A Vow to Cherish (18 page)

He bowed as he opened her door and made his voice prim and proper. “Good evening, ma’am. I’m John Brighton. I live right here at 245 Oaklawn. My wife, Ellen, lives at Parkside, and we have three beautiful children together.” He knew it sounded corny, but he wanted to make her laugh, to lighten the moment.

She rolled her eyes, then grinned up at him. Extending a hand, she followed suit. “Julia Sinclair. Nice to meet you, John.” She let him help her from the car, and followed him up the walk to the front door.

He unlocked the door and stepped back to let her in first. As he led her through the main rooms on the first floor, she admired the old house. They chatted cordially while John gave her a brief tour. While she oohed and aahed, he bragged about Ellen’s taste in decorating the house. It felt good to be open with her about Ellen, to not have to weigh his words so carefully.

“Would you like something to drink? Iced tea?”

“That’d be great. Don’t go to any trouble though.”

“No trouble. I made sun tea this morning. Do you take sugar?”

“Mmm. Sounds great. No sugar though, thanks.”

While Julia tried to reach Sam, John poured tea over ice in tall glasses and brought them into the living room.

Julia hung up the phone and reported that the boys were playing basketball, but Mrs. Baylor wasn’t sure where. They weren’t due back for another hour. Julia explained the situation to her and arranged to call back later.

“Why don’t we go get a bite to eat while we wait? There’s a great little diner just a couple blocks down the street.”

“Oh, John. You don’t have to do that.”

“I don’t
have
to, but I’d sure enjoy the company. You haven’t eaten have you?”

“Well, no.” She looked at her watch, then at him, her brow knitted. “If you’re sure you don’t mind.”

He smiled and jingled his car keys at her. “Let’s go. I’m starving.” He led the way to the front door, feeling happier than he had in a very long time.

A
t the café near John’s house, they ordered burgers and fries. Conversation came easier now that they’d cleared the air. Wanting to begin anew in complete honesty with Julia, John told her about the rough day he’d had with Ellen. He poured out the whole story from the beginning, concluding, “It’s just devastating to have her vent her rage on me. I honestly don’t think she has any idea who I am…. I know I shouldn’t take it so personally, but still, it’s hard not to. I feel so frustrated for her.”

The waitress brought their food and they picked at it in silence for a few minutes. It seemed neither of them were hungry after all—except for conversation.

Julia wiped her mouth on the paper napkin and shook her head sympathetically. “Oh, John, I just can’t imagine how awful it must be to have someone fade away before your eyes like that. You know, I was so angry because I didn’t get to tell Martin goodbye, but this must be so much worse. You have to say goodbye every day.”

Julia’s face softened, and John could hear in her voice that her kindness was genuine.

“That says it perfectly. I feel like Ellen has died over and over. In many ways it would have been easier if she had just suddenly died one day. This has been…I don’t know…a walking death, I guess. Ellen has been dying a day at a time. We’ve lost one thing after another, and I know it will continue that way, until finally, there’s nothing left at all. This is a terrible disease, Julia…it’s simply terrible.” He stared into his coffee mug, afraid of breaking down in front of her.

When he looked up, he saw there were tears in her eyes. He went on, emboldened by her attentiveness and sensitivity. “First I lost my confidante. Communication was always such an essential part of our relationship. Ellen and I talked all the time—about everything. There was nothing we couldn’t tell each other. It seems so cruel that one of the first things Alzheimer’s took from her was her ability to speak—or at least to speak sensibly.” John shrugged and shook his head, feeling anew his confusion at the way things had turned out.

“After that, things went downhill in a hurry. I lost my helpmate. Ellen was a teacher, and we frequently worked together on projects at school—things that involved the students. Only a year after she was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, she had to quit teaching. Of course, she’d had it much longer than that. We just didn’t know what it was. About the same time, I started doing all the cooking and shopping. We finally hired someone to clean when she couldn’t handle that anymore. Of course, eventually, we needed someone at the house all the time.”

He told her then about the awful day that Ellen had wandered off, and about the excruciating decision he’d had to make to put her in Parkside.

John struggled with how much he should say. Julia was so understanding that it was tempting to tell her more than he should. But he went on, avoiding her eyes. “Then I lost my lover. When Ellen didn’t know me anymore—or worse, when she thought I was her father or one of the boys—it just didn’t seem right to…well, you know what I mean.” He paused, overcome with emotion. Though he willed the tears away, his eyes burned with them. “When Ellen first moved to Parkside, at least she was still a companion to me. I could go and just sit with her. I felt it meant something to her…that I was helping her by being there. And it eased my loneliness, too. But now, I don’t even have that. I just don’t have any part of her anymore, Julia.”

“You still have the memories, John,” she said quietly.

He paused, thinking about her comment. “I do. We made some good memories. But I have to work so hard to conjure them up, it sometimes doesn’t seem worth it. The truth is, Ellen is a totally different person now. I feel as though my Ellen has been dead for years.”

“Oh, John.” Julia shook her head slowly. “I’m so sorry.”

“Alzheimer’s is a cruel disease. It has totally robbed Ellen of her personality. There’s nothing left of the old Ellen—the one I loved.” His eyes were unfocused, staring into the face of the past. He tried to remember now, and the remembering was easier because Julia was there to share it.

“Ellen was funny and smart and strong. She loved to ‘debate,’ she called it—” he chuckled as he suddenly saw Ellen’s furrowed brow, and the expression she always wore during a good argument “—but she never held a grudge.”

His thoughts carried him to the past. “Ellen was such a good mother. We lost a baby at birth—our first—and I think Ellen treasured the other three that much more because of it. It makes me angry that she’ll never be able to see what our kids have become. We had so many plans for these years. We wanted to travel. She always wanted to go to Europe….” His voice trailed off again, remembering.

Julia didn’t try to fill the silence.

“I’m grateful this happened after the kids were grown and living away from home,” John said. “It would have been far worse to deal with it while they were still home. But, oh, I’d give anything if Ellen could see how happy Jana is…how much Brant likes his job…how excited Kyle is about student teaching. I think you probably understand more than anyone how the joy diminishes when you can no longer share these things with the one you love—the one with whom you gave life to your children.”

“I do understand that, John. I would never tell my children this, but when Martin died, it was as though their lives became a little less, somehow. It’s hard to explain, but their father was so much a part of them, and even though I see him in both of the boys, it’s not the same now that he is gone. It’s like he was the standard for comparison, and now there is no standard. Does that make sense?”

“I think so.”

“Martin was such a strong person. He wasn’t perfect, and I’ve tried to be careful not to put him on a pedestal like so many widows do. But he had a…a presence about him—a strength. The boys don’t have it, at least not yet. I think sometimes I fault them for that. Maybe it would have been easier if we’d had girls. Maybe I wouldn’t have expected so much from Martin’s daughters.”

“And maybe you would have expected more. One thing I’ve learned, Julia, is that it doesn’t pay to play the ‘if only’ game. It’s hard enough to get through what is, without worrying about what might have been.”

“I know you’re right. But that’s something I’ve always found difficult. I’m too analytical, I guess. And I do play the ‘if only’ game. Oh, I lay awake those first nights torturing myself. If only I’d insisted we get new tires on the car. If only I hadn’t told him that morning to hurry home…” She paused, obviously lost in her memories of the past.

John waited for her to come back from her reverie.

“I was so lonely—so terribly lonely. You know, when Martin went away on a business trip—even a long one—I often thought, ‘this isn’t so bad…I think I could survive as a widow.’ But I had no idea…
no idea
of the loneliness, the emptiness you feel when someone you love is gone forever from your life.”

She looked at John, her brows arched, as though a revelation had struck her. “That’s how it is with Ellen, isn’t it? She’s…she’s gone forever from your life.”

He set his jaw and nodded.

They barely touched their food, taking sustenance in the conversation instead. The waitress cleared their dishes away, and John paid the check. It was dark when they got in the car, and as they drove back to his house, talking of less serious things, John watched Julia’s expressions in the ebb and flow of the yellow light cast by the streetlamps they passed. With fascination, he saw her hands echo the words she spoke. He remembered now that it was one of the first things he’d noticed about her that day they’d first met in his office.

Back at his house, Julia called the Baylors again. She relayed to John that Sam was back, and he heard her make arrangements to meet him at their house.

When they pulled into Julia’s driveway ten minutes later, Sam wasn’t there yet, so they sat in the car and continued their conversation.

Julia began to talk again about the dreadful day Martin had been killed. Her voice was detached, as though she were telling someone else’s story. John could see by the faraway look in her eyes that she was reliving the day in her mind—going to school to get the boys…the horror of telling her sons that their father was dead.

“That was the most difficult thing I have ever done in my life. I went to Andy’s class first. I’m not sure why. Isn’t that strange? I don’t remember why I went there first.” Her voice rose with emotion and questioning, and she looked up at him.

Then her eyes glazed over again. “I remember Andy came bounding out of the classroom with a huge smile on his face—like I’d come to bring him a wonderful surprise or something. I—I don’t remember what I said, but I didn’t want to give him the news inside the school, so I made him come outside with me. Then he was
sure
I had a surprise for him. I must have been calm because he…he was babbling on trying to guess the surprise. He thought we had a new car. He guessed that we were going to visit his grandparents. He guessed a pony! A pony! I—I couldn’t make myself tell him to stop the guessing. And then…then I had to tell him his daddy was gone forever. I’ve never felt like such a traitor. I will never forget the look in his eyes….” Suddenly, her voice broke. She put her fist to her mouth, but the sobs came anyway. She wept bitterly, unable to speak.

John was overcome with compassion for her. He felt the well of tears behind his eyelids, hot and threatening to spill. Spontaneously, he leaned across the seat and took Julia in his arms. Tenderly at first, then with more insistence. Almost instinctively he took her face in his hands, felt the smoothness of her damp skin against his palms. Before she could wrestle free, he realized what was happening and backed away in horror at his own unbridled emotions.

“Oh, Julia. I am so sorry. Please, I didn’t mean for that to happen. I had no right—”

But she was already out of the car running for the front porch. He got out of the car and ran after her. Halfway up the steps he grabbed her shoulders and turned her toward him.

He looked straight into her eyes and spoke firmly. “Julia, I was wrong. I promise you that will never happen again.”

She was trembling. “It wasn’t just you, John. I’m guilty, too. And you’re right, it won’t happen again.”

They heard a car approaching, and John dropped his hands from her shoulders. The car slowed and turned into the driveway behind John’s car. Sam got out and waved as the Baylors backed out of the drive. Then he ran up onto the porch.

“Hi, Sam,” Julia said with obviously feigned cheeriness. “You know Mr. Brighton, the superintendent of schools? John, this is Sam.”

“Sure, I remember Sam.” John extended his hand.

Sam shook it, a questioning look on his face.

“I rescued your mom in the parking lot at Parkside. Seems she locked every key she owns in the car.”

“Yeah, that’s what Brian’s mom said.” Sam cocked his head, as though not quite sure he bought John’s explanation. “Well, thanks a lot for bringing Mom home. I’ve got my keys.” He waved them in the air as proof.

John turned to Julia. “Can I give you a ride back to your car?”

“No, thanks. You’ve done more than enough.” She winced.

John pretended not to catch the double meaning of her words, but he cringed inside, as he waved off her thanks. “You’re sure. How will you get to work in the morning?”

“I can catch a ride with a coworker. She just lives a couple blocks up the road.” She motioned toward the street. “I do appreciate everything, John. Thank you. We’ll be fine now.” She dismissed him.

“Well, okay,” he said, drawing out his words, reluctant to leave. “I guess I’ll be seeing you.”