Chapter Eight #2
She moved back into the living room. As she did so, she wondered how he’d known she was behind him. She didn’t think she’d made any noise, nor was she wearing perfume. He’d just known. The way she sometimes knew things about him.
It was just the result of their spending several evenings together each week, she told herself. They were friends, nothing more. But she couldn’t help the warmth that spread through her or the flash of fear that followed. What was that expression? Damned if she did and damned if she didn’t.
Two large bags stood by the front door. They were the wedding presents Jim had purchased earlier that day for Rick and Lupe’s wedding. Heather had steered him clear of an incredibly ugly, incredibly expensive ceramic clock and had instead persuaded him to buy several items from their gift registry.
She glanced around the room. On the sofa was a big bag containing a stuffed bear several times larger than Diane.
Jim had insisted it was exactly what the infant needed, and that as she got older, she could sleep with it and never have to worry about being afraid of monsters in the closet.
Heather didn’t completely agree with his reasoning, but she’d given up protesting after about ten minutes of heated argument. Some things just weren’t worth winning.
Her gaze moved to the new mini blinds in the living-room window.
Mini blinds she’d purchased six months before but had never found time to hang.
In the kitchen and bathroom she had new towel racks, and her bedroom furniture had been shifted so that the morning sun no longer shone directly into her eyes.
All compliments of Jim. He’d also put together most of Diane’s furniture and fixed the baby monitor when it had suddenly stopped working.
“You’re looking serious about something,” Jim said as he came in the back door. “Everything all right?”
“Yes.” She pointed to the sofa, then went into the kitchen to get him a beer. She collected a glass of water for herself. “I was just thinking about everything you’ve done in the house,” she said as she returned and took a seat at the opposite end of the sofa.
He paused in the act of opening the bottle and frowned. “Are you going to get all feminist on me and tell me that you resent a man helping?”
She laughed. “Not at all. I appreciate your help. Most of the stuff I could have done on my own, but I’m willing to admit that it was nice to have assistance.”
He didn’t look convinced.
“I swear I’m telling the truth,” she said, crossing her heart.
“I grew up with a mother who learned to do a lot on her own. She was really good at it, but she would’ve liked having a man to help around the house, especially with anything heavy.
I would’ve put up the mini blinds myself, but by the time they arrived, I was a little too pregnant to feel comfortable standing on a ladder, so they had to wait. ”
“If you hadn’t helped me, I wouldn’t have picked out the right present for the wedding,” he said cautiously, as if still worried that she might yell at him. “I’m terrible at choosing ties.”
She shifted until she was facing him, then tucked her right leg under her.
“If you’re trying to make me feel that we each contribute the same in the helping category, you’re not doing a very good job, but don’t worry about it.
I was making an observation, not complaining.
You’ve been very kind to me and I appreciate it. ”
He eyed her warily, then nodded. “You’re welcome.”
She chuckled. “I mean it. Maybe if I’d grown up with a father in the picture, I would’ve expected this sort of behavior from a man, but for me it’s a new experience. One that I’m enjoying.”
“Okay. I’ll relax.” He took a drink of beer, then glanced at her. “At the risk of starting trouble again, what happened to your dad?”
“He left when I was born. Stayed with my mother until I popped into the world, then he walked out. She never heard from him again.”
Jim frowned. “Ouch. That had to be tough for both of you.”
Heather shrugged. “She always told me she knew it was bound to happen. He wasn’t the kind of man who could deal well with the responsibility of a family.
She said that having a wife had been enough trauma for him.
” She paused. “I don’t know what to think.
I never knew the man, so I try not to make any judgments.
My mom was disappointed, but she never hated him.
I suppose the hardest thing for me to deal with was the rejection. ”
“What are you talking about?” he asked.
“My father walked out the second I was born,” Heather explained. “It’s difficult not to take that personally.”
“But it wasn’t about you—it was about the responsibility of a family. He would have left any child.”
“I know you’re trying to make me feel better. And you’re not saying anything I haven’t already told myself. But it feels like it was about me. I was the only child involved.”
Jim’s blue eyes darkened with empathy. “I’m sorry.”
It was a polite phrase, yet coming from him it made her feel a little better. Probably because she knew he meant it.
“Thanks. It was a long time ago. I’ve gone through stages when I hated him, when I prayed for him to come home. I’ve thought about trying to find him. My mom always said that she would give me what little information she has if I want to hire a detective or something.”
“Did you?”
“No. I never saw the point. The entire time I was growing up he wasn’t interested in me, so why should I be interested in him now? If he came looking, I don’t think I would be that hard to find, but it has to come from him. I’ve made peace with my past.”
Jim took a long swallow of beer, then set the bottle on the coffee table. He faced front, resting his elbows on his knees and lacing his fingers together. “I wish I could do that,” he said grimly.
“What do you mean?”
He gave a quick jerk of his head. “Nothing.” Then he glanced at her and smiled faintly. “I don’t suppose you’re going to believe that, are you?”
“No, but if you really don’t want me to push, I won’t.”
“It’s no big deal,” he said. “My dad walked out on me, too. I was a little older and I don’t think it was about me, but he left all the same.”
Heather pressed her lips together to hold back all her questions. There was so much she wanted to know. Yet something inside of her whispered that Jim had to tell the story at his own pace. So she remained quietly in place on the sofa and waited.
“I guess my parents were happy,” he said at last. “They fought some and then they made up. I remember things being pretty good between them. When I was about eight, my mom was diagnosed with MS. After that, everything changed.”
Heather’s breath seemed to freeze in her throat. “Multiple sclerosis?” she asked in a whisper.
He nodded.
Heather didn’t know what to say. What could she say? An illness like that put a lot of pressure on a family. Jim had been only eight years old. “You must have been scared.”
“I didn’t understand what was happening,” he admitted.
“She wasn’t sick like with the flu, but she was having trouble moving around and doing certain things.
Hers was the kind that progressed fairly quickly without many remissions.
My dad stayed for two years, then, when I was ten, he walked out on us. ”
“He left you?” she blurted without thinking. “Just like that? While your mom was sick?”
He nodded.
“Were the two of you alone?”
“Yeah. Neither of my folks had much in the way of family. That’s when I got so scared.
That’s what I remember most about that time.
My mom had just started using a wheelchair.
It was tough for her to get around the house because some of the doorways weren’t wide enough.
I couldn’t carry her or anything. We had decent medical insurance and sometimes there were nurses, but it wasn’t enough.
My dad sent money, but that wasn’t enough, either. ”
Heather’s stomach tightened as she tried to imagine a grown man leaving his ten-year-old son in charge of a disabled woman.
“When he left, he said it was up to me. That I would have to be in charge and take care of things. I didn’t understand what he was saying. When I started to cry, he slapped me across the face and told me to quit acting like a girl.”
Heather pressed her hand to her mouth to hold in a soft cry of pain.
Pain for him and the child he had been. She slid toward him on the sofa but didn’t touch him.
She wasn’t sure if she should encourage him to keep going on with his story or tell him to stop.
She wanted to do whatever would make him feel better.
But before she could decide what to do, he started talking again.
“My mom got progressively worse. I would come home from school every day and take care of her.” He closed his eyes against memories she couldn’t begin to imagine. “She suffered a lot.”
“So did you,” she said gently, and touched his arm. “You were too young to be dealing with that kind of pressure. I’m surprised the court didn’t put you in a foster home.”
“I don’t think anyone knew. The nurses came during the day and they all thought my dad was at work. My mom didn’t tell them anything different. I think she was afraid of going to a nursing home.”
He clutched his hands tighter, until she could see white on the knuckles and the ridges of his tendons.
“I tried,” he said. “I tried so damn hard, but it was never enough. The more incapacitated she became, the more I had to do for her. Finally, the nurses told us she was going to have to go on a respirator.”
A shudder rippled through him. His voice dropped to a whisper. “That night, my mother told me she didn’t want to try anymore. She was in pain and she was dying. She refused to live her last days breathing with the help of a machine. So she wanted to kill herself.”