Acts of Contrition
Read Acts of Contrition Online
Authors: Jennifer Handford
ALSO BY JENNIFER HANDFORD
Daughters for a Time
The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.
Text copyright © 2014 Jennifer Handford
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.
Published by Lake Union Publishing, Seattle
ISBN-13: 9781477809518
ISBN-10: 1477809511
Library of Congress Control Number: 2013910125
Cover design by Anna Curtis
For my loving husband, Kevin
CONTENTS
CHAPTER SIX Defects of Character
CHAPTER SEVEN Admitting Wrongs
CHAPTER NINE Deserving of Love
CHAPTER TEN Failing to Do Good
CHAPTER TWELVE Choosing to Do Wrong
CHAPTER FOURTEEN Detesting Sins
CHAPTER FIFTEEN Heartily Sorry
CHAPTER SIXTEEN The Pains of Hell
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN The Nature of Wrongdoing
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN Cornerstone of Faith
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE Sin No More
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO Above All Things
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE To Do Penance
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR Restore Sanity
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN Awakening
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT Deserving of Love
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE Principles
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE Persons Harmed
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE Make Amends
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR Working the Steps
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE The Big Book
PART ONE
CHAPTER ONE
Ordinary Time
I AWAKE BEFORE THE ALARM
sounds. It’s early—five thirty early—the dreamy time of predawn when the golden light softens what’s real, blunts the sharp edges of daily life. It’s in these quiet moments when my perspective is the most forgiving, Zen-like.
There are many paths that lead to happiness,
this enlightened outlook reminds me, knocking out of the way my judgmental point of view that admonishes me for making wrong turns. For a few breaths—inhale, exhale, inhale—I’m free from my blundering.
Then the alarm blares.
I roll onto my side and reach over my husband, Tom, to hit snooze. Still enjoying the gauzy calm, I kiss the top of his arm, give his scruffy head a rub, and put my face in front of his. “Time to wake up, sleepyhead.”
“Argh,” he groans. “Too early.”
“I know,” I agree.
“Where are the critters?” Tom asks, referring to our twin four-year-old boys who burrow their way into our bed each morning.
“Still asleep. Hilarious, right?” It’s hilarious because the boys are crack-of-dawn early risers. But today happens to be the first day of preschool for Domenic and Danny, and neither of them is as excited about it as I am. I adore the boys, and while I routinely stare in wonder at the pint-sized cuties, identical with their skin as fair as alabaster and hair as glossy as black licorice, I’m still beyond eager for school to start, checking off each day on the calendar for the past month with a thick, indelible Sharpie. If the morning goes according to plan, in exactly four hours, I’ll be sans children for the first time in nine years, sipping the frothy goodness of a venti vanilla latte and savoring the sweet, warm dough of an apple fritter. I’ll be cloistered in my car, listening to the raunchy DJ on DC101 talk about something unacceptable, like underpants or threesomes or sex toys. The escapism will be pure bliss.
But first I need to mobilize the sleeping beast husband and four children.
“Come on, babe!” I nudge Tom. “You have a plane to catch and I’ve got children—all of the children—to get to school.”
“Big day,” he says, offering a small smile and rolling onto his back, hooking my head into a gentle half nelson.
I settle into the crook of his shoulder and latch my arm over his chest. “Seriously, honey, you
need
to get up. I’ve got to get the girls to the bus stop and the boys to preschool, and I really don’t have time to help you get out the door this morning. You’re on your own.”
“Just give me a minute.”
Tom reaches for the remote and turns on the news. Traffic and weather, and then, in the next instant, even though I’m still pressed up against him, we’re no longer snuggling. It’s more like
a judge has just issued a heavy thud of his gavel, delivering a guilty verdict, sentencing me to life.
On the screen is a photo of my ex-boyfriend. The crawler below it reads:
VIRGINIA ATTORNEY GENERAL LANDON JAMES DECLARES INTENTION TO RUN FOR SENATE SEAT IN VIRGINIA.
Landon James, the darkest of the many wrong paths I’ve taken.
The golden hue of the room brightens to white. The soft edges render into right angles. My life: husband, kids, house, and an unforgiving past.
Even though I haven’t seen Landon in person in nearly a decade, he still occasionally tromps through my life, leaving designer footprints. I met Landon a lifetime ago, though I remember our first meeting as clearly as I can recall the scent of my children’s skin. I was only nineteen when we first met, twenty-three when we were reintroduced, twenty-nine when I finally got sober from his brand of loving me and then pushing me away. The fact that he took things from me and never gave them back—a decade of my life, a piece of my heart, and the end of the thread that could unravel my entire life—is never buried far enough in my thoughts.
Tom slides his arm from around me and is already on the way to the shower before I can call to him. “Tom?”
“Nothing like seeing Boy Wonder first thing in the morning,” Tom grumbles before he turns on the water.
“On an empty stomach, too,” I call over the shower’s noise, using the technique I’ve now perfected: siding with my husband
no matter what.
Years ago there was one argument—the nadir of Tom’s and my mud wrestling over Landon—where this lesson
was drilled home. Tom commented—innocently enough—on Landon’s swagger (“Guy’s got an ego the size of Texas”) and ostentatious polish (the perfectly styled hair, the tailored suits, the gleaming cuff links). Stupidly, I jumped to Landon’s defense. He really wasn’t like that, I said; underneath the ego he was actually a decent guy, a pretty
normal
guy, who came from humble beginnings, who had been through a lot of hurt. Tom huffed away in disgust, said he couldn’t believe I’d defend him after he’d strung me along for so long, couldn’t believe I excused Landon’s every trespass.
That taught me a valuable lesson: Never defend the man who wasn’t my husband.
When Tom steps out of the shower, I slide past him with a bland smile (knowing better than to chance a touch) and hop in for a five-minute scrub down: a quick wash of the hair, a lathering of soap, and a few swipes of the razor over the lower half of my legs. As I work some conditioner into my shoulder-length brown bob, I exhale in a long, slow stream, quietly so that Tom—at his sink, just feet away—doesn’t hear.
Play it cool, Mary. Act as though seeing Landon meant nothing to you.
Early on with Tom, I made big mistakes: I told him how deep it went with Landon, how strangely addicted to each other we were.
Even now, seeing Landon heats my chest and speeds my breath. I push it down and bottle it because the feeling is irrational, and Irrational Me makes Logical Me sick, because Logical Me has everything she’s ever wanted.
With a towel wrapped around me, I glance over at Tom to assess his mood, but his expression is washed clean of clues. I lean over and kiss his cheek. “I love you,” I say, and even to my ears I
sound guilty, like I’m trying too hard, like it’s obvious what we’re both thinking.
I duck into the bedroom to retrieve clothes to wear. Tom has casual Friday at his engineering firm. I have casual Friday every day. The suits and pumps I once wore to a swanky Connecticut Avenue law firm have long been donated to St. Vincent de Paul and replaced by jeans and chinos, T-shirts and sweaters, a classic wardrobe from the Old Navy moms department.
By six o’clock I’m downstairs, out on the deck, feeding our golden retriever, Daisy. Drawing in the cool morning air restores me to myself, settles me down, brings me back to normalcy: husband, kids, house. Inside, I start packing the lunch boxes and preparing breakfast.
Sally stumbles down the stairs a few minutes later. At age nine she’s my oldest, and an amber-haired beauty. Tall and bold, with broad shoulders and mile-long legs, she resembles the Greek goddesses she’s been obsessed with since studying them last year. If Sally were truly a Greek goddess, she’d be one of the tough ones, like Artemis, a hunter strapped with a bow and a quiver full of arrows.
You want a piece of me?
I can imagine her saying, staring down a three-headed monster twice her size.
“Tired,” she moans. “Hungry.” Sally’s always hungry. She eats more than Tom and me, hands down. But she’s active, and at least for now her metabolism is besting her appetite.
“Waffles? Eggs?” I say, coming around to give her a kiss. When she slips off the stool to hug me, the top of her head reaches my mouth. She’s growing tall and I’m short, a combination that will soon leave us lopsided.
“Both,” she answers. “And hot cocoa, please.”
This morning she is wearing green flannel pajama bottoms and a tight tank top revealing an inch or two of tanned belly. The straps from her training bra tangle with her tank top. People mistake her for older, easily twelve years old. Her body has grown and matured faster than her peers’, which nearly kills me, but I’ve done a good job of keeping my cool, like it’s no big deal to talk about cup sizes and getting her period.
Yeah, whatever,
that’s me. The cool mom who is accessible.
Talk to me,
my easy disposition says,
I’m here.
It’s not that I wasn’t aware that she would someday grow up. It’s just happened so fast. Smacked me in the face like a snowball I hadn’t seen coming.
She bellies up to the counter, lowers her face to her hands, and sets down her Nancy Drew. Sally is a voracious reader and doesn’t go anywhere without a book, even downstairs to breakfast.