My Dear Stranger (42 page)

 
'And I needed Him to go away Sadie.  For you!'
 

 
'You needed me to help and I fixed you.  We're fine and I did that for you.  I made Him go away, FOR YOU!'
 
  Oh FUCK!  What did he do?
  “What did you do, Alex?  Tell me,” I beg.
  “What do you mean?” He whispers beside me.
  “What did you do to Him?” I ask.  There I've asked the question I should've asked when this all started.  “How do you know He won't come back?”  Oh god...
  “What do you mean?”
  “You know what I mean.  Please don't screw with me.  I know you know what I'm asking.  What. Did. You. Do. To. Him?” I spell it out clearly.
  “Nothing.”
  “So then He might come back one day.  He might come back to claim me.  He might hurt me again.”
  “No, He won't,” Alex says shaking his head.  But he knows.  I can tell he knows more.
  “Please, just fucking tell me what you did.  I don't care anymore, and I won't be mad.  I just need to know.  What did you do to Him?”
  “Sadie, I swear I didn't do anything to Him.  Just drop it, baby. Let it go now.  It's over.”
  “It's NOT over!  Don't you get it!?  It will
never
be over!  If I'm not fucking Him in my sleep, I'm waiting for Him to come back to fuck me awake.  It never ends for me!  What the fuck did you do?”
  “I didn't do any-”
  “JUST TELL ME!” 
  “There's nothing to tell.  I swear I didn't do anything!” Alexander yells back visibly shaking.
  “Okay.  Well, I don't believe you, and I don't want to live like this, and I can't keep doing this with you.  I know you did something, and I know you won't tell me, but I can't keep doing this.  I WON'T keep doing this, Alexander!”
  “What the hell does
that
mean?  You don't want to be with me because of Him?”
  “No!  I don't want to do this anymore with you because
you’re
the one I'm supposed to trust, and I don't trust you because you won't tell me what you know, or what you did.  And if I can't trust you, then we have nothing left.  You've never hurt me, but I keep learning more and more I didn't know about you, and I feel like I can't trust you, and I always did trust you because you proved to me you wouldn't hurt me, but you keep hurting me. And this weekend of reality has been awful and exhausting, and I don't love you enough to fake it if you won't be honest with me.”
  “So that's it?  I don't know what happened to Him, but I'm sure He won't be back for you, and that's enough to make you not love or trust me?  That's all it takes after the years we've been together and the life we've built together?  That's all it takes for you to not want to be with me anymore?!”
  “Yes.  That's all it takes,” I say shocking us both I think.  Actually, I AM shocked.  I never thought I would want to live without Alex.  I love him, and he makes me happy, and he forgives all the disgusting in my past, and he loves Jamie, and he's happy with our lives which I love.  And I don't want to be a single mom, and I don't want to live alone anymore, and I love Alex, but I don't want to be like this anymore.
  “I don't think I trust you because you won't tell me what you did.”
  “But I didn't do anything!” Alexander yells at me, while shaking my chair with his hand.
  “You did!”  I scream in our garage.  Screaming, I push his hand away and jump up.  Standing, I look down at Alexander and I want to beat the shit out of him I'm so frustrated.  I don't even care that he's 6 foot and I'm 5 foot 2.  I don't care that he's all fit and muscular, and I'm an ugly, emaciated waif at the moment.  I don't care that he could defend himself without so much as a scratch landing on him, I still want to beat the shit out of him!  I want to hurt him, and I'm shaking with the need to hurt him.
  “Don't even think about it, Sadie.  I'm not the bad guy here.  I'm your husband and I love you.”
  “I can do whatever I want! And I know you know more than you're telling me!” I yell as I lunge for him. 
  But as I knew would happen, I am quickly subdued.  I am twisted and thrown back into my lounge chair, even as it almost tips over to the side.  With his hands holding my arms, and his lower body pressed against my legs, I am completely subdued again.
  “Do it!” I spit in his face.  “Take me, Alex!  Why not?  Fuck me like they did!”
  “Holy
Fuck,
Sadie!  You've really lost your fucking mind this time!” He yells back into my face.  “Sit there!  And don't fucking move!  Just light another fucking smoke and sit there!  I mean it!  If you fucking move out of that chair, you'll see me really fucking pissed!  Do you understand?!”
  “Yup!  Take your time, Alexander!  You fucking murdering asshole!  I know exactly what you did!” I scream as he releases my arms.
  Shaking his head, he storms back for the house, but not before threatening me again. 

 
“Don't you fucking move, Sadie, or else you'll see what a murdering asshole I can be!”  And then he throws the garage door open as it slams against the inside wall.
  And I don't move.  Just the novelty and shock of Alexander's anger is enough to keep me seated.  I called him out, and I can't wait for this to end.  No matter how it ends, I'll just be glad it’s over.  I'll miss my baby boy forever, but I need this to all be over.  And even though things are looking really bad for me, I can still strangely admit I don't think Alexander would ever hurt Jamie.
  Ironically, I think whatever Alexander does to me, he would never do to Jamie.  I just hope I gave Jamie enough good memories of me that he'll never forget how much his mommy loved him.  Crying, I hope Jamie knows how much I have loved him from the moment he was placed on my chest 6 years ago.  I hope he always remembers me with love.
  Still crying, I jump when Alexander walks back into the garage.
  Staring at his face of rage, I feel my tears fall faster down my face, even as I lift my hand for one last drag of my smoke.  And the scene is suddenly very funny to me.  I feel like I'm actually smoking my last cigarette like a death row last request.  It's too bad I didn't have time to request my last meal though- toast with Alexander's thick sticky syrup.
  Suddenly laughing. I find this whole thing beyond my ability to cope with.  If I had a knife I'd slit my legs to release the pressure.  If I had alcohol, I'd drink until I was numb and didn't care.  If I had pills I'd down them until I passed out.
  But at least I have my smokes with me.
  “Pick up your journal,” he barks.  And I do.  “Look in the back,” he yells again, and I open it quickly.  Skimming through, I see nothing but my last entry from the night before our wedding.
  Impatiently, Alexander grabs the book from my hands, and flips to the end.  Opening the journal wider, he places 2 pieces of paper against the missing edge, and I'm stunned.
  “Read it,” he suddenly whispers and in that change of his voice alone I am blindsided by my panic.  
  Looking back up at Alexander, he hands me my smokes again and moves to lean against the wall with his arms crossed against his chest and his eyes looking downward.
  So I read.
 

CHAPTER 36

  But the torn out
page is blank but for one stain and one sentence.
  “Today the stranger died before he killed me.”
 
Flipping the page quickly, I see a stain of lips on the middle of the second page with only one sentence below.
 
“But I kissed you goodbye... stranger.”
 
Looking at the lips, I'm sure they're mine.  I'm sure they're the same shape as my own.  I'm sure this is my kiss on the page.  But I've never worn brown lipstick in my life.
  Looking at Alexander I breathe my confusion of reality in this moment.
  “I don't understand...”
  Shaking his head, Alex finally raises his head and stares at me.  Staring at me in silence, I find I can't breathe.  I don't understand any of this, and I don’t understand the look on Alexander’s face.
 

  “I found Him in the septic tank of the old house, Sadie,” Alexander whispers again while choking up.
  “What?!  What do you mean?”
  “I mean, when Chris and I were in that shitty old basement trying to figure out what the hell reeked down there, I found Him in the septic tank.”
  “Why?  What did you do to Him?”
  “Sadie, you need to think for a minute,” Alex says very calmly.  “You need to really think about this.  I let you pretend you didn't know until the nightmares stopped, and then I think you really didn't know after that.  I think you forced yourself to forget Him because you needed to not know what happened.  I don't know.  But now I need you to think really hard.  I need you to remember so we can get back to normal.  I need you to remember what happened so you stop thinking I did something wrong.  Because I didn't do anything wrong.  I didn't do anything but clean up what YOU did.”
  Gasping, I'm in shock at his accusation.  “What
I
did?  I didn't do anything!”
  “Yes, you did.  You did this.  Not me.  I did nothing but clean up afterward.  And you need to remember Sadie so you let this go once and for all.”
  When Alexander walks toward me and crouches in front of me, he takes my face into his hand and forces me to look at him.  I know my eyes are wide, and I know my mouth is open.  I know I'm breathing heavily and shaking uncontrollably.  I know there's more, but all I see is Alexander’s beautiful eyes in front of me.
  “I found Him in the septic tank, Sadie.  Do you remember that?” And shaking my head, I know I don't remember.  “Think Sadie.  You freaked out for 2 weeks.  You were a fucking mess.  You acted so deranged, I hated even leaving Jamie with you, but somehow I still trusted you wouldn't hurt Jamie when I went to work.  Do you remember those 2 weeks?”  And shaking my head I know I don't remember.  “You were so messed up.  And you were still moaning for Him in your sleep, but you were screaming out and crying as well.  You were horrible, and I didn't know what to do.  I was exhausted from the nightly rituals with you.  I was exhausted and so tired of all the drama at night with you.  We starting fighting every night after you woke up, and you wouldn’t tell me what was wrong, but you kept saying it was over between us, over and over again and I didn't understand why.  And I fought you back and told you we weren't over and we would make it.  And I thought you were just losing it because you had started working a week before and I thought you couldn't handle being without Jamie, so I tried to make you quit working.  I tried to make you quit but you argued we needed the money, which we did.  You were so screwed up at night, but totally lucid in the days when we’d talk.  Do you remember those 2 weeks?”  And shaking my head no, I know I don't remember.
  “Think! 
Please,
baby... Think about it.  That was when you freaked out on my mom and called her a kidnapper and a murderer.  That was when you totally lost it on her in the street.  Do you remember that day?” And nodding my head, I know I remember that day.
  “That was when you got better though.  After my mom calmed you down and we decided we would sell the house, you calmed right down.  You still cried a lot at night, but I thought it was just the change in our circumstances.  You've never handled change well, and I thought because you had to go to work for a few hours a day you were struggling.  Do you remember that?” And nodding, I know I remember that.  I WAS struggling with being away from Jamie.  I hated it.
  “I would find you sitting on the bottom steps of the basement and I had to physically carry you back to bed.  I would find you crying in the bathroom, and I had to coax you back to bed.  I would find you all over the house crying, and I would have to kiss you until you stopped sobbing.  You even once told me my kisses were magic for you, which under the insane circumstances I suddenly found us in almost overnight, was such an innocent, sweet thing to say to me, it made me keep fighting for you to get well.  Those simple words made me try to love you more so you would get better again.”
  Looking at Alex crying in front of me, I'm heartbroken.  I hate him feeling sad, and I hate him crying.
  “Your kisses
have
always been magic to me...” I whisper against his mouth, as he leans his forehead against mine.
  Breathing in Alex's scent I'm reminded of all our years together.  Not even a decade together that feels like 2 lifetimes.  He has been so good to me over and over again.  He has been such strength for me for years, I'm sure I never would have survived my life without him.
  “You're so strong all the time, Alex.  Don't you ever get tired?”
  “All the time.  But I don't think I'm as strong as you think.  I think sometimes it's almost a weakness that keeps me with you...” He admits sadly. 

 
And he's probably right.  What kind of person stays with someone like me for years?  What kind of man waits on such a weak woman for years?  Why would he wait around when I have given him so little in return?
  “Sadie, I need you to think hard about what happened.  I need you to try to remember.  Do you remember the septic tank?  Do you remember the smell in the basement?”
  “What did you do?”
  “A week after we decided to sell, Chris had left our house after helping with the roof, but I was still in the basement looking for a dead rat, or something else to explain the smell.  But that’s when I found Him in the tank,” Alex says as he gags.  Pulling away from me, he sits back on his heels and looks like he's fighting either crying or gagging again, or maybe both.  “I found Him and I ran upstairs but you were sleeping on the couch with Jamie, so I ran to our room and found your journal under your sweaters in our closet.  I tried to find out if you wrote about it, and that's when I found the 2 pages at the back of the book which really didn't tell me much.  So I panicked,” Alex says painfully.