Rosette took down the pictures and put them all in one large box; she also added the photos on the fridge and anything that looked like a letter. There was a list on the fridge that contained baby items in Amanda’s handwriting. Rosette even saved that. She packed the laptop as well so she could save any pictures on it. Summer might want the computer, she realized.
She had actually asked Summer if she wanted to do this, or come along, but Summer was dead set against ever coming here again.
It didn’t take as long as Rosette had expected. And there was an even bigger surprise—she didn’t cry the entire time. She actually smiled over a few pictures. She packed some of Amanda’s necklaces and favorite shirts. Part of her worried she would pack away too much and it would overwhelm Hope, but…this would be all she had of her parents. She filled four boxes with things from both Ricky and Amanda and then sat on the sofa, looking around. Trey would take the furniture to Goodwill later today. Soon the duplex would be bare.
All the facts seem to say Amanda had wanted to end her life. For some reason, maybe because she was stubborn, Rosette just couldn’t believe it. She’d been doubting and hoping, but sitting here where Amanda had lived, she
knew.
Amanda loved life and making other people laugh. She had wanted her baby more than anything. Even with Ricky gone, she had been eagerly anticipating about her child’s life.
“I’m so sorry,” Rosette whispered, hoping somehow, somewhere, Amanda knew.
~ ~ ~
Trey bumped his foot on the floor, keeping the rocking chair in slow motion—back and forth, back and forth, back and forth—and watched Hope drift off to sleep. Her empty bottle sat on the end table beside him. Afternoon light slanted in the windows, filtering through the light rain falling outside. There must have been a raincloud right above them. A rainbow danced on the air over the ocean. He could see dark spots underneath clouds hovering across the vast expanse, yet sunshine pierced through as well.
He still debated if he should have insisted on going with Rosette to Amanda and Ricky’s place. He wanted to there for her. He wanted them to be there for each other again. They’d been busy so he hadn’t told her everything about his breakfast with Alex, just that the two of them had talked quite a bit.
Yesterday after breakfast, he had thought things had gone really well with Alex, but then Alex had shut himself in his room most of the day. He’d said he was working on that history paper, but it wasn’t like Alex to hide out. Trey went over their conversation and wondered again if he had missed something.
Spinning his wheels. That’s how he felt all the time lately. He pulled a long breath in through his nose and exhaled. At least he had some quiet in the house for a while, with Rosette out, Jake taking a rare nap, and Candice engrossed in a toy parade in her room. He had stopped in the doorway and watched for a few minutes as she set up. All her stuffed animals were lined along the bed and walls. The smaller toys were gathered by the door. Candice started a parade, moving each toy forward a step, working her way down the line of toys. It usually took her an hour or more to circle the room that way. No one knew where she’d gotten the idea, but it was one of her favorite pastimes in her room.
His phone buzzed in his pocket—Harry. He quickly answered, relieved Rosette wasn’t there.
“Hey, did anything turn up?”
Harry blew out a breath before answering. “There just isn’t anything here. By all accounts and opinions, it looks like she came around the corner and then just drove off the road at full speed.”
It was time to let this go. Why couldn’t he? “But remember how Officers Jones and Havera said it looked like she veered into the side rail before careening off the road? If she suddenly veered, there had to be something there.”
Harry was quiet. Trey shook his head at himself.
“Trey, I want to find a better answer too, but maybe there isn’t one. Maybe we’ll never know. You can still decide what you tell their daughter.”
Their
daughter. Hope didn’t feel like
their
daughter. She felt like
his
. The thought unsettled him even though it wasn’t the first time he’d considered it. “Okay. All right… I don’t mean to push you. It sounds like you understand where I’m coming from, and you’re probably right.” That last part wasn’t easy to say.
“Are things…okay besides that?”
“Could be worse.” He meant for the words to sound light, but they didn’t. “Harry, I’ve been thinking about my career.” Trey paused, hoping Harry would fill things in or ask a question. In typical Harry fashion, however, he just waited on Trey. “I might want to look into other options.”
“Okay.”
“I haven’t yet. I’m not sure why I’m even saying anything, but…”
“But it might be good for you.”
“Yeah.” They said goodbye and Trey leaned back, letting the motion of the rocking chair calm him down. He heard a tap on the side door and stiffened. His eyes were closed and Hope was sleeping, so he just pretended to be asleep in case whoever it was could see him.
Whoever
—as if he didn’t know perfectly well who was at the door.
He heard the latch click open and gritted his teeth. Damn it.
“Trey?” She walked into the living room and sat down. “Psst, Trey.”
At least she didn’t come over and touch him. He hadn’t spoken to her since that day when she had put her hand on his chest and made sure Rosette had seen it. He pulled his head up and looked at her. “Hey, Leena.”
She started to smile but then suddenly became emotional instead. “I’m sorry if I caused trouble for you.”
He felt bad for her, for a second. “Well, it’s water under the bridge now. But I don’t think you should come over anymore, Leena.”
She popped up from her chair and moved to the closer sofa. “Trey—”
“Leena, stop and listen to me.” He worked his jaw side to side. No matter what, he had to stay in control here. He couldn’t yell at her with Hope in his arms and his kids upstairs. “Rosette and I have a lot going on, and we don’t need anything else to deal with. Go find one of those college boys.”
Turned out he didn’t need to yell. His cold voice traveled across the room loud and clear. Tears were running down her face now.
“I don’t want some stupid college boy. I can’t help how I feel about you.”
She was gearing up for a full-blown attack. Now she’d tell him she knew he felt it too. Trey cut her off. “I don’t want anyone else. I’m married. I want my wife, that’s why I married her. End of story.”
“But you don’t have to be stuck with her!”
“Get out!” he hissed the words, trying not to scare Hope. “I told you not to come over here anymore. I mean it. Don’t bother me or my family.”
Her nostrils flared. Leena stood, not bothering to wipe away her tears, and turned on her heel in a huff. Her shoes clicked through the house, and the side door shut hard.
Trey fell back in the chair. He reached up to rub his forehead, pure emotion rolling through him instead of any coherent thought.
Then he heard a step behind him. What the hell. He jerked his head, planning to yell even if he did wake up Hope. Rosette stood there in her coat, wordlessly holding her purse in front of her with both hands.
Something about her face struck him—her lips were red from the wind outside, her face white, her eyes big pools of questions. His anger seeped away.
“Were you trying to catch me?” he asked sadly. He hadn’t heard the garage door open.
She gave a half nod, half shrug that meant she was.
“Why? You don’t trust me anymore?”
She looked defeated and couldn’t even look at him. Instead she shook her head at the wall.
“Even after you heard that? Don’t you trust me now?
Rosette swung to face him and her blank expression went hard. “Why would I trust you? She runs over here every time I leave! And you’ve let her.” She shook her purse at him, forgetting it was in her hand.
Hadn’t he just told Leena off? Told her to leave and stay away? It took everything in him to sit and hold Hope calmly. Once he felt back in command of himself, he stated, “I trusted
you
after the thing with Ricky.”
Her hand dropped as the fire went out of her. Her eyes grew shiny, and he knew she was fighting tears of frustration. Maybe she was so hurt and confused she’d instinctively lashed out.
“Listen, let me lay Hope down to sleep. Then I think we need to talk.” He rose and carried the baby upstairs to her crib. Candice was still busily talking to her parade. Trey peeked into Jake’s room to see him sprawled across the bed, limbs thrown in four directions. When he returned to the living room, Rosette had taken her coat off and set her purse somewhere. She stood in the living room, her arms crossed, waiting for him with tears in her eyes.
Before, he was afraid of saying too much and destroying what progress they’d made. He’d worried they’d hurt each other even more if they said everything they were thinking. Now he was way past all that.
“Let’s get things out in the open,” he said, holding his hands up in surrender. “Let me have it. All of it. If the problem is more than Leena, we need to take care of everything. What’s hurting our marriage, Rosette?”
She spread her hands out wide, maybe illustrating the many, many things that had piled up over time. “You haven’t been here for me.”
“I know I’ve been dealing with my own stuff but—”
“No, you were here, but not
here
. When I lost our baby you didn’t care at all.”
That sucked the air right out of him. He couldn’t fathom what she was talking about for a full minute. For one, it was so long ago, and two, well, it hadn’t been that big of a deal. “I had no idea...”
She didn’t answer with words, but her eyes said more than he wanted to know. He could faintly remember that it’d been a relief, a solution. The other two pregnancies had been so hard. Both labors were long and difficult. It seemed like God was taking care of it with that early miscarriage. It hadn’t felt like a baby to him.
“I’m sorry.” Looking at her, he saw it hadn’t been just a miscarriage or failed pregnancy to her. That had been a baby. But was he going to fix that now, years later?
“You’ve been in your own world since getting hurt, too. I gave you space and time to heal, not to run to another woman.” She shook as she spoke but fought through it.
“I know I messed up,” he said. “You’re right. You have a right be to angry and hurt. You have a right to say what you need to, right now.” He wanted to work through everything today, to fix their relationship and move forward.
“You’ve taken everything from me!” The words flew from her, out of control.
He opened his mouth, wanting to argue, to question that. But it was true, wasn’t it? She’d been hurt all this time because she’d given him everything she had, and he’d taken it, and now he would take it all away with him if they split up.
“Why?” she asked, looking at him through tears, her body shaking harder. “Why did you do it?”
He knew that last part was zeroing in on Leena. He could say, yet again, that he didn’t do anything with Leena. But so many words were jumbled up in his head that he couldn’t get any out. He wanted Rosette. He wanted his marriage. He wanted to live his life again.
“I JUST WANTED TO FEEL SOMETHING!”
She jumped.
The outburst left him panting, trying to suck air into his empty body. He’d come into this knowing she needed to let loose. His outburst shocked him. Strange relief washed over him, like hot water in the shower, but he knew it’d been too much. They stared at each other. She was breathing hard, too, as she held a hand over her mouth.
A noise made him jump and turn his head.
Alex stood in the hallway, staring at them. Rosette sucked in a breath. “Alex—”
She tried to say more but she, too, was at a loss for words.
“I lost my family once already. And we just lost Ricky and Amanda.” Alex shook his head hard, shaming them. “You—both of you!—do NOT have to be SO SELFISH!” He turned and ran up the stairs. His door slammed a second later.
They stared after him. Trey waited for Jake to cry or Candice to run to the top of the stairs and ask what was going on. Nothing happened. Was Candice that engrossed in her toys? And Jake that asleep? He hoped they weren’t both holding their breaths right now, waiting.
“We have to talk to him,” Rosette said. “We can’t leave it like that.”
He nodded, knowing it was his responsibility. He took the stairs slowly, feeling each one. At Alex’s door, he knocked and waited. Nothing.
“Alex? Want to talk about it?”
“No,” Alex said, his voice uncharacteristically flat. He sounded just like Summer, and it made Trey’s heart freeze up in his chest. Somehow, all this time and through all the ugliness and loss, he had assumed Alex would be okay. That was just Alex, the way he was. But what if he wasn’t?
“I’m sorry we upset you.” Trey stopped and gathered himself, wondering whether to explain or make excuses. “Rosette and I, we have our moments, just like everyone else. We disagree and even argue. We’re okay, though.”
Trey waited another minute, his hand on the door and his heart sinking lower and lower. They’d never left anything remain broken, but he wasn’t sure what else to do.
“Daddy?” Candice leaned out her bedroom doorway and looked at him with big eyes. “Want to see my parade?” She made parade into two syllables: par-ade.
She didn’t act like she’d heard any of that. Trey looked at Alex’s door one last time, as if he could teleport how he felt into the room. Maybe Alex needed some time to cool off, and then they could talk.
“Sure, sweetie.” He carefully stepped over the stuffed animals and sat on her bed. If she had heard the argument or heard him talking to Alex, maybe she didn’t really listen or understand. She prattled on about each animal, holding them up one by one. After the confrontation with Leena, then Rosette, and then Alex, Trey felt drained. He thought about the kids slurping those drink packets till the package collapsed. That’s how he felt. Sucked dry.
He listened to Candice, appropriately smiling and nodding, focusing on her descriptions like there was a test afterward. In the now quiet house, he heard a click that sounded like Rosette going outside. He hoped she was going to work in the greenhouse. She loved those plants, and they relaxed her. She hadn’t been out there in the last two weeks either, so he had a feeling she might be worrying about her plants.