wake her, not even after splashing a cold glass of water on her face, Meghan had called for an ambulance.

  That day at the hospital was when Meghan found out that Joanna had cirrhosis of the liver. The doctor had started to lecture Meghan about Jo's smoking and drinking and revealed that he had already spoken to Joanna about it and had urged her to quit smoking and drinking in order to try to prolong her life.

  Meghan wasn't aware what the doctor was even talking about. Jo had found out about her illness and had kept it a secret from her wife. It was yet another secret that was consuming her inner workings and thoughts. Since Meghan had become so obsessed with having a baby because she thought it would help their marriage, Jo hadn't wanted to give Meghan any bad news. Why rattle the cage when she didn't have to? Or like her mother used to say, why rock the boat?

  Now, a few short months later, Meghan sat by her hospital bedside once again. Only this time it was as Jo lay dying. Jo had spent twenty long years loving a woman that never once loved her, but on her death bed, she finally had the heart to tell Meghan her secret.

  “I have to tell you something,” she whispered to Meghan as she sat in a chair near her. “Come close.”

  Meghan scooted her chair close to the hospital bed. “I'm here, honey.” She gripped her hand firmly and intertwined her fingers in Joanna's. She cared about her so much and couldn't understand why she had smoked and drank herself to death. She wondered why she couldn't make her happy. She had held her in her arms so many nights when she had cried for Alex and she knew she couldn't ever find a better
friend or lover. It's why she had married her. She had cried for another and yet, Joanna had still found it in her heart to love her.

  “All the flowers and gifts when we first met...” whispered Jo through an oxygen mask.

  “Yes?” replied Meghan.

  “I didn't send them. I never sent them.”

  “What? What are you talking about?” asked Meghan. She released her hand from Joanna's and stood up. She thought Jo was delusional. Maybe she was losing her mind due to medications.

  “I never sent them,” she said again. “They were from Alex. Alex Hunter.”

  Meghan suddenly felt as if she'd been run over by a large truck. The tears began to flow like a heavy rainfall down her face. “No. No.” She shook her head. “You're lying. You're just out of it because of your medications. Tell me it's not true.”

  “It's true,” said Joanna. The tears streamed down the sides of her eyes and onto her pillow leaving small pools of water on the pillowcase. “She sent them all. Even the ones to your house. I got there before you did and removed the cards. I'm sorry.”

  I'm sorry. Those were the last words that Joanna ever said to her. After twenty years together, she finally confessed the truth. She was only forty years old when her body succumbed to cirrhosis of the liver. She had tried to drink away her troubles, her inner turmoil, but, in the end, it was the drink that had killed her.

  Meghan slumped down into the chair feeling her legs give out beneath her. She sobbed as Joanna flat lined, but the tears were more in anguish and frustration for the loss of Alex and knowing the truth at last. Even though Joanna had just crossed over into another world, another dimension, Meghan was angry with her. How could she have done that to her? She had thought that Jo was her friend! Her lover! Her loving wife for so many years! She had held her in her arms so many nights as she had cried for Alex! And all the while, she knew that Alex loved her! She had never felt so betrayed in all her life.

  As the hospital nurses and doctors ran into the room on Joanna's code blue, the code signifying emergency or cardiac arrest, Meghan ran out the door and into the afternoon sun. Her world was spinning. She had to find Alex. All of these years, Alex loved her. She had thought that Alex had stopped loving her, stopped wanting to see her and all the while, it was she that had stopped communicating with her. Every card, every flower, every chocolate or bear she had ever received was from the woman she loved and she hadn't ever responded because she thought they were from Joanna! What a fool she had been! She had to get away from there. Joanna hadn't been a good person like she thought she was. She was manipulative and conniving, and had purposely kept the love of her life away from her. She knew she would never be able to forgive her for that. She tried to run to her car. She had to get to Alex. She had to find her. But the dizziness enveloped her, and she fainted falling down like a sack of potatoes near her automobile and onto the pavement.

  When she awoke, she was in a hospital room being examined by a doctor. “Are you okay, ma'am? You took a nasty fall.”

  “Yes. I'm fine. My wife and I had been trying to have a baby, but I've been so upset lately with her illness that I hadn't bothered to go get checked out. Do you think it's possible that I could be pregnant?”

  “We'll get a urine sample and order a pregnancy test right away, and you'll be the first to know,” replied the doctor smiling. The nurses asked her questions so as to have her admitted so she could receive proper care, but Meghan was reluctant to give much information.

  Meghan prayed she wasn't pregnant. What would she do if she was? She hadn't expected Joanna to die so suddenly. It was only a matter of months after she found out that she had cirrhosis that she passed, and she had forgotten all about wanting to have a baby. In a way, she had thought it would help to mend their marriage. Maybe, she had thought, it would bring happiness into their home and Joanna would be more involved in family life and stop smoking and drinking so much. It was what she had hoped and prayed for, but now that Joanna was gone, she couldn't fathom the idea of raising her baby all alone.

  It didn't take more than an hour after she gave a urine sample before the doctor and nurse got back to her.

  “Looks like you're pregnant,” said the doctor. “Only a couple months along.”

  Meghan was glad she was sitting down. She suddenly started to feel faint once again. The nurse began to fill out some paperwork and stopped when she noticed the name on the discharge papers. “Your name is Meghan Jeffries?” she asked curiously.

  “Yes, why do you ask?”

  “Did you ever work for the Daily Reporter on Main Street?”

  “Why yes. That's me. Do I know you?” questioned Meghan not recognizing the woman.

  The nurse shook her head. “No, but I know you. I knew Alex. She had herself an awful fall from a ladder many years ago, and she sent you countless flowers and messages. She nearly died. She was devastated when you never came to see her. I tell that tragic love story to all my patients. You're famous.”

  Meghan couldn't believe her ears. She raised her eyebrows in surprise. “Alex? You knew Alex? Alex Hunter?”

  “Hunter. That was the name alright. Alex Hunter. She sure did love you. She was here for months and months. Poor little bird couldn't walk or barely talk.”

  “Do you know what happened to her?” asked Meghan. She was nearly bursting at the seams with excitement.

  “Not sure. I think she got married.”

  Meghan could hardly stand it. “Are you sure? Alex Hunter. Blonde, beautiful. Blue eyes.”

  “Yes, I never forget a name or a face. I think she married her physical therapist. Sheryl Warren.”

  “Do you know where they might live?” questioned Meghan. She had no intention of tearing Alex away from her wife, but she had to talk to her. She had to explain herself. She couldn't live another day having her think that she didn't care about her or love her. If she had known about her accident, she would have never left her bedside at the hospital, and she surely would've nursed her back to health.

  “You know,” said the nurse, then paused for a moment. “I believe they moved into that old haunted house down the road. The one where the woman went berserk and killed her husband.”

  “I know the place. Thank you!” shouted Meghan. She jumped up from where she was seated and ran out the door.

  “Wait, Miss! I haven't given you your discharge papers yet!” shouted the nurse. But it was too late. Meghan was already halfway to her car. She wasn't even sure how they had managed to get her information if she was passed out, but she assumed they'd already had most of her insurance information because of Joanna being a patient there. She didn't think twice about it, but got in the car and rushed over to the house on the lake in search of Alex.

  Chapter Eighteen

  When she arrived at the lake house, she was surprised to see a heavy set old woman with gray hair sweeping the front porch. The old woman had her hair tied up in a bun and was wearing a faded blue house dress with a flower pattern.

  “Hi,” said Meghan. “I'm looking for Alex Hunter. Are you her wife?” She was reluctant to ask. She feared that the answer might be yes.

  “No, no. I'm her mama. I come to help out for a few days since Sheryl's been in the hospital.”

  “She's at the hospital?” asked Meghan curiously. She might have run past Alex or been in the same hallway and not realized it. “What's she there for? Is Alex okay?”

  “Uh hmm. Alex is okay, but Sheryl was on a stool and stacking some dishes away in the kitchen when she had a bad fall. It's a horrible coincidence considering what happened to Alex years ago.”

  “Yes, ma'am,” replied Meghan. She didn't know all of the details. She only knew what the nurse had told her. “Do you know if Alex might come home soon? I'm an old friend from school.” That hadn't been entirely true. She hadn't ever met Alex when they were children, but she had never met her mother before and decided it was best not to tell her that she had been a love interest.

  “She should be coming hom
e soon. She comes home for a change of clothes and to get something to eat, so she doesn't have to eat at the hospital. Would you like some lemonade?”

  “That'd be mighty kind of you. Thank you,” said Meghan. She sat down on the porch swing to wait for Alex. She could feel her palms become sweaty with anticipation. She wiped her hands on her jeans. She had so much to tell her and didn't know where to begin. She would also have to worry about funeral arrangements and the birth of her baby in the upcoming months. There was so much to think about, but first she had to talk to Alex to explain her circumstances. She wasn't sure how Alex would react. Would she throw her out? Ask her to leave? Not believe her story? She was a widow now, but Alex was still married.

  As a beat up old pick-up truck pulled up to the house, Meghan could see Alex behind the driver's wheel. She wondered what had happened to Alex's other vehicle, the Jeep she loved so much. Alex hopped out of the truck and didn't seem to notice her until she walked up to the porch and saw Meghan sitting there sipping on her lemonade. The years had aged her. She had crow's feet on the sides of her eyes and a few wrinkles across her forehead, but there was no mistaking her for anyone else. It was Alex, the woman she had fallen head over heels for so many years ago.