To Protect and Serve (2 page)

A waitress walked by with her arms laded with hot food and set plates in front of some teenagers in the booth directly across from Nancy -- and behind
him
.

             
Him
.  The man she had been married to for the past 22 years.  The father of her two teenage daughters. 
Him
.

             
She could see his mouth moving and realized that he had asked her something else.

             
“What?”  

             
“Are you all right?”  he repeated.

             
“I suppose so.”  She actually felt sort of shocky and numb.

             
Just then their waitress came by and asked if she wanted more coffee.

             
“Uh, sure.”  Nancy didn’t really, but she was unable to think of anything else to say.

             
“I’ll be right back with a fresh pot,” the waitress responded before heading to the kitchen, popping her gum along the way and efficiently gathering empty plates as she passed vacated tables.

             
Nancy looked at Jonathon (
Him
) again and realized that he was watching her with an expression of sympathy on his face. 

             
Suddenly she felt something more than just a hollow numbness; she felt something approaching irritation.  Maybe even – YES – Anger. 

How
dare
he pretend to care about her.  How dare he feign compassion!  For that matter, how dare he draw breath!  She entertained a small fantasy about throwing her glass of water in his face and storming out of the restaurant, a la Katherine Hepburn.  Then she took a deep breath and decided that maybe that wouldn’t be prudent.

             
Not less than one minute ago (she was pretty sure it was only one minute) he had said that he thought it was time for them to split up. 

             
Split up?  As in divorce?

             
“Yes.  I think that this is as good a time as any.”

             
As good a time as compared to
when
? 

             
Only an hour ago they had been looking at a new house to buy.  Last week their 13 year old ‘baby’ arrived home from a two-week tour of China (of all places) with her karate team, which had left Nancy frantic with worry the whole time.  Tomorrow Nancy’s father was scheduled for an angiogram.  And - oh yeah - two days ago she’d had another birthday.  Of course . . . this just
must
be the perfect time.

             
Up until now, the few times in their marriage that Jonathon had talked about splitting up, Nancy had dragged him in for marriage counseling.  Things would get better between them for a while and they’d be almost happy.

             
But right now, she just didn’t have it in her to fight anymore.

             
“Why the hell not.” 

             
She wasn’t truly angry ... not really.  She was more confused than anything.  Hadn’t they just been looking at a new house with their realtor?  Why would Jonathon have agreed to go house hunting if he wanted a divorce?  They hadn’t been fighting recently.  In fact things had seemed to calm down a little.  Then why the divorce?

             
“Babe, are you okay?”

             
Babe? 

             
He’d called her “Babe?!?”  This was getting more unreal by the moment.

             
“Yeah, I-I think so.”

             
“You’re crying.”

             
“I am?”

             
“Yeah.”

             
As she wiped her face with a napkin, the waitress stopped with fresh coffee.  She looked at Nancy and then looked at Jonathon.

             
Jonathon shrugged his shoulders at the waitress and gave her a small ‘women-what-can-you-do?’ smile.  The waitress frowned at him, her mouth diligently working the gum.  The waitress’ response actually felt kind of good; as though someone was on her side.

             
Sides.  Oh, for pity’s sake.  Now there were going to be sides.

              Jonathon pulled a folded sheet of paper out of his pocket and proceeded to read from it.  “I’ve figured out what the child support should be.  I’ll also help with college for the girls.  Of course I want final approval of the college.”  He continued to talk in a normal tone.

             
College?  Child support?  Weren’t they first supposed to talk about what had gone wrong?  Wasn’t there first supposed to be some sort of emotional catharsis?

             
Nancy’s eyes moved around the restaurant again.  Then it dawned on her.  Of course!  She looked back at Jonathon and realized that he had been afraid that she would become upset and there would be an argument.  Hence, the restaurant instead of a private conversation.  Apparently he thought that she wouldn’t make a public display. 

             
She sighed.  He was right.  He knew her pretty well after all.

             
“Why the hell not.”

             
“So, it’s okay with you?”

             
Not really
.  “Sure.”

             
She held out her hand for the piece of paper that had been printed in his engineer-type block lettering, with evenly spaced columns and numbers.  Good grief, he’d even put it in outline form!  And now he wanted an answer.  Nancy knew that she should get a lawyer.  She knew that she should refuse to make any decisions at this time.  She knew that she should take him for every penny she could get.

             
She also knew that she wouldn’t do any of that.  She just wasn’t built that way.  She even thought that maybe, somehow this was her fault.  She was sure that if she’d only been thinner, younger, more athletic, more...well just more ANYTHING, this wouldn’t be happening.

              Didn’t other marriages have rough patches?  Didn’t you stick together through thick and thin?  Weren’t you supposed to honor in sickness and in health?

             
Obviously not everyone thought so.

             
Then Nancy had a thought that made her heart hurt.

             
“Is there someone else?” she asked haltingly.

             
“No.”  He seemed to be telling the truth.  “Do you have someone else?”

             
What?
  What was he talking about?  She wasn’t the one asking for the divorce.  He was.  Unreal.

             
Jonathon went back to the figures on the paper and as he continued to talk about which items he wanted to keep and which she could have, her mind must have gone onto auto-pilot.  Obviously, she agreed to many things because they were finished in about ten minutes.

             
Jonathon paid the bill, leaving a very small tip as usual, and for once Nancy didn’t sneak a couple more dollars onto the table.  For once she didn’t even think about it.  They moved towards the entrance doors just as two local police officers entered.

             
As Nancy walked past the officers, one of them turned to watch her walk by.  He’d noticed her tear-streaked face and wondered what had happened to her. 

             
Doug Saunders had entered the police force in order to help people and this woman sure looked like she could use some help.  It had been a hell of a day for Doug, and he felt the need to be able to do something – anything – right.  Just then a man about 5’10”, thin and balding walked up behind the woman and escorted her out of the restaurant.

             
“Do you know her?” the other officer asked, looking back over his shoulder.

             
“No, Bill.  She just seemed familiar somehow, that’s all.” 

             
“Doug ol’ buddy, that’s the type of woman you should be dating.  Not those bleached blond, Balboa babes you hang out with.”  He gave Doug’s shoulder a shove.

             
“My love life is off-limits as a topic of conversation.”  Doug placed his hat on the counter top.

             
“Since when?”  asked Bill, scooting onto the counter stool.

             
“Since now.”

             
Grinning, Doug and his friend Bill picked up the menus and took sips of coffee from the mugs that the waitress had automatically placed before them.  The image of the woman’s tear-streaked face was re-filed into a back section of Doug’s mind. 

             
When Nancy and Jonathon exited the restaurant and walked out into the strong sunshine, Nancy was sure that she only had a few minutes left before she fell apart.  She’d be damned if she’d let Jonathon see how much this had hurt.  For some reason, right now pride was important.

             
“I have a few things to finish up in my classroom at the school.  Could you just drop me off?  I’ll get a ride home.”  She was pretty sure that her voice didn’t give anything away.

             
“Okay.  Are you sure that you’re all right?”  He actually sounded as though he cared. 
Yeah, right
.

             
The ride to the school was done in silence.  Jonathon kept sneaking glances at Nancy, but couldn’t read anything from her expression.

             
He dropped her off in front of her school, and Nancy walked to her classroom without looking back.  Thank goodness no one else was around.  She wasn’t sure she had it in her to carry on a normal conversation right now.

              She made it to her classroom unaccosted and locked the door behind her.  Nancy slowly walked over to her desk on legs that felt as stiff and brittle as old wood.  Measuring each step as she went, easing her way into the chair, she was afraid that if she moved any faster she’d crack.  Moving slow seemed to be the glue that was holding her together right now, and if that’s what it took to survive, then she’d move as slow as necessary.

             
She sat at her desk, resting her head in her hands, while her mind wandered over the past twenty-plus years, touching on various times, sort of like flipping through a photo album.  Where had everything gone wrong?

             
Nancy remembered meeting Jonathon for the first time.  She’d fallen in love with him when he’d directly asked her if she was already involved with someone.  He’d seemed so sure of himself.  When she’d said “No.  No one.” he’d then asked her if she was at all interested in him.

             
She’d thought that his directness indicated honesty.  It had, but it had also indicated a lack of romance.  However, she’d been swept off her feet so fast by his attention that she’d failed to notice the little things that were actually indicators of the bigger things.

             
Jonathon wasn’t a mean man.  He was just VERY practical.  He didn’t waste words.  Such as “I love you.”  But if Nancy had been honest with herself, she would have realized that she was the type of woman who needed words.  She also needed affection.  And not just when Jonathon wanted to have sex.  She needed to be told she was beautiful, or at least pretty.  She remembered after she’d given birth to their second daughter and she’d looked up at him with joy.  She expected him to tell

her something like “thank you for the beautiful baby” or “you look radiant.”   Instead he’d told her that she needed to brush her hair.

             
And since Nancy was being honest with herself, she realized that he’d never once tried to convince her that he was anything other than what he was.  She also realized that she’d harbored some sort of fantasy that he’d change his ways for her.  When he didn’t, she’d read that to mean that he didn’t love her, which wasn’t true.

             
She supposed he loved her in his own way.  He’d provided well for her and the girls.  He’d handled all the bills and their finances.  He’d even purchased a new home for them.  Jonathon would have fit in well back in the early 1950’s.  Too bad she wasn’t Donna Reed.

             
Nancy actually hadn’t wanted the kind of guy who was all emotional, and “in touch with his inner woman.”  She liked guys to be guys.  She just hadn’t wanted to feel like she was begging for attention and affection.

             
She wasn’t sure how long she’d been sitting there, when the door was unlocked from the outside and her teacher’s aide, Tess, walked in.

             
“How did the house-hunting go?  Did you find the perfect place?  I didn’t expect to see you back here today.”  Tess hadn’t even looked in Nancy’s direction as she’d been talking a mile a minute.  Instead she was dumping school supplies from her arms onto the nearest desk.