While Jillian choked back some unexpected tears, Bella and Brady approached the bench. “Will you play with us, Dad?” Bella asked.
“You too, Jillian,” Brady said.
Mac shook his head. “With all these other kids running around, you want me to play with you?”
Both kids nodded, grabbing for his hand.
He stood and allowed them to lead him. Jillian happily followed.
At first, they tackled the slides, but that was only a warm-up. From there, it was on to the real games. Like wild gorillas, they hit the jungle gym hard. Before long, the air turned hot. While playing hide-and-seek, Mac’s big butt and Bella’s giggles gave them both away. Jillian picked the game of tag next and it was complete, unadulterated fun. Each of them laughed, really laughed, and was loving every second of it. There were no real adults there to tell them what they couldn’t do. They were royalty and knowing this, they quickly claimed their territory. They built a fort under the jungle gym.
Resting on a floor of dirt and wood chips, Bella made a birthday cake out of mud. While she, Jillian, and Brady sang out of tune, Mac blew out the candles. Then, to everyone’s surprise, Brady found a bottle cap, reacting like it was the most valuable thing on earth. “It’s a real treasure,” the little guy squealed. “Let’s bury it for some other lucky kids to find thousands of years from now.”
“What a treasure,” their dad agreed.
Quietly digging a hole, all four buried the bottle cap where nobody would ever find it. Mac marked the spot with a stick, while they promised each other, “We never tell anyone.” It was their secret, something they could rediscover at a future visit to the park.
⧝
Jillian returned to the present, her cheeks soaked in tears. I don’t want to remember, she thought, her body convulsing with heavy sobs, not ever again.
Chapter 15
The long weeks of separation were enough to shatter the coldest heart or test the strongest faith, as Mac learned the incredible effort it took to heal. From his confined cell at Presbyterian Hospital, he finished writing another letter.
Dear Bella, my beautiful princess,
Guess what? I was thinking about you today. And yesterday. And the day before that. And I’ll be thinking about you tomorrow and every day after that. I miss everything about you, sweetheart. But the feelings that sometimes make me feel sad—like missing you and your sister and brother—also give me the strength and inspiration to fight even harder to get well and get home to you guys.
Do you know that it’s impossible for me to think about you and not smile? It’s true. You’re such an wonderful girl. I hope you know that. You’d better.
Even being here in the hospital, I can still feel your love. From the moment you came into this world, I’ve felt a very strong connection to your spirit, like I knew you before you were born. That probably seems strange right now, but I have a feeling it’ll make good sense to you when you get older.
I’m so excited to see what the future holds for a heart as big as yours. And I’ll be there, Bella, I promise. Once I get home, I’m never going away again.
Be a good girl. Say your prayers. Most of all, be happy. Your dad loves you so, so much.
You Live in My Heart—Always,
Dad
After folding up the letter—addressed to Ms. Bella Anderson—Mac sealed the envelope and gave it a kiss. There was no stamp. He’d stopped mailing the letters weeks before.
⧝
For the third time that morning, Philip, Jen’s not-so-secret admirer at the newspaper, walked by her desk and winked.
She grinned, involuntarily.
He stopped, turned and started back toward her, the look of a young hunter sparkled from his green eyes.
Oh boy, she thought, here we go again.
“Have dinner with me,” he said, standing at the corner of her desk. It was more of a statement than a question.
Somebody’s a little too confident, Jen thought, but said, “I can’t.”
“Because you don’t eat dinner?” he asked, his grin aimed at tearing down whatever defenses she’d erected.
“I do, but I can’t.”
“Really?” he asked, more surprised than dejected.
“I’m flattered,” Jen said, “I really am, but…”
“But you’re married, right?” he said.
“I am that,” she said, “though my husband is gone and I’m not sure he’s ever coming back.” Hearing the words aloud, she felt a jolt tear through her. “The reason I can’t is because my children need me right now a lot more than I need to be going out on a date.”
“Really?” he asked again, his emerald eyes betraying even more surprise.
Jen grinned. “Really,” she confirmed.
“We could have some fun and your kids would never have to know,” he whispered, maintaining his devilish smirk.
“But they’d know that I’m somewhere other than with them,” she said, shaking her head. “It’s not happening,” she grinned, “at least not right now.”
“Okay then,” he said, starting to slink away.
“But I’m flattered,” she repeated.
He looked over his shoulder and smiled.
But if the kids were a little older and didn’t need me so much, she thought, watching him walk away, oh, would you be fun…
⧝
As the endless days ticked by, Mac struggled to adjust and overcome in his new world. With Butch on his heels, he grabbed a plastic tray and entered the cafeteria.
“Schools don’t teach kids practical skills anymore,” Butch said, “not even cursive so they can sign their own names.” He shrugged. “Kids today can’t balance a check book or write a resume and it’s all intentional to fleece the masses.”
“Okay, Mr. Conspiracy,” Mac said.
“Whatever,” Butch countered. “Back when we were kids, at least we received the basics.”
Mac slid his tangerine-colored tray along the stainless steel rails like he was back in school. The shower-capped cafeteria lady looked at him, waiting to fill his order.
“Let’s go,” Butch teased the grimacing woman, “breakfast isn’t going to serve itself.”
After picking the watery scrambled eggs and undercooked bacon, Mac and Butch looked for an empty table in the bustling cafeteria. As they scanned the room, Nurse Mal approached. “You boys doing okay?” she asked.
Mac smirked. Two broken souls and a smart-ass nurse that does her best to look after them, he thought.
Butch leaned in toward her, as if he were about to share a secret. “Poor guy,” he whispered near her ear. “Mac is a bit on the slow side and it’s really not his fault.” He looked back at Mac and grinned. “He’s here because he split his head open while drinking from the toilet and suffered some serious brain damage. It was so bad that they had to put a plate in his head.”
“Oh really,” Mal said, pausing to play along.
Butch shrugged. “He couldn’t afford metal, so the doctors went with a paper plate.” He shook his head. “I don’t think it worked, though.” He looked over at Mac again. “Every time Mac takes a shower, the plate gets wet and he starts talking with a lisp.”
She obviously tried to hold it in, but looked at Mac and laughed.
Mac couldn’t help himself and chuckled along with her.
“I’m glad to see you’ve finally found a friend, Butch,” she said.
Butch shook his head. “Friend? We’re business partners.”
Her eyebrow rose.
“When we get out of this pit, we’re going to raise hamsters together.” He nodded. “They’re a little tough to herd and they kind of freak me out…” Leaning in even closer, he lowered his tone. “Did you know that the harder you squeeze their bellies, the more their eyes bulge?”
She studied his face for
a moment. “You really are nuts, huh?” she whispered.
Mac nodded in agreement. “You have no idea,” he confirmed, releasing a hearty laugh that rocked his entire body.
Butch smiled. “A little, I guess.”
It’s been forever since I’ve laughed like that, Mac realized.
Shaking her head, Nurse Mal walked away.
“We should go buy that old witch a gift certificate to the local pet groomer’s,” Butch said, his face now serious, “so she can get her hooves filed down and polished.”
Mac studied his friend’s changed demeanor. Nurse Mal definitely knows her stuff, he thought, Butch is nuts. Mac then spotted George Saber sitting off in the corner with another man. His instincts screamed for him to veer away, but morbid curiosity screamed louder. With each step toward George, he felt like he was witnessing another terrible car wreck, only this time it was his future. You need to get as much insight as you can about where the legal side of things might land with the kids, he thought.
George and his friend looked up as they approached.
“Do you mind if we join you?” Mac asked, gesturing toward Butch with his head.
“Of course,” George said, “this is Andrew Souza.”
Taking a seat, Mac placed his tray onto the table and shook Andrew’s hand. Before he could even place a napkin into his lap, Mac turned to George. “That was quite the story you shared the other day in group session.”
George tilted his head sideways.
“About all your troubles in court,” Mac explained.
George shook his head, his face immediately returning to an angrier place.
“Sorry to bring it up,” Mac said. “If you don’t want to talk about it…”
“Are you kidding?” George said. “Talking about it is the only thing that’s stopped me from killing someone.”
Mac nodded, thinking, I hope he means that figuratively.
George said, “I’ll never forget when my jackass attorney whispered, ‘The judge went easy. You’ve been given standard visitation.’ Went easy? I thought, more pissed than I ever imagined I could get. And to add insult to injury, I was still paying the mouthpiece to defend rights that were never mine to begin with.”
“Ain’t that the truth,” Andrew blurted, indicating that he’d experienced a similar situation.
“Not long after my ex and I left court,” George went on, “reality set in. I took my kids for our court-ordered visits, only to drop them off a few hours later. And believe it or not, things got even worse.”
“Oh no,” Mac blurted, more for himself than for the man telling the story.
George nodded. “Yup, she called the shots from then on. And because of one simple chromosome, my role in my kids’ lives was now limited.”
“That sucks,” Butch said, though he was clearly more interested in what remained on his plate than the bleak table conversation.
“And so it went,” George said. “I’d drop my kids off after our quick visits so another man could bounce them on his lap.”
New boyfriend? Mac thought, his stomach kicking up enough acid to make him stifle a gag. He’d never even considered the possibility of Jen finding a man.
“Yup, each new boyfriend was given all the time he wanted with my children,” George said. “At first, it killed me, but I decided that whatever was best for my kids had to come first.” He threw his fork into his plate. “It stung something terrible all the way to Christmas.”
“Oh, the Christmas story,” Andrew sighed, as though issuing a warning to the others.
Mac steeled himself to hear more. You need to know this, he told himself.
George took a deep breath. “I waited in my old driveway for four long hours, while three inches of snow covered my windshield, as well as all my screaming from inside my truck. When my ex and the kids finally pulled into the driveway, the old lady snickered, ‘I must have lost track of time.’ The kids were dead tired and half-asleep. And the ex…well, she just grinned, knowing there was nothing I could do about it. It took all the strength I had left to hide my tears from the kids.” He sighed heavily. “I hadn’t planned on giving my ex anything for Christmas—like a broken nose—and was doing my best to stick to the plan.”
Though it was anything but funny, Butch laughed.
“For months, I tried to contend with my children’s misguided guilt of their parents being separated. It wasn’t easy. I only had a fraction of my ex wife’s time to soothe them. In the meantime, nothing seemed to ease the bitch’s spite. She had no qualms about using our kids as pawns in her constant games. She had custody, so the kids were used as negotiating tools.” He looked Mac in the eye. “And while I was fighting for fair visitation, she was going for money—as much as she could get.”
“They take everything, the dirty bitches,” Andrew blurted again, without explanation.
“Which isn’t anything compared to how she bashed my character,” George hissed, his bottom lip curled over his teeth, “and used our kids as her sounding board.” He shook his head sorrowfully. “I mean, I understand being angry, but this never made any sense to me. Wouldn’t every derogatory word directed toward me insult half of who my kids are?”
Mac nodded, feeling the same sorrow. Oh, that sucks, he thought, picturing his sister-in-law’s smug face and wondering if the same thing was going on at home while he was eating lunch with these broken men.
“On the flip side,” George continued, “I could never reply in the same manner without compromising the honor I wanted to instill in my kids.” He exhaled deeply. “Boys don’t talk badly about their moms and understand respect. Knowing this, I never matched my wife’s vicious slander—even though she made it a sport to stain our kids’ last name.”
When a person can demonize someone, Mac thought, it obviously frees up their conscience to justify anything they do or say about that person. His heart fluttered nervously. I suppose no one looks in a mirror and sees a bad person looking back.
“Words like abandonment were constantly used to mold me into a monster,” George added, “justifying the worst acts of greed and cruelty against me.”
Mac felt nauseous at the word abandonment.
“I was at the mercy of someone who was consumed with a hateful vengeance. And through it all, she swore that she needed to protect our children, to put them first. Imagine that,” George asked, “having to protect my kids from me—their own father?”
As if he were a jack-in-the-box, Mac sprang to his feet, his lunch nearly untouched. “Sorry,” he said, struggling to conceal the dark emotions that swirled in him, “I have a session with Dr. Fiore and I can’t be late again.”
Each man studied him, their faces betraying their lack of belief.
“I’m sorry if I said something…” George began
“Not at all,” Mac lied. “I just need to go.”
“I’m guessing that you need to make things right with your kids again,” Andrew blurted, looking at Mac. “There’s no secret to it, pal. Just make yourself available and let them know they mean more to you than anything else in the world.” He studied Mac’s face. “But you have to mean it, or they’ll know that too.”
“You clearly have no idea who I am,” Mac said, taken aback.
“I don’t need to know who you are,” the crass man said, “your kids do.”
“And they do!” Mac roared, surprising himself with the rage that still simmered just beneath the surface. At least I think they still do. Without another word, Mac made a beeline to the gray trash can and dumped the barely eaten meal from his tray.
⧝
As the long weeks turned into months, Jen had never felt so exhausted. Struggling with the heavy stresses of everyday life as a single mom, she was sitting at the kitchen table when her cell phone rang. She picked up the phone and looked at the caller ID. “Roland Dube,” she said al
oud, preparing to answer it. But she didn’t. I can’t, she thought. I just don’t have the energy for another Mac update right now. She screened the call, letting it go to voicemail. Two minutes passed when she checked the phone again. No voicemail, she thought. Good.
She dialed her sister’s number.
“Hello?” Diane answered.
“Hi Di.”
“Oh, hey Jen,” Diane said, sounding happy to hear from her. “Mom said you didn’t attend the awards ceremony?”
“No, I didn’t.”
“Why?” Diane said. “You should be proud that...”
“I’m very proud of the journalism award, Di,” Jen interrupted, “but I need to be home with the kids.”
“I could’ve babysat.”
“You don’t understand,” Jen said. “Brady asked me a few weeks ago what would happen to him and his sisters if I left them too. ‘Will Grandma take care of us?’ he asked.”
“Oh no,” Diane said, “you didn’t tell me that.”
“Because it’s not uncommon, Di,” Jen said, shaking her head. “Mac hasn’t lived with us for months, but sometimes it feels like he never left.”
“How so?”
“A few weeks ago, I took the training wheels off of Brady’s bicycle…” And the memory returned.
⧝
On the Anderson’s thawed lawn, Brady fought to balance a two-wheel bicycle. Jen ran behind him, while Jillian and Bella stood off to the side, looking on. All three kids were happy; there was even a little laughter in the air.
“Not bad, Brady,” Jillian called out to him, “but when Dad taught me to ride a bike, he…”
A dirty look from Jen halted the comment. Bella ran into the house, crying. The others were left to face a horrible moment of silence. Jen felt like crying. It’s hard enough juggling work and raising kids alone, she’d thought, but when there’s bitterness and anger involved, it can be unbearable.
⧝
Jen returned from the stinging memory. “And at gymnastics, when Bella slipped off the pommel horse and fell hard onto the matt, spraining her arm, who do you think she yelled out for?”
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