Katie's Love Ch. 09

There is also a very long and detailed description of what happened the night that Jean came to visit her. That really opened my eyes in a lot of ways and the next entry talks about her coming over to my apartment the next night.

Thursday January 21, 1981 7:10 PM. Tony and I went out last night. I didn't tell him that Jean was here on Tuesday or what happened and we went his apartment afterwards. I wanted to make love to him but I was afraid of how bad it was going to hurt. I hope he didn't see how much pain I was feeling when he first went inside of me. But for some reason, he started making love to me with such tenderness that all of the pain disappeared. It took a lot of effort for me to not to cry it was so special. I love him so very much and I have to find a way to tell him. I feel like I am going to explode with all these feelings. This weekend I will tell him. I don't know how yet, but I will!

Monday January 25, 1981 6:45 PM. I don't know where to begin or even if I can begin. I finally told Tony that I loved him on Saturday. It was the hardest thing I have ever done in my whole life. He told me that he loved me and that he always would and I know that he means it with all of his heart. I have been sitting here crying for a long time just trying to find the words to write down what I am feeling. I am so happy! I just can't believe how good this feels and I feel so bad that I waited so long to finally open up and accept it. I gave him my father's hairbrush to spank me with and he could tell I was terrified of it but he used it with so much love. I know that one day I will have to tell him all my darkest secrets and that will be very hard as well. But whatever happens from now on, I am ready for. I love him and I will love him, forever and ever and ever!

Monday April 6, 1981 7:30 PM. We went dancing Saturday night and I had such a great time! I didn't drink much but I was drunk from all the fun we had. I wore poor Tony out, his legs were so sore that he could hardly walk yesterday morning. I was so naughty. I danced with this girl and we played a little. I thought Tony was going to be mad at me but he thought it was hot. I'm going to have to find someone for us to have fun with, I don't mind sharing him a little. Maybe Angie from the bar. She is pretty neat and I have this feeling about her. One day I will have to go over for lunch over there and talk to her without Tony being around.

This one was written after the Saturday night that she spent four hours dominating me.

Monday June 8, 1981 8:45 PM. I cannot believe what I did to Tony this weekend. I don't know what came over me. I could have hurt him badly. Why am I this way? Why? Why? Why! I wish he had gotten angry with me but he didn't. Damn it! I should tell Jean to come visit and make me pay for how stupid I was, but I can't tell her, she will be very angry with me. I wish I had the courage to take the hairbrush and spank myself with it. I am so sorry Tony, so very, very, sorry.

Monday July 12, 1981 8:05 PM. My period started yesterday and I made a big decision today. I'm going to stop taking my birth control pills. I know I should talk to Tony about it but I know that he will be happy. I'm still not sure I can even get pregnant. The doctor said that there is no reason I can't, but I just have this feeling.

Monday August 10, 1981 6:45 PM. We had another beautiful weekend together. I got my period today. I'm disappointed but I know these things take time. I want this to happen for both of us so very much.

Monday August 17, 1981 6:35 PM. Saturday night we made love under the full moon. What a simple sentence to write but it doesn't begin to do justice to what happened. The first time we made love it was great. We have made love so many times now and there have been some very special times, but nothing could compare with that. Then we made love a second time. He was going real fast but for some reason he started going really slow and I thought he was going to make love to me all night. The moonlight wrapped around us like a soft silver cocoon and our souls joined together as one in the power of our love. I have never ever felt anything like that in my entire life. Tony didn't even want to make love Sunday morning, he said he wanted to keep remembering what happened on Saturday night. It doesn't get any better than this!

Tuesday September 8, 1981 7:10 PM. Damn it! Damn it! Damn it! I think of all the girls I know who had sex one time and got pregnant and here I am making love to the most wonderful guy in the world and it isn't happening. It started on Sunday night while I was asleep and I made a big mess in our bed. Tony was here until this morning because of the holiday, but it didn't bother him. Why can't I get pregnant?

Monday October 12, 1981 9:00 PM. I'm pregnant! I didn't get my period last week even though I pretended that I had it when Tony was around. I hate lying to him but I want to be sure that everything is okay before I tell him. It has to be a special day, not that it won't be a special day. I know he will be so happy. I am so excited but I'm afraid as well. It's going to be hard but I can't wait to be a mother!

Thursday Oct 15, 1981 8:35 PM. I am going to tell Tony on Christmas Eve. I hope I am not showing too much before then but if I am I will deal with it. I have also decided that after I tell him that we will redo the playroom and use that as our bedroom and my bedroom will be the baby's room. It is time for me to put all that away and behind me. I am also going to tell him everything about me. No more secrets. I want to get it out of me once and for all.

But the most painful ones to read were those of that last week and especially the tear stained page written the day before the accident.

Monday November 2, 1981 9:30 PM. I can't take much more of this! Why does it have to be like this? Why does it have to be me? It has been so damn hard trying to hide this from Tony. I'm just glad that it didn't happen this weekend. He is going to be so devastated. I just hope he has the strength to get through it. I wish it was over.

10:00 PM. My precious baby. I am so sorry that I will not get the chance to bring you into this world. To watch you live and grow. But I will be there, no matter where I am, to watch over and protect you. Whatever or whoever is doing this to me, they owe me that much.

The very last words that Katie wrote in her diary were the only ones she addressed to me directly.

10:45 PM. My dearest Tony. I know some day that you will be reading this. I hope and pray with all my heart that you have managed to find some happiness in your life. Just know this, I will always be there for you and on that day, when it is your time to leave this world, I will be waiting for you. Then we can be together again. Forever and ever and ever. With all my love, Katie

After I finished reading her diary for the second time, I wrapped it up again with the cloth and ribbon. I could feel Katie there with me the whole time but she didn't say anything. When I finally went to bed that night, she gave me a kiss and wrapped herself gently around me. After I got back to my office the next evening, I put it in the file cabinet that I have stored off my writings and other memories of that wonderful year with her. Prior to writing this story, there has been only one other time that I got it out and read it and even after all these years, her words still invoke a lot of very powerful emotions within me.

I am sure that a lot of folks after reading these little bits of Katie's most private thoughts are thinking that she had some deep problems and I agree. I have gotten a lot more knowledgeable about such things since I first read her diary and if I wanted to, I could put a name to those problems. With age comes wisdom, and sometimes that wisdom isn't always the nicest thing to acquire, especially when it comes from dealing with other problems in your life. I am also sure that some of you have questioned my sanity as well, what with the candles and talking to her spirit. I know that I have on more than one occasion. But learning all those new things about Katie did not change the way I felt about her one bit.

I also know that a lot of readers are going to be wondering about how I felt about her getting pregnant without telling me. By the time I found out about her being pregnant, eighteen years had already gone by and as I sit here and write this, twenty-nine years have gone by. As most of you know, trying to go back all those years and trying to put yourself in a situation like that is very hard and any thoughts or feelings that I could come up with would be questionable at best. But as I have said many times and many ways throughout this story, for that time we were together and especially the period from the end of January until the accident, I lived every minute of every day totally immersed in the love that I felt for her. That is about as good of an answer as I can give you.

The next year came and went like they always seem to do. My business had been slow for the first couple of months of 2000. All of my clients had spent a lot of money the year before and it took a while for things to balance out again, but I also needed a break as well. Business picked up in March and was back to what I considered a normal level again by April.

I was looking forward to seeing Elizabeth at the cemetery that year. November 3rd fell on a Friday and we had agreed by letter to meet at noon. The day was overcast and a little on the damp side, but she never showed up. I waited at the grave for a while and went over and sat on the bench until it was after 1:00 PM. I was worried about her and even thought about going over to her house, but I didn't want to cause any problems with Charlie. I took the two roses back over to Katie's grave and left them lying on the base of her tombstone. Then I waited another fifteen minutes and left.

I was concerned about her all weekend and then on Monday morning around 11:00 AM, my phone rang. I answered it and I heard a woman's voice on the other end say, "I'm going to kill a couple of idiot doctors!"

I laughed and said, "Elizabeth. I was worried about you."

She said, "Idiots! I went in to my regular doctor early on Friday morning for a checkup. He started listening to my heart and got all excited. He said I was going to drop dead if I didn't get to the hospital right away. So they called the ambulance and off I went. I got poked and tested and tested and poked. Finally my heart doctor came in on Sunday and he asked what other medications I was taking and I told him. Turns out that something the first idiot gave me was causing something the second idiot gave me to make things sound worse than they really were. He asked if I had told the first idiot what he had given me and I said yes! Then the first idiot showed up in my room and both of them got into a yelling contest, but they finally agreed on something and let me go this morning," and of course I was roaring with laughter the whole time.

I replied, "I'm just glad that you are alright."

Elizabeth went on, "I'm so sorry Tony. I was really looking forward to seeing you again. That last kiss never made the newspaper so I thought we'd give it another shot." I laughed again as she finished with, "I'll be going over to the cemetery this afternoon and I'll take care of the vase and the roses."

"Thank you Elizabeth," I said.

She replied, "I will let you get back to work."

I said, "Again, I'm just glad that you are okay."

Her parting words before hanging up the phone were, "I have to see if I can find that old baseball bat that we had here. There are a couple of idiot doctors that I'm going to knock over the head, drag to the river and drown!"

I laughed for a good five minutes after she got off the phone.

The next year business was steady, but I was starting to get tired of the never ending stress. If I called to get my truck fixed, or to make a dentist or doctor appointment, I got told to stand in line. But everyone seemed to think that they were going to die if their damn computer wasn't fixed right away. That and the fact, that I always seemed to be running into strange problems that supposedly no one else in the world was having, was getting old.

Everyone knows what happened in New York City on Sept 11, 2001. I knew that Jean's office was located far enough away from where everything happened, but I was still concerned. I tried to call a few times that day but I could not get through. Finally late Thursday afternoon, she called me and we talked for a while. She was very upset, not that everybody wasn't, but this really hit Jean hard. In all the years that we had been talking, I had never heard her sound so scared. She was also angry but that didn't mask the fear I heard in her voice.

That week I also started having another affair. I always kept my distance emotionally while having them in the past, but this one was different. The sex was really good and she was such a great person that after a few weeks I fell in love with her. Not the same kind of all consuming kind of love that I had felt for Katie, but love comes in different ways between different people. As we had done the previous year, Elizabeth and I had agreed to meet at the cemetery. This was the twentieth anniversary of Katie's passing and it fell on a Saturday. Elizabeth had some things to do in the morning so I said that I would be there for 2:00 PM.

I got to the cemetery a few minutes early. The sun was shining and it was warm for that time of year. I waited at Katie's grave like the last time, but Elizabeth never showed up. I sat on the bench for a while as well. It was 3:30 PM before I left after leaving the roses on her tombstone. I was concerned, but after what had happened the pervious year, not too much.

She had written in her last letter to me, "I'm not going anywhere near those idiots for a week before!"

I was expecting her to call me again but it never happened. I had also found out that week that the husband of the woman I had been seeing was getting transferred out of state and that they were going to be moving, very much against her wishes, before the end of the year. Needless to say, I was getting a bit of an attitude about the first week in November. The week and then the weekend passed and there was still no call or letter from her, then Monday morning around 10:00 AM my phone rang.

I answered it and I heard the voice of an older sounding man ask, "Is this Tony?"

I said, "Yes it is."

"You are the guy who was in love with my wife," he went on.

I got really concerned and asked, "Who is this?"

He replied, "This is Charlie, Elizabeth's husband." This was the first time I had ever talked to him and I was shocked that he would call me, but I also suspected the worst, which was confirmed as he said, "Elizabeth passed away last Saturday morning. They said that she died in her sleep from a heart attack around 5:30 AM."

I said, "I am so very sorry to hear that Charlie. She was a very great and special lady."

He went on, "I didn't hear a thing. I woke up around 8:00 AM and she was lying there with the sweetest smile on her face. Her funeral was on Thursday. I was going to call you about it but," and he never finished the sentence.

I replied, "That is okay. Where is she buried?"

"Next to her first husband and daughter," he answered. "I told her years ago that I wanted us to be buried together but she said her grave was paid for and since there was a plot waiting for me along side of my first wife that there was no sense in wasting the ground or the money."

I laughed a little and said, "That does sound like her."

Charlie agreed, "There was no use in arguing with her once her mind was made up. He paused and went on, "I have something for you. She made me promise a few years back that if anything happened to her, that I had to make sure that you got that damn old candle back."

I said, "I can be at the cemetery tomorrow around 2:00 PM. If you want to go in the morning and leave it by Katie's grave, I'll get it from there."

"Oh no," he replied, "She also made me promise that I would hand it to you in person. She said that if anything happened to it, that she would come back and haunt me for the rest of my days." I laughed again and he said, "I'll see you there at 2:00 PM," and hung up the phone.

I was very sad at this news but I was glad that she had gone peacefully. Elizabeth had lived a long and a good life and despite the pain of losing her husband, daughter, and grandchild, she never let it affect her life and her love for others.

I called Jean, got her voicemail, so I hit the button to get her secretary and said, "I need to talk to Jean."

The secretary said, "She is busy on another call."

I didn't feel like playing phone tag or waiting so I replied, "Tell her that Katie's Tony is calling and that it is very important."

She sighed and said, "I'll try," and put me on hold.

After a minute or so, Jean came on and asked, "What's up?"

I said, "Elizabeth died last Saturday."

It was quiet for a little while, then she said, "Hold on." She dropped the phone on the desk and a few seconds later I heard a door slam shut. I heard her pick up the phone and she said, "Tell me about it."

I told her that Charlie had called and what he said.

She sighed a little, then I heard her start crying and she said softly, "The same day as Katie."

I replied, "Yes."

Still lightly crying Jean said, "I knew that it was just a matter of time. But I am going to miss her."

I said, "I am too Jean."

She asked where she was buried and I told her. I also told her that Charlie had something to give to me and that I was meeting him there tomorrow.

"That other candle I guess," she said.

I said "Yes."

I had told Jean about the candles a few years before, but she didn't believe that they had any kind of power or magic. She thought that Katie's spirit was just something that I had made up, so I never mentioned any of it again after that.

It was quiet for a few seconds then I said, "Jean, Elizabeth told me about Katie being pregnant."

She let out another sigh and replied, "Oh fuck! When did she tell you?"

I answered, "Two years ago when we met at the cemetery."

Another quiet period went by and then she said, "Keep Thursday night free."

I replied, "I can do that."

Jean asked, "Are you still going to Harrisburg?"

I answered, "I don't have any business down there this week."

She said, "I'll find someplace closer. Damn it! I need a break. I'll call you tomorrow and let you know when and where," then she hung up the phone.

I thought, "This is going to be interesting."

The lady that I had been seeing was going to be away with her husband starting Wednesday morning so we weren't going to be getting together that week. On Tuesday, Jean called me around 1:00 PM and told me to meet her at one of the resort hotels up in the Poconos area north of Stroudsburg PA.

Jean told me the room number and said, "Be there for 5:00 PM and just come right up to the room," then she hung up the phone without saying another word, but then being polite was never one of Jean's strong points

The next day I was back at the cemetery and in my left hand was a white rose for Elizabeth's grave. As I headed over to where they were buried I saw an old man standing there leaning on a cane with his left hand and he had a plastic shopping bag in his right hand. He was tall and not overly skinny but not fat either and he turned towards me as I got closer.

I extended my right hand and said, "Hello Charlie."

He waited a few seconds, then moved the bag to his left hand and extended his right hand and grasped mine in a strong handshake.

Charlie quietly said, "Hello Tony." He looked me in the eye for a few seconds, before saying, "I have to tell you. I have hated you for all these years. I felt that Elizabeth didn't love me completely because of her writing all those letters to you." He paused and went on, "But I was wrong. She had told that when her time came that there was a box of items in the one closet that she wanted to buried with. On top of the box was a letter that she written to me a couple of few years ago. She told me that she loved me and while she cared very deeply about you, that I was her true love. She also said that if I didn't believe it, I should think long and hard about who it was that she went to bed with every night for all these years." He paused again then finished with, "So I want to apologize to you and to her. I was wrong and I feel like a damn fool!"