Saving Evangeline

by Nancee Cain

  “You wouldn’t take care of it?”

  Reluctantly, I admit, “That was her fear.”

  “But you want to take care of this dog? What’s changed?” He glances over at me waiting for my answer. An answer I can’t give him. I refuse to let him in and give him the power to hurt me.

  You. You’ve changed me. Life doesn’t seem so bleak since I met you.

  I gaze out the window, staring at the scenery. I’ve never been out of Florida before, and I find the green hills of Tennessee intriguing. Peeking at him out of the corner of my eye, I sigh when Father Persistence raises an eyebrow, waiting for my answer.

  “I dunno.” I cross my arms and stare at the road ahead.

  “Well you can’t leave me with this dog. If you kill yourself, the dog will truly be a goner.”

  I gasp and face him, my mouth open with disbelief at his callousness. “That’s blackmail. You’re the most unethical priest I’ve ever met.”

  He smirks as he pulls a cigarette out of the pack. Rolling down his window, he lights it, inhaling deeply. “If you only knew, Crazy Girl.”

  “Oh? Is there scandal in your past, Father?”

  “Nothing compared to yours.”

  I huff with indignation. “Smart ass.”

  “If you can’t take it, don’t dish it out.” He plugs in his phone and hits his Evangeline playlist, cranking it up full blast. I pretend to fan the smoke out of my face, even though in fact, the open window pulls it out of the car. Ozzy Osbourne wails about a crazy train, and Goner starts howling as if he’s singing along. Tension broken, we laugh and Remi drums the steering wheel with his thumbs, while I play air guitar, joining Goner’s howling on the chorus. After a few more songs about crazy people, Remi turns the music off and we drive for over an hour in a comfortable silence listening to Goner’s rhythmic snores. The dog’s heavy breathing, combined with the hypnotic rumble of the car engine, and boring landscape lulls me into an almost meditative state.

  “Tell me about Jack.”

  The question snaps me out of my car-induced stupor, and I stare out the window. I knew he’d ask sooner or later. My respirations cease for a moment as the dull roar in my ears escalates in direct correlation to my increasing anxiety level. Dry as desert sand, my tongue feels stuck to the roof of my mouth. I look down at my clenched hands and white knuckles, forcing myself to breathe in slow, deep breaths.

  “What about him?” My voice sounds like a frog. The stabbing pain in my heart makes it seems like only yesterday I lost Jack, instead of two years ago.

  “How did you two meet?”

  My bitter laughter sounds shrill and on edge. “There was no meeting Jack, he was always in my life, until he went away to college. That’s when he met Kayla.”

  “His wife?”

  I nod and using my thumbnail, push at the cuticle of my other thumb. I don’t want to discuss this.

  “How long were they married?”

  “They never should have married,” I snap, my cheeks flaming with indignation and hurt. “He was mine, first.” I don’t attempt to hide my bitterness as I rub my face with my hands. Why does everyone want me to talk about this? Why can’t they just let it go?

  “Then why did he marry her?”

  “I don’t know.” I rock in my seat, my arms wrapped tight around my middle.

  “Yes, you do.” He reaches over and peels my fingers apart, taking my hand in his, giving it a comforting squeeze. “Tell me your story, Evangeline. It’s time.”

  I swallow, and try to speak, but nothing comes out. It takes me a full minute to formulate the words. “I loved Jack all my life. He was always there for me—when my Daddy died, when I broke my arm rollerblading, even when I wrecked my first car. I can’t remember a day I didn’t love him. He was as much a part of my life as my parents were.” I sigh and stare at the passing scenery. “My shrink called it an unhealthy obsession.” I glance over at Remi. “I’ve never understood that. How can loving someone be unhealthy?”

  “Go on.” He lights a cigarette, once again cracking the window.

  “We grew up together. He didn’t have a father at home so he used to bug my dad to teach him about cars and motors. You know, guy stuff…”

  Remi’s brows draw together as he exhales a smoke ring. “How much older was he?”

  “Five years.”

  I smile as memories flip through my mind like turning the pages of a photo album. The way Jack would shove his glasses up his nose when he concentrated. And how he would pull at his lower lip when irritated. His walnut brown hair was always in need of a trim and he usually had scruff on his angular face. Not because he thought it made him look sexy, but because he’d forget to shave when wrapped up in some new project.

  “It wasn’t just sex, you know,” I defend hotly, having been through this before with countless therapists.

  “I didn’t say it was.”

  “Jack took care of me in lots of ways, even fussing when I wouldn’t balance my checkbook. He’d sit and work on it for thirty minutes, figuring it to the penny. Whenever I saw him, he’d check the oil sticker in my car to make sure I changed it on time.” But I also loved the way his kisses made my toes curl, and the lingering smell of his cologne on my neck after we snuggled. It was these silly little things I missed most.

  “What happened to your car?”

  I sigh. “After Jack died, Mama sold hers and took mine. She was afraid I’d…” I don’t need to finish. He knows.

  “What was he like?” Remi asks, breaking into my thoughts. I drag my attention from the past and stare at him. Jack was the polar opposite of the man sitting next to me.

  “Quiet, with a dry sense of humor. He was tall and lanky, but not athletic, a total geek, complete with glasses and ink stains on his hands. But to me, he was beautiful. He had the most amazing hazel eyes that would light up with excitement over dumb stuff, like jigs and bell cranks. He loved tinkering with machinery. Whenever he came home from college he’d cut our grass, do odd jobs for Mama. Like I said, he was always part of my life. I thought he was my happily-ever-after.” I can’t suppress the sigh or stop the tear that escapes down my cheek. I wipe it away.

  I hear that distinct sound of ruffled feathers and turn to face Remi. He’s staring at the road with a scowl on his face. “When did you become intimate?” A small part of me wonders if he’s jealous, but I erase the thought. Of course Father Blackson isn’t; he can’t be.

  Heat rises in my cheeks as I recall the first time Jack and I had sex. For months he’d come home from college on the weekends and sneak in through my bedroom window. We’d get hot and heavy with the petting, but we always stopped short of doing the actual deed. Until the night Mama had to work a double shift…

  I suck in a deep breath and whisper, “My fifteenth birthday.”

  “Ass wipe.” Remi slams his fist on the steering wheel and pitches the cigarette out the window. It’s a few seconds before he asks, “So what happened to the great love affair?”

  “Kayla happened.” I don’t attempt to keep the bitterness out of my voice. It’s impossible for me to be rational when I think about her.

  I hated her from the first time Jack mentioned her name.

  I hated her more when he married her.

  I hated her no less after he died.

  And I hated myself for continuing to hate her after she died…

  “So Jack married Kayla.”

  I ignore his statement of the obvious. I refuse to talk about her.

  “Why did he marry her?”

  I stare at the passing scenery, wishing I were anywhere but in this damn car.

  “Why,” he persists.

  “Stop,” I cover my ears and close my eyes. I can’t talk about this. It makes me feel like my heart will implode from the pain. Like a shattered mirror, my mind provides a distorted image of myself and it isn’t pretty. I was obsessive, difficult to deal with.

  Jack didn’t want me.

  “Tell me why he married her.”
>
  “I don’t know,” I scream. “She entrapped him somehow. I think he was lonely.” I shove the truth away. Jack loved me. He had to have loved me. Otherwise, my entire existence has been for nothing. Even now, I’m nothing without Jack.

  “He was lonely?” He shoves his sunglasses on top of his head and glances at me for a few seconds. Those few seconds is all it takes for his intense gaze to strip me bare. I know what he’s doing, restating my statement in a question so I’ll open up. I’ve endured enough counseling sessions to recognize the technique. I’m the fucking Queen of Therapy. Instantly, my guard is up and standing at attention.

  “Because I wasn’t there,” I hiss with frustration. Frowning, I look at him through narrowed eyes. Why is he being so persistent? Has someone instructed him to ask these questions?

  Remi shrugs his shoulders as if to say, so?

  “At college,” I stress, frowning with annoyance at his blank expression. “I was at home, he was at college.” I throw my hands up and roll my eyes.

  “How could the jerk be lonely? He had you as his secret tryst at home and Kayla at school. He used both of you.”

  I gasp at his impudence and jump to Jack’s defense. “Take that back. You didn’t know him. How dare you! He didn’t get to come home every weekend. We couldn’t be together because I was still in high school and then beauty school. I wasn’t there—”

  “Oh, ex-cuse me. Where did he go to college? The University of Timbuktu?”

  “Where the hell is that? No, the University of Florida.”

  “Oh, wow, that’s all of what, five hours away? This is the twenty-first century. Didn’t he have a car? A computer? Or a phone?” His sarcasm strikes like a venomous viper and the truth I’ve managed to suppress surges forth. I’m falling fast and I hang on to my denial like a rescue rope over quicksand.

  “He was busy. After college he went straight into the Masters program. I wasn’t there…” The interior of the car spirals as my mind splinters into a million shards. Can’t he see I’m falling apart? I rock faster, squeezing my eyes tight, holding my arms across my chest as if I can keep my heart and mind from shattering.

  “So? If he loved you, he would have made it work, Evangeline. Jack took advantage of you and used you. Technically, what he did when you were underage was statutory rape.”

  My eyes snap open. “It was her fault. She seduced him. We were together for years until she pranced into his life with her blonde hair and easy ways and normalcy. He was mine, first.”

  He snorts with derision and frowns at me. The car swerves from his inattention. I dig my nails in to my palms, bouncing my right leg in time with my pounding heart. Stop, stop, stop…

  “Jack loved me.” I want to hit this man of God. He knows nothing of love. I sit on my hands to keep from acting on impulse. I know how disastrous lashing out in a moving car can be. Been there, done that and lost Jack because of my careless actions.

  His voice softens, “I’m sure he did in some way, but the point remains he married her. He used you and was unfaithful to his wife—”

  The dashboard Virgin Mary mocks me with her serene smile. Since I can’t hit him, I strike at the next best thing, and she falls to the floor as the hula girl sways seductively.

  “Shut up!” I cover my ears with my hands. My heart sits firmly lodged in my throat. He reaches out to me, but I shove his hand away. “Leave me alone! Let me out of here. I have to get out of here.”

  “Shh, just relax, you’re getting too worked up, Crazy Girl.”

  “Don’t touch me, and quit calling me that. I don’t want to hear for the millionth time how stupid I am. Do you think you’re the first to tell me how wrong it was for me to love him? Why is love wrong?”

  “Calm down,” he barks, glancing my way. He presses his lying lips in a tight line. The tic in his cheek flexes several times as he taps the steering wheel with his thumb.

  He might be pissed, but I’m livid and my world is spinning out of control.

  A wave of nausea sweeps over me, and I clench my teeth to keep from spewing. “Don’t tell me to calm down. Pull over. I want out of this damn car, right now.” I try to open the door, but he punches the automatic door lock. I struggle trying to get it unlocked and his hand grabs mine.

  “Stop it! What the hell? Do you want us to have a wreck?”

  I freeze as my surroundings twist and twirl. A voice from the past whispers tauntingly, Stop Evie, you’re going to cause us to wreck. I whimper and clutch my stomach. Not again, not again, not again…

  “S-Stop the car,” I croak. Is it déjà vu or just some sick coincidence? Closing my eyes, I refuse to watch us wreck. Not again.

  “Holy moly, hang on, sweetness.” The car stops moving, but my world continues to spiral. Remi leaps from the car and yanks open my door just in time. I fall to my knees onto the rough gravel as my stomach heaves violently. He holds my hair as I vomit and sob. Still in the car behind us, Goner whimpers before dashing out on to the side of the road.

  “Goner!” we both scream, but he takes off into the woods. I struggle to my feet, but the ground rolls underneath me and I collapse. Remi catches me and holds me tight as my world falls apart.

  “Shh, everything’s okay. I’m so sorry, sweetness. I shouldn’t have pushed you.”

  I’m sorry Evie; I should never have led you on. I love you, but Kayla is my life now. I love her and we’re going to have a baby…Jack’s voice haunts me and pushes me over the edge.

  Everything is my fault. “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry. Oh God, it’s my fault you wrecked…” My shoulders shake with my silent sobs, and I bury my face in Remi’s T-shirt. Jack’s gone. In a rare, startling moment of truth, I realize he was never mine. He belonged with Kayla. And like a tempestuous three-year-old wanting a toy that didn’t belong to her, I’d tried to steal him from his wife. I was responsible for his death, her unhappiness and ultimately the worst tragedy of all. The weight of my guilt makes my knees buckle.

  Remi scoops me into his arms and leans against the car. He rests his cheek on top of my head, murmuring soothing words. I cover my face with shame. “I nearly killed us. Just like I killed him.”

  “No, you didn’t. I had full control of the car. You got nauseated and it made the car seem like it was out of control. And you didn’t kill Jack; it was an unfortunate accident.”

  “I wish you were wrong, but I did. I was mad at him and we argued. He told me Kayla was pregnant and he wouldn’t leave her. I hit him and he lost control of the car.” I squirm out of his arms and stand before him, a broken girl. I hang my head with shame. “I’m a horrible, evil person.”

  “You are not a horrible, evil person. You’re a sweet girl with a good heart and you’ve shouldered this guilt for far too long. It was an accident,” Remi reaffirms as he cups my cheeks in his warm hands and forces me to look at him. “It was an accident, Evangeline. A tragic, horrible accident.”

  I shake my head and stare at the ground. “You don’t understand. I’m responsible for Kayla’s death, too…”

  He tips my chin back up and his brows pull together. Those mesmerizing eyes search mine, compelling me to tell the truth. “Kayla was in the car with you?”

  “No.” I look away, not wanting to see his condemnation or the hatred in his beautiful face. “She found out I was in the car with Jack the night of the accident.” I can’t continue, he’ll hate me and then I’ll lose him, too.

  He rubs my arms. “Tell me. Get rid of this guilt you’ve carried around once and for all. Ask for forgiveness, mean it, and be done with it.”

  “There is no forgiveness,” I whisper. “I’m responsible for Kayla’s death and—” The overwhelming burden of my culpability makes me shudder. “And I killed Jack’s unborn baby.” I turn away and vomit again, as if my self-hatred can no longer be contained. I want to curl up on the side of this godforsaken interstate and die.

  “You had an abortion?”

  I laugh hysterically. “No. God knows better than to ever le
t me be a mother. Kayla’s baby.”

  “What makes you think you did that?” He squats beside me, placing a hand on my back. His voice is calm, non-censorious. I stare at him, wiping the spit off my mouth with the back of my hand. Fire rages for a moment in his pupils but quickly burns out, and it’s like staring into a calm green meadow.

  “I exist,” I sneer, preparing for his condemnation, determined to withstand it.

  “Don’t give me that over-dramatic-woe-is-me bullshit. Just tell me in plain, simple words, what you did. Did you pull a trigger? Poison her? Push her off a balcony?” He pulls me to my feet and the look on his face isn’t one of hatred or disgust. I see concern and patience as he shakes a cigarette from his pack and lights it.

  I blink, taken aback by his objectivity. Father Asswipe had been full of pompous disappointment. My mother hasn’t been able to look me in the face for almost two years. The shrinks have all spouted psychobabble that’s left me feeling more confused than ever. “No, of course not. Kayla overdosed on pills. It killed her.” I swallow and look at the ground. “And the b-baby.”

  “My goodness. Aren’t you the All Powerful Queen of Shit?”

  Startled, my mouth drops open, and I’m shocked speechless. He nonchalantly takes a puff on the cigarette as he watches the cars driving past us.

  “What did you say?” Surely I must have misheard. Why isn’t he disgusted? This is where he’s supposed to leave me on the side of the road with Goner. I’m prepared for the abandonment. My life is a series of being left behind by those I’ve loved. What’s one more?

  I gasp at my own revelation. Am I falling in love with Remi?

  “Sad and heartbreaking as Kayla’s death was, you’re not responsible. You made some pretty bad decisions and tragedies occurred, but you have to let all of this guilt go and move on.” He smiles sadly and pushes a strand of hair that’s blown across my face behind my ear.

  “You don’t understand. I’m bad. This wasn’t the first time I was responsible for someone’s death.”

  Remi pauses and exhales the cigarette smoke. I’m pretty sure he just checked an eye roll. The look he levels at me makes me fidget and rock on my feet. The poor man doesn’t have a clue just how sinful I am. My soul isn’t black. It’s non-existent. Despite his bad language, smoking, and irreverence at times, he’s too good to understand true sin and wickedness.