One Prayer Away (4 page)

“Such as?”

“It didn't matter, man. Anything I could think of, I was saying it. I complained of not being able to find clean underwear because she hadn't done the laundry. I accused her of seeing another man because she'd gotten home an hour later than normal that day. I complained about being hungry because she hadn't cooked dinner.”

“Did you really think she was seeing another man?”

“I was intoxicated, Chris. Drunk people are some of the world's most stupid people. I was smashed and I was an idiot. It wasn't about dinner or the laundry, and it sure wasn't about another man. I knew Virtue better than that. If she really wanted to be with another man, she would have just abandoned me like everybody else in my life had. I was just angry at myself for what happened to my grandparents and for losing my job and my family and for becoming a colossal failure. Virtue reminded me of the good things in life and all I could see and wanted to see were the bad. The first time I hit her, it was just a slap across the face. Not that that wasn't bad enough,” Mitchell quickly added. “But it was nothing in comparison to the last time I hit her. I used my fist, and the blow was so hard that she flipped over the sofa and hit her head on the coffee table. As drunk as I was, I could see the instant swelling that followed. She didn't even bother to pack.”

“That was the last time you saw her?”

“Yeah. Seven years ago.” Mitchell pulled his keys from his top drawer and held them up so Chris could see them. Dangling between two of the keys was a gold wedding band with small diamonds embedded on the top. “This is all that I have to really remind me of what I had with her. When the movers came a couple of weeks later, they took every garment and every photo that had her in it, including the wedding album. Virtue had to be with them on the day they came. I wasn't home when they came and got her stuff, but I don't know how they would have known what
to take had she not been there. When I got in that afternoon, it looked like I'd never shared that apartment with anybody. All of her things . . . everything was gone. It was like she'd vanished without a trace.”

Chris stood and took a few steps across the floor before turning back to Mitchell. “Who filed for divorce?”

“She did, a few months later. I probably never would have filed, because I didn't want to be divorced. In spite of the way I mistreated her, I loved Virtue. I still . . .” Mitchell's voice drifted, and when it returned, the previous thought was left incomplete. “I guess in the back of my mind, I'd held on to the hope that she'd eventually return to me like she did after the first attack. But I had no such luck. I didn't even contest the divorce. I'd put her through enough, and she deserved to be happy. I was still struggling to find sobriety, so I knew I wasn't what she needed or wanted.”

“And you'd never seen her again until the other day?”

“It wasn't for lack of trying, though,” Mitchell said with a laugh. “After I got my life together, I would look for her periodically, not knowing if I really wanted to find her or not. I guess what I was most afraid of was seeing that terrified look in her eyes. Like the one she displayed three weeks ago.”

“When was the last time you looked for her?”

“Remember last year when I spent my vacation in Detroit? That was the last time I looked. Her parents had moved, so they were no longer in the place where I'd known them to live. For years I'd been afraid of going to them, knowing that they'd known what I did to their only child. Her father never really liked me to begin with, so I was actually kind of frightened about how he would react to seeing the man who hit his daughter. But I manned up and said it was time that I faced the music. Whatever he said or did to me, I deserved that plus some more. But when I got there, I found out that they'd moved away.”

Chris had made his way back to the chair he'd abandoned during Mitchell's explanation. The coffee in his cup was lukewarm, and he frowned after taking a swallow. He replaced the cup on the desktop and leaned back in his chair, shaking his head in disbelief of what he'd just heard.

“Man, you need to write a book,” he said. “In our pre-marital counseling session with Rev. Inman last week, Lisa and I were asked to talk about the most tragic marital stories we'd ever heard, not including her own experiences, of course. When it was my turn, I just sat there looking like my last name was Huxtable. My parents have been married for almost fifty years, and Ursula and her husband have a good marriage. If I had heard your story a week ago, I could have made Lisa's tale of her coworker's bitter divorce and custody battle sound like an episode of
Sesame Street.
”

A sudden overwhelming sadness engulfed Mitchell, and all at once he fought the threat of tears. For years he'd prayed for a chance to rectify the unforgivable sin he'd committed when he dared to lay his hands on his wife. He had foolishly taken for granted that he'd wake up the next morning with her in the bed beside him as in the previous case. Virtue's failure to return devastated him, and he spent almost every sober moment of the days following the fight looking for her. After two days passed and she hadn't returned home, Mitchell had gone to her job at the school where she taught dance and was surprised that she'd quit the job she loved with a simple phone call to her boss. Mitchell began to feel panic setting in. He was almost certain that she had found refuge with her parents, but each time he called, he got no answer. None of Mitchell's messages were returned, and without a vehicle he couldn't make the hour-long drive to their house. At least, that was the excuse he'd used at the time. Today was the first day that he'd been able to admit that fear was the real reason he didn't find a way to make the visit.

Since gaining a close relationship with Christ, Mitchell
had obtained a level of peace, believing that his prayers had been heard and that God had given him an immeasurable amount of patience to wait for Virtue to reenter his life. All those years of praying for a chance, and when he finally saw her, Mitchell was too dumbfounded to form any words other than her name. There was so much more that needed to be said. He'd never apologized. He'd never had another opportunity to tell her how much he loved her. Perhaps most of all, Mitchell needed to show her how much he'd changed. He wanted her to witness the differences in his life. Instead, all he'd been able to do was see a woman who was nearly frightened to death just by the very sight of him.

Mitchell unconsciously closed his eyes and tried to block out the image of the look in her eyes just before she'd dashed from the restaurant as though her life depended on how quickly she could escape. His meditation was broken when he heard Chris mutter five words.

“You think she's remarried now?”

It was a probability that Mitchell had given no thought to. Or perhaps it was one that he felt would not be so if he just didn't give it consideration. Virtue was an intelligent, gifted woman who was beautiful both inside and out. It only stood to reason that a man much smarter than Mitchell had seen what a jewel she was and had leapt at the opportunity to treat her like the queen she deserved to be treated as.

“I'm sorry,” Chris said, realizing that he'd struck a chord with his last statement.

“It's okay,” Mitchell said, suddenly wanting more than anything to end the conversation. “I'm sure she has. Like I said, she deserves to be happy.”

Both men sat in silence for several moments. Mitchell's mind was bombarded with thoughts, just as it had been every day for the past three weeks. Although he'd never forgotten Virtue or the love he had shared with her,
Mitchell thought that he'd successfully moved on and accepted that that part of his life was over. As remorseful as he was for everything that had happened between them, he thought that he'd accepted the responsibility, gotten forgiveness, and would move on with his future, never having to revisit that part of his past.

Seeing Virtue had changed everything. It opened a flood of questions in his mind.
What is she doing in Dallas? How has her life been affected by what I did to her? Has Virtue ever found it in her heart to forgive me? And, if so, why did she run? What is she doing in Dallas?

The question of her presence in Dallas was the one that repeated itself the most. Mitchell couldn't help but give way to the possibility that Virtue had somehow, maybe by divine order, made her way to the same city that he now called home. It would be ironic and quite coincidental given the fact that, as far as he knew she had no family ties here. Chris's question of whether she'd remarried weighed heavily in the back of Mitchell's mind. If he were a gambling man, Mitchell would bet money that she had. Even so, he still wanted to seize the opportunity, if one actually existed, to apologize. She may never find it in her heart to forgive him, and that was understandable as far as Mitchell was concerned; but he'd prayed for it, and if God was opening the door to allow it to happen, he needed to seize the moment.

But how?

Just as the thought formed in Mitchell's mind, Chris's voice overshadowed it.

“You still love her, don't you?”

Mitchell looked up and found Chris looking directly at him, asking a question that his eyes indicated he already knew the answer to. The obvious truth would be simple to say, but Mitchell wasn't sure whether he wanted to verbally admit his lingering love for his ex-wife. The answer might have been simple, but it was a painful truth. And if
Virtue's heart indeed belonged to another man now, it would be a
pointless
truth.

“When a man is as big of a drunk as I was, Chris, very little else means anything to him, even love.” Avoiding a direct answer to the question seemed like a safer route to take. “I was barely clearheaded long enough to even think about love. Virtue slept in the bed most nights and I passed out on the sofa, opting instead to sleep with Pearl.”

Chris looked at him in a mixture of surprise and disgust. It was clearly not the response he'd been expecting. “Pearl? You mean you actually carried on an affair, with your wife in the next room?”

“What can I say?” Mitchell shrugged. “Pearl was smooth, elegant, supple, full-bodied, and just a little bit spicy. She made me relax, and I loved going to sleep with her in my arms.”

“I don't mean no disrespect, man, but no wonder Virtue left your sorry behind. And listen to you. Even now, you make it sound like this relationship with Pearl was deeper than your relationship with your wife. It sounds like it was serious, man.”

Mitchell looked at the profound expression on his friend's face and burst into laughter, unable to continue the façade. After the emotional overrun of thoughts that had nearly broken him just moments ago, the laughter was a welcome change. Mitchell's outburst seemed to cause Chris's concerns to diminish but his confusion to double. Once Mitchell stopped laughing, he explained himself.

“Pearl is the brand of vodka I used to drink, Chris. Believe me, there was no real love there. We just used each other. I used vodka to drown my sorrows, and vodka used me to infiltrate my life and tear it to smithereens. Pearl cost me twenty-four dollars a bottle and, eventually, everything else too.”

Chris broke into a hearty laugh at the realization of it all, but his next words were halted by the sound of his telephone
ringing in his office down the hall. Barbara answered, but it was only a matter of seconds before she called for him.

“We'll finish this conversation later,” Chris said just before walking from the room and once again leaving his partner to his thoughts.

Mitchell knew that he wasn't off the hook. He knew his best friend well. Chris was perceptive enough to know when Mitchell wasn't ready to talk about an issue, and he was always kind and wise enough to back away when needed. But Chris was also determined. Mitchell knew that when he came back, the question of whether or not there was still love in his heart for Virtue would be high on the list of conversation pieces. This time, Mitchell had avoided answering. Next time, he knew he wouldn't be so fortunate.

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