I often ask him if God will forgive me. I'm told that I have to forgive myself and that God has already forgiven my taking of a life, because I have asked forgiveness. However, until I forgive myself, God's forgiveness will never seem enough in my eyes.
But how do I do that? How do I move on? How do I stop this self-flagellation and torture that I put myself through? When will I have suffered enough? Will I ever get my life back? And the real question is would I want my life back the way it was? Do I deserve to have a life without these tormenting memories?
Perhaps I have found my true calling. I am making a difference in people's lives on a more personal level now. The smile I get from a little dirty faced child is more satisfaction that I ever got in my past life.
Perhaps that old adage of “God works in mysterious ways” has some type of truth here. I would never suggest God would want me to kill someone who was innocent, but perhaps this is an example of creating good from bad. If I had not done what I did, would I be here right now? Helping these people? Making a difference in the lives of people, some of them afflicted with the same condition of the man I shot?
I pray every day that God will provide me the peace that I so desire, and until that day comes, I will continue to seek out peace by trying to make a difference in the lives of others.
The Forgotten Letter
Standing there in the musty attic, for the first time I realized that I was shaking. I couldn't take my eyes off the envelope in my hands. It was addressed to me, in an unmistakable handwriting. I had seen that handwriting before on letters that my father had written me many years before. The ones with Reynolds Correctional Facility stamped on the back of the envelopes in bright red ink.
I had not really known him, as he and my mother separated when I was three. My mother told me how he would get drunk all night and abuse her. Eventually he ran off with a waitress at some topless bar. I grew up with a festering hatred for him. Every letter I got from him was filled with anger towards me and my mom. He lashed out at how we made him the way he was, and how we must have been happy that he was finally away. He wrote about how much he hated me, and wished I was never born. I read every letter, out of some strange feeling of masochism, absorbing every word which caused my hatred of this stranger to grow.
Now as I stood and held his final letter, my hands were shaking and I sat on the floor to keep myself from falling. I had always wondered how a man could have so much hatred for his blood relatives. I mean, I never knew him. He at least knew my mom and me.
I opened the letter and my mouth hung open in shock. I was not prepared for what I read:
Dearest Son,
I am writing to let you know that I'm sorry for all the things I wrote to you over those years. It was wrong of me, and I see that now. Of course I'm dying and perhaps this is all just a symptom of that, or rather a direct result. Anyway, I just want you to know that everything I ever wrote you in those letters was never the truth. The feelings towards you were never what were displayed in those horrible letters.
I hope someday you can forgive me for this ultimate betrayal and misleading you the way that I did.
Love Always,
Mom
Vegas Baby
She walks down the sidewalk, swaying slightly almost as if in a daze. Her eyes are glazed over and she seems barely there. Her breathing is labored, and erratic, and her makeup is smeared on her face, the results of many tears streaming down her pretty cheeks.
"What a difference, a day makes," she sings softly, as she brushes against a car, as she walks. "Twenty four little hours."
She feels eyes on her, but she ignores them. They don't matter to her, nothing does now. Those times were gone, and her sympathy for others and her caring of what they may have thought of her were gone, having been replaced with a numbness that went from the surface of her needle marked skin, to the depths of her soul.
She stops at a building and leans against the wall. Her hands instinctively go to her belly without even thinking. They hover there for a moment, before she withdraws them, and put them in her jacket pockets. How long would it be, she wonders, before she stops rubbing her stomach? Before she puts the past day's events out of her head? Before she can forget?
What would happen if she could not move forward? Is moving forward an option, or would she be doomed to a life of being wracked with guilt for her many perceived sins, and most importantly her most recent egregious one?
What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas, the tagline says.
"If only that were true." she whispers, to no one in particular.
No matter what the tourism department wanted her to think, she would never be able to rid herself of the memories of what happened. A hundred and fifty years would not erase 24 hours.
She would grow up and have more children, of that much, she was sure. Maybe even five, but she would always wonder what could have been, what would have been. She would blame herself, whether or not that was warranted. If she hadn't drank, would things have ended differently? If she hadn't been a sorry loser junkie, would that have changed things? Would she get another chance, or had she lost her chance to be a mother?
She drops to her knees and looks up, seeing giant neon cross, and the words SALVATION.
"God help me!" she croaks, as she is on her knees, arms outstretched and tears streaming down her face.
She closes her eyes and falls back on the cold sidewalk, arms still stretched out. After a few moments she opens them, and sees nothing. She sits up, and looks at the building in front of her, and sees just a casino. She looks around and wonders if her mind is finally going away.
She has so many questions to be answered, and they eat at her very being.
She draws her arms in, and folds them across her stomach, wishing that someday she would be able to feel a life growing inside her again. And praying to God that this next one would live long enough for her to look into its eyes, and whisper its name.
She had the name picked out and everything. Deborah Vegas. To remind her always, of the day she went into Vegas a 'sorry loser junkie' and came out a winner. The house of life loses, and she wins, for once in her life. Deborah was going to change things. She now had a reason to live, a reason to rise up out of the drugs and sex and alcohol that had ruined her life since she was a kid. Everything was going to work out, she told herself.
Now she never wanted to remember Vegas again. Nine months of happiness and anticipation all went to hell during three hours on the operating table. They hadn't said that drugs or alcohol played a part in her baby having been still born, but she would never be able to separate that thought from her mind. Every waking hour, of every day that she lived she would know in her heart that she had killed her child. What kind of forgiveness was there for that? What kind of absolution could she possibly receive for such a heinous crime?
Women all over the world are suffering because they can't have children, and now she gets one and what happens? She kills it through excess and self-medication. She had always been selfish, even to a fault. All of her life she had followed a certain path of self-destruction, and now it had reached its destructive grip out to that which was most precious.
Now she couldn't help but think she would never get out of her rut. What did she have to motivate herself? A family that had disowned her? A boyfriend who took off as soon as he found out she was pregnant -- but only after he realized he couldn't get any 'pregnant ass' from her? She could only imagine the whispers from the neighbors who had looked at her with disdain at the fact that she was a single mother, once they found out that the baby had not survived.
As she sits on the sidewalk, back to the wall she realizes that she would get over this, as hard as that is to imagine. She has to because the options are to either get over it, or die. And as appealing as death looks right now, she's sober enough to realize that it wasn't the answer.
She closes her eyes and says a little prayer to the God she has forsaken all these years before. The God whose
name she had mentioned a mere five minutes before for the first time in six years. Wondering if God would forgive her for all that she had done, and for putting her child in harm’s way, and ultimately leading to Deborah's death. She is tired of living everything according to how she wanted. Maybe it is time to let someone else help.
"It's up to you now, God. You better be for real, ‘cause I got nothing left to try."
She sighs and opens her eyes. She gets up and brushes off some dirt that is on the back of her jeans. She puts her hands in her jacket pocket and makes her way back to her motel. Back to a new life, unsure of what awaits her.
Time Out
The man sat by himself at a table in the corner of the bar, as far away from the door as possible. His back to the wall, he was able to see anyone who would approach. As he was drinking his glass of scotch on the rocks he heard the sound of chimes. He looked up as a woman entered and walked to the bar with her back to him.
He lifted the glass and as he sipped it he let his eyes wander over her figure. His eyes closed briefly, as he allowed a brief interlude of illicit thoughts to enter his mind. He sat the glass down, and wiped his lips with a crumpled ring stained napkin.
He shook his head, partly to clear the thoughts that had emerged, but also to shake the effects of his second scotch. When he looked back up, the woman was standing in front of his table, looking down at him, a slight smile on her face.
“May I?” she asked, gesturing towards the chair opposite where he was sitting. The man, unable to speak, simply nodded. She hung her purse off the back of her chair, and then sat down. The man cleared his throat, “Um...I...How are you?” he asked, his voice cracking a bit. She smiled, and he could imagine what she was thinking.
Nothing nice was coming to mind for him at this moment.
“I'm doing fine, and yourself?” she asked her voice soft and smooth.
“I'm...I'm fine. Fine. Yeah, I'm um...I'm good. And you?”
She smiled.
“I - mean...yeah. I'm fine,” he stammered.
She leaned forward, one hand on her glass, the other reaching across and resting on his hand. “What's your name?” she asked.
The man swallowed and replied, “Roman.”
“Well, Roman,” she said, her voice putting him at ease, “just relax.”
Roman let out a nervous half laugh as if, of course, he had everything under control. It didn't quite come out as he had imagined. She smiled nonetheless.
“You're cute, Roman. My name is Margaret “
Roman didn't know what to say and didn't want to sound stupid so he didn't say anything. He nodded instead.
“Roman,” Margaret said. “Can I ask you a question?”
“Sure,” he said.
“Why are you here? I mean you seem to be a, for the most part, together person. I'd guess you're married, judging by the mark around your finger there, where a ring used to be.”
Roman instinctively covered his ring finger with his other hand.
“And so I'm guessing you have a wife at home...maybe a kid or two, am I right?”
Roman was silent for a few seconds before shrugging, “Yeah.”
“I'm not judging you, Roman. In fact, you seem to be someone who can keep a secret, so I'll let you in on one...I've got someone at home as well. I'm sure that he is thinking the same thing that your wife is thinking. Something work related, I'd guess. Am I right?”
Roman stared at her as if he wasn't sure what to make of her.
“Something like that.”
Margaret leaned back, and ran her hand through her hair, and then leaned forward again.
“Roman, I already told you. No judgments here. We're two peas in a pod, you and me. We're the same.”
Roman took a sip of his scotch before responding. “We are?”
“Of course we are. We're both people who love our significant others quite deeply. We would never intentionally hurt them, and yet we're human. We have feelings and needs, and those needs aren't always met. Not that it's their fault, necessarily, but it creates a scenario where there becomes a need for a time out.”
“Time out.” Roman repeated.
“Yes, a time out. It doesn't make us bad people. Just means that we perhaps need a break. A moment in time, shall we say, to just step away from our lives, and live a little.”
“Live a little” he said.
“Yes. That's why you're here, Roman. That's why I'm here. We both showed up hoping we would find someone that could take our minds off of our own lives for just a few seconds, minutes, hours. A time out. It just so happened that we found each other.”
Roman thought about what she was saying, and then leaned in closer, as she did the same. “And what exactly did you have in mind?”
She smiled, and whispered, “I thought you would never ask.”
Roman sat back and smiled to himself, clearly realizing this was not an everyday occurrence. He started taking another drink from his glass when he felt her right foot sliding along the inside of his left calf. He choked a bit on his drink and began coughing. He quickly recovered and wiped his mouth with the napkin, as he looked around nervous about someone seeing.
Margaret grinned mischievously. “What's wrong, Roman?” her foot inching farther up his leg. “Are you okay, Roman?”
Then he finally felt her foot resting between his thighs, her bare heel resting on the chair, the bottom of her foot firmly up against his crotch. He suddenly felt very restricted.
“Um. I ...I...uh...Nothing. Nothing's wrong.”
“Are you sure?” she cooed, as she smiled. “I mean, you seem like...you know...something's making you uncomfortable.”
He stammered a bit before finally pulling back a bit, her foot rejoining her other one on the floor. “Margaret...I...I...” he closed his eyes and took a deep breath, and holding it a couple seconds before exhaling. He looked around nervously as if everyone would be paying attention to what was happening.
“I've never...done...this...” his voice trailed off. Margaret smiled and switched chairs to the one right beside him. She leaned forward, placing her hand on his cheek and pulling his head towards hers. She leaned in and with her lips inches from his ear she whispered, “Its okay. I have. Let me take care of you.”
Roman felt his heart racing and it was almost as if he could hear it pounding in his ears.
“I...I...” He couldn't speak.
Margaret reached over and slid her hand inside his buttoned shirt and he felt her hand sliding across his bare chest, and he heard her sensual voice again, “It's okay. Let me take care of you. You deserve a time out.”
She slowly removed her hand, and sat back in her chair. She looked at Roman, who was clearly a mess, which thrilled Margaret to no end.
Roman looked at her and simply nodded. Margaret smiled and then stood up, reaching over and grabbing her purse from the other chair. She extended her hand to Roman, who took it and stood up.
She leaned towards him, “Let's go to my place. He's away for the weekend.” Roman couldn't speak, however he managed to nod.
The drive to her place was nearly unbearable for him. As she drove, he had his head back against the headrest, as she softly spoke illicit thoughts that filled his ears and drove him wild. His eyes were closed and he couldn’t help but think that this night would never be matched for as long as he lived.
He was lost in his thoughts, when he suddenly realized that they had stopped. The passenger side door opened, and the seat belt immediately retracted into the holder by his head, smacking into place. He opened his eyes and looked over at Margaret standing beside the car.
She smiled looking down at him. “Can you walk?” He coughed a bit and smiled. “I think so.”
Roman stood up and followed her up the sidewalk to her home. When they reached the door, she turned around and took him firmly and pushed him against the wall, putting her lips to his. He let out a grunt of surprise as he felt her tongue enter his mouth.
After a
minute of making out, she pulled back and smiled at him. She leaned forward and licked his lips before kissing him softly again. She then took out her keys and put her house key into the lock.
“Are you still with me, Roman?” she asked. Roman blinked a few times, and licked his lips, still tasting her on his mouth. His head was slightly buzzed from his two scotches.
“I'm with you. Time out.”
She smiled, and unlocked her door and walked in. As they entered the house, he was shocked out of his thoughts by the sound of a little girl yelling.
Through The Soul's Window Page 5