Part Eight I’m going to be an uncle. I commit the ultimate faux pas by smiling. “You think that’s funny?” Maria’s voice is like ice. Her eyes are practically ablaze now. I shake my head. “No, not funny.” I think I need to be very careful here. “I’m just happy for them. It’s a good thing.” She snorts and looks away from me. I manage to shrug off my coat and drop my briefcase to the floor. I walk over to her, stand before her. “Don’t you think it’s good for Iz and Alex?” I ask her. She shrugs noncommittally. Now I snort. I understand being childless because even though she thinks this thing only happened to her, it happened to me as well. She will never be a mother, but I will also never be a father because of this. And the fact that she can sit here and begrudge Isabel and Alex happiness irks me beyond words. I’m outta here. I turn to retreat to the bedroom and just as I am about to enter the hallway, something smashes into the wall inches from my head. I hear the sound of shattering glass as I realize she has thrown an ashtray at me. I whirl on her, but she is quicker than I am. “Don’t walk away from me!” she shouts. She is now standing up in front of the couch and is waving an accusing finger at me. “I will,” I tell her. “Because I can’t stand to spend another moment with you, Maria.” Oh…did I just say that aloud? Run for the ocean, dear citizens of Pompeii – I feel a rumbling in the earth that can only be a volcano about to spew its contents into the atmosphere. Her eyes narrow. “Really? Well, there’s a revelation, Max.” I toss my hands into the air. “What is that supposed to mean?” She waves her hands in that agitated manner of hers. “You haven’t wanted to be with me for years, Max.” That’s not true…is that true? Let’s pretend for the sake of arguing that it is. “Who would want to be with you?” I retort hurtfully. “Who would want to be with someone who can’t be happy for someone else’s good news?” She’s speechless for a moment and I almost think I see tears in her eyes. When she speaks, her voice is low, cold. “You, Max Evans, are the most insensitive person I have ever met.” Me? “How can you stand there and not understand how bad this hurts me?” she asks and I believe she is about to cry. “It has nothing to do with you,” I sternly remind her. “It has to do with Alex and Isabel and a new baby for them. You are in no way impacted.” She snorts. “This is what I mean,” she says, bitter defeat in her tone. “You can’t understand that it does impact me, Max. I am never going to be able to do what they’re doing.” Yes, my love, I know. I was there. “And it’s your fault.” Wha…? I can’t think of any come back. None. She has just put harsh, blunt light to the idea that I have been mulling around in my head for the last eight years. In my mind, I see villagers running for the ocean, fleeing the wrath of nature. “Isn’t that what you think?” she accuses. “Poor martyred Max,” she mocks. “Couldn’t charge in on the white horse and save the damsel in distress this time, could you?” I’m feeling incredibly angry. I think it has something to do with her childish, mocking tone. “Stop it,” I warn her. I know if she pushes me too hard, I am going to unload on her and it is not going to be pretty. In fact, I can feel my head start to pound with the sudden rush of adrenaline. It’s not going to take much to push me over the edge on this one. “God, Max,” she cries, holding her head. “You’re so fucking blind to everything going on around you! You just sit around stoned all day” – she knows about that? – “and detach yourself from the rest of the world. You’re a zombie, Max!” *KABOOM* And the mountain erupts into a blaze of fire and molten rock… “I’m a zombie!” I shout. “I’m a zombie? Jesus Christ, Maria – look at yourself! You walk around painting yourself up and gathering uncaring friends so you don’t have to be yourself, so that you don’t have to deal. Not once have I seen you cry over the loss of that baby or the fact that you are never going to have another one. I’m the cold, insensitive one? At least I grieved – I cried and tried to hold you and make it all better but you just pushed me away and turned yourself into this fake person. I don’t know where the Maria I knew went. She checked out years ago. She gave up. She went and let some doctor disfigure her beautiful body because she couldn’t deal with who she was. You’re right – I stay stoned all day long so I can ignore the elephant we have living with us. I stay stoned because I can’t stand to see someone I love turn her back on everything I loved about her and become this hollow shell of a person. Goddammit, Maria, don’t you ever call me cold or a zombie again because when it comes to emotional lock-down, you’ve pretty much nailed the gold medal in that one.” The silence in our apartment is suddenly very loud. My chest heaves with my fury and I think I’m a bit startled that I let all of that out. Maria is looking at me, her eyes wide, her bottom lip quivering. We seem to stand like that forever, then she bursts into tears and rushes past me, down the hall and into the bathroom. She slams the door so hard I hear a picture in the hall fall to the floor. Alone, I am overcome by guilt. This is the moment I never wanted to come. I think I always believed that we would just continue down our dysfunctional path and never confront one another. I mean, this has been festering for many years. It should have exploded within the first few months. In my mind, I see thousands of Pompeians covered in volcanic ash. I sigh and run a hand through my hair. I can hear her sobs coming from the bathroom. Turning on my heel, I walk to the door and speak softly against the wood. “Maria. Let me in.” “Go away!” she snaps. I shake my head. Not this time. I try the handle – she didn’t lock it. I push open the door and am greeted with an all-too-familiar sight – Maria in a puddle of blood. She’s sitting on the toilet lid, elbows on knees, head in hands, a pool of blood beneath her foot. I think she must have stepped on pieces of the broken ashtray when she ran passed me. I kneel before her and reach for her ankle. She tries to push me away, but her emotional breakdown has exhausted her. “Shh,” I say and lift her foot. She’s got a pretty big gash there. I wet a washcloth in the sink and hold it to the wound. I silently wonder if it’s bad enough to require stitches. She sniffles, wipes her nose. When she speaks, her voice is small and her words shock me to the core. “Why could you bring Liz Parker back from the near death, but you couldn’t heal me enough to give you a child?” There it is, folks. It bold, blinking neon. The thing that has really been lying between us for all of these years. I sit back on my heels and meet her gaze. She doesn’t look away. She looks sad, miserable. I shake my head. “I don’t know.” And that’s the truth. I really don’t know. It doesn’t have anything to do with the level of emotion between us. I did love Liz, but I love Maria more. Maybe I could heal Liz because her injury was an accident. Maybe I couldn’t heal Maria because this is the way things were meant to be. I just don’t know. She sniffles and gives a weak smile. “It’s all I wanted,” she confesses as new tears fill her eyes. “What?” I ask her gently. She looks at the floor. “To have a family with you.” Her tears flow onto her cheeks. “Because I love you so much, Max. I can never give you a family, a life and I’ll understand if you don’t want to be with me, if you want to go find someone else.” I cock my head and regard her with sad eyes. I feel like I should say something, but then again maybe this time I shouldn’t say anything. Her eyes are unwavering as she looks at me, then her face contorts into a mask of pain and she begins to sob. “I wanted that little girl so bad, Max. For you. For me. For both of us. And now I can’t ever have –“ She chokes and breaks into a full sob. I don’t tell her to stop, I don’t tell her everything is going to be okay – it’s been eight years in the works and I am not about to diminish her right to grieve. Instead, I simply reach forward and put my arms around her. At our contact, she gasps, then begins to cry harder. I hold her as tight at I can, feel her frail body trembling against mine. She is flat-out wailing now and I feel my eyes start to sting. I can’t fix her, I can’t heal her, but I can hold her while she grieves. “Oh, God, Max,” she sobs. “I am so sorry. So sorry. Forgive me.” But there is nothing to forgive her for. So I just pull her closer to me and rock her. After a bit, I stand up and hoist her into my arms and here I am – carrying my bloody wife again. I take her to the bedroom and lay her on the bed. Then I lay down with her and cradle her, let her cry. She seems to cry for an eternity until finally, exhausted, she drifts to sleep. I lay there for a long time, just watching her face as she sleeps. Her tears have left dried salty tracks down her cheeks, across her face. I, too, feel exhausted, like someone has let all of the air out of me. This should have happened a long time ago. And I’m as much to blame as she is. I’ve spent so much time stoned, avoiding a day like today. And I would have kept on avoiding it had it not been for my sister’s good news. Eventually, I carefully disentangle myself from her and creep down the bed. Cautiously, so as to not disturb her slumber, I unwrap the washcloth from her foot. Ugh – bloody mess. She needs stitches. I consider waking her so we can go to the hospital, but then I look into her peaceful face and I can’t disturb her. I know what I need to do. I can’t believe I’m nervous about this. But it has been many years. I’m not sure I remember how. I guess there’s only one way to find out. I draw in a breath and put my hand on her foot. At first nothing happens, then I feel a charge through my whole body and I have to struggle to keep myself from gasping. My hand is suddenly warm and a faint glow illuminates from beneath. In only a matter of seconds, I feel my power wane and I fear that I have failed again. But when I lift my hand, her skin is smooth and unmarred. It worked. I give a little laugh and smile. It really worked. I sit in the chair by the window and watch her sleep. The light flowing through the window slowly fades until I can only see her illuminated by the streetlight outside. So I sit in the dark, watching her shoulders rise and fall with her slumber. It has a hypnotic effect. And it’s suddenly daylight and my neck hurts. And my back. And my arm. I must’ve fallen asleep in this damned chair. I untwist my body and stretch. Maria is still asleep on the bed, though she has managed to change positions some time during the night. I get ready for work silently. I don’t want to disturb her. She had a major break-through yesterday and it apparently sapped her of her energy. It’s okay, Maria, you sleep. I know you’ll be here when I get home and then we can talk. Because I know things between us have changed again. |
| PART 8 |