Stranger is the Sail Ch. 03

Laura, to her credit, doesn't shy away from answering. "I wasn't happy," she admits. "I should have been, and I knew that, but I wasn't." A look of dark amusement crosses her face. "Ironically, the only thing I want in the whole world now is to be able to go back to that time and stay there forever. I thought that I was unhappy then, but..." she looks away.

"Did you love him more than me?"

"I don't even think it was love. Maybe I loved the carefree excitement that I associated with our time together, but I never felt anything for him that I would describe as love."

"Oh. What about the..." I brace myself. "What about sex, Laura?"

She rolls her eyes. "He was good, but so were you. Honestly, it wasn't about sex to me...not ever. It was about escape. And it turns out I got exactly what I wanted, doesn't it?"

I shake my head. She looks so tired to me, now. "Thank you for telling me," I say.

She nods, turns to go, and hesitates. "I really wish you would stay," she whispers.

"I know."

Her shoulders sag a bit, she nods her head, and with that, she's gone.





Friday, June 27th

LAURA BURKE

I am an idiot

Doing an fool's dance to a fool's song,

and even though I know it, I continue on and on.

Adrian is leaving me today. I may never see him again. So what do I do? I run away.

I couldn't stand to sit and watch him pack, and in my suddenly-frantic desperation I fled. Worse, I called Victor.

"Can I see you?" I asked, my voice bizarrely calm. It almost seemed to be coming from somewhere else, like a ventriloquist's act.

"Sure," he said, sounding amused, "come on over."

When I got to his place, he greeted me warmly. No questions about the baby. He did seem eager to get all romantic again, though. I guess the belly doesn't bother him.

Well, it bothers me, goddamn it.

When I tried to talk about the future, about what might happen next, he withdrew. That's when I noticed the pictures on the counter. A new ones, of him and some woman. Cuddled together, skin to skin, smiling stretchy white smiles as light as the air. When I asked about them, he seemed relieved and told me he'd been seeing her for a few months.

I pointed out that he texted me just fifteen days ago to tell me how much he missed me, and he just laughed that off. "Oh," he smirked, "you know...I was drunk."

"And what about just now, when you were getting all grabby?"

Another laugh, another smirk.

After that, I couldn't leave fast enough.

I don't know why I even went. It's certainly not that I want Victor. In fact, the more time passes the more angry I am at myself for ever wanting him. But after everything that's happened, after the emotional rollercoaster of the last few months, the idea of going it alone as a single mother is more terrifying to me than the idea of being with an asshole like him. And even as much as I hate him now, when Victor first opened the door to let me in...when his eyes studied my figure...I felt something.

Stupid, stupid woman.

I guess the truth is I just don't want to have to see Adrian leave. If he's home when I drive off, and gone when I return, then it's like he went to work. Or to a movie. Or to see a friend. If I have to say goodbye....

It's been a strange couple of weeks. Everything about the divorce has been very amicable. Easy, even. And he's been in such an incredibly good mood. Nicer and gentler and easier to talk to than he has been in weeks. Like some stranger living in my house.

My house. Yes, I get the house, and with Mom and Dad's help I might even manage to keep it. They're going to move to Des Moines so they can be close and help out with the baby. That's one more concession they're having to make for me...Mom doesn't mind it here, but Dad has always hated the city.

Considering how brutal the last few months have been, and how miserable my time with him has been, you would think that losing Adrian wouldn't bother me this much. Ever since the weeks leading up to the accident, there was always some barrier between us. My affair, his injuries, my secrets, his discovery, our combined anger...I can barely remember what our marriage was like when it was good. But somehow I still want to keep him. It's like I'm losing something important, something essential, but I can't quite place what it is.

Turning onto our street, I see that he and Rodney are still loading up the truck. They look close to being done. Shit. I really didn't want to see this. I pull over to the side of the road, about a block down the road. Fine. I'll watch you go, but you can't make me say goodbye.

Settling in to wait, I turn on the radio. My station is playing some god-awful happy song about how great Friday night is, and I'm not inclined to agree just now, so I scan the dial. Passing by a hard rock song with a whiny singer and a hip-hop song about sex, I get stopped by a strange singer with a gravelly voice.

I turn up the volume. What is this? He sounds like he gargles razor blades and heals the cuts with whisky. The music underneath him is sparse and melancholy, but it seems almost amateurish. It doesn't fit with my tastes at all...I like pretty voices, I guess, and simple lyrics. A year ago I might have liked that Friday song. But something about this one is mesmerizing right now.

At first I have a hard time understanding the words, but as the music swells and the singer begins almost howling he becomes a little clearer. I turn it up even louder as he leans into the next line and I try to focus on the words.

"You can't steer a ship with your faith," he cries, his open-throated howl sounding for all the world like my broken heart. "And the wind still pulls me far from the mast,
But if you cling to the rail now,
You're safe.
As long as I'm here you'll be safe."

Oh.

He's her sail. The man in the song is her sail.

Something comes at me...something from my dream. The one I'd so quickly forgotten. It's my mother, shaking my shoulders, telling me to get Adrian before it's too late. Before we miss the wind.

And with that, I suddenly know what I'm losing.

I'm all cried out. Honestly. But I can't help misting a little as I replay the words in my mind and watch Adrian climb into the cab of the pickup. The engine starts, and the brake lights shine red. I can just make out the sight of him putting on his seatbelt.

I'm lost at sea.

I have been for a long time. I just didn't know it. I grew listless, directionless, and I made bad decisions. But somewhere deep down, I was terribly lost and frightened. And now the wind may be picking up at last, offering to take me home. But it just doesn't matter anymore.

I'm losing my sail, right when I need it the most.





-----



Well, there it is. It's taken most of a year and somewhere around 140,000 words, but the first part of my story is finished. And even though it's just the events of the first summer, it does feel a little bit like mission accomplished.

Unfortunately, though, I've been pushing in too many directions at once. Between writing, work, living, and weight lifting, I've managed to overextend myself. So now, my wrists, back, ass, and wife are all suggesting that I need to take a break before continuing on. I suppose that's the order that I listen to those things, anyway. So that's what I'll have to do.

As of right now, I'm figuring on taking the rest of summer off before starting to work on the final draft of The Lunatic. Even when I get started, that story does threaten to be as long as Hallelujah if I don't end up making some changes to it, so the writing process will be an endeavor.

There are a handful of Tribute Tales that I've started and discarded along the way, and maybe I'll finish one of those and put it up in the meantime, but in general they got left behind because they weren't good enough to keep around, so I'm skeptical.

In the meantime, I'll just keep hopping on here from time to time and hoping there's something new that's good to read. You know how it goes.