Garth returned home from the club every weekend with amusing stories of his day of golf with his buddies. I’d never been able to reciprocate since I had no amusing stories to tell. I couldn’t wait to get home from shopping with Michelle and share my day with Garth. We had seen interesting people, Michelle had told me funny stories, and I had bought a new dress that I wanted to model.
When we pulled into our driveway, I noticed that Garth’s car was already there. I figured the golfers had called it quits early and skipped the beer. Then I saw him standing in the front door, waiting to greet me. I hopped out of the car, thanked Michelle for the wonderful day, and ran to Garth. When I reached him, I leaned up to give him a kiss, but he didn’t move, didn’t respond. He just stood with his arms crossed and his jaw set.
Through clenched teeth he said, “Where the hell have you been?”
I didn’t yet understand the severity of the situation and simply said, “I went to the mall with Michelle from my office,” and walked on past him into the house, chattering about my day.
It wasn’t until he grabbed me by my arm and spun me around and yelled, “You scared the shit out of me!” that I realized there was a problem.
I asked how I had scared him, and he continued to yell, “I had no idea what had happened to you! I saw your car in the garage, but you weren’t here. Why, you could have been kidnapped!”
I said, “Garth, this is absurd. I’m a grown woman, and I just went to the mall with a girlfriend.”
And he responded, “A girlfriend, huh? Who is this Michelle? I’ve never heard of her. Are you sure it wasn’t Mitchell?”
Garth had always been possessive, but he had never behaved like this. But, then, this was the first time in all our years of marriage that I had taken off with a girlfriend without telling him. His reaction, though, was bizarre and childish. And for the first time since I had met Garth, I lost it.
I screamed, “You’re acting like a spoiled brat! I just went to the mall, for god’s sake. I had a good time without you, and you just can’t stand it. If you have the chance to make me feel good or piss in my cornflakes, you’ll pick cornflake pissing every time!”
And that’s when he hit me for the first time. Yeah, that’s right, the first time—the first of many times. He had been belittling and demeaning me since the beginning, but this was the first time he drew blood.
As soon as the cornflake-pissing remark escaped my lips, Garth’s right fist connected with the left side of my head. The impact sounded like a watermelon on concrete, and the explosion was blue-hot. I reached out my hands to steady myself against the wall, as I felt the wet seep through my hair and onto my neck.
My last thought before I hit was, “Is this how The Colonel has made you feel, Ma’am?”
I regained consciousness to the sound of Garth’s wailing. He was sitting on the floor, sobbing, cradling me in his arms, rocking me, pressing a cold, wet cloth to my head. I tried to move, but the pain was too severe and the cradling too comforting.
“Oh, my god, Baby Girl. I don’t know what came over me. I was just terrified when I got home and found you missing. I love you so much, and I would just die if anything ever happened to you. Oh, please forgive me, Babe. I promise, oh, I promise I will never lay a finger on you again. I swear on my life.”
And for the rest of the day and night, Garth pampered me, sponging my wound and my fevered body. He prepared dinner for the two of us, and we ate it out on our patio, under a full moon. At bedtime he made love to me in a way I’d never experienced. He was tender and passionate and satisfying.
But the tenderness didn’t last. Soon we were back to our old patterns. He was golfing; I was sitting home, reading. I was preparing meals which we ate in front of the TV. And the sex was rough and hurried and unsatisfying.
I longed for the comfort.
I began going to the mall or going to the movie, knowing that my actions would enrage Garth. I knew what his reaction would be, but I knew that comfort always came at the end of the reaction. I know it’s sick, but when you’re starved for attention, starved for comfort, you’ll resort to just about anything. And that is how the sick dance works. I’m ashamed to admit how long I let it go on.
I still don’t know what gave me the strength to say, “It’s over, Garth. I’m leaving you,” but I said it.
He sobbed, he begged, he promised. I stood my ground and said it was over. It was only when he suggested marriage counseling that I agreed to give our mess of a marriage one last-ditch effort.
We made appointment after appointment, but as each arrived, something—a migraine, a broken crown, a flat tire—prevented our keeping each appointment.
Thirty-nine
Ma’am found a lump in her breast. She didn’t mention it to a soul. She is such a private person that she just couldn’t bring herself to talk about her breasts—or even say the word breast. She also felt, like so many women who find lumps in their breasts, that if she didn’t validate the lump, it wouldn’t be true.
Then The Colonel found the lump in Ma’am’s breast. I can’t allow myself to imagine the circumstances under which my father found a lump in my mother’s breast, and I’m thankful that The Colonel did not feel the need to share the details with us.
The Colonel is not frightened by wars, gangs, plague, hurricanes, earthquakes; but The Colonel was terrified of the lump in his wife’s breast. He had never missed a day’s work in his life, yet he took a leave of absence from the University to take care of our mother. He set his jaw, rolled up his sleeves, and jumped right into being nursemaid.
Ma’am has always played the helpless southern belle, but under Colonel Tom’s care, she became a lifeless rag doll. He would carry her from bed to sofa, where she would stay until it was time for him to carry her back to bed. He not only cooked her meals, he actually spoon fed her. And when he gave her a sponge bath, she would look up into his face with watery, adoring eyes.
Colonel Tom found the best specialists for Ma’am. She was scheduled for a needle biopsy, and The Colonel was with her, holding her hand all the way. Apparently, a needle biopsy is pretty painful. When they returned home from the procedure, The Colonel had to carry Ma’am from the car directly to her bed, where he gave her extra TLC.
The biopsy was inconclusive, so Ma’am’s specialists determined that she needed surgery. The surgeon would remove the lump from her breast and run some tests on it while Ma’am was still sedated. If the lump proved to be benign, the surgeon would just stitch her back up and send her home, good as new. If, however, the lump were malignant, the surgeon would have to remove the surrounding tissue and, possibly, lymph nodes. They would discuss chemo and radiation if and when they had to cross that bridge.
The two weeks until Ma’am’s surgery were the longest, and most frightening, of our lives. I had never seen The Colonel so concerned, and he wouldn’t let Ma’am out of his sight. He continued to carry her every time she wanted to move, and she continued to stare into his face with puppy-dog eyes. He prepared her meals and served her on trays. He sponged her and dressed her in clean lacy negligees—many of which The Colonel had bought for her to wear during her illness. Once Percy and I found The Colonel painting Ma’am’s toenails. And still she had that look on her face.
Poor Oops was still in high school when Ma’am found the lump, and the kid was terrified. She was so afraid that our mother was going to die and leave her at the mercy of The Colonel. Percy and I did our best to calm her fears, but since all of us were so frightened, the three of us did little more than hold one other up.
Garth was such a selfish ass and hated for me to give my attention to anyone but him. He even resented my siblings. I usually bowed to his whims, but I just didn’t give a shit during this time. My little sister needed my comfort, and I needed hers. Oops seemed to like being with me, seemed to enjoy getting to know me—something so new to us. I also think she felt the need to distance herself from the situation at home and clear her head.
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�s more, The Colonel was so preoccupied with coddling Ma’am and Ma’am was so given over to the attention, that they both completely ignored Oops.
Percy, Vickie, and Lydia worked hard to get Oops’s mind off the situation at home. They went on picnics, popped corn and watched videos, went to ball games over at the high school. Although Oops claimed that Percy and I ganged up on her when she was a kid, she said that she would always be grateful for our love and care during that frightening time.
On the morning of Ma’am surgery, Colonel Tom dressed our mother in her favorite outfit and lifted her into the family car. Percy, Oops, and I followed behind in my car as The Colonel drove our mother to the hospital. While The Colonel checked Ma’am in and got her settled, Percy, Oops, and I went to the waiting room. Once Ma’am was wheeled into surgery, The Colonel joined us in our waiting. We read two-year-old magazines, and Percy got us luke-warm cocoa from the vending machine. We snoozed and stared at other waiters until, hours later, Ma’am’s surgeon came to share his findings with us.
“Mrs. Albemarle’s tumor was benign.”
I could feel the blood drain from my face and the tears drain from my eyes. I didn’t realize just how terrified I had been until that moment. My Ma’am could have needed invasive surgery; she could have endured painful treatments; she could have lost her hair; she could have lingered; she could have died. Ma’am could have left our little sister a motherless teenager. For some reason, that struck me the hardest. But none of that was going to happen. Our mother was going to be fine once she recovered from the minor surgery of removing the benign lump from her breast.
Once Ma’am awoke in recovery, a nurse came to get all of us so that we could be with her when the doctor gave her the good news.
The Colonel was holding Ma’am’s little hand when the doctor said, “Mrs. Albemarle, you are going to be just fine. The tumor was benign. We needed only to remove the lump; you won’t require any further treatment. You’re free to go back to your normal routine with no restrictions whatsoever.”
We were all waiting for the relief to wash over Ma’am’s face, but it didn’t come. She actually looked disappointed by this news. She turned her face away from her family and stared out the window into the hospital parking lot. Everyone was baffled—everyone but I. I understood what lengths some of us will go to for attention, for comfort—perhaps, even welcome cancer.
The Colonel, of course, turned out to be the hero. Had it not been for his finding the lump, our mother could be in her cold grave by now. Never mind that the tumor was benign and the doctor said that it would have remained benign without the surgery. But The Colonel took the credit for Ma’am's recovery and never missed an opportunity to remind her how lucky she was to have such a remarkable husband.
The Colonel returned to the University—never to paint Ma’am’s toenails again—and Ma’am returned to her mint juleps.
The puppy-dog eyes disappeared—never to return.
Forty
One Thursday night, not long after Ma’am’s cancer scare, I was home alone. Garth had flown to Chicago that morning to a dental convention and would be gone until Sunday night. It was only seven o’clock, but I’d already taken my shower, put on my pajamas, and had settled down on the sofa with a trashy novel and a glass of wine. Then someone had the nerve to knock on my door.
“Shit! Can’t I have just one night to myself? Don’t I deserve a little me-time?”
I stormed to the front door, not caring who saw me in my pajamas. I opened the door and found Oops standing there, tears puddling in her eyes.
So, naturally, I said, “What the hell has The Colonel done now?”
The puddle of tears became a waterfall as she bellowed, “It’s not The Colonel. I’m p-p-p-pregnant!”
I said, “Oh, Oops, come on in and sit down,” when what I really felt like saying was, “How the hell can you be pregnant? You’re brainy and whiney and nerdy! Who in the world would want to make you pregnant?”
My brain felt like cotton—you know, when the thoughts find it impossible to filter through. I just couldn’t wrap my mind around this one, as hard as I tried.
I went to the kitchen to get Oops a glass of water and to clear my head. When I returned with water and a box of tissues, Oops was still sobbing, snot running down her chin. I waited and waited while she cried some, drank some, wiped some, blew some, drank some more, cried some more.
Finally when she had slowed to a hic-hic-hic, I said, “Do you want to talk about it?”
And before I could brace myself, the painful story poured out of my little sister.
He was a football player—BMOC. He could have dated any girl. But he had asked her out. She wondered why but figured he must have seen something in her that others hadn’t.
Oh, you poor little thing. Of course, you wanted to think that. Who wouldn’t? Who wouldn’t hope?
He had picked her up at the house. The Colonel had preened, interrogated the BMOC. BMOC had said all the right things, laughed at all The Colonel’s lame jokes, flattered Ma’am, smiled real pretty.
He drove Oops straight to a secluded spot in the woods. She asked where they were going on their date. He said that this is what everybody did on dates. Of course, she wanted to be like everybody—everybody wants to be like everybody—so she went along with BMOC because he knew all about dating.
My heart broke and the tears poured from my eyes when my little sister said, “Sis, I know I should have said ‘No’, but it felt so good. No one had ever touched me, not even my own mother or father, and when he touched me, it hurt good. I didn’t want it to stop. The whole time it was happening, I knew it was wrong, but I didn’t know till then that I needed for someone to hold me, to pretend to love me.”
With that, I folded my sad little sister in my arms and said, “Oh, Oops, I’m so, so sorry. I love you, and that’s not pretend.”
Of course, Oops was not surprised that BMOC had ignored her when they returned to school and that all his friends had stared and snickered.
But that was small stuff compared to what she was dealing with now.
Through her tears she said, “What am I going to do? I can’t tell Ma’am and Colonel Tom.”
Well, hell, I knew that!
I told her, “First step: we’ll find out if you’re really pregnant. If not, we’ll move on. If you are, we’ll decide then what our next step will be.”
Oops said, “You keep saying us and we.”
I said, “That’s right. We’re in this thing together. And I promise, Oops, I’ll never leave you alone.”
Once again, she started crying. I led her to the guest bedroom, undressed her, pulled a baggy T-shirt over her head, tucked her into bed, and kissed her on the forehead. Before I could straighten, she was sound asleep.
I went to the phone and called our parents. I told them that Oops was with me, and they didn’t even ask why. I said she was going to spend the weekend at my house. Okay with them. Goddamn!
The following morning I called my office and requested a personal day off. Since I had been such an exemplary typist, no one asked questions, and I was granted a personal day. Then I called Oops’s school, posed as our mother, and told the school secretary that Oops had terrible cramps and would not be able to make it to school that day. The lying came so easily I scared myself.
I looked in the phonebook and found a clinic on the south side of town. I figured the only way we’d know anyone on the south side of town was if she were pregnant and unmarried, too, and then it wouldn’t matter if she saw us. I called the clinic and found that we needed only to walk in and a doctor would see us—first come, first served.
I woke Oops and told her the plans I’d made, and she looked so grateful. I told her to shower and dress while I made us some breakfast—something she was unaccustomed to at home. Ma’am slept while Oops poured her own cereal.
While she was showering, I made us some soft-scrambled eggs and bacon, along with cheese grits, Oops’s favorite. When she showed
up in the kitchen and saw her breakfast waiting for her, she began crying again. I don’t think the tears were for her breakfast alone, but for all that was happening to her and for her sixteen years of no breakfast at all.
After we had eaten, we headed to the south side of town. I had been given good directions, so we had no trouble finding the clinic. When we arrived, we found that there were about twenty people ahead of us. But we had all day, and we’d use it all if need be.
Then we ran into our first obstacle. Oops could not be examined without a parent’s consent. I had to convince these people that I was her mother—her very young mother. We both had our driver’s licenses—Oops had had hers for two weeks—and we both had Albemarle in our names, as I had retained my maiden name as my middle name. I showed the nurse our licenses, being careful to keep the birth date on mine covered. I said that we had different names because I had had her out of wedlock when I was a teenager and had given her my maiden name as a last name. I had since married, of course, thus the different last name.
I figured they thought, “The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.”
Looking back, I’m confident they thought no such thing. I’m sure pregnant teenagers were pretty commonplace at the south side clinic.
There were dog-eared magazines, but we weren’t interested in reading. We sat is vinyl-upholstered chairs with stuffing protruding from the cushions and held hands. Little children with runny noses and dirty faces and sweet smiles played quietly at their mothers’ feet. Their mothers, most of them pregnant, cradled their protruding bellies in their hands and wore looks of grim despair. One by one patients were called, and as they disappeared through the door to the examining rooms, other patients arrived to fill their spaces.
After about three hours, a nurse appeared at the door and called Sophia Colleen Albemarle. Oops jumped right up, but it took me a moment to realize they were calling my sister.
Getting the Important Things Right Page 17