Coming Unglued

by Rebeca Seitz

  “Tandy!”

  “Sorry, sorry. You’re right. I’ll be over in a second.”

  “Thank you.” Kendra set the phone down and laid back into the plump cushions. In a few minutes this part would be all over, and she could focus on begging her way back into Darin’s life. Because, after all this, she had no idea what she’d do if he didn’t let her back in.

  Not that he had any reason at all to do so. Unless he was as lonely without her as she felt without him. Unless his world didn’t spin as fast or as fun without her to tilt it for him. Unless he was happier with the silence her absence created.

  Kendra absently gazed around the room, then stopped on a picture of her and Darin in a red frame.

  Starting again on the right side, she allowed her eyes to pan the room. Slowly.

  How had she not noticed this?

  She, a lover of color, lived in an environment decorated in shades of white. Her carpet served as a white cloud for her feet. Her walls reflected back Arctic white. Even her pillows were variations on white, accented with dove gray and pale gold. The entire room looked like an iceberg.

  One big, frigid iceberg.

  Except a slash of red encircling her smiling face beside Darin’s.

  Her conscious mind now embraced what her subconscious always knew: Darin Spenser represented the color in her life. His color was safe enough for her life even though she couldn’t control it. Before, she could only pour color onto a canvas, either on an easel or on the canvas of her body in clothes and jewelry. Color she controlled.

  But she couldn’t control Darin.

  Kendra shook her head, blinked, and looked around again. Yep, the whole thing lacked even a hint of color except that photograph and frame. She pushed off the couch and walked across the room, coming to a halt before the red frame.

  Her own face, almost golden in the sun, laughed back at her. Darin’s head tilted into hers, his eyes sparkling in the sunshine. His face crinkled into a grin. She gently lifted the frame and carried it back to the couch.

  She was still holding it ten minutes later when a knock sounded on the door. Kendra kept her grip on the picture as she went to answer it. Tandy stood on the other side, and her eyes went to the frame in Kendra’s hand.

  “Okay, let’s get this show on the road. What is that?”

  Kendra held it up. “It’s a picture of me and Darin.” Her voice still held the awe of her discovery.

  Tandy wrinkled her nose. “Oookay, and you’ve got a death grip on it. Why?”

  “Come here.” Kendra led Tandy into the living room and pulled her into its center. “Look around.”

  Tandy turned in a circle, then looked at Kendra. “It’s a living room.”

  “No, dummy.” She spun Tandy in a slow circle. “Look again.”

  Tandy did as instructed. She gave Kendra a worried look. “It’s still a living room.”

  “Yeah, but what color do you see?”

  “Oh, that’s easy. You love—”

  Tandy stopped and checked out the room. “Wait, why isn’t there any color in here?”

  “Exactly.”

  “No, not exactly. I’m serious. You’re a painter, for goodness’ sakes. You love color. Why have I never noticed this?” Tandy kept looking around the room, trying to find a spot of color anywhere.

  “I just saw it myself. When this was on the table over there.” Kendra held up the picture.

  Tandy took it from her, peering at the photo. “Oh.”

  “Yeah, oh.”

  “I can’t believe I didn’t notice this before. You’ve never had color in here?”

  Kendra shook her head. “Nope. It’s been this way since I first moved in.”

  Tandy’s face softened. “Oh, Kendra.”

  “I know. I know. I finally allow a little color into my personal life, and look what I do—stomp all over it and leave it bleeding on the other side of town.”

  Tandy put her arm around her sister and pulled her to the sterile-looking couch. “Okay, we’re going to fix this, though. Starting right now.” She reached across Kendra and picked up the phone. “What’s Lorena’s number?”

  Kendra told her, and Tandy dialed. Kendra picked up Kitty and petted her, keeping an eye on Tandy.

  “Hello, is Lorena home, please?” Tandy shot Kendra a thumbs-up. “Thanks.”

  She handed the phone to Kendra. “He’s going to get her.”

  Kendra swallowed, unable now to think of what she could say. What were the appropriate words for confessing to a wife that you’ve been with her husband? Emily Post didn’t cover this.

  “Lorena? Hi, it’s Kendra.”

  “Oh, hi, Kendra. How are things in lovely Stars Hill? Are you feeling better?”

  Kendra raised her eyes to Tandy, who nodded her encouragement. “They’re okay. Listen, I need to tell you something. And I wish I didn’t have to tell you this, but I do. It’s about why I lost it in your office.”

  “Oh. Okay. Are you all right?”

  Kendra grimaced. Here she was about to obliterate the woman’s marriage, and Lorena asked if she was all right.

  “I’m going to be, Lorena. The thing is, remember how you told me you thought your husband was cheating?”

  “Oh, yes. I must have been wrong, though. Everything’s been fine for the past couple of months.” Lorena’s voice was too bright. Fake.

  “He isn’t having sex with another woman.”

  “That’s what I said. I just thought something was happening that wasn’t. My mistake. I’m so glad I didn’t take your advice and accuse him, though.”

  “Well, wait. I don’t know that he’s not having sex.” Gosh, could you be any worse at this? “The thing is, I didn’t know Harrison Hawkings was your husband until I saw his picture in your office.”

  At Lorena’s gasp, Kendra looked to Tandy. Tandy grabbed her hand and squeezed it in support.

  “I see.” Lorena’s voice had become deathly still. “Are you having an affair with my husband, Kendra?”

  “Not like you’re probably thinking, and I haven’t seen him in two months.” Kendra rushed to set the record straight. “I spent a lot of time with him, though. I first met him this spring. At a jazz club when I was singing. I didn’t know immediately he had a wife, but I didn’t stop talking to him even after he told me. He kissed me. We kissed. Once. The rest of it was just conversation.”

  “I don’t understand. You had conversations with my husband, and you’re calling me for what reason?”

  “Because they were conversations I shouldn’t be having with a married man.”

  “So you’re dumping your guilt onto my lap. Is that it?”

  “No! No. That’s not it at all.” Kendra took a breath, and Tandy squeezed her hand harder. “Listen, I know this sounds weird; and, trust me, I thought long and hard about calling you. But at the end of the day, what I shared with your husband amounts to an emotional affair. And if I were in your shoes, I’d want to know. I especially thought you’d want to know that you weren’t wrong in your suspicions.”

  Silence hummed over the phone line, and Kendra pressed her lips shut, willing herself to give Lorena the time to respond.

  “I’m not sure what you want me to say.” Lorena’s clipped words sounded like shards of glass hitting stones. “I assume you’ve broken the news to Darin?”

  “Yes. I told him that day in your office.” Kendra wondered how Lorena could care about a client right now. Maybe she wanted to focus on something besides her own life. “We haven’t spoken since, though not because I haven’t tried. I’m still trying, actually.”

  “Darin is a good man. An honest man. I can’t see him with a cheater.”

  Kendra closed her eyes against the pain. Cheater. Just like Sylvia.

  Except Sylvia wouldn’t be making this call. Sylvia would be running as fast as she could in the other direction right now. “You’re right. He’s having a hard time, and I can only pray that God will heal him.”

  “Oh, you’re
going to pray, are you?” Lorena’s voice turned snide . “Mighty convenient. Break up someone’s marriage and get forgiveness just like that.”

  “It’s not like that, but I can see how you’d feel that way.”

  “Can you? Let me tell you what you can see, Kendra Sinclair. You can see your way out of my life and my husband’s life. Don’t you ever call here again, and if I find out you’ve been in touch with my husband, I’ll make sure your little boyfriend never does business in this town again.”

  Kendra heard the click and jerked the phone away from her ear.

  Tandy eased up on her grip. “What’d she say?”

  “She threatened to kill Darin’s ability to get real estate up there.”

  “Oh, please. She doesn’t control the whole town.”

  Kendra set the phone down. “You’d be surprised. They’re a pretty tight-knit community up there.”

  “But why would she punish Darin? He didn’t do anything here.”

  “I don’t think she’s rational right now. She’s just trying to save her marriage. I’d be doing the same thing.” Kendra leaned into the cushions. “Gosh, I’m exhausted. I feel like I’ve just painted a thousand canvases.”

  Tandy patted her hand, then got up and headed for the kitchen. “You need tea. With lots and lots of sugar.”

  “Tea? I’ve just confessed to Harrison’s wife, and you’re bringing me tea?”

  “And chocolate.”

  “Well, now you’re talking.”

  * * *

  LATER THAT NIGHT, after assuring Tandy for the one hundred and forty-second time that she was fine already, “just go see Clay before he calls here again looking for you,” Kendra walked into her studio.

  Despite Lorena’s response, she knew that calling had been the right move. The dark cloud, hanging over her head for months, finally dissipated; and Kendra wanted to dance for joy at the cleanness inside.

  I am not Sylvia. I do not have to be Sylvia. And I proved that today.

  A grin spread across her face. No more worrying about repeating the mistakes of her birth mother. Kendra opened her mind to the idea of being, of becoming, the woman Momma and Daddy told her she could be in God’s eyes.

  The clean woman.

  The free woman.

  The purposeful woman.

  She could be that now. No more Harrisons. No more anything that resembled the life she’d known her first eight years.

  She could walk with her head high now—not because she had to take on the world and fight it every second but because she could relax in being herself. In the knowledge of her worth as a daughter of the King.

  And her first step would be painting something colorful to hang in the living room.

  Not in red. Not yet.

  Maybe light blue—the color of fresh, clean skies.

  Her footsteps were light as she crossed the studio and arranged an empty canvas onto the easel. She touched the button to activate the stereo and put in a CD of piano jazz. The happy notes lifted her spirits, and her hands began to move over the brushes and paints.

  This painting, she had a feeling, would be different from anything else she had done. Because, right now, she could paint wonderful forgiveness.

  She squeezed electric blues and shining yellows onto the color wheel, then chose a brush. Fixing her gaze on the canvas before her, she said, “Honesty,” and began to paint.

  Her fingers made small strokes at first, dabbing the color to block in her thoughts. With each new spot, each change of color from aquamarine waters to azulene skies, the image rose in increments before her. Celeste, azure, and cerulean alternated to give her vast sky its depth. Puffs of argent-colored clouds danced across the sky. Hyacinth undulated in the waves, with dots of crystal blue hanging in the air from children at play in the water.

  Kendra laughed aloud as her hands danced above the canvas, dabbing titian and thistle together for sand, emerald and cobalt for tiny bathing suits, heather and indigo for blankets on the sand.

  When she finished with a final flourish and smile, she stepped back and gazed upon a work she knew she hadn’t been alone in creating.

  Toddlers frolicked along the shoreline, tossing water into the air, their heads tossed back in laughter. Waves moved along the surface, creating smiles of water. Half-built sand castles stood precariously while their makers ran for more sand. In all their faces, in every single movement, lay honesty. Openness. Commitment to the moment at hand. No worries for the next. No plans for tomorrow. No excuses to make. No stories to create. Just the thought of enjoying the sun, the sand, and the sea.

  She laid her paintbrush down and turned to look in the mirrors lining one wall. Shades of blue dotted her face where she’d swiped at her hair. They blended beautifully into the caramel of her skin and highlighted the new light in her eyes.

  She tilted toward the mirror and saw, yep, the cerulean was in her hair as well. “That’ll take forever to get out.” But she didn’t care. Not about paint in her hair. Not about anything. Nothing could take this lightness of being from her.

  Leaving the room, she padded down her white-carpeted hallway and entered her white-walled bedroom. She crossed to her white-tiled bathroom and stepped into the shower, making sure a white terry towel hung at the ready.

  All this whiteness could be fixed, she thought as she picked up her white bar of soap and sudsed up. She just needed more pictures of her and Darin in frames of red and blue and purple and yellow all over the house.

  Which she would have as soon as she went over there and begged forgiveness.

  The thought stopped her happy movements. What if he wouldn’t talk to her? What if he said, “Thanks for the apology, but I’m moving on now”? What if he took all his color and never came back to her home? What then? Because, as wonderful as painting “Honesty” had been, she didn’t want her home full of color from her own hand. No, this home’s canvas needed painting by somebody else.

  And that somebody was Darin Spenser.

  Whether he knew it yet or not.

  Twenty-Three

  By Thursday Kendra decided waiting was designed by small-minded idiots bent on torturing the people who actually wanted to accomplish something.

  She sloshed another bowl into the sink and scrubbed it with the dishrag. “Kitty, what are we waiting on? A sign in the clouds? A holy Post-It note floating down from God? Permission?”

  Every day since the disastrous yet freeing phone call on Sunday afternoon, she’d asked Tandy if today was the day.

  And every day Clay came back with the same answer.

  Wait.

  Kendra wondered if Clay would still be saying the same thing ten years from now.

  “When I’ve died from loneliness in my little white apartment.” The hot water felt good on her hands as she rinsed off the bowl. “You know what I think? I think it’s time we went over there and started the healing process. What do you think, Kitty? You ready for your momma to go do some serious groveling?”

  Kitty twined around her ankles, purring.

  “Yeah, that’s what I think.” Kendra pulled her hands from the dishwater and dried them on a towel. Enough with the waiting. Clay meant well, but there would never be a perfect time for this.

  Today, right now, was as good a time as any.

  She marched through the apartment and snatched the keys off the table by the door. Pounding down the stairs, Kendra gave a fleeting thought to the possibility of failure, then tossed it off like yesterday’s garbage.

  The outcome didn’t lie in her hands. Only her actions did.

  She revved up the RAV4 and reversed down the driveway, mentally rehearsing her lines. I’m sorry. I was dumb. I should have told you. I have no excuse. I’ll do anything.

  I love you.

  She swallowed hard. Maybe save that one for after he forgave her. Might not be good to drop that kind of bombshell in his lap.

  The historic-reproduction streetlights on Lindell were just coming on as she drove down the stree
t. Dusk, the magical time when the world looked foggy enough to be a dream, descended on Stars Hill. Kendra turned onto University and followed it to the highway. She took the next off-ramp and turned right toward Darin’s.

  Please, God, let him be at the apartment. Let him be ready to hear me.

  Before her heart was ready, but after her mind had convinced her to ignore her heart, Kendra pulled into the parking lot of Darin’s apartment complex. Rows of townhouses stood silent, observers of the falling night.

  Kendra parked, stepped out of the car, and shivered despite the heat radiating from the black pavement. She stepped forward, faltered, and stepped forward again.

  Now or never.

  Crossing the distance to Darin’s door was harder than running five miles in wet sand. She slogged through the wall of indecision, though, and arrived on his doorstep. Her finger pushed the doorbell, and she wondered how she’d made it the whole way from the car.

  The door opened and there stood Darin.

  “Hi,” she offered.

  He looked awful. A wrinkled Van Halen T-shirt and ratty blue jeans hung on his body like forgotten laundry. His jawline sported a stubble she guessed at being at least a week old. Behind him, she could see fast-food bags and wrappers all over the coffee table. No sign of the fastidious Darin Spenser she knew existed in the immediate vicinity.

  “What do you want?”

  She recoiled from the harsh tone. “I–I just wanted to talk to you. For a second.”

  “So talk.”

  Oh, God. Her soul cried its best refrain. “Can I come in?”

  “I don’t think you’ll be here long enough for it.”

  She stared at him, trying to find the warm, humorous man she’d dated the past six months. The guy whose fingers raised goosebumps along her arm and whose kiss made color explode in her world. The warm, tender man who helped her after her accident, who listened to her stories and laughed in the right places.

  He was there, she knew. Somewhere beneath this layer of protective anger.

  “All right.” She gulped. “I wanted to tell you I’m sorry.”

  Darin took his eyes off her and focused instead to a spot just above her head. She went on, needing him to hear her words.