Finding Love (Behind Blue Lines Book 3)

by Christine Zolendz

  I loved him. I loved him through all his faults. Then I lost everything.

  Dylan and I were tangled together, a strange thing, yet it felt like the most natural place in the world to be.

  “When he heard about me losing the baby, he either had one hell of a party or he purposely overdosed, I still don’t know which. It didn’t matter, though. In the end, I lost them both.”

  His arms tightened around me, and for a while we stayed like that, sitting on the cold floor, holding on to one another, making sure there was enough room there for our tragedies and the ghosts that haunted us still.

  “Well, I guess we’re both a little broken,” he said after a while.

  I pulled away then and attempted a small smile. “Everybody’s broken. We all just have different ways of putting our pieces back together.”

  We sat close for a moment, staring at one another. I felt the overwhelming urge to kiss him then. Just put my lips to his and fuck away the pain. But for the first time in years, I didn't give in to my impulses. There were kids here—a wife—a family to save. They had a chance I was never given. I climbed to my feet and withdrew. He loved his wife, no matter what she did, like I loved Craig.

  I pressed myself against the wall and cleared my throat. “I can come here after work and help out until Sheri gets better. You guys can make it work.” For better or worse, right? “Right now, Sheri is safe somewhere with her family. Your only job the next two days is finding a full-time babysitter before you have to go to work on Monday.”

  “Yeah, yeah, I guess you’re right.” But he didn’t look like he believed me at all.

  Chapter 10

  Dylan

  That night, I called Sheri a dozen times, her mother a dozen more. At midnight, her mother called me back to let me know Sheri was fine, home with her and dealing with things.

  “Withdrawals?”

  This was my wife. How did anyone think I would just accept simple answers? I needed to know everything that was happening.

  “Dylan, I think she’ll be fine. I enrolled her in a great outpatient program here on Long Island.” She let out a loud breath and sniffed. She went through this more times with Sheri than I had, and her doubt was apparent in her tone.

  “Outpatient? Claudine, that didn’t work for her the first time. She needs to go somewhere and—”

  “Going away somewhere didn’t work last time either. I have great faith this program will work, and most importantly, Sheri does as well. She's positive about it.”

  No, I didn’t believe that for a second. Sheri never got along with her domineering mother. She hated when she visited, hated when she called on the phone, and always became upset with me when I initiated her visits. I needed another pair of eyes on her, and Claudine was usually on my side with things, always helping me out –but now? In the hospital, she blatantly blamed me for everything that was happening with Sheri, as if I was the one giving her drugs.

  "I want to bring the kids to see her tomorrow. They miss—”

  “No. Absolutely not. She needs Sheri time and to focus on getting healthy." That was all she said on the matter, then promptly ended the conversation.

  Fuck that. Sheri was my wife.

  I rang Claudine’s doorbell at eight the next morning. Reluctantly, she opened the door and stepped outside onto the porch to talk with me.

  “Dylan, I thought I made it clear…”

  "She's my wife, and I need to see her. The kids need to see her." She swept both of my children into her arms and sighed. "I don't think the kids should see her, not yet. You go out back. She's with that awful woman she met at group therapy. What's her name?" she whispered, mostly to herself. She shook her head and continued to murmur, "I don't remember. She came last night and hasn't left."

  Fucking enabler. “What? Why would you let another addict go near her?”

  “Dylan, please.”

  She bent down and whispered to Addison to meet her in the playroom upstairs. Ben grabbed a handful of Addison’s hair as she did, and a blood-curdling scream tore out of her mouth. I squeezed my eyes closed and inhaled as deep as I could.

  “Okay, okay. Addi. Ben didn’t mean to hurt you,” I said, trying to pry Ben’s death grasp open.

  When I finally got them separated, Addison sniffled her way upstairs and Claudine and I drifted into the foyer of her home.

  “She’s my daughter, Dylan, and I can’t see her in pain. I don’t know what to do anymore.” Her chin trembled as she spoke.

  Was there ever going to be a positive outcome here? Was this life ever getting any better?

  I lunged forward on the balls of my feet and headed straight for the back porch. This is bullshit. She had children who needed a mother.

  As I neared the French doors that led out into the backyard, I saw Sheri smoking a cigarette on the back patio. I slowed, watching her gestures and movements. She didn’t even look like the girl I married four years ago.

  In the chair next to her sat a shrunken faced girl. Her eyes were hollow and ringed red, and her collarbone jutted sharply under her skin. So did the bones of her wrists and fingers. She looked skeletal.

  I remembered her from rehab two years before.

  The both of them sitting side by side looked ashen and dead.

  I slid the doors open and stepped out quietly.

  The girl – I suddenly remembered her name was Daphne – slowly looked up at me and smiled. Her gums were black with decay. I cringed, my forehead breaking out into a cold sweat and my skin crawling with disgust.

  “Sheri," I said, since she hadn't acknowledged I had just walked outside. "We need to talk.”

  Her head tilted up at an awkward angle, barely able to open her eyes to see me. She mumbled something unintelligible, her hands oddly suspended in the air, as if they were held up by puppet strings. Her cigarette smoldered down to one long cylinder of ash that told gravity to screw off.

  “Sheri?” My voice broke as I stepped closer.

  “I can’t, Dylan. I need to...think.” Her eyes were half-open then, and her speech slurred. She was baked.

  “Think about what? What did you take?”

  “Nothing, babe, I swear. Hey, hey, hey, you have any money? Because,” she licked her lips and gave me a grim expression, “I need to buy…” She nudged her chin up and looked down her nose, turning her head in all weird directions. “That stuff for Ben.”

  The junkie next to her giggled.

  “Shut up,” I growled and knelt in front of Sheri.

  I slid one arm under her legs and another under her arms, then lifted her off the chair. She weighed nothing. All hard edges of bone and no meat. I wanted to scream.

  I carried her into the house, her head nodding into my chest. I wouldn’t be able to talk to her until she sobered up. I didn’t know how much she took or how long ago, but I’ve seen her nod for as long as two hours.

  I was utterly fucked. I needed to find a sitter by tomorrow; there was no way I could take the day. I needed the damn job—but I needed to talk to her, reason with her.

  Everything would just be fine if I could talk her through it.

  I gently laid her down on the bed in one of the guest bedrooms and stared at her, willing her to snap out of it.

  “Come on, Sheri. Wake up,” I begged, but she just moaned.

  I waited by pacing, every few minutes peeking out the window at the patio right below where Daphne was doing a nod of her own.

  I can’t believe Claudine let her meet up with another junkie. How was I supposed to get her help if she was allowed to be near people who freely offered her drugs?

  Twenty minutes before ten o’clock, Sheri slowly blinked her eyes up toward the ceiling.

  “How do I bring you back to us?” My voice trembled and choked. I wanted to scream and yell and physically shake her. My fingers vibrated with rage, my hands and arms tensed with the restraint I was just about to lose.

  Her eyes met mine, but her expression was void of any emotion. “What mak
es you think I’m not here?” Her voice was low and raspy.

  The question was so absurd, I wanted to laugh in her face. “You’re a fucking heroin addict, Sheri.” I spat the words out like they were poison on my tongue. I didn’t want to fight – God, I didn’t – but it was hard to back down, not to tell her all she’d done, all she was doing to us.

  She blinked her eyes at me, all deer-like and innocent. She nibbled on the bottom of her lip, playing her little games; the problem was, I was numb to it now. Numb.

  "That's not going to work. You have a serious issue."

  “I know I have a problem, okay? I know it by the way I feel sober. I feel wrong. I feel like all I want, all I need is that high, and I don't care about living without it.”

  “You…want it more than us?” Shock cracked at my vocal chords.

  She didn’t answer right away. My heart exploded in my chest, and I died a thousand times, over and over.

  “Do you?” I screamed the question into her face.

  “Yes! Okay? Yes. I can’t think of anything else. I can’t focus. They have me on methadone, and I fucking hate you for it. You’re the one who makes me do this. Dealing with you, and pain, and those fucking kids.”

  “Did…did you just call them those fucking kids?” I was stunned, my voice raw.

  “You know what? You're addicted. Dylan, you have a problem,” she snapped, pointing a finger at me.

  “Me? How is that?” Was she fucking crazy?

  “You’re addicted to saving me. Changing me. And I fucking like the way I am.” She laid a hand on her chest, like she was swearing some oath to drugs or something.

  “I just want you back. Come back to us. Be healthy. Be okay.” She shook her head at me, but I continued pleading. “Don’t do this. It’s killing me,” I begged softly.

  “You? It’s always about you. I have this big, empty hole in my heart and I’m filling it with drugs, and you want to talk about you?!” she shrieked.

  “Then tell me how to help you!”

  “All I want to be is high. I hate my fucking life, Dylan. I hate it. You knocked me up. I didn’t want any of this.” Her face turned bright red, and spit flew out of her mouth.

  “That’s fucking wonderful to say, thanks. Just great,” I said, throwing my hands up in the air.

  “It’s the truth, you asshole. I hated being pregnant. I hated not getting high then. I hate you. I fucking HATE YOU!” She punched her hands into the mattress as she yelled.

  “How are you getting it? How?” I roared.

  “Any fucking way I can! I need to numb everything. You. I need to numb you.”

  “You were good. For so long, you were clean,” I whispered.

  She climbed out of bed, shoulders slumped, jaw slack. “I haven’t been clean since I was nineteen. You just never noticed because you’re a selfish prick.”

  It’s the drug I hate, not the addict. It’s the drug I hate, not the addict. It’s the drug I hate, not the addict. If I kept repeating the words in my head, I could save her. I could save us.

  “You need an intervention. But I’m still paying for the last one, thirty-four grand I owe for you. How much are you using a day?”

  “Fuck you,” she spat.

  That’s not my wife talking, that’s a drug addict. My wife is somewhere inside there still.

  “No, she’s gone!” Sheri shrieked, flailing her arms at me.

  I must have said the words out loud, but there wasn’t time to think. Sheri’s fists pounded into my chest, my arms, my face. It was weak, a pathetic attempt at rage.

  "I hate you. I hate you. I want a divorce! I hate you! If you don't leave, I'll fucking jump off the fucking balcony.” She lunged for the sliding glass doors to the balcony. “Get away from me. I swear, I’ll fucking do it!”

  I stumbled out of the room. Outside in the hallway, Addison stood frozen at the bottom of the staircase, eyes wide; her little body painfully rigid. How much did she hear? Holy shit, my little girl. What the fuck did she hear her mother say?

  “Daddy?” she cried out as tears welled in her eyes.

  “Hey, babycakes.” I smiled, walking toward her. “Let’s go get Ben. We’ll visit with Grandma another day, okay?”

  “What’s wrong with Mommy? Why is she mad at you?”

  I scooped my daughter up into my arms and held her tightly. Mommy’s a fucking junkie. Mommy’s sick. Mommy is going to fucking die doing that shit.

  “Mommy bumped her elbow and hit her funny bone,” I stammered, trying to think of something reassuring or just plain okay for a four-year-old to hear and understand.

  I rushed her back up the stairs and found Claudine with Ben in the playroom.

  “We’re going.”

  All she could do was nod her head in understanding.

  “I need to focus on finding a safe environment for the children while I go to work. I’m going to visit a few places today.”

  I didn’t even look at her while I spoke—just concentrated on getting our belongings together and leaving as quickly as I could.

  “I hope that’s not a forty-ounce hidden in that bag.”

  My head snapped up to see Callie standing in front of the park bench I was sitting on. Addison was on the swings with another little girl she just met, and Ben was fast asleep in the stroller. And no, the bag was full of goldfish crackers—the only thing I’d eaten all day.

  Callie? How does she have the ability to show up when I’m at my lowest?

  The sky was darkening around her, and I blinked quickly, trying to clear the fog in my head. We were probably at the park for way too long; the last thing I remember was the sun warming my skin, the anger and hurt simmering just underneath.

  “Are you okay?” Callie was jogging in place, her chest bouncing at an X-rated rate. The clingy material of her shorts hugged her skin—wet skin—sweaty wet skin all down her legs and across her chest. It was like she was glistening in the setting sun, the epitome of health and beauty.

  Wonder if she ever took drugs?

  “We get tested, randomly. I’d lose my job.”

  Shit. I asked that out loud. What’s happening to my life? I’m losing it, that’s what’s happening.

  “How’d adventures in catching a babysitter go today?” Her smile brightened the whole park. She stopped jogging and stretched. I couldn’t form words.

  “Dylan?”

  “Huh?”

  “Did you find a babysitter?” she asked, sitting next to me on the bench.

  “One woman was older than dirt. The VIP day care on Tenth Street is infested with bedbugs and closed until further notice. And Babywatch.com will charge me more money than I make in a week to watch two kids under the age of four.”

  “Oh—”

  “I took the kids to try and see their mother today, who was too fucking high to stand up straight.” I laughed darkly at the shocked expression that crawled across her face. “She told me she wanted a divorce. She hated me. Never wanted to have the kids.”

  “Oh, Dylan—”

  "Oh, no. It gets better. All the time, I thought she was clean? All the rehab I’ve been paying off and the bail money? That was all for nothing. Because she never stopped. I just didn't notice because..." I leaned forward and jammed my finger into the wood of the bench as I spoke. "Because I am a selfish prick."

  Callie twisted around on the bench to face me. “You? A selfish prick?”

  "I went home, and I went through all the bills. My bills haven't gotten paid – none of them – in months. All the jewelry, everything valuable in the house is gone.” I ran my hands through my hair and rubbed at my forehead. There had been a jackhammer in my skull all day. “I was too busy working double shifts for the last few years, and I was too selfish and too much of a prick to notice.”

  “Look, Dylan. I get five vacation weeks a year. I haven’t taken any. I could take off a few days to help you—”

  I put my hand over hers. It was purely innocent, just showing someone gratitude; letting h
er know her thoughtfulness moved me. What I hadn't expected was the intense electrical current that surged across my skin as I touched her or the way my entire body ached with need for a moment where I could just let go of everything shitty and press my body against hers, my lips against hers.

  I needed to back away.

  Her eyes locked with mine and widened. She felt it, too, didn't she? This live wire between us. Whether it was born of loneliness or grief, I couldn't say. But it was real, and it thickened the air around us. Goosebumps puckered along her skin, and she shivered slightly. It was cold, and she was still slick with sweat, but the way she looked back at me, that shocked sort of oh shit expression, I knew she felt the same way.

  I needed to back away and let go of her hand—tell her I’m sorry for the touch—I’m sorry for getting her involved. I’m sorry my wife was a junkie and my kids rang your doorbell.

  I choked out a small gasp. I couldn’t say any of those things. I was too overwhelmed with the heat radiating up my arm from her and the overpowering urge to be burned by it.

  “You’re single with no kids—no responsibilities—your vacations should be spent on beaches with margaritas in your hands.”

  Her gaze dropped instantly, and her face flushed with color. Did I somehow hurt her feelings? I didn’t mean to. With all she had done for me already, the last thing I wanted to do was hurt her.

  “Callie! Callie! Callie!” Addison squealed as she barreled into us, eyes sparkling and cheeks gleaming. “Did you come to get us because it’s bedtime? Will you read me a story, pwease?”

  Callie eyes darted quickly up to mine, waiting for me to answer. She was definitely hurt by whatever I said before. She really wanted to help me. She really liked the kids and they really liked her.

  I nodded my head, and the smile I got in return was stunning.

  “I sure can. Come on,” she said, taking Addison’s hand. “Let’s get you home and cleaned up for a story.”

  I pushed Ben’s stroller through the park after them just as the streetlights came on.

  We bathed the kids, then Callie read to Addison as I watched in awe from the small bedroom doorway. I savored the moment, trying to ignore the strange lump that filled my throat.