The Sweetheart Deal

by Polly Dugan

  It was hanging between the kitchen room and the living room spaces in a big green frame. The picture of my dad and the blow-dryer and our old freezer. Around it was a white mat with all kinds of writing on it. I walked closer to it so I could read the words. I love you, Leo. Love you, my brother. See you on the Top Floor. You’re with us every day. Keep us safe, Lion, just like always.

  No one was saying anything, and finally Brian walked up next to me to get a better look too. His whole body trembled, and I could tell he was crying even though he wasn’t making any noise. I was afraid he was going to punch me or push me away, but I moved closer to him anyway and reached up and put my arm around his shoulder, and he let me.

  Kevin walked away from the counter and stood behind us. “Brian,” he said. “We should have given it back to you. I’m so sorry we didn’t. It wasn’t ours to keep. I’m sorry you’ve been worrying about it. It’s my fault.” His voice was husky. “It’s such a great picture of your dad. We wanted it here with us so we could see it every day. But we had no right.”

  Brian managed to nod his head even though his body was still shaking.

  Kevin walked around us and took the framed drawing off the wall. “You take it home with you today. It’s yours. It doesn’t belong to us.”

  “You keep it.” Brian pushed out the words before he slipped out from under my arm and crushed himself against Kevin and sobbed.

  Garrett

  After Kevin and I had spent the day blowing in the insulation, we went to Kells. Kevin sat at his regular stool, and I sat on his other side, not on Leo’s.

  We were two beers in when I told him. I had to.

  “So something’s been happening with Audrey and me,” I said. “Like we talked about a while back. It started and it’s still going.”

  “I saw that coming.” He wasn’t surprised and I listened for judgment, but there wasn’t any. He looked at me. “Didn’t you?”

  “No,” I said. “I didn’t. But now, now I can’t imagine it not happening.”

  “You’re consenting adults,” he said. “Nobody else’s business. Do the boys know?”

  “I don’t think so,” I said.

  “You’d know,” he said.

  I drained my glass and waved to the bartender. I felt compelled to explain.

  “There’s something else,” I said. “Something nobody else knows.”

  “Something else?” he said. “What’d you do, propose?”

  “Shut up,” I said. “Listen.”

  He leaned back and raised his hands in surrender.

  “A long time ago, it was Y2K, I was here for a visit,” I said. “Leo and I got drunk and he told me he wanted me to marry her if he died. It was stupid. He made me sign this paper he wrote up. It was a joke. I still have the fucking thing.”

  “Man, that guy,” Kevin said.

  “Yeah, well, it stopped being a joke,” I said. “He shouldn’t be dead.”

  We both sat there and sipped our beers.

  “So you could say he gave you a kind of a permission slip,” he said. “A green light, if you will.”

  I shrugged.

  “Does she know about the paper?” asked Kevin. “You think that’s why you’re in your present situation?”

  I shrugged again. “I don’t know. I don’t think so. I think if she did, it would have come up. And I think if she found out now, she’d be pissed.”

  “Yeah,” he said. “I could see that. No question.”

  We were quiet.

  “You happy?” he said.

  “I guess,” I said. “As much as I can be given the circumstances.”

  “She happy?” he said.

  “I don’t know,” I said. “Sometimes she seems happier. Sometimes just less unhappy.”

  “So be happy,” he said. “Life’s too short. Nobody’s ever happy enough when they can be. You’ll be unhappy again soon enough.”

  “Right,” I said.

  “Well, I appreciate you opening up to me,” he said, laughing. “I think we’re growing closer.” His hand clutched my shoulder in mock comfort. “But I don’t think you’re any less burdened, my friend.”

  He was right.

  “Don’t sweat it—play the hand you’ve been dealt. You’re being a gentleman?”

  “Of course,” I said.

  “You can’t mess around here,” he said. “Audrey’s not someone you can have a fling with. I know I don’t have to tell you that.”

  “You’re right, you don’t have to tell me that,” I said, annoyed. “It’s not a fling, not for me.”

  “Good, good, sorry, just checking.” he said. “You’re all right.” He squeezed my shoulder again before he took his hand away. “But, Jesus, couldn’t he have picked someone who was good-looking at least?”

  Audrey

  Some days were better than others. The sex with Garrett brought comfort and guilt in equal measure, the way I imagined drinking did for a drunk. The very thing that eased the shame was what caused it in the first place. It was as infinite a cycle as the snake swallowing its own tail. I felt like I had put Leo’s death in a room and closed the door in order to do what I was doing with Garrett. But the room was always there to enter when I wanted to, and when I did and let myself miss him, and agonized over what I was doing, I wondered which kind of death was easier for survivors to heal from. The shocking loss of Leo in an instant, someone still so beautiful and strong and solid one minute and gone the next, dying alone, sent out of his life without anyone there to say goodbye? Or the prolonged dying some people endured, lingering and disappearing bit by bit, devastating the loved ones gathered around while they waited and hoped for the end to come as much as they wanted it not to, saying goodbye until they had no more goodbyes to say?

  And what about those tragically drawn-out deaths—when someone lingered for far too long, for years—and the still-married spouse, suspended in a purgatory between the life and death of their beloved, began a companionship, a conflicted romance with someone else, and nobody blamed them? Of course, there were people who blamed them—needing something to blame—but it usually wasn’t at all about the romance, but about their own reluctance to move on, their refusal to give up hope despite the undeniable evidence.

  I kept it from Erin. I had never lied to her, so it was a demanding task. To make it easier on myself, I eliminated or reduced the opportunities where it could come up in conversation and I’d be forced to lie to her. I told her I’d tweaked my knee and that until it was better I’d rather go to yoga than run. During yoga, we couldn’t talk, and I often met her at the studio instead of driving together. After class, if she had time, I invited her back to the house to visit. We couldn’t talk about Garrett with him right there. When she got the chance, she’d give me a look or ask on the fly, “You okay? Are things okay?” I’d look her right in the eye and keep my gaze even: “I’m good. Everything’s good.” I remembered a time when those words were the truth, and tried to sound convincing. I was pretty sure it worked when I could see the relief on her face and she said, “Okay,” and nodded, seeming satisfied. Aware of my own bald-faced dishonesty, I also considered that Erin could be letting me lie to her. I waited for her to push me beyond what I told her, and she never did.

  And some nights were better than others. The nights that were bad made the following days bad, because of my dreams. There were two recurring versions, and they kept me away from Garrett until the sobering memories wore off enough that I could be with him again.

  In the one dream, Leo and I are in bed, making love, and I can feel his lip between mine, and the weight of his body between my legs. In any number of ways, Garrett appears—walks through the doorway, sits in the chair in the corner, or, the worst, lies in the bed next to us—and after he sees what we’re doing, leaves the room. I only get a brief look at his face, expecting but not seeing any emotion. The only thing on dream-Garrett’s face is resignation and acceptance, the way someone might look leaving a restaurant in search of another after
learning their first choice has no available tables.

  In the other, I’m married to Leo but Garrett and I are together, very innocently; we never have sex. But I’m planning on it and we both know it’s going to happen. Because in this dream, although Leo is alive and we’re married, I’ve given myself permission to cheat on him, but only with Garrett. That’s my defense in the dream, although it never comes up between Leo and me. I’ve allowed myself to sleep with Garrett, because it’s Garrett.

  I still had an IUD, so when Garrett brought up that awkward but necessary matter, I told him it was taken care of on my end, but asked—I had to, given all his women—if I had anything to worry about with him, risk-wise, and he’d assured me I didn’t. Despite our discussions and my wanting him to after our family was complete, Leo had refused to get a vasectomy, to get cut, as he’d called it, like a bull or a stallion. I’m afraid, he’d told me, that it wouldn’t be the same. That I wouldn’t be. Nothing I could say would convince him, and while I knew his reluctance was based on fear, it still felt selfish to me. He hadn’t been perfect.

  So while I lied to Erin, and suffered the dreams and their aftermaths, I made an appointment to talk to Father John. He had said Leo’s funeral mass and called me in the weeks afterward. I thought about going to confession, but he would know it was me anyway, which was okay, but as much as I felt like I wanted to confess and be absolved—before repeating the same sin and getting absolved for it again the following week—I wanted to have a different conversation than what the confessional offered. Although he wasn’t a stranger, talking to him seemed far easier than talking to my best friend. A little distance for something like this wasn’t a bad thing. We met in his office one morning after I’d walked the boys to school.

  “I’m glad you called me,” he said. “You seem well.”

  “Thank you, Father, I do,” I said. “I know, seem well.”

  Father John smiled. “What you’re in the middle of takes a long time,” he said. “And while it will never fully end, you won’t always be in the middle of it.”

  I nodded.

  “First, let’s pray,” he said. We blessed ourselves and said the Hail Mary and Father said a prayer for Leo. Too late, I realized neither this meeting nor confession was going to offer the solace I’d hoped for.

  “I’ve been keeping an eye on Brian and Andrew,” he said. “How is Christopher?”

  “I’m proud of all of them,” I said. “They all have their moments, but I think they’re doing the best they can.”

  He nodded. “And you? What you must do is continue to move forward every day, the best you can, especially through the days that test you the most. Putting your faith in God is what makes that possible, and over time, easier.”

  “I’ve been doing that,” I said, and I had to an extent, but I had to intervene before he offered more theology than I could handle.

  “Father, I thought about going to confession,” I said. “My wanting to talk to you has to do with something I didn’t expect. I think you’ll find it unexpected as well.”

  Father John was a smart man, in addition to being a better priest than the ones I’d known growing up. He’d been an army chaplain and had lived around the world during his time in the service. He modeled a progressive parish; there were at least five same-sex couples I saw regularly at mass. I wanted to talk with the smart, worldly man who happened to be a priest, not the man whose job it was to spread the word of God.

  “I’m here to help,” he said. “Do you want to make your confession? We can do it here.”

  “No,” I said. “I don’t. I’m hoping we can just talk. There’s something I’m having trouble with, something I feel guilty about.”

  “It’s your call, Audrey,” he said. “What’s happening?”

  “Leo and I have a very good friend, Garrett,” I said. “He’s been Leo’s friend since they were Christopher’s age. He’s been here since February and he’s been a great help. Maybe you remember him from the funeral. He’s finishing the work on the house that Leo was doing, and he’s been wonderful with the boys. He’s really a very good friend. I’ve known him for a long time. But recently, our relationship has developed into something new, something intimate, and I’m feeling very bad about it. I know the church’s position on what we’re doing, so I’m sorry I’m in violation of that. But it’s really about Leo that I feel the worst.”

  I didn’t want a lecture, but if a lecture was what I was going to get, I had it coming. That certainly would have been a place for Father to start: intimate, not married, let’s talk about that. But there was nothing in the Commandments or the Bible that I knew of that addressed my particular problem.

  “Guilt is such a useless emotion,” Father John said. “If you told me what you’re feeling guilty about in confession and I absolved you, would it make a difference?”

  “No, I don’t think it would,” I said.

  “I’m not here to tell you what’s right and wrong and what you can and can’t do,” he said. “I think the only time guilt serves us at all is if it helps us go to great lengths not to repeat something we truly regret.”

  “That’s my conflict,” I said. “My relationship with Garrett feels like something good, but it’s too soon for it to be happening—plus I never would have expected our friendship to go in this direction. I feel guilty but I’m continuing it anyway.”

  “If you could name the exact reason for feeling guilty, what would it be?” he said.

  “I’m betraying Leo,” I said. “How can I not feel like I’m betraying Leo?”

  “Did you and Leo promise each other that if either of you died, you’d never remarry or love anyone else?” he said.

  “No, no we didn’t,” I said. “But it never came up.”

  “Was any of this with Garrett happening before Leo died?” Father John said.

  “No, of course not, no,” I said. “And Garrett’s not married. He’s never been married.”

  “That would be very different,” he said.

  “But it’s too soon,” I said again. “Garrett was his best friend. The irony, of course, is that I wish I could talk to Leo about it. And I have. I pray and apologize to him.”

  “Too soon. Too long. We all feel that way at some point, don’t we? More than we’d like to admit,” Father said. “You know, we’re on God’s time line; He’s not on ours. What comes to us sometimes, maybe even the answer to our prayers, often appears in ways and at times we wouldn’t consider ideal.”

  “I understand that,” I said. “I know. But knowing that doesn’t make me feel any less conflicted.”

  “Is your relationship with Garrett helping you live your most authentic life?” he said.

  I didn’t know how to answer that. I was keeping it from the boys and from Erin; that wasn’t authentic. “Father, nothing feels authentic since Leo died,” I said. “What I would call authentic no longer exists.” Father John’s question gave me pause.

  “Is this relationship with Garrett making you happy, holy, and healthy?” he said. “I’m not keeping a list—these are just things for you to think about. Not even criteria, but steps toward self-examination. It’s more productive than guilt.”

  The last thing Garrett made me feel was holy, but Leo hadn’t either, and I didn’t know if I’d ever felt holy. When the boys were born, those three times I had felt a sense of what was close to holiness, but it had existed outside of me.

  “That’s a tough one, Father. I’m sorry, I’m not trying to be a hard sell,” I said. “I think I am closer to happy and healthy than I would be without Garrett, but still those things feel a very long way off.”

  Father John nodded, like I was starting to give the right answers. “Love is a gift,” he said. “The love that you’re having now doesn’t eradicate the years of love with Leo. All God asks is that we’re good to each other, and that we love each other.”

  Love. I hadn’t said anything about love. Of course I loved Garrett, but there was love and there was
love.

  “Audrey, in my opinion you’re not betraying Leo, and you’re not betraying his memory either,” Father John said. “But it doesn’t matter what I think or what anyone else thinks or says. God forgives us no matter what, but it’s much harder for us to forgive ourselves.”

  I nodded.

  “You know, there’s a Kahlil Gibran quote that I think is very popular,” he said. “It’s from The Prophet. Do you know it, about joy and sorrow being inseparable?”

  “I do, yes,” I said. “It’s really lovely.”

  “It is,” he said. He got up and walked to his desk and took a frame off the wall. “But I think the piece is best in its entirety.” He handed me the frame, in which the poem was preserved.

  Then a woman said, “Speak to us of Joy and Sorrow.”

  And he answered:

  “Your joy is your sorrow unmasked.

  And the selfsame well from which your laughter rises was oftentimes filled with your tears.

  And how else can it be?

  The deeper that sorrow carves into your being, the more joy you can contain.

  Is not the cup that holds your wine the very cup that was burned in the potter’s oven?

  And is not the lute that soothes your spirit, the very wood that was hollowed with knives?

  When you are joyous, look deep into your heart and you shall find it is only that which has given you sorrow that is giving you joy.

  When you are sorrowful look again in your heart, and you shall see that in truth you are weeping for that which has been your delight.

  Some of you say, ‘Joy is greater than sorrow,’ and others say, ‘Nay, sorrow is the greater.’