Secrets She Left Behind (7 page)

Sara
Stepping into Jamie’s World
1989

I
HELD STEVE’S HAND AS WE SLIPPED INTO ONE OF THE PEWS
at the Free Seekers Chapel. With Steve home and not interested in going to the chapel, months had passed since my last visit, and the congregation had swollen to thirty people. I spotted Jamie sitting in his usual pew, but Laurel wasn’t with him.

Steve let out one of his long, weary sighs that told me he was already bored, and my chest tightened up at the sound. I’d struggled to explain to him why I wanted to return to the chapel. It was the sense of community, I told him. Being part of something.

“What are you talking about?” he’d asked. “You’re surrounded by military wives. You have a built-in community.”

“This is a
spiritual
community.”

He stared at me with those steel-gray eyes. “One of the things we had in common is that we weren’t into religion,” he said.

“This is different,” I said. “You’ll see. Please come with me. Otherwise, I’ll go alone.” I felt nervous talking to him that way. Steve wasn’t a mean man, but sometimes I remembered how it felt when he pried my legs apart in the backseat of his car. It hurt, and the animal that took him over didn’t seem to care. I remembered
that, and I was always a little afraid to stand up to him. But I needed what I’d found at the chapel. Was it the pull of the beautiful setting or the pull of Jamie Lockwood? I didn’t even want to think about that question.

Steve finally said he would go to the chapel with me, just one time. I felt intimidated by his presence, though, so I didn’t stand up to say where I’d experienced God that week. It would embarrass him. Or maybe I was afraid he’d think I’d been brainwashed. He kept up with the sighing. A few times he shifted in the pew as if longing to get up and stretch his legs. It wasn’t working out as I’d hoped. He wasn’t getting it at all.

After the service was over, Jamie greeted people as he usually did by the exit of the chapel.

“Is there any other way out of here?” Steve whispered as we moved toward the front door.

“I don’t know.” I didn’t care, either. I was already smiling at Jamie, stretching my hand out to shake his.

“It’s good to see you back, Sara,” he said.

“This is my husband, Steve,” I said. “Steve, this is Jamie Lockwood.”

Steve shook his hand. “Nice building,” he said, and I was grateful to him for making the effort to be sociable.

“You have a new baby by now, don’t you?” I asked. The last time I came to the chapel, many months earlier, Laurel had announced her pregnancy. Saying the word
baby
out loud made my breasts ache.

“I
do.
” Jamie glowed. “She’s a month old. Her name’s Maggie.”

“Congratulations!” I said. “How’s Laurel?”

He hesitated just long enough to let me know that all was not well with his wife, and I wished I hadn’t asked.

“She’s doing okay,” he said finally. “We’re both a little overwhelmed right now, but I guess that’s to be expected.”

“Let me know if I can help somehow,” I said. “I have plenty of free time.”

Steve nudged me, so I walked forward, making way for the people behind us to talk to Jamie. My offer to help was genuine. I longed to get out of the house, but Steve didn’t want me to work. “None of the guys’ wives work,” he’d said. Anyway, jobs were few, especially for a military wife who might have to move at a moment’s notice.

Jamie caught up to us in the small, sandy parking lot in front of the chapel.

“Were you serious, Sara?” He shaded his eyes from the sun. “About wanting to help?”

“Oh, yes,” I said.

“We can really use it,” he said. “I’ll pay you, of course.”

“No! Please. Let me just help out. Like I said, I have loads of free time.”

I gave him our number, and he wrote it on a small notepad he pulled from the pocket of his jeans.

I felt so happy as I got into the car. I could do something useful for a change. I could help Jamie, touching his life in a positive way, the way he’d touched mine by building his chapel.

Steve and I were nearly to the high-rise bridge before either of us spoke.

“You think that’s a wise thing for you to do?” he asked.

“What do you mean?” I asked, although I knew.

“You know. Taking care of a baby.”

“I want to,” I said.

It was the closest we’d ever come to discussing Sam. I bit my lip, feeling anxious. Finally, Steve was giving me an invitation to talk about him.

“Do you ever think about him?” I asked.

“Who?” he replied.

“Sam.”

He was quiet for so long I thought he was going to ignore the question.

“Doesn’t do any good to think about him,” he said. Then he pointed to a speed-limit sign. Thirty-five miles per hour. “Is that new?” he asked. “I thought it was forty-five along this stretch.”

Jamie suggested I come to the real-estate office where he worked. I supposed he wanted to interview me before accepting my offer of help, but when I walked into his small office, I found him holding the baby. I sat down and he walked around his desk to hand the infant to me.

Every baby looked beautiful to me, even those with cone-shaped heads and scrunched-up faces and homely features. All of them, staggeringly beautiful. Yet Maggie Lockwood was extraordinary even at a month old. She had Jamie’s enormous brown eyes, and they were wide open, already taking in her world. She had a thick crop of dark curls and tiny features carved in pale, flawless porcelain.

“She’s a little colicky,” Jamie said. “But she’s a good baby.”

It was like holding feathers, she was so light. Like holding a miracle.
Experiencing God.
The thought slipped into my mind, and tears filled my eyes. Could I bear it? Helping to care for this child?

“Are you all right?” Jamie asked.

“She’s just so beautiful.” I felt one tear slip down my cheek, but
managed to stop the rest. He’d think I was deranged. Maybe the sort of woman who would steal a baby. I looked up at him, clearing my throat as I grounded myself again in my surroundings. “Is this her first visit to your office?” I asked. “Your coworkers must have flipped over her.”

He tapped his fingers on his desk, not answering right away. “Actually,” he said, “I’ve brought her here all this week.” Leaning forward, he studied his new daughter where she rested quietly in my arms. “Laurel’s having a hard time.”

Was he confiding in me? “I’m so sorry to hear that,” I said.

“She had a very rough start,” he said. “She hemorrhaged during the delivery and is anemic and I think she feels isolated and…unsure of herself.”

“Oh. Poor thing.” I felt sympathy for the woman I’d met only a couple of times. How hard to have a new baby and not feel up to taking care of her. “I hope she feels better soon.”

“Thanks. Me, too.”

I looked at the stack of real-estate brochures on Jamie’s desk. “It’s strange, seeing you here in an office,” I said. “Seeing you look human.”

He laughed. “I’m very human,” he said. “That’s all I am. All I want to be. A good human.”

“I…” I wanted to tell him what my few visits to the chapel had meant to me. I knew I would be going back, with or without Steve. I looked down at Maggie, whose long-lashed eyes were now closed, the lids twitching a little as if she was dreaming. “I don’t know how to explain to you how I feel in your chapel,” I said, raising my gaze to him again. “I’m not religious, so it’s strange. It’s hard to put into words.”

“It’s bigger than words?” he suggested.

I nodded.

“Oh, Sara,” he said. “Welcome to my world.”

Jamie and Laurel lived in a round cottage called the Sea Tender, right on the beach. I didn’t want to feel envy when I walked inside the cottage and took in the ocean view from the living-room windows, yet how could I help it? Clearly, the Lockwoods had money, something I doubted I’d ever have myself.

“Oh, this is fabulous!” I said as Jamie led me through the room to the sofa, Maggie sleeping against his chest. He’d asked me to stop by to “reconnect with Laurel,” since I’d be helping out with the baby. “Have a seat,” he said. He handed Maggie to me. “I’ll let Laurel know you’re here.”

I settled down on the sofa, the sleeping baby on my knees. A few minutes later, Laurel walked into the room. She moved slowly, as though her legs were made of concrete, and I honestly wasn’t certain I would have recognized her. Her hair was long and stringy and dull, her eyes lifeless. Her face was not pale as much as jaundiced, like a tan that was fading in uneven patches. She wore a yellow robe that needed a good washing.

Seeing her, I felt deep concern that the pretty woman from the chapel had been replaced by a ghost. I could see that she had a long recovery ahead of her. Maggie’s delivery must have been horrendous.

“You have a gorgeous baby.” I lowered my eyes to Maggie to hide my shock at Laurel’s appearance.

“Thank you.” Laurel sat down in a rocking chair.

Jamie brought me a glass of iced tea I knew I wouldn’t touch. It would be sweet, no doubt. That Southern abomination.

“You two remember each other, of course,” Jamie said as he sat down on the other end of the sofa.

“Of course,” I said. “Your house is beautiful, Laurel.”

“Thanks.”

“I…Jamie and I thought I should meet with you to see if you have any special instructions about Maggie.”

Laurel shrugged as though she didn’t really care how I took care of her daughter. “Just don’t kill her,” she said.

“Laurel!” Jamie said.

My body must have jerked at Laurel’s words because Maggie started to whimper.

“Shh, honey.” I tightened the blanket around the baby, wondering if Laurel could possibly know about Sam. Who could have told her? I was afraid to look up. I didn’t want to meet her eyes.

Laurel laughed, breaking the tension in the room. “You know what I mean,” she said.

“Well, okay.” I attempted a laugh myself. “I think I can manage that.”

Jamie had a tiny office in the chapel, and that’s where I spent most of my time with Maggie because Laurel didn’t want me in the house.

“It’s not you,” Jamie reassured me. “It’s anyone right now. She’s too tired to have someone around.”

Or the baby around,
I thought. It was unspoken between us, but Jamie and I both knew there was something more going on with Laurel than tiredness. Laurel wanted Maggie out of the house. Out of her sight.

The chapel had electricity and Jamie installed a small refrigerator and a hot plate in the little office so I could heat Maggie’s
formula. There was also an old-fashioned wooden cradle and a lightweight stroller. I spent my days there with Maggie, reading and teaching myself to knit when I wasn’t feeding, cuddling or changing diapers. I couldn’t believe my luck at being able to spend so much time in the beautiful, simple building. I was drawn to the panoramic windows, and I watched the sea for dolphins and the sky for pelicans. In a way, I finally had beachfront property.

When the weather was mild enough, I took Maggie for walks in the stroller. I’d push the little girl right past the Sea Tender, learning quickly there was no point in stopping in for a visit. Neither Maggie nor I would be welcome.

On Sundays, I sat next to Jamie in the chapel with Maggie on my lap. The first time, Jamie briefly explained to the thirty or so people there that I was helping him and Laurel out with Maggie. When new people came during the summer, though, I wondered if some of them thought I was Jamie’s wife.

It fascinated me to feel Maggie melt into my arms when she heard her father speak. He had a hypnotic quality in his voice that soothed not only Maggie and myself but most of the other people in the chapel as well. With the influx of tourists, the fifty seats were nearly full each week. People stood one after another to say where they recently experienced God, but I rarely stood myself. I felt too raw with emotion in the chapel during the service. In just a couple of months’ time, I’d filled up with such a painful sort of joy that I knew if I tried to speak during the service, I would lose all control. God—Jamie’s God—was with me nearly every minute of every day by then. I had a purpose: I was able to hold a tiny life in my arms. I was able to help Jamie when he so clearly needed my help. Even at home, I caught myself smiling as I made dinner or pressed Steve’s uniform or cleaned the small house we rented. I had enough
joy inside myself that the sorrow over Sam, over my loveless marriage, didn’t have a chance to come through.

A few months later, Jamie told me he thought Laurel needed a friend.

“She doesn’t have any friends with babies,” he said. “Not that
you
have a baby. But you’re so warm and nice and kind.” He looked away from me, as though he’d said more than he meant to. “She’s depressed. She’s not taking care of herself. You know. Grooming. Hygiene.”

“Maybe she needs more help than a friend can give her,” I suggested gently. The truth was, Laurel was unpleasant to be around, and I avoided her as much as possible. There was nothing of the starry-eyed young woman left in her.