The Miles Between Us (25 page)

Her eyes welled with tears
, and a single teardrop broke free and spilled from the corner of her eye. “I don’t think we can,” she said. “I don’t think we can fix it.”

Rob

He hung his toothbrush in its holder and studied his refle
ction in the bathroom mirror. The ravages of age were beginning to march across his face. He still wondered, every time he looked into a mirror, what Casey could possibly see in him. He’d never been much to look at, but with age, it was getting worse. All those wrinkles. These days, when he looked into the mirror, it was his father who stared back at him. The first time it had happened, he’d thought he was hallucinating. Until it happened again. And yet again. Now, he just accepted it. Just as he accepted the growing understanding that life didn’t go on forever. Time was a fickle mistress who ravaged your body and your mind, lied through her teeth, then left a trail of laughter behind her when she moved on.

In the end, what
did any of it mean? What was the significance of all those moments that made up this thing called a life? Lying in the dark with his wife, naked skin pressed to naked skin, giving love, receiving it in return; the innocence of his children’s laughter, filling his heart with joy; the immeasurable sweetness of his fingers drawing magic, against all odds, from the strings of his guitar. What did all of these things mean? How did they fit together? Were they jigsaw pieces with smooth, perfect edges? Or were they a tangle of misfitted fragments that only peripherally touched each other’s boundaries?

He’d never given much thought to any of this
. Rob MacKenzie had always been a simple man, not given to introspection. But lately, these questions, and others like them, circled his head like vultures circling a carcass. And he had a growing suspicion that it was his carcass they were circling. He wasn’t sure how he’d arrived at this particular time and place. Wasn’t sure if the emotions that left him choking at random moments were more lies from that fickle bitch, Time, or if he’d really taken a wrong turn somewhere.

And if he had taken a wrong turn, was it too late to
backtrack and change course?

He switched off the light, went barefoot to the bedroom, peeled off his clothes and got into bed
. In the darkness, he found her, and drew her into his arms. They adjusted their fit for maximum body contact, sinking into each other’s warmth. “Hey,” he said.

“Hey.”

They lay in silence, broken only by the sound of breathing. This was home, in a way nothing else had ever been or would ever be. He’d had two great loves in his life. One was his music, the love that had chosen him at the age of nine. The other was this woman, the woman he’d fallen in love with while she was still married to his best friend, the woman who was slowly becoming unwound as he watched helplessly from the sidelines.

“You want to talk about it?” he said.

“No. But I probably should.”

“
We’re all alone now. Just you and me. You can tell me anything.”

“
I know.” In the darkness, her voice was very small.

“What happened? With the little girl?”

“I don’t know. She was just there, walking along in front of us, part of the crowd. At first, I didn’t pay any attention to her. But gradually, I realized that she had hair like Katie’s. All those curls, that beautiful blond bounce that Katie’s hair had. And she was the same age, even wore the same brand of clothes I used to put Katie in. She was even built like Katie—those little tanned arms and legs—and something happened inside me. I can’t explain it. I knew better. I’m not crazy, damn it! I knew she wasn’t my daughter. Katie’s been dead for eight years. And I knew that even if Katie wasn’t dead, she’d be thirteen years old now. She wouldn’t look anything like that little girl. But my heart started pumping, and—I don’t know. It was like there was this crazy person inside me that had to see her just one more time before she went away forever. For a couple of minutes, some part of me really believed that she’d have Katie’s face. And—I’m so ashamed of this—I left Emma with Paige and chased after her. Just ran blindly after her, right through an intersection, with cars squealing all around me like some crazy cops-and-robbers movie. I could have been killed. And for what? When I caught up to her, she turned around and looked at me, and—” Her voice broke, and she cleared her throat. “I’m not crazy, Rob. I’m not! But the way her mother glared at me, she clearly thought I was unhinged.”

“You’re not unhinged.
” He no longer knew whether or not those words were true, but she needed to hear them, and he’d spent his entire adult life putting her needs ahead of his own. It was an ingrained habit, one that wasn’t likely to change anytime between now and death.

“But what if I am
? What if I really am losing my mind? What I did…that’s not normal behavior. No matter how you look at it, there’s nothing normal about chasing after a strange kid on the street because she looks just like your dead daughter. The daughter, I might add, who’s been dead for eight years.”

“You know what Phoenix said to me
? You can’t put a time limit on grief. That kid’s smarter than he looks.”

“And you like him a lot more than you let on.”

“He’s growing on me.” He drew her closer, gave her cheek a tender kiss and found it damp. His heart sank. “What about today?” he said. “The apartment? I thought you were doing better. The last couple of days, you’ve been more like yourself. And this morning…” He trailed off, not sure that asking wouldn’t make things worse.

“I know
. I thought so, too. And this morning was lovely. But—”

“But sex is never the answer.”

“Sometimes it is. Just not this time. But I can’t think of a pleasanter way to search.”

In spite of the gravity of the situation, he laughed
. “I love you,” he said. “I’ve loved you since the first time I saw you, and I’ll love you until I draw my last breath. And I don’t care if you’re crazy. I hope you realize that I wouldn’t love you any less if you were.”

“Thank you.”

“I just thought it needed to be said. So tell me why you thought you’d find some kind of an answer in that hellhole.”

She let out a soft sigh
. “Everything that I am today,” she said slowly, choosing her words carefully, “is filtered through the lens of what happened to me there. It was an odd, turbulent time in my life. It’s where I lost that first baby. It’s where…other things happened. I understand exactly how Dorothy felt after she came back from Oz. Some of it was scary and terrible, but some of it was beautiful. I just thought that, since living there marked me so deeply, going back might help to open up some of those closed doors inside me. It was probably a stupid idea.”

“It wasn’t stupid
. But—” He wasn’t sure how to broach the subject. He’d brought it up before, but that was in anger. This time, he was serious. “I think you need to see someone.”

“A shrink.”

“Some kind of therapist, yes.”

“But I’m not crazy. Damn it, Rob, do you really think I’m
that crazy?”

“Of course not
. And you know as well as I do that seeing a therapist doesn’t mean you’re crazy. It did us a world of good when we went with Paige.”

“That was different. We were le
arning how to parent a teenager with behavioral problems.”

“And she was grieving the loss of her mother.”

“I’m not ready. Not yet. I still think I can find the answer myself. It’s out there somewhere. I just haven’t looked in the right place yet.”

“You’re playing
Russian roulette with your life. Is staying an independent cuss who refuses to accept help worth the possibility of losing yourself forever? I don’t want to lose you.”

“You won’t
. I’m not going anywhere.”

“Maybe not physically.”

“See. You do think I’ve gone around the bend.”

“I think you have some serious issues that need to be addressed by a
mental health professional. Because it’s in your best interest. And because I wouldn’t survive losing you.”

“I won’t live my life making decisions based on fear
. I can’t do that.”

“I don’t want you to.”

“Then stop pushing me. If the time comes when I think I need help, you’ll be the first to know. In the meantime, let me try to work this out on my own.”

It wasn’t the answer he wanted
. But it was the only one he was going to get until she was ready to admit that she needed help. If they were both lucky, he’d manage to survive her temporary insanity without falling off the edge of the earth himself.

* * *

He spent the morning waffling. It wasn’t like him; generally, he made a decision and then took action, and he wasn’t shy about acting on his impulses. But this wasn’t about him; this was about Casey, and making this call felt a lot like tattling. If he did this, and she found out, she’d probably fillet him and serve him for dinner. But there was also the little matter of love, and in Rob MacKenzie’s book, love trumped fear of retribution every time. He was deeply in love with his wife, and he was losing her in little bits and pieces. The combination of those two truths was terrifying, far more terrifying than his fear of Casey’s anger. He’d faced that before and survived. If he had to, he could face it again.

He waited until midday, hoping the doc would be on a lunch break, and not with a patient. While Phoenix and the studio crew were eating pizza, he
borrowed Luther’s cell phone, went outside, and leaned against the side of the building. He needed privacy to make this call; there was no need to spread Casey’s personal business around the studio. He dialed the number, cupped his hand around the phone to muffle traffic noise, and waited.

At the other end, the phone was picked up, and a perky, feminine voice said, “River Valley OB/GYN. How can I direct your call?”

“Hi,” he said. “I’d like to talk to Deb Levasseur.”

“I’m not sure if Dr. Levasseur’s available. I’ll have to check. Who’s calling, please?”

“Rob MacKenzie. It’s about my wife. It’s important.”

“Hold, please.”

He pressed himself against the building, crossed his ankles, and watched a giggling, boisterous trio of teenage girls pass. They eyed him briefly, dismissed him as a person of no importance—undoubtedly someone’s dad—and continued on, chattering like a flock of blue jays.

“Rob? Deb Levasseur. How can I help you?”

“Thanks for taking my call. I’m sorry if I interrupted anything—”

“
Are you kidding? I’m sitting at my desk, eating a ham sandwich and dictating patient records for my receptionist to type. Your call is a welcome interruption. Is everything okay with Casey?”

“I guess that depends on your definition of okay. Physically, she’s fine. Mentally, not so much.”

“What’s going on?”

So he told her, pacing back and forth in front of the studio while he talked. Deb listened without interrupting until he was done. Then she said, “I knew something was wrong when I saw her. She was too complacent, too evasive. That’s not like her.”

“I’m scared,” he said. “I think she’s having a nervous breakdown.”

“It’s probably
not that serious,” she said. “It’s also not unusual.”

“Not unusual? She’s never done anything like this before!”

“Let me clarify. Although it’s not typical behavior for Casey, it’s not unusual behavior for a woman who’s experienced a miscarriage. Or, in her case, two miscarriages within a short time. And her determination to get pregnant again isn’t surprising, either. She’s nearing forty. Her biological clock is telling her that time is getting short. It’s not impossible, of course. Not yet. But it is more difficult and less likely with every year that passes.”

“I don’t know what to do.
I’ve told her she needs professional help, but she refuses. She says she can find the answers herself. So far, she’s not having much luck. She’s so goddamn stubborn.”

“You said she’s
refused to use birth control…is there any chance she may be pregnant again?”

“Hell, no.
She refused to use birth control, so I refused to touch her. Until yesterday, we hadn’t been intimate since before the miscarriage. She thinks I’m not being supportive. I think that keeping her alive is about as supportive as it gets.” He rubbed his temple, slowly. “She doesn’t see it that way.”

“What happened yesterday?
”

“She caved
. She decided we were both being ridiculous, and she told me she’d be willing to use birth control as long as we didn’t give up on negotiating another pregnancy.”

“That sounds like progress.”

“It would be progress, for sure, if I hadn’t been the idiot who got carried away and forgot the damn condom.”

“Oh,
my. Not the news I wanted to hear.”

“
That makes two of us.”

“So you’re still in New York?”

“We are. My job here will be done in a few more days, and then we’re coming home as soon as I can get us out of this place. By Labor Day at the latest. I thought bringing her to New York with me was the right thing to do. I didn’t want to leave her alone after the miscarriage, and I figured that here, I could keep an eye on her. I was more worried about her physical health than her mental health. She seemed sort of brittle when she left the hospital, a little bitter and fragile, but I didn’t see anything really off about her. I thought it was natural for her to feel that way after losing another baby. And I thought New York would get her away from the scene of the crime, so to speak, and she’d be so busy here that it would distract her from thinking about what she’d been through. But it hasn’t worked that way, and the things she’s done behind my back scare the hell out of me. Running through traffic, chasing ghosts, taking trips down memory lane. God knows what else. I’m spending most of my time in the studio. She has too much alone time. I don’t think it’s good for her. It gives her too much time for thinking.”