Should Have Known Better

“I’m going to Augusta later,” I said like a stone. I was walking quickly out of the building with her jogging to stay at my side.

“Augusta? For what?”

I stopped.

“Mama, he’s sorry,” I said.

“No.” She sounded broken somehow.

“He still loves me. I love him.”

“No, baby.”

“We’re meeting at the house later to talk.”

“No. You can’t go back there. Not after everything you’ve been through. You can’t go back.”

“He’s my husband. He made a mistake and he said he’s sorry. I believe him. He may have made a bad decision, but he’s not a liar.”

“And what about you? What about what you’ve started here? Your new life? You’re just going to walk away from that?” she asked.

“What life? I live in a house with you. I can hardly pay any bills. I don’t have a career. I’m just floating. At least I had something there.”

“Well, how are you going to get there? You can’t drive,” she said.

“Mama, you can’t stop me. I’m doing this.”

“But what if you get caught?”

“I’m doing this.”

My mother repeated herself again and again as we drove home. She threatened to call Kerry. To call the police. Said she wouldn’t watch the twins for me. Cried.

I couldn’t be broken though. Being back in Reginald’s arms had already taken me halfway home and I wasn’t turning back. He was my love. Not the greatest. But mine. I was happy, and I wanted her to be happy with me. To trust me and support me.

Once I’d packed a few things and was moving them out to my car, she came out of the house wiping her tears.

“If you do this, you’ll see yourself back,” she said.

“Mama, you’ve said that.”

“I don’t want you to take the children. They can stay here with me for as long as they need. I don’t want your mistake to be their burden. Not like I did with you.”

“This isn’t like that. I promise you. It’s going to be good.”

14

If someone saw me walking around downtown Augusta that day I was supposed to meet Reginald back at the house, they’d say I was skipping or prancing, maybe bouncing like a ball. I couldn’t contain my happiness. It was all over me. The farther I got from Atlanta, the closer I got to Augusta, I was returned to myself. I had to have my husband back. I knew it when he touched me. He was a part of my whole and I couldn’t live without him. When you have someone in your life for that long, the idea of moving forward without them, especially when they make it clear they don’t want to do that, is impossible. It took my breath away.

I decided to make Reginald and me a big dinner. A romantic night, a meal to claim our new start. I’d bought and planned to cook everything he loved. I proudly put these gifts into my car and looked at them through the eyes I’d had for Reginald when I was 19. I wanted to make him happy. To see him happy. I just needed to get a few more things. One more stop.

As I walked into Target, the sun in the sky had little feathery clouds around it. I know, because I looked. I stopped and looked at the sun and smiled before I walked inside.

“Dinner . . . flowers . . . my baby’s favorite cut of steak,” I listed slowly to myself, passing a galley of red shopping carts as I walked into the superstore. “I’ve got everything we need. Even my old Luther CD.”

I just needed to get his favorite almond-scented candles. I thought that would be a nice touch.

I got the candles, put a few in a basket I was carrying, and went to get in line to pay. But when I got near the front, I looked over at the Customer Service station and remembered that I still hadn’t gotten the pictures from our spring camping trip to the mountains. Reginald had kept begging me to get them, but I was too busy. I headed toward the counter, thinking how cute it would be to have the pictures of us camping with the twins in DeSoto Falls spread out on the dining room table when he walked in the door.