Vow to Cherish Page 11

  Just after Christmas, on a beautiful, crisp evening, John bundled Ellen up, and they walked several blocks around the neighborhood. He’d been feeling cooped up and in need of fresh air, and it felt good to get out in the brisk night air. It had been weeks since the weather was warm enough for them to take a walk.

  Tonight, the sky was clear and full of stars, and Ellen seemed nostalgic. In fragmented sentences she recounted aloud their first days living on Oaklawn. While she couldn’t remember the current day of the week, sometimes she could recall events of their past—often in surprising detail. This was ground on which John could meet her. He was feeling cheerful and optimistic with reminiscence.

  They came back to the house, and standing by the closet in the front hall, John began to help her out of her coat and gloves and scarf. Her face was flushed from the cold, and she looked like the Ellen of old. She flashed a winsome smile, and suddenly, he was overcome with desire for her. He dropped her coat to the floor and took her in his arms and kissed her hungrily. She didn’t resist him, but looked at him questioningly. He took her hand and started up the steps to their bedroom.

  Suddenly, Ellen sighed heavily, contentedly. Then in a clear but childish voice she crooned, “Oh, Daddy. So fun…fun. Can we go again? Walking? Maybe Mommy can come, too…walk on the farm.”

  John stopped in his tracks. He turned, sick at heart, and looked down the steps at Ellen. Her eyes were gazing far away into the past. Her expression, her voice, were those of the child she had been forty years before. And in a moment of horrible realization, he knew that in Ellen’s mind he had become her father. How could he take her into their marriage bed?

  He turned slowly and guided her back down the steps. In the kitchen, he fixed her a cup of warm milk, and while she sat at the table sipping contentedly, John went to make up the twin beds in the bedroom on the ground floor.

  The room had most recently been Jana’s. The wallpaper was a pale peach to match the ruffled comforters. The furniture was French provincial—a young girl’s dream room. He brought down a few of Ellen’s things from the bathroom and carried their alarm clocks down and plugged them in. Then he went to the kitchen and led Ellen to her new bed. He tucked her in and gave her a chaste kiss.

  She seemed unaware that anything was amiss. With a sigh, she burrowed under the blankets and closed her eyes.

  John turned out the light, and with leaden feet, he climbed to the attic. There he unplugged their lamps and gathered the contents of his night table drawers. He took their toothbrushes and toiletries from the bathroom and moved these things down to the bathroom across the hall from Jana’s room.

  He went back to the attic and gathered the clothes from Ellen’s closet and drawers. Burying his face in the soft fabrics, he breathed in the faint scent of her perfume that lingered there. He arranged her things in the downstairs room and returned once more to the attic stairway and climbed it slowly.

  At the top of the stairs, he stood in the doorway and looked around the room, now lacking their personal items. Through misted eyes, he saw the history of their love in this room. Sweet, intimate scenes floated like ghosts before him in the emptiness—a young couple sharing tender, romantic moments. Was that him? And Ellen? And now it had come to this?

  His throat was so full with emotion he felt a physical pain. John pulled the door shut, and with finality he put the timeworn key in the lock and turned it.

  The next morning John awoke slowly. With half-closed eyes he looked groggily around the room, trying to remember why he was here on a narrow bed in Jana’s old room. He turned over, squinting to block out the blinding sun that streamed in the east window. In a halo of sunlight, he saw Ellen’s auburn curls spread on the pillow in the bed next to his, and it all came back to him with terrible clarity.

  He had said goodbye to his lover last night. Never again would he know the intimate touch of her hands on his body. Never again would they share the oneness that had healed so many differences…the communion that had been such a joy to them for a quarter of a century.

  Today he awoke to a new role. No longer friend and equal. No longer lover and confidant. Today he would begin to learn to be Ellen’s protector…her keeper…her defender. Today she had become his child.

  The weight of the task before him was oppressive. He felt small and unworthy. And worse, he wasn’t sure he wanted the awesome responsibility—however precious his charge.

  He threw back the covers and rose to face the morning. He would live one day at a time. It was an old cliché, but never had he understood its meaning so clearly.

  Ellen stirred beside him. Barely acknowledging him, she sat up in bed and looked around the room. Amazingly, she didn’t seem to see anything amiss. After a minute of stretching, she crawled out of bed and stumbled toward the kitchen.

  John followed her, pulling out a chair at the kitchen table for her, patting her shoulder as she sat down. He started coffee brewing and put two slices of bread into the toaster.

  And so together—with much difficulty and many blunders—they began to learn how to live with this terrible thing called Alzheimer’s.

  Spring came again, a long summer passed, and when autumn once again caused the leaves to drop from the trees, when everything shriveled and died, John finally felt that nature reflected Ellen’s perverse metamorphosis. However, there was a beauty in nature’s dying that John could not find in Ellen’s.

  Like the leaves falling one by one from their branches, Ellen died a little each day. A memory gone here, a sparkle of laughter there, until John hardly recognized the woman he loved.

  Julia

  Chapter Seventeen

  Martin Sinclair was buried on a cold day in October. The wind swept through the trees in sporadic gusts, carrying the last dead leaves of autumn in frenzied circles, dipping and diving between the marble gravestones.

  Julia Sinclair, Martin’s young widow, sat under the canopy with the casket, her eyes red-rimmed, the skin around her nostrils ruddy and raw. She had shed a myriad of tears in the past three days; no amount of makeup could hide that fact. But her eyes were dry now, her demeanor dignified.

  She sat erect, her short dark hair brushed away from her face, her slender hands clasped in her lap.

  The air was gray with a dense fog that muted the colors of the landscape to muddy greens and browns. The cemetery was wrapped in the stark tracery of a black iron fence. Against this backdrop her beloved husband, the father of her sons, was laid to rest.

  The minister wore traditional black over his starched clerical collar. He stood before the people, intoning the ancient psalm: “‘The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures; he leadeth me beside the still waters. He restoreth my soul…’”

  The contingent of mourners swayed imperceptibly, a sea of dark coats on the side of the hill. The silence was broken now and then by muffled crying, the dark fabric relieved by the white flash of handkerchiefs.

  “‘Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.’”

  But there was no comfort for Julia, or her young sons, who stood protectively by her, one on either side of her chair.

  Julia’s silence was incongruous with the voice that cried out in her mind, struggling to fathom the reality of this funeral. It was still like a dream. The phone call…the panicked trip to the hospital. The words played an abrupt staccato in her mind: “Rain-slick roads…an accident…nothing we could do…Martin…gone…so sorry.”

  With agonizing pain, she saw again the stricken looks on her son’s faces as Sam and Andy absorbed the news that their beloved dad was gone.

  At fourteen, Sam had tried valiantly to be brave, and Julia marveled at how he’d comforted her that first awful day. But he couldn’t contain the sobs that racked his adolescent body as he lay in his room that night. Julia stood at his door and prayed to be given some perfect words that would make his pain go aw
ay.

  Andy, not yet twelve, was the tender one. He fell into her arms and cried inconsolably when she told him the news. It made Julia feel stronger, for the moment anyway, to be needed by someone hurting so badly.

  She watched her sons now as the coffin was lowered into the dank hole. Sam’s face was unreadable, but she feared she saw anger in Andy’s eyes and in his posture. A crazy thought flitted through her mind: Martin will know how to handle this.

  “‘Thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life: and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.’”

  Oh, Martin. It’s true. You’re really gone. How will I ever make it without you? How will these boys live without their father?

  The final prayer was offered, and the pallbearers walked out from under the canopy. The mourners swarmed slowly toward the row of seats where Julia and the boys, her parents, and Martin’s mother and brothers were seated.

  As the people passed by wearing sober frowns like masks, she nodded a mute reply to each expression of sympathy. She was moved by the sheer number of friends who had come to pay their respects to her husband. Martin was so loved.

  She felt small, each condolence given from a height above her. At one point she tried to stand, but the ground beneath her was spongy under a grass carpet. Her heels sank into the uneven sod, and her legs would not hold her. She fell back onto the hard chair and buried her head in her hands, trying to compose herself before the next mourner paraded by.

  Julia’s parents had flown in from Indiana for the funeral. They stayed at the apartment with Julia and the boys for a week. On the morning they were to fly back home, Julia woke with a start a few minutes before five o’clock. Martin’s antique alarm clock ticked a steady cadence, and the old refrigerator hummed out in the kitchen, but the rest of the house was quiet.

  She tried to go back to sleep, but it was no use. Slumber eluded her. Finally she threw back the covers and crawled out of bed. Pulling on a robe, she padded into the kitchen and started a pot of coffee brewing. As much as she had needed her mother and father at her side during these difficult days, she knew the real work of grieving Martin could not begin until her parents had gone home. She was anxious to tell them goodbye and begin the unavoidable task.

  She carried a steaming cup of coffee to the table by the big kitchen window and sat down. The apartment that had been her home—their home—for over a decade was a renovation in Chicago’s old Lakeview neighborhood, one that the real-estate listings had touted as having “lots of character.” And in spite of the temperamental plumbing and the inefficient utilities, Julia had grown to love the rooms’ high ceilings and creaking hardwood floors. She looked through the kitchen into the open living and dining areas beyond, and memories came flooding back.

  It seemed to her that Martin had been gone forever—and yet it also seemed as though he might walk into the room at any moment, his booming voice holding a smile that one could hear.

  “Up so early?” Her father’s voice startled her, brought her back to the moment. He was freshly showered and smelled of the spicy shaving soap he’d used for as long as she could remember.

  “Oh, I couldn’t sleep. I’m sorry if I woke you.”

  “It’s okay. I couldn’t sleep either.”

  “Here…I’ll get you some coffee.”

  She started to rise, but he waved her away and went to pour himself a cup.

  He brought the carafe and refilled her cup before sitting down across from her to doctor his coffee with sugar and creamer.

  She felt his eyes on her as he stirred.

  “Are you okay, sweetheart?”

  She sighed and took a cautious sip. “I’m dreading this day…I’ll miss you and Mom. And yet…I know that until I face this apartment alone and see how the boys are really handling all this, I can’t begin to…to recover.”

  She broke down then, putting a tight fist to her forehead. “Oh, Dad…how can I ever recover? I just never thought this could happen to me. I never thought I’d be alone.” Panic rose inside her as she faced the reality of the life before her. “I can’t raise these boys by myself! I can’t do it, Dad! They need a father! They need Martin!”

  Her father pushed back his chair and came around to stand behind her, placing his hands firmly on her shoulders.

  His voice was thick with emotion, but he spoke with the strength that Julia remembered from her childhood. His words poured over her like a soothing ointment. “Julie…oh, Julie.”

  He hadn’t called her that for twenty years. “Honey, I don’t know why God has seen fit to put you through this. If I could take away the hurt…if I could bring Martin back, you know I’d do it in a heartbeat. But I can’t.”

  He appeared to be wrestling with his own emotions, and when he spoke again, Julia knew the strength came from somewhere outside of himself. “I know this, though, you’re not in this alone, honey. You know that God is able, above and beyond all that you can imagine, to take you through this. I have not a doubt that Mom and I are leaving you in good hands when we get on that airplane today. Don’t you forget that.”

  “I know, Dad. I know. Just…please pray for me.”

  “Oh, honey. We’ll be praying for you every single day.”

  She stood to meet his embrace. “Thank you, Dad. Thank you for everything.” For more than forty years her daddy had always been there when she needed him, and never had she needed him more than today.

  Six months later Julia stood in the same kitchen surveying the apartment through new eyes. Her father’s words had proven true. Though there had been times of despair, the Lord had comforted her in miraculous ways. But the memories of Martin were painfully close here in these rooms they had shared.

  At first it had comforted her to be reminded of him at every turn. She’d tried to keep their family traditions alive—taking the boys to breakfast at the Pancake House before church each Sunday, grocery shopping together every Wednesday night, out for pizza afterward. She had renewed their season tickets to the symphony and invited a friend to use Martin’s ticket. She had continued to jog the route they had jogged together each morning.

  But now she had begun to be angry that he wasn’t there sharing these places with her. She’d begun to resent whatever friend sat in Martin’s seat at the symphony. She dreaded the jogs because they only reminded her of how lonely she was.

  The apartment was full of Martin. He’d had such a presence about him. Without being obnoxious or overbearing, Martin had held court in any room he entered. He was charming and affable, and he had been the indisputable head of the Sinclair family.

  Three months after the funeral, Julia had cleaned out his closet and packed up his toiletries from the bathroom. In a fit of anger, she’d rearranged the furniture in their bedroom, grunting and huffing to move the huge bed by herself. She took his sailing trophies off the mantel and threw them in a box. How dare he leave her alone like this! How dare he leave his things to remind her, everywhere she turned, of the great love they’d shared. But try as she might to banish his ghosts from the apartment, his presence permeated every room.

  The boys were haunted by memories, too. Sam and Andy both refused to sit in Martin’s big recliner in the living room. It had been “Martin’s chair.” When he was alive, the boys had argued over the chair if Martin wasn’t home, and wouldn’t have dared to sit there if he was. Now that they were free to take it over, it was as though the chair was abhorrent to them.

  Not understanding their feelings, Julia had made a terrible mistake about that recliner one night.

  The three of them were watching a movie in the living room when Sam and Andy started to argue over the couch they were both sitting on. Sam sprawled across the length of it, and plopped his huge feet on Andy’s lap. When Andy complained, a shoving match ensued, and Sam pushed him to the floor. This made Julia furious.

  “Sam, if you want to stretch out so bad, sit in the recliner. It’s sitting ther
e empty—the best seat in the house. You can stretch all you want.”

  “No, Mom. I was here first.”

  “Fine. Then sit up so Andy will have a place to sit.”

  “Why don’t you make him move?”

  “Because he’s not the one who wants to hog the entire couch.”

  Sam ignored her and stayed recumbent on the couch.

  “Sam, get off right now.”

  No response. The movie blared in the background, and Sam feigned interest in the action on-screen.

  “Hey!”

  He sat up, eyes wide. She had his attention.

  “Don’t make me tell you again, Samuel James. Go sit in the recliner.”

  “Forget it. I’ll sit up.” He made a halfhearted effort to start moving.

  “No,” she said through clenched teeth. “It’s too late now. You just lost your couch privileges, buddy. You sit in the recliner.”

  He stood and started to move a straight chair from the table in the adjoining dining room, dragging it off the rug and across the bare wood.

  “Sam! Stop it. You’re scratching up the floor. Don’t drag that in here. What’s wrong with the recliner? Just sit there.”

  “No!”

  He was so adamant she should have sensed it was something more than just losing his place on the couch. But she only heard his defiance. He was standing right in front of the recliner now, and she gave him a shove that neatly seated him in the big chair.

  The anguished cry that rose from his throat was barely human. It was the wail of an injured animal. No, she realized too late, it was the wail of a boy who had sat in the lap of a ghost.

  Sam struggled to pull his gangly body from the chair and fled to his room, sobbing.

  Julia was shocked. She turned off the TV and stared at Andy as though he might have an explanation. He started crying then, too. Through tears he tried to make her understand.