Stranger is the Sail Ch. 03

At any other time, I would have asked her about the baby's father. Now, I just say, "I know. If I could take it back, I would."

She breathes. "Why did you do it?"

"Partly because I lost my temper."

"What are the other reasons?"

"There's only one other reason," I admit. "But I don't want to talk about it."

"Well, I DO, goddamn it! I want to talk about it! What was the other reason you had to lash out at me back there?"

I look out the window, and for the first time in weeks I see the stranger. He's watching me carefully. "Because I'm so sad," I tell the both of them.

She doesn't talk for a while, but I see her wiping at her face a few times. Personally, I don't know if I have any crying left in me.

"Well," she says, "if you wanted to hurt me, then you did a good job of it. I hope that at least gives you something you can feel good about."

I glance at the stranger. His face is twisted, angry and terrible looking. His mouth is opened up wide, with too many teeth crowding it's cavern. He looks hungry. I blink my eyes a few times, look again, and I just see me.

"It doesn't," I say. "I don't feel good about it at all."

She lets out a sob, then takes a few deep breaths as she struggles for control.

When we get home, she falls into her chair at the table and sits staring at the floor. I walk past, headed for the bathroom. This night is ended. I just want to sleep.

"You don't have to shut me out all the time," she says. "You can...you can leave me, when the time comes, but while you're here..."

I almost don't answer, but something occurs to me. I stop and turn around. "I do have to shut you out, Laura. I'm sorry. It's the only defense I have, right now. If I don't, then...tonight was the result of me trying to find a way to stop keeping you at arm's length. The more we're around each other, the worse that's going to get." I start to turn back, then pause. "Listen," I say, "I really am sorry about what I did back there. I just...anyway, I'm sorry."

She doesn't say a word. She doesn't even blink. She just stares at the floor and puts her hand over her belly. After a while, I can hear her whispering something to the unborn child within.

She's still sitting there when I go to bed.





Saturday, June 12th

LAURA BURKE

The dream is a simple one, but strange.

I'm back in my old room at my parents' house, the way it was when I was a child. Mom and Dad interact with me the way I remember them doing when I was very young, though they appear to be the same age that they are right now. I respond to them as if this is all perfectly normal, but I too am my actual current age. My belly is obscenely, surreally swollen with pregnancy. I am an adult woman sitting on a child's bed, calling it my own, bloated with impending childbirth.

"Sweetie," Mom asks from the doorway, "have you finished your homework yet?"

"No," I say irritably. "I'm watching for the wind to come."

"Oh," she says, giving me a reproaching look. "Just remember to get it done before bed."

"I will," I turn away from her to stare out the window. All that I can see is water. Calm, reflective, peaceful water. This house is on the ocean, and we need for it to find land.

I scan the horizon, frustrated. Then, in the distance, an unusual blurring appears in the air. I don't know how else to describe it. The water turns choppy, the clouds seem to quicken, and the mysterious haze moves swiftly in our direction.

I blink my dream eyes and smile. The wind is coming.

"Mom!" I shout. "Dad! It's here! The wind! It's here!"



"Good!" my father calls out from the basement. "Now go get Adrian! Quick!"

"Adrian?" I ask. The name is familiar, but I can't put a face to it. Who are they asking me to get? And why?

"Yes!" Mom shouts, running into the room and shaking my shoulders. "Adrian! Get Adrian! Hurry, or we'll miss the wind!"

I can't make any sense of what she's saying, and her fingers are hurting my shoulders. "Why do we need Adrian? Who is he?"

Mom recoils from me in horror. "What do you mean, who is Adrian?" she asks, taking small backwards steps to increase the distance between us. Then she looks out the window, and panic spreads across her face. "You have to get him. Hurry! It's almost here!"

I turn to look out the window, and I feel a kicking in my stomach.

"I felt the baby," I say.

And then I wake up.

Sitting up, breathing heavy, I squint at the clock. Six-thirty. So early.

Memories of the night before return to me, unwelcome and disappointing, and I want to scream. I wonder if they had anything to do with that dream...

I try to remember what it was about, but the details of the dream are already fading, escaping me, so I don't think too hard about it. It was upsetting, but that's about all that I can recall.

There won't be any more sleep, now. I'm a part of the day. I head downstairs to make coffee and get some breakfast.

The refridgerator hums, the eggs sizzle, and I almost burn my hand because I'm not paying close enough attention.

Melinda will be gentle about it. I know she will. There will still be occasional phone calls, maybe even a few meet-ups, and she will still send Christmas cards for a few more years. Oh, she'll complain about how we never have time to see each other anymore, how lovely it is to talk to me again, and then we will make tentative plans that never get followed through on.

The preacher's daughter was my last friend. What does that say about me?

As I turn to get a cup for my orange juice, I see that my cell phone is blinking. Curious. Who would have called me between the hours of eleven and six? I flip it open.

It's not a call. It's a text...from Victor.



"Missing you," it says.

That's funny. The only person left in this world who is bothered by my absence is the one person I wish I'd never met.

Is that completely true? I doubt it. Even now, I feel a thumb stroke against the strings of my heart when I think about him. We don't control who we fall in love with...or who we lust after, either. But there's no future there. Not for anybody.

This is the first time he's tried to contact me since I met with him to talk about the child. I don't know what I expected to happen that day. I guess my fantasy was that he would beg for the chance to be a part of his son or daughter's life, would plead for the chance to help raise it, and I would turn him down and live the rest of my life with Adrian at my side. What an incredibly stupid girl fantasy to have. So stupid.

Instead, Victor shocked me by offering to pay for the abortion. And the way he said it...like the way someone offers to pay for lunch...took the breath right out of me. For the rest of my life, I will never have any difficulty conjuring up the exact image of my child's father's face as he offered to fit the bill for it's murder. The way his smile became a promise, or the way his lids drooped slightly. Like he was flirting.

I left immediately, and I threw up in the parking lot before coming home.

"Missing you." What a joke. Am I supposed to respond to something like that?



Here I am, all alone. Adrian will never accept this baby, and Victor doesn't deserve it.

I delete the text and close the phone. Then I eat my breakfast without tasting a thing.





Monday, June 14th

ADRIAN BURKE

"Do you have a minute?"

"Of course," she says. A smile grazes the corners of her lips, but apprehension flickers in her eyes. It's a very conflicted expression. "Why?"

"I think we need to talk about what happens next."

Laura's smile droops, and the conflict becomes simple fear. "Oh. Okay."

She turns off the television while I take a seat in my recliner. I've been thinking about this conversation, and what I want it to be, ever since our dinner with the Blakes. But now that it's time, I find myself strangely nervous.

I lick my lips and begin. "First of all, I want you to know that I am sorry for the way I've behaved these last few weeks. It's taken me a long time to get my emotions in check well enough that they don't affect my decision-making, and I'll never really be done with that. But I don't like it, and I'm done doing things just to hurt you."

She nods, but she looks very sad. "I'm sorry, too-"

I hold up my hand. "I promise to be brief, and I do promise to listen to what you have to say afterwards." Here comes the hard truth. I hope she's ready for it. "So please understand that I'm not trying to hurt you, but simply to move on with my life, when I say that it's time for us to talk about divorce."

She sucks in air, like someone just surfacing after nearly drowning, then emits a small, almost inaudible moan. "No," she says.

"I'm sorry, Laura. But you had to realize that the ending of this story was decided the moment it began. Even before I learned what you had been up to, there was no twist that was going to prevent us ending up right here. I love you, I really do. But there is no happily-ever-after for us to have. And that's what I want to have, someday, with someone. So it's over."

She shakes her head. "I can't accept that. There has to be something that we can do! There has to be some way for us to make it through this." She leans forward. "All you have to do is tell me what it is, and I'll do it!"

I shake my head. "Laura..."

"Please, Adrian! Please! Just think for a moment...what would we have to do, to save our marriage? What would I have to do, for you to want to be with me again?"

I close my eyes. This is not how I was hoping she'd take this. "Laura, I'm moving. I'm going to Chicago, and I'm never coming back to Iowa again."

She stares at me. "Moving? Why?! Why would you do that? What's in Chicago? And what's wrong with Des Moines?"

"I don't remember this place, is what's wrong with it. My life right now is shit, and I want nothing more than to experience a fresh start. If I can't remember this place, then what significance does it have for me? A bunch of streets, a couple of landmarks. Who cares? I don't remember their names."

"But you could learn-"

"To do that, I would have to want to learn. My wife betrayed me in this town. She cheated on me, and she threw me away. I nearly died here, twice. The less I remember about Des Moines, the better."

She shivers. "Chicago," she whispers. "When?"

"A little under two weeks. I've saved some money up from the gas station, and Rod's brother said he'll let me stay on his couch until I can find a job and a place to live."

"Oh." Then, she squares her shoulders up. "What if I was willing to move, too? What if I wanted to come with you?"

Outside, the wind blows, causing the house to groan. "You would have to wait," I tell her. "It would be some months yet, before you were ready."

She frowns and opens her mouth, as if she's going to ask a question. Then her eyes go wide and she puts her hand to her belly. "I'm not giving my baby away," she says. "Don't ask me to do that."

"I'm not asking you to do anything, Laura. Not to give up your child, or to move to Chicago, or anything. I'm just leaving. So stop asking questions and let me go."

Her face folds up and a tear drops down her cheek. "I don't want to," she says.

"I'm sorry for that. But it is happening."

Another tear falls, and she wipes at her face. "You would be its father, Adrian. You know that. And I don't care what you say...it's an innocent, a blank slate. If you would only stay until it's born, you would see that. You would change your mind."

"Raising a child isn't enough. It's not the same, and we've had this discussion."

"Well, have it again!" she snaps. Her chest rises and falls, hyperventilating in her attempt to control her tears. "Because you're wrong! You're WRONG, Adrian! A father is someone who cares for a child, who nurturs it. Who reads bedtime stories and goes to parent teacher conferences and goes to soccer games. Why can't you be that person? WHY?"

I open my mouth and "Fuck you," comes out before I can even think. Then I throw my hands up in a placating gesture and say, "No. Wait. If you want to have that conversation again, then fine. I've been thinking about it anyway. What if Melinda had done this thing to Rodney? What if she was the one pregnant with another man's child?"

She flinches. "Melinda would never do that to Rodney."

"I suppose not. She's too devoted to her husband to do what you've done to me. But pretend she did it anyway. Okay?"

"Okay." She sounds small, but also skeptical...or maybe nervous about what point I might be making.

"Now lets assume that Rod either doesn't know the child isn't his, or forgives her and stays to help raise it. The birth is difficult, but Melinda pulls through it, and they have a little girl. Eight years go by, things are going as well as they can for the little family, and then something terrible happens. Let's say a car accident. We're no strangers to those, right? Rodney is in a car accident, not of his own making, and he dies." I wave my hands in the air. "Where is he?"

She frowns. "I don't understand what you mean."

"There's an eight year old girl grieving at his funeral, but she doesn't have his eyes. Or his nose. Or anything. Whatever it was that made Rodney Blake who he was...it's just gone. It won't be carried on. And that little girl will grow up and remember him as her father, but when she has children of her own it will be somebody else's genes she's passing on. The lessons and stories and adventures that they shared will exist as memories, then as stories, and then not at all."

"Are you saying that little girl doesn't deserve to have a father figure in her life?"

"Sure she does. But why does that become Rodney's responsibility?"

"It's not about responsibility! It's about doing the right thing!"

"Small difference."

She shakes her head. "The difference is bigger than I could ever tell you."

"Let me turn this around the other way. Pretend-"

"ADRIAN!"

"JUST FUCKING DO IT!" I'm up on my feet before I realize what I'm doing. We stare at each other, both a little shocked. I need to maintain control, or I'll end up doing something stupid. "Please. One more time. Pretend." I sit down. "Pretend that the child in your belly really was mine, okay? Pretend that you hadn't shut me out of your life just before the accident, and I happened to get one past the goalie. Okay?"

She nods, looking sad. "That would have been nice."

"Now pretend I died in the accident."

"Adrian!"

"Just do it. So OUR baby is in your stomach and I am killed. You grieve, you mourn, and then the baby is born. Like you said, it deserves a father figure, so eventually you remarry." I shake my head. "Do you then see your new husband, this presumably caring man, as the child's father? Am I then just a sperm donor and a memory? Or do you take comfort in knowing that a part of me lives on through my daughter? Hmm?" I wait, but she doesn't answer. "Tell me, Laura. If things had ended that way, instead of this, would it matter to you at all that you could see me in your daughter's smile, or in the way she thinks and talks? If I had died, and we had a child together, would you see my face framed in hers and find my mannerisms in the way she behaved, or would you just see her as this new man's child? Who is the father, then, Laura?"

She sniffles and looks down. "I...I can't."

"Tell me."

"She would always be your daughter," she admits it like a boxer hitting his face on the mat.

"Hm. So I guess DNA counts for something after all, doesn't it? Laura, if I'm walking to work tomorrow and I get hit by a car, where would you look for me then?" I look away as she starts sobbing. "There wouldn't be anywhere to look, and you know it."

"We could still have children of our own," she insists.

I can't help snorting. "You know, here you are shitting on me for being cavalier about your child, and you're just as willing as I am to write it off as a mistake. 'Oh, whoops, sorry about the bastard...let's just surround it with real children and then maybe when people look at our Christmas card pictures they won't notice.' Disgusting."

Her head lifts, eyes afire. "That's not what I meant and you know it. I mean that this doesn't have to be the entirety of our family. We can have more-"

"To what end? I may not be any good with numbers anymore, but I'm not stupid. We must be in a pretty bad place financially, and it's not going to get better. I'm not going to suddenly start making forty thousand dollars a year again. You're not going to win the lottery. I'm surprised you haven't brought up the idea of selling the house and moving into a smaller one, yet." She looks away and blushes. "Oh. That was coming up pretty soon, here, wasn't it?" She nods. "Well. There it is. We're broke. I'm broken. When I get angry or frustrated I can barely control myself. Why would you want these things for your children, Laura? You can give them better than that."

She shakes her head, but after a time she says, "Go, then, Adrian. Just go. It's what you're going to do anyway." And then she stands up and walks back towards the bedroom.

The door closes. Outside, the wind picks up again, and the house complains about it.

"You're right," I say. "It is what I'm going to do. I just hoped that you would understand why."





Wednesday, June 16th

ADRIAN BURKE

My finger bumps against the plastic side of the container, and I drop the pill on the counter. Carefully, I pick it back up and drop it into the pocket labeled "Friday." Then I carefully double-check each pocket before standing up and looking to Laura.

She leans down and does a quick inspection, then gives me a small smile and nods. "Perfect again. That's three weeks in a row." With that, she turns and heads off to get ready for work.

That has to be hard for her, confirming my success. It's one of the last hurdles I face to getting out of here. But she has never tried to undermine or fight my efforts to grow. I don't think she holds out hope for reconciliation, anymore, but maybe she thinks it's a small step towards redemption.

So I can dose my own medication, now. Cross it off the list, Adrian. It feels good.

There are some things I'm simply never going to get back. My talent for numbers is lost, as is the decoding ability needed to be anything but a remedial reader. I've made improvements, but I'm more like a high school dropout than a college educated professional.

Emotions will always be a tricky and volatile problem, too. I can learn all sorts of calming techniques, but I can't control them completely. And I doubt if I'll ever be able to get control of my actions when they overwhelm me. It's a strange experience...it's like I'm two people. After I'm done doing something mindlessly destructive out of anger I am perfectly capable of stepping back and viewing it as an observer. I can shake my head and realize that what I just did was mean, or stupid, and then the next time I get mad I might just do it all over again.

Whatever looks I had going for me before, those are out the window forever. Between the lightly pocked scarring and the red right eye, I imagine a lot of people mistake me for a drug addict of some sort...especially when I get fatigued, and start slurring my speech. Not much to do about that.

But for the first time in months, I'm thinking about the future and feeling excited. And hopeful.

"Congratulations."

I turn around. Laura is standing in the doorway, dressed for work. She must have walked back in and I didn't even notice. Too lost in my own thoughts.

"Thank you," I say, and smile at her. Then, impulsively, I ask, "Can you tell me about it?"

She blinks. "What?"

"The affair. Did...what was wrong with our relationship, Laura? Was something missing? I'd just...I guess I hadn't thought about it much, but lately I've started to wonder."