by Lorrie Kruse
His father patted Rex Johnson’s shoulder, reassuring. Matt could imagine his father loading on a pile of bullshit. We’re right on target, Rex. Don’t you worry. We’ll have this puppy tied down in plenty of time.
Bullshit. That’s what it was. A big, steaming pile of shit. And it was all Matt’s fault.
They needed a miracle if they were going to get the group home done in time. He concentrated all of his thoughts on his right ankle, willing it to move. Nothing happened. Not even a quiver.
Mr. Johnson got in his truck. He didn’t look happy as he drove away. Obviously, he knew a pile of shit when he stepped in it.
His father stood there, staring into space. Probably doing mental yoga trying to bring calm into his life. Matt gave up on his ankle. Looking at his father was just as depressing, so he watched Brad and Derrick install a piece of siding. He frowned as he estimated the board’s length. They’d cut off sixteen inches to vary the length so the joints didn’t land in the same location each run. Sixteen inches wasted. Lopped off too short to be used anywhere else and not look like a job done by a bunch of amateurs.
“No, no, no.” He wheeled over to his brother. “I had it all planned out so we’d be down to the exact amount of siding we needed. Didn’t you look at the diagram?”
Brad held the siding in place with his hammer and looked down the ladder at his brother. “Sure I did, but who can read your writing? This made sense, so we went with it.”
“No. It doesn’t make sense. You cut off thirty-two inches, we can use it somewhere. We can’t use sixteen.”
“Who the hell made you boss?”
Their father joined the party, a roll of antacids in his hand. He popped a couple tablets in his mouth and then said, “I did. When it comes to materials, you listen to your brother.”
“But—”
“But nothing, Bradley. You know your brother has a knack for making materials stretch. You also know, since he made the bid, that if anyone knows how close we are on materials, it’d be him. If he says not to make a sixteen-inch cut, then you listen to him.”
Matt’s heart thumped as he watched his father chomping the antacids that he thought were no longer a part of his life. This wasn’t good.
“Yes, Dad.” Brad glared at Matt.
Matt scanned the building, checking what had already been done. It looked like they’d be okay. He nodded at his father. “We’ll be fine.” He sighed, wishing he’d been talking about more than just the siding.
“Glad you were here. That could have cost us.” His father looked up at the sky. “Weather looks like it’s going to hold. We should probably make use of it and stain the trim even though we’re not going to need it for a while. If I lay out some boards, you want to get going on that?”
Did he want to get going on the staining? Hell, no. Of everything his job entailed, staining and varnishing were his least favorite. But he read between the lines. His father was scrambling to find something for his least helpful employee to do. “Sure. I love staining.”
His dad set up some boards in the cavernous living room/dining room area, right where weather conditions didn’t matter. He tried to tell himself it was okay. At least he was doing something productive.
The sawhorses were the perfect height for someone standing. Not so perfect for someone sitting. Fifteen minutes later, he worked a kink out of his shoulder. A headache throbbed behind his watering eyes. Nothing like shoving your face right in the fumes. He eyed the boards lined up along the wall, all waiting for the grand treatment, and then looked at the few boards he’d done so far. It would take him until Christmas to finish.
“Great idea, Dad,” he muttered as he moved to the next board. The room swam before him. He paused a moment until the sensation passed.
He had to get out of here. Get out in the fresh air. Hell, he needed to go a lot further away than just outdoors. He couldn’t do this anymore, come to work every day and pretend he was useful. He put down the stain can and wheeled from the building where he sucked in fresh air. His father came running.
“Son, are you okay?”
Acid rolled around in his stomach, but the stain fumes had little to do with it. From the first time his father had brought him to a construction site, this was what he’d wanted. To be like his father. And now it was over. “I think I’m going to be sick. I have to go home.”
By the time he pulled into his driveway, the nausea had passed. The headache still throbbed, but his eyes had stopped watering. He almost wished for the blurriness to return as he eyed the kitchen counter that in recent past had housed only the bare essentials. At least fifty various items were now crammed along the back wall of the counter. A cat cookie jar. Metal wildlife canisters. A giant mug that held pens and pencils. Decorative clutter. He’d told her to make the kitchen hers and she’d done just that. In his wildest dreams though, he couldn’t have envisioned how much space her crap was going to take up.
Just like he hadn’t envisioned turning into an old married couple so quickly when he’d suggested they live together. Not that he’d wanted sex every night, but once in the last six and a half weeks would have been nice. She obviously didn’t feel the same.
He wondered how much of it had to do with his lifeless legs.
She claimed it didn’t bother her. Easy to say, harder to live by. Still, he’d like to believe her because if he didn’t, that made for a pretty bleak future. So he looked for another reason. Could simply be because she was a woman. Women and men had different ideas when it came to sex. Men wanted instant pleasure and then they were done. Women wanted all the crap that led up to the sexual act, the romance.
Romance. He just about whacked his forehead with the ah-ha awakening. That’s what Crystal needed. Wasn’t that what she’d been trying to tell him with the body oil rub? That she needed some tenderness.
Well, if romance was what she wanted, then romance was what she was going to get. He’d cook her dinner. Turn the lights low. Watch one of those chick flick movies with her that’d turn her teary-eyed. He’d sit on the couch with her even though it was easier to stay in the wheelchair. Romance wasn’t about easy. It was about showing the other person how much you care.
Excited about his plans, he wrote up a grocery list and headed to his car. Within an hour, he was back home. Fresh cut flowers filled a vase that he’d put in the center of the table. Just call him Mr. Romance, he thought with a smile.
Instead of spaghetti sauce from a jar, he dug out a recipe he’d gotten in home-ec. Making sauce from scratch had to prove how much he loved her. Within minutes, the sauce bubbled, speckling the stovetop with red droplets. He boiled water in a pan and then dumped in a box of spaghetti noodles. He tossed the empty box onto the counter next to dripping, empty tomato sauce cans.
His grin spread. This was going to be so great.
§
Crystal pulled into the driveway while Matt was cutting lettuce for a salad. Here we go, he thought with a grin as he grabbed the towel and wiped his hands. She was going to be so surprised. And happy. Nothing better than a surprised and happy woman. He dropped the towel onto the counter next to the tomato sauce cans and then turned toward the door.
“Home already?” She made it two steps into the kitchen and then stopped dead. Her gaze went to the counter where the empty tomato sauce cans sat. She sighed and her shoulders sagged. “Been home a while, I see.”
Not quite the reaction he’d hoped for. Thank heavens he’d gotten the flowers. He motioned toward the vase. “Tonight’s your lucky night.”
She dumped her purse on the table so close to the vase that one of the straps fell against a tightly-closed rosebud. She turned away from the table and sighed as she stared at the counter where most of the clutter had accumulated. “Oh, I’m lucky all right.”
Crystal’s nose scrunched as she picked up a dripping tomato sauce can. The hairs on the back of his neck prickled as the can landed in the sink with a tinging whack. Why could she see the cans, but the vase filled
with thirty-dollar roses was apparently invisible?
He took a deep breath as she picked up another can and threw it in the sink. “I can clean later,” he said. “Dinner’s done. Why don’t you sit down?”
As if he’d spoken in a tone only animals could hear, she picked up another can and tossed it in the sink. With two fingers, she picked up the towel from the counter. “Damn it, this towel is ruined.” She slammed it back onto the counter. “Why aren’t you at work instead of home…cooking?”
He gave up on the illusion that romance was what she needed. “Because I’m useless there, just like I’m useless here.”
She rinsed a can and then dumped it in the recycle bin under the sink. “You’re not useless.”
“Well, I obviously can’t do anything right.”
Another can landed in the recycle bin. He felt about as important as the vase of flowers. Not even worthy of a Don’t be stupid, Matthew. This was so not what he wanted in a relationship. None of it. He didn’t think he could stand being with her another hour let alone another eighteen thousand two hundred and seventeen days.
“This isn’t going to work, is it?”
“This what, Matthew?” She closed the cabinet door a little harder than necessary.
“Us. Our relationship.”
“Sure, it is.” She took the dirty towel and wiped it across the counter.
It all became so clear. He loved her. But he didn’t want to be in this relationship alone. Not even to keep from telling his father he’d screwed up, once again. “No. It isn’t.”
He waited for her to protest.
She rubbed at the counter with a clean corner of the towel.
“Look at me, Crystal.”
She turned, but her gaze seemed to settle somewhere above his head. Eighteen thousand two hundred and seventeen days wouldn’t make any difference. It’d just be the both of them putting in their time, which wasn’t what he wanted.
He knew what he had to do but he didn’t think he could. If he called off the wedding, there’d be no going back. Their relationship would be over.
He stared at her as she stared at something else that wasn’t him. Something shifted inside him, a reckoning. Their relationship was already over. It had been for quite some time. The hole in his chest deepened. “I’ll call Pastor Ron and tell him to cancel the wedding ceremony.”
Apparently forgetting the dirty towel in her hand, she hugged herself. Her gaze stayed focused above him. “That isn’t what you want.”
“Hell no, it isn’t what I want.” His voice boomed so loudly his half-deaf elderly neighbor could probably hear him. “I want us to be married until we die together at a ripe old age. I want us to fill this house with kids. I want us to spoil our grandchildren and great-grandchildren rotten.” I want what my parents have.
His chest hurt. Every breath was a knife to his heart because he knew that every breath from here on would be without her. “What I don’t want is a divorce in five years, and that’s exactly where we’re headed, if we even make it that long.” He wheeled closer, wanting so desperately to hold her. He stopped when she was still just out of reach. “If that happened, if we got divorced, it’d kill me.”
Her eyes lowered.
“Look at me, Crystal. Look at me and tell me I’m wrong. Tell me you haven’t thought that it’d be okay to marry me because you could always get a divorce when it got too hard?”
The single tear that trailed down her cheek told him everything he needed to know. His own tears blurred his eyes but he refused to cry. He looked away from her. He stared at a pull knob on the cupboard. “If you get me all the numbers, reception hall, florist, caterer, I’ll call everyone and cancel.” He pushed his wheelchair backward, away from her, away from the future he’d wanted. “You can take as long as you want to move out. You can sleep in my old room upstairs.”
He turned his chair around, toward the door. “I need to be alone. I’ll be back later.”
“That’s it, Matt?”
He stopped but he didn’t turn around. He couldn’t. If he looked at her, he’d never be able to leave.
“You’re just going to walk away again?”
Again? What the hell did she mean again? Hell, he couldn’t even walk, let alone walk away again.
“Is there a reason not to?” He closed his eyes and listened hard, willing her to give him any excuse to stay. Even a hiccup and he’d be turned around and across the room, pulling her into his arms.
Silence. Nothing but silence behind him.
With , motions he wheeled forward, giving her time to stop him. How the hell was he supposed to tell his father he wasn’t getting married? He kept his head high and rolled down the ramp, doing his best to act like this was any ordinary day—and that he wasn’t dying inside. He made it to his car without her coming to the door to stop him.
It was really over.
He got in his car and drove aimlessly. The further he got from home the bigger the hole in his heart grew. How’d his life get so screwed up? Just three and a half months ago he’d been an active construction worker with a wedding so close he could smell the wedding cake. Now, he was nothing. A pile of waste.
He came to the area where he’d had his accident. He looked at the tree he’d crashed into and thought about crashing into it again. Just ending it all. What point was there in living? Every last plan he’d had for his future was gone. Kaput.
If he killed himself, he’d never have to face his father as a total failure.
It’d be so easy. Just turn the wheel. Apply more gas.
His tire crossed the center line. He envisioned the jarring crash. And then, darkness. Nothing. Over. Done.
He squeezed the gas lever a little harder. Then, he thought of Abby’s mother. Brain damaged. She’d crashed into a tree and hadn’t died. He hadn’t died the last time he’d hit the tree. There was no guarantee he’d die this time, either. He could end up like Abby’s mother. And then he’d definitely be of no use to his father.
He corrected his path, swerving back into his own lane. But now his thoughts were on Abby, wondering what kind of chipper advice she’d have for him right now. Too bad she wasn’t here. She had a way of lifting him from whatever deep pit he’d fallen into. She’d been a good substitute for Derrick.
With that thought, he knew exactly where to go.
Back in the hospital, Abby had been a perfect substitute for Derrick. Now the tables had turned. It was Derrick he was going to use as a substitute for Abby.
He drove to Derrick’s and stopped at the end of the driveway. He stared at Crystal’s CRX parked next to the garage, seeming to glow in the flood-light on the side of the house. As Matt’s friend, Derrick was also Crystal’s friend. But it still surprised him that Crystal would turn to Derrick instead of one of her girlfriends.
He thought about backing up and going home, but he didn’t want to go to an empty house. Maybe Crystal being at Derrick’s was a sign. Maybe she’d realized she didn’t want to call off the wedding. She’d come here thinking this was where he’d go.
Praying that was the case, he pulled in behind her car. He rushed through the process of putting the wheels back on his chair. With eager hands, he wheeled up the ramp Derrick had built for Matt’s visits. He raised his hand to knock on the screen door and then hesitated when he saw Derrick through the open door with Crystal in his arms. For just a second, he felt a stab of jealousy, and then he talked himself out of it. Crystal was upset. Obviously, Derrick would comfort her.
She tipped her head back, and Derrick’s mouth covered hers.
Feeling sick to his stomach, Matt grabbed the chair’s push rims. He turned to leave and hit the door casing with his foot, the sound much louder than the creaking deck board. Derrick and Crystal stood frozen.
“Oh, God.” He pushed backward on the wheels. Kept pushing. Had to get away. “Oh, God.”
His wheel caught in the groove between two deck boards. He pushed hard. The next thing he knew, he was bouncing ba
ckward down the steps. He grabbed the wheels, trying to stop his backward motion. The chair flipped and went in one direction while he went in another, landing hard on the pavement. Stars sparkled all around him.
The back door opened and closed with a slam. “Oh, no. Matt.” Crystal’s voice mingled with the sound of footsteps. Derrick and Crystal crowded around him.
Matt grabbed his wheelchair and pulled it upright.
“Are you okay?” Derrick reached out, ready to help Matt.
Matt pushed away Derrick’s hand. His head throbbed.
“You’re bleeding.” Crystal poked lightly at Matt’s head.
Gotta get away.
Derrick reached out again to help. Matt glared at him. “Don’t fucking touch me.”
Derrick and Crystal stood like stone statues while Matt worked himself into his chair, his head throbbing with every movement. Blood dripped down the back of his head, seeping through his hair. He could do this. He had to.
His eyes went to Derrick as he struggled to lift himself. The man who’d been his best friend for the last eighteen years had been kissing Crystal. The truth lodged hard in his stomach. This kiss hadn’t been their first. Acid tickled the back of his throat. He took quick, deep breaths. The acid rose, bringing with it the urge to vomit.
Needing to get away, he gathered all his strength and pushed himself up that last little bit that brought him into his chair. His breaths came faster, in quick pants. He had to get away.
He wheeled forward, aiming as best he could for his car. It felt like the world was tipped at a crazy angle, pulling his chair toward the grass instead of down the driveway.
Derrick stopped the chair’s forward movement. “I can’t let you drive like that.”