Page 48 of Beside the Rolling Waves
“I guess you’re right. I guess it will take some time. I… I keep thinking you’re going to leave me again. I mean it was so sudden. And I was absolutely dumbfounded. And I don’t mean to keep rubbing it in. I understand, you were embarrassed and ashamed and all that. Whatever. I get it, I guess. But you’ve got to see it from my perspective, that I thought you were all in with me, and then you suddenly disappeared. And it made me feel like I wasn’t worth your time or effort. Not even to say goodbye to.”
“I am so sorry. I can’t change that. I wish I could.”
“I know. We can’t go back. And I don’t mean to rehash the past. I told you I forgive you, and I do. But I suppose while forgiveness carries a lot of I’ll bear the cost of that, I’ll pay for it, it also doesn’t come with an automatic, I’ll let you do that again, you know?”
He understood what she was saying. She forgave him, but she couldn’t be sure that he wouldn’t do it again, and she wanted to put some guards in place so that she wasn’t hurt. It would make sense that if he had stolen from her or spit in her face, she might forgive him, but she was going to lock up her valuables and keep a safe distance between them in order to keep those things from happening again.
“I understand. So I guess that kind of defines the future for me. Right now, I’ve got to take care of the babies, that’s number one. Because they can’t take care of themselves. But linked very closely with that is number two, and that’s trying to prove to you that I’m not going to do that again. Ever.” There were a few things they were going to have to hash out, but he skipped over that. Right now, he was trying to establish a friendship again. “I suppose that’s what the house is about. We need a place to keep the kids, since being in your sister’s apartment is hard for you. Seeing her shoes, her coat, all the things that have her touch on them.”
“We’re going to have to clean it out eventually,” she said softly, looking out the passenger window at the darkness as it flew past.
“I know. But we don’t have to do it now. We’ll find out where her rent info is at, we’ll pay it for a year, and then we don’t have to go back if we don’t want to.”
“I guess I would rather get it done, but… It would be nice to have a month or two to settle into some kind of routine with the babies, and I don’t know. Just give some time to pass to get used to the fact that she’s not around anymore.”
“Again, yeah. I think whenever we do it, it’s going to be hard. That’s not the kind of thing that’s ever going to be easy. But if you give yourself a little bit of time to adjust to this, get caught back up in your sleep, and deal with what’s already happened. It probably won’t be quite as difficult.”
“Thank you. I really do appreciate the time. I was kind of dreading that, along with everything else.”
“Don’t worry about it. We can take as long as you need to. Even if it’s ten years.”
She looked across the space that separated them and gave him a little smile. It was encouraging. He wanted more of those. He wanted her to not worry. To not fret. To be perfectly okay with whatever happened.
They were quiet for a bit, and then he broke the silence.
“Is there anything else you want to know about me?” It was a dangerous question, he knew. Because she could ask the one thing that had the potential to blow everything apart. But he was willing to take a chance, because he wanted to be an open book for her. And he was going to tell her anyway, very, very soon. Just wanted to be closer to her first. To make it harder for her to push him away.
“So what have you been doing for the last five years?”
“Specifics? Or in general?” he asked, hoping she was talking about the business.
“You told me you lost everything. Start from there.”
“Well, I did. I lost everything. I owed people money, and I didn’t have anything coming in with which to pay them. I lost my apartment because I couldn’t pay, and I had penalties there as well.”
“You had no place to live?”
“Yeah. A friend took me in for a couple of months, but I finally found a cheap, ratty apartment in the absolute worst area of Chicago you can imagine. It was not safe, and it was not good,but it was the right price. From there, I talked to Ford. He was the one who had been advising me all along. He could have bailed me out. And I know on one level, I wanted him to. I was ashamed at what I had done, and I really thought that he was going to ream me out, laugh at me, or tell me how stupid I was.
“But without preaching at me, he showed me the mistakes I made, and then he gave me some ideas of things that I could do to pull myself out of that mess. He warned me that it wasn’t going to be a quick fix. Nothing that lasts ever is. And I was starting out with less than what I had started out from before.”
He paused for a moment, thinking back on that hard, difficult, agonizing conversation. “He also highly recommended that I pay everyone everything I owed, with interest. He said that he knew that I had borrowed some money from friends, and that included him, and that the friends would understand if I couldn’t pay them back. Especially the ones that were rich enough to not notice. But he told me a man’s only as good as his word. And I knew that.”
“And yet you didn’t keep your word to me.” Becky might have been trying to keep the bitterness out of her voice, but she was not successful.
“No. I didn’t keep my word to you. And the longer it went that I didn’t keep my word, the worse I felt about it, and the harder it was for me to face the idea of facing you. And I kept telling myself that it would be easier when I had money, and then when I finally got things to turn around, I continued to tell myself that. Like more money would somehow make a difference. Like I could eventually have enough money that I would look strong and invincible in your eyes. And… I just kept putting it off. I guess I was scared more than anything. But my excuses sounded legitimate in my mind.”
“I see.”
He wasn’t sure whether she really did or not. She wasn’t a man, and she didn’t understand a man’s need to…look strong? Like a provider, like someone who could protect, someone who could be counted on. Obviously, if he lost everything, he couldn’t be counted on for anything.
They didn’t talk much more as they continued on the highway. He thought maybe Becky had fallen asleep, and he didn’t want to say anything that might wake her up. Thankfully the babies slept, but by the time they pulled into the apartment, it was late, and they were crying again.
“We’re home,” he said softly.
Becky stirred and then sat up with an abrupt, “oof!”
She looked around. “Did I sleep that long?”
