Every Breath(62)
The questions had plagued her ever since she’d learned of his first affair. She’d known all along she hadn’t committed fully to him, just as she now knew that the marriage had been doomed from the instant she’d accepted his proposal. She tried to make up for it with friendship these days, even if she had no desire to rekindle anything between them. In her mind, it was a way to make amends, or atone, even if Josh might never really understand.
She would never confess her guilt to him—she never wanted to hurt anyone again, ever. But no confession meant no chance at forgiveness. She accepted that, just as she accepted the guilt for other wrongs she’d committed in her life. In quiet times, she’d tell herself that most of them would be considered minor when compared to the secret she’d kept from her husband, but there was one that continued to haunt her.
It was the reason she’d come to the beach, and the mirror image of the two great wrongs in her life struck her as both ironic and profound.
To Josh, she’d said nothing about Tru in the hope of sparing his feelings.
To Tru, she’d told the truth about Josh, even while knowing the words would break his heart.
THE BOX
Hope woke to the sight of a sky the color of robins’ eggs, peeking through gauzy white curtains. Glancing out the window, she saw that the sun made the beach glow almost white. It was going to be a gorgeous day, except for the temperature. A cold front pushing down from the Ohio Valley was expected to last for a few more days, with gusty winds that would likely steal her breath as she walked the beach. In the past few years, she had begun to understand why Florida and Arizona were such popular retirement destinations.
Stretching her stiff legs, she got up and started some coffee, then showered and dressed. Though she wasn’t hungry, she fried an egg for breakfast and forced herself to eat it. Then, putting on her jacket and gloves, she stepped onto the back porch with her second cup of coffee, watching the world slowly come to life.
There were few people on the beach: a man trailing behind a dog in the same way she used to follow Scottie, and a female jogger in the distance who’d left a trail of footprints near the water’s edge. The woman had a bouncy stride that kept her ponytail swinging to a lively beat, and as Hope watched, she remembered how much she used to enjoy running. She’d given up the sport when the kids were young, and for whatever reason never resumed. She thought now that it had been a mistake. Nowadays, her physical condition was a source of constant preoccupation—sometimes she longed for the heedless way in which she once took her body for granted. Age revealed so many things about oneself, she mused.
She took a sip of coffee, wondering how the day would unfold. She already felt on edge, even as she cautioned herself against getting her hopes up. Last year when she’d come to the beach, she’d been buoyed by the excitement of her plan, despite its unlikely odds of success. But last year had been the beginning and today it would end…answering once and for all the question of whether miracles really could happen.
When Hope finished her coffee, she went inside and checked the clock. It was time for her to get started.
On the counter was a radio, and she turned it on. Music was always part of the ritual, and she adjusted the dial until she found a station playing soft acoustics. She increased the volume, remembering that she and Tru had been listening to the radio on the night they’d first made love.
In the refrigerator she found the bottle of wine she’d opened the night before and poured herself a small glass, not much more than a swallow. Like the music, wine was part of the ritual she followed whenever opening the box, but because she had to drive, she doubted she would even finish what she’d poured.
She carried the glass to the table and took a seat. The box was where she’d left it the day before. Setting the glass aside, she pulled the box toward her. It was surprisingly heavy. It was constructed of dense wood, both chocolate-and caramel-colored, and had oversize brass hinges. As usual, she took time to admire the intricate carvings on the lid and around the sides—imaginative stylized elephants and lions, zebras and rhinos, giraffes and cheetahs. She’d spotted the box in a booth at a Raleigh street fair, and when she learned that it had been made in Zimbabwe, she knew she had to buy it.
Josh, however, had been less than impressed. “Why on earth would you buy something like that?” he’d said with a snort. At the time, he’d been eating a hot dog while Jacob and Rachel played in a bouncy house. “And where are you going to put it?”
“I haven’t decided yet,” she’d answered. Once home, she brought the box to the master bedroom, where she stored it under her bed until he went to work on Monday. Then, after adding the contents to it, she’d hidden it at the bottom of a box of baby clothes in the attic, a place she knew Josh would never find it.
Since their time at Sunset Beach, Tru had never tried to contact her. For the first year or two, she’d worried that she might find a letter in the mailbox or hear his voice on the answering machine; when the phone rang in the evenings, she sometimes tensed, steeling herself just in case. Strangely, her relief that it wasn’t him was always coupled with a wave of disappointment. However, he’d written that there was no room for three people in the life she would be leading, and as painful as it was, she knew that he’d been right.
Even at the lowest points in her marriage to Josh, she hadn’t tried to contact Tru, either. She’d thought about it, come close a few times, but had never succumbed to the temptation. It would have been easy to run to him, but then what? She couldn’t face the thought of having to say goodbye a second time, nor was she willing to risk the destruction of her family. Despite Josh’s failings, her children remained her priority, and they needed her undivided attention.