“When would you have had time to listen?” I ask, my voice also getting louder. “Do you know how many times I stood outside your office door waiting for you to come out and talk to me? Or laid there in bed wondering if you were going to join me? Put your arms around me and let me know in some small way that you still cared? There was always something more important to you than me.” I take a deep breath and lower my voice. “He was there when you weren’t.”
“I thought you would wait for me. You’re my wife. I thought you of all people would understand.” Chris’s shoulders slump and he runs a hand through his hair. “I feel like I don’t know you at all. How am I supposed to trust you now, Claire?”
If Chris only knew how many times I longed for Daniel to hold me in his arms, and how many times I resisted the physical pull of him. But that won’t help anything now. He won’t want to hear any of it.
“I’m sorry if I hurt you, Chris. That was never my intent. But Daniel could be dying right now, and I will not be okay if that happens. He was important to me. I need to know that he’s all right.”
Chris walks away and moments later I hear the office door slam.
I relocate to the bedroom and watch news coverage continually, flipping between all the stations, desperate for an update on Daniel’s condition. I feel powerless. There’s no one I can call, and I have a better understanding of how Daniel must have felt when I was in the hospital. I keep the bedroom door closed because I don’t want to be bothered, but it doesn’t matter because Chris never comes upstairs. Additional details trickle in and I gasp in horror when I learn that Daniel—and the reserve officer who rushed to his aid—both sustained gunshot wounds to the head.
My thoughts race and images of Daniel flash before my eyes like a slide show that’s moving too fast toward an outcome I can’t even contemplate.
63
chris
I walk into the kitchen to grab a bottle of whiskey and a glass from the cupboard. Claire has gone upstairs, which is a good thing because I really don’t feel like talking right now. I take the bottle into the office and pour myself a drink, hoping it will numb me but knowing the only thing I’m likely to achieve is a hangover.
I feel like I’ve been blindsided. To find out that some guy spent time with my wife, had some kind of relationship with her—no matter how platonic she says it was—hurts more than I ever imagined it would.
I can’t stop picturing them together. Talking and doing whatever it was that they did.
I want to know, but I don’t.
I should be grateful she didn’t sleep with him, but I’m not. I feel as if we’ve taken one giant step backward.
And I’m too pissed off to listen to the voice inside my head that’s saying it’s mostly my fault.
After spending a restless night on the couch I finally walk upstairs to our bedroom. Claire has fallen asleep with the TV on, but I don’t bother shutting it off. Once I’m out of the shower and dressed I look in on the kids and then I get in my car and drive to the airport.
64
claire
I don’t remember what time I finally fell asleep, and when I wake up at 6:00 A.M. the TV is still on. Chris’s side of the bed is empty and hasn’t been slept in. When I go to the bathroom I see his damp towel on the floor and smell the faint traces of his cologne, and when I check the garage I discover that he’s already left for the airport.
I watch the morning news as I make breakfast for the kids. The newscasters recycle the same information that I already learned last night before I dozed off: that Daniel and the reserve officer were flown by Life Flight helicopter to the University of Kansas Hospital and taken directly to surgery. They’re both in critical condition. The shooter—whom Daniel pulled over for running a red light—was strung out on drugs and wanted for a parole violation. He took his own life at the scene.
Elisa follows me home after we put the kids on the bus. “I’ve been watching the news coverage. You must be so worried,” she says.
“I am. I called the hospital, but they won’t give me any information. He’s in the ICU, so I can’t go there. I’ll have to wait until he’s transferred to a regular room. If he’s transferred.” I blink away tears.
Elisa nods and hands me a Kleenex from the box on the counter, and I dab at my eyes.
“I had it out with Chris last night, too. I told him about Daniel. He didn’t take it very well, shattered trust and all that.”
“I’m sorry,” she says.
I shake my head. “I deserved it. We were just finding our way back to each other, Elisa. It’s my fault. All of it.”
“Not all of it, Claire. Don’t be so hard on yourself.”
“I still care for Daniel. I can’t just shut that off.”
“Of course not. There are lots of people pulling for him right now. For both officers. People that don’t even know them. It’s tragic when something like this happens. Give Chris some time. He’ll come around.”
I know she’s right, and that Chris needs time to process everything. I send him a text. Are you okay?
He answers an hour later. I’m fine.
Fine. A word that means the opposite if there ever was one.
I spend most of the day on mundane chores, leaving the TV on and refreshing the browser on my laptop every fifteen minutes. A little before 3:00 P.M. the BREAKING NEWS banner flashes at the top of the TV, and I hold my breath. I start crying when they announce that the reserve officer has died.
And I feel horribly guilty for being relieved that it wasn’t Daniel.
65
claire
“Mom?”
I struggle to open my eyes.
Josh is standing beside my bed, dressed in his pajamas. “Aren’t we supposed to be up by now?” he asks.
The clock on the nightstand reads 7:34. I was still awake at 3:00 this morning, despite my repeated attempts to fall asleep. I tried everything: reading, watching a boring TV show, lying in the dark trying to empty my mind. Nothing worked. I hate not knowing how Daniel is doing, and Chris is responding to my texts with short, terse replies. The tension, the anxiety of it all, keeps building and I feel constantly on edge, mind whirring with possibilities, none of them positive. Finally, at a little before 4:00 A.M., when I couldn’t take it anymore, I took a dose of Benadryl, which worked very well. Too well, it seems.
My heart races when I realize how late we’re running, and I fling back the covers. “Go get dressed, Josh. I’m going to wake up your sister.”
“Okay,” he says, hurrying off to do what I asked.
I rouse a sleepy Jordan from her bed and tell her to get ready, then hurry to the kitchen to make breakfast. Cereal bars, bananas, and juice are all we have time for this morning.
Josh sits down at the table and starts eating while Jordan wanders in, sharing none of her brother’s sense of urgency.
“Come on, Jordan,” I say. “Pick up the pace a little, okay?”
My eyes burn, my head pounds, and my feet feel like cement blocks as we walk to the corner, reaching it a scant fifteen seconds before the big yellow bus pulls up. Elisa and Travis are the only ones there and I’m grateful that Julia and Bridget are absent this morning. In the vague recesses of my mind I remember that Julia is still in rehab and that Bridget’s house is now empty.