The Way Home (49 page)

“You’re probably accustomed to scenes of that sort.” Helen picked up a china figurine and stroked a dust rag over it, her expression pensive. “I’ve always thought it a terrible mistake for a person to marry out of his or her class,” she said thoughtfully, seeming to be speaking to the china shepherdess in her hand. “It’s so difficult for both parties. The woman struggling to live up to standards she simply cannot understand. And it does seem as if it’s always a woman who marries above herself, doesn’t it?”

She didn’t seem to expect a response, which was just as well, because Meg couldn’t think of one.

“And the husband trying to make the best of things, although he soon realizes what a mistake he’s made. And, of course, it’s even worse when he’s married her out of pity. A man is so much at the mercy of his sense of honor, don’t you think?”

“I don’t know,” Meg said, when the pause lengthened and it became obvious that the other woman was waiting for a reply. She shoved the rug away from her, her nose itching from the dust that rose from it.

“No, perhaps you wouldn’t, coming from the kind of background you do,” Helen said with a sigh.

Meg had never really never thought of a sense of honor as being confined to any particular class, but apparently her mother-in-law disagreed.

“Tyler’s always had a very strong sense of honor.” Helen’s tone indicated that she thought it might be a bit
too
strong. “After his older brother died, he tried so hard to take his place. Not that anyone could take the place of my beloved Dickey, of course. But he’s always tried so hard to please me.”

Meg wondered where Ty leaving college to become a flyer fit in with always pleasing his mother, but she didn’t say anything.

“And compassion. He’s always had a great deal of compassion. I can’t tell you how many stray animals I had to get rid of after he’d brought them home.” She paused and then heaved another sigh. “I thought maybe he’d outgrow that habit once he got older.”

Meg felt her mother-in-law’s eyes on her, but she didn’t look up. With a final heave, she finished rolling the rug. She stood up and dusted off her hands.

“I’ll go wash my hands and then get started on taking down the curtains,” she said. She saw frustration flash across her mother-in-law’s face. Obviously Helen had been hoping for some response to her not-so-subtle barbs.
If only she’d known that she was preaching to the converted,
Meg thought as she turned and left the room.

There wasn’t anything Ty’s mother could say that Meg hadn’t already said to herself. That she’d ruined Ty’s life, that she should never have married him, that he regretted their marriage. She’d thought all those things and was more than half convinced they were all true. The final one, at least, she knew was accurate: Ty did regret marrying her.

He hadn’t said anything to her, but then, he wouldn’t. His mother was right about that — he did have a strong sense of honor and of responsibility. Hadn’t he proved it again and again? He’d married her out of a sense of responsibility. No matter how much of a failure as a wife she’d proved to be, he still felt responsible for her.

Instead of washing her hands in the kitchen, Meg climbed the stairs to the bathroom she shared with Ty, wanting at least the illusion of privacy. After turning on the faucets, she thrust her hands under the tepid flow and stared at her reflection in the small mirror above the sink. It was not an appealing picture. A young woman whose eyes seemed too large for her pale face. Her hair was dragged back and pinned into a bun at the back of her head. Looking at it in the light that filtered through the cotton curtain, Meg thought that it seemed as if all the gold had faded from her hair, leaving it a dull brown, as drained of life as she felt.

She sighed. No wonder Ty chose to sleep in his sister’s old room rather than share a bed with his wife. Even if he was able to forgive her for losing the baby, there was nothing about her to make him want to touch her, to hold her.

Maybe if she wore her hair down, perhaps put on a little rouge to add color to her face, and a pretty dress … Meg’s shoulders, which had begun to straighten, slumped again. There was no sense in lying to herself. Ty didn’t want her and the reasons went deeper than rouge and a pretty dress. He didn’t want her because, deep down, he couldn’t forgive her for losing his baby. She understood that because she couldn’t even begin to forgive herself.

Meg turned off the taps and shook her hands to dry them a little before reaching for a towel. She supposed that, before too long, she would have to find a way to release Ty. She couldn’t just ask him for a divorce, because he wouldn’t give it to her unless he was sure she had something else to go to — a job perhaps. She should start trying to find something, try to make some kind of arrangements …

She sank down on the edge of the tub, struggling against an almost suffocating wave of depression. It was too soon, she thought shakily. She couldn’t think about leaving Ty — not so soon after losing the baby. Even if he was already lost to her, she needed to hold on just a little while longer, just until she found some way to fill the terrible emptiness inside. She just needed a little time.

“Why don’t you come out to the farm with me today?” Ty was standing in front of the dresser, and he watched Meg’s reflection in the mirror. “The weather’s nice. You could take a look at the place, see what work we’ve done so far. Maybe we could take a picnic. The apple tree’s starting to bloom.”

He wondered if she’d think of their last picnic out at the farm. That had been the first time he’d kissed her, the first time he’d realized just how much he wanted her. He wanted her now, he thought, watching her reflection as she made the bed. The bed where she slept alone each night.

They hadn’t shared a bed in over a month — not since the miscarriage. His offer to sleep in his sister’s room had drifted on long past the one or two nights he’d originally envisioned. He kept thinking that all he had to do was move back into their bedroom. And then he’d look at Meg, see the carefiil emptiness in her eyes, and he’d be overwhelmed with guilt, remembering the pain she’d suffered.

So he’d continued to sleep in Louise’s narrow bed, not sure if he was a fool or simply doing the decent thing. But he’d kept his clothes in the room they’d shared. It was inconvenient as hell, but at least it kept a link between the two of them, even if it was tenuous.

“How about it? You feel like driving out to the farm?”

“I don’t know.” Meg straightened away from the bed and lifted her hands to pull her hair back from her face. The movement thrust her breasts against the front of her cotton robe, and Ty felt his body tighten in response. He swallowed hard and looked away, feeling guilty.

“It would do you good to get out,” he said, reaching for his wallet and thrusting it into his pocket.

“I don’t think so,” she said slowly. She let her hands drop to her sides as he turned to look at her.

“Why not?” He thought she looked started at the question. They’d already exchanged more conversation than they had in weeks. It wasn’t the first time he’d suggested that she come out to the farm. Each time she’d refused, and he’d accepted that refusal without question.

“I don’t really feel up to it,” she said, her eyes sliding away from his.

“Doc Corey gave you a clean bill of health, didn’t he?” Ty couldn’t have said just what it was that was making him persist this time. Maybe it was the feeling that she was slipping farther and farther away from him.

“Yes, but I really have other things to do today.”

“Like what?”

“I … Well, I should help your mother …”

“I’m sure she could manage for a day without you.” Anger was starting to throb in his temples, but Ty couldn’t have said just whom the anger was directed toward — Meg, for her stubborn refusal to get on with life; himself, for being the cause of her withdrawal; or fate, for creating the situation they were now in.

“I’d just be in the way,” she said with a quick smile that didn’t even come close to her eyes.

Tylooked at her a moment longer and then lifted his shoulders in a quick shrug. “I won’t drag you.”

He picked up the car keys and walked to the door but he stopped before opening it. Dammit, they couldn’t go on like this forever. He spun back toward her, struggling to control the unreasoning anger that made him want to put his fist through a wall.

“Life keeps moving, Meg. It doesn’t stop just because you wish it would.”

“I — I don’t wish it would,” she stammered.

“You have to keep going,” he said, ignoring her protest. “Hiding in this room isn’t going to change what happened.”

Without waiting for her response, he turned and left, the door closing behind him with a distinct snap. Frustration carried him down the stairs and out the front door, dismissing his mother’s question about breakfast with a curt “I’m not hungry-“

The frustrated anger lingered throughout the day, leading him to attack the jobs at hand with a ferocity that raised Jack’s eyebrows, though he didn’t comment but only matched Ty’s pace, perhaps working out some frustrations of his own.

By the end of the day, Ty was physically tired, but he hadn’t managed to do more than soften the edge on his mood. The sun was starting to set and the light was nearly gone, but he didn’t feel like going home. He didn’t want to see Meg look at him with all the light gone from her eyes. He wanted her to shout at him, to tell him she hated him. If she’d just give him something solid to fight …

“Ouch!” He’d been hammering a nail into the side of the bam, repairing a loose board. In the poor light, he’d misjudged and the hammer caught his thumb a glancing blow.

“A very wise man once told me that you should never use a hammer in the dark,” Jack said from behind him.

Scowling, Ty turned to see his friend leaning against a fence post. “It’s not dark,” he snapped, nursing his aching thumb. “I thought you went home.”

“I came back.” Jack straightened away from the fence and walked over to where Ty was standing. Throwing one arm around his shoulders, he pulled him away from the bam. “It occurred to me that we’ve put in a ridiculous amount of work on this place without once stopping to celebrate our progress.”

“I don’t feel much like celebrating tonight, Jack,” Ty protested wearily.

“All the more reason to do so.”

The logic in that reasoning escaped Ty, but before he could say as much, they’d reached the newly repaired front porch. Sitting there, the amber liquid catching the last of the light, was a bottle of whiskey and two glasses. And Ty suddenly realized that what he wanted, more than anything in the world, was to get roaring drunk.

“Jack, you are a true friend.” Ty sank onto the top step, feeling an ache that went deeper than sore muscles. Jack sank down next to him, watching as Ty twisted open the bottle and poured a generous serving into each glass.

“To true friends,” Ty said, grinning as he lifted the glass.

He waited to see Jack lift his glass in return and then took a hefty swallow, feeling the liquor bum its way down his throat.

“Damn!” He looked at Jack through watering eyes. “What did you do, piss in a bottle of kerosene? This stuff is godawful.”

“Best I could find on short notice.” Jack shrugged and then lifted his glass again, his grin taking on a bitter twist. “To women. Who the hell needs them?”

Without waiting for a response, Jack downed the remaining contents of his glass, barely wincing at taste of the whiskey. Ty swirled his own drink in his hand.
Who needed women?
He wasn’t sure he
needed
Meg exactly. But he couldn’t just dismiss her, either.

At the sound of a bottle clinking against glass, he turned to watch Jack pour himself a second drink. In the last gray light of dusk, Jack’s face was grim. It was an expression Ty had seen a lot these past few weeks. Since Meg’s miscarriage when Jack had brought her sister to see her. Ever since then, there’d been something riding Jack. Ty had been too occupied with his ownproblems to pay much attention and he felt a sudden twinge of guilt.

“You want to talk about it?”

“No.” Jack didn’t look up from the glass he was nursing between his hands. “I want to get drunk.”

“Sounds like a fine idea.” Ty lifted his glass and took another drink. Perhaps the first swallow had served to numb his throat, because the second one didn’t bum nearly as much going down. And the third tasted almost good. He smiled as he drained his glass, feeling the whiskey settle in a pleasantly warm pool in the pit of his stomach, driving out the chill that he’d lived with for so long.

Meg glanced at the clock for the third time in as many minutes. It seemed as if the hands were crawling around the face. Past ten o’clock and still no sign of Ty. He sometimes worked after dark, but he’d never worked this late before.

When he hadn’t shown up in time for dinner, his mother had put his meal on a plate and left it in the oven. Her comment that it was hardly any wonder that he didn’t want to come home had been accompanied by a pointed look in Meg’s direction that made Meg wonder if her mother-in-law had overheard any of their quarrel this morning.

If it had
been
a quarrel. She wasn’t sure that was the right word for it. Ty’s anger seemed to have been directed at himself as much at her. He’d looked almost … hurt. As if she might have hurt him. That thought had been in her mind all day, unsettling her, nibbling at the wall she’d so carefully built around her emotions, weakening it.