Samson and Sunset (38 page)

Shay came the next morning very early. I
could tell he was aware that there was something different with me
this time. I couldn’t talk to him. I felt a wedge between us. I
wanted to lean on him, but I wasn’t able to forgive and forget him
having a woman over to our house the night my daddy died. I wasn’t
going to forget that he wasn’t there to protect me from Harrison.
If Shay had been with me, it wouldn’t have happened, so I blamed
him as much as I blamed Harrison.

  “Callie, I want to talk to you. Can we
go out on the porch?” Shay asked.

  “No, we can talk in the bedroom.” I
wanted nothing to do with the front porch right then.

  “Shay sat down on the bed. “Callie,
what are you going to do?”

  I was standing by the window. I turned
and looked at him. “I’m leaving you, Shay. I want a divorce. I’m
going out to the house tomorrow to pack the things I’ll need for
the kids. I don’t want you to be there.”

  Shay tried to hug me, to touch me, but
I pulled away. Not because I didn’t love or need him desperately,
but because I had my pride too. He had crushed me when I was down.
He asked me to go with him somewhere to get a 7-Up, but I just
wanted to be left alone in my sorrow, so I asked him to leave. He
could tell he wasn’t reaching me, so he finally got up and walked
out the door.

  ‘Fight for me, fucker,’ I whispered as
I lay on the bed. But the sound of the Impala’s glass packs just
grew fainter as the car disappeared down the road.

  Look Me In The Eyes And Swear It

  I went home the next day to pack some
clothes for the kids and myself. I didn’t take the kids with me. I
wanted to get this done and then sit them down and explain that
Daddy and I were going to get a divorce. I was packing things when
Shay came into the suite. I will never forget the look on his
face.

  “Callie, don’t do this. Please,
princess.” He reached for me. I started packing. “We can work
through this if you don’t leave.” He stepped toward me. “I don’t
want to be here without the three of you…” I kept packing without
looking at him. “You’re coming home.” Shay’s voice broke. “I won’t
let you go.”

  “Well, that is something you should
have thought about the night you invited another woman into our
home,” I said. Tears dribbled down my cheeks but I kept
packing.

  Shay took my arms and moved me to the
loveseat. He sat us both down and looked pleadingly into my eyes.
“Please stay, Callie. I’ll move to the Big House and you and the
kids can stay here. This is your home.” His eyes were filled with
tears.

  “Didn’t look that way the night my dad
died,” I said matter-of-factly.

  We sat there for a second in silence.
Then I looked right into Shay’s face and said, “Shay, look me in
the eyes and tell me you’ll never step out on me again.”

  Shay just looked down. He wouldn’t lie
to me, so he couldn’t look me in the eyes. He didn’t say
anything.

  I stood up and said, “Well that pretty
much says it all. We’re out of here. I can’t live where I see you
every day, you can’t ask me to do that.” Tears were streaming down
my face but I folded my arms and stood my ground. “Now please leave
while I pack. Just leave the house. I can’t think with you standing
there.”

  “No, I want to hold you, Callie,” Shay
said stubbornly. “Please. I can’t live without you. I’m so sorry
about what happened. If I could take it back I would.”

  He tried to hug me but I stepped
away.

  “Fuck you, Shay. If that were true,
you would tell me it would never happen again. But you can’t, so as
far as I’m concerned, that makes you a fucker, Shay Westover. Now
get the hell out of here until I’m gone, I don’t want you near
me!”

  “Callie, if I say it will never happen
again, that could be a lie if I slipped, and I won’t lie to you. It
would be a false promise just to get what I wanted, and that’s not
fair to you. Less than a week ago I had a wife, kids and a happy
home, now you’re telling me it’s all gone?”

  “Damn right that’s what I’m telling
you,” I told him. “Less than a week ago I had a daddy and a husband
I thought loved me enough to be with me at the most horrible moment
of my life. I had my dad thirty-six years, I had Marie ten months,
both deaths are just beyond my comprehension, and now I don’t have
a husband.”

  I stepped toward him. “Where was my
husband, my
love
, while my daddy was dying? He was having a
beer on my sofa, in my house, with a girl!” I put my hands over my
eyes. “Just go and I’ll be gone soon. Call when you want to see the
kids, because I don’t want to be there when you get them. Now get
out!” I yelled. “I never want to see you again!”

  Shay looked at me a long while; then
he walked out of the bedroom. I heard him go down the stairs and
out the kitchen door. As I heard the car start up, I sank to the
floor and just lay on the carpet sobbing, begging God to help
me.

  “God,” I whispered, “I can’t live
without this man. But I love my daddy too much to sweep what had
happened under the rug. Please help me. I don’t know what to
do.”

  I would spend the rest of my life
punishing myself for not being woman enough for my Shay. I never
hated anyone more in my life than I hated myself in that instant.
I’d always known somehow I didn’t deserve a happy life. I lay down
on the carpet in the sitting area and sobbed as I heard the
Impala’s glass packs fade into the distance.

  ***

When I told the children about the divorce,
they wouldn’t believe me, and I heard them crying in their beds
that night. They couldn’t picture life without Mom and Dad
together. They had always considered us the All-American Family.
They were inconsolable.

  They had this record they loved to
play, called “Our House.” It went something like, “Our house is a
very, very, very fine house…” I can’t remember the rest of it. I’d
brought the record player and our records to Mom’s, and one day I
found that record broken in a hundred pieces in the trash.

  Thinking back on it, I am surprised I
didn’t go back to Shay just for the kids. I wasn’t thinking
clearly. Finding another woman in my own home the night my daddy
died was too much for me. I couldn’t live with it. It made me too
damn sad.

  ***

Shay would call the kids but I never talked
to him. He would send Maggie to pick them up. We avoided each other
at all costs.

  I heard rumors that Shay was seen out
with other women. I wasn’t surprised. I told myself he was a good
man and deserved happiness. I just wasn’t the one to give it to
him. I felt that a part of me had known this since the day I met
him.

  If you love someone, they say to set
them free. If they return to you, then it was meant to be.

  He wasn’t returning.

  ***

I enrolled the kids in Hudson public school.
It was now going on four months since I’d seen Shay. Was I okay?
Hell no!

  At one point my mother came to me and
said, “Kathrine, what can I do? You cry all night. I hear you
crying out Shay’s name. I hear you begging God for Shay and I hear
you asking God to take care of Shay and let him be happy.”

  She put her hand on my shoulder.
“Kathrine, you can’t go on like this. You don’t eat, what do you
weigh?”

  I was ninety-two pounds, skin and
bone.

  ***

One day Maggie called and took me to lunch.
She put both her hands out, palms up, right in the middle of the
table, and I knew she wanted to hold my hands. I placed my hands in
hers.

  “Kathrine,” she said sadly, “Shay only
sleeps at the house. He’s never there; he eats at our house and
hardly talks. There’s no sparkle in his eyes. I know he’s drinking
hard liquor. He doesn’t care about the business or himself.
Kathrine, I don’t know what happened between the two of you, but I
do know this: Shay can’t live without you. He’s going to kill
himself drinking like that and driving. Is there anything I can do,
honey? Just tell me.”

  “Maggie, he made this bed for himself,
now he has to sleep in it. And from what I hear, he’s not sleeping
in it alone. You have to let it go, Maggie. I’ll be filing for
divorce soon. I was giving myself a few months to get the strength,
but I will be filing soon.”

  Maggie just gazed at me sadly.

  “There’s something I want to tell
you,” I said. “Something I don’t think you ever knew. When I met
Shay I was living on the upper west side, but Maggie, I didn’t
belong there. My parents and I had just moved into that house when
I started dating Shay.”

  “Where are you going with this,
Kathrine?”

  “Well, Maggie, the truth is, I’ve
never been good enough for Shay. He deserved someone from his
station in life. Maybe this is the reason I’ve never been enough
for him, because I’m truly not enough for him.”

  “Where did you used to live?” she
asked me.

  “322 Oak Street.”

  “Darlin’,” Maggie squeezed my hands.
“I was born and raised all through high school at 214 Redwood
Street. That’s two blocks from where you grew up. When I met
Sterling, it didn’t matter to him. He saw me and he wanted me.”

  I was totally taken aback. Maggie, the
beautiful, sophisticated Maggie, had grown up where I had grown
up.

  “Maggie, if you hadn’t told me this, I
would never have known!”

  “Well, Kathrine, would it have really
mattered? I’m still Maggie,” she smiled. “Beautiful Kathrine, it’s
not where you come from, but who you become. You, my dear, are a
wonderful person. You completed Shay. So whatever your problems
are, Kathrine, never, ever diminish yourself; you have more class
than any girl Shay ever brought home.”

  For the first time in my life, I no
longer cared that I was from the wrong side of the tracks. I was so
glad I had accepted Maggie’s luncheon invitation.

  “Now, Kathrine,” said Maggie, “with
all that’s been going on, I missed your birthday, so I’m taking you
shopping. I’m buying you a beautiful new outfit. You’re a good
mother and you take such good care of my grandchildren.”

  We had so much fun shopping. Maggie
picked out the perfect dress: winter-white knit with long sleeves
and a turtleneck. It looked like a form-fitting sweater and came up
to about four or five inches above my knee. We accented it with a
wide chocolate-brown belt and three and a half inch heels in
winter-white with chocolate trim. Plus a beautiful necklace and
earring set in chocolate with gold trim. Every woman knows, no
matter how broken her heart is, it will feel a little better in a
flattering new dress.

  Now if I only had somewhere to wear
it.

  ***

Let me tell you, divorce is lonely. Anyone
who has gone through one will tell you. All our couple friends were
originally Shay’s buddies, so I lost the husbands and along with
them, of course, the wives. My friend Susie had gotten married and
moved to Denver, Colorado, before Wessy was born. I hadn’t seen her
since; though we did talk on the phone once in a while.

  So when one of our old friends, Jenny,
called and asked if she could see me, you can imagine how excited I
was. It felt good to know someone cared. I made cinnamon rolls and
a pot of cinnamon tea. I was so glad to see her that when I opened
the door, I hugged her.

  We had a small chat, and I will admit
it was a strained chat, as I don’t think she knew what to say.
Somehow I got the feeling she was glad this fairytale love of
Shay’s and mine was over. She really didn’t ask how I was doing or
seem to care. She told me a little about their new house, and I set
out the rolls and tea.

  “Well,” Jenny said, “I really can’t
stay very long, Kathrine; I just wanted to run over because Troy
and I would like to buy your and Shay’s bedroom set—since you’re
getting a divorce.”

  I nearly fell off my chair. “Are you
kidding me, Jenny?” I said. “Our furniture is not for sale. Do you
think our life is for sale? I haven’t even filed for divorce yet,
and if and when I do, no one will be buying anything that belonged
to the two of us. I’d burn it before I’d let someone else use
it.”

  If she thought sleeping in Shay’s old
bed would be like having sex with Shay she had another think
coming. Jenny looked at me, opening her mouth as if to speak.

  “Jenny, I realize you’re not finished
with your tea, but I’d like you to leave. I think you were totally
out of line coming here with such a ridiculous request.”

  I got up, went to the kitchen and
asked Mom if she would please see Jenny out. When Mom came back, I
told her why Jenny had come to see me.

  “You know, Kathrine,” she sighed,
shaking her head, “we’ve seen some pretty bad behavior in people
lately. What is this world coming to?”

  I sat there with tears running down my
face. I thought someone had come to see me, and all she wanted was
our bedroom set.

  ***

A couple of weeks later, Mom’s phone rang. I
answered and it was Susie. She was calling Mom looking for me,
because I hadn’t answered at home. Never in my life had I been so
happy to hear Susie’s voice. She told me she was also getting a
divorce, and that the next week she’d be at her parents’ house. She
wanted to know if we could go out one night and catch up.

  “Yes, yes,” I told her, excited. “I
really need to see you, Susie.”

  Before she hung up she said, “Well
Kathrine, I’m shocked. I’d never have thought you and Shay could
ever be apart. You’ll have to tell me everything.”

  I could trust Susie; she truly was my
friend. We made arrangements to meet the next Thursday evening at
nine at the new lounge in Hudson, called The Blue Gill. I’d heard
it was the happening place, whatever that meant. There was nothing
happening for me, but I was excited to get out of the house and see
a friend; and I’d be able to wear the new outfit Maggie had bought
me.