and perhaps she feels the same way about it as I do. We haven’t spoken about it, and I don’t want to. We’ve thrown out a lot of things the last two months, the biggest our old bed, and maybe our rings should go too, but they have history as well.
Wednesday
Wade comes to work the following day. He’s early and so am I. I want to talk to him.
“You’ve got to hold it together, man,” I tell him. “They’re looking at canning the show.”
“They won’t can us.”
“Don’t be so sure.”
“Why? What do you know?”
“I know Stewart’s angry with us. If he stops backing us up, then it’s over.”
“Crap.”
“Right. What is it with you?”
He sits heavily. “I don’t know. That weekend got me spooked. You know that’s not me.”
“Why not?”
“I don’t roll that way. It’s just not who I am.”
“You’re married.”
“Yeah. I know,” he replies ruefully. Chloe keeps telling me.”
“Listen, man, you’ve got a good thing there and you’re well on the way to screwing it up like I did with Quinn. You know how that turned out.”
“Yeah. I know. I’m sorry about that, man.”
I’m taken a little aback. The closest I’d gotten to an apology is: ‘I’m sorry how this shook out.’ He’s looking as earnest as I’ve ever seen him. It’s not a look I’ve seen all that often, usually when he tells me I have another problem he needs me to make go away. I haven’t had any jobs like that to do lately, thank Chloe.
“I think you actually mean that.”
“I do. And I meant it when I said that you were one of my only friends. I tend to annoy people, you know. But you know that, and you’re still here.”
“You pay me well.”
He smiles slightly. “I do, don’t I.”
“So, what do you want to do? If you think you’re going to leave Chloe then you should do it sooner than later before she gets hurt too much. Don’t leave it a year and then surprise her like you and Quinn surprised me.”
“You’re not going to let that go, are you?”
“Eventually I will. It was a crappy thing you two did to me, and there’s no getting around it. But, buddy, I’ve forgiven Quinn and I’ve forgiven you. I’m not wasting my time being angry any more.”
“But I don’t want to leave Chloe and I don’t want to sleep around.”
“Then don’t.”
“But I know I will. Eventually.”
“Were you there at that weekend? Did you listen at all?”
“Yeah...”
“I’m not saying that I’ve got it together. I don’t. But I know that I need help and I’m getting it. You need help, a lot of help, to stop doing these things you do. They’re habits, man, and you’ve got get better habits. Right?”
“I suppose.”
Carrie is at the door. “You guys better get down to the booth,” she tells us. “You’re on in ten.”
We stand and I put a hand on his shoulder. “Get it together,” I tell him, “and remember, you’re only supposed to be an ass on air.”
After work I go to the nearest mall and look through the jewellery stores. It takes me some time, but I find an engagement ring that is similar as her last one. I’m not good with this sort of thing, so I’ve stolen the old ring and I’ve been using it to compare. I also think I can use it for sizing. It’s not as expensive as the old one, I’m trying to get some money together in preparation for the baby, but I buy it anyway, and a plain gold band that I plan to give her when we speak our vows again. I’m ahead of the game here and I’m pleased with myself.
Friday
I’ve booked a table at one of her favourite places for out date night. She’s almost completely out of her usual tops now. Pregnancy shirts are starting to feature in her wardrobe. I like them. I can see her baby belly and I can place my hand upon her unhindered, feel our baby girl kick under my hand. She’s lovely, and even though she doesn’t believe me, I tell her all the time.
We’ve finished our mains and we’re waiting for desert. There is no ducking into the bathroom for a quick course of marital fun. That is behind us. I’m starting to get anxious. I can feel my face getting flushed and I’m starting to sweat. I know it’s stupid. I’ve done this before, with this very same woman, and she said yes then. I was almost completely confident she’s say yes again – she was planning to say her vows again after all.
“Are you okay?” she asks me with a frown.
I take a deep breath. If I don’t do this now, I’ll lose my nerve. I slide out of my chair and stand. She’s still frowning, watching with her eyes questioning and intent. I come around next to her and drop to one knee. She puts a hand over her mouth, her eyes now wide and intent. In my hands is a small, open case that holds a ring, golden and capped with a diamond.
“Oh my god,” she says with a gasp.
“Quinn Altman,” I say with a shaky, formal voice, “will you stay married to me? Will you say your vows again with me? Will you be my love and my friend until the day I die?”
She’s crying. She’s laughing. She’s nodding.
“Yes,” she says finally when she recovers her words, and the restaurant erupts into applause.
Saturday
She can’t take her eyes off the ring I bought her all the way to our counselling session. She’s talking about our future as we drive and even though I’m not saying anything I’m more glad than I can say that I’ll be part of it. We have a short list of names now, just three. She’s not settled on one, not yet. She still refers to our baby as ‘our girl’, but I guess she’ll start referring to her by her name and I’ll know what she’s picked. That’s what happened to our baby boy. Thomas she named him and that’s what sits on the little plaque at the cemetery amongst all the other children taken before they had a chance to live and grow and love.
We know that it will be hard today. It always is, but still we’re driving to this place with hope, fearless against the pain and dark memories.
“So what have you been doing about this problem,” Grant asks me. We’ve been talking again about our childhoods and the effect that has had on us. It must be important, because we’re back to this in more detail. There is no more tears now – just sad words, and maybe a little laughter when it comes to my family.
I exhale deeply. “Well, knowing about it is one thing. I’ve been working on forgiving my mother – that’s hard because she really doesn’t see that she’s damaged me and my brothers and sister.”
“What about your father?”
“The thing is, I didn’t really know him all that well. When I was home after the funeral and we were sitting around the table recalling memories about him, I had to be honest, I couldn’t remember a single thing.” I laugh. “He did all his own wiring in the house. It was an absolute mess. I was trying to find which fuse had blown, which they were always doing, and I got myself a nasty shock. I was out cold on the floor for god knows how long. I kind of had a revelation while I was lying there, I guess. I had a memory. I remembered he called me ‘J’.”
I’m smiling now, but back then I was crying in my mother’s arms.
“But as an adult he didn’t really connect with us,” I continue. “I guess he didn’t know us because he didn’t know us as kids. I suppose I’d been kind of avoiding seeing him when he was dying and I feel guilty about that. And he’d been dying for a while.”
I sigh. “And then in the end I didn’t go down and see him before the end. I was depressed and ashamed about how things turned out. I couldn’t face them and tell them that Quinn and I were over. I couldn’t tell them that I’d been humiliated like that.”
Quinn looks at me like she’s supposed to, but there is sorrow in her eyes and determination. She’s doing it because she wants to and because she’s supporting me, even though she is the cause of my pain. But I’m not in pain anymore. This doesn’t hurt me. It’s
my past that has gone, a chapter that I have read and turned the page on.
“But I did in the end. Wendy, my sister, made me do it. I wonder though what my father would have said to me, what advice he’d have given me. I know what my mother thought, but my father was always a closed book. I’d like to think that maybe in the end he’d have tried to see me as his son that needed him like Mom said he would.”
“Do you see any similarities between Quinn’s father and your own?” Mary asks me.
“I don’t know. I guess they were both hard to get to know, but for different reasons. Mine just shut himself off, where Quinn’s just plain rejected her. But all of this has kind of opened my eyes to just how both our families were and how they affected us. I see Quinn in a new light because of that.”
“It’s interesting that you said ‘shuts himself off’,” Grant says. “Do you think that your father doing that was a template for your own ability to do the same? Do you think you learned how to do that from him?”
“Maybe,” I say. “It’s hard to know. Maybe we all did once my mother started to write our lives down in painful, vivid detail. Anyway, I’m aware of all this now, and I’m trying not to shut myself down anymore. I’m trying to be honest and communicate.”
As we’re leaving Grant gives me his assignment. He hands me a list of books that I might find helpful. Essentially the theme is breaking negative behaviours learnt from our parents. I’m to select one and read it.
“I hear that Quinn has asked for a period of abstinence,” he says.
“Yeah,” I say,