My Heart Can't Tell You No

by M. K. Heffner

  CHAPTER XXXIX

  Joe woke to a cool draft flowing over his legs. It took a moment to remember why Maddie was there, sleeping soundly in his arms, then the tightness in his chest started again. He felt the draft more; someone behind him was pulling away the blankets. Slowly, he turned to see the little trespasser who was holding up the blankets and staring with great curiosity at the man’s mid-section.

  “What are you doing?” Joe whispered groggily.

  “Does Mommy always steal the blankets from you?” Robby dropped the blankets and moved to stand near Joe’s head.

  “Most of the time. What were you looking at?”

  “I saw some of your underwear when I came in. But I thought you didn’t wear underwear when you slept with Mommy. Jackie says it’s because you’re too hot. Was it too cold last night to sleep bare-naked?” Robby leaned his elbows on the bed as he rested his chin in his hands and gazed at his father.

  “Go ahead, Irish. Answer that one,” Maddie said as she moved closer to the warmth of Joe’s body. “I’d like to hear this.”

  “Ask your mother.” Joe turned away from the child and closed his eyes, not surprised when he felt his son climb up behind him, then lean over him until they were face to face.

  “Dad-dy,” Robby insisted.

  “It’s cold! Your mom stole all the blankets!” Joe told him. “Wouldn’t you be cold if someone stole all the blankets?”

  “I’m cold now,” the boy said.

  “I think that was a hint,” Maddie told him.

  “So do I.” Joe and Maddie separated as Joe pulled up the blankets. “Dive in.”

  Robby wasted little time doing as his father said, lying on his back as he looked up at his parents, then turning his back to Joe. His little arms went up around his mother’s neck as he touched his forehead to hers.

  “Guess what,” he whispered to his mother.

  “What?” She kissed him.

  “Daddy wants to lay next to you—but I ain’t gonna let him. Ya know why?”

  “No,” Maddie laughed. “Why?”

  “Because this way you can make a sandwich and I’ll be the cold meat—and I’ll be nice and warm.” He looked back toward the doorway. “Should I go get Jackie? Then he can be the cheese and he’ll be warm too.”

  “I think your brother would rather sleep in his own bed, don’t you?” Maddie asked as Joe watched them.

  “What kind of cold meat should I be?” Robby asked.

  “Sliced turkey,” Joe told him.

  “I ain’t no turkey, Daddy!”

  “How about bologna?”

  “No,” Robby laughed. “Daddy’s wheat bread, but you’re Italian because you’re prettier than he is.”

  Maddie laughed again as she hugged the child. “I knew there was a reason I had you. You do wonders for my ego.”

  “Who says Italian bread is prettier than whole wheat?” Joe asked.

  “He does.” Maddie stuck her tongue out at Joe. “And that’s good enough for me.”

  “Look.” Robby picked up a strand of Maddie’s hair and laid it across his upper lip. “Now I look like Daddy.”

  “Now you look ridiculous,” Maddie laughed as she glanced over at the stubble on Joe’s upper lip.

  “Like Daddy?”

  “Ya know, you two aren’t very Goddamn flattering first thing in the morning.” Joe raised himself on an elbow as he watched them.

  “Mom?” Jackie looked at them oddly from the doorway. “Why are you down here?”

  “We’ll explain everything when we come out,” Joe told him. “We’re going into town, so you might as well get dressed awhile.”

  “Jackie!” Robby jumped out of bed and raced for his brother. “Make me a Pop Tart!”

  “Poof! You’re a Pop Tart,” Jackie grumbled as he started back toward the kitchen.

  “Jackie, that’s dumb,” Robby told him as he followed along behind.

  “I’d better get up with them,” Maddie said as she started to sit up, but Joe’s hand met her shoulder and stopped her.

  “They’ll be all right for a while. I think Jackie’s able to run a toaster all by himself.”

  “Did you call off work?”

  “Yes. I called around six this morning. Now,” He moved closer, draping a leg over hers as his arm went over her waist. “I want some answers.”

  He watched as her dark eyes slowly moved from his shoulder up to his face. “All right.”

  “What?! Did you say all right?! After twelve days of fighting me every step of the way—you say all right?!”

  “Would you rather I fight you for a few more days?” she asked.

  “No—no. I want to know what got into you the night of that party. I want to know what you saw that made you blow up.”

  He watched her eyes move away from his, as if she didn’t want to answer, but then she looked back up at him as her fingers traced the muscles of his shoulders.

  “I—thought—you were kissing that woman in the pool room. John told me yesterday I was watching the wrong man. He said I was watching her fiance—that since you were both built the same, and were both wearing the same colors, I mistook him for you.”

  Joe studied her for a moment. “Are you serious? Do you really think I’d do that to you?”

  “Joe, I didn’t know what to believe. Not when the evidence was right there in front of me. How was I to know there were two of you? I didn’t know where you went after you walked into that room with her, but you certainly vanished from my sight.”

  “If you must know—I didn’t appreciate the idea of watching you out on the dance floor with my supervisor. So I stood in the corner of the room—so I couldn’t see you—not so you couldn’t see me.” He looked down at her face, finding the situation amusing now. “So, you punched out a woman over me?” He smiled down at her.

  “Yes.” She nudged him with her leg. “And I’m not proud of it, I might add! Getting into a common brawl. That just made me angrier yet.”

  “I know. You were fuming.”

  “And you’re getting a big kick out of it, aren’t you? Building up your ego?”

  “Let’s put it this way—if you were the type to go out getting into cat fights, it would have made me madder than hell. But since you’re not—yeah, I’m feeling pretty good about it right now.”

  “Well, good for you.” She gestured for him to get up. “Right now, we’ve got two sons who are probably somewhere in the middle of a Pop Tart fight.”

  “Let them. I’ve got a few things to tell you, a few more questions to ask.” His fingers moved through her long dark hair, threading the thickness through his fingers as he watched it shine. “The other week when I saw your car go down that hill I realized something. I’m not much without you—nothin’ but a big mess. But when I’m with you—I’m everything I want to be. When I didn’t know if you were dead or alive, I knew it didn’t matter a damn why you kept the boys from me. I was apologizing for everything as I ran down that hill.” He looked at her, seeing the soft mist in her eyes. “We were too young when we started. My fault, I’ll admit. We expected too much of each other. We wanted a blind love—when we weren’t willing to close our eyes to the other one’s mistakes and flaws. It kept us separated for a long time. It was during that time you got some crazy notions set in your head. Number one was that I wasn’t fit to even know Jackie, because I was supposedly out whoring around all the time. Number two, you thought if I ever found out about the boys, I’d take them. Tell me if I’m wrong, but didn’t that nonsense come to an end when I lived with you for three and a half months?”

  “You threatened to take them the night you found out,” she said quietly.

  “Only for two weeks! I’d have brought them back!” he insisted. “Why, Maddie? Why did you still try to hide them from me?”

  She turned her head away. “I—didn’t want—to lose you.”

  “Maddie.” He turned her head back to face him, seeing she was crying again. “How could you lose me by giv
ing me two sons?”

  “You told me—right here—you wouldn’t put up with a liar. My God, I spent over eight years doing nothing but lying to you!”

  He sighed deeply as he reached down to brush her tears away. “So I did. Again, it falls back on me, doesn’t it? Well, I won’t put up with lying. So, since I won’t tolerate any more lies. Tell me something—there aren’t any more kids stashed around here you haven’t told me about—are there?”

  His attempt at a joke seemed to work. She smiled weakly at him and shook her head. “No. No more.”

  “Fine. Then I guess it’s safe to say we can finally get on with our lives. Maybe settle down like a normal family. Or a semi-normal family anyway. I’ve yet to see a seven-year-old boy hate his father as much as that kid of ours does.”

  “Jackie doesn’t hate you,” she said softly as her hands moved over his sides to his back.

  “Doesn’t he? I’ll tell ya, I think he’s more Bob Green’s son than he’ll ever be mine. But . . . ,” he gently kissed her. “Other than that minor problem. Do you want to marry me?”

  “Marry you?” she laughed. “When?”

  “The sooner the better. Next week. Lew won’t let me wait much longer,” he said with a smile, then his memories of the previous night came back, making him slowly move off of her.

  “What do you want me to do? Ask him to give me away again?” He watched as her words seemed to have the same effect on her, turning her into his arms as she rested her head on his shoulder. “God, I forgot. He can’t.”

  “No, he can’t,” Joe sighed.

  “Why?” Jackie stood in the doorway, his voice stiff. “Why can’t he do it?”

  “Do—what?” Maddie slowly turned to face Jackie and Robby.

  “I don’t know. I only heard a little of what you said. I heard him say I’d never be his son.” Jackie’s words brought another heavy sigh from Joe. “Then I heard him say Lew won’t be able to wait much longer. And you said something I didn’t hear. Then you both said he can’t.” The boy seemed near tears as he watched them, sensing from his parents there was something terribly wrong.

  “Jackie, come in here.” Joe sat up.

  “No! You tell me why Lew can’t help Mom!”

  “Jackie.” Maddie sat up next to Joe, but the child took a step inside with clenched fists, stopping her speech.

  “Jackie—your Uncle Lew—well, he—he died last night.” Joe got out, then saw how the boy seemed to pale and sway slightly before placing one hand on Joe’s dresser.

  “No, he didn’t! You’re lying! You just don’t want me and Robby to see him anymore, because you know we like him! You want to keep us all to yourself!”

  “Jackie!” Joe said sternly. “I wouldn’t lie to you about something like that.”

  “Mom!! Tell him to stop it!!” Jackie looked at his mother helplessly.

  “Jackie, he isn’t lying,” Maddie tried, and Joe could hear the tears threatening to spill again. “Lew died last night.”

  “No!” Jackie looked back to his father, tears streaming down his face. “Why couldn’t it have been you?! Why couldn’t you have died and just gone away?! I hate you!”

  Robby watched the scene with wide eyes, watching his brother turn and run from the room, then listening as he slammed the door to his bedroom. When Robby turned back to look at his parents, his thumb was in his mouth as his tears began to flow.

  “What . . . . What . . . ,” was all he managed to get out. It was evident to Maddie and Joe the boy was very confused—not having a clue about what was going on.

  “Come here, Rob,” Joe said, then waited until the boy climbed up on the foot of the bed. When Joe looked over at Maddie, he saw she was breathing heavily, trying her damnedest to keep from crying outright as she stared into nothingness. “Did you hear what we told Jackie?” The boy shook his head, staring, with his thumb still in his mouth. “We told him your Uncle Lew died. Do you know what that means?”

  “His pet guinea pig,” Maddie said in a shaky voice.

  “Do you remember you pet guinea pig?” Robby again shook his head.

  “Uh—Finny. His name was Finny,” Maddie told Joe, still looking toward the far wall.

  “Do you remember Finny?” This time the boy nodded yes. “Do you remember what happened to him?”

  “He wouldn’t move no more,” Robby hiccoughed. “So Mommy gave him to Tom to take away, and he never brought him back.”

  “Well, that’s what happened to Lew. He’s gone away—and he’ll never come back again. He died,” Joe said.

  “Heaven,” Maddie told him.

  “He’s gone to heaven.” Joe glanced at her, then back to Robby, not sure how Maddie wanted it presented to him, just going on what he had known from her family’s beliefs. “He—went somewhere where he won’t hurt anymore.”

  “Watching over him,” Maddie added.

  “He’s up there watching over you now.”

  “Up—where?” Another hiccough from Robby.

  “Heaven,” Maddie said. “Now it’s his job to take care of our baby until it’s born.” Her voice broke at the end, and she rose from the bed and went out of the room.

  “Will he come back? After the baby’s born?”

  “No. He won’t come back.” Joe felt the coil of his own emotions about to spring.

  “Then I don’t want the baby. I want Lew.”

  “Lew went away. He just happened to see the baby before it’s born. It isn’t the baby’s fault Lew died. Lew wanted your Mom to have this baby. Lew loved babies—so isn’t it only right that if he had to go away—it was someplace where he could take care of your baby brother or sister? So it will be all right when it comes down here to you?”

  “Won’t I ever see Lew again?!”

  “No, Rob. You won’t see him again.”

  “But I was gonna go along with him and Pap to get his shoe! He said I could!”

  “He won’t be going for it now. He has his own foot back now. He doesn’t need the shoe. Where he went, there’s no more pain, no more disease that could make him lose his foot again.”

  “I—think I want Lew back here—with us,” Robby sighed as the thumb finally came out and he moved up to sit on Joe’s lap. “Can you call him and tell him to come home?”

  “No, Rob. It was his time to go. We can’t call him back. He’s happy up there now.”

  “Happier than he was with us?”

  “Yes. And whenever he starts to miss us, all he has to do is look down, and he sees us. And, whenever you miss him, he’ll know it and look down and watch over you again.”

  “He can see us?”

  “I think so.” He watched as Robby gazed up toward the ceiling and, with a slight movement of his hand, waved, then slid off his lap and started for the living room.

  “Okay. Then I can talk to him whenever I want and he’ll hear me too.”

  Joe watched him shuffle out the door, seeing Maddie standing in the doorway as she kept her eyes on him. The tears were still there, but she wore a sad smile.

  “Thank you.”

  CHAPTER XL

  As Joe pulled into the small parking lot Maddie saw her mother standing with John, Beth and Jenna beneath the aura of the street lamp. They waited for her, Joe, Robby and Jackie to join them, then they all started into the funeral home. Maddie had been there the previous month for her aunt’s funeral. It was the family funeral home; most of her aunts and uncles on her mother’s side had been buried from this place, as were her brother Jackie, and Bob.

  Maddie glanced around, seeing they were the first to arrive, then looked up at Joe as he held Robby in his arms and watched her closely. His body was in the doorway of the viewing room, blocking sight of the casket. She had a feeling this was done deliberately, whether to block her view or to keep himself pointed in the opposite direction, she wasn’t sure.

  “Do you want to sign in?” Maddie nodded toward the book on the podium next to the doorway. He came back, but as soon as the view was cl
ear, Maddie averted her eyes. She had been to many funerals in her life. She knew the way most of them looked. If they weren’t altered so a person wouldn’t know one’s own mother—then the palish gray hue, and stiffness of facial features were enough to paint a very unnatural picture. She reached for Jackie’s hand, but he took a step away from her, toward his uncle John. “Jackie, are you coming?”

  “No. I’ll wait for Gram, with Beth and John.”

  “All right.” Maddie looked up at Joe.

  “I think it would be best for him to wait out here too.” Joe nodded toward the boy he was holding. “We can come back out for him after a minute or so.”

  “I’ll hold him until you come out. We’ll take him back in the other room.” John reached for Robby, then looked up at Beth. “Wait here for Mom. Then ask her if she’ll wait for us before she goes in to see him.”

  “I will,” Beth answered. Everyone knew what he meant. The four adults accompanying Sarah Baker needed all their strength to stand watch over her. It would be best if they got through their initial grief before they took her up to see her youngest brother.

  “Well?” Joe looked down at Maddie.

  “Let’s go,” she sighed, then turned and started through the doorway.

  She had seen Joe walk through that doorway twice before. The first time, she was only eleven years old, but she remembered his face; well-masked grief and confusion. The second time she was barely seventeen at his own father’s funeral. At that time he showed little grief, not as a man losing his father, only one human laying another human to rest.

  This time, with her eyes on him as they walked through the doorway, he couldn’t hide the pain ripping him apart. His sudden hesitation and the slight widening of his eyes as he looked in the direction of the casket, before moving on again, turned her own eyes in that direction. So many flowers! She had never seen so many before! It looked like an outlet to a flower shop. Her eyes moved to the casket, then to the flag lying inside. Lew had been a Korean War veteran; sometimes she forgot. There were the four red rosebuds she had been asked to order for her mother, her uncle and her two aunts. A token of the love for the youngest brother they had lost. And then his face.