Crystal Lies (20 page)

I noticed my Bible still on the coffee table with Sherry’s newspaper markers sticking out. Feeling bad that I had ignored it so far, especially in light of Sherry’s recent loss, I grabbed it and flipped open to a marker and read the sentence underlined in purple. “I am leaving you with a gift—peace of mind and heart. And the peace I give isn’t like the peace the world gives. So don’t be troubled or afraid.”

I’d heard this verse before. In fact, I think there had been a time when I had even believed it. “Peace of mind and heart,” I repeated aloud. That
did
sound wonderful, but impossible, too. Just the same, I copied this verse down on a scrap of paper and taped it to my refrigerator, which now had three messages posted there. The one about not being anxious but praying, from Marcus Palmer, the rehab counselor. And one from Jack in the laundry room. And now one from Sherry. I glanced at Jack’s message again and suddenly felt a chill go through me.

“The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away. Blessed be the name of the Lord.” It hadn’t made much sense to me before, but now I wondered if it had really been meant for Sherry. Matthew had been one of those sunny children who seemed like a gift. And now he was gone. Gone. And suddenly I realized that Geoffrey might’ve been a jerk to come like this today, but he had been right about one thing. It
was
time for me to be strong for Sherry. Maybe I couldn’t do this for myself, but I thought I could do it for her. “Give me strength, Lord,” I prayed as I picked up the phone.

I wasn’t really surprised to get their answering machine, and although I hate leaving messages, I braced myself and did the best I could. “Sherry and Rod, I am completely devastated by your news. My heart goes out to you guys, and I am really praying for you. If there is anything—I mean anything—I can do to help out, please feel free to call. Really, I mean it. I may have been a mess yesterday, Sherry, but I am here for you today—”

“Glennis,” came a raspy voice as someone picked up.

“Oh, Sherry,” I cried. “You’re there. Oh, I wish I could just give you a big hug and—”

“Can you come over?” she asked. “Rod had to go take care of some… some things, and I’m alone.”

“Of course.” I looked down at my hideous sweats. “I’ll be there in just a few minutes.”

I don’t think I’ve ever moved so fast in my life. I leaped in and out of the shower, managed to put on a somewhat decent outfit, and got down to the parking lot in about seven minutes flat. I combed my hair and then, ignoring the pale gray roots already in need of a touch-up, put on some lip gloss at the stoplight. And I was at Sherry’s house in less than twenty minutes. Even so, I felt nervous as I walked up to her door. What could I possibly say to make things better?

I tapped quietly on the door, then let myself in. The drapes were still drawn, probably just as they had been when the Lexingtons got the horrible news early this morning. Even so, they lent an uncharacteristic somber tone to Sherry’s otherwise cheerful country-style home.

“Sherry?” I called tentatively as I tiptoed through their living room. Sherry’s house always had a genuine, lived-in feeling. Not messy by any means, but comfortable, as if the occupants really enjoyed being here. I knew this house by heart and suspected Sherry was in the master bedroom. I went down the hallway, keeping my gaze away from the family photos that lined the wall. I knew it would break me into pieces to look into Matthew’s sweet nine-year-old face smiling from a Little League photo. I called her name again.

“In here.”

I found her on her bed, her face blotchy and eyes swollen. She had on jeans and a sweater, but her hair was uncombed and her face void of makeup. I went straight to her and put my arms around her. “I’m so sorry, Sherry. So, so sorry.”

“I know,” she sobbed.

And then the two of us just held on to each other and cried. I knew there were no words to soften the pain that had sliced through her heart this morning, nothing I could do to take her suffering away or even lighten her load. I might not have lost a child yet—not physically anyway—but I had lost Jacob time and time again in my heart. And I knew,
if things didn’t change, I might lose him still. I knew that no amount of sympathetic words would change anything if I were in her shoes. And so we just cried.

Finally it seemed we were both cried out, at least for the moment, and we both just lay back on the bed saying nothing. I could hear the sound of a clock ticking and the occasional sound of a car’s tires on the wet street outside. But mostly we were covered in a blanket of silent grief.

“Thank you,” she finally whispered as she reached for a tissue.

I rolled over to look at her and nodded.

“Rod hasn’t even cried yet. At first he was just really, really angry. He wanted to go out and find the kids who took Matthew out last night. I think he wanted to kill them.”

“I can understand that.”

“
Really?”
She seemed shocked.

“Sometimes that’s how I feel about some of Jacob’s drug friends.”

“Oh.”

“Sherry…” I knew I had to confess. “When I heard the news on TV this morning, and they weren’t releasing the name, I felt absolutely certain it was Jacob.”

She nodded.

“And then when it wasn’t I was so incredibly relieved.” I was starting to choke up again. “But then…then when I heard it was Matthew—” I gasped now, unsure whether I could say this aloud or not. “Well, I just kept thinking about Matthew and what a sweet kid he was and how he’s never really done much of anything wrong in his whole life and—well, this is really hard to say—God forgive me, but I…I thought it
should’ve
been Jacob instead.” Now I just totally lost it. I was sobbing and crying hysterically. “I…I thought that Jacob’s the one who…who’s messed up so badly, and he…he probably should’ve been the…the one who—”

“Don’t even say it.” She put her hand up as if to stop me from speaking. “Don’t even
think
it, Glennis.”

“But it’s not fair, Sherry. It’s so wrong.”

She nodded, then lay back, staring at the ceiling. “I agree, losing my child—especially like that—it does seem totally wrong.”

“I just had to tell you that, Sherry. I’m sorry”

“No, I appreciate your honesty. You’re a good friend, Glennis.”

Then we just lay there in silence again. I couldn’t believe I had just confessed that about Jacob. It was a thought that had been haunting me all day, but I’d never dreamed I’d admit it. It seemed to prove that not only was I a terrible mom but a traitor to my son as well. Oh, certainly, it wasn’t that I wanted Jacob dead. God knew I would rather be dead myself. But it just seemed so ironic and random and, yes, unfair.

The next couple of days passed in a blur. I tried to make myself as helpful as possible at Sherry’s house. I answered the phone, organized the food that was coming in, got the guest room ready for Sherry’s parents, and even mopped the hardwood floors. Anything to stay busy.

Then, the night before the memorial service, Jacob came home. I’d spent so much time at the Lexingtons lately that I hadn’t caught up on my own housekeeping. Not that Jacob noticed. He smelled so bad and looked so bummed that I suspected he’d been sleeping in Dumpsters. Even so I hugged him, holding him close to me for a few seconds and thanking God that he was still alive.

“I heard about Matthew,” he said in a sober voice, dropping his filthy backpack by the front door as if he didn’t expect to be here long.

“The service is tomorrow.”

He nodded.

“Do you want to come?” I asked. “I don’t know.”

“Sarah came home. She’s with Dad.”

He nodded again, then went over to the kitchen window and looked out for a bit.

“Looking for someone?” I asked as I joined him. He quickly turned away “No.”

“Are you hungry, Jacob? I made a big lasagna for the Lexingtons, but I made an extra one that’s still in the fridge.”

“Sounds good.”

“Want to take off your coat?” I asked as he sat down on a barstool. “That’s okay.”

I nodded. “Okay.” I turned toward the refrigerator, unsure of what I should say to my prodigal son. Finally, after I’d heated the lasagna and poured him a glass of juice, I asked how he was doing.

He shrugged. “Not so good.”

“What do you mean?” I asked as I set a generous portion of lasagna in front of him. “What’s going on?”

He took a big bite, chewed noisily, then answered. “It’s not exactly easy living on the streets.”

“You’re really living on the street?”

“Pretty much.”

“Oh.” I sat down on the stool in the kitchen. “I thought maybe you were at Daniel’s.”

He shook his head and shoveled in another bite. “Not welcome there.”

“Why’s that?”

He was scraping his plate clean now, trying to get every last bite. Then he looked up at me with sad, empty eyes. “It all comes down to the bottom line, Mom.”

“You mean money?”

He nodded.

“He wants you to pay rent?”

“Yeah, something like that.”

I took in a deep breath. “There’s still rehab, Jacob.”

He frowned, and his face looked dark and tense, as if he might explode if I said or did the wrong thing just now. I knew that Dr. Abrams would be telling me to throw him out again. But somehow I couldn’t do that tonight. Not after having been so frightened to lose him, and not on the day before my best friend was going to bury one of her sons.

“Your dad asked about you.”

He made a laughing sound that had no warmth. “Yeah, I’ll bet.”

“He said he’s going to look into some other kinds of rehab places. He heard about something in Colorado.”

He rolled his eyes. “Yeah, that sounds like Dad. Ship me off and lock me up someplace far away so I don’t embarrass him.”

“You don’t embarrass—”

“Don’t bother, Mom.” He shoved the plate away so hard that it went sliding off the counter and crashed onto the floor. I bent down and began picking up the pieces, unsure as to what I should do or say to defuse this conversation. And since I’d taken to praying more lately, I breathed a little “show me what to do, Lord,” prayer as I picked up the broken pieces. Finally I stood up and looked at my son.

“Sorry,” he mumbled.

“It’s okay,” I told him. “Those dishes are pretty ugly anyway. Sometimes I feel like breaking them myself.” His eyes seemed to smile at this.

“Do you want to spend the night here?” I asked. Somehow I felt certain this was the right thing to do—for today anyway. I had no idea about what I would do tomorrow.

He looked surprised. “Are you sure?”

“Yeah. Don’t get me wrong. I still want you to go in for rehab,” I told him. “But why don’t you go ahead and stay here tonight if you want.”

His face brightened a little. “Thanks, Mom.”

I looked at the clock in the kitchen. It was nearly midnight. “The service is at eleven tomorrow morning,” I told him. “But I’m going to the church an hour earlier to help get things set up in the kitchen. And I’ve had a long day.”

He nodded. “Me, too.”

“Feel free to take a shower,” I said, worried that it sounded more like a command than a suggestion. Still I couldn’t bear the thought of him sleeping in that condition. Although, judging by his smell, I’m sure he’d slept in filth plenty of nights before. “And put your clothes in the laundry basket in the bathroom,” I continued. “Maybe we can get them washed tomorrow.” I looked at his hair now. Jacob had always kept his hair cut short in the past, but he hadn’t had a haircut since last summer. So besides being greasy and dull looking, it hung limply in his eyes and down over his collar. I wondered if there would be time to get him to a barber before the funeral in the morning.

I was just about to say as much when I, amazingly, remembered something Marcus Palmer had said at the codependent meeting I’d attended a week or so ago. Had it only been that long?“Pick your battles carefully,” he had told us. Not that he was encouraging us to fight, but rather to draw the line. He said we had to let the less important things go and focus on the real issues, like reminding the addict in our life that he or she needed to seek treatment. As a result, I decided not to say anything more about Jacob’s personal appearance tonight. Besides, I had the distina feeling that it wouldn’t take much to erupt into a totally futile fight, and to be honest, I just didn’t have the energy for it. Even if that meant feeling somewhat embarrassed by his appearance at the funeral, I would have to bite my tongue. Eliminating the street stench would be worth a lot.

So I told him good-night and headed for bed, and I know it sounds horrible, and it’s difficult to admit, but I suddenly felt very uncomfortable
in my own apartment. Unsafe even. Jacobs condition was confusing and frightening to me. And I wasn’t thinking only of his lack of personal hygiene, which was bad enough. But that blank look in his eye and the knowledge that he had been using and may have even become addicted to crystal meth were deeply disturbing. I hadn’t done much research yet, but I’d seen a TV news show recently that had exposed how meth addicts can often become violent and unpredictable as a result of the drug. And I still remembered how Jacob had been that night when I’d confronted him about the hypodermic needles—like a stranger.

Once in bed, I felt restless and wide awake and suddenly wished I had a deadbolt on my bedroom door. Then I had to almost laugh at myself since the doors in this apartment weren’t much heavier than cardboard anyway, and already Jacob had managed to put his fist through the thin walls a number of times. What good would a deadbolt do, really? But as I lay there imagining the kinds of horrors that would lend themselves to a bad scene in a Lifetime movie, I finally had to ask myself why I even cared. What difference would it make? So what if my son murdered me in my sleep. Why would I want to go on living with a son who was such a mess anyway? Perhaps it would be best to simply get it over with. Maybe mothers like me deserved what they got. Besides that, my life wasn’t much to fight for these days. Happy thoughts to put me to sleep with, I know, but it was how I felt.

Even so, I did manage to pray again. Despite my hopelessness and apathy, I asked that God would protect both me and my son. And then I managed to fall asleep and eventually woke up the next morning, still alive. At least partially. More and more I was thinking that a large part of me had already died. I couldn’t exactly pin down when this had occurred, but perhaps it had been a process. Some of this death was related to Geoffrey, some to Jacob, a little to Sarah and her unwillingness even to speak to me, and some as a result of Sherry’s recent loss.

I got up before six and took the basket of Jacobs filthy clothes down to the laundry room. I think I was hoping to find Jack around. But, of course, it was too early for him to be doing laundry. So I put the load in and sat down, and, feeling exhausted even though I had slept relatively well, I put my head in my hands and wondered how I was going to survive all this.

Fortunately or not, depending on how you look at it, I had a funeral to attend today and various responsibilities to fulfill…and as a result I had little time to dwell on my misery just now.

I finished Jacobs laundry, folding each piece just as carefully as I had done when he was my sweet, little, chubby-cheeked baby in diapers. Then I went back upstairs and took a shower and got dressed. I took time to select the perfect outfit, the one Sherry had enticed me to purchase. It wasn’t that I particularly cared about my appearance these days but more because I didn’t want Sherry to be ashamed of me. I wanted to be strong and dependable for her. In all honesty I’d been living my life for her benefit these past few days. Trying to masquerade myself as a together sort of woman who was fully functional and rational. Perhaps I was even mimicking the way that Sherry had been when she rushed to my rescue as my life crumbled into pieces. But at least my facade was working. For Sherry anyway. It didn’t seem to be working for me.