The woman turned to me, a sad expression across her face. “Yes, Hector is a good man, though. He just made a really bad mistake.”
“That seems to be going around,” I mumbled. “What’s your name?”
“Anna. Anna Rodríguez.”
“Have you been working here awhile?”
I don’t know why I was making small talk. I think it was just a habit of mine as a reporter. The best stories seemed to come organically.
But Anna didn’t seem to mind. It almost felt like she was appreciative that a guest thought enough of her to hold a conversation.
“Six years.” She smiled. “Blessed to have a job.” She patted the bedspread down, then fluffed the pillow.
“Well, I’ll be in and out.” She paused as she was about to walk past me. “And I don’t mean to offend you, but whatever it is that is burdening your soul, know that it will work out. With God, all things are possible.”
I smiled. “Yeah. For some of us anyway.”
She didn’t flinch. “For all of us. Always. It may not be the way we want it to work out. Or even when. We may not understand it. But He’ll work it out in our best interest.”
That conversation made me uneasy. At some point I’d have to reconcile my feelings of abandonment by God, but now, during this painful process, wasn’t the time.
I noticed the gold chain on her neck. “Are those your children?” I said, noting the names written in cursive and connected by hearts.
She fingered the necklace and her face lit up. “Yes, they are my world. I have four children. My three youngest are my pride and joy,” she said. “My oldest, love him something crazy. But he . . . he is a challenge. He’s a good kid who has taken up with the wrong crowd, so I’m staying in prayer.”
It was obvious this woman sought her solace in God, but that just no longer worked for me. After my accident, when I prayed, I came up empty. When my prayers of motherhood weren’t answered, I just got to a point where I stopped praying.
“Oh, yeah,” I said, the thought of prayer reminding me of the tattered book. But when I stood, I knocked my purse over and several items toppled out.
“Here, let me help,” Anna said, kneeling to pick up my things. “I knew you looked familiar,” she said as she gathered my business cards. “You’re the lady reporter from Channel 26,” she said, smiling in recognition.
I nodded. “That’s me, but please excuse my appearance.”
“I watch you every night. You’re even prettier in person.”
My hand instinctively went to my hair. How anyone could call me pretty right now was beyond me. “Thank you,” I replied anyway.
“Can I have a card?”
“Absolutely,” I said.
Anna dropped the card in her apron pocket, then resumed cleaning the room.
“That is what I was going to ask about.” I picked up the Bible off the nightstand. “This was in this room. Does it belong here or did the last guest forget it?”
Anna looked at the book, then shrugged. “I’ve never seen it before. Not sure if it belongs here. Do you want me to take it to Lost and Found?”
I thought about it. “Nah, I’ll just leave it here. Maybe someone can use it.” I dropped it back on the nightstand. “Thank you. And Anna, it was nice to meet you.”
“Nice to meet you as well.” She paused as she headed toward the door. “Remember, sometimes it may feel like we’re walking this journey alone. But those are the times that He’s carrying you. You’re here in this room for a reason. God wants you to be still so you can hear what He wants for your life.”
She smiled and left the room.
Be still.
Hmph. I’d been still and I still didn’t know what I was going to do.
chapter
* * *
10
There’s no loyalty among friends.
That’s all I could think as I peered out the peephole of my hotel room.
My husband was standing on the other side, looking like he hadn’t slept in days. He had bags under his eyes, his pupils were pierced with redness. And he was here, outside Room 316. The only way he’d have known I was here was if Yvonne had opened her big mouth.
“I see you looking at me,” Clark said. “Open the door, Savannah, please? You said we could talk.”
“I lied. Just like you did when you claimed to love me.”
“I haven’t lied to you, Savannah. I do love you. With all my heart,” he pleaded.
“What do you want?” I shouted. “How did you convince Yvonne to sell me out?”
“She knows how much I love you,” he replied.
I was going to kill Yvonne. I sighed, then said, “Clark, go away. I don’t want to talk to you.”
He stared like he was trying to see through the door. “So, are you just going to stay holed up in this hotel forever?”
“I’m going to stay here until I’m ready to leave,” I yelled.
“Then I’m going to stay here until you’re ready to talk to me.”
I peeked out of the peephole again. “You’re going to be waiting a mighty long time.”
“Cool,” he said, taking off his jacket and setting it on the floor. I was surprised that he wasn’t at work. He was the director of the Boys & Girls Club of Houston, and I knew they had a big event today. The fact that he was here and not there spoke volumes.
I peered down until I couldn’t see him. “I’m going to call Security,” I yelled.
“And I’m going to make a scene, and you know you don’t like scenes,” he replied.
I waited a few moments as I gathered my thoughts. I liked it here. The last thing I wanted was to get kicked out. Finally, I leaned back in toward the door and said, “So, you’re just going to bully me into talking with you?”
“That’s what marriage is, Savannah. You don’t run from your problems. You stand strong and face them head-on,” he announced.
“Don’t preach to me about what marriage is,” I yelled back through the door. I inhaled, trying to calm myself down. “Just go away, Clark.”
“Nope,” he replied. “I’ll stay right here until you hear me out.”
Clark could be so headstrong. He was strong, period. As I stood by the door, my mind raced back to the only time I’d seen him falter.
My husband was living under a cloud of grief. I understood because it had been my home for months. But still, I tried to do what I could to bring him out.
“Clark, maybe you should go talk to someone,” I told him one day after he’d been sitting on the patio smoking a cigar for three hours.
“Not now, Savannah,” he replied, not even looking my way. “I just want to be left alone.”
Instead of doing what I’d been doing since Rob’s death—closing the door and going back into the house—I walked outside and sat next to him on the patio sofa.
“I miss Rob, too,” I said.
Clark was silent.
“But it’s like you told me, at some point you have to move on.”
With a slow turn, he looked at me and frowned. “Really, Savannah? It’s been a month, and your answer is to just move on? You think you can just say get over it and all is well?” he snapped. “You, of all people, know it’s not that easy.”
“No, you know that’s not what I’m saying.” I was trying to recall all the things he had said to me to pull me out of my grief, but over the past month it seemed as if everything I’d said had been the wrong thing, so I remained hesitant to push him.
“I was just thinking—”
“Can you give me some time, please?” he asked, cutting me off.
I let out a heavy sigh. I knew his irritation wasn’t with me, but with his struggle to deal with Rob’s death. I just hated that he was shutting me out of the healing process.
The sound of Clark singing “At Last” brought me out of the past. My stomach fluttered against my will. That was the song that had been playing when he proposed. And we had our first dance to the song at our wedding. I
t was our song.
I shook away the thought.
No! I screamed inside, trying desperately to push away the memory. Clark and I no longer had a song. And he could be stubborn, but so could I. He could sit out there all night for all I cared.
chapter
* * *
11
Anderson Cooper had gone off. Two episodes of Family Feud had played. And Will & Grace had graced my screen for an hour.
And still Clark waited.
I’d peeked through the peephole several times over the last few hours. I’d stopped talking to him and refused to answer his questions, thinking in time he’d just go away.
He hadn’t.
Clark was plopped on the floor, his back against the door. He almost fell back when I cracked the door open.
“Are you really going to sit out here in the hallway all night?” I said. “It’s one in the morning.”
He jumped up and put his foot in the door like he was scared I’d slam it back shut. He didn’t know I would still slam it, even with his foot in it.
“Savannah, please, baby, just hear me out. Let me talk to you.”
I inhaled, then figured the sooner we could hash this out, the sooner I could begin the paperwork for my divorce. I didn’t say a word as I stepped aside to let him in.
“Sweetheart, let me explain,” he immediately began after he stepped inside.
“So, you can explain sleeping with our friend? Your best friend’s wife?” I let the door close, but didn’t move into the room. I didn’t want him to get comfortable.
Shame filled his face. “There’s no justification,” he said. “I was wrong. Dead wrong.”
I waited for him to make up an excuse, to add a “but.” Instead he stood there in silence.
“Yeah, you were dead wrong.” I folded my arms. “So, how long have you two been having an affair? How long have you been smiling in my face, probably laughing behind my back while you did it? Were you sleeping together when Rob was alive?”
I knew better than that because when I came up on them, I’d heard the pain in both of their voices. And Dawn claimed it was a onetime occurrence. Besides, if Clark was capable of more than that, then I truly did not know him at all. I knew that they hadn’t been sneaking around for years, but this was the picture I wanted to paint right now.
“I would never betray Rob like that,” he said.
“But you’d betray me?”
He winced like he regretted his choice of words, but I wasn’t letting up. “And it’s okay to betray him when he’s gone?”
“Neither Dawn nor I expected or wanted this to happen,” Clark said.
“Expected or wanted what? Me to find out?”
“No, it’s not that at all.”
“So, her husband dies and she just decides she’ll steal mine?” I snapped before he could wade into his explanation.
“No.” He walked into the room, as if putting some distance between us would make this easier. “We both . . . It’s just the void with Rob. We got lost in our grief.”
“I lost Rob, too,” I screamed, then lowered my voice before someone called Security. “I don’t know how many times I have said that over the past six months.”
“I know that but . . .” He began pacing back and forth across the room. “Rob was like a brother to me.”
“Oh, that makes it worse. That means you had no problem sleeping with your ‘brother’s’ wife?” I said.
He stopped, looked at me, and with conviction said, “I’m not going to try and justify it. Why it happened,” he said. “It should not have happened.”
I stepped closer to him. I wanted him to see my pain up close and personal. I wanted him to feel it, dance with it. I didn’t want him to be able to run from it. “Where did it happen? Did you screw her in our bed?”
“Come on, now. You know I would never do anything like that,” he said.
I edged away from him, unable to stomach his presence.
“I don’t know anything,” I said. “I thought I knew my husband enough to know that he wouldn’t sleep with his best friend’s wife. But obviously, I was wrong.”
“You have every right to be mad at me,” he said.
“Oh, thank you for giving me permission,” I replied. I walked over to the window and stared out, keeping my back to him while I tried to stop the flow of tears.
“All I’m asking is for you to go deep in your heart and look for forgiveness. I can’t lose you,” he said.
That caused me to spin like I was starring in The Exorcist. I no longer cared about the tears. “You don’t want to lose me?” I asked, incredulous. “You should have thought about that before you slept with her. I mean, I was coming over there to bring her child tickets to a concert. A child that I looked at as my own niece.”
“And they’re still family.”
“Like hell,” I said, pushing by him again. I sat on the bed, but when an image of Wilson flashed through my mind, I jumped up.
“Savannah, what happened was a huge mistake,” Clark continued. “I don’t love her. She doesn’t love me. Not like that anyway. Grief brought us together.”
“Oh, that’s such a convenient excuse,” I said.
“You know firsthand what grief can do to a person.”
I glared at him, stunned that he would go there. “Oh, so because I was in the depths of despair, I should understand, right? I should understand why you landed in Dawn’s bed. When I was grieving, I kept to myself. I didn’t find solace in the arms of another man.”
“I know,” he said, his face cloaked in desperation. “I know how you dealt with your grief because I was right there helping you through it. You shut me out and I was still there.”
“You shut me out in grieving Rob. But I guess that’s because you preferred to commiserate with Dawn.”
“I know. I know. I shut down. But it’s like Dawn got it. Dawn felt as close to him as I did. My sense of loss matched hers.”
I knew that Rob and Clark had had an unbreakable bond. I knew that he was heartbroken over his death. But it wasn’t my fault that he wouldn’t let me in to help him heal.
“Oh, I’m so happy that you and Dawn have something in common,” I said. Then, deciding to stop fighting the tears, I just let them flow. “I didn’t betray you. I would’ve never betrayed you,” I said, my voice cracking.
Clark tried to take my hand. “Savannah, if you give me a chance, I will spend the rest of my life making it up to you. We can go to counseling. We can do whatever you like.”
The sarcasm left me. In its place was only pain. “I can’t do it, Clark,” I whispered. “How can I ever heal from this betrayal?”
“We have healed from worse,” he said, squeezing my hands tighter. I was willing myself to snatch my hands away. But my body betrayed me. “Much worse,” he added.
And with those words, I knew he was right. But I didn’t see how in the world I could ever come back from this.
“Just come home. I’ll stay in another room until you’re ready. But we can’t work on us if you’re not at home.”
I shook my head. “Not yet, Clark.”
Relief passed over him. “Okay, at least you didn’t say never.”
I finally pulled away, headed back to my safe space at the window.
“Take however long you need, but not too long,” he continued.
When I turned and cut my eyes at him, he quickly added, “Please?” Clark didn’t wait for my reply as he reached in his jacket pocket and pulled out an oversized manila envelope.
“When you get time, there are some things in here I want you to look through. I want you to know how much I love you. Everything in this envelope will help you understand just how much. I love you, Savannah Graham.”
He leaned in and kissed my forehead, and this time I didn’t resist. But I didn’t relax until he was gone.
chapter
* * *
12
Clark had been gone for two hours. But his words were stil
l right there with me.
My heart was screaming for me to go home, but my head was trying to be the voice of reason. My heart wanted me to forgive; my head wanted to wallow in my anger. But I was tired of being angry.
I gently ran my finger along the manila envelope that Clark had left. It was probably some long note about why I should give him a second chance. He’d won my heart by writing me love letters when we first started dating after I’d moved from Lawton and began reporting in Oklahoma City and he was working his way up the ranks of the Boys & Girls Club in Dallas. His letters had touched my soul, and for that reason I almost threw this new envelope in the trash. But I could feel that there were several items inside, and curiosity got the best of me.
I sat on the edge of the bed, flipped the envelope over, gently eased it open, and dumped the contents out on the bed.
The first thing that caught my eye was our wedding picture. I picked it up and didn’t know whether to smile or cry. This had been the happiest day of my life, followed only by the day I found out I was pregnant. But this was back when I believed in fairy tales and happily ever after. Back when I didn’t know that my dream would end with a nightmare.
I tossed the picture aside and picked up a card. The cursive writing on the front let me know it was one of those Mayflower sappy greeting cards. I opened the card, read the heartwarming message about a “forever love,” then Clark’s handwritten note at the bottom.
While you grieve, I’m here.
When you’re finished grieving, I’ll still be here.
I’m never going anywhere.
Love you always and forever, Clark
That brought a tear to my eye. Clark had slid this card to me one of the days when I wouldn’t get up off the sofa.
I sifted through some more items from the bag until I came to one of those plastic stretchy bracelets. I picked it up and read the inscription: The Lord heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds.
The Book in Room 316 Page 6