Chapter 8
CHAPTER 8
GAbrIEL
The biggest park in Sugar Creek has been transformed for the fair.
Weeks of setup all for this three-day weekend.
It doesn’t disappoint.
Everywhere I look is an explosion of color. Families. Children .
There’s something about small kids that delivers an invisible gut punch. Especially ones who are around three or four. Avery and I didn’t make Lulu on that trip to St. Lucia, but we would have eventually. If I hadn’t blown it, Avery and I would be the happy family at the fair, eating deep fried food on a stick.
It’s one of many colossal regrets.
I walk around, offering to relieve people I know who are running tables, and watch everyone else have a great time.
I’ve just settled onto a bench after manning Jane’s booth for fifteen minutes while she took a break when I spot Avery meandering through a crowd. I stare, transfixed, like I was the first time I met her. I still cannot believe she’s here. Normally I’d think maybe I’d been given a gift, a shot, but I must be out of second chances by now.
She’s alone. The fabric of her dress moves around her thighs, and she holds a cone of cotton candy. I watch her pluck off a piece, pushing the sugary pink cloud into her mouth. She pivots, and her eyes find mine as if she’d been looking for me.
I see it. I feel it. The sparks, the electricity, the sheer magnetism that has always existed between us.
She stares at me, then draws back her shoulders and comes my way. I’d been certain she’d turn around and go in the opposite direction, and now I’m in shock watching her come closer. Her hips switch, and her cheeks are pink. She is different, but familiar. I’m not sure how that’s possible, but it is. I’ve read her book, so I know she has grown in our time apart, likely in more ways than is detailed on the pages.
“Hey,” she says when she reaches me. She shifts from one foot to the other, looking back over her shoulder like maybe she made the wrong choice by coming over here.
I scoot over on the bench, silently inviting her to sit.
She accepts my unspoken offer and sinks down. She pulls off more cotton candy and eats it.
“This is really cute.” She motions out to the fair. “Better than the state fair. That place is always so crowded.”
I watch her speak. I’m in awe of her, especially after reading her book. “I’ve never been.”
She gapes at me. “You never went to the state fair? But you grew up in Phoenix.”
“My parents didn’t take us.”
Avery’s eyes widen at my casual reference to Nash. Prison was its own brand of hell, but it gave me an unexpected opportunity: time. Time to think, to sit deep in my feelings, to sift through all that happened that landed me in that place. When you’re stripped bare, you don’t need a mirror to see yourself clearly. Between my own reflecting, all the books I read, and the group therapy I chose to attend while I was in, I learned about myself and my choices.
Avery recovers. “Come on, Doug and Corinne,” she says, playfully scolding my parents.
I smile. It feels intimate, the way she uses their names.
“How are your parents?” she asks, pulling off a whorl of fluffed sugar.
“Good, I suppose. My dad retired a little over a year ago.”
Avery’s eyebrows lift in surprise. “He loved his job.”
“He loved it less when he didn’t have a son to share it with. Those were his words.” He’d told me during one of his visits to the prison. He probably hadn’t intended to pour salt on a wound, but for me it was like adding more collateral damage to my tally.
Avery nods and offers me cotton candy, and I take some. She watches me, smiling mischievously. Cotton candy is on a short list of foods I’d rather not eat.
“How’s that?” she asks.
“Sugary,” I deadpan. She laughs.
“Come on, let’s find you something savory.” She stands, and tries to pull me up with her.
I stay rooted in place as she takes a step forward, and it stops her forward momentum. She looks back at me and drops my hand, a question in her eyes.
I squint up at her. “I thought you wanted us to stay away from each other?” For the record, I do not want to stay away from her. But I don’t want to be the reason she feels any kind of pain, and she made it clear the last time we saw each other she believes that will be the result.
Avery’s lips twist. “It’s been hard for me these past few days, to know you’re not that far away. For so long…” Her sentence dies, but I know what she was going to say. For so long, I couldn’t reach you even if I wanted to . Even when you sat beside me, I could not reach you.
I nod once. “Same.”
“Have you been reading my book?”
“Twice.”
She blinks. “You read it twice? The entire thing?”
“The entire first half,” I clarify. “And some scenes a few additional times.” I don’t specify which scenes.
A flush grows on her cheeks. “It feels weird to know you’ve read it.”
“Reading your side of the experience is fascinating. It’s like peeking inside your head.”
She sits back down beside me, her posture stiff. I don’t want her to feel uncomfortable, so I say, “I loved the scene in the lawyer’s office.”
Surprise lifts her eyebrows. “I wouldn’t have guessed you’d like that one in particular.”
I stuff my hands in my pockets and shrug. “I like it because I remember it clearly. I guess you thought I’d lost the will to fight for myself, and I admit I kind of had, but it was more than that. I was in awe of you that day, the way you took charge and stood up for me, even when I didn’t deserve to have you in my corner. You were passionate, and you spoke from your heart. In a way, it reminds me of your writing. Gregory Decker said you’d make a good activist, but I think writer is more your style. You can slay dragons with your words.”
My compliment draws a semi-smile from her. “The pen is mightier than the sword. I’m going to change the characters’ names. Just so you know.” She tucks her hair behind her ear. “And if there’s anything you don’t want me to include, you can tell me. I can change stuff around. This is the first draft, which is more me telling the story to myself. The final product will be different.”
“How about the guy? Hudson. Can you press the delete button on him?” There’s no hiding the jealousy in my tone. I know I should be grateful someone else came along and treated Avery the way she deserved, the way I didn’t, but I can’t help how envious I feel of him.
She gives me a sympathetic look. “I wondered how you’d feel about that.”
Like someone else has been on the receiving end of your touch, and your smiles, and your laughter, and that smirk you get when you know you’ve made a really good point during an argument but you’re trying not to rub it in.
I don’t say that, because I gave up the rights to all that, along with so many others. “It wasn’t my favorite part,” I concede, and this draws a chuckle from her.
Her eyes light up. “I have an idea. How about today we act like we’ve just met?”
“Really?” With a history like ours, I’m not sure it’s possible to put on the blinders, even for a few hours.
“Really,” she confirms. “Maybe we can set aside this tension”—she gestures from me to her—“for a little while.”
Am I going to argue with her idea? Hell no. I’m going to ride her suggestion until we run out of road.
She offers her hand between us. “I’m Avery. I’m twenty-nine, divorced, and I may or may not become a published author. Only time will tell.”
I slide my hand in hers. “I’m Gabriel. I carve and burn wood, and I promise it’s not as weird as it sounds. I’m thirty-two, and I got out of prison five months ago.” My voice catches at the end. I can’t help it.
Avery doesn’t falter. She shakes my hand, smiles like the last part of my sentence is neither a shock nor a bother, and is the first to take a step. I fall in beside her.
We ride the Tilt-A-Whirl, the Ferris wheel, and I spend twenty-five dollars winning her a stuffed monkey. We make no mention of the past. Avery drags me to the Zipper, laughing when I eye it cautiously.
“Don’t be afraid,” she tells me, handing our tickets to the teenager. We climb on and go up, up, up, spinning in the air. Before I close my eyes, I see Avery, laughing with her eyes wide in exhilaration.
Unbelievably, it does feel like we’ve just met. This person who is laughing and trying fried Oreos and holding on to a fuchsia stuffed monkey? She is new to me.
“You’re staring at me,” Avery says.
I look away from her as our cage reaches the top position on the ride, and pauses to allow on new riders. “It’s hard to believe I’m here, with you. After…everything.”
“What do you mean?” Avery pretends not to understand. “We met today.” She says it like come on, get your head in the game .
“Right,” I nod.
The ride is still stopped. I look down, which is really never a good idea when you’re this high up in the air. Below us, the teenager grimaces at the switchboard and scratches his head. He grabs a phone attached to the switchboard, says something, then looks up.
I look at Avery. “I think we might be stuck.”
“Very funny,” she replies.
I point down. “I’m serious.”
She peers over. I watch her take in the scene below. She straightens up, her body tense. “You weren’t kidding.”
I shake my head. “I wish I were.”
“What do we do now?” Panic edges her tone. “Gabriel?”
I like how she says my name and asks me this question, even though I have about as much control and influence over this situation as she does. The fact she’s looking to me to solve a problem ignites some biological instinct in me to protect her, to make everything better.
“Folks,” a voice blasts through the air. Avery and I look down at a man standing below, holding a bullhorn to his mouth. The teenager stands beside him. “Nothing to worry about, but we’re going to stay put for a few minutes while we work out a technical difficulty.”
“Nothing to worry about?” Avery scowls. “Easy for him to say. He’s not the one dangling in the air in a metal container.” She pats her hands on her thighs in rapid succession, her feet bouncing.
I withdraw my phone from my pocket, choose my music app, and pull up a list of my favorites. I hit play, and the first notes drift out into the air. Avery looks over, her hands and feet ceasing their movement. A tiny smile tugs at the corner of her mouth.
“Gabriel and his music,” she murmurs. The affection in her tone is clear.
I didn’t choose this song on purpose. Better Man by Leon Bridges. It’s the first in a long list of favorites.
Avery listens, watching me. Her chest moves faster with her breath, and she suddenly says, “Why didn’t you come for me five months ago? Why wasn’t I your first stop?”
How can I explain it to her? There are a million words I can choose from, but they all fall flat. Instead, I choose a story. “You have a yellow dress with blue flowers printed on it. It has sleeves like a T-shirt, but it’s low-cut.” Using the pointer fingers on both hands, I demonstrate a deep ‘v’ going down the front of my chest. “It reaches half-way down your thighs, and you look like an angel when you wear it.”
Her eyes widen. “I bought that dress last summer.”
My heart beats double time. “You were my first stop.”
Her breath comes in short, panicked gasps. She covers her face with her hands, her head shaking back and forth. “You’re not supposed to be here, saying all the right things. I’m not supposed to want you to say all the right things. I’ve moved on.”
Gently, I pull her hands from her face.
Tears drip down her cheeks, tumble off her jaw, soak into the fabric of her dress.
I cannot watch her agony and not attempt to soothe it. I was made to love this woman. Closing down the space, I fold her into my body and cradle the back of her head in my palm. My cheek presses to the side of her head, my fingers curling and stretching, slipping through her hair.
Her shoulders hunch forward, as if she could curl in on herself, and I continue to hold her. Her sobs subside, her quaking chest evens out, but still something rocks us.
It’s my body, jerking with silent sobs.
My wife. My Avery. My everything.
“Gabriel.” My name on her lips is a mangled whisper.
I pull back to look at her. She wipes away the tears that stick to my eyelashes.
“I came back for you.” I need her to know, even if all knowing does is bring her peace. “I went to that place, the one with your favorite flowers. I thought ‘ she’s probably going to use these to slap you .’” Avery smiles after I say it, but smiles when a person has been crying don’t look anything but sad. “I was standing in line, and I looked out the window. There you were, across the street. A hostess was leading you and some guy to an outdoor table. He had his hand on your lower back. He pulled out your chair. Held your hand across the table. Ordered your drink. I remember thinking ‘They’re comfortable with each other.’” The knife in my heart twists. “You were smiling at him. You looked happy. And I’d already done enough to you. I didn’t want to cause more damage.”
Avery presses her fingers to her lips as she listens.
I’m replaying the scene in my mind, but it’s morphing into an alternate reality, where I cross the street and interrupt the date. Where would we be now, if I’d done that? I don’t have a good answer. Maybe we’d be nowhere. Maybe we’d be somewhere.
“Fuck,” I murmur regretfully. I tip my head closer, and we’re forehead to forehead, nose to nose. Her warm breath streams against me, and she smells of sugar. I wish the sweet smell of her were my only thought, but it’s not. I hate myself for what I’ve done to her, and it’s keeping me from being fully in the moment. “Why are you here with me? Why are you letting me be in your presence? Why don’t you hate me, Avery?”
“I could never hate you.”
“I hate me.”
“That’s why I can’t.”
I shake my head. The tip of my nose moves across hers. “You should.”
“Don’t tell me what to do,” she whispers.
She doesn’t move. Her lips are an inch from mine, and it would take almost nothing to close that gap. She’s waiting for me, and I don’t need to be asked twice.
Without warning, the ride moves. Avery tumbles back in her seat. She grimaces and rubs at the back of her head as she looks down. “Guess they fixed it.”
I bite my lip and nod.
We’re quiet all the way to the bottom. The operator opens the cage door and makes a sideways comment about us behaving ourselves up there. He looks away quickly when neither of us respond.
We walk a few feet from the ride, and Avery stops. She looks up at me. “I need to get back to writing.”
I tuck my hands in the pockets of my jeans. “Understood. I guess the game of pretend is over? You don’t want to see me again?”
Avery stares at me, and I can’t tell what she’s thinking. The seconds stretch on, then she nods curtly. She takes a step away, but stops, turning back to me. “You think I should hate you, but let me tell you something I’ve learned. Once you separate the action from the person, clinging to hate becomes a more arduous task.”
She turns, and I watch her walk away. I watch until she disappears, swallowed up by the crowd of children with dancing balloons, tired adults, teenagers high on life.
I give her a lengthy head start, then I leave too. Being a party of one doesn’t sound so great anymore.
Most weeks, the faces are the same. Especially in a town that doesn’t have a lot to choose from in the way of meetings.
We’re seated in a semblance of a circle in a church library. The air smells stale, but also of bitter black coffee and books. Twelve pairs of kind eyes and expectant expressions are on me.
I nod at the room. “I’m Gabriel, and I’m an alcoholic.”
“Hello, Gabriel,” the group recites.
Alcoholics Anonymous is a condition of my early release. Even if it weren’t, I’d attend anyway. For myself. And everyone else in the world.
Two days a week, I can be found in this musty library. Some of the people here I only see when I step foot in this room. Others, I see throughout the week as we carry on with normal life. None of them look like a reformed drunk, whatever that means. Add that lesson to the list of what I’ve learned over the past few years. Alcoholics can present as functioning adults. Contributing members of society. Some alcoholics may teeter around public sidewalks in the middle of the day gripping a paper bag, but so far I haven’t met one.
I’ve learned the kinder term for alcoholic is ‘alcohol use disorder.’ Like Avery said yesterday, it’s separating the action from the person. ‘He’s an alcoholic’ versus ‘He has alcohol use disorder.’ I’ve also learned the symptoms of the disorder vary from person to person, and have varying levels of rapidity and severity. This was all courtesy of group therapy and recently published books I read.
AA is old-school.
Here, in this meeting of people with alcohol use disorder, there is an accountant. A grandfather. A young mother. A veteran of the Vietnam War. A landscaper, librarian, two dentists, a teacher, and a newspaper editor. And me, the former firefighter.
The twelfth person here tonight is a baker.
“Good to see you again, Gabriel,” Jane says, approaching me after the meeting has wrapped up.
“You too, Jane. How did the fair treat you?”
“Well. I sold out of everything. I was up most of the night baking enough to be able to open the shop”—she yawns—“this morning.”
“By yourself?”
She nods.
“Ask me for help next time that happens. I’m not half bad in a kitchen.”
Jane’s head tips sideways, her eyes curious. “Speaking of the fair. I saw you with someone.”
I nod slowly. “She’s my ex-wife.”
Jane’s eyes widen, but she quickly gets control of her reaction. “Huh. I wouldn’t have guessed that.”
Jane knows about Avery. Jane knows about everything. “Why is that?” I ask.
Jane stacks the AA booklets on a nearby table. They are there in case someone new comes to the meeting, but that rarely happens. The last time someone here was new, it was me almost five months ago. Jane straightens. “It looked like you were on a date. Judging by your body language, because that’s all I could see from under my tent.”
Was it obvious I had to glue my hand to my thigh to keep it from straying to Avery’s lower back? I try to imagine me and Avery, walking side by side, but I fail. I can only see her from my viewpoint. Brown hair loosely curling over her collarbone, eyelashes dark and thick. “She’s in town for another week, working on her book.”
“She’s a writer?” Jane sounds impressed.
“She is.” I nod, pride flowing through me. “She’s halfway finished with her first book, and she already has an agent. I’ve read it,” I say, excitement hastening my words. “I’ve read what she’s written so far, and it’s good.”
Jane gives me a knowing smile. “What’s it about?”
“Uh…” I stall, suddenly not sure if I’m supposed to be saying what it’s about. “It’s a love story.”
Kind of. Maybe.
Jane’s knowing grin ratchets up to full on know-it-all. “Is that right?”
I see where she’s going with this, and I nod.
Another person stops by to say hello to Jane, and I excuse myself. On my way out the door, Jane calls my name.
“People tend to write what they know,” she says, with a wink.