Walking on Broken Glass

by Christa Allan

  “Can you believe a father would leave like that?” Dad asked. “What’d he do, honey, oh, just not come home one night? It's a shame, that's what it is. A shame.”

  She nodded, then patted his hand. “Have you told Leah about your fishing trips with the boys and the deck they’re planning for your backyard?”

  A smart woman, indeed. She knew that to brag on her own sons would’ve been cloying. Dad bragging on them let me know how much time they’ve all spent together and how proud he was to have done so.

  He smiled. She smiled. They both smiled.

  Right again, Peter.

  Dad and Dani split a large fried oyster po-boy and a basket of sweet potato fries because “Dani's system can’t tolerate too much fried food.” Dad insisted we try the bread pudding, and Dani graciously allowed him to scoot out of the booth to order it. She did, though, smile sweetly and tell him she wouldn’t mind at all “taking care of dessert,” which gave him an opportunity to, once again, crow about her generosity and kindness.

  She eyed Dad as he excused himself through a mixed bag of construction workers, suits, and soccer dads, then she turned and made dead-on eye contact. “Your father is won-der-ful. One of the nicest men in the world (which sounded like “whirled”). Of course, you know that already.”

  Her cell phone jingled, and I was treated to a mother-son bonding moment. “Hi, sweetie. No, I’m not at work. Remember I asked for the day off so I could meet Mr. Bob's daughter? (smile) No, no, I’ve been working so many hours, they were happy to let me go for a day. (eye roll) Um. No. I don’t think we’re going to be long. (eyebrows raise questioningly) Well, okay, but you know you don’t have to do that. (unabashed pride) Sure, sweetie, I’ll tell Mr. Bob you said you can’t wait to go fishing. Bye, Sam-Sam. Talk to you later.”

  Dani snapped her phone closed. “Sam called to ask if he could go to Home Depot and buy a book of deck plans. Those boys just adore your father. They’ve been such company for him. You know how lonely he must be, poor man. I’m so glad he's had some time to enjoy himself. He certainly deserves it.” She must have spotted Dad headed back to the table because she leaned my way, and said, “Sometimes it's just hard for men to do what they need for themselves. Your dad deserves to be happy, and he seems to be really happy since we met.”

  I sat back and waited for the credits to roll.

  “Dani made Gloria Thornton's performances look like Scout Finch's ham acting in the county play.”

  Peter and I shared his backyard swing. Since my feet couldn’t reach the ground, Peter pushed us back and forth.

  “Can you stop with the literary references already?” He looked up, then back at me, “Wait. I’ve got this one. To Kill a Mockingbird. Atticus Finch. He was a lawyer I remember.”

  “You did read in school,” I teased.

  The sultry quiet erupted. A trio of white-faced squirrels on a feeding frenzy, pecans clutched between their tiny paws, chased one another up, down, and around the trees. The neighbor's orange cat watched in bemusement from its perch on top of the fence post. It had jumped down once already, sending the squirrels into a manic run to the tree's top branches. I watched their crazed but amusing behavior, and knew I’d felt that same frenetic lunacy. I knew, too, that wasn’t the life I wanted.

  “I forgot to mention Dani figured out Dad's hot spot—”

  “Yuck, Leah, what—”

  “I meant she's all over the ‘I love to garden and plant flowers and play in the dirt thing.’”

  “Didn’t I tell you?”

  “Stop. You’re almost sounding like him. Do you want to be the cat or the squirrel?” I pointed to the nature drama in front of us. “I’ve been watching them, thinking how I’ve been like those squirrels, running all over the place trying to get what I need. Sometimes I do. But I’m always at the mercy of that thing hanging over my head or scaring me away from what I need to do. You can’t let his problem become your problem.”

  “Might be too late for that.”

  “I hope not,” I said, and hopped off the swing to call our father.

  Knowing Dani would be working Sunday, I called Dad and asked him to come to Peter's house so we could talk. I told him and later, Peter, if they didn’t agree to meet with me, I’d stop talking to both of them. Sometimes, guilt is an effective motivator.

  The next morning, the three of us sat at Peter's pedestal table, and I held court. “You’re both going to listen, and I’m going to talk. I’m leaving here tomorrow knowing my family is not like those goofy squirrels outside.”

  “What squirrels? What is she talking about?”

  “Dad, no talking, remember? I’ll start with you. I know you’re lonely. You have to give Peter and me some credit. When's the last time you dated? Almost thirty years ago? You have every right to spend time with someone who makes you happy. And don’t think this is about your kids not wanting Mom replaced. You’re a successful man, generous, and kind. Not many men like you are left, and sometimes you’re the ones taken advantage of. Why would you want to live with someone you’re not ready to have a permanent relationship with? You’ve known her three months. Just be careful.”

  Dad opened his mouth, then looked at Peter and closed it again.

  “I’m almost finished,” I told him. He resettled himself in the chair, “harrumphed,” and waved his hand for me to continue. “Once she moves in, especially with her sons, your life is going to change. It concerns us that she's hurrying this along with the ‘have to renew the lease, don’t have enough money, where are we going to live’ story. What would she have done if she hadn’t met you? Where would she have gone? And if this doesn’t work out between the two of you in a month or a year, then what? If you’re going to do this, you need to protect yourself financially. By the way, if you don’t want people up in your business, don’t leave credit card bills hanging around. Peter may have looked too closely, but he was right. Did you win a lottery you didn’t tell us about? A daughter who's a recovering alcoholic, and you’re spending more money on drinks than dinner. Dad, really.”

  Then I turned to Peter. Dad seemed almost amused.

  I told Peter we didn’t have to like Dani. “It would make life easier if we did, but this is Dad's choice, not ours. If there's one thing AA is teaching me, it's that people have to be responsible for themselves—not just their decisions, but the consequences of them.”

  “I want the two of you to agree to be honest with one another. For me, right now, agree to allow one another a life. One day at a time, guys.”

  “Leah, before you and Dad leave, if we’re going to be all about honesty, I need you to hear this.”

  If Dad hadn’t looked as confused as I did, I might have suspected they’d planned their disagreement to suck me in.

  Peter apologized for being invisible, for not making time to spend with me, especially after we lost Alyssa. “I used school and my job as excuses, but the truth is you know I don’t like Carl. I know what you mean about Dani, because I wasn’t all that fond of Carl, but you loved him.”

  “Carl's a good man. He's given Leah a nice life. He works hard,” Dad said.

  “Dad, you don’t have to defend Carl,” I said. “I’ve known for a long time how Peter feels about him. I don’t think you ever understood because, well, you’ve had more of a relationship with Carl than with Peter.”

  “Leah, your turn not to talk. Dad, you know she's right. You and I don’t have the same things in common that you have with Carl. I don’t blame either one of you. Sometimes it's like he's your son, not me. But that's something we need to work out between the two of us. Later.”

  Dad said nothing, but I could tell by the way he stared at the table, running his fingers along the thick edges, he was beginning to own some of what Peter had said.

  Peter continued. “When you first married, Leah, you seemed happy. As time passed, you seemed less like the sister I knew. Then, when Alyssa died, something died in you. Whatever and whenever Carl and his family wanted you to do s
omething, you did it. Did you think you owed them something for getting to live the lifestyle you have? Carl degraded you, made jokes at your expense, and you’d just take it. Carl's parents had control over him, so he had to have it over you?”

  “I know, Peter,” I said. “I’ve been dealing with some of this for the past two months. I guess I don’t understand why you’re telling me all this now.”

  “Truth? You wouldn’t have believed me before or even listened. Truth? I think Carl's the one who should have been admitted, not you. Final truth? You need time to yourself— time to focus on being sober, on being Leah again. I want you to think about that. You can stay here for as long as you need. You and the baby. Carl's controlled your life a lot longer than you have. You had to go to Brookforest to get sober. I think you need to consider being on your own to stay sober.”

  Dad shook his head, his voice low. “You know your mother and I were never big churchgoers. Felt like we could live as good, honest people without the hoopla. We probably should’ve done a better job with the two of you. I don’t claim to know much about the Bible, but I’m pretty sure that walking out of your marriage isn’t something God would want. I’m kind of glad your mother's not here. Break her heart to know you were telling your sister to leave her husband.” He looked at me. “Break her heart if you did it too.”

  “Leah, I didn’t mean you should divorce Carl. I am saying you can’t have it both ways. You can’t preach being responsible for yourself and your decisions to other people and not follow your own advice.”

  Peter's bluntness didn’t shock me. What shocked me was that his words found safe passage through my defense mechanisms to connect to feelings I couldn’t yet speak myself.

  I knew you could stay in a marriage and really not be there at all. I didn’t know you could leave a marriage to try to stay in it.

  45

  Melinda suggested I use Carl's session time plus my own while he was away. After the weekend with my brother and father, I regretted I couldn’t have given our sessions to both of them.

  “Analogy woman that I am, I’m so enamored with myself for this brilliant squirrel/cat connection to our lives, I shared it with Peter. Then after my brother, Dad, and I talked, I realized we weren’t either one of those. We’re the nuts.”

  “It's important to discover who you are, don’t you think?” Melinda's attempt at a granite-face only made both of us laugh more.

  “Let's talk about Peter's concern,” she said. “He's right about your needing to focus on sobriety. From what you’ve told me, you’ve made a meeting everyday since you were discharged. What about when you went home?”

  “Peter had already checked out meeting times and places. Who knew you could Google AA meetings? I just made it work. A weird feeling at first, going to an out-of-town meeting. Regulars think you’re new, and then you have to convince them you’re not. Makes for a fun beginning.”

  “Planning ahead. What a concept. If it works for out-of-town, it works for everything else. It appears you and Carl have a number of social events to attend because of business. Have you thought about how you’ll handle those?”

  “Yes. I’m staying home with the baby. Honestly, I was never a barfly kind of drinker, so that's not the problem. Happy drinking, wahoo party drinking, that's a tough one for me. Rebecca suggested holding a glass of water, club soda, or ginger ale because people usually don’t ask if you want a drink if you’re holding one. For right now, a virgin version of an alcoholic drink is still too close. I’ve told myself to stay away from those because it feeds into stupid brain and the whole ‘romanticizing’ about the glory days.”

  “Good strategies. Those could make the difference between Drunk Leah and New Leah. Sobriety's your focus, and you don’t need to carry any other emotional baggage during your first year. That's why we tell new people in the program not to make any drastic, life-changing decisions for the whole first year of sobriety. Like Peter, I’m not saying stay or go. I’m not sure you’re at a place in your relationship to decide yet. But a year's a good rule of thumb.”

  Melinda had read notes from Ron's sessions with me at Brookforest and wanted me to consider how some of my feelings about sex may have been seeded. “I know you love your mother. We’re not placing blame, but if we don’t say, ‘I see where this started,’ we pass on behaviors. Here's what I think you need to consider giving back to the past: How did you know when your mother was angry?”

  “She wouldn’t talk much.”

  “What if she was very angry?”

  “She’d talk even less.”

  “Would you say your parents had fights often?”

  “No. In fact, only one that I can remember. She threw one of her shoes at him one night. It might have been a spiked heel. I don’t even know how it started.”

  “Not showing anger can be a form of being angry for people who shove it all inside. Your mother may have grown up thinking anger is wrong. Maybe she was told to be nice on the outside, even though you may be seething inside. How much anger can one body hold? Not much, and it gets handled in some unhealthy ways … like addictions, like your mother's afternoon drinking.”

  “Well, she must have stuffed more than anger. Can you stuff affection in there too?” I crossed my arms and hoped this would soon end.

  “You already know the answer to that one. She had a difficult time expressing emotion, not feeling emotion. She emotionally detached, and I think that's what you’ve been afraid of as a mother yourself. You don’t want to emotionally detach from this baby because of Alyssa. Your mom did the best she could with what she had. You need to remember that. Because your mother's dead, you may never know what precipitated these behaviors for her. The good news is you don’t need to know to heal.”

  Listening to Melinda, I began to see my mother not as her “mom” label but as a young woman like myself: hesitant, uncertain, a woman told to deny her feelings. I wanted her to know that I understood.

  Mom didn’t give it back.

  She never had the chance.

  I’m your chance, Mom.

  My cell phone rang just as I fastened my seat belt. I dug it out of my purse, flipped it open, and started the car. Carl called to tell me that he wouldn’t be home in a few days like we’d both expected.

  “Another two weeks?”

  “Unexpected delays. Had to rebid some of the jobs. Construction costs increased. We’re reviewing the building plans for the retail and office spaces. I thought I’d be able to make it home this weekend, but I don’t think I’d be able to leave until late Friday night. My Monday meeting starts at 7:30, so I’d need to leave home Sunday.” The fatigue in Carl's voice surprised me. I expected him to be energized in this effort to prove himself worthy of the business.

  “Do you want me to drive there for a few days?”

  Please say no. Please say no.

  “I’d love for you to be here, but I’m so busy right now we’d barely see each other. Besides, you have your own stuff to do … your meetings, sessions …”

  When I asked him if he wanted me to reschedule the appointment with Dr. Nolan next week where we’d, hopefully, find out if we should buy blue or pink, his response lapsed into an irritation I hadn’t heard for a while.

  “When did we decide we wanted to know this?”

  “I don’t think we talked about it specifically. It's just what happens next.”

  “Well, do we have to do this? I thought we wanted to be surprised like we were for Alyssa.”

  I hesitated.

  The truth will set you free.

  “Honestly, I didn’t press the issue then because you’re the one who didn’t want to know. Not me. If you don’t want to know the sex of this baby, Dr. Nolan and I won’t tell you.”

  “Anything else you haven’t mentioned?”

  “I made an appointment with a contractor. I had some ideas about expanding the nursery to make—”

  “Why aren’t you talking to me about this before you go off and make plans
?”

  “Carl, it's an appointment to talk. I haven’t signed papers. I thought I needed to not wait until a month before the baby's due to make changes.”

  “You seem to be doing a lot of thinking while I’m gone.”

  “Yes, I guess I am.”

  Isn’t it great?

  I closed the cell phone, rested my forehead on the steering wheel, and gave myself time to decompress. I didn’t want to drive under the influence of disappointment. Not even to an AA meeting.

  Melinda started my session where we ended the last. “A mother afraid to show affection doesn’t provide a healthy climate for showing any kind of physical tenderness,” she said.