Not Quickly Broken

by Cronk, LN

  He indicated that I should talk to Charlotte.

  “I want to know,” I told her, trying to keep my voice even, “what was going on with you and Elias. I want to know how it is that you moved in with him as soon as you found out that I’d kissed Rhiannon.”

  “I don’t want to talk about it,” Charlotte said, crossing her arms again.

  “That’s not fair!” I cried. “I just sat here and told you everything you wanted to know! You can’t just tell me you don’t want to talk about it!”

  I glanced at Dr. Oransky, but he just gave me a tiny shrug.

  “The only thing you need to know,” she said calmly, “is that everything that happened was because you kissed Rhiannon. If you hadn’t kissed her, nothing would have happened between me and Elias. Nothing.”

  She sat back in her chair and lifted her chin at me in that defiant way she had about her and I knew I wasn’t going to get anything else out of her. It took everything that was within me to say what came out of my mouth next.

  “You’re right,” I nodded slowly. “I did something I shouldn’t have done, and everything that happened because of it is my fault.”

  I worried I was coming off as condescending, but I must have sounded sincere enough because Charlotte seemed surprised and Dr. Oransky looked pleased. When our session ended, we agreed that we’d all see each other the next week.

  Once we started meeting together, Dr. Oransky asked me if I wanted to keep meeting with him individually as well. I told him that I did and then he floored me by telling me that Charlotte had said the same thing. I couldn’t believe it.

  Through it all, I kept praying that God would allow me to love Charlotte the way I once had. The more we met, the more I remembered how I had felt about her before and the more I started having faith that I might actually feel that way again.

  Any new feelings of love that I developed for her, however, quickly disappeared as soon as I remembered that she was still going home to Elias every night. I guess it was good that at least I was having those feelings, but they sure didn’t hang around very long.

  I kept praying.

  ~ ~ ~

  At the end of our next joint session, Dr. Oransky looked directly at Charlotte.

  “Don’t you have something that you want to tell Jordan?” he asked her.

  She didn’t look very happy, but she finally nodded. Then she turned to me.

  “I’m staying at the Allerton,” she said.

  “You . . . you left–”

  I couldn’t bring myself to say his name, but she nodded. I closed my eyes.

  Thank you, God.

  I opened them again.

  “I’m glad,” I told her. “I’m really glad. Thank you for telling me.”

  She nodded again.

  At our next session, Dr. Oransky did the same thing to me.

  “Don’t you have something you’d like to say to Charlotte?” he asked.

  “Uh, yeah,” I said. I turned my body so that I was only facing her. “I, umm, I was hoping . . . I mean . . . umm . . .” I swallowed and tried again. “Would you go out with me?” I finally managed.

  She looked at me for a moment, but then gave me a small nod.

  “Okay,” she said, and suddenly I had a date with my wife.

  ~ ~ ~

  “AS THE TWO of you start progressing in your relationship,” Dr. Oransky said when I met with him individually before my date with Charlotte, “it’s going to be a lot different than when you first started going out with her. You have a whole different foundation to work with than you did when you were teenagers.”

  I nodded, not really sure where he was headed.

  “I’m really recommending that you take things slow,” he warned. “As Charlotte finally starts to trust you again she’s going to be much more willing to express that trust in some ways rather than others. The things that have always mattered the least to Charlotte are going to be what she trusts you with first now.

  I nodded again.

  “I’m talking about sex here,” he clarified, just in case I didn’t understand. “Having sex with you is going to be the easiest thing for her to do. Moving back in with you, believing that you really love her, letting herself love you again . . . those are the things that are going to be hard for her. I highly recommend that you let her get those other things in place first – just like you did before you were married.”

  “Okay,” I agreed.

  ~ ~ ~

  WE WENT TO Navy Pier and chose a nice restaurant to eat at. While we were waiting to be seated, Charlotte’s phone rang and I recognized the ring tone. It was her grandmother.

  “I’m sorry,” she apologized, pulling it out of her purse. “I should have turned this off.”

  “It’s okay,” I assured her. “See what she wants.”

  “Hi, Grandma,” she said into the phone. She listened for a minute. “Well what did you say?”

  The hostess came to take us to our table. We both stood up and followed her, Charlotte still talking into the phone.

  “Why did you say that?” Charlotte cried. The hostess showed us to our table and I thanked her. We both sat down.

  “No! No!” Charlotte said, her free hand on her forehead. “That’s not what it means!! It means ‘Laugh Out Loud’!”

  She listened for another moment. “Yes, I’m sure!”

  Charlotte looked at me and shook her head.

  “Well, just tell ’em what you thought it meant,” she went on. “I’m sure they’ll understand . . . Okay . . . Yeah . . . Yeah – I love you, too . . . Okay. I’m going to turn my phone off, but you can leave me a message . . . no, you can still leave a message even if my phone is off.”

  She rolled her eyes at me. “Because, Grandma! You just can! That’s just how it works . . . because you aren’t really leaving it on my phone . . . you’re leaving it on my voice mail . . . okay . . . I love you too. Bye.” She closed her phone.

  “Oh, my gosh,” she said, shaking her head as she turned her phone off.

  “What was that all about?”

  “I got her set up on one of those sites that she can ‘reconnect’ with all of her college classmates and stuff, ya know?”

  I nodded.

  “And so somebody’s husband died and people were leaving these posts telling this woman how sorry they were and everything, and my grandma wrote: I’m so sorry to hear about Stanley. Please know that I’m thinking of you and praying for you. LOL.”

  “Why did she write that?”

  “She thought it meant ‘Lots Of Love’,” Charlotte explained. “Apparently somebody left her a nasty comment about it.”

  I covered my mouth with my hand and tried really hard not to smile, but I couldn’t help myself. We both burst out laughing at the same time.

  It was then that the waitress brought us our menus and asked us what we wanted to drink. I couldn’t answer her. I couldn’t even look at her. The harder I tried not to laugh the worse it got. Charlotte had her head in her hands and her shoulders were shaking up and down, soundlessly.

  “Can we have a minute?” I managed to ask the waitress.

  “Take all the time you need,” she smiled, walking away. When she came back a few minutes later, we’d pulled ourselves together somewhat.

  “Oh,” I said, shaking my head after we’d ordered our drinks. “Poor Nancy.”

  “She’ll be okay,” Charlotte assured me. “Once she tells everybody what she thought it meant, I’m sure they’ll let her back in to their Internet shuffleboard game or whatever they do.”

  I laughed again and she smiled at me . . .

  And that was the tone for the whole evening. We laughed. We reminisced. We joked and talked and ate. It was a million times better than anything I could have imagined.

  The temperature wasn’t nearly as cold as it usually was in early December and after dinner we decided to take a walk. Before long, we neared Pier Park, which was kind of like a year-round carnival with rides and stuff.

&
nbsp; “Look!” Charlotte cried. “A Ferris wheel!”

  A Ferris wheel? Seriously?

  “Do you want to go on it?” she asked excitedly.

  “No,” I said instantly, shaking my head. “Absolutely not.”

  She looked disappointed, but didn’t press it any further.

  “I wish we could go out on the lake,” I said, anxious to change the subject. I looked at the boats that were docked along the pier.

  “Maybe we can.”

  “I doubt anything’s operating this time of year,” I said.

  “Some of them are,” she informed me. “We went out on one last February.”

  I didn’t ask her who she meant by “we”.

  Sure enough, before long, we found an after-dark cruise and we paid our money and boarded. It was a huge ship with climate-controlled rooms . . . but Charlotte wanted to go out onto the deck.

  Outside there were only about three other people and Charlotte and I made our way to the front of the boat and sat down in the bow. Charlotte put her hands on the rail and rested her chin on them, looking out over the water. I did the same.

  “It’s so pretty out here,” she said and I agreed. The boat picked up speed and before long Charlotte sat up and put her hands in her pockets.

  “Cold?” I asked.

  She nodded at me and smiled.

  “Wanna go back in?” I offered, but she shook her head and moved closer to me. I tentatively wrapped an arm around her and when she rested her head against my chest, I pulled her closer to me. We sat like that for a long time, watching the lights of Chicago twinkle across Lake Michigan.

  “Are you cold?” Charlotte asked me after a while.

  “Not unless you are,” I said. Actually I was freezing. I had put my free hand in my pocket, but the hand I had around her had turned into a block of ice a long time ago. My ears were so cold that they had finally stopped hurting and I could no longer feel them.

  “I think my nose is frostbitten,” she said.

  “You wanna go in?” I offered again, and she nodded.

  I kept my arm around her as we headed in. There was a space heater inside and we huddled in front of it. It wasn’t nearly as romantic as the dark waters of Lake Michigan, but it was a whole lot warmer.

  I knew that my prayers had worked and that I loved Charlotte again . . . or at least that I was going to love her again. I was happy for the first time in months and when we pulled up in front of her hotel, Charlotte asked me why I was smiling.

  “I’m just happy,” I said. “I had a really good time tonight.”

  She looked at me.

  “I hope you’ve had a good time, too,” I said. She nodded.

  I walked around and opened her door, taking her hand to help her out of the car. When she didn’t let go, I kept hold of it all the way to the lobby and once we were inside, I tugged on it a bit so that she turned to face me.

  “Thank you for going out with me tonight,” I said. “I really did have a good time.”

  “Me too.”

  “I’d like to go out with you again,” I said.

  “Me too.”

  I looked into her golden eyes for a moment.

  “Would it be okay if I kissed you?” I asked. She thought about it briefly and then nodded. I was still holding her hand, but I brought my free hand up to her face and pulled her gently toward me, leaning down to press my lips against hers.

  “Goodnight,” I said when I pulled away from her, smiling.

  “Goodnight,” she said, and then she turned and headed for the elevators.

  Oh, yeah, I thought as I watched her go. I definitely love her again.

  The next week we went out to dinner again. This time, when I pulled up in front of her hotel to drop her off, I kissed her before we even got out of the car.

  “This has been nice,” I said, squeezing her hand. “Really, really nice.”

  She nodded in agreement.

  I leaned forward and gave her another kiss and once again she returned it. It was a slow, gentle kiss . . . one of those kisses that stays with you forever. Her lips were unbelievably soft and warm on mine.

  “I love you, Charlotte,” I told her, stroking her cheek with my thumb.

  She looked back at me.

  “Are you going to walk me in?” she asked.

  “Of course,” I nodded. “Sure.”

  I ran around and opened her door for her, reaching for her hand like I had the week before. It was as warm and soft as her lips had been. I closed the door and we started walking.

  When we went through the lobby doors together, we were still holding hands. The touch of her skin against mine was electric. This time, I walked her all the way to the elevators.

  “I had a great time,” I told her, squeezing her hand. I leaned forward to kiss her again, but she pulled back and put her free hand against my chest.

  “Do you want to see my room?” she asked, looking directly into my eyes.

  I could barely nod at her. She dropped my hand and turned, punching the up button for the elevator, and we stood in silence, waiting for it.

  By the time it arrived, someone else was waiting to go up too – a middle-aged woman with a red tote bag.

  “Fifteen, please,” tote bag lady said. Charlotte pushed fifteen and the top button . . . twenty-five. We rode up in more silence.

  Tote bag lady nodded and smiled at both of us and then got out on her floor. The next time the doors opened, Charlotte turned to the right and stode down the hall purposefully. I walked along pretty much beside her, slowing only when she did in front of what was apparently her door. She already had her little keycard out and she swiped it across the lock strip. A green light flashed and she swung the door handle down, pushing the door open and stepping in in front of me. A light was already on in the room and I followed her, letting the heavy door swing shut behind me.

  I was about to make a brilliant comment – something to the effect of how nice her room was – when she turned to face me. Without saying a word, she reached her hand up to the back of my neck and pulled my mouth toward hers. We kissed with fervor, pulling and pushing each other further into the room. When we reached the bed I somehow managed to stop kissing her long enough to shake my head and say, “Dr. Oransky won’t think this is a good idea.”

  “I know,” she whispered back against my mouth, “but Dr. Oransky isn’t here right now.”

  Later, as we lay next to each other on the bed, I reached toward Charlotte and brushed a strand of hair from her face.

  “I love you,” I said, smiling at her.

  She didn’t answer.

  “You’re so beautiful,” I told her.

  She stared up at the ceiling.

  “I think you should go now,” she said finally.

  “What?”

  “I said I want you to go.”

  “Why?” I cried, sitting up on one elbow. “What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing’s wrong,” she said, bitterly. “You got what you wanted and now I want you out of here.”

  “Charlotte–” I said, reaching out to her. She batted my hand away and got out of bed, grabbing her robe as she headed into the bathroom.

  “Charlotte!” I said again, calling after her. She slammed the door shut.

  I stared at the closed door for a moment and then got out of bed. I pulled on my pants and knocked on the bathroom door.

  “Go away!” she yelled.

  “No!” I said, trying the door. “I’m not going to go away. I want to talk to you!”

  “Well I don’t want to talk to you!” she cried. “I want you out of here!”

  “What is wrong, Charlotte?”

  She didn’t answer me again. I stood there outside the door for a long time and then I sat down on the bed.

  I knew that Charlotte was stubborn enough to stay in that bathroom all night long if she had too, but I could be stubborn too (and I had a bed to stretch out on). I finished getting dressed and then laid down on the bed, putting my hand
s behind my head and laying quietly, waiting for her to come out.

  About half of an hour had passed when Charlotte finally opened the bathroom door. I sat up on the bed and swung my legs around, but before I could even stand up, she had grabbed her purse and retreated back into the bathroom, locking it behind her again.

  Then I heard her talking.

  “Charlotte!” I yelled, banging on the door. She ignored me and kept talking. I pounded on the bathroom door one more time and then grabbed my jacket and opened the door to the hall.

  I had zero desire to experience a third arrest, so when I heard the elevator chime I ducked quickly into a vending area. I held my breath as someone walked by and then I heard them knock on Charlotte’s door. When she opened it and started talking, I stepped quickly into the hall and then over to the nearest stairwell. After twenty-five flights, I finally reached the lobby and – when nobody stopped me from leaving – I bolted for my car.

  ~ ~ ~

  THE NEXT MORNING was Saturday morning and Dr. Oransky’s office was closed. I considered trying to find his home number, but then I envisioned how that conversation might go.

  Hello, Dr. Oransky?

  Jordan? Is that you?

  Yes. It’s me. I need your help. I really screwed up.

  You slept with her, didn’t you?

  I decided not to call him.

  I’d been listening to Dr. Oransky dissect Charlotte for three months now – hadn’t I learned anything in that time?

  I didn’t need him . . . I could fix this on my own.

  ~ ~ ~

  I WENT BACK up to the twenty-fifth floor and walked down the hall. I knocked on her door, but there was no answer and I had this sneaky suspicion that she wasn’t answering because she knew it was me. I sat down against the wall, a few feet from the door where I was pretty sure she wouldn’t be able to see me through the peephole. She couldn’t stay in there forever . . . I decided to wait her out.