Days became night became days. Thoughts filled the void. This new antechamber of purgatory allowed no wiggle room for distraction.
While she lay awake, staring, while Darius read in his rich voice, while Mrs. Tandy played Angry Birds, Marianne’s mind wandered. Roved endlessly in search of thoughts to lasso. And what she discovered one morning as she watched light creep around the edges of the curtains and listened to birds heralding another day might have been the ugliest truth of all.
For decades she had sought excuses, and medicine delivered: You need to live within your psychiatric means, Marianne. Gotta love scapegoats: blame the pills, blame the doctors, blame Gabriel for leaving her alone with Simon. Demonize her illness. Blame everyone but herself. Because to blame herself meant to revisit decisions made in the months prior to her baby’s death. Decisions made of her own free will. She had released herself from complicity. Had given her past a Viking funeral, pushed it out to sea on a burning boat and said, “So long.”
Events leading up to that night on the A428 had come from one starting point: the first time she slept with Simon. And she wasn’t manic or hypomanic when she made that colossal mistake. She was bored. Mania didn’t destroy her chance at motherhood, teenage boredom did—a stupid, secret game started with Simon because she had no one to play with.
Clean out of scapegoats, Marianne sat up, slowly. Darius was asleep in the other bed: on his back, arms flung out, hair spread across the pillow. He was snoring through his twice-broken nose. He’d never told her how the first breakage occurred—ex-wife, no doubt—but the second break had been caused by a singer throwing a mic.
Quietly Marianne got up, tiptoed to the bathroom, and peed. When she pushed back up to standing, her legs wobbled. As she clasped the sink, she accidentally glanced in the mirror. Defeat and neglect stared back. She had committed the number one sin of the deranged: allowed her illness to define her, to whisper, “Give up the fight.”
But she wasn’t her illness, and manic-depression was not responsible for the worst decision of her life. She had tried to reinvent herself by leaving the past behind and never looking back—until the accident in February.
Reinvention wasn’t acceptance. It was denial.
Marianne leaned closer to her reflection. Bad enough that she’d given up on herself—and all that meant for Jade and Darius—but she gave up on EmJ, too. Worse, her inaction allowed the memory of Emmajohn Peel to disappear into statistics. A young woman committed suicide and no one cared. Almost no one had come to her funeral.
But she cared, and today she would find words to express that.
Gripping the sink tight with her left hand, Marianne gave defeat the finger. Then to make sure he’d gotten the message, she stuck out her tongue.
After she climbed back into bed, exhausted from being a rebel for the insane, she lay awake, watching and waiting. When Darius opened his eyes and looked straight at her, she whispered, “I love you with all my heart.”
When was the last time she had said those words and meant them?
FORTY-TWO
JADE
Jade was about to say, “From the top, guys,” but the singer, who’d chewed off his nails between each take, was now picking apart the rip in his jeans, thread by thread. Would it be totally out of order to offer him the Xanax she kept in the control room for Darius? Or Sasha could run to the touchy-feely gift shop on Weaver Street and buy some scented candles. Or Zeke could offer the dude a foot rub. He’d certainly kneaded the tension knot in her shoulder into melted butter.
“How are you feeling in there?” Jade spoke into the talkback mic. “Want a beer break?”
The singer looked up and smiled. Bingo.
She turned to Sasha to say, Take my wallet, but the control room door was wide open. Jade glanced through the plate glass into tracking room B, and there was Sasha, taking drinks orders. Zeke came up behind her and discreetly squeezed her butt. Sasha smirked at him. Fantastic. What the hell would happen to the studio chi when that little tryst went kaboom?
Jade pulled out her phone and called England. By now AT&T probably owned her soul, her savings, and what was left of Ernie. Gabriel picked up straightaway.
“You sitting on top of the phone?” Jade said. Since God hadn’t listened when she’d asked Him, sweet as pie, to lobotomize the part of her brain that insisted she was in love, Jade had developed a new ploy for making it through phone calls with Gabriel. She concentrated on images from the movie This Is Spinal Tap, when the drummer spontaneously combusted on stage.
“I didn’t want to wake Marianne,” Gabriel whispered.
“You think she’s asleep?”
“I insisted Darius take a night off and go to the pub with Hugh. I’m Marianne-sitting from the bottom of the stairs, but Darius left the bedroom door open. I’m checking to make sure”—his voice got quieter—“yes, her room’s still dark.”
“She is going to snap out of this, right? I mean, I know it’s been eleven days, but Darius is husband of the century. He wouldn’t let anything happen to her. Right?”
“Jade, he continues to win my utmost admiration, but what happens next is not up to Darius. Only Marianne can find the will to fight. The decision is hers alone. But she did talk to Darius this morning. I think that’s the only reason he agreed to go out.”
“I’m scared.” She hadn’t said that aloud before, but now it was September. Marianne’s mental collapse, or whatever it was, had sucked up the entire summer. October wasn’t far off, and that was never a good month for Marianne. What if she couldn’t pull up from the nosedive before then?
“I know you’re frightened.” Gabriel paused. “Honey.”
To hell with the exploding drummer. “Did you just call me honey?”
“Indeed, and it worked. You’re laughing. Although I have to say, I find it a very empty endearment.”
“What would you use?’
“I’m old-school. It would have to be darling.”
Jade started to groan and turned it into a fake cough. “Allergies, sorry. We get them year-round in North Carolina. It’s total shit. Must stock up on antiallergy meds.” Maybe love was an allergy. If only there was a pill for that. “What happens next?”
“That, my dear Jade, is the question.”
Dear. Where did that fall on his endearment spectrum—anywhere close to darling?
“Hugh thinks some sort of fund-raiser for teens in crisis might help the band members heal. To be honest, I’m worried about Matt, the drummer. His parents have him on lockdown, although his mother has allowed me to visit. He’s made bad decisions, but I believe he cared deeply for EmJ. I don’t want him to carry this guilt for the rest of his life.”
His voice had hardened, and he was no longer whispering.
On the other side of the glass, Zeke sat on the floor and rolled a joint. The band members formed a circle around him. Therapy Zeke-style. Maybe she should start getting stoned. Medicinal marijuana for the pain of love?
“Do you think an event with music could help Marianne heal?” Jade said.
“I’m out of ideas at this point.” Shuffling noises came down the phone. “Jade, I’ll have to call you back. Marianne’s out of bed.”
FORTY-THREE
MARIANNE
She blinked, the light coming up from the downstairs hall too bright. Gabriel rushed toward her but stopped with one foot on the top stair and one on the landing. His hand shot to his throat. An oddly self-defensive gesture that protected his jugular.
“I don’t bite.” Her voice came out croaky and rusty. Not even Darius could fix that sound.
Gabriel frowned. “Do you need something?”
“A new mind? You not to look at me with fear?”
“I’m concerned, not afraid.”
If she had the energy, she’d call him a liar. But that might lead into a discussion about the words my darling Nightjar.
“Did your skin heal where I clawed at you?” she said.
“Gracious.” He rub
bed his arm. “That was nothing.”
Liar. She turned, and Gabriel moved quickly, blocking her path.
“Sorry if we disturbed. Jade was checking in. She’s worried about you, as we all are.”
“I need to get back to bed. I’m feeling a bit shaky.”
“Absolutely.” Taking her elbow, he guided her back to the bedroom doorway. “Wait there a minute.”
He straightened her bedding and puffed up her pillow while she leaned against the door frame. Standing took such effort, such concentration.
“You were talking to Jade about a fund-raiser for EmJ?”
“An idea Hugh and I are batting around.” He started to smooth out her bottom sheet and then jerked back his hand. Had he discovered it was still warm? “Would you like to be part of the discussion?”
“Discussion takes work. But could we talk tomorrow?”
“Absolutely.” A second absolute. Gabriel had always thought, talked, and acted in black and white: This is right, this is wrong. If they played their old game with daisy petals—He loves me, he loves me not—where would it stop?
“Are you going to tuck me in with your old Winnie-the-Pooh hot-water bottle?”
“Heavens, no. I don’t lend him to just anyone.”
Finally he sounded like Gabriel, but she couldn’t read his eyes in the darkness. She shuffled toward the foot of the bed and dragged herself up to the pillows. With a grunt, she flopped down to watch the shape in her doorway, lit from behind.
He buried his hands in his pockets. “Need anything? How about a hot chocolate?”
“No, but thanks. I’m going to take the sleeping pill Darius left out.”
“Right. Night, then.”
“Gabriel?”
He bobbed back into the doorway.
“Next time Jade calls, I’d like to talk to her.”
“Excellent plan,” he said, and pulled the door shut.
When she woke, having apparently slept through until dawn—rare to not remember her dreams or wake up to pee—Darius was snoring, and the room smelled faintly of pub. She sat up and wiggled her toes on the prickly short-pile carpet. Slowly she stood and walked to the bathroom, this time avoiding the mirror.
“Would you like to be part of the discussion?” Gabriel had asked.
Yes, she would. But a fund-raiser was a nebulous event that took planning. Took energy. And her brain hadn’t done much work in a while. The only thing it told her right now was to go outside and see the day wake up.
She tiptoed back to the bedroom, found a pen and a piece of paper, and scribbled a note: “Need fresh air and a clear head. Going for a short walk. Don’t send out the cavalry. Back soon. Love you.”
Angling the note toward Darius so he would see it the moment he opened his eyes, she secured it with the alarm clock. Then she pulled on a cardigan and a pair of jeans and picked up her flip-flops. She went to the door, hesitated, and returned to the note, tacking on a row of kisses and a lopsided heart. Definitely fatter on one side than the other.
Downstairs she found Gabriel’s green-and-gold baseball cap for the Northampton Saints, his favorite rugby team since they were kids. Everything about Gabriel traced back to childhood.
Holding her breath, she stumbled as she eased open the front door and then clicked it closed. Damn meds had stolen her stealth. Sneaking out of houses in her teens, she was quieter than a cat burglar. Gabriel had been the heffalump.
She walked slowly, head lowered. A local celebrity, the lunatic who’d caused two scandalous deaths. When she left Newton Rushford this time, it would be for good. No way was she game to leave her mark on village history with another repeat performance.
The part of the A428 that became the High Street was deserted.
Memories swirled: pedaling frantically down the broken white line at two a.m., leaving Gabriel behind. He’d never joined her in the middle of the road, preferring to cycle where he should—at the edge. She’d forgotten that about Gabriel, how he followed her lead but always hung back. How when mania began to consume her, he chose to walk away. But if he hadn’t, she might never have found Darius and Jade. Although Simon would still be alive. Was his death the price of her happiness? How could anyone—let alone an insane person—make sense of it all? Maybe Dr. White had been right all those months ago, and there was no reason. Or maybe everything that happened, including tragedy, concealed reason. And Dr. White needed to brush up on his Aristotle.
Down by the village green, a car door slammed and an engine revved. She stopped and waited as the car turned onto the A428, and then she watched its taillights heading for the spot that had changed her future. Or created it.
A flock of geese flew over in perfect formation, honking, and the church clock struck seven a.m. Marianne kept walking until she reached Puddings Galore, a place she had yet to scope out. But then she had no interest in things that tasted too sweet. It was the reason she liked English cream. No sugar spoiling the taste.
To her left, the war memorial pointed into the pale, clear sky where the outline of a crescent moon was still visible. Stepping closer, she stopped by the low black chain around the base of the plinth. It had been freshly painted and the stone of the Celtic cross scrubbed clean. The village took care of this memorial dedicated to the young men who had died for king and country in two world wars.
“‘Their names liveth forever more,’” she read aloud.
Unlike EmJ’s. And while she was on a riff about reason, how the hell could she find any in the suicide of an eighteen-year-old?
A robin sang, and a silent movie played in her mind: young soldiers enlisting for the front lines, getting on trains, traveling into battle. Living and dying in the inhumane conditions of the trenches in France. Then her mind flashed to the posters on the display in the back of the church. Posters for the women’s land army. How many of those women had seen their loved ones return with broken minds? Shell shock, the grandfather of post-traumatic stress disorder. Seemed she shared something with professional soldiers.
And so did EmJ.
Neither of them had signed up for their private wars. Conscripts, they were dumped down in their own trenches without ammunition. EmJ went over the top only to die alone in no-man’s-land. There would be no well-kept memorials for people like EmJ. No accolades or medals for their victories; no words carved into stone; no shiny commemorative plaques. But their deaths mattered, as did their courage. The courage to get out of bed and make it through another day. The courage to not slink off to America for a second time, leaving behind gossip and shame. The courage to keep fighting the monsters.
As always the Marianne Stokes strategy had been flawed, but facing the devil within had been a good, solid idea. Stopping her meds was the catastrophic mistake. Without them she couldn’t think straight. Tugging off the baseball cap, Marianne shook out her greasy, matted hair and walked back to the rectory. Once again she was going to stand up to the devil. But in front of a captive audience with her brain tanked up on meds. And this time she would be fully rehearsed and fully clothed.
It would be her memorial to EmJ.
FORTY-FOUR
DARIUS
He was finishing up the Cadbury chocolate he’d found in the fruit bowl when Gabriel shuffled through the kitchen door and threw a proprietary glance at the wrapper. Darius shoved in the last strip of milk chocolate with a flash of finders-keepers attitude. Given that warring factions of his psyche were slugging it out over his next move—steam-releasing visceral anger or old-fashioned spousal patience—the last thing he needed was grief from the vicar.
“Marianne still asleep?”
“My beloved went for a walk.” Darius swallowed hard, and a lump of chocolate stuck in his esophagus with a nice left hook. He swallowed again, making a strange gulping sound.
“Need a glass of water?”
Darius shook his head, and the chocolate started its slow descent into his churning stomach. Gorging on chocolate might not have been the best idea, but when you didn
’t drink, didn’t smoke, and didn’t do drugs, how else could you get a quick fix?
“Marianne left a note saying not to worry.” Darius shredded the chocolate wrapper. “This is me not worrying.”
“And chocolate is always an excellent choice for breakfast.”
That, apparently, said without sarcasm.
“According to the Huffington Post, if you eat the equivalent of twenty-two Hershey’s kisses a day, you lower your chance of heart disease and stroke. Not much of a facts-and-figures guy, but that’s a number I can live with. And the best part—it includes milk chocolate. I mean, no one really likes dark chocolate, right?”
Mail plopped through the slot on the front door and landed on the hall floor as a voice said, “Morning, Reverend!”
This place was ridiculously busy and chirpy. The amount of people traffic would do his head in if he lived here. A room of one’s own shouldn’t be the exclusive right of feminists.
“Do you have any idea when Marianne left?” Gabriel pulled out a chair and sat on the opposite side of the table. As far away as possible.
“That would be a negative. I was asleep.”
“And you’re not concerned that she’s gone walkabout after not leaving her bedroom for over ten days?”
Seriously? The guy didn’t think he was freaking out in a thousand ways amplified? Despite everyone’s best efforts, the offbeat vibe between him and Gabriel remained, and he wasn’t entirely sure why. It didn’t bother him that Marianne and Gabriel had been in love as teenagers—okay, so perhaps a teeny bit. But he was curious as all fuck to know how Simon fit into the picture. Did his wife have a fetish for brothers, or had the love triangle really been about Simon and Gabriel’s relationship?
No, it wasn’t the past that bothered him; it was the now. Gabriel protested a helluva lot for an innocent, and Marianne had said nothing at all. Did she keep the home fires burning for this guy? His mind skittered through a kid’s taunt: Marianne and Gabriel sitting in a tree, K-I-S-S-I-N-G.
“Look, by now you know that Marianne is my life, but marriage isn’t all nonalcoholic champagne and roses. I’m simply trying to respect her wishes.”
Echoes of Family Page 26