Shortly after giving my official statement and signing off, I limped away from the swelling crowds, my hip so tight now the pain caught my breath in intervals. Alone down by the water I found myself once again studying the horizon, that thousand-yard stare which had become an unexplained side-effect of my newfound sobriety. The water riffled in the breeze and a mother duck and her chicks floated by. I grabbed my phone to call Emily, to share the good news. I stopped and tilted my head with spontaneous reflection. I was actually delighted that I felt the urge to call her. The counselor had been right. As long as there was still love, there was a way. Things were getting a little better each day with us. Was I…happy? My phone buzzed in my hand. Emily’s number flashed. I smiled. Telepathy. She would do cartwheels with the good news. Me catching the bad guy. My reinstatement. I picked up.
“Hey there gorgeous,” I almost sang it, heart beaming with boundless pride. “I was just about to call you. You’re never gonna’ guess where I’m making dinner reservations. It’s time to celebrate, baby. We got him.”
The voice came on. Not my wife Emily. I double-checked the phone. Yep. Emily’s number. “Yes, this is Detective Bardane.” I pinched the bridge of my nose. Trying to hear. “Excuse me?”
Still not getting it, I tried again. “Who is this?”
No. I misheard you. “What are you trying to say again?”
I froze. “What?”
I saw a still pond and a rock exploding into the surface. My phone slipped from my hand. The naked boy in the bedsheets, Lassiter’s crushed face, Emily’s perfect profile, the smell perfume on her neck where I kissed her, an ocean of smashed liquor bottle glass…it all swelled up like one great tidal wave and came crashing down at my feet.
3
The Unreal
Emily died. At a notorious intersection near Roosevelt known for pedestrian accidents, my wife stepped right off the curb into the path of a delivery truck. She was killed instantly. One of her passions was to listen to music and stroll through Chicago, remarking once that it gave the downtown urban pulse a real rhythm. That it centered her. She was always talking like that. I didn’t always get it. But I liked it a lot- that she felt some great energy in the world that was invisible to me. It gave me hope for our kids. For the future. And that future was now erased. Three months had passed since I’d busted Lassiter in the marina, when the cop called me on Emily’s phone with the news. “I saw it coming,” he’d said. I saw the truck and tried to stop her. Yelled as loud as I could. But she had a set of headphones on. I’m so sorry.”
In the full sense of the word, I was no longer alive either…trapped like some animal in that ragged edge between sleep and wakefulness, the living and the dead. This morning was no different. Sprawled on the carpet at the foot of my bed, my heart kicked with a rumble of thunder just outside my bedroom window, where rain drove sideways against the panes. Purple strobes, the booming followed by silence. Something cold whistled into my clothes, coiled inside my shirt and wrapped around my throat. I could feel my head tilt over when bedroom walls wavered liquidly like linen sheets. I clawed my way under the bed, where the floor beneath me buckled and caved in. A muddy chasm opened up, swallowing me as I grasped at wet tree roots that hanging from earthen walls. In freefall my head struck against the porcelain sink in the bathroom and blood poured from my face, lip split open. Hyperventilating, I regained my footing and screwed the cold-water tap full flow, splashing my face, the blood spinning down the drain. There had been no thunder. No rain. Only trauma. Waking nightmares, they were called. I accepted the fact that I might never really sleep again. Or find myself entirely awake.
I’d requested Emily’s casket remained closed for visitation where all attendees presumed the accident had left her too disfigured for viewing. Miraculously her face had remained untouched, like a perfect porcelain sculpture. No, the lid remained locked shut for an entirely different reason. None of the family knew any different. I’d reached the solitary decision and directed the funeral director accordingly. Not even Brant and Lilly knew why the box stayed closed.
Two long days at the funeral home came on like a blur, all the edges going fuzzy, the picture not making any sense. The kids curled tightly in my arms, they didn’t get it, eyes with dark circles, all of us exhausted from the constant press of crowds milling about. We were worn thin, three weary passengers adrift in an ocean of condolences, seasick with shock and sorrow.
“Where’s mommy?” Lilly asked me the question only once.
“Heaven,” I said. The truth was I didn’t have a clue where the soul went. But her body? I knew where she wasn’t. She definitely wasn’t inside that casket. That’s why I ordered it to remain shut.
Our home had become a sort of living tribute to the woman. A morbid mausoleum of sorts. In our bedroom, everything remained untouched, exactly as it had been that morning when Emily awoke for the last time. Her silk slip was still on the floor crumpled in a pile where she had cast it down, her deodorant rested on the vanity without the lid snapped back on, pruned and shrunken like a fossil. The bed sheets even held a hint of her outline, her physical impression forever captured in wrinkled silk sheets. While the rest of the world slept, I would lie on the floor against her side of the bed. From time to time I would rise to my knees and trace my finger on her pillowcase, smelling remnants of perfume. I foolishly believed somehow the effort would bring her back home. But each day she didn’t return my despair deepened and finally the booze reappeared. Not because I was drinking it, but because I had a plan.
The vast collection of bottles collecting on the bedroom sideboard, the dresser, the floor, highlighted my daily shopping excursions. Everywhere sat full bottles of bourbon, vodka, gin, and dark red wine. Not a single seal had been cracked, not one drop poured. I’d bought the first three bottles of bourbon on impulse at the liquor store with the idea of killing myself. My intention had been to drink the whole thing out in my car, right there in the parking lot. But sitting in the car, as I fondled and rolled a bottle in my hand, I thought, “This just won’t be enough”. Since then, the vast collection accumulated. This morning I eyed the mountain of liquor and contemplated its full meaning: This was to be my going away party. A high-pitched voice called from below the stairs. I jumped inside my skin. “Daddy?” Lilly called up the steps. “We’re hungry. And we have to leave for school.”
I rose to my feet and caught a glimpse of myself in the full-length mirror. Since working with my counselor Kathleen Hodges, I had actually put on ten pounds but the neck still looked thin, the skin a bit loose around my throat. Downstairs, I scraped a spatula across the skillet with dull fine-motor skills, but managed to fry the eggs and serve them up. Brant stared at me with big blue eyes, his lower lip sticking out, quivering.
“What?” I grunted. “This is good enough. Don’t complain.”
Brant crossed his arms. “Mommy makes the eggs with the yellows cooked, not runny, yuck.”
“Just deal with it this morning Brant. We have to get you guys to school.” The toast popped out of the toaster. I slopped on butter and cut the slices in half.
“You’re doing it all wrong, Daddy,” Lilly said. “Mommy cuts off the edges.”
Out of nowhere I slapped the toaster off the countertop where it ricocheted off the wall and hung by the electrical cord.
“Goddamn it guys,” I clenched my jaw. “I’m not Mommy. Mommy’s gone” My voice tripped up an octave. “And if the she hadn’t been wearing those fucking headphones, wandering around and stepping in front of trucks, she might still be here to make the fucking eggs.”
Both kids burst into tears and vanished from the room. I flung the spatula against the wall where clattered all about and landed on my foot. I grabbed my phone and texted 911 to my therapist Kathleen Hodges. She rang back.
“Thank Christ,” I answered. “My kids are upstairs howling that I cut the toast wrong again and fucked up the eggs. I’m so
pissed with Emily. She screwed that kid and left us in a pile of wreckage. I had one of those nightmare things and busted my eye open. If I don’t get out of here soon Kathleen, I’m going to kill myself. I swear. Everything here is dead to me. The house. Chicago. Everything.”
There was a pause. “Good morning, Shade.”
“I’m serious.”
“My eleven canceled this morning.”
“Okay.”
“Shade?”
“Yeah?”
“Don’t go and do anything stupid before you get here.”
Kathleen’s sense of interior design left something to be desired. The office walls were wrapped in burgundy burlap wallpaper and showcased golden-famed portraits of animals playing poker, smoking cigars, and drinking adult beverages. I sat in a chair facing the St. Bernard wearing a yellow sun visor who dealt cards to a few poodles and an Irish Setter throwing back a shot of whisky. She knew about my suicidal ideation and the growing booze collection.
“Morning crisis?” She pushed a tuft of grey-blonde hair from her eyes.
“These,” I ignored the question. “These are all truly awful.”
“Excuse me?” she leaned forward, her heavy weight making the chair pop and ping.
“These paintings,” I said.
“Animals partaking in human vices?” she said peering over the frames of her reading glasses, cracking a smile. “What part of that don’t you understand?”
“Funny,” I said.
Her blouse was too small, begging for the next size up, the threads stressed, the buttons wanting to give way, too much flesh for too little material. We each had our battles, my booze versus her sweet tooth. She leaned back, the springs in the swivel chair aching again. “The subject matter of vice is metaphorical. It begs a bigger question. Of all my clients, I imagined you would have figured it out quickly…detective.”
“I can’t cook eggs let alone decode canines playing cards.”
“It’s obvious,” she pointed to the wall behind her without turning around. “Cigarettes? Booze? Gambling? Of course, it looks ridiculous. And it is. Just think about it. Addiction and compulsion are not refined human activities after all. They are animal instincts run amuck. That’s it. That’s the point.”
“Instincts run amuck,” I stared at the floor.
“Shade,” she said tapping her teeth with a pen. “If animals look this stupid acting out, what about humans doing the same shit?”
I held up my hand like stop. “Okay. Okay.”
She glanced at her watch and back at me. “What’s the emergency?”
“Another night of waking nightmares,” I squirmed in my chair. “This one sucked me into a hole in the ground beneath my bed. I was caught in a storm. I couldn’t get away from it. Came up fighting the vanity in the bathroom. A real zombie. I couldn’t make it stop.” And shrugged. “Like usual.”
“I see,” she said, her eyes narrowing. “Are you still fantasizing about killing yourself on alcohol?”
“No,” I said with a shrug and waited. “Yes.” My eye was really tender to the touch now. “Shit Kathleen, I don’t know. Really, I don’t know anything anymore.”
“What about the daily pilgrimages to the liquor store?”
“Like I told you last time, it’s been a couple of weeks.” It was the truth.
“What about all the bottles of booze?”
“Still scattered all around Emily’s bedroom.”
“Your bedroom,” she sighed. “Shade it’s your bedroom now.”
“Okay.” I squirmed some more, wanting to touch my eye again without doing it.
She sat up straight, wrinkling her nose. “Have you shared this in A.A.?
“Yep. Just like you asked.”
“What did they say?”
I smiled. “They said to come to you.”
“Shade,” she shoved her gray-blondes out of the way again, giving me direct eye contact. “I know you don’t want to die.”
“How in the hell do you know that?” I said, throwing my hands into the air in surrender. “I don’t even know that.”
“Because you called,” she smiled. “And you’re here instead. And I also know why.”
I wanted to shout but held my voice down, straining. “Why?”
“Lilly and Brant,” she said. “You don’t want to die. You just want the pain to stop.”
Kathleen stared at me, her tiny green eyes looking enormous behind strong reading glasses. Her insights so simple and to the point at times. And correct. It was like she’d unscrewed my head and peered down into my soul. I loved my kids. I didn’t want to die.
“Don’t be ashamed that there’s a part of you that wants to live.” She interlaced her fingers and twiddled her thumbs. “Your love for Lilly and Brant ensures that. The waking nightmares? It takes time. They’ll go away. But we both know why you’re really here.”
I reached into my pocket, peeled opened a piece of nicotine gum and slid it into my mouth, chewing slow. “Who can make a decision like that,” I grunted.
“We’ve been talking about it for weeks.”
“Talk’s cheap.” I kept chewing.
“Shade,” Kathleen stopped twiddling. “Level with me here.”
I drew a deep breath and sat silently. She didn’t speak, waiting for me to answer. “I’m so scared.”
“I know you are,” she nodded, eyes filled with real empathy.
“There’s nothing left here for me and the kids.” I bit my lip and let off. “It’s like being stuck in a horror film.”
“You have been saying it for months now.”
“I know.” I stood slowly from my chair, brushed off my jeans and gazed out the window, clutching back tears. Twenty stories below, Chicago’s historic Loop brimmed with suits, and tourists moving in herds along the sidewalks, among the street vendors. Cars, buses and taxis crawled along slowly. Faint police sirens could be heard, distorted by wind, resonating off concrete building and glass office towers. This place had been home for so long. Chicago would go on without me. Without Emily. Without the kids.
“When do you leave?” she asked.
“I’m here deciding that right now with you.” A new conviction lifted inside me, my nerves going shaky like my foot might start involuntarily tapping. “If I leave this place can you guarantee I’ll get a decent night of sleep?”
“I can guarantee that you can’t survive much longer living inside a mausoleum dedicated to your wife.” She pushed away from her desk, rolling back a bit. “But the booze? There’s no geographical cure. Where ever you go, there you are.”
“I know.”
When you get to Kentucky, you must find an AA support group immediately.”
“You said.”
Kathleen slid open the center desk drawer, and slid a business card my direction. “This is a former client of mine who lives near those mountains, the place you said, where your sister-in-law and her family live?”
“Story Mount, Kentucky.”
“Call him,” she pointed at the card. “Go get coffee. Become best friends for all I care. Just do it.”
I walked over and grabbed it off her desk and tucked it into my pants pocket without reading.
“Good,” she said. “You still got everything laid out at the house the same way as the morning Emily died?”
“Yeah,” my head fell toward the floor, my eyes burning, some tears letting loose. “But I’m cleaning up this weekend.”
“You have support?”
“Yeah, some family is coming by to help.”
“Are you sure you’re ready?”
“Kathleen,” I spoke without looking up. “I can’t live this way any longer.”
Outside, between two distant office towers, a blue scrap of Lake Michigan shimmered. I missed her so bad but I was so angry. Thank
s Emily. Emily, the mother, the wife and the adulterer in our bed. The woman who stepped in front of a truck and abandoned her family forever. Then I realized this was the key to leaving this place. Anger. Lilly and Brant didn’t deserve this. They needed a fresh start. If love was not a feeling then love had to be an action. So I would use my anger toward Emily as fuel, a means to burn us forward into a future I could neither see nor understand.
“Yeah,” I said looking at my therapist. “I’m done.”
Two weeks passed and Emily’s parents came into town to help with the packing. We disassembled the bedroom in just one day, all while Lilly and Brant were in school. I arranged a box of Emily’s things which included jewelry, a brush still full of Emily’s blonde hair, her favorite sweater, a stack of love notes, several photo albums and a bottle of her favorite perfume. The phone would still ring occasionally, old colleagues from Frisk Investigations checking in, but even that faded with time. I donated the alcohol to a silent auction for breast cancer research. Emily’s parents needed a car so I gave it to them. I kept my beat-up Ford Taurus. There was absolutely no way we could bring all the furniture, and I wanted a smaller, more affordable place in Kentucky, until I got back on my feet financially at least. A local realtor I’d done some private work with in the past was willing to hold an estate sale to liquidate all the furnishings left behind, and then list the property for sale.
The day we finally said goodbye I took a last glance in the backyard and the rusted swing set. Lilly and Brant were 10 years old now and twice the size they had been when we first bought the playset for them. For a moment, in my mind’s eye, I watched a younger Emily push a couple of five-year old’s back and forth, her laughter bouncing in the air. She turned back at me, smiling, holding me in her gaze. The skin on my arms tightened with goose-bumps. And for a moment, just for that moment, I forgave her for everything.
Skin the Cat Page 3