some friends from work had invited him. A tiny church set on a street corner, he didn’t know what a Baptist was supposed to be, but by the end of the night it didn’t matter. That was when he started searching, searching deep down inside for that thing that he knew that he would not find there. The thing he needed most. Or was it the Person he needed most?
It had been only a month or two after that he’d met Trisha. The rest was history, and all that.
He looked back on it and couldn’t help but smile. Mother had been dead right—Trisha had made him worse. The more he came to realize how God loved him, the more he knew how he should love Trisha, and he was more than willing to love he the way he needed to love her. Six months after the revelation was when the ring materialized in his hand after a nice meal. That night he professed love to Trisha, and realized how much he loved God who had loved him.
Mother was right.
After…
THE NIGHT hours always dragged on the longest, each second stripped away from him the barrier he had in the day, the barrier against the worry, against the grief. It was in those nighttime hours that his mind did the most wandering, and tried to figure out where she was, what was happening to her, who had her, and what he was going to do to them when he found her. He tried to keep thoughts of extreme violence to a minimum, but a lot of the time that was just too much to ask of him; sometimes they seeped through the cracks. Not without guilt, he found that he enjoyed them. He enjoyed them a lot.
It was really late at night when he usually heard the movements across the hall, knowing that they were nothing, but that nagging voice deep down within mocked him and said that it was her ghost, haunting him as she would for the rest of his miserable life. He would never be rid of her; she would follow him wherever he goes.
Those were the nights that he resorted to prayer, and after a while it all subsided, but it was a hard battle to get there. There was a lot of road between the worry and the peace. It was a longer, darker road at night.
It was that kind of night that kept him at the late hours that he was growing used to, if a man can ever get used to that kind of thing. The long dark hours walking the road between the dark and light—the one that everyone had to walk down every now and then, the one that claimed lives and saved others. He knew that it was nothing but what was necessary in the Divine plan, but sometimes that was easier to say than to believe. No, most of times it was harder to believe. Especially at night—especially in the dark.
He rested against the pillow, the darkness of his room surrounding him. He preferred that, the total darkness while he tried to sleep. It helped him fight the monsters inside, no distractions.
He often went over the different conversations that he and Trisha had in the initial stages of their courtship. They were so loose and free with words then, nothing was help back from topic. They were trying to get to know each other in the only way they could think of, just talk about everything. It was those times he realized how much he really treasured every word that she spoke. He had never realized that before, he had never considered how much he delighted in listening to her talk. A bitter reminder that you don’t realize what you have until it’s gone—taken away from you.
It was those times that he felt broken inside, like someone had torn something out of him and refused to return it.
It was those times that he could search for her without end.
It was those times he had the violent thoughts.
It was those times he could kill.
THE PHOTO album lay out on the table in front of him. It was the same table that he and Trisha had sat on the other side of when he told Mother they were going to get married. When he had asked for her blessing, and she had reluctantly agreed, the same, beat up, lousy coffee table that had been in the living room for as long as he could remember.
The photo album had been as old as the table at least. The wrinkled leather, smelling faintly of deteriorating cardboard and paste mingled with a dash of old perfume, looked older than he was. As far as he knew it was.
The sunlight drifted slowly through the windows, dancing between the curtains, casting a ray here and there on the table before him. The leather soaked up the light dimly, too old to reflect it and not old enough to shrivel away from it.
Tom listened for Mother, just a moment, and then carefully pulled the album open, taking extreme care due to its age. The pages flopped, like a lazy dog, off to the side, heavy with old photos, a mixture of more professional prints and Polaroid’s. A smattering of perfectly handwritten captions adorned the pages, a few hear in there in Mother’s wonderful, neat script.
He saw a couple of Mother when she was young at the front, ones that were taken at birthday parties, school events, and different events such as that. Mother was a large child indeed, he had seen the photos before many years ago, but looking at them with older eyes, more understanding eyes, he saw that Mother had indeed been a larger person her whole life, oftentimes dwarfing her peers. In the pictures were children that he supposed were her friends, but she had never talked about really having any friends. Not that he knew of at least.
He turned the page. More pictures, when she was a teenager. For being a larger girl, she had been a very attractive girl, he noticed. She was still taller than most, and a little husky, but not fat. She just looked like a taller version of her other classmates, but not as frail looking.
Another page flopped over.
There were several pictures of a party—a wedding—and he spotted his father among them, just like he had been in the other pictures. That same tall, narrow build. He was with her in most of the shots on that page, nearby, his arm around her.
Mother was smiling in the pictures on that page, the joy on her face was hard to miss, the hope and expectations of a new wife, thrilled to death to spend the rest of her life with the man she loved and who loved her. It was something that he had seen before in Trisha. Just before she disappeared.
I can’t even look at a family album and not see her in it. He thought. How long will this last?
The lazy dog flopped again.
More pictures. Tom saw when he was born, a picture in the hospital and that same joy encapsulated in Mother’s eyes, shining brightly, unashamedly.
There were a few shots scattered on the page, a few of the usual pictures taken for memories. Christmases, birthdays, Easters, the holidays that made up the year all arranged in order, an organized but artistic arrangement. Tom couldn’t help but to smile, as he looked at the album, pleased to look at the pictures—pleased to remember. He had no real recollection of the events, but he was sure that he had been there. Inside the scenes, although almost new to him, resonated. He had been there, and he had seen these things. He had sent eh Christmases, birthdays, Easters, and the joy that shone on Mother’s face during these events.
He hesitantly flipped the page.
The next page was littered with news reports. Scattered documentations, clipped from a variety of newspapers. They all had similar headlines, and the subject was the same with all of them.
“Man Dies in Fatal Car Wreck”
There were a couple of shots of a car, most of it burned to a skeletal cinder, the vehicle looked as if it had just passed through the underworld. There was no way anyone could have survived a wreck of that magnitude, Tom thought, before realizing that it was the wreck that had killed his father. He still couldn’t quite piece it there, though. It seemed too far removed—too foreign.
“Police Investigate Deadly Car Accident”
A shot of a policeman standing, obviously speaking to the reporter, he was by the station. Tom glanced over the report to glean some details and saw that there was some suspicion as to the “accidental” nature of the wreck. Some didn’t believe it was a total accident, but that notion didn’t seem to be founded on anything except a few minor details. The report didn’t say what those details were, and they were very sure to emphasize that it was probably nothing.
“
Car Wreck Victim’s Wife Speaks Out.”
There was a picture of Mother, though younger, standing on a street somewhere, outside of a building, probably the police department, speaking to the reporter. She looked angry in her eyes; her face was a sheet of disappointment and cold hatred. There was a quote in the report. “How could I have ever killed my husband? I loved Ross, why would I kill him?” He glanced through the report. “The police are just making a mountain out of a molehill, a few things wrong with the car and all of the sudden I’m blamed.”
I didn’t know this. He thought to himself. Mother never mentioned the police thinking she had done something.
The report went on to name that there were some things wrong with the brakes in the car, though there had been no mention of that before they had begun to look at the car itself. Another matter of suspicion were the two gas cans without caps that were stowed in the back seat of the car, half filled, they were the perfect bomb. If nothing else, it had been an accelerant, and they were spilled during the crash, as it was supposed. The car went up in flames before anyone knew what had happened. There were a few in the police department that had other ideas however.
He quickly finished the report and looked at the pictures on the other page, and saw that there were a few more news clippings, something about a