When My Heart Joins the Thousand(84)

Or maybe if I’d seen the truth before it was too late—that my mother was the one who needed help. She’d been wounded inside for a long time, maybe even since before I was born, and she had no one to turn to. What if I had recognized that and told someone that she was depressed—that she’d been drowning long before she drove us both into the lake?

Maybe I could have saved her. Maybe not. We were both children, in a way, stumbling through the dark woods, confused and uncertain, clinging to each other for warmth. Maybe we just lost our way.

I trail my fingers through the shallow water, and a faint ache spreads through my chest, but the tide of anguish I expected doesn’t come. I came here to find closure, to say whatever words I need to say to express everything inside me. But in the end, there are only two words.

“Good-bye, Mama.”

The waves gently lap away the name in the sand.

Whatever alternate possibilities exist, they are not my world. This is. I look at the blue sky, the sun shining in rays through the clouds, sparkling on the lake. Gulls wheel in the air, brilliant white. The sand is warm under my feet, and I am alive. I stand and walk away from the lake, toward the edge of the beach.

Stanley waits in the car. The sunlight turns his hair a brighter gold.

We drive back. I’m behind the wheel. His hand finds mine and squeezes, then slips away.

“It took a lot of courage to tell me the truth, didn’t it?” he asks.

I shrug. “You’ve been honest with me.”

Outside, the telephone poles glide past. A murder of crows flies high overhead, black dots against the clear sky.

His hand drifts to his chest, fingers clenching on his shirt. “I still haven’t . . .”

“We have time.”

I want to make him understand that the scars don’t matter, the pain and fear doesn’t matter, because he is my life mate and I know that in every cell of my body. Nothing will ever turn me away from him. I want to find words to tell him, but no matter how many times I reach for them, the words are never there. There must be another way. I think and think.

And something clicks.





CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT


I’ve never visited a tattoo parlor before. I look at the reclining leather chair, the sample art on the walls, and fidget, crossing my arms over my chest. I feel terribly out of place.

I’ve prepared myself for this mentally, or at least, I thought I had. Now that I’m actually here, the reality is sinking in, and adrenaline prickles under my scalp. Will I even be able to endure something like this? I have a high tolerance for pain, but pain administered by another person? That’s another matter. I imagine sitting there for hours, watching the needle penetrate my skin over and over, fighting the overpowering urge to flee. And of course, I’ll be shirtless the entire time.

Already, I want to run. But I’ve made up my mind. This is something I need to do.

The tattoo artist is tall and skinny, with a goatee and arms covered in lines of Sanskrit. He cocks an eyebrow at me as I sit in the chair. “You eighteen?” he asks.

I’m prepared for this. I’m not eighteen yet, not quite, but I’ve obtained the necessary paperwork to prove that I’m a legal adult. I show him.

“Okay,” he says, but he’s frowning. “You already got ink, or no?”

I stare blankly.

“This your first tattoo?” he clarifies.

“Yes.”

“And you’ve thought it through.”

“Yes.”

He squints at me and says, “You sure you don’t need someone’s permission for this? Because I don’t want to get in trouble.”

I’m getting impatient. I wonder if he interrogates all his customers; it seems like a funny way to do business. “There’s another tattoo parlor ten miles from here, and three more within a forty-mile radius. If you’re going to give me a difficult time, I don’t have a problem going to someone else.”

He blows air through one corner of his mouth and crosses his scrawny arms over his chest. “Well, it’s your skin,” he says. “So, you know what you want?”

I pull a piece of paper from my pocket, unfold it, and show him. He takes the paper from me and studies it a moment, his forehead creased. Then he nods. “Where?”

I point at the center of my chest, between my breasts: the place just over my heart. “Here.”

By the time I get home, I’m starting to wonder if the tattoo was a bad idea, after all. I’ve never even asked Stanley what he thinks about tattoos, because these things never occur to me until after the fact.

When I enter the kitchen, he’s sitting on a tall stool in front of the stove, stirring a pot of spaghetti sauce. The aroma of tomatoes, oregano, and garlic bread fills the air. He looks over his shoulder at me and smiles. “Hey. Dinner’s almost ready.” He glances at the clock. “I was hoping to have it done before you got back, but . . .”

“It’s okay.” I told him I’d be home at eight, since I didn’t know how long the process would take. I walk over, lay a hand on his shoulder, and kiss his temple.

It’s strange, how natural these gestures now feel.

His face turns toward me, and our lips meet. There’s a faint taste of sauce on his tongue; he must have been sampling it.

As we sit down to eat, I keep expecting him to ask me why I was gone for so long, but he doesn’t.