Fire in Me

by Dawn Mattox

  “That was the stupidest thing you have ever done!” Chance was here, and his presence left me stunned. Chance never comes to my private office. The decision had to do with space, boundaries, respect, and probably Paige and Travis as well. But, here he is, my butt barely warming my chair after the incident at the jail.

  “I can't believe you went to the jail. What in God's name were you thinking?”

  It wasn't a question. Chance was furious. And his remark was as close to taking the Lord's name in vain as Chance ever got.

  “I don't need your permission to go to the jail,” I said, angry that he was angry. Okay, I was angry because he was right. The best defense is a good offense, they say, and I thought anger masked my fear fairly well. But whoever thought up that pithy saying has probably never confronted Chance or Logan.

  “If Jack finds out...” Chance let the threat hang in midair for me to fill in the blank. “You might have prejudiced the case.”

  “All right already!” Jaws, fists, buns—everything that could clench, did. “Jack doesn’t own me! Logan doesn’t own me! Travis doesn’t own me! And you—”

  “I know! I know, Sunny. Please. You're making this really hard for me. Again.”

  “I make it hard, for you?” I said with rising indignation.

  Chance’s brows collided as he struggled to control his temper and response. “You have never let me confront Logan in my own way. And I admit, there were times it was for the best.” He nodded in agreement with his own head talk. “I could have killed the filth. And part of me is sorry I didn't. I've killed people who were less deserving of death than Logan,” he said, referring to his military days. “I risked our marriage to work with agencies to put Logan away for good, and now you might have jeopardized the case.”

  “You think I can't take care of myself? Think about it Chance—I probably changed my own diapers.”

  My mind flashed through all the times I had survived trauma. I saw my dad, who had survived war to be murdered by my husband. I recalled the searing agony of gang rape. Burying Frito, my best friend. Watching my mother get zipped into a body bag. And I can still hear the hiss of rattlesnakes and Logan's chilli8ng laughter. Hadn't I survived all that... and so much more on my own?

  I am a survivor, not a victim!

  “Of course you can take care of yourself. You never fail to remind me.”

  Chance leaned in, his muscles tight and jaw set. He lowered his voice. “I am your husband! It is my duty, my privilege, to fight, and even die for you if necessary.”

  That was my husband speaking. No cliché. No melodrama. No Oscar performance. I knew Chance meant every word.

  “And you wanted me to stay out of it. Don't be a man. Don't be a husband. Go mind my own business, as if I were a child!” His words swung like a sword between us—sharp and dividing. “God knows I was wrong for what I did with Paige. But everything I have done to protect you was done because I love you.”

  A single tear escaped, and it was one too many. I was tired of the tears. Chance had left, still angry. I robotically maneuvered through the remainder of the day with zombielike enthusiasm. Disassociation has been a tried and true friend for most of my life, but even that failed to rescue me today. So I fixated on work and it was only the sound of the custodian, methodically banging trash cans into his cart that broke the spell, reminding me of the late hour.

  A knock on my door startled me. “Paige?” I hastened to pull myself together. “Why are you still here? It's after hours.”

  I had done well avoiding her since her appearance at the memorial. She hadn’t looked well then. She looked worse now.

  “I need to speak with you, Sunny.” Her voice cracked with strain.

  I looked at my watch. “Sure. I have a couple of minutes.”

  She moved slowly, tentatively toward the sofa, avoiding eye contact. I was curious, but couldn’t imagine anything short of an I-give-a-care feeling from me today. I was already running on empty.

  “I know it's late. I was hoping you were still here when I saw your light on.”

  I put on my best, bored, professional face. “How can I help you?”

  “I'm going to have a baby.”

  My first thoughts were neither kind nor Christian. I gave a shrug.

  “And you're telling me this, because?” I searched her face, and she returned a blank stare. “I don't know what I am supposed to say, Paige. Congratulations? I am so sorry? What?”

  She stiffened, throwing her hands in the air with a curse and shaking her head.

  “What do you want from me? A baby shower? An abortion fundraiser?”

  She jumped up and dashed for the door. I didn't care. In fact, I felt vindicated; thinking she finally got what she deserved. She probably doesn't even know who the father is.

  I flicked the overhead light off, simultaneously flicking on my Stupid Light. Maybe the baby was Mark's. Maybe it was Travis's. Maybe... OMG!

  The motor in the little red Beemer was running and I would not have blamed Paige if she “pulled an Aden” and ran me down in the parking lot.

  “Come back! Stop! Wait,” I gasped, rapping on her window.

  The window slid down to reveal fresh tears on a helpless, hopeless, looking Paige. She paused, cast her eyes down and turned off the engine.

  “I am so sorry, Paige. Really! I am. That was mean of me. Please don't go.”

  She stared at her hands that seemed limp, barely able to hold onto the steering wheel. “I just needed someone to talk to. I don't have many friends—women friends, that is. None who would care about this,” she said, touching her belly. “I know you hate me. It's okay. I have it coming.” Her voice trailed off.

  I had to know. The suspense was so taut that I could barely squeak, “Whose baby is it?”

  “Mine. Just mine.” Her lower lip trembled and jutted out as she turned a sad but determined pair of hazel eyes on me.

  “You don't know who the father is?”

  “I don't care who the father is! I thought I could talk to you—you being the big Christian and all. I was wrong. But promise me you'll keep this just between us... if you can handle that.”

  “But...”

  Paige gripped the steering wheel in fierce determination. “Promise me!” Her voice rose, shrill and demanding.

  “Okay. Okay. I promise.”

  “Good!” She started the engine, and I stepped back as she put the car in reverse. The last thing I saw was her All About Me bumper sticker fading into the night.

  “You should move back in together. It's the best way to solve your problems. You'll never solve anything living apart.” Ashley grew thoughtful as we sipped the steaming mochas she had made for us in her kitchen. “If I had moved out on Shane the time he...”

  “But you didn't.” I cut in.

  Ashley raised her brows in surprise. “But if I had—”

  “Stop it, Ashley! I interrupted.” I need this to stop.”

  Sometimes Ashley is like the blind leading the blind. For all of her good intentions, she cannot take me where she has not been. I knew I was risking it all. I seemed to be doing a lot of that lately. Ashley is my best friend, but the truth is, I had been preparing, possibly even rehearsing this moment for a long time. I didn't want to offend her. I couldn't bear to lose her too. But everything has a tipping point, and our friendship was balanced on that point right now.

  “This is really hard for me to say, Ash. You're my best friend and I love you. But I need you to stop telling me what to do.”

  Complete silence.

  Ashley always tries to edify me, which is Christian lingo for teach, instruct, enlighten, and improve. Those aren’t bad things if delivered with sensitivity.

  “Really?” Ashley's eyes grew big and round, then rapidly narrowed. She bristled, “And this, coming from The Advocate? You can dish it out, but you can't take it? Is that it?” She stood with arms crossed.

  Mental ouch followed by another awkward pause. “I love you, Ash. But you're wron
g. My work isn't about telling people what they should and shouldn’t do.”

  “Really?” She sounded skeptical, defensive... and deeply offended.

  “Really! I give people options based on my training. I say things like, ‘Have you thought about... Do you think... What would happen if...’ kind of stuff. Then I offer options; like services and resources. I would never tell someone what to do. They need to find their own strength and figure things out for themselves. I just show them different paths they can take and where those paths might take them. They have to decide for themselves which path to travel. That's how they grow.”

  Ashley continued to monitor me as she analyzed the information.

  “Okay,” I teased, “I'd like to tell a few of them 'where to go.'” I said, laughing and rolling my eyes to break the tension between us.

  “Seriously,” I said, reaching out to touch her sleeve, “I appreciate it when you share ideas and options. It's just really upsetting when you try to correct and direct,” I said, hastening to add, “even though I know you have the best of intentions.”

  Pause.

  “I know you've been a Christian longer than me, but I am getting there. I will discover things as God reveals them to me. It's a process. And maybe, once in a while, I'll even have something to offer you, to build you up. Usually, I never feel I have anything to offer you.”

  Ashley's eyes shifted rapidly right and left, up and down, and finally came to rest on mine. “Are you calling me self-righteous?”

  I laughed. “Yeah, I guess I am.”

  Quiet.

  Then the air filled with the music of our laughter. After all, Ashley really is a mature Christian. She got up, walked around the table and hugged me, whispering in my ear, “I’m sorry. Forgive me?”

  This conversation was part of the changes I sought as I struggled to reposition myself in my relationships.

  A jagged splinter of early morning sunlight pierced the slit between the blackout curtains, poking me in the eye and waking me at last. I don't know how I knew, but without a doubt, I knew the time had arrived. Today was the day.

  After the morning coffee ritual, I poured a second cup into a travel mug and filled a water bottle for Kissme. Bundling up in a fleece-lined sweatshirt, jeans and a pair of thick, furry socks and hiking boots, I stuffed Kissme into her “I HEART MOM” sweater.

  The sun was shining, but the wind sliced through the layers of clothing and made me shiver. Tucking my mother under one arm, I nodded to Kissme, who flew out the door and beat me to the truck. I took inventory as I surveyed the pile on the seat. “Let's see: Mom, coffee, flowers.” Thanks to Chance, their fragrance filled the cab, “Miss Kissme and the Bible.”

  I tucked an old black and white photo—one I had a local glass company seal between two pieces of glass and then frame for me—under my Bible. It was a picture of Lefty, Starla, and baby Sunshine, taken just one hour after I was born. Lefty was beaming from ear to ear, my little face peeking out from a receiving blanket was pink and wrinkled with a tiny rosebud mouth, and Starla was gazing at the bundle in her arms with a mixture tenderness and radiant joy. It was irrefutable proof that I was once loved.

  We drove up a narrow, twisted and gutted dirt road high up above the old railroad town of Pulga. Winding ever upward, I would occasionally pause to admire a majestic tree and listen to the melody of the brook that splashed and danced its way parallel to the road. The wind would catch the watersong and whisk it away, scattering it across the mountains.

  I talked with Starla, Kissme, and God, then popped in a favorite worship CD and sang along, filled with the Spirit. Still, we drove until at last we arrived at a small white bridge that crossed the water beneath a crystalline waterfall.

  Getting out, I set about fastening the picture to the little bridge and then lovingly placed the flowers, bundled as if they were a baby wrapped in a blanket of white tissue, beneath. Drinking in the sound of the rushing water, the melody washed away the last of the rag-tag remnant memories that tried to intrude on the serenity of the moment.

  A yellow swallowtail butterfly sailed along, first pausing to drink on a wet boulder, then sipped from a tiny red flower that bloomed inside the sheltered cove where the water gathered before leaping down the mountain to the Feather River far below.

  Telling Kissme to stay in the truck, I hugged Starla to my breast as I carefully climbed over the rail and onto some rocks. Climbing down the rocks, I stepped easily onto a short deer trail that led to a pool at the bottom of the falls. It was calm and peaceful, out of the wind; but the rush of the water created its own mist and spray that swirled up softly, seeming to drench my face with kisses. Sliding open the lid, I saw my mother. Not the ashes or the dust, for ashes and dust they were, but I saw the flower child that once danced in the garden and did yoga to the rising sun. I saw her broomstick skirts, blonde hair that shimmered down her back, and laugh lines around azure eyes. She had been so young, so alive, and so very beautiful.

  “Good night, Mama. May the angels of God escort you to your destiny,” I whispered, releasing her into the rushing waters to begin her journey to the sea. The powder seemed to float and swirl, pausing in farewell. The yellow butterfly returned to hover for a time, before each of us went our different ways.

  CHAPTER 45

  Change was in the air. No doubt about it. Things were coming to an end, or maybe a new beginning, depending on your point of view.

  The wind chimes rang out in reckless abandon as the sizzling grip of an Indian summer continued to give way to cooler mornings and chilly nights. Lofty clouds scudded overhead casting magnificent displays of wind-swept blue and black shadows parading across jutting foothills. Jake brakes are popping, thuda-thuda-thuda-thuda, from the cattle trucks as they slow passing the observation point, hauling livestock down the canyon from summer pasture in the high country to winter pasture in the valley. Farmers look at the sky, students check their new class schedules, and I? I am looking at a fat gray squirrel, larger than a house cat, stockpiling acorns in the black oak not far from the deck.

  Amazing how fast the world can change. One day you are a little girl, walking home to your mother. An hour later, she will vanish from your life for the next three years. One day your heart is full, and you are happily married to the man of your dreams, and the next day a text message shatters the promise with the force of a deer flying through your windshield. One day you are a cop who dreams of finding sanctuary from a turbulent life in the wilds of Montana, and the next day, the dream is laid to rest with the man.

  Dead leaves swirled, piling up against the railing on the deck. They look so sad. Like mortal remains of dreams gone by, leaving behind only the memory of their beauty and their bounty.

  People at work are watching their inboxes for the dreaded pink slips as the county faces another round of budget cuts. Everyone is perched like vultures, preparing to either take flight or feast on the remains of the newly unemployed. This has become an annual event as we wait for the county administrators to decide our fate.

  But today is Sunday, and I am sitting here wondering if church will come to me.

  “Good afternoon, Sunny!”

  Kissme flipped out, as little dogs will do; thoroughly embarrassed at being caught cat-napping and giving me heart palpitations as I snapped from my contemplations back to reality and the friendly face of Pastor Mac.

  “Didn't mean to startle you like that; guess you didn't hear me pull up or knock on the door.” My pastor climbed the steps up to the deck and crossed the distance to give me a warm, heartfelt hug that quieted my heart and silenced the dog.

  “When you asked me to stop by after church, I had this crazy idea you were actually going to be at church. So what's up, sister? You looked like you were a few light years away.”

  “Sorry. Would you like a cup of coffee?” I asked, knowing he loves coffee almost as much as I do.

  “Love one! But don't get up.”

  “I wasn't going to.” I teased. “Through
the door to your left, there's coffee on the counter and half & half in the refrigerator. Oh,”—I held out my empty cup—“would you mind filling mine while you're at it?”

  I could hear Mac laughing as he made himself at home. I always like that, when people come to visit. No entertainment required. We are all just family and friends.

  “Here you go,” he said, stepping back outside and handing me a cup, and settling into a chair across from me.

  One of the many changes I was going through was the realization that I had nothing left to hide—and nothing left to lose. So I hugged my cup, dropped my eyes and took a cleansing breath.

  “A lot of bad things have been happening to me, Mac. I guess I want—I need—absolution.”

  Astonished, Mac tucked in his chin, lifted his brows, and drew his cup tight against his chest.

  “My job is in jeopardy, and my leg still hurts from the snakebite because I went to the cabin when I shouldn't have. My mom died because I left her unattended while I rushed to save her soul. I was getting close to Chance, and now we aren't even talking. The other night a woman came to me for advice because I was a Christian, then ran out in tears when I said a lot of mean, hurtful things. I feel terrible. I am ashamed and I feel guilty. Mac, I know God is punishing me for being such a fool. And I know I deserve every—”

  Mac interrupted. “Stop! No more.” His expression tightened with concern.

  I have become nothing more than an artesian well for an endless supply of tears that push their way to the surface. “I'm sorry,” I whimpered as tears spilled from my eyes.

  “It’s okay, Sunny. Take a deep breath. I need you to listen. We'll take it slow.” We both took deep breaths. Mac gathered his thoughts like the squirrel harvesting acorns. “I need to ask you something.”

  “How is it possible that you have sat in my church... for, what? about three years now? and you never heard me read the Bible verses that clearly state; God has already forgiven you.”