Chasing Rainbows A Novel

FOUR


“HRA BKANHAQH EFQHNYA CVS MNP ENYA FP WFTA FQ HV LA MVPHFPSNWWC TANKFPB CVS ZFWW ENYA VPA.”

-AWLAKH RSLLNKX

I tossed and turned all night, the events of the past several days playing through my mind like a movie reel on fast forward.

When the morning light filtered through the blinds, I let out a sigh. I was wondering how in the hell I was going to rebuild the rest of my life when Poindexter body-slammed the bed.

“I’m sleeping,” I mumbled, unable to summon the energy necessary to lift my mouth clear of the pillow.

He responded by slamming the bed again and again in an apparent effort to keep our morning routine on schedule.

I tossed back the covers and cringed when my feet hit the cold floor. I shrugged into my favorite sweatshirt--you know the kind--where the cuffs are worn and torn and all signs of elasticity have long since disappeared.

Whether I wanted to admit it or not, the sweatshirt symbolized the person I’d become--well-worn, a bit beat-up, and hanging by a thread.

I operated on autopilot, following the dog down the stairs and through the kitchen to the back door. Poindexter no sooner made it outside than I heard the roar of a jet engine overhead.

“Shit,” I muttered, just as the barking began and the phone warbled from behind me. I picked up the receiver but said nothing.

“Mrs. Murphy?” Mrs. Cooke’s voice reached across the line.

“I’m sorry,” I spoke using my best recorded-voice imitation. “No one is available to take your call at the moment. Please leave a message after the beep.”

“I know you’re there,” Mrs. Cooke said. “Your car’s in the drive. You need to get a muzzle for that--”

“Beep!” I drew out the word until I heard the unmistakable clunk of my next-door neighbor hanging up in my ear.

Maybe she wasn’t a morning person. But then, who was?

Poindexter stood waiting for me as I eased open the back door. “What part of no barking before eight o’clock in the morning don’t you understand?”

He graced me with a happy dog wiggle before he trotted over to the kitchen counter where I kept his treats. He sat, nose tipped toward the counter, left front paw in the air. If nothing else, the dog had a flair for the dramatic, and who was I to say no to that?

I shook two treats out of the box and tossed them into Poindexter’s bowl.

Now that I was up before seven and had nowhere to be, a major decision loomed before me. What on earth was I going to do with myself?

I waited for the coffeepot to finish its cycle, filled a mug, then chugged a steaming mouthful before I ran through my options.

I could go for a jog.

I shook my head. Too much, too fast. I needed to pace myself.

I could draw up a goal poster, update my resume, surf the Web for charities that needed volunteers. I could sign up to work the food line at the local soup kitchen, offer to read to the blind, take meals to the homebound. Or, I smiled, a flicker of determination lighting inside me, I could purge.

I knew just where to start.

Back upstairs, I stood at the door to the smallest bedroom in our house--the room Ryan had used as a home office.

I’d spent the past few weeks fantasizing about tossing a gas-soaked rag and a match into the space, but the rational part of my brain kept reminding the irrational part that my homemade firebomb would take out all of my belongings as well as those belonging to he-who-sleeps-with-pregnant-slut-bimbos, or PSBs for short.

Ryan hadn’t taken a thing from his office, and I couldn’t help but wonder when he would. Once he took his things, my fate would be sealed, but the truth was, my fate had already been sealed. Any emotional connection between us had snapped a long time ago. Ryan was gone.

I was alone. At my age, chances were pretty good I’d stay that way.

Don’t get me wrong. I still had moments in which I wished I could reset my life. My dad would be alive. My marriage would be intact and Ryan and I would find a way to fix what we’d let break. My life would be what it had been before I fell into the chasm of personal chaos.

After all, if Dallas could write off a whole season, shouldn’t I be able to write off a few weeks?

I slouched against the doorframe and stared at the shelves next to Ryan’s desk. Framed certificates. Plaques. High school swimming trophies.

Swimming.

That seemed an appropriately passive-aggressive sport for a guy who’d grown up to cheat on his wife while pretending to rough it on business trips. Not that I had anything against swimmers as a group.

The crack in my heart began to fuse, fueled by the anger suddenly boiling inside me. The morning sun shimmied between the blinds in the office, gleaming off the crystal trophies I’d worked so loyally to keep dust-free. Day after day. Year after year after year.

I sneered at the little men in their little Speedos.

I’d never nicked or scratched or chipped a single one.

Just look at them. Spotless. Perfect. Extremely fragile.

I snatched one from the shelf and held it, testing its weight. Poindexter tipped his head from side to side, studying my every move. When I tossed the trophy from one palm to the other and then back again, understanding lit in the dog’s eyes. He turned and ran, disappearing beneath the bed in my room.

I tapped the trophy tentatively against one corner of Ryan’s mahogany desk.

Nothing.

I banged.

Nothing.

Then I slammed the perfect replica of the cheating male species against the desk with all my might.

The crystal remained intact. The desk...not so much.

A whisper of disappointment slid through me. I peered at the dent in the desk and frowned. While denting Ryan’s desk gave me a small measure of satisfaction, I wasn’t sure whether he or I’d be getting the piece ultimately, so I decided to pursue Plan B.

I cradled the trophy in the crook of my arm then piled the additional trophies on top. Two. Three. Five. Seven.

Perfect.

I hurried out of the office and into the hall. Poindexter stuck his head out from beneath the bed, took one look at me and ducked back out of sight.

I made it down the steps, to the back door and out onto the patio in record time. A pair of squirrels paused mid-frolic, watching as I lined the trophies along the back wall of the house. I hoisted the first above my head, and the squirrels dashed for the fence, scaling the vinyl and disappearing over the top.

Everything around me grew still, as if my impending rampage had lowered the cone of silence. No birds chirped. No tires squealed. No horns honked. No planes soared overhead.

When I released the crystal statue, I heard nothing but the satisfying crash of Ryan’s cherished prize shattering against the concrete.

Then my conscience kicked in. Loudly.

I’d looked away to protect my face from flying glass, but as I turned back, the glistening shards provided none of the gratification I’d expected.

Shame and guilt tangled in my gut.

Was trashing Ryan’s trophies that much higher on the maturity scale than burning his office? And what had the trophies ever done to me? None of these little swimmers had impregnated the future Mrs. Murphy.

“Is everything all right?”

I winced as Sophie Cooke’s voice sang over the hedge that divided our properties. Did the woman miss nothing?

Was everything all right? I stared again at the countless splinters strewn before me, the perfect symbol for just about every facet of my life.

“I’m fine, Mrs. Cooke.” Liar. “Just dropped a glass.”

Ten minutes later, I’d swept up every last trace of my transgression. But instead of carrying the surviving trophies back up to Ryan’s old office, I set them on the kitchen table. Then I tracked down a sturdy box and a roll of bubble wrap in the garage.

Carefully, meticulously, I wrapped each swimmer as if somehow I could make up for smashing their counterpart into smithereens.

When I finished, I placed the sealed box next to the front door. After a few minutes of sitting on the steps staring at the taped up cardboard, I knew I’d made a mistake.

The box looked pathetic waiting for Ryan to come back.

Poindexter settled on the step behind me and rested his chin on my shoulder.

“What do you think, buddy?”

He nudged my cheek with his cold nose, and I nodded in agreement.

“You’re right.”

I crossed the foyer, hoisted the box into my arms and carried my cargo to the garage.

I cleaned off a shelf then placed the box in its new home. I scrounged around for more empty boxes and totes before I headed back inside.

I worked the rest of the morning, packing, padding, purging.

Poindexter studied my every move as I cleared and cleaned each surface in Ryan’s office.

Once the boxes sat stacked in the garage, I returned to the office, now empty. The paint had faded, leaving marks where Ryan’s diplomas had hung.

I couldn’t sort out whether melancholy or satisfaction welled inside me. In the end, I decided it was loss--not hope--that consumed me still.

I didn’t know what the future held for the office anymore than I knew what the future held for me. I smoothed my hand across the empty desk then left and shut the door behind me.

Maybe closing the door would make my new life a bit easier to find. If nothing else, there would be one less reminder of the life my husband had left behind.

o0o

By Friday afternoon I knew I had to do something to fill my time or I really would have a breakdown. I’d be damned if I’d let that happen. After all, I had zero intention of proving either Ryan or Blaine McMann right.

I’d scanned the online job listings and found nothing matching my skills, so I headed for the only business where I knew the owners--Diane and David’s ice skating rink. Diane’s car wasn’t out front when I pulled into the lot, but I found David in the office.

“She’s not here--” he shook his head “--said she didn’t feel well.” He twisted up his mouth as if her pregnancy symptoms were harder on him than on her.

“Well, it can’t be easy, David. She’s forty-one years old. Maybe you could be a little more sympathetic.”

He scowled. I hated it when David scowled. He’d been scowling at me ever since I’d convinced Diane that a few shots of rum the night before senior finals would help her study.

“You think it’s easy on me?” He patted his chest. “I need her here.”

I narrowed my gaze on him. He couldn’t be this selfish. Could he? Didn’t he realize how lucky he was to be expecting another child?

“Do you know what I would...”

I caught myself before I said it. Do you know what I would give to be pregnant?

I’d put on a pretty good front when it came to Diane and David’s pregnancy. I wasn’t about to blow the illusion now--especially not in front of David.

I tried again. “...what I would do?” I gestured grandly toward the rink, empty now that the local hockey league practice had ended. “I’d get some temporary help.”

He scowled again. This was really growing old.

“You think it’s easy to find the right person just like that?” He snapped his fingers. “Plus, that would mean another salary.”

I tapped my chest, knowing I had a solution that could help us both. “I could do it...for free.” I was desperate for direction in my life and, if nothing else, helping at the rink would achieve my first two life goals. Keep busy. Get out of the house.

As far as life goals went, mine might not be up there with say, saving the world, but they were a start.

David’s expression tightened. I hadn’t thought it possible. “What the hell are you talking about?”

I cleared my throat, pulled myself up taller and bolstered my resolve. “I’m taking a sabbatical from work. I could help you out in the afternoons.”

One brow lifted. “I heard you got fired.”

David had always believed the worst of me. I shook my head and decided to rise above the temptation to argue semantics. “I quit.”

“Shouldn’t make big decisions right after a major life change...or two.”

This time I was the one sporting the scowl. “Where’d you learn that? Daytime television?”

“I know things, smart ass.”

“You don’t say?” I rubbed my chin as if I were impressed by David’s enlightenment.

He smirked. “You’re serious about helping?”

I nodded.

“When can you start?”

“Right now.”

“Great. Ashley needs a ride to some bead party thing.”

o0o

We were barely out of the ice rink parking lot when Ashley let loose with a sigh that rattled the car windows.

“Did they tell you they want to sing at my school family night? Sing.”

I winced. On the grand scale of parental embarrassment, that had to rank right at the top.

“I’ll die, Aunt Bernie. Die.” She gasped. “Sorry.”

“No problem, honey. In this case, it’s a well-deserved use of that particular figure of speech.” I chose my words carefully. “Other parents must be performing, right?”

Ashley shook her head. “I don’t care. You’ve got to stop them.” She gestured wildly. “If they sing in front of the whole school, I’ll...I’ll...”

She turned to me dramatically, leaned across the console and spoke slowly and clearly. “I’ll never be able to go back there again. I’ll have to change my identity or something.”

I worked to keep my expression as controlled as my response. “Ashley, it can’t be that bad.”

“Have you ever heard them sing?”

Sadly, yes. “Not since college. They used to sing this old Sonny and Cher song.” I laughed. “Lord, they were awful.”

Ashley blew out another sigh and slumped against the passenger door.

I blinked. “They’re not singing that, are they?”

She nodded. “In costume.”

Okay, so the kid had reason to panic, and suddenly, I couldn’t help torturing her just a bit more.

“Hey, if you want real talent, your mom and I could do our Superfreak dance routine.”

The heat of the kid’s glare singed my cheek. “You’re not helping.”

I bit back my grin. “I’ll talk to them.”

“Thank you.”

The instant relief in her voice made me smile. “So, tell me about this party.”

Ten minutes later I’d gotten a blow-by-blow description of every girl attending the birthday party. Apparently, this was Ashley’s first invitation into an “in” crowd gathering, and she was scared to death.

“What if I blow it?”

I patted her back as we walked toward the entrance to the shop. “You won’t blow it. Relax.”

As soon as we pushed through the door, the sound of teenaged giggles and squeals carried from somewhere out of sight.

“Are you here for the party?” A young woman looked up from a table where she worked, beads and tools strewn in front of her.

Ashley nodded.

“In the back.” The woman smiled. “Have fun.”

Ashley’s expression suddenly lost her usual I-can-do-anything confidence. “Don’t leave, Aunt Bernie.”

“You’re going to have a great time. Stop worrying.”

She swallowed. “But, I don’t really know these girls. What if they don’t like me?”

I gave her shoulder a squeeze. “How could they not like you?”

She frowned.

“I’ll stay,” I said.

“You’re welcome to try beading a bracelet or necklace.” The young woman sitting at the table barely looked up before her dark gaze dropped back to her handiwork, her focus intent. She tucked her long, smooth mahogany hair behind her ears and a pang of hair envy flickered through me.

I watched for a moment as she wove a fine silver wire into an intricate design. As much as I’d like to fantasize about my ability to do something similar, I had no problem admitting my shortcomings.

“I don’t have a creative bone in my body.”

Then I thought of the cryptograms from Dad. How was I going to reinvent myself if I was afraid to bead jewelry?

“It’s easy.” Ashley gave my elbow a shove. “That way you’ll be right here in case we need to bolt.”

“We’re going to work on that confidence,” I called after her as she sauntered away. She didn’t turn back, already deep into her I’m-too-cool-to-acknowledge-you cover.

“Come on,” the young woman coaxed. “I’ll set you up for a bracelet.”

She placed a tray in front of me then clipped a length of some sort of flexible wire from a spool and handed it to me. I held it as if it might explode. “I meant what I said. I’ve never done a creative thing in my life.”

“Here.” The woman held up a matching wire, threaded on a clasp, then wove one end in and out of some sort of silver bead. “This is the crimp bead. You tighten your wire like so--” she pulled the wire taut, holding it in one hand while she reached for a small tool with the other “--then you use these to squeeze the bead.” She looked up and gave me a dazzling smile. “Like that.”

After five mangled attempts I managed to crimp the bead. The result wasn’t pretty, but the wire held long enough for me to bead the ugliest bracelet ever known to mankind.

In the end, I decided to check jewelry designer off of my list of possible future careers, yet I still managed to spend far too much money on far too many supplies that would, in all likelihood, never witness life outside of a kitchen drawer.

Maybe I’d been caught up in the warmth of Ashley’s thank-you hug at the end of the party, lost in the moment she wrapped her arms around me and smiled. For a fleeting moment, I’d looked from Ashley to my new bracelet and believed I might someday make something beautiful.

I stared at my purchases later that night before I slid the kitchen door closed. Chances were good I’d forget about the beads completely. After all, my brain wasn’t operating at peak efficiency these days.

But who was I to argue with the possibility I might someday open the drawer and surprise myself.

o0o

“The greatest mistake you can make in life is to be continually fearing you will make one.”

–Elbert Hubbard