Forgiving
Page 50
“I love you, too, Mom.”
“I just need a little time, please, darling.”
“I know.”
Michael stood waiting with the door open, touched by Bess’s use of the familiar baby name,
Bess drew back, squeezing Lisa’s arm. “Get lots of rest. I’ll call you.”
She passed Michael and headed down the hall, clasping her clutch purse under one arm, pulling on her gloves, her raspberry high heels clicking on the tiled floor. He closed the apartment door and followed, buttoning his coat, turning up its collar, watching her speed along with an air of efficiency, as if she were late for a business appointment.
At the far end of the hall she descended two stairs before her bravado dissolved. Abruptly she stopped, gripped the rail with one hand and listed over it, the other hand to her mouth, her back to him, crying.
He stopped on the step above her with his hands in his coat pockets, watching her shoulders shake. He felt melancholy himself, and witnessing her display of emotions amplified his own. Though she tried to stifle them, tiny mewling sounds escaped her throat. Reluctantly, he touched her shoulder blade. “Aw, Bess...”
Her words were muffled behind a gloved hand. “I’m sorry, Michael, I know I should be taking this better... but it’s such a disappointment.”
“Of course it is. For me, too.” He returned his hand to his coat pocket.
She sniffed, snapped her purse open and found a tissue inside. Still with her back turned, mopping her face, she said, “I’m appalled at myself for breaking down in front of you this way.”
“Oh, hell, Bess, I’ve seen you cry before.”
She blew her nose. “When we were married, yes, but this is different.”
With the tissue tucked away and her purse again beneath an arm she turned to face him, touching her lower eyelids with the fingertips of her expensive raspberry leather gloves. “Oh, God,” she said, and emptied her lungs in a big gust. She drooped back with her hips against the black metal handrail and fixed her tired stare on the opposite railing.
For a while neither of them spoke, only stood in the murky hallway, helpless to stop their daughter’s future from taking a downhill dive. Finally Bess said, “I can’t pretend this is anything but terrible, our only daughter and a shotgun wedding.”
“I know.”
“Do you feel like you’ve failed again?” She looked up at him with red-rimmed eyes, shiny at the corners with a new batch of tears.
He drew a deep, tired breath and took stock of their surroundings. “I don’t think I want to discuss it in the hallway of this apartment building. You want to go to a restaurant, have a cup of coffee or something?”
“Now?”
“Unless you really have to hurry home.”
“No, that was just an excuse to escape. My first appointment isn’t until ten in the morning.”
“All right, then, how about The Ground Round on White Bear Avenue?”
“The Ground Round would be fine.”
They turned and continued down the stairs, lagging now, slowed by distress. He opened the plate-glass door for her, experiencing a fleeting sense of déjà vu. How many times in the course of a courtship and marriage had he opened the door for her? There were times during their breakup when he’d angrily walked out before her and let the door close in her face. Tonight, faced with an emotional upheaval, it felt reassuring to perform the small courtesy again.
Outside, their breath hung milky in the cold air, and the snow, compressing beneath their feet, gave off a hard-candy crunch like chewing resounding within one’s ear. At the foot of the sidewalk, where it gave onto the parking lot, she paused and half-turned as he caught up with her.
“I’ll see you there,” she said.
“I’ll follow you.”
Heading in opposite directions toward their cars, they started the long, rocky journey back toward amity.
Table of Contents
Cover
Contents
Title page
Copyright
Dedication
Acknowledgments
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Preview: Bygones