In the beginning, there was her sister. She was small when I met her, about five months old. The walls, they were painted this blue that I imagine they paint the basins of swimming pools, except this pool was frozen. It was so cold in there that winter, I don't know why, it never was so cold after that, but there was an air of frigidness in there, and she was cold and stiff and frozen. I don't think they knew what they had done, they didn't know what they were doing, although I feel like he gained more confidence and realized she wasn't going to break, how could she? she was a block of ice.
It took a lot of effort to engage her. She didn't respond to cooing, being held, being sung to, being whispered to. I bombarded her with so much, too much, until her eyes began to focus. It may have been a month before I saw her blurred eyes sharpen in understanding. Eventually, she melted, her arms loosening, and her hands grasping, her eyes following, her head, and the last things to be free, to move about with freedom were her legs and it was a long time, eighteen or nineteen months until she walked unaided. She wasn't lazy, she just was frozen in that house, with that mother.
It seemed to me their marriage was strained somehow. Except they had been together for some time before the arrival of the baby, so perhaps it had something to do with the arrival of this new much more intense routine of responsibility. I have a feeling she may have had post partum depression. Because he handled it so well, so carefully. I don't think she felt motherly toward her and I wonder if she saw that her baby was frozen and it came out of her and what must that mean?
Often times when I was there, she was just trying to get back into the routines of her old life, like someone frantically trying to replace the shreds of something destroyed into its original shape. She was a shattered woman, but some part of me suspected this was just another thing in her life that she had been shattered about and it had happened before. He had that air of having been tested by her so many times that he fell under her lash willingly, devotedly. In the end, he didn't even say a word to me, after all that happened, I was so hurt by that.
But how had I hurt her? She laid in bed and wondered where he was countless times and then brought it up days later when we all happened to be in the same room. I don't know how she really felt about it, but she sure acted like she believed something had happened between us. I would have done anything to assure her out of my own pride and indignation, except I was so mad at her for wasting him (one of the best men I have ever encountered in the world, who I adored so mightily out of regard for so many of his kindnesses not just to me, but every man, woman and child I witnessed him encountering, he was the same tender jovial man who spread so much joy).
Even more appalling, he was so devoted to her that even if she shoved a woman into bed with him, he would never do anything with someone who was not her, and also someone who was not his wife, the woman he promised his whole being to, with complete understanding of the marriage vow. He was not someone who took his word lightly. And even though I ached for him and wanted him, sometimes feeling him urging me to do something, I could not and would not. Because I didn't want to lose him if he had to break his vow, which seemed like it would shatter him. And I knew he would not reciprocate and if he did he would hate me for making him make that choice. She needn't worry so, it seemed to me, because I was there with him and even I knew nothing would happen; she was not there and convinced he would betray her.
No comments:
Post a Comment