Therapy Ever After (Therapy #1.5) (9 page)

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Authors: Kathryn Perez

BOOK: Therapy Ever After (Therapy #1.5)

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THE WARM, EVENING
Texas breeze dances across my wrinkled skin. I rock back and forth in this many-year-old squeaking rocking chair on our front porch. The chair next to me is empty. It feels strange sitting here without Jace. The sun is setting on this long day and I feel almost victorious for surviving another day without him. A single tear escapes my eye and runs down my face. I know people think at my age and after so many years with him the sadness shouldn’t or wouldn’t be as deep, but they’re wrong. I don’t think it matters how old a person is because when you lose your other half, you feel it. You feel it deep in your bones whether they’re strong or frail.

We had a good marriage, a good life together. With every squeak of the old chair, another memory floods my aging mind. I may forget where I left my glasses or have no idea what I was doing minutes before starting a new task, but there are parts of my mind that have never aged. The memories are etched there, untouched by time. The breeze blows silvery strands of my hair into my face. I brush them away. Jace used to tuck them behind my ears and then kiss me on the cheek, telling me how beautiful I am. Even with sagging and old wrinkly skin, he’d never miss a day telling me how beautiful I am.

As I watch the sun lower into the deep blue shadows of the sky, I exhale. Another day has come to an end. I miss him. Every evening we would sit out here on our porch and watch the fireflies dance through the tall grass in the pasture across the way. Before my legs became so unsteady, I would run with the grandkids or great grandkids chasing those fireflies. We’d fill Ball jars with them. Jace would then pull out his pocketknife and poke holes in the lids. We’d sit outside watching the glow radiating from the jar until the kids were tired and ready for bed. The weekend sleepovers were the thing memories are made of.

The next morning, Jace would tell them, “It’s time to give them back to the sun.”

Standing in the yard, they’d release the fireflies and we’d watch them take flight. On the evening after Jace’s burial service, everyone came over. Just before sunset, we sat out here on our large wraparound porch, and our oldest daughter, Lilah Beth, was looking out across the expansive land at the sun and said, “It was time to give him back to the sun, Mama.”

This made me smile. She was right. Jace Collins had been so many things to me in my life. He had been pain, fear, anger, and loss, but once we found our rhythm, forgave our missteps, we lost all the bad and found the light. From then on Jace had only been my best friend, the love of my life, and with every single bad time we found ourselves in he was the light. I never stopped fighting my demons, and neither did he. He stood by my side, his sword drawn, and fought with me through it all. At my worst he loved me. At my best he cherished me. The vows we said so many years ago stood the test of time, and Lilah Beth was right. Jace had come into my young life and rescued me from darkness with his light, and it was time to give him back to the sun. I was sad and heartbroken to lose him, but oh God how blessed I had been to have been able to love and be loved by him for so many years of my life.

Jace was so many things to me in my life, but when we had children, I truly saw who he was. I couldn’t have asked for a better life partner and father to our children. He was their champion in all they did. Our girls learned what true love and respect is from his example, and our sons learned how to grow up and be loving and respectful men. He was never behind the scenes. Jace showed up one hundred percent in their lives. He wasn’t the kind of father I had known as a child. I was grateful for that. When I would tell him how thankful I was for the father he was, he’d stop me and quickly say, “I don’t deserve thanks for being what I should be. They deserve a father and mother who show up for them in all ways, and you’re just as much a part of who they’re becoming as I am. I’m not your father and you’re not my mother. No one should thank us for that because the people who raised us weren’t people to make comparisons to by any means. We’re trying to be good parents, as we should be.”

It was a touchy subject with Jace, our parents, especially his mother. Even after years of therapy, I’m not sure he was ever able to completely close that wound. We didn’t visit her grave once in all the years of our life together. It was just too much for him, I think. Oddly enough, on our one-year wedding anniversary we visited Kingsley’s grave. It was Jace’s idea. I had told him early on about the notebook Kingsley’s sister, Riah, had dropped off. I read the part to him where Kingsley declared Jace was my soul mate. Jace was genuinely moved by it, to the point of tears. Again, in that moment these two men came together, one in life and one in death, for me. When we visited the grave, Jace spoke to Kingsley out loud.

“Once upon a time I felt nothing but anger toward you. I could’ve never seen back then how wrong I was to allow my jealousy to overcome me. You were what she needed. You loved her when I didn’t know how, and then your selfless words placed her back into my arms. I want you to know I’ll never take the gift I was given for granted. I’ll love her every single day and be the man she deserves for the rest of my life.”

We placed purple lilies on the grave and walked away hand in hand. It was a beautiful moment between all three of us.

It’s crazy, but looking back it feels like only yesterday, the two of us standing before one another vowing ’til death do us part. Until our kids were born, it was the happiest day of my life. I push myself up and out of the old rocking chair with wobbly arms. The evening chill is getting too cold for me. When I get inside, I venture into my old study. It’s been a long while since I used it. My hands started to fail a couple of years ago, making it too painful to do much writing, which is what I spent most of my retirement years doing in between traveling with Jace. After years of teaching, I spent hours submerged in poetry. If I wasn’t writing it, I was reading it. For my retirement gift, Jace took me to West Yorkshire in England. I was able to visit where my very favorite poet, Sylvia Plath, was laid to rest in St. Thomas Churchyard. As a young woman, I had the message that’s engraved on her headstone tattooed on my shoulder.
Even amidst fierce flames the golden lotus can be planted.

I sit down at my desk and pull out the last journal I ever wrote in. When my handwriting became illegible due to the arthritis pain, I tried using a computer, but it felt wrong. My poetry couldn’t be written on a computer. There’s something about paper and a pen, something organic that helps the words flow. I miss it. Now I just keep all the words that come to me in my aging mind. I dust the leather-bound journal off and open its stiffened pages. Page by page, I flip through them, reminiscing. Just when I think I’m getting to the last poem I wrote, I notice there’s more. After the last poem is Jace’s handwriting. I immediately gasp and bring my hand to my mouth, full of astonishment. There’s a date at the top. He wrote this almost a year ago.

I drop my hand and run it over the words and whisper, “You wonderful and sneaky man.”

I begin to read, and with every single word I take my time absorbing it, tracing it with my finger and trying to not only feel the words but feel Jace through them.

Dearest Jessica,

I hope when you come across this you aren’t upset that I wrote in one of your beloved journals. Although, I’ll never come close to writing beautiful things the way you do, but I hope you can see the beauty and feeling behind my words nonetheless.

My love, my best friend, and mother of my children, I’ve spent a lot of time reflecting lately. Our life together has been full and blessed. As we spend our last days on this earth watching our children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren make their way in this life, I’m so incredibly grateful.

I’ve been gifted with your love for most of my life. I’m the man I am because I found you. I know you see it differently and think I rescued you, but you’re wrong, my dear. From the moment I fell for you, you began reshaping the contours of my heart. You taught me the true meaning of love. Love is just a word until someone comes along and gives it meaning. You did that for me. When you love, you do it with an intensity that’s unmatched. Your love is a fire that burns hot and bright. Your love is water cutting through stone and earth, never letting anything stop it.

I couldn’t have ever asked for more because you are my more. I hope I’ve loved you enough. I have tried to be all you needed, wanted, and desired. I want you to know you have been all that for me, and when I breathe my last breaths, I’ll do it as a man who has known the truest form of love and friendship with the one woman who taught me how to let go and hold on all at the same time.

Love You Now

Love You Forever,

Jace

With tears streaming down my face, I sob. I cry for the loss of this wonderful and loving man, and I weep with joy simultaneously. I pull the journal to my chest and clasp it tightly in my hands over my heart.
His heart.
I speak out loud as if he’s in the room standing right next to me.

“I love you, Jace Collins, and knowing you left this earth with so much love in your big heart gives me solace. I know I was never the perfect wife, but my love for you was everything imperfection is not. My love was pure, and if you ever doubted the kind of husband you were, please rest in peace knowing I never lived a day in our life together wanting for anything or wanting anyone but you. You gave me more than I could have ever dreamed of. You gave me one thing I will forever cherish. Acceptance. You loved me for me and you never, not once, tried to change who I was or made me feel guilty for being me. My mind ailed me all my life, and you accepted every broken part of who I was without faltering. You even stopped trying to put the pieces together because you trusted I could do it on my own. And if I didn’t, you wouldn’t walk away. You stayed through all the storms, through all the brokenness, and you sat in the pain with me just like you sat in the happy parts with me. So, just know, if you can hear me somehow, when I breathe my last breaths, I’ll go full of love in my heart having lived a life worth living. You did that. We did that.”

The tears continue to flow, and I turn, still holding the journal to my chest. I go back outside on the porch and look up to inky black sky. It’s dotted with twinkling stars and a glowing moon. I inhale the fresh night air and close my eyes. My mind drifts far back in time to a sunny day, in a swimming pool, with a boy.
I. See. You. Jessica Alexander.
In my mind I’m back there, just a girl with the boy who would see me for the rest of my life.

“I saw you, too . . . I saw you, too,” I whisper.

My eyes flutter open and I look back to the sky, hoping he’s up there looking down on me. “Wait for me, Jace. Wait for me like you always have, and I’ll find my way back to you like I always do.”

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Read on for a sneak peek of KINGSLEY and an excerpt of Letters Written in White.