The Mistaken (12 page)

“Oh God, Jill, I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry.”

With my hand still at her womb, I laid my forehead
against hers and sobbed. All the sounds around me faded away and
everything went still. I don’t know how long I stood there. It
could have been thirty minutes. An hour. Maybe two. It seemed like
an eternity had swallowed me up whole. But at some point, I was
finally pulled from her side, and I thought that eternity was not
nearly long enough.

Chapter Twelve

Tyler

For the next three days, my home was constantly
filled with people—friends, family, colleagues—but it didn’t
matter. I felt alone. And while I appreciated their collective
efforts, I would have preferred to actually be alone. With Nick at
my side, I made the obligatory rounds, accepting their apologies,
their sympathy, but while I looked them each in the eye and nodded,
I didn’t speak, not to anyone. I didn’t eat the food they brought.
I didn’t stroll in the backyard when they tried to maneuver me out
of the house. I just stared and nodded, completely numb.

Finally, I retreated to my room where I sat with the
door shut and the blinds pulled closed. Sitting there in front of
me was Jill’s purse, its contents scattered across the bed,
including a prescription bottle for Wellbutrin. It was dated nearly
two months ago, yet it was full. I counted. Not one pill was
missing. Not one. I stared off into the darkness, wondering how in
God’s name I could have missed that.

I heard my in-laws in the hall outside my bedroom
door, their voices raised, calling out my name, concerned for my
well-being. But I didn’t care anymore. My only goal was to make it
through the next few hours, until the funeral was over and everyone
went home to live their own lives and leave me the hell alone.

“Tyler, honey, Jack and I are leaving for the church
now,” Jillian’s mother, Lily, spoke through the closed bedroom
door. “Are you sure you won’t come with us?”

Her voice was rough, constricted, as if she were
choking back her tears. I imagine she stood outside the door for a
few moments, waiting for me to respond, knowing that, after three
days of brooding silence, I probably would not. I heard her and
Jack talking to my brother. Nick assured them he would get me there
soon then closed the front door behind them. He knocked on my
bedroom door before he entered. He walked over, stood in front of
me, and knelt down when I wouldn’t look up. Nick’s eyes were
trained on my face, but I stared blindly past him as I sat
motionless in my chair.

“Tyler, it’s time to go. The funeral Mass is
scheduled to start in less than an hour. It’s important for you to
be there. You’ll never forgive yourself if you don’t go.” He
paused, waiting for a reply he knew he wouldn’t receive. “I know
how it feels. I didn’t get to go to Mum and Pop’s funeral, or Kim’s
either. It’s hard to move on when you don’t get the chance to say
goodbye.” He placed his hand on top of mine. “You need closure,
Ty.”

He stood back up, yanked my suit jacket off the
hanger, and held it up for me to pull on. He shook it and looked at
me expectantly. I regarded him sullenly but complied. Hours
earlier, Nick had managed to push me into the shower, but I hadn’t
shaved for days, nor had I slept, and the combination made me look
like a strung-out zombie, not that I cared. I’m sure I was a fine
sight, but no one said anything about it. It’s not like it was an
affair where pictures would be taken. Who really cared what the
poor widower looked like, right? As long as he was there to grieve
properly for his dead wife.

Nick pushed me out of the house and into the black
Town Car idling at the curb. The driver took us to the same
Catholic church where Jillian and I were married a few short months
ago. I sat where Nick put me, next to Jillian’s parents and sister
in the front pew. I listened to all the beautiful stories everyone
shared about Jillian, how much they all loved her, how much they
would miss her. They cried through their speeches, and wiped their
tears away with tissues and shirt sleeves. I listened to the Mass,
my ears pricking when the priest spoke about God’s will, and that
through His forgiveness, we would all be saved.

I snickered in contempt. Saved? Ha! What a load of
shit!

The priest looked over at Nick and nodded. He turned
to me and indicated it was my turn to speak. I stared numbly at him
for a long moment then stood up and walked slowly to the podium. I
scanned the crowd and saw how they all looked at me. Their pity was
palpable, filling the church with a silent dirge that clawed at my
ears. Many cried as I stood there looking so mournful. I hadn’t
cried since leaving the hospital. I simply existed, grieving
inwardly, angry with myself. I looked at the congregation and tried
to speak, but the words stuck in my throat as the tears I’d been
holding back for the last three days spilled unheeded.

I stared down at the photo of Jill I’d been carrying
around. It was taken on our wedding day. Tremendous joy radiated
from her. I could almost feel the warmth of it emanating from the
paper itself. It made me smile to look at it and remember her that
day. I gazed at the photo and, with a shaky breath, gathered myself
to speak.

“I want to thank you all for coming.” I paused while
I scanned the crowd. “It would have meant a great deal to Jill.” I
stopped again, momentarily unable to continue. I chewed on my lip
and tried to recover. “I’m sorry…I...” I shook my head, took
another deep breath, and started again. “Most of you know how much
Jillian meant to me, that she was my whole life. I know how much
she meant to you, as well. So…so I want to say to each of you who
loved her that I’m…I’m sorry.” I paused a third time, my chin
quivering with the effort it took to remain standing up there. “And
um…while I know Father Kenny spoke to you all about forgiveness,
you should know that...that this…was…my fault...”

Nick jumped up from his seat and was at my side in
an instant, cooing softly as he tried to pull me away.

“No...don’t,” I insisted, twisting my elbow from his
grasp. I turned back to the congregation. Many had their hands
drawn up to their mouths while others dabbed at their eyes. I
scanned them all, looking each in the eye as I continued.

“I did this. Me. Not Jillian. I deserve all the
blame for taking her from each of you. I don’t deserve your
forgiveness. Or God’s, for that matter. So, please…don’t pity me. I
don’t deserve that either.”

I looked back down at Jill’s picture and smiled
weakly once more before I turned to Nick. I pressed her photo into
his hand, stepped down off the altar, and walked out of the service
without speaking another word. With the Town Car idling slowly
behind me, I wandered aimlessly through the neighborhood
streets.

I did attend the grave-side service a couple hours
later so that I could honor all that was good about Jill. I wanted
to look into her family’s eyes and apologize directly. They didn’t
seem to want to hear it, but I insisted all the same. When the
service was over, I asked them all to leave, so I could be alone
with Jill. Everyone drove back to my in-laws’ house where they held
a wake, which I would not be attending.

I stood looking down into the dark hole that
contained Jillian’s casket, knowing that she lay cold and stiff
inside, our child still nestled deep within her. Due to her
extensive injuries, her casket had remained closed during the
visitation and Mass. I never saw her again after I was pulled from
her side at the hospital. That was the very last memory I had of
her. The last image I had of her face. I would never forget what
she looked like, all bruised and broken, her flesh pale white and
her blood spilled all around.

I would carry that image with me forever. I deserved
it. I was responsible. It was a burden I would keep close to my
heart, always...right next to the place that ached for retribution
against the only other person besides myself who held some
accountability for Jillian lying cold and alone in that dark hole.
I recalled the Bible verse where God said, “Vengeance is mine,” and
I sneered with derision.

“Well, fuck that,” I said aloud. “It’s mine. And
I’ll be damned if I don’t find some way to have it.”

I turned to walk away but thought of the last time
Jill and I had spoken, and what I regrettably hadn’t said to her. I
pulled a single white rose—Jill’s favorite and the sign of eternal
love—from one of the arrangements nearby. I added a purple hyacinth
to beg forgiveness and a pink carnation to let her know I would
never forget her. And lastly, a red rose. I threw them all down
onto her casket.

“Goodbye, Jillian,” I whispered. “I love you.”

Then I walked away.

Chapter
Thirteen

Tyler

I locked myself in the house for five weeks after
Jillian’s funeral. I kept the blinds and drapes pulled tight and
shut the world out as best I could. Client calls went unanswered,
construction jobs left unfinished. Friends came by from time to
time, knocked on the door, and left when I didn’t answer. They
often left food, hoping I would at least eat. It rotted where it
lay.

Lily stopped by every day for the first two weeks.
She talked to me through the door and reminded me of what Jillian
would want. I thanked her for her concern, but told her I didn’t
want to see anyone yet. When she continued to drop by, I stopped
responding to her pleas, praying she would just stay away. It
worked eventually.

Nick was next. He called every day, but after three
weeks, I finally stopped answering. Frustrated, he pounded on my
front door. It shook and rattled under his fist as he called out my
name.

“Ty, if you don’t open this door, I’m just going to
let myself in.”

He waited silently for a full minute.

“Tyler, I know where you keep the hidden key. Jill
told me. I’m going to use it.”

He waited again.

“Tyler!”

He fumbled around on the front porch then worked the
lock and pushed his way in.

“Ty?”

He couldn’t see me sitting in the dark, or all the
junk that lay scattered about the floor. The house was a complete
disaster, a victim of my rage. I had no other way to discharge it
except to throw whatever I got my hands on across the room. The
dining chairs were first. Two lay in shambles, half their legs now
useless posts protruding from the walls, and the seats shredded,
padding and all. The pages of two dozen books, mostly my own design
texts, littered the room like New Year’s Eve confetti at Times
Square, as did a month’s worth of newspapers, all my building
plans, and Jill’s old photography magazines. Art work, old
pictures, wall sconces, all of it a mangled mess strewn across the
living and dining room floor.

Then there were all the things Jill and I had bought
for the baby. When I first spied the large pile neatly arranged in
the den, I sorted through it, one item at a time. Until I unearthed
Jillian’s jogging stroller. That was the proverbial straw. I
triggered the mechanisms and allowed it to collapse, as designed.
But then I picked it up like a club and began hammering it against
the floor until it was nothing but a tangled jumble of metal
spokes, plastic shards, and frayed canvas. The rest followed: the
still boxed crib, the freshly painted rocker, the partially
assembled changing table. Even the tiny infant clothes.

The house looked like Banda Aceh, Indonesia in the
aftermath of the 2004 Boxing Day tsunami. The screams that
accompanied these episodes probably sounded similar, too. I was
left panting and sweating, but mostly sobbing as I surveyed the
home Jillian and I had shared for the last four years. But still, I
could not come to terms enough to clean it all up. Nick stumbled
over the mess as he walked into the dark foyer.

“What the fuck?” he said as he fell to the floor.
“Bloody hell, Ty. What is all this shit?”

He reached for the switch and turned on the
light.

“Turn it off, Nick, and get the hell out,” I warned
quietly.

He kicked the debris to the side and found a path in
my direction. He crouched down in front of me as I sat in the
living room chair, resting his hands on my knees.

“Whoa, Ty, you look like shit. And your house…” he
said as he scanned the room. “God, it’s a wreck. We need to get
you, and this place, cleaned up.” He examined me closely, tensing
his eyes and his head shaking in disappointment. “Ty, come on—”

“Get out, Nick.”

He stood up and looked around for a moment then
started picking up the mess that lay around us. “This is
disgusting, Tyler. Jillian would be as mad as a cut snake if she
saw the house like—”

I pounded my fist on the armrest. “Don’t talk to me
about Jill!”

Nick stood in front of me with his mouth open. “Ty,
come on. Jillian wouldn’t want this. You have to know that. She
would have wanted you to—”

I sprang up off the chair and lunged at him,
knocking him down as he tripped backward over the detritus. “I said
don’t fucking talk to me about Jillian! You didn’t know her. You
don’t know what she would want for me. You don’t know a goddamn
thing, so just leave me the fuck alone.” With my hands on his
collar, I knelt over him, straddling his chest, pinning him to the
floor.

Nick held his hands up in submission and gaped at me
like I was crazy. I suppose I was—crazy with grief, with
loneliness, and most of all, with intense, overwhelming guilt that
burned through every cell of my being hotter than the Devil’s
anvil.

“Just go, Nick, please. Leave me be.” I raked my
hands over my face and pushed off, rolling onto the floor beside
him. “Please, Nick, I...I can’t. I can’t stand to...to talk about
her, to...to even hear her name. Godammit, it’s bad enough I can’t
stop thinking about her.”