Come Back To Me (24 page)

Chapter Forty-Two

Beau lay on his back on Tess’s side of the mattress in their bedroom that now felt too big, too empty. He looked around for some sign that he’d made the right decision. What that sign might be, he had no idea. He wished there were a magical guide, something that gave a virtual nod to people who had to make these decisions. He thought back to the pamphlets, the way they felt as though they were filled with betrayal.
Was it the right decision?
he wondered. His mother seemed to think so. The doctors definitely agreed, having pushed him in the direction of letting go. Why, then, did he feel like such a traitor? His gut burned, and his chest ached. The leg he’d broken sent searing pains through his knee. He wondered if the pains were real or imagined—his own silent form of self-punishment. He turned onto his side, closed his eyes, and inhaled through his nose. Tears rose to his eyes. He grabbed the pillow and buried his face in it, taking a deep whiff.
Nothing.
He shoved his face into the mattress, inhaled.
Nothing.
He needed her.

His pulse raced. He climbed to his knees and ripped the drawer from her bedside table, fumbling through the contents looking for her tube of CK One lotion. Where the fuck was it? He slipped to the floor and rifled through the drawer, tossing out pencils, a notepad, bottles of Motrin and Tylenol, lotion.
Lotion!
He pulled open the cap and brought it to his nose. His pulse calmed. He gripped the tube in both hands like a lifeline, squeezed a dab into his palm and rubbed his hands together, then wiped the lotion on his neck and cheeks. He lifted a stack of magazines from the deep drawer, exposing Tess’s journal.

Beau stared at the journal for a long time. He’d never once considered reading her journal. He reached a shaking hand into the drawer and lifted the keeper of Tess’s private thoughts into his lap.

The ringing phone broke the silence.

“Hello?”

“Honey? I just wanted to make sure you were okay,” Carol’s voice embraced him.

“I’m okay, Mom.”

“You sure? Want me and Dad to come get you? We can drive you to the hospital.”

There it was.
Reality
. Today was the day they were saying goodbye to Tess—forever.

“Beau?”

“I’m here. It’s okay. I can drive myself.” His hand rested on the journal, the tips of his fingers curling around the edge of the fabric-covered notebook.

“Are you sure, honey?”

“Mom.”

“Okay, well, we’ll see you in an hour?”

“’Kay.”

Forty minutes later, Beau picked himself up from the floor, lotion safely tucked away in his pocket, and tossed Tess’s journal onto the bed. He went to the bathroom, brushed his hair, and came back into the bedroom, the guilt of what was yet to come shadowed his every move. He grabbed Tess’s journal and headed to the car.

Chapter Forty-Three

Tess’s journal lay on the passenger seat calling to Beau as the apple had called out to Eve. Beau eyed it as he gathered his strength for what lay ahead. He shouldn’t have brought it. He wasn’t sure why he did. He picked it up and held it to his chest.

“Tessie,” he whispered. An envelope fell from the journal, landing in his lap, his name scrawled in Tess’s handwriting across the front. He set the journal on the seat, and pondered the envelope. Was it his Dear John letter, the explanation that she was leaving him? He didn’t want to know.

Beau pressed his body into the warmth of his parents. His mother’s tears landed on the crook of his neck. His father held him tight against his chest, his broad hand spread across Beau’s back. Beau would have stayed within their embrace forever if he could, safe from the nightmare that loomed. Cognitively, Beau knew that the right thing to do, the humane thing to do, was to turn off Tess’s life support, to provide closure to everyone who loved her, an end to their agony. He just wasn’t sure he was capable of actually doing it.

Carol stepped back from Beau and Robert. She blew her nose, patted her eyes with a tissue. Robert lifted his hand from Beau’s back, releasing him. Beau remained against his father—a child’s safety revisited. Eventually he pushed back, a glazed look in his eyes. A lump inhabited his airway. He couldn’t shake the feeling that he’d let everyone down, especially Tess. 

Tess’s face looked like a rag doll that had been stitched a few too many times. Beau saw past her marred skin. He saw milky-white smoothness, soft and inviting, the tiny dimple that formed just above the outside right corner of her mouth when she smiled, and the cute way she’d crinkled her nose when he’d mentioned the word “anchovy”. Beau looked past her still body, feeling her index finger lightly pushing on his palm, the way she’d push her shoulder into his armpit and snuggled close as they walked down the street. He heard her whispering to him in the stillness of the night,
Hold me
. His heart swelled with each memory. The antiseptic smell of the room suddenly changed, as if a new scent, Tess’s scent, had come in with a breeze.  The unique minty, flowery aroma of her breath came back to him. Behind her closed eyelids he saw the shine of her morning glory blue eyes, dancing when she laughed at an inside joke between the two of them.

His parents, Kevin, and Alice faded away. It was just he and Tess in their last bubble of time. He felt the drag of her finger across his shoulders and spun his head around. She wasn’t there. Of course she wasn’t, and he wasn’t hulking over photographs on the living room couch—he might never be able to pick up another camera—he was mourning the upcoming death of his wife in a stale hospital room, with people waiting for the turning off of her life support. The person lying in the bed before him, unmoving, unthinking, that was not Tess. That was an imposter, a manikin of the woman Beau loved.

Robert put an arm across Carol’s shoulder, his eyes on Beau. He spoke with concern, not rushing or pushing Beau. “Son?”

Beau’s eyes were red and swollen, shadowed with gray. He lifted his chin.  Kevin and Alice stood apart from the family, an uncomfortable distance between the two of them.

“Sorry, man,” Beau whispered through his tears.

Kevin squinted, shook his head, sending a silent message,
Don’t even think about it. I’m here.

“For all the shit I put you through, I’m so sorry,” Beau said.

“No worries, man, no worries.”

Beau lifted his gaze to Alice, emaciating before his eyes. Creases had formed across her forehead, her normally tight cheeks, now sunken and hollow. Her eyes had become dull, frightened. Beau’s chest tightened, still believing that Alice knew about Tess’s affair before he’d left for Iraq. He tried to feign a pleasant look. He failed.

Alice stiffened.

Robert put his hand on Beau’s shoulder. “Son? Would it be okay if we said a few words to Tess before we leave you alone?”

“Alone?”

“We just thought…you might want a few minutes alone to say goodbye to Tess,” Carol said gently.

Beau nodded.

Carol brought her husband’s hand up to her lips, pressed them there, and closed her eyes. Robert pulled her into his side, kissing the top of her head. She lowered his hand. Carol brushed Tess’s hair from her forehead, tears streaming down her cheeks.

Alice reached for Kevin’s hand.

Beau leaned against the wall, his back to the others. He slipped the letter out of his pocket, turning it over in his hands, contemplating the weight of it. He opened the envelope and withdrew the light pink stationary. His pulse climbed with each passing second. He filled his lungs and read.

Beau, my love. You didn’t come back to me. You promised. How can I not be angry? I don’t want to be angry, but it’s happening anyway. I trusted you. I know it’s not your fault, but I have no one to blame, and my every thought carries anger.

The “me” in blame was smudged, as if a tear had fallen and washed it away.

I feel like I’m floating through each day without knowing where I’m going. I can’t see anything but you. I look for you everywhere. I feel you with me, even now, when everyone says I’m crazy. I pick up the phone to call you, but you’re not there. I can’t see you, but I can feel you. I know you’re here with me. Everyone is telling me to move on. I don’t think I know how. It feels like I’m betraying you if I try to get back to normal, whatever that is. Normal won’t ever be normal again.

We promised till death do we part, but I never expected it to happen so soon. I wonder what you were thinking when the helicopter went down. I wonder if you’d wished you’d never gone. I wish you’d never gone.

Nothing feels right, Beau. Food tastes bad, the sun is too bright. Your side of the bed is too empty. Do you feel me at night, when I inch over to where you should be? Do you hear me when I call out to you in the middle of the night? Damn it, Beau, I’m not cut out to handle this. I know you think I’m strong, but it’s not real. Maybe one day I was, but I don’t know how to be strong anymore. I’m trying to carry on because that’s what everyone says that you’d want for me, but in my heart, I don’t believe it. I think you’d want me to stay connected to you. I think you’d want what I want, to feel you here with me, every second of every day. I love you, Beau, and forever more you will be with me, and I with you. I will never say goodbye. Tess

Beau was alone with Tess for what he knew would be the last time. Tears streamed down his cheeks. He held her hand in his own, his words stuck in his throat. He still hoped for a miracle that he knew would never come.
Why,
he silently asked
God, why Tess?
He swallowed past the lump that stopped his words, and found a whisper of his voice. “I can’t say goodbye, Tess,” he said. “I’m not strong enough for this. I don’t think I can do it.”

He looked down at the note in his hand, his tears coming faster. He brought his fist, and the note, to his forehead, and clenched his eyes shut. “I need you,” he cried. “I am so sorry, Tess. Can you ever forgive me?”

Beau rose on shaky legs and climbed onto Tess’s bed, ignoring the wires and monitors, ignoring the pain in his throbbing leg. He had to hold her one more time, to smell her, to feel her next to him. She had to know she was loved. She had to feel his love, his heart beating next to hers. He wrapped her in his arms, his left leg crossed over hers, his chest against her side. His face nuzzled into her chest for the last time, he sobbed. He cried for the loss of the only woman he’d ever loved. He cried for the time he’d already lost and for the looks he’d never see from her. He cried for her voice he’d never hear again and for the dimple he’d never wait to see appear. He cried for the baby who would never know her mother, the one they’d never raise together. Beau cried until his eyes ached and his throat threatened to stop letting air pass. Beau cried until his parents entered the room and embraced him as he embraced Tess, a human cocoon he wished he’d never have to leave.

Tess’s lips parted, a soft puff of air released. Beau’s body shrank into itself. His chest heaved with painful sobs. Efforts of comfort from his parents went unnoticed. The room blackened. His pain dissipated. He couldn’t feel. He couldn’t see. He couldn’t think. Tess was gone, and he’d been the one who’d done it. Beau closed his eyes against the sight of her, free of the breathing tube, dead. Images of her eyes, the second before the airborne car struck her, stared back at him in the dark recesses of his mind. A wail broke through his sorrow, ripping from his throat like broken glass. He couldn’t catch his breath. His mother’s arms were around him, his father’s hands on his shoulders, a gurney to his son’s failing strength.

Sadness was a monster that clawed at every inch of him, ripping noises from his throat, his heart from his chest. He couldn’t stand it. He broke from his parents’ arms and rushed toward the door.

He could feel their pitying eyes on him. He hated them—every one of them. He hated the doctors. He hated that this day had come. Where the fuck was rewind? How could he go back? He panted, sweat dripping down his brow, soaking his armpits. He wrapped his arms tightly around his chest, trying to dodge the truth, huddling against the pressure of it. He was only a few feet from the door. He could make it. He could bolt from the room and never turn back.

“Son?” Robert reached for him.

Beau ignored him.

“Bob,” Carol said softly, motioning for her husband to step back, to give Beau his space.

The doctor spoke to the nurses in hushed tones, “7:16 P.M.”

Beau pushed himself to his feet, held onto the counter, willing himself to catch his breath, the letter, wet and crumpled, in his fist. He turned toward the door, his face wet with tears.

“Let’s go,” he said.

No one moved.

Beau trudged toward the door, the muscles in his arms twitched. He turned back toward them, then silently walked out the door.

“Mr. Johnson?” Dr. Kelly called after him.

Beau turned to face her, his eyes a mixture of defeat and determination.

She held an envelope in Beau’s direction. “I have your paternity results.” Her voice held no indication of the results.

Beau reached his hand out and took the sealed envelope. He stared down at it, then gripped it in both hands and tore it up, handing the shreds back to Dr. Kelly.

He turned and walked down the hall, his family staring after him. He stopped again and turned slowly to face them.

“Mom? Are you coming?”

She looked at Robert, bewildered.

“Abbey’s waiting, and I’m pretty sure she needs her grandmother as much as her father.”

Epilogue

Beau watched Abbey toddle across the living room and tumble into Samira’s arms. It had been fifteen months since Tess had died, and Beau still couldn’t look into Abbey’s luminous blue eyes without seeing Tess looking back at him. It no longer pained him, as it once had, now it embraced him like a hug. Abigail Tess Johnson had her mother’s spirit. Headstrong and dead set on proving the entire medical community wrong, she met each of her milestones, with the exception of rolling at three months. Abigail decided to scare everyone and roll at four months instead, quickly turning that roll into a scrunch-and-push crawl at five months and twenty-nine days. That’s when Beau knew he was in trouble and that Tess was very much alive, just in a smaller body with rolls of chub along her legs.

“I want to hold her!” Zeid had warmed to his new life in the States. It had taken months, but he no longer regarded Beau as the enemy. The misplaced anger he’d felt had slowly dissipated.  He pulled Abbey from his mother’s arms and into his lap. Abbey squirmed, their giggles filled the room.

Samira smiled at Beau. She no longer looked at him as though he were an unattainable glass statue on the tallest shelf. “Suha would roll her eyes at this behavior,” she laughed.

“Yes, but she’d secretly welcome it,” Beau said.

“Would not!” They’d become as close as siblings and teased each other as such. Samira had quickly become fairly proficient with the English language. She seemed a reborn person to Beau. He attributed her newfound confidence to the fresh, unrepressed environment of living with the Fulans, who encouraged her to take English as a Second Language classes and who provided a supportive family life. The filing clerk job Mr. Fulan had given her had also given her purpose and a chance to practice her new language skills. Ten hours per week were just enough for her to feel as though she contributed to the wellbeing of her family.

When Mr. Fulan had told Beau that Samira had found his camera and he’d been able to salvage his photographs, Beau had refused to have them published. They were a hurtful reminder of the loss of Tess. It had taken his mother four months of pushing and begging for him to look at the touching photographs. When he had finally relented, the images jumped off the page: Iraqi families standing with the American soldiers who remained in their country protecting them, becoming one community rather than a world of “we” and “them.” Carol’s words rang true for days afterward,
Tess would want you to share this with the world. Tess would have wanted.
Beau would never forgive himself for following his dream. He’d never accept the dismissal of blame from the others, but his mother was right. Tess would never have walked away from a chance to show the world that good came from something difficult. She was never one to shy away from a challenge. He’d finally relented, agreeing to publish the photos in memoriam of Tess. The photographs were to be released the next day, all monetary proceeds to be given to the underground organization that helped women escape Honor Killings and other abuses and threats to their lives.

Edham and Athra decorated cookies at the kitchen table with Carol. Alice glowed as she showed Robert the new sparkling diamond ring on her left finger—classic cut, of course. Kevin hung back and watched, relishing the thought that he was soon to be part of the Sacred Club of Married Men.

Beau stood back from them all, watching, and tracing the letter “I”, the shape of a heart, and the letter “U” in his palm.