Chapter 11 #2
I didn’t respond. My legs carried me outside, my brain not even on the same playing field.
The same galaxy. I rushed over the brick sidewalk.
The laughter from the café behind me abated in the distance as I tried to navigate my way home.
Every detail of the accident screamed its way over me.
The rough impact caused the glass windows to crack.
Water rushed in, flooded around my knees, and rose higher. And higher.
“Maddy!” Washington’s voice cut through the earthy, muddy taste of lake water that would forever cling to the back of my throat.
Tears blurred everything: the sunlight, the cars. Had I walked one block? Half a block? My fearful eyes darted around. Hell, I hadn’t even cleared the parking lot.
Washington caught up with me, his steps steady even though mine faltered. I wrapped myself in a hug, but Washington wouldn’t allow me to fill that void myself. He slipped my arms open and put himself, a rock-solid fortress, right there. Right where I shouldn’t need him.
“I see him, Washington.” The words tumbled out of me before I could reel them back. My voice broke, torn and ragged by the way my cheek lay flush against his stony chest. Rough, hard, yet the comfort I swore I didn’t need. “If I think too long. If I get too happy, I see him.”
His arms tightened around me. Lips brushed my temple, then my cheek, soft and reverent, as if he could wipe the grief away with the touch of his mouth against my current of tears. “Shhh. It’s okay to imagine our son, Madison. Lemme help you remember the best times.”
“You don’t understand.” My voice was a rasp. “I see him when I look into your eyes. But when I’m not, uh …” I glanced away, rubbing the heel of my palm into my achy chest. “When I’m not mean, we laugh and life’s good.”
“That makes sense, Madison. You and me. No matter what’s going on around us, life is good, bébé. All I want is for us to hold each other down.”
“No, Wash. I hate when it’s good because he disappears.
” The pain in my heart was so intense that the words barely hung on.
“When I’m not with you, and I’m not happy, I see him.
I see his face, his little hands. And he calls for me.
And he reminds me to stay. That only a terrible mom would leave him. ”
Washington pulled back enough to hold me at arm’s length; his thumb traced my cheek, his eyes wide with shock. “Nah, that ain’t my son. I don’t know what little demon is telling you to stay angry.”
“Wh-what?”
“Maddy, we don’t talk about him. That’s why the connection you feel to our son when I’m around disappears after we’re having a good time. That’s instinct warning that we need to have a conversation. Let’s go inside the restaurant and talk about our son.”
“No!” I sidestepped his attempt to take my hand.
“Okay.” He held his palms out, then after a second, he made another attempt to take my hand.
This time, both of them. When I allowed him to, Washington clasped my fingers and looked me in the eye.
“Okay, I feel you, Madison. We’re not there yet.
But I need you to listen. You’re letting anger, guilt, and fear win.
It’s twisting your mind. What you just said sounds confused. A contradiction.”
“Washington, I’m your ex-wife, not the twelfth juror. Miss me with that. I’m not confused!”
“You said, when you look at me, you see him. I get that. You see him, and you’re happy when you’re with me.
Then when you’re alone, some creature tells you to live in some gray box.
Not laughing, not smiling, not breathing.
” His voice was gentle but firm. “That ain’t living, and that ain’t how we honor Elijah. ”
“But—”
“Hell, I’d rather you blamed me for once, for crappy piloting. For not inspecting our plane thoroughly enough.”
“You did.”
“Even after the aircraft management crew at the hangar assessed our plane, I always inspected it. I was showing Elijah all I do to prepare for a flight. Maybe I didn’t do a good enough job checking our plane.
But I’d rather you put all the deserved blame on me.
I’d rather you loved him and lived again.
I’d rather you loved me … and kept him. And if you can’t love me? I’d …”
That last part hurt us both. He intended to say move on and love. Even if he couldn’t get the words past his throat, the words hung in the air. It was too close to a truth neither of us was ready to handle.
And then his eyes flicked across my face as if he was afraid this one year was enough time to undo our love.
“Listen, Madison, I’m right here. Even when pride allowed me to agree to the divorce.
Grief doesn’t come with instructions, but I damn sure know it’s best done together.
God didn’t create us to be alone. C’mon, bébé.
We were always good together. Our best …
together.” His words hit something deep in me, something I wanted to believe, but the guilt pressed harder. Crueler.
He might’ve flown that plane, but I paid for those pilot hours.
Maybe I had wanted him and Dad to have something in common when my parents visited once in a blue moon?
Maybe I had wanted to impress all my rich friends?
How many times had I said, Oh, yeah, Wash flew us to whichever big city was fashionable at the moment for a shopping spree?
Maybe I was as ambitious as Judge Plantation Politics DuVall.
“I’ll see you at the Jazz Brunch,” I murmured. “Wash, let’s just finish our messy dating scheme.”
He didn’t move. He stood there, jaw set, eyes darker than heartbreak. I walked off before the ache of missing him consumed me.
The sun hit the wetness on my cheeks, and my heart urged me to return. To not allow suffering to win.
Behind me, Washington’s voice carried enough to reach me. “I’ma always be here, Maddy. You don’t gotta see me to know it.”