Whisper Me This(104)

Or maybe none of those things would have happened.

Maybe I never would have had Elle, and that is beyond imagining.

“Yes,” I say, looking up at the sky.

“Yes, what?”

“Yes to dinner. Yes, I would like to go out with you.”

I’m still looking at the sky, but I hear him draw in a deep breath and breathe it out in a whoosh. And then his hand finds mine. Our fingers intertwine and we sit there, separate but together, both of us looking up at the sky, and even though I’m not looking at him, I know his face wears a smile that matches the one on mine.





Leah’s Journal

Are you judging me yet, my Walter? I am judging myself, and find myself wanting. Not for what I did that day, the day I limped down the street with Maisey and that heavy old suitcase. Even now, looking back from this viewpoint, I don’t know what I could have done differently.

I didn’t trust the police would protect me or that a restraining order would do me any good. And I believed then, and still believe, that Boots would have done as he said. I could have gone back to my life with him and taught my children that it is okay to be beaten into subjection and submission by a man who is nothing—nothing—compared to you in terms of intelligence and decency and worth.

Or I could rescue one of them and teach her that a woman can do anything, be anything she wants to be.

I’m proud that I left him. Proud of the life I built here in this house with you.

I’m proud of my Maisey and what she has turned out to be, even though I know she could have done so much more.

But I see now that I should have gone back.

I should have left Maisey here, safe with you, and tried to rescue my Marley. Only I believed—I can’t tell you how fervently I believed—that if I so much as whispered this story to anybody, Boots would do as he had promised. That he would know if I spoke of him, that I had broken my part of the bargain, and he would kill my baby.

I believed he would come after us here. That he would kill you, Walter. And Maisey. And then me.

And so I have kept silent and stayed away for all of these years.

When you told me you had contacted Marley, I was terrified. I understand why you did what you did. I know you wanted to help. And I hadn’t told you anything about Boots. I was terrified that he would know and come after me or the girls. And Marley was still there with him.

What should I do? I waited in dread to hear of her murder. I hoped he wouldn’t find Maisey, since she carries your last name. I hoped he wouldn’t find me—or you—but I bought that gun, just in case.

And I began searching the internet, looking for news of my Marley. And I saw what she has become, despite her father and the upbringing she must have had. She makes music, Walter. She did more than just survive.

You want me to reach out to her, to try to talk to her. It is too late for that. Better to leave things as they are. If I were able to explain, if she were able to bring herself to forgive me for leaving her, it would be for what? To watch me die?

Death is a difficult companion. It is with me always now, demanding more attention than Boots ever did. This time I can’t run away. And I have no attention to spare for building new relationships or repairing old ones.

I have loved my daughters—both of them, the one I brought away with me and the one I left behind. I have loved you. And I’ve tried to make amends as I can for the places I went wrong, for the decisions I wish that I could change.

Was it worth it, to write out my story? To force myself back through the heartbreak and the fear and the guilt? I think so. I feel something that is very close to peace. Not with death, mind you. He’ll drag me from this life kicking. Neither have I come to any compassion or forgiveness for Boots.

But I can see my own choices from this new place, and that will make the dying a little easier.

Tomorrow I will shred these pages, to save you the pain of that task. The last wish of my heart is that I could make this easier for you. But I can’t. I suppose my death is part of your own journey and the choices you have made, and that, my dear Walter, is as close to wisdom as I am ever going to get.

Leah





Epilogue

One year after my mother’s death, the three of us—Marley, Elle, and I—go together to visit her grave. Dad comes here regularly, I know, but when we asked if he wanted to come today, he just smiled and shook his head.

I’m not much for graveside visiting—I don’t see the point.

My mother is present in every room of the house. She’s always in my head. Her grave is the last place in the world I feel close to her. But today is about some kind of symbolic gesture, as Elle puts it. And this was Elle’s idea.

The three of us stand in a row, spring sun on our bent heads, staring down at a grassy mound that is meant to represent, somehow, a woman who was never still, who never rested.

I feel awkward and self-conscious. All my grief and whatever else I’m supposed to be feeling is hanging out at some other grave, I guess. After I lay down my bouquet of flowers, I have nothing to do with my hands. I watch a parade of ants marching over the corner of her tombstone. Shift my weight to ease a sudden random pain in my right calf. Barely restrain myself from taking out my phone to see if Tony has messaged me.

As usual, Marley is the one to speak up first.

“Are we supposed to do something?” she asks. “Because if the idea was to stand here and look at the grave, we’ve done that. Can we go now?”