Chapter Thirteen
Jake
After dropping Kristen off at her tiny little apartment block, I drove around the neighborhood a couple of times. I don’t know why I did; I suppose it was because I knew that Noah would be sleeping and I needed to calm down a little bit.
I wasn’t wired or anything. I just had this little surge of adrenaline running through my system that was making me think of things I hadn’t really thought about in years. I kept remembering the way Kristen’s white blouse had opened a little at the neckline every time she leaned in. It was a modest amount of cleavage that I’d glimpsed, but it had been enough to get me a little hot under the collar.
I hadn’t been that affected by a woman’s cleavage since Daphne. And that was at the beginning of our marriage. I remembered the first time Daphne and I had had sex. She had entered my bunk one night while my bunkmate had been at dinner and climbed into bed with me. She had undressed me silently, and then we had fucked quickly before we could be interrupted. Then she had climbed off me, gotten dressed, and disappeared from my room.
The memory had held me through some tough nights when we had been separated over the first few years of our career. But now, it brought my only sadness. It felt like a lifetime ago—and it felt as though the girl who had snuck into my room just to seduce me had disappeared long before her death.
Kristen’s neighborhood was kind of homey, but there was raggedness about it, as though it were trying to straighten itself out, but the effort was too much. I wondered why I was so interested in her life all of a sudden. She had been my secretary for months now, and I had never felt the need to know more about her. I realized with a start that dinner tonight had been a pivotal shift for me.
Now she was not just my secretary. She was a fully formed person, with a past and a story and a bag full of history that had followed her here from Michigan.
A part of me knew it had been a mistake to take things so personally. She had called me Jake all evening, and I had accepted the change happily. It felt nice and familiar, and I realized how much I had missed that. When I couldn’t stall anymore, I drove back to my apartment, comparing it mentally in my head to Kristen’s. Mine was huge and spacious and even extravagant if you put them side-by-side. I decided not to think about that.
I heard the television running when I walked in. The moment I set my keys down on the table, Janet turned it off and stood up.
“Jake,” she said. “You’re here.”
“I hope I’m not too late,” I said, taking pains to be polite.
“I actually expected you to be later than this,” she replied.
“Listen, Janet,” I said. “About the last time… I’m sorry I gave you a hard time about leaving. You cleared it with me beforehand, and I should have remembered.”
She seemed pleasantly surprised by my apology, and I realized that my dinner with Kristen had vastly improved my mood and my attitude.
“Thank you for that,” she nodded.
“How’s your father?”
“He’s doing as well as can be expected,” she replied. “But the chemo is difficult for him. I think he just likes having family there with him: helps make it a little easier.”
“Of course,” I nodded. “I can’t imagine what you’re going through.”
Janet’s eyes glazed over for a moment and she looked a little distant, as though she were remembering something from long ago. “It’s funny how life is, isn’t it?”
“Funny?” I asked, taking a cue from the expression on her face. “Or tragic.”
Janet smiled. “I suppose I mean both,” she said. “Can I ask you a question?”
“Sure.”
“It’s a really personal one.”
I felt reluctance almost immediately, but I sensed that she was in need of some conversation and was seeking me out because I was particularly qualified to handle this question.
“Go ahead,” I said at last.
“What went through your head when you heard your wife had died?”
I knew it was going to be a question like that. I was silent for a long time. “I can’t quite describe it,” I said finally. “I know that probably sounds like a cop out, but the truth is…you don’t feel much of anything at first. At least, that’s how I felt when I heard. I lived in a different apartment at the time, and Noah was crawling around on the floor when I got the call.
“I think I just zoned out for a while. My mind couldn’t process anything. I was just…a zombie for a couple of days.”
“How did you manage, with Noah?”
“I have an aunt who lives in the next state,” I admitted. “I left Noah with her for a couple of days and just drove.”
“Drove?” Janet repeated. “Where?”
“Anywhere,” I said. “I spent the night in cheap motels, and when I couldn’t find a motel, I just slept in my car. There were moments when I wasn’t sure I was even going back.”
“How long did you stay away for?”
“Five nights, six days,” I replied. “Which was two nights longer than I said I’d be away for, so my aunt was beside herself with relief when I showed up a few days later.”
“What made you come back?”
I raised my eyebrows at her. “What else?” I said. “Noah—he’s the only reason.”
“When did you start getting over it?” Janet asked.
I sighed. “Sometimes I still don’t know if I’m over it. Sadness catches you on odd days. You just have to keep going, endure, and survive. At first, you do it for the people around you and in time…you start doing it for yourself, too.”
“I keep trying to prepare myself for his death,” she said in a deadpan voice that haunted me for a moment. “I keep telling myself that it’ll hurt less if I do.”
“It won’t hurt less,” I said bluntly. “Daphne was in the army; I was in the army. Death was a part of our lives. We came to expect it. But when I was told that she was gone, it still felt like…”
“Like?”
“Like nothing was real anymore,” I said, wondering if I made sense.
“I get that feeling now,” Janet said, in a hushed voice. “I’m with Dad during his chemo, and sometimes I look over at him and see his stooped frame, his bald head, the lines across his face, and… It doesn’t feel real. It’s like I’m in some sort of bad dream.”
“You have a sister, don’t you?”
“An older sister and a younger brother,” Janet replied.
“So, you have a support system,” I said. “That will help you get through it.”
She nodded silently, and we just stood there in my living room, standing opposite one another for a few moments. Then a car backfired somewhere outside, and it seemed to break the spell we were under. Janet transformed back into my babysitter, and her tone went from sad and dreamy to curt and to the point.
“Noah is in bed asleep,” she told me.
“He ate dinner?”
“Yes,” she nodded.
“What did he have?”
“Burger patties and bread.”
I knew the patties she was talking about. They were the processed ones that they stockpiled at the supermarkets for like a dollar fifty. I pursed my lips but decided not to say anything to her. It’s not like she made the attempt to change in any case. “Was he okay today?” I asked. “Did he ask where I was?”
“He always asks where you are,” she said. “I told him you were working.”
“Right,” I nodded as I led Janet to the door.
“What happened with his leaf project?” I asked, remembering at the last moment.
Janet furrowed her brow. “I’m not aware of a leaf project.”
“Oh well… he might have turned that in awhile ago now,” I said, realizing that I wasn’t as involved in my son’s life as I should have been.
Maybe that was the reason he had felt so free to confide in Kristen only hours after meeting her. Maybe she had displayed the interest that I hadn’t the time to show. The thought provoked me to ask a question of my own.
“Janet?” I said. “I have a kind of personal question to ask of you, too.”
“I suppose that’s fair,” she said. “Go ahead.”
“Do you actually like this job?”
I could tell that she hadn’t been expecting the question. She paused for a long time, and I knew I had my answer then.
“It pays my bills,” she said finally.
It wasn’t the answer I had wanted to hear, but I appreciated her honesty. “Goodnight, Janet,” I said, as she waved goodbye and left.
I closed the door, sighing deeply, and walked to my couch. I felt utterly and completely drained, and it had nothing to do with work. The weight of all the emotionally-charged conversations I’d been having lately had started to wear on me.
After a few minutes, I got up and walked to Noah’s room to check in on him. He was sleeping soundly in his bed with the night-light on. I could see the faint glow of light fall onto the picture of Daphne that I’d placed by his bed. I wondered how she would feel if she knew I’d been on what was effectively a date tonight. I paused for a moment, realizing that my night with Kristen had very much been a date. At least, that was how it had felt to me. Maybe that’s why I had felt so…strange afterward.
“Would you have wanted me to move on, Daphne?” I asked quietly, to her frozen image. “Would you have been happy for me?”
I wasn’t quite sure. Given our line of work, we had actually discussed certain things about our individual futures during our early marriage.
“If I died, would you remarry?” Daphne had asked one day while we had been lying in bed.
“That’s a morbid question.”
“Answer it, please.”
“No,” I had replied. “I would just pine for you for the rest of my life.”
She had laughed and kissed my nose. “Good boy.”
It was nothing more than a light-hearted conversation between young lovers confident in their future and their mortality. Looking back now, I saw the cruel irony there.
Still, I wondered how Daphne would feel if I moved on with my life and remarried. I wasn’t even sure how I felt about it. I looked at my sleeping son and felt an ache in my chest. What I would give to see him have a mother...
I thought about Janet and how detached she was from Noah. He was a job to her and nothing more, which was why he had no real attachment to her. With Kristen, it had been different. Noah had taken to her immediately, and that made me wonder. Was I depriving him in some way? Was I underplaying the importance of a mother in his life?
I was confused, I was scared, but most of all, I was searching. I was searching for something that would give me the help I needed to do this job right because I couldn’t screw up with Noah. I had to be better than the average father because I was all he would have. Unless…
I stopped the vain hope in its tracks. There was no unless. I had to stop thinking about a future wife and a future mother for Noah.
This was what life looked like now, and I had to work with what I had. I just hoped Noah wouldn’t suffer for it.