I knew you felt sorry for him and caved, but…”
“But you thought I was just stupid? Well, partly. But mostly it’s that Roger is so good at convincing me he’s sorry, that he’s learned his lesson and he’ll never do it again. I think I’ve recovered from that temptation now.”
Maggie stiffened. “You mean it’s all an act?”
“Actually, it’s not an act. I think he really goes through it—the remorse, the guilt, the shame. The depression. The problem is, it has yet to modify his behavior.”
“God, that accident. It really did shake up your thinking. You finally get him.”
“Sort of,” she said. “Probably it’s more that I finally get me.”
Maggie settled back in the family room, relaxed and had a glass of wine. Clare’s was apple juice—the wine didn’t go well with pain meds. Maggie made time for the family gatherings but the rest of her life was always a rush; she always had a million things to do. Now she seemed more at ease, hanging out at her dad’s during the workweek, than she had in quite a while. Clare wondered if it was because they were finally on the same page about her divorce.
Then Sarah came home, a little early, as she was doing these days. It was almost as though she was desperate to make sure Clare was all right, that the family remained intact. She was clearly delighted to see Maggie. Before the accident the sisters tried to carve out time for an after-work cocktail at least every other week. “Oh boy,” she said. “Happy hour.” She poured herself a glass of wine and joined them.
Sarah was wearing paint-stained overalls. Underneath was a lime-green sweater, the sleeves so baggy that when she pushed them up to her elbows, they just slid down again. Maggie noticed that she had a piece of duct tape holding her glasses together. “You didn’t have to dress up for us,” Maggie said.
“The paint doesn’t care what I wear,” she said, pushing her glasses up on her nose. “What are you doing here?”
“Just dropping by.”
“Good,” she said. “I’ll be glad when we can get back to our regular happy hours.”
“It’s going to be a while, I’m afraid,” Clare said.
“Sooner than you think,” Sarah said, giving Clare’s hand an affectionate pat.
“Tell her about Roger, Maggie,” Clare said. “She’ll get a kick out of it.”
“Roger’s falling apart,” Maggie said.
“Really?” Sarah asked, leaning forward.
“I went to see him about getting Clare back in her house and caught him drinking in the early afternoon. He’s miserable. He’s greasy and wrinkled and pathetic.”
Sarah grinned. “What’s he pathetic about? Can’t he get a date?”
“He wants to take care of Clare,” Maggie said.
Sarah sipped her wine and leaned back on the sofa. “Tell him to stick it up his ass. We can take care of Clare.”
“Sarah!” Maggie said, laughing.
This, Clare thought, was why she loved her sisters so. Because they were dedicated, irreverent and sometimes hilarious. What more could a crippled, almost-forty-year-old, almost divorcée need?
When Maggie had gone and Sarah was busy in the kitchen, Clare crutched her way to Jason’s room and tapped on the door.
“Yeah?” he answered.
“Can I come in?”
“Yeah,” he said.
She found him lying on the bed with a Game Boy hovering over his face.
“I need to talk to you,” she said.
“As long as it’s not about him,” he returned, his eyes glued to the game.
Clare entered slowly, careful not to get a crutch snagged on something left on the floor—clothes, shoes, books. She could get around pretty well now and was using the crutches only to give herself assistance, to keep the pressure off her pelvis. Walking no longer caused horrid pain but the ache crept back in as the day wore on.
She slowly lowered herself to his bed and he moved his long legs over to accommodate her, but he stayed focused on his game. She gently pulled it out of his hands. He released it and sat up, leaning against the headboard. “It’s about him. I need a favor.”
“Aww.”
“Jason, the accident—it not only shook up my body, it shook up my mind. I can see that I need to make changes in my life, big changes. I have to heal my body, and also I have to heal my spirit. I have to get a life. And I need you to lighten up. I know you’re mad. I’m not going to try to talk you out of it—you can work out those issues with your counselor. But I can’t get better while I’m constantly faced with your rage. I can’t move on. Understand?”
“But don’t you hate him?”
“Actually, I don’t,” she said. She didn’t even have to reach for the answer. “I’m really mad at him. Who wouldn’t be? But Jason—he’s the one who’s losing out here. He had his last chance with me and it’s over. He lost a good wife. And, I fear, a wonderful son. You have no idea how much hurt this is causing him. You have to trust me.”
Remarkably, tears gathered in Jason’s eyes. “You should hate him,” he said, but he didn’t say it in rage, he said it with pain.
“There was a time I did,” she said, reaching out and threading some of that thick, floppy blond hair across his brow. “But I’m just too busy now. Healing is like a full-time job. And the second I’m better, I have to think about our own house, a good job and getting on with my life. My life with you.”
“Sometimes I just can’t take it,” he said.
“Take what?” He shook his head in misery, looking down. “What, Jason?”
He looked up and a tear spilled over. Even though he was at that ragged and vulnerable age, seeing him cry was rare. “He’s like his dad was, right?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know. I guess so.” She wasn’t sure of the details of Roger’s family. He never bitched about his father. His mother, a widow for some time now, complained about what her life had been like, married to a man who was greedy and unfaithful and left her virtually penniless, but Roger’s father had been dead for a long time and Roger took good care of his mother. Clare had met Roger’s father, but couldn’t say she knew him.
Just when you think your kid isn’t paying attention. Apparently Jason had heard everything that spilled out of his grandmother’s mouth.
“So? What if I’m like him?”
“Oh, Jason.”
“Well? I look like him!”
True. When he filled out, gained some muscle, survived the pimples, he would be as handsome as his father. “It could be worse, Jason. You could be like me.”
“That’d be okay!”
“Oh yeah?” she laughed. “Wishy-washy, do anything to please, passive-aggressive?”
“Passive what?” he asked, brushing impatiently at a tear.
“Passive-aggressive. I punish people by being late, by not speaking. Instead of being direct.” Not giving sex, being coolly cooperative, acting like I’m back in the marriage when I’m really just counting the days or weeks or months ’til the next confrontation.
“You’re not that way.”
She was that way with Roger, and she knew it. That’s why it was better for everyone if that cycle finally came to an end. “Or,” she said to her son, “you could be like yourself. You could be exactly