Let Love Be Page 5

  Mike Jones, the captain on this tour, is waiting beside the rig, a look of surprise on his face when he catches sight of me.

  “Thought you left when Ramirez got in?” He slides his boots on and pulls up his bunker pants.

  I shrug my shoulders and offer to help out on the fairly routine run.

  “Yeah, come on along. I can go over some of your study material about updating service systems.”

  Watching the blur of Manhattan traffic pass me by, I realize that my fifty-pounds of gear will always offer more comfort than a “fancy” blue dress shirt ever will.

  When we get back to the station an hour later, I call Tessa but it goes straight to her answering machine. The thought of going to meet her and her friends at the restaurant is pretty much the least appealing idea I can come up with.

  Okay, it was shitty on my part not to get in touch with her. Letting my conscience get the best of me, I call the restaurant and leave a message with the maître d’ asking him to let Tessa know that I can’t make it. Sure, if I haul ass, I might be able to make it there in time to be bored to death by Marco’s stories of how much money he made in the stock market today, or of how Angelina needs to get her nails done. But something about spending the night with people with whom I have absolutely nothing in common is the last thing I want to do.

  I need to clear my head. Instead of going to dinner and instead of going home, I walk. There’s something calming about walking the city streets that soothes my soul. Some find it too chaotic and loud, but for me, it lets me focus on my thoughts.

  In the two hours I spend maneuvering through the foot traffic, I decide Tessa has no place in my future. She’s never understood my job − that it’s way more than just a job. It’s my life, my family. She has always struggled with the fact that my hours are crazy and my safety is not guaranteed.

  But looking back over our relationship since I’ve been injured, I realize what a terrible girlfriend she’s been. Even her reaction to seeing me in the hospital was telling. She was more angry than concerned. The fact that I was in pain, that my stomach had been burned and my arm had been broken, were second to her anger at “my stupid job.”

  Replaying that scene on a continuous loop in my head, I make the decision to end things with Tessa. There’s no sense in trying to revive a relationship that’s been dead for far too long.

  Since I have her key, there’s no need for her to buzz me up. It’s early yet, so I doubt she’s even back from dinner. I walk up the three flights and stare blankly at the 3A on her door. It’s not the aftermath that I’m dreading – honestly, I’m suddenly looking forward to being single. What I’m dreading is the hours that I’m going to waste trying to explain myself to her when I know that every single word I say will just fall on deaf ears.

  Sliding the key into the lock, I hear muffled sounds from inside. Shit, what if Marco and Angelina came back here with Tessa after I canceled on her? Apparently, I didn’t think this through all the way.

  I take a deep breath and figure I’m here already − no use is putting it off any longer. Except when I walk into the living room, no one’s there. Odd, I swear I just heard voices.

  Walking down the short hallway leading to Tessa’s room, I figure out where the sounds are coming from.

  I crack the door opened slowly, trying my best not to make any noise. The angry and lifeless laugh that escapes my mouth as I watch the scene before me makes me realize just how okay with this I am.

  When I clear my throat, the guy at least has the decency to stop drilling into Tessa. “Catch you at a bad time?” I arch an eyebrow and tip my chin at them sprawled out on the bed.

  Grabbing for the sheets to cover up, Tessa calls out “shit, shit, shit” in rapid succession. As the guy who was just fucking her stands up, I realize it’s Marco – the prick.

  As I stalk away from the door, I hear Tessa calling out to me. “Wait, Evan. I can explain.”

  I turn around so abruptly that she crashes into my chest. “What exactly do you plan on explaining, Tessa?”

  “I…it’s just… you said you weren’t going to make it… and then… things just happened.”

  “Things just happened?” I snarl with more anger than I thought I would have.

  She straightens her spine and looks me dead in the eye, venom suddenly replacing her sorrow. “Yes, Evan. Things happened because you weren’t there. You’re never there. I always come last to you.”

  I look her up and down, the crisp white of the sheet glowing against her bronze skin. “You sure do.” I open the door and stop on the other side to pull my key off the ring. “Here, you might want to give this to Marco.”

  Without a backward glance, I walk away from the only real relationship I’ve ever had, without carrying an ounce of sorrow or regret along with me.

  The next morning, I wake up with a raging hangover. Turns out drinking away your anger over a cheating girlfriend is only an effective solution in the short term.

  I stumble into the bathroom, take two Advil and turn on the shower. The hot water helps clear my head a little, but I still feel like shit. A bagel and some coffee settle my stomach somewhat.

  Flipping through the morning news channels, I realize that today is Thanksgiving. “Right, cause I got so much to be thankful for,” I snap back at the newscaster talking about the parade taking place in front of Macy’s.

  The phone rings a few minutes later, and even though I really don’t want to talk to anyone, the only person who would be calling me is my younger brother Joe.

  “Hello?”

  “Hey, Ev. Happy Thanksgiving, man.” I can hear his smile through the line.

  “Yeah, you too.” I rub my hand over my two-day-old stubble. Even though the pounding in my head is receding a little, the screaming wails from the baby through the receiver kills. I hear him shush his newborn daughter and my heart swells more than a little listening to Joe sweet talk his baby girl.

  “How is she?” I ask, a smile cracking across my hung-over face.

  “She’s really great. Sara’s been good too,” he adds making me feel like an ass for not asking about his wife.

  “That’s good. I’m happy for you.” We get lost in catching up – where they’re going for the holiday, how Katie is sleeping and eating, how Sara is keeping up with her medications.

  “So are the doctors worried about her depression getting worse?” Sara has always had mental health issues, and the doctor has only recently diagnosed her with mild depression. Afraid that it would only get worse after the baby was born, Joe made her promise to get treatment right away.

  I hear a door close and what sounds like Joe flopping onto a bed, the sheets crinkling in the background. “It might be more than depression. At least that’s what this one doctor says. So we may have to get a second opinion, but she’s actually willing to go, which is a huge improvement from before.”

  “Geez, Joe. Why didn’t you tell me sooner? Is there anything I can do?” I know there’s nothing I can do, but I hate feeling useless. He lives a few hours away in upstate New York. I feel like a shit that I haven’t even been able to meet Katie yet.

  “No, we’ll be fine. I just wanted to keep you updated that’s all.”

  Before long, we end the call. Katie needs to be fed and I need to get ready to get in to work for my shift. I’m on at five, but I want to try to get in early to relieve one of the day guys so they can get home in time for Thanksgiving dinner with their family.

  I might not have a family of my own, but these men will always be my brothers.

  “Food’s on!” I yell out through the loudspeaker. A sea of blue uniforms floods the kitchen area. It’s almost comical, but at the same time, I’d expect no less. Since it’s the hour where shifts are overlapping, there are more people in the room than usual. The volume is louder than that of normal conversation and the laughter fills up the space.

  Slowly, the noise fades away as everyone steps to the sides of the room. Since I’m behind the high-top
butcher-block counter, carving the last of the turkey, I don’t see him right away. In fact, I don’t even know he’s in the room until I hear his voice.

  “Hey, old man!” Brody calls out as he wheels up to the counter.

  My gut twists into knots of guilt. I nearly lose it when I see Brody’s father standing behind him, his hands resting on the handles of the wheelchair.

  “Still a wiseass, I see.” I pump his hand and squat down next to him. “It’s real good to see you, Brody.”

  “You too, man.” I stand, my knees cracking on the way up. Maybe he’s onto something with this “old man” shit he keeps harping on about.

  “Mr. Callahan, it’s good to see you again, sir.” I shake his father’s hand and offer him something to eat.

  “Kyle, call me Kyle.” I nod as he adds, “Thanks, but we’re actually on our way to dinner, but we wanted to stop in and pay you all a visit.”

  He clears his throat, calling the attention of the room – not that he needs to. Everyone’s eyes have been glued to both him and Brody since they walked in.

  “I just wanted to say thank you,” Mr. Callahan scans the kitchen, making eye contact with as many people as possible in the process. “There are no words to express the debt of gratitude that my wife and I owe you for everything you’ve done for our family,” he claps a hand on Brody’s shoulder before adding, “for everything you’ve done for our son.”

  When the round of applause dies down, Brody speaks up. “Now, I don’t want you all to think you’re rid of me now. I’m working on something down at The Rock. I’m not making any promises or anything like that, but you might be sitting on the other side of a desk taking notes from me one day.”

  The Rock is what we all call our training headquarters out on Randall’s Island. Right next to a landfill, it reeks of garbage, but that’s where we all start out. If Brody could work there, maybe training new cadets, that would be really amazing.

  I walk Mr. Callahan and Brody to their wheelchair accessible van parked out front. “It was good seeing you, kid. I…” My apology for letting him down dies on my lips.

  “Hey, you still think about studying?” Brody asks so abruptly I can’t help but wonder if he doesn’t want to talk about it either.

  “Yeah, I actually just started last week. There’s a test in the spring. Why do you ask?”

  “Feel like having a study partner?” There’s caution in his words. It’s clear he doesn’t want to be a burden, but it’s inspiring he’s not letting his accident get in the way of him moving forward.

  “Sure thing. I’ll be in touch this week.” I shake his hand as he smiles up at me.

  It doesn’t alleviate all of my guilt, but knowing I can help him in some small way, makes my head swim a little less, makes the knots in my gut loosen just a bit.

  It’s been two months.

  I’ve spent the last sixty-three days, eleven hours and twenty-seven minutes without Jimmy.

  But I also started a different count.

  It’s been seven weeks – forty-nine days, six hours and four minutes - since Melanie was born.

  I still sleep on his pillow, hugging his shirt. It’s starting to smell less like him and more like Melanie. There’s still some cologne left in the bottle on his side of the bathroom counter. It has its own gravitational pull, beckoning me to pick it up and inhale the woodsy, clean fragrance every time I walk past it.

  I think Melanie is getting used to the scent as well, falling asleep easier when something of her dad’s is next to her.

  Melanie’s still asleep and like usual, I fought sleep all night long. Waking in the pre-dawn hours of uneasy solitude, I find myself talking to Jimmy, gazing out at the fading stars.

  “Your parents moved down to Florida just last weekend. It was too painful for them up here. Even though they said it was about the cold weather, I saw the anguish in your mother’s eyes when she held Melanie. She looks just like you, Jimmy.” I ghost my fingers over the framed wedding picture on my nightstand. Tracing the lines of his face, I’m already starting to forget the scratchiness of his day-old stubble. “I made Linda move out too. I know, I know. You’re probably thinking that I’m being my usual crazy, stubborn self, but I just had enough of her waiting around for me to break.”

  The real reason was because she was pushing me – too hard, too fast – to do things that I just wasn’t ready for at the time. Clean out his closet, donate his clothes, pack up the only remnants I have of my husband – things I’m not sure I’ll ever be able to do.

  The sun pops up over the horizon, spilling out across the sky, the colors of candied oranges. Melanie wiggles restlessly in her bassinet. Laying my hand across her back calms her. I tuck her back in and decide that I should shower now, while she’s still asleep before the day gets away from me.

  Glancing out the window one more time, I catch the sun billow up into the aqua-colored sky. “I’ll talk to you again later, Jimmy. Love you, babe.”

  Inwardly, I laugh a little at my coping mechanism. Sure, some might say it’s a bit off kilter, a bit crazy, but it’s helping.

  As the steam from the hot spray fills the room, I test the water and slide the glass door closed. Jimmy’s stuff is still in here too – his shampoo and shave gel. I haven’t been able to bring myself to throw anything of his out. Like his cologne, I am drawn to the clean, masculine scent of his soap, unable to resist bringing the bar up to my nose every time I shower.

  Rubbing it in my hands as I build it into a lather, I wonder how long this bar will last before I open up a new one. How long will the package under the sink last until I add it to the shopping list – buying soap for the husband I no longer have.

  Shaking away my depressing thoughts, I finish in the shower and get ready to face my day with Melanie.

  Just because I kicked her out, doesn’t mean Linda actually stayed away. She just doesn’t sleep here now. I guess I should have known better.

  But when I hear her car pull up into the driveway and her key twist in the lock, my heart lightens a little knowing I won’t be completely alone today.

  “Hey, I brought bagels and coffee,” she calls out as she closes the front door behind her. When she walks into view, I press a finger up against my lips and point up over to the bassinet in the living room where Melanie is napping after her morning bottle.

  We open our bagels and sip our coffee in somewhat stilted silence. It’s been like this since I came home from the hospital – awkward, strange, like I’m waiting for something to happen, waiting for someone to tell me that I should do something, anything.

  “So what’s on the agenda for the day?” Lin’s got some serious mind-reading skills.

  I sigh and lean back in my chair. “I don’t know. I mean what am I supposed to do?” I know what she’s getting at. She thinks I should be cleaning out Jimmy’s things.

  She scans the clean, almost sterile living room. “Wanna get a Christmas tree and do some decorating?” The words “it might help lift your spirits” are on the tip of her tongue and I love her for taking a sip of her coffee instead.

  Ironically, even with all my day counting, I didn’t piece together it was time to decorate for Christmas. I also didn’t realize until just now that this is Melanie’s first Christmas. So, as much as I may have been ready to throw the holiday to the side and continue to mourn, the sense of obligation to give my daughter the Christmas she deserves weighs heavily in my heart. Of course, she won’t remember anything, but I don’t ever want her to be short-changed because of Jimmy’s death.

  I surprise the crap out of Linda when I agree to her plan. I know it won’t change my mood all too much, but it’ll get me out of the house. It’ll give me a reason to do more with my day than just cry and take care of Melanie.

  We time our trip to the store around Melanie’s feedings, leaving right after giving her a bottle and coming home just in time to hear her cries of hunger once again.

  “You take her and I’ll bring in the rest of the stuf
f.” Linda drops a handful of shopping bags, filled to the brim with ornaments and tinsel, before returning to the car for more.

  After warming her bottle and sitting on the couch, I stare vacantly at the lifeless living room sprawling out before me. “Your daddy loved Christmas, you know?” Of course, Melanie doesn’t answer. She just slurps away at her bottle, fingers curling tightly around mine.

  “Oh, he did. He would already have this place decked out and lit up, having everything just so, perfect, like he was.” I nod down at Melanie as if she actually understands what I’m saying.

  Linda’s hand falling to my shoulder from behind the couch startles me from the conversation with my daughter. “I’m so sorry, sweetie,” she says as she slides next to me on the sofa. “I didn’t mean to make this a sad day. I just… I wanted to give us something to do, something to distract us from Jimmy not being here, not make you think about what it was like when he was here.”

  “I know you didn’t, Lin. But there’s no avoiding it. Everything reminds me of him, so there’s no way around it.” We exchange a sad look; her eyes are filled with sympathy.

  Hoisting Melanie up on my shoulder, I pat her back a few times. After she burps, I hand her over to Linda. “I might not know how to move on just yet. Hell, I may never know how to move on, but I can’t let it hold me back. I have to be there for her.” I brush my knuckles over Melanie’s baby-soft cheek. “Just because I’m no longer a wife, doesn’t mean I can stop being a mother.”

  “I wish you could still be both,” she adds with so much sadness that it squeezes at my heart.

  “Me too, Lin. Me too, but this is just how it is.” Though there’s a hint of confidence in my words, they’re really just as fragile as my soul.

  I take Melanie from Linda, wrapping her in a blanket and tucking her in for a nap. Thinking about how excited Jimmy would be to decorate for Melanie’s first Christmas reenergizes me somewhat. I pop in a holiday music CD, keeping the volume low enough so it doesn’t wake Melanie and ask Linda if she wants any hot chocolate.