Unmaking Grace

by Barbara Boswell

  This would be the last time she would enter the house as her home. Heavy of heart, for she had loved it here, but compelled by a force much larger than anything she felt for David, she made her way up. Not for the first time, Grace cursed God; a merciless, malignant God who took pleasure in shuffling the cards of their lives in the completely wrong order. This life with David was a mistake. As bad as she felt to hurt him, Grace needed to focus on Johnny, her first love. It should have been him all along.

  It should have been him. The thought filled her head as she plodded up the stairs, toward the devastating deed she was forced to commit. It should have been him. The rhythm of her footsteps on the concrete veranda floor. It should have been him. The sound of the key as it turned in the front door lock. It should have been him. The scream of the stars, moon, and night sky retreating from her, as she prepared to do this thing, utterly alone.

  The house was dark and quiet, save for the glow of a nightlight at the very back of the bedroom. She entered the living room. David lay sprawled there on the couch, fast asleep. The kitchen was neat, everything in its place, and the living room had been tidied. Grace slipped off her shoes and padded over to the couch on bare feet. She stood, feeling helpless, watching her husband in his sleep of innocence. Her heart swelled with tenderness for him, but she checked it, steeling herself. This should have been Johnny, right here, on the couch. Johnny should have been the father of the little girl asleep in the bedroom. David stirred, sensing her presence, and opened his eyes, soft from the memory of a dream. He smiled. Grace warmed to the crinkles around his eyes. He whispered hello in a sleepy voice. Clearly Gwen had not yet been there.

  Grace sat down on the couch, on the spot he had made by moving back for her. How easily they accommodated one another—their bodies had their own language of give and take, each continuously shifting and making space to accommodate the other; each daily making way or leaning in as the other needed. Grace was about to shatter this bond; her heart had started its own personal excruciating breaking. Perhaps this would break them open to let the world in.

  David reached for her, and she kissed his outstretched palm, leaving her lips to linger on his skin.

  “I need to tell you something, David.”

  His arm encircled her waist, pulling her down. “No talking. Just lie with me for a bit.”

  Grace obliged, gratefully. A reprieve, ever the gentleman; even in this he was treating her softly.

  David moved onto his side, making room for her. She slid in next to him, facing him, savoring the warmth of his hard familiar torso. Grace felt her muscles relax from the warmth of this body she knew and loved so well—every contour, every scar, every weakness. She put her hand, palm open, against his chest, and watched it slowly rising and falling with his deep, sleepy breath. She felt the thump of his heart against her hand; constant, steady, and predictable as the sun. This was the heart she was preparing to crush. Grace closed her eyes and let herself breathe the spicy smell of his cologne. Here she was again, under his wing. It felt like the most natural place to be—easy, comfortable. Here she was, back home, painted with garish makeup and stinking of smoke. She felt good against him, and dirty and cheap. He drew her in. She melted.

  “I really have to tell you…”

  Her hand lingering against his heart, in the darkness of the room, she tried to find his eyes, but they were closed. He whispered, shhhhh, and kissed the side of her neck. A part of her wanted to stay there forever, safe in his embrace with their daughter securely in the next room. But it should have been Johnny. She forced the image of the young boy with freckled cheeks into her head, conjured up the dark, beautiful face. She took a deep breath.

  “It’s okay, Gracie. I already know.”

  Her heart stopped. “How…?”

  “I can smell it on you. I know you’ve started smoking again. It’s all right.”

  Relief, then grief, flooded her body. Oh beautiful, naive David. She did not deserve him.

  His warm hands crept under her shirt and circled her breasts. His breathing deepened, and he pulled her toward him with a familiar urgency.

  “It’s okay, I forgive you.” He smiled.

  Grace was transported back to those first days under the oak trees at university, her longing for him then, the delightful discovery that he longed for her too, the friendship that had slowly built itself into something that all of a sudden, one day, became urgent. After weeks of looking and yearning: the moment when they both had to touch, to move into an accelerated realm of companionship that would blossom into physical love. Their first kiss one night in a friend’s dorm room; their awkward fumbling becoming surer and stronger; the pleasure of his beard against her neck. Beads on the string that threaded their lives together. Her husband. Her baby’s father. She saw it all: the wedding, Sindi’s birth, the tired, sleepless nights that overwhelmed and dragged her into a chasm so deep, so empty, that Grace thought she had lost herself forever. David moved on top of her now, warm breath chasing her neck, while tears streamed down her face. He soothed, cooed, kissed the tears away while his hand worked surreptitiously to undo her skirt. She arched her body toward him, loving him with a fierceness that surprised her, wanting more than anything for this to be enough. She moaned, forgetting about Johnny, Sindi, her mother-in-law. For a time there existed only David. His body by now was naked, and she took in with him the final impressions of the last time.

  It was the strangest sensation to one who had felt herself a victim all her life, to willingly inflict the worst kind of pain on one you love. Grace had gone through life blameless, believing that the hand God had dealt her conferred a righteous innocence. Yes, she bore that cross. She loved, she sacrificed, she did for others. She defined herself by this good; felt herself to be a special category of human being by virtue of the loss of her mother. She had protected those charged to her care, except for this day, when she would become the vehicle of destruction for David. Yet she had to do this breaking, inflict this pain, in order to be true to herself. She was sure that if Johnny walked out of her life she would die.

  Grace lay with David, their limbs still entwined, and cradled him to her chest as she told him everything. Slowly, deliberately. She started with the day of Mary’s death and ended with Gwen at the traffic lights. She made clear her intention to leave. She would forever after recall the heaving sobs, childlike, into her chest of the beloved face she could not see. And when he finally looked up, the light was gone from his eyes. To watch a life shatter is not easy, more so when you are the cause of that shattering.

  David went and came, went and came, in and out of the room. Pleading followed questioning; bargaining followed pleading. Was she sure? He understood how losing a parent that way could fester, unresolved, and make her do things she really didn’t mean to. If he had known, he would have supported her more, been a better husband. How terrible it must have been for her to bear this burden all alone these years.

  He could understand, in a way, the thing with Johnny. It was grief, unresolved grief. This stranger had taken advantage of her, how was Grace to know that, blinded as she was by sadness. He could forgive all of it, everything, right then and never speak of it again if she promised to swear off the impostor. Grace couldn’t. By the time light filtered into the living room through the cracks in the blinds, it was over, everything. A joint life, carefully crafted, lay tattered before them, and Grace could not help but wonder: was he worth this, at the same time as she reassured herself that yes, he must be.

  It should have been Johnny.

  Resignation settled in David’s eyes. He asked Grace to leave the room so that he could make a phone call in private. A damp stain of fear spread across her chest. She left, slipping into the bedroom where Sindi was still asleep, blissfully unaware of the events that would shape the rest of her life. It was going to be okay, Grace told herself. David was angry and sad now, but he’d recover and realize that it was for the best. Who would want to hold onto a halfway love? David’s v
oice traveled in a low whisper through the kitchen and bedroom. Grace couldn’t make out the words, but she heard the sobbing, the breaking all over again. She stifled the urge to go and soothe him.

  A long silence fell on the house, broken eventually by the fall of David’s feet on the wooden floor as he moved toward the bedroom where Grace lay with Sindi. The digital alarm clocked screamed 6:45 am in bright red numerals.

  “Pack your things. Now.” He was calm, measured. “Be quick. Don’t waste any more of my time. I want you out of here.”

  David threw a canvas tote at Grace, who unzipped it and moved away from the crib to the chest of drawers at the other side of the room. She pulled out some of her clothes and reached into Sindi’s clothes drawer, but David gripped her hand.

  “I said pack your bags.” His face hovered close to hers and his lips curled back into a sneer as he spat the word. “Sindi is not going anywhere, do you hear me? Just take your stuff and get out! Now!”

  Grace’s courage sank to her feet. This was not how it was supposed to go. She reached out and laid a hand on David’s upper arm to calm him down, but he jerked away violently. He clasped both her hands together and pulled her out of the bedroom. He never raised his voice in front of Sindi. He hadn’t needed to before.

  “David, I’m her mother…”

  “Now you listen to me, Grace. That child, my daughter, will leave this house today over my dead body. Clear? You can go and be with the fucking love of your life, but you’re not taking my child. Is that understood?”

  “David, please. She needs me.”

  “Apparently not enough to keep you home nights. God, Grace, look at you. Look what you’ve become. Filth. You disgust me. Get out!”

  “David, I understand that I hurt you…”

  “Hurt me?” He laughed. The next words cut sharp and deep, mercilessly. “You rip my fucking heart out, and then you want to take my baby? Not happening! Now get out, before I do something we’ll both regret.”

  Grace moved back toward the bedroom door, but David blocked her with his body.

  “No, no, no! Not with my daughter. Get out, Grace! I’m warning you now. I’ve never lifted my hand to a woman, but as God is my witness, if you don’t get out of my sight this minute, I will.”

  Grace felt the line that she could not cross, knew instinctively to push no further.

  A key turned in the front door lock. It was Gwen, Grace could tell by the click-clack of her high heels.

  “Coward!” Grace screamed at David, enraged and emboldened by Gwen’s presence. “Calling on mommy to come and save you. Why don’t you fight your battles like a man?”

  David grabbed her by the shoulders, spun her around, and started marching her toward the front door. Grace screamed, and Sindi, awakened by the commotion, joined in.

  Gwen was in the living room. She nodded silently at David, looking away as Grace tried to catch her eye. She moved past the struggling couple to go and soothe her granddaughter. As David forced her toward the front door, Grace could hear Gwen cooing at Sindi, comforting her. For once she had slept through the night, not waking to eat. She must be starving.

  “God, David, she’s hungry. Let me feed her at least!”

  “No. She doesn’t need you. We’ll manage.”

  He unlocked the front door with one hand and pushed Grace toward it with the other. Then with one big, final heave, he ejected her from the front door, slamming it against Grace’s breathless pleas. A few seconds later, he reopened the door, but only to throw out her handbag and coat. The door crunched again, locked. Grace rifled through her purse, searching for her keys—she was not going to leave Sindi without a fight—but David must have already removed them. With sweat dripping down her back despite the cold morning, Grace paced frantically around the stoep. She had lost all sense of decorum, all fear of what anyone might think: she needed to get back inside, back to her daughter. David would have to be reasonable. Words tumbled out of her, shrill and incoherent, punctuating the cold morning air. She heard herself shriek about lawyers, bastards, and bitches, while a small crowd gathered in the street below to watch the unfolding drama.

  Grace looked down at herself—she was wearing the same clothes from the night before—so much for her emergency plan. David had not given her time even to pack the tote bag.

  “What you looking at! Fuck all of you!” she screamed at the neighbors.

  She went through her bag again and found a cigarette; lit it while she moved toward the front window of the house, trying to peer in. She found herself transported back to a spring day on Saturn Street, years ago, in another part of the city, when it had been her on the other side of the door, Patrick pacing the stoep like an animal. And here she was, years later, disgraced, retracing his steps. His words still rang in her ears—“Please, Mary, open the door”—and in that moment her hatred for him solidified and rose up through her, building into a full-throated, raucous shriek that ripped from her throat as it propelled her entire body—a ball of solid hatred—against the front door.

  “Open up this door! I want my baby!”

  Like pistons, her fists pummeled the wooden door, which refused to budge an inch. No one stirred inside. Grace remained oblivious to the growth in size of the audience down on the pavement. She didn’t care who was watching, what they thought of her. She wanted her baby!

  Johnny’s car pulled up at the agreed upon time. Defeated, Grace made her way down the stairs under the collective gaze of the neighborhood and got in. Now they were really talking. They drove away—Grace crying, Johnny consoling—carrying the neighbors’ judgement on their backs. Johnny promised her that this was not the end. He had a friend who had a lawyer friend. They would fight and get Sindi. Grace nodded, but doubted: since when did men who wore steel-toed boots count lawyers amongst their friends? As if reading her thoughts, Johnny withdrew his hand from hers and sped further away from the house that contained her heart, her Sindi.

  Chapter 18

  Grace free fell into her new life. Every tender security, every organizing principle she had clung to in the past to make sense of the world, was gone. She had walked away from the ritual and duty that had scaffolded her life, and in abandoning these, she floundered and flailed like a chick kicked out of the nest too soon. She had jumped voluntarily; no one had pushed her. But her newly won freedom swallowed her into a state of shiftless somnolence. There was work, which she managed competently, without too much thought. She made the journey into town every morning, as she always had.

  Johnny found a flat in the suburb bordering her former neighborhood, keeping his promise that they would be close to the child she would never see. Perched in a Victorian building above a row of thrift shops, their apartment was small but sufficient. They furnished it with hand-me-downs draped with random bits of fabric, hung colorful beach wraps for curtains, and stuck candles in forgotten wine bottles. It would have been the perfect love nest had Grace been five years younger and unencumbered by motherhood. Her longing for Sindi throbbed like a toothache. Grace pined for her, wept for her. She took a perverse pleasure in the pain of breasts engorged with redundant milk, milk that eventually dried up to reveal a deeper, more devastating pain. She called David twice a day in a bid to see Sindi. She stalked the house overlooking the bay after work, trying to get a glimpse of them as they arrived home, but David was always ahead of her. He had moved the child to a different daycare—she had phoned the day-mother—and had changed her routine, while steadfastly refusing to answer the door or the phone. For two excruciating weeks after leaving, Grace lived without seeing her daughter.

  This was not the auspicious start to a new life she’d hoped for with Johnny. For the first few weeks, most of their nights together were spent with Grace crying. Her lover reassured her that they would find a way to get the child, brought her little gifts of rose bouquets and trays of chocolate to make her smile. After a few days, these reassurances grew thinner and thinner until they shrank to silence when the topic of Sindi
came up.

  One evening Johnny said, “It’s hard to see you like this, Grace. Can you try, if not for your own sake, but for mine too, to be a bit more cheerful?”

  Grace glared at him for this suggestion. Johnny started reasoning that they should see the silver lining, that perhaps it was all for the best. The small flat was all they could afford, and it wasn’t exactly suitable for a baby. Living with her father, Sindi had a bigger house, a garden, support from extended family. Neither he nor Grace had the grannies and grandpas to help with Sindi the way Gwen could.

  Grace bristled. “You promised. That night in the car. You promised we would work this out.”

  “Yes, that’s what I said.” His reply was clipped. “And I would take her on if it was that simple. But he really wants her, and he’s not letting go without a fight. And I’m not the kind of man to fight for another man’s child. I would be happy to have her, Grace, but it’s not simple anymore. Why spend money on lawyers, money we don’t have? His mother has money—he can drag this out.”

  Fury rose within Grace like lava. Johnny was right, but to give in so easily?

  She stopped talking to him about Sindi, but nevertheless made an appointment with a lawyer, who offered a grim prognosis. She had left the child, unheard of in most cases for a mother, and this fact, coupled with her adultery, would reflect poorly. David held the moral and legal high ground. It would be best for her to wait him out, let his anger cool, and then appeal to his sense of what was in his daughter’s best interest. Grace argued, in vain, that David had thrown her out. No, it did not matter. Her intent had been to leave anyway. Perhaps he would become calmer as his anger subsided.

  Adultery. Grace walked away from the lawyer’s office with the word ringing in her ears. This was what she was now, an adulterer who had lied and cheated her way out of a perfectly good marriage. David had never hit her, had not ever had an unkind word for her. She was no better than her father. God knew, the way she felt these days, if murder would bring her baby back, she would unhesitatingly commit it. To live without her daughter would be a fate worse than death.