The Reading Circle

by Ashton Lee

  “I do,” Jeremy said.

  She kept on smiling down at him tenderly, and there were moments when it felt like she was his mother and he was her little boy. “I’ll just clean you up a bit until the paramedics get here. Just a few wet wipes and a little alcohol to remove some of this blood just below your hairline. Really, it’s not that bad. You went off the road ahead of the right people, don’tcha know. First thing Father and I did after we retired and bought our Winnebago was to take a CPR and first-aid course. You never know what might happen out here on the open road.”

  While she fussed over him, the man began scouring the wreck with his flashlight. “I’m afraid your little car is totaled, son. What happened? Why’d you skid off the road like that? It hasn’t been raining even the least little bit.”

  “A deer in a helluva hurry did me in.” Jeremy decided to add nothing further, suddenly feeling weaker.

  “I can certainly believe that. Why, Mother and I have seen maybe a dozen by the roadside since we got on the parkway just south of Nashville. And some wild turkeys, and even what looked like a wolf, but it may have just been a wild dog. Mother hasn’t stopped with the camera all the way down.”

  Jeremy didn’t feel much like talking now, as the Michigan fight song continued to play over and over in the background. But he felt he ought to say something every once in a while. “I like that Midwestern twang you both have. Very distinctive.”

  The man snickered. “Well, Mother and I like to hear you people speak Southern to us down here. We get the biggest kick out of it. We especially like all those ‘you alls’ we’ve received everywhere we go—in all the restaurants, gas stations, rest stops, you name it.”

  “Yeah, I guess we’re famous for that,” he managed. Then he was frowning. “I guess we haven’t introduced ourselves yet. I’m Jeremy McShay from Nashville, Tennessee.”

  “Pleased to meet you, Jeremy. Though I wish the circumstances were different,” the woman said, continuing her cleanup duties. “And we’re Darlene and Malcolm Hayes of Battle Creek, Michigan.”

  A terrible weakness suddenly engulfed Jeremy’s entire body, and he was unable to focus in on too much more. Just that last line from the Michigan fight song—“Hail! Hail! to Michigan / The champions of the West!”—along with the distinctive but distant wail of a siren.

  Then everything went dark.

  Maura Beth felt so guilty she could hardly stand it. “Here I was, so mad at Jeremy because he didn’t show at the meeting tonight, and now I find out he was doing his best to get down here to Cherico. I’m being punished for such mean-spirited thoughts, I just know,” she told Connie and Douglas as she began to tear up.

  The three of them were standing just outside Jeremy’s hospital room on the second floor of Cherico Memorial, and the McShays had just told Maura Beth everything they’d learned from the visit with their nephew and his doctor. “Don’t be ridiculous. No such thing is happening,” Connie said, giving her a hug and a few pats on the back. “It’s wrong to even think such thoughts.”

  “She’s right, you know,” Douglas added, nodding sympathetically. “You need to lighten up a little. This isn’t the time for second-guessing yourself.”

  Maura Beth was sniffling now. “Well, you just ask Periwinkle what I said to her after the review tonight. I couldn’t have been bothered with giving Jeremy the benefit of the doubt. Oh, no, not me!”

  Connie pulled away and gave Maura Beth her sternest glare. “You are not going to help Jeremy one bit if you go in there and break down in front of him. Just be thankful he’s basically walked away from this with only a mild concussion and one fractured rib. From the looks of his car, they say it could have been much, much worse.”

  Maura Beth looked skeptical. “Who are they?”

  Douglas stepped in at that point. “Dr. Tillman said the state trooper, or the park ranger or the paramedics, I forget which—anyway, somebody said that the driver of that car shouldn’t have survived at all. But somehow Jeremy did. That could be a sign, you know.”

  “There were angels on his shoulders,” Connie added. “And they’re probably looking after you, too. So stop beating yourself up. Stand up tall, march straight in there, and the two of you get things back on track. That’s what you want, isn’t it?”

  Maura Beth wiped her eyes with the back of her hand and then a smile broke through. “I didn’t realize how much until you called and told me what had happened tonight.”

  “You just hold on to that, then,” Connie said. “You lift his spirits, and you’ll be lifting yours at the same time.”

  Maura Beth gave them both her best smile, pointing to it with her index finger. “How does this look?”

  “Dazzlingly white,” Connie told her. “And no spinach between your teeth. Now, go on in there. You channel Scarlett and Melanie together the way only you can. And don’t forget to give Jeremy that little gift from those lovely people.”

  “Thanks, you two.”

  Indeed, when Maura Beth walked into Jeremy’s room, she noted with great relief that he did not look particularly compromised. There was a big bandage on his head, and he was hooked up to the usual equipment monitoring his vital signs, but it was clear that the car and not Jeremy himself had suffered most of the severe damage.

  “Here I am,” she called out softly, after closing the door behind her. “Maura Beth Mayhew, reporting for duty.”

  “Don’t say anything that’ll make me laugh,” he said, flashing a smile her way. “I have this rib issue, you know.”

  She moved to his bedside where she let go of a giggle or two. “So I’ve been told. I hope you’re not in too much discomfort.”

  “Only when I breathe.”

  Maura Beth’s expression went from sunny to taken aback. “I hope you’re just kidding.”

  “I am. Kinda.”

  She decided to confront everything head-on, but with a bit of humor thrown in for good measure. “I hear Christmas came early out there on the historic Natchez Trace Parkway.”

  He took a moment and then shrugged faintly. “You mean the deer? No, I don’t think it was a reindeer trying out for Santa’s sleigh. But it did fly through the air, and that’s why I swerved off the road and landed in the woods.” He made the smallest of gestures with his index finger. “Why don’t you relax and sit down? I assume you aren’t in a hurry.”

  “I was told not to tire you out, though,” she said, pulling up a nearby chair. “You do have some healing to do.”

  “I promise to let you know if I feel like I’m fading.”

  She was gathering her thoughts now, trying to get everything just right. “I just wanted you to know . . . that I appreciate the effort you made to come to the Forrest Gump review. You were thinking about us, after all, and that means a lot to me. It was practically just as good as you being there.”

  “About that. I feel the need to apologize—” he began, but she wouldn’t let him continue.

  “No, I don’t want this visit to be about that fallout we had. Let’s just put it behind us. You eventually made the decision to attend, and except for that crazed deer, you would have been there in my library a few hours ago saying whatever it was you planned to say. Right now, just the image of that makes me very happy.”

  “You’re very easy to please,” he said. “Especially when I was very definitely in the wrong.”

  She wagged a finger. “No, no. None of that.” The conversation lapsed for a while, but then she said, “Have you made a decision yet about your job at New Gallatin Academy?”

  “I thought I had when I left my house this afternoon,” he told her. “I was determined to stick it out with Yelverton at the helm.” Then he started frowning, turning away from her slightly. “After this wreck, I’m not so sure. It’s going to be hard for us to make this relationship work with us living so far apart, no matter how smoothly my job is going at New Gallatin.” He managed a short, forced laugh, obviously restrained by his rib injury. “I mean, we can’t go on meeting like th
is.”

  Maura Beth’s laugh, however, was unrestrained. “You’re so right, and I adore your sense of humor at a time like this.”

  “Gotta have one these days,” he said. “But lying here in bed, I’ve been thinking that I have a darned good résumé. I’m no ordinary, rote teacher. Besides, New Gallatin Academy isn’t the only school on the face of the planet. Rumor has it that they even have schools down here in Mississippi.”

  “I’ve heard the same thing.” Maura Beth could feel the excitement rising inside of her. “Are you saying that you’d be willing to look for a job down here? Right here in little bitty Cherico? Or as the locals like to call it, Greater Cherico?”

  He turned back toward her and raised an eyebrow. “I might. But it would depend on what’s available. Teaching jobs are often a matter of timing, you know.”

  She reached over and patted his hand gently. “But you will let me know if there’s anything I can do at any time to help?”

  “Of course.”

  Then she remembered. She dug down into her purse, making all sorts of muted noises moving things around. “I have a present for you.”

  “Aw, you shouldn’t have.”

  “I didn’t,” she said. She produced a CD, holding it up so he could see what it was all about.

  “The University of Michigan Spirit Package,” he said, his face lighting up immediately. “Cheers and Fight Songs.” He gave Maura Beth a quick wink and then read the neatly printed message on the Post-it note attached: “Get well soon—Darlene and Malcolm Hayes. Go Blue!”

  She nodded eagerly. “Your Aunt Connie said they stayed until you were transferred from the ER. They wanted to be sure you were okay. Then they had to be on their way. Something about not falling too far behind on their trip to New Orleans. They gave Connie this CD and told her it was something for you to remember them by, and she thought maybe I ought to be the one to give it to you.”

  “I wish they’d stayed a little longer,” he said, the emotion clearly registering in his voice. “It’s possible I owe them my life. I might have died of shock out there if they hadn’t come along in their Winnebago.”

  He took the CD from her and brought it closer to his face. “I’ll certainly never hear the Michigan Fight Song again without thinking of them. They’ll always be heroes in my heart.”

  12

  Here Today, Gone Tomorrow

  Becca and her Stout Fella were having their usual breakfast of cereal, yogurt, and orange juice at the kitchen table. Without warning, Becca loudly chimed her spoon on her water glass several times, causing Justin to start noticeably and some of his Raisin Bran to go down the wrong pipe. He coughed a few times, his face turning pink. This was followed by an improvised ritual of alternating sips of water with vigorously trying to clear his throat.

  “You all right?” she asked, but she hardly sounded concerned.

  He was nodding and scowling at the same time. “What the hell did you do that for, Becca?”

  “Sorry, I didn’t mean for that to happen.” She was not about to leave it at that, however. “Justin, I want to talk to you about something very important. I thought that might get your attention, since I haven’t been very successful at getting straight answers out of you these days.”

  He took yet another sip of water and exhaled. “Yeah, well, there are other ways of getting my attention besides causing me to nearly choke to death.” He went back to eating his Raisin Bran as if nothing had happened. For a while Becca was content to sit and watch. Finally, he couldn’t take the staring any longer, looked up, and said, “What? What did you want to talk to me about? I’m not a mind reader.”

  She decided then and there not to back off as she had so often recently. She was going to tell him the truth. Then maybe he would level with her, and they would move on to some kind of understanding. “I wanted you to know that I went off the pill several months ago. I didn’t tell you because . . . I want to get pregnant. I want us to start a family. It’s way past the time we said we couldn’t afford it. We’ve been riding high for years.”

  He put his spoon down and wiped the corners of his mouth with his napkin. “I see.”

  “That’s all you have to say?”

  He glanced at his watch and offered more of the same evasive behavior she had come to despise. “Could we talk about this another time? Winston Barkeley’s coming by the office around nine o’clock to discuss the new lake plat. This is gonna be my biggest deal yet.”

  “Where have I heard that before?” she told him. “The last time you rushed off to see Winston Barkeley, you ordered a cup of coffee and the ‘heart attack special’ at The Twinkle. Slowly but surely, you’re getting right back into that pattern of letting your job run you instead of the other way around.” She brought her napkin up from her lap and haphazardly tossed it on the table so that it covered part of the bowl of cereal she had been picking at here and there. “Besides, my dear husband, I know we have a problem. Certainly one of us does.”

  He focused on the two pills he had carefully placed beside his water glass at the beginning of breakfast. One was small, pink, and round; the other was larger, oval-shaped, and white. He was now on their schedule. “Let me take these first.”

  She waited for him to finish with his medications and then cut to the chase. “I should have gotten pregnant by now, Justin. Once we started having sex again, I know for a fact I was ovulating several times.”

  He stared her down and briefly gritted his teeth. “Okay, okay. You have a right to know. I was gonna tell you sooner or later, but this is not gonna be easy for me. We do need to clear the air, though, and I do want our marriage to work. I hope you believe me when I say that. I still love you, Becca. I always have.”

  It was the first time he had said anything of substance to her about their relationship in months, but she didn’t like the sound of what was coming. It flashed into her head that perhaps she would be better off not knowing whatever it was. Then he dropped the bomb.

  “I’m afraid to make love to you. There, I said it.”

  Becca sat stunned, wondering if she had heard him right.

  “Say something, Becca.”

  “I . . . I don’t know where to start.” In truth, she didn’t even know what he meant.

  He filled up his big chest and exhaled. “It doesn’t matter what Dr. Ligon says about what I can and can’t do, or how the medications may affect me. It doesn’t matter what anybody says, for that matter. The only thing that counts is, I’m afraid. I’ve been that way since I came home from Nashville last year. That first time after the angioplasty and I’d lost all that weight, I thought I might have another heart attack. Think about it from my point of view. The last thing I wanted to do was . . . well, to die on top of you. And that’s the God’s honest truth. After that first time when I didn’t follow through, I didn’t even want to try again. I kept putting you off, and that made you think maybe I was having an affair. But it wasn’t anything like that. I’m a one-woman man. And then . . . and then lately, I’ve been—please don’t laugh—I’ve been faking it.” He was shrugging his shoulders and chuckling, but it all came off as forced and uncomfortable.

  Becca immediately felt as if she were going to melt into a puddle of some kind. It would probably contain equal parts empathy, love, and understanding, and she wanted nothing more than for her Stout Fella to bathe himself in it and begin the process of healing. “Oh, Justin, why didn’t you talk to me about this before now? You’ve been shutting me out, and that’s done terrible things to my head. You don’t live in a vacuum, you know. What do you think I’m here for? I’m your wife—for better or worse, remember?” She moved to him quickly, standing over him, and he rose to embrace her warmly. All the tension that had been generated between them recently seemed to break like a high fever that had run its course. Now, finally, things would cool back down to normal.

  He pulled back, and she could see that he was visibly shaken. She had felt the trembling while they were embracing.
>
  “Are you disgusted with me?” he said, hanging his head. “I guess I’m disgusted with myself.”

  “Of course I’m not, sweetheart. I truly understand. You just had no business keeping this to yourself. But now that it’s out in the open, I’m sure we can get you back to the man I married. Have you told Dr. Ligon about this?”

  He shook his head, trying his best not to bring forth his tears. But Becca could see clearly that he was on the verge.

  “You must make an appointment and tell him about this, you know,” she said. “I can’t imagine he won’t have some advice for you. Other men have surely gone through this kind of thing.”

  He sat back down, but Becca remained standing, massaging his shoulder while he let everything out. “Just the other day, Doug and I were having drinks out at The Marina Bar and Grill. He told me about Maura Beth’s boyfriend, that teacher fella from Nashville who was in that bad wreck on the Natchez Trace. Doug said he was told by somebody at the hospital that no way should that guy have walked away from it alive. Said they still don’t know how he managed it. I guess it was meant to be. But on the way home I thought I was having a panic attack when I kept thinking about that wreck. I just couldn’t let go of it.”

  Becca stopped her massaging for a moment and frowned. “Yes, I know about the accident. Connie told me over the phone, and I’ve talked to Maura Beth, too. She says Jeremy’s doing just fine now. He’ll be out of the hospital soon. But what does all that have to do with you?” Justin looked up at her with sad, puppy eyes, and it nearly took her breath away. “Why did that bother you so much?”

  “Don’t you see,” he told her, turning away. “That fella could’ve been gone just like that. A snap of the finger, and he’s no longer walking the earth. And then I thought about myself. I could be here today, gone tomorrow—just doing an ordinary thing like making love to you. That’s how messed up I’ve gotten.”

  She leaned down and softly kissed his cheek. “It’s out in the open now. And you listen to me, Justin Brachle, you’re not going anywhere anytime soon. You’re going to stay right here with me, and we’ll raise a wonderful family together before it’s all said and done.”