Due Process (Joe Dillard #9)(2)

“Are we breaking the law?” she said.

“Do you mean are you breaking the law? I’m not drinking in the car.”

“Well, am I?”

“Would it make you feel good if you were?”

“It’d make me feel naughty. I don’t get a chance to be naughty much these days.”

“Sorry to disappoint you,” I said, “but a passenger can drink a beer in the great state of Tennessee.”

“I’m disappointed.”

“You can pretend you’re naughty. Use your imagination.”

The second bottle went down almost as quickly as the first.

“You’re slamming that stuff,” I said. “You looking to get drunk?”

She took Oxycontin for pain every day, she’d taken the Benadryl earlier, and she was already reaching for her third beer.

“I need to talk to you,” she said.

“And you can’t do it sober?”

“I’d rather not.”

“Okay...talk.”

“You’ve been dreaming about me dying, Joe. You’re having nightmares about it.”

What she was saying was true. She’d awakened me several times over the past month, but I had no idea she knew the specifics of the dreams I’d been having.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “I’m talking in my sleep?”

“You’ve always talked when you have nightmares, and you sweat so much the sheets get soaked. You’ve been having nightmares about Sarah, too, about when she was raped when you were children.”

“What do you want me to say, Caroline? I don’t have them intentionally.”

“Do you think I’m going to die?”

“No.”

“Do you want me to die? Are you tired of all this? Because I’d understand if you are. I read about this syndrome last week. It’s called compassion fatigue. I think you have it.”

“Did you just ask me if I want you to die? I’m not even going to answer the question. I’ll just chalk it up to the drugs and the beer. And I’ve never heard of compassion fatigue.”

“I’m not drunk and I’ve taken so many drugs they don’t even affect me. Look up compassion fatigue when we get home. It happens to a lot of different groups of people, like nurses and doctors and police officers, but one of the other groups is caregivers within families who have to deal with the long-term illness of a relative or a spouse. You’re definitely in that category.”

“So? Are you saying I don’t care anymore?”

“I’m saying you’re tired of all this and it’s stressing you out to the point that you’re having nightmares.”

“I think you’re wrong.”

“I’m not wrong. You’re losing compassion. You’re becoming numb. You’re doing it to protect yourself because you’re afraid I’m going to die.”

“Fine,” I said. I was starting to get angry but trying very hard to control the emotion. “But this isn’t fair. Seriously, how dare you suggest that I want you to die? So you have cancer. That doesn’t mean you can do or say whatever you want. Sometimes you think there are no longer any consequences to your behavior because you can always play the cancer card.”

“See?” she said, her voice rising. “That’s exactly what I’m talking about. You’re mean to me. You were never mean to me before.”

As much as I hated it, this kind of spat was becoming more frequent between us. There always seemed to be tension hanging over us. I knew it was the constant pressure and frustration from the disease, but that didn’t make it any less real. And as much as I didn’t want to admit it, there was probably at least a grain of truth to what she was saying. I thought she was wrong about any lack of compassion, but the more time that passed and the more the disease progressed, the more stress I felt. I found myself wondering what I would do without her, and I didn’t have any answers. But I couldn’t say that out loud, I couldn’t talk to her about it, because I knew if I started talking about what I’d do without her, I’d start tearing up and might even cry, and that would just upset her more. As far as the nightmares went, she was probably right. The long-term stress of dealing with the disease was a contributing factor, but my confusion about and fear of having to go on living without the woman I’d loved since I was a teenager was also undoubtedly in the mix.

“Can we please not argue?” I said. “I love you. I’ve always loved you and I will continue to love you. I’m sorry about the nightmares, I really am. I’ll sleep on the couch so I won’t wake you.”

“I don’t want you to sleep on the couch. I want you to sleep in our bed like you always have.”

“Then I’ll sleep in our bed like I always have.”

She took another pull off a beer and turned toward me.

“Why are you suddenly being so agreeable?”

“Look,” I said. “This has been a long, hard road for both of us. For all of us. Especially for you. And now that Lilly and Randy and Joseph are gone, it’s been even harder. We don’t have as much help, and I’ve seen an emptiness in you that breaks my heart. You and Lilly were always so close, and we both had so much fun with Joseph. When they left, it was like part of your heart was torn out of your chest. Mine, too, but it’s been worse for you.”