by Ella Parks
I opened the back door to our house and noticed the silence where there was always sounds of living and happiness.
“Ana,” I called out, but she didn’t come to meet me with arms reaching up for me. I walked through the kitchen still calling her name. The living room was silent too and I felt a chill of dread creeping all over my body. She was in our bedroom, covered and looking even smaller than she was, she had our baby close to her breast. Her eyes were closed. My heart felt like it had cracked open in my chest as I moved toward everything I loved. I gently pulled the cover back as she woke and opened her beautiful eyes, trying to smile at me. Her face was flushed and hot to the touch.
“Oh Lord baby, how long have you been feeling bad?” I asked as I gathered her close to me.
“Not long.” She whispered but I knew different.
“Don’t bother with me. See to Joy, her face feels a little hot to me.”
“She was right, our little girl was hot, maybe even hotter than her Mother.
Sorrow ripped at me as I realized that I have been taking care of everyone else while the two I loved more than my own life were sick while I was not with them. What have I done? I felt the heat of her fever as I whispered.
“I am so sorry, so very sorry! Please forgive me my love.’
“No, don’t feel that way. You have a calling and I want you to always take care of everyone you can. You didn’t neglect us. We just started feeling bad today. I was going to call you, but I kept thinking it might pass, that it is maybe just a little thing. I am hoping it is just a little thing. You didn’t neglect us my love, don’t ever think that, please don’t ever think that.”
I buried my head in her hair cradling her head while the first of many tears soaked my face.
“I’ll get my bag darling. You rest, and I will be right back.”
She didn’t answer, she just closed her eyes again against the chills that was shaking her body.
I spent that day and night doing everything I knew to do for them as the fever burned higher and higher. I did everything I knew to do, nothing seemed to help, nothing. Nothing stopped the fever while it climbed higher, and higher stealing the life from my wife and baby. When I wasn’t giving them medicine or putting wet cloths, on their burning bodies I would lay with them, crying, praying, promising God anything if he would save them. In one breath I was begging God for mercy and the next breath I was cursing myself for leaving them alone while I tried to take care of everyone else. I was so near them, only a few yards away. I had thought they would be safer if I stayed in the office, but now they burned with the fever while my skin stayed cool to the touch. I asked myself over and over why they caught it and I had not. I prayed to take it and feel the burn instead of them. I wanted to take it away from them and I would have gladly given my life to save them. From time to time I would hear pounding on the door, someone else needing a doctor, but I didn’t move away from them. My face was never dry, as I told them both over and over how sorry I was that I had let them down, and how much I loved them. Their breathing was shallow and forced and Ana didn’t seem to hear me anymore. She didn’t reach her precious hand to wipe the tears from my face, trying to comfort me even while the fever raged in her. They both were quiet now, still burning but quietly struggling to pull air into their lungs. Joy’s chest was only slightly moving, and I watched each rise and fall with fear in my broken heart. Ana’s was not much better and as a doctor I knew what was going to happen, so I raised my eyes to God and begged that if he had to take as them from me to please take them fast, so they would not suffer any more. I believe in God’s power and him having a better place for the good and I knew my two were two of the best. God didn’t answer my screaming pleas for healing, but he answered the second prayer. They both died within a few minutes of each other, even though I had prayed for their relief as I watched them struggle for their last breath, I started screaming. I was still screaming when one of the neighbors run over to see what was wrong. I don’t remember when I stopped screaming. Their burial is still hazy to me as if it couldn’t have really happened, then I had to go back to that empty house where I had known such happiness but now it was all gone. I would look around me wondering how everything or everybody could go on. To me, it seemed like the world was changed and nothing would ever be right again. I couldn’t find the strength to go to bed at night or get up the next morning. I couldn’t even eat the things I knew they enjoyed. I spent hours holding her pillow to my face inhaling the scent of where she had slept. I would go through the silent house picking up small things they had touched, holding them close to my chest like I wanted to do with them. I couldn’t stand to be alone, but I couldn’t stand to be around anyone either. I wondered why they caught the fever instead of me. I had been exposed to it so many times even holding the both of them while they burned with it. I would have gladly given my life for theirs, but I never caught the fever. I sobbed my questions to the still silence of the house that had once held such joy, but now only held the painful echo of my pain.
I closed my office and stayed drunk for two years. I was one of Barry’s best customers back then. I can’t even tell you how many nights I would open her bottle of perfume I had bought her, inhaling the fragrance and drinking until I couldn’t even walk to my bed. There were times I felt her presence was still in our little house and I wouldn’t allow anyone else to come in, fearing them being there would disturb her presence somehow. As I look back now, I realize the grief had made me insane for a while. It was larger than my strength was, breaking me in ways I can’t begin to describe.
One morning I realized that Ana would be disappointed in me, in the way I was living, wasting my knowledge to help others, so I started trying to clean myself up trying to once again be the man she had loved. It took time. I had been drunk so long that it took a while before I trusted myself again, but I took one day at a time, thinking about what my beloved Ana would want me to do. You asked about the women, after several years I did try to spend time with a couple of very special ladies, and I did care about them in some ways, but it was more of a friendship than anything else and I just stopped trying. It didn’t seem fair to them that no matter how I tried my heart just never belonged to anyone except Ana. As you know Lucy internal pain eats a person from the inside out, leaving a shell of what we once were. Sometimes even now there are times I think I can hear her laughter, and sometimes I can almost feel how soft her lips were against mine. I pushed myself working longer hours until I could fall into bed so exhausted, I could sleep
and somehow the weeks turned into months and the months turned into years. The pain is still there, but not quite as sharp as it once was, now I have a little peace that I value. I’ll take all the peace I can get.”
Tears were flowing freely now, on my face as well as his, because I understood his all, consuming grief; I understood it all too well.
“Oh Doc, I am so very sorry, so sorry.” I sobbed feeling his pain as mine as I reached for him and held him close to me while we cried.
“I feel like you are the daughter I never got to see grow up and I love you so much, that is the reason I made the decisions I did about Billy and Belinda. I was terrified Barry would kill all of you. I wanted to kill him when beat you so bad and might have done it, but I couldn’t bear to be away from your side while you were in such bad shape.”
“I love you Doc,” was all I could say over and over again as we held each other. He pulled away first and got his handkerchief out and handed it to me first.
“Don’t cry Lucy, it was horrible losing them both, but time does have a way of teaching us to go on. We never forget but we can learn to live with the pain and hopefully make the best of what we are left with. I am just thankful that you and Billy are together now. You don’t know how it does my heart good seeing you and Billy and Belinda together. All of you are my family now and I cherish all of you.”
I knew he was trying to ease t
he burden the knowledge of his pain had caused me. He had opened his soul to me, but he loved me so much he did not want me to have to carry his pain. My heart swelled with love and compassion for him as I let him ease me back away from thinking about his suffering, His hands reached for mine as we tried to bring our minds back to now as we sat in his car on that quiet country road with tears still rolling down both our faces. Once again, I wiped at his dear face as he turned to start the car again and I pushed his hair back with a gentle touch as one would touch a child as I whispered, “I love you Doc, I love you so much.”
“I know you do Lucy and I love you too.”
I briefly wondered if I was wrong to have asked him about his life that way, but I was glad that he loved me enough to share those feelings with me and burdens shared are easier to live with than trying to carry everything alone. He started the car and pulled back on the road, both of us were silent most of the way home, each of us lost in thoughts and when we talked again, we talked about Dora and her new baby. I knew I would not bring his past up to him again unless he said something first.
4
When we got to the house, he helped me get Belinda out of the car and he carried her into the house. She was awake by that time and teasing him trying to get him to play with her. He played for a few minutes, but I knew he had to be exhausted and I told Belinda it was time for her to get a bath. She hugged him and planted sweet kisses on his face before he left now, I realized even more what her loving him meant to him.
I bathed Belinda and she played while I fixed our meal, but my mind was still on the things Doc had told me today. I had everything on the table waiting when I saw Billy coming in from the fields. It was getting into late afternoon now, but I knew he would plow as late as he could. He had taken his shirt off and the dark hair on his chest followed a line going down to the band of his jeans. I caught my breath as I watched him walking across the yard. I was looking at him through the window, but he must have either seen me or sensed me watching because he raised his hand in a wave and a smile broke across that handsome face. He picked up his steps and I was waiting at the door with open arms when he walked in.
We kissed a deep kiss, as if it had been a while since our lips had touched.
“I smell like sweat my love.” He whispered, as I kissed him again and again until Belinda demanded her kisses too. Billy got washed up and we ate while Belinda told him her stories about her day. He put her to bed while I started washing the dishes and he walked to me while I was standing at the sink pulling me close and kissing my neck.
“What is on your mind my sweet one?”
“Why do you think I have something on my mind?” I answered his question with one of my own, but I put the dish I was holding down and pulled his hands even closer to me.
“Because I am in your mind and your heart and I know you. I can read those beautiful eyes of yours.”
“It’s about Doc.” I said.
“What about Doc? Is something wrong?”
“No but today I asked him why he never mentioned a woman.”
“Oh,” he said, and I realized he knew Doc’s story.
“So, you knew about Doc?”
“Yes, I have heard the stories.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I didn’t think about it. It happened a long time ago. You and I were so young our parents only spoke of it in whispers because of his drinking. I heard most of the story after he stopped drinking and was trying to get some kind of life back. Lots of people thought he was too far gone to do that. I do remember hearing a lot about his drinking. Talk said he would go for days not even eating. He wouldn’t see anyone and when he got really drunk, he would scream out her name over and over. I wasn’t trying to keep anything from you, I just haven’t thought about it in a long time. Did he tell you that after he sobered up, he started coming by to check on me?”
“No, he didn’t say anything about that.”
“He did, sometimes three or four times a week, just to tell me to be strong and to be the kind of man you would want me to be even if it seemed impossible for us, that I should still strive to be that kind of man. It meant something to me Lucy and I began to believe that he was right. That is why I bought this farm and started working it. Somehow, I wanted to please you even if I never saw you again, I wanted to feel that I had made you proud of me.”
“Awe Billy I have always been proud of you. I love you so very much.”
“I love you too baby and I want you to let me finish these dishes and you go lay down. I will come to bed shortly, but I want you to get some rest, between helping deliver the baby and worrying about Doc, you have had a full day.”
“You have been plowing all day.”
“Go to bed baby.” He said as he gave me a gentle nudge.
He did come to bed soon and I pulled the cover back welcoming him as he slipped into bed beside me, my arms reaching for him pulling him close to me.
“You are still sad about Doc, aren’t you?”
“Yes I am. He has been so kind to all of us and it hurts me to think of how he suffered.”
“I know baby, but I think he has found some happiness and a form of contentment now.”
“Yes, I think so, but Doc has so much to offer.”
“Maybe, but only if he wants to give it, maybe he feels he gave everything he had to his wife and doesn’t have anything else to give to another woman.”
“That is what he told me today. I believe we are his family now.”
“I think you are right Lucy and we are all blessed to have each other. Turn over baby and let me rub your back and shoulders. You need to relax.”
“No, you are tired. You need to rest too.”
He kissed my words away as he started rubbing my stiff shoulders and it wasn’t how I planned for the night to end, but I fell asleep as he stroked my aching muscles.
5
The sound of the rain falling on the tin roof woke me, and I lay there lulled by the sound. I knew the rain would keep Billy from the fields that day, and I listened to the steady beat almost closing my eyes again to drift back towards sleep, but his steady breathing pulled me toward wakefulness as I had other plans. I touched his lips with mine and he opened his eyes and smiled as he reached to pull me closer.
“I love rainy days.” I whispered.
“Me too baby, but I love every day with you.”
The rain was falling harder and pelting the tin roof as we merger closer and closer together, whispering soft words that quickly turned into soft sighs, as I melted into him, inhaling the sweet scent of his skin, savoring each touch, hands moving slowly as the fire burned between us.
Later we were still wrapped close together as he stroked a lock of my hair while I traced the shape of his lips tenderly with my fingers. The sharp ringing of the phone in the hall made us jump like two teenagers caught locked together and he smiled at me as he quickly got up and pulled his pants on. The phone must have woken Belinda because I heard the patter of her little feet as she got out of bed. I reached for my robe and went to meet her. She ran to me with arms outstretched, as I picked her up, she snuggled up close to me. Her hair and skin smelled so sweet. I could hear Billy talking and I knew it was Doc on the phone. I heard him say, “Hold on a minute, and I will ask her.”
He held the phone down and asked me. “Doc wants to know if you have time to ride over to the hospital today. He wants to interview some people and he wants you to be there.”