Home Front

She was sitting up in bed, her hair a mess, holding Tami’s unopened letter, staring down at it.

“Read it,” he said harshly.

She ignored him.

He saw the open wine bottle on the nightstand. Without thinking, he walked over to her, grabbed the bottle, saying, “Enough, Jo. ”

She reached out. “Don’t—”

“Don’t what?” he yelled at her. “Don’t love you anymore? Don’t want you? Don’t care if you drink yourself into a coma?”

She flinched at the obvious reminder of Tami.

He saw her eyes go blank again. She was retreating, pulling her pain into that dark place inside of her, the place to which he’d never been granted access. ???Enough,” he said again, yelling it. “I was an asshole before you left. I admit it. I was an asshole and I broke your heart and I might have ruined us. Maybe I did ruin us. But I’ve changed, Jo. I’ve changed and you don’t seem to care. I’m sick of throwing myself against the concrete wall of your defenses. You’re giving me nothing. You’re giving your children nothing. Nothing. And you know what that’s like, don’t you, Jo, getting nothing from your parents. If we’re broken now and this family is ruined, it’s on you. On you. I can’t try any harder. ”

She looked at him through tears. “You think I don’t know that?”

“Give me something,” he said, his voice breaking. Her tears brought it all home to him, pulled the fire from his anger and left him shaken, cold. “Reach out, Jo. Talk to me. Be my wife again. ”

“I can’t. ”

“So we’re done … after all this…”

She rolled away from him, pulled the covers up around her.

He stood there, uncertain, feeling as lost and alone as ever in his life. It was worse even than standing at his father’s graveside. Jolene, he realized right then, realized it to the marrow in his bones, was his life.

Behind him, there was a knock at the door. He said nothing, but the door opened. Lulu stood there, her face wet with tears. “I’m scared, Daddy,” she said.

With a sigh, he went to her, took her in his arms. “It’s okay, Lulu,” he lied, leaving Jolene’s room, closing the door behind him.

Twenty-Eight

The next day was Carl’s “celebration of Tami’s life” for friends and family.

All day, Jolene had been shaky, angry. She’d snapped at her children and cried at the drop of a hat. The fight with Michael had pushed her to the very edge of control. She kept her emotions in check with the fiercest grip of her life. A headache throbbed behind her eyes. She drank two glasses of wine, but it didn’t still the trembling in her hands. She should have been at Tami’s house at three o’clock, setting out food and plates and utensils, making sure that everything was ready. It was a best friend’s job to help out the husband at a time like this.

Jolene had nothing to give. She was so empty inside she was surprised every time she looked in the mirror—how could her veins not be showing through her pale skin, how could her bones not be visible?

At seven, Michael knocked on her bedroom door and came inside, closing the door behind him.

She sat on the bed, dressed in jeans and a white blouse, her hair still damp. She knew by the look on his face that her eyes were red-rimmed and bloodshot.

“You don’t have to do this if you can’t,” he said tiredly, but he wouldn’t meet her eyes. She saw how much she’d wounded him, hurt him, and it shamed her. She thought of the letter she’d written to Michael before she left for Iraq. I loved you, beginning to end.

“I have to. ” She got unsteadily to her feet.

He was there in an instant, holding her arm. At his touch, she felt a surge of loss. Had it only been a few weeks ago that he’d kissed her? That she’d thought maybe? and began to fall in love with him again? It all felt so far away now, like memories held under water.

He kept hold of her arm as they went into the family room, where Mila and the girls were waiting. Mila and Betsy both held foil-wrapped casserole dishes, and Jolene thought, I should have cooked.

Tami’s seven-layer dip. She loved it …

She almost stumbled; Michael held her steady. They walked out of the house and across the yard. On this cold November evening, it was already darkening. Soon, there would be frost on the fence posts and across the green surface of the grass.

Michael opened the gate. They walked through the opening and over the hump of grass and up the Flynns’ gravel driveway. At the house, there were dozens of cars and trucks parked out front. Lights blazed from the windows.

I love a party.