The Wild Truth (12 page)

One year when we returned from church, Aunt Jan and her husband, Uncle Marc, had contrived an elaborate production aimed at confirming that Santa was real. Dad threw metal trash can lids up on the roof, making Chris and me believe we were hearing the sleigh and reindeer land. We were both sleeping in Chris’s room, and Mom and Jan retrieved us to quietly sneak downstairs. We watched in awe as Santa himself added to the gifts under the tree, played with our train set, meandering through the packages, and then, with a touch of his nose, he seemed to disappear right before our eyes. It was magic. How they managed to make thin Uncle Marc look so much like an authentic fat Santa and vanish like that, I still don’t know.

No candles lit my wedding ceremony, no congregation looked on supportively. Reverend Smith was nowhere near, though the justice of the peace seemed like a nice enough guy and wore a suit for the occasion. The aroma of his lunch wafted in from the adjacent kitchen.

What would God think about me now?
I wondered.

“I now pronounce you man and wife.” The officiant’s words cemented me at the point of no return. I was full of smiles as we signed our marriage certificate and prepared to leave and begin our new life together. Another couple walked through the door to get married just as we were walking out. Patrick’s father, J.P. (John Patrick Senior), cheered and threw rice at us. He’d flown in from Ireland to be our witness. He wore a fine dark suit that unintentionally trumped his son’s, complete with a rosebud in his lapel. His thick silver hair matched his weathered and deep jovial voice. He was a charismatic man, pleasantly thrilled by our union. My parents were not invited or even informed I was getting married.

Our honeymoon was a trip to Ireland, the airline tickets a wedding gift from my new father-in-law. Patrick’s parents had divorced long ago, with no love lost between them. J.P. had a beautiful home out in the lush countryside, with gray stone walls and patios that sparkled when the sun’s rays hit the rocks during high tea. He also had a very young wife named Wendy. “Winnie,” as J.P. called her, had a melodic alto voice and waist-length strawberry-blond hair, and she was simply beautiful without a stitch of makeup. Together they had three very sweet, young, and fun daughters—nicknamed Lulu, Matti, and Izzie—who adored their father. “Daddy!” they cried when we arrived at the house, and they jumped into his arms. He tossed them up in the air and gave them hugs and kisses. When the girls weren’t climbing all over their daddy, they stayed at my heels and loved to listen to my accent.

As the evening progressed, I noticed Patrick’s father drinking heavily. Wendy grew increasingly apprehensive, and I saw something familiar in the faces of the little girls. By nightfall, J.P. was raging and violent. He pushed Wendy around the house while he screamed at her and the girls. He threw things and crashed into furniture in an unpredictable stupor. I was shocked and looked directly at Patrick, waiting for him to intervene. Not only did he do nothing to stop his father, he didn’t seem the least bit surprised at his behavior. He had never mentioned to me that his father was violent.

“Wendy,” I said and pulled her aside. I picked up the video camera that we’d used to tape the kids playing earlier in the day. “We’re going to record this.” She looked at me like I was crazy. “You can’t just document the good stuff,” I explained. “He needs to see what he’s doing.” My voice was calm, even strong. “Let me help you.” I wanted to do something proactive to stop the violence. Wendy nodded at me, and I started filming.

J.P. sneered when he saw the camera pointed at him, but he was too far gone to tell me to turn it off, and I wouldn’t have anyway. I recorded his despicable actions, his violent outbursts, and his nonsensical ranting. I captured the fear and despair in his daughters’ eyes as they ran toward the camera to hide behind me. I kept the camera rolling until he had passed out.

In the morning, everyone was up before J.P. When he came downstairs from his room, he didn’t look as though he’d been three sheets to the wind the night before. He wore a nice pair of slacks, a shirt with cuffs, and a sweater. As he fixed his tea and we ate breakfast, the table was silent. I spoke up. “Do you remember what happened last night?”

He was jovial and tried to laugh it off. “Oh,” he said, “I’m assuming I had one too many.”

“I want you to see what you did,” I said, looking at him intently. “I want you to understand what it’s doing to your family.” I brought everyone into the living room, including J.P., who followed without argument. He looked like he had no idea what he was going to see. He sat in a chair while the girls and Wendy sat on the couch, and Patrick stood in a corner, still saying nothing. We watched the disturbing footage of what he’d done the night before in the same room we now occupied.

“Is this the husband you want to be?” I asked. “Is this the father you want your girls to grow up with? Is this what you want for them when they choose a husband?”

“You’re right,” he said, bowing his head. “That’s terrible to see. I’m sorry I put everyone through that. I’ll do better. I promise.”

I’d helped make a breakthrough; I was sure of it. People
could
change. Breakthroughs
could
happen.

It would be much longer before I knew just how rarely they do.

I HAD NEVER GRASPED THAT PATRICK
had a violent side, but it was as if the perfect storm had developed over the Atlantic, and by the time our plane touched down in Virginia, the seawall had crumbled and a deluge swept in. After returning to the apartment that first night home, I made a simple dinner and he became enraged. He accused me of posturing in front of his father.

“You’ve never cooked for me as well as you cooked for him when he was here!” he shouted. “Eh? Whadya have to say to that, ya tart? That’s bollocks, that is!”

“What?” I started to back away. “Pat, what are you talking about?”

“Don’t wrinkle that pretty little forehead at me like you don’t know what I mean!” he persisted. “My father mentioned he may help us to buy a house and you were walking around here, cleaning and primping the place in front of him, cheffing it up in the kitchen like the perfect little homemaker. You’re just after the money!”

He grabbed me by the shoulders and shoved me down onto the couch. When I stood back up, he grabbed my wrists and swung me around like a pendulum. When he released me, I crashed into a small portable oak dining stand I had placed against the wall to hold a jade plant.

His roommate, Glenn, came into the living room at the sound of the commotion. “Whoa! Patrick, what the hell are you doing?” he yelled, seeing me, fragments of the plant and its dirt spread about the beige carpeting.

Patrick snapped to attention. His face fell back into one I recognized. “Oh, Carine. I’m sorry.” He apologized as he helped me up.

I didn’t say anything.
Holy shit,
I tried to say to Glenn with my eyes. A panic grew in my belly. What the fuck had just happened?

NOW THAT PATRICK AND I WERE MARRIED,
Glenn moved into his girlfriend’s place, and all buffers were removed. As the next few weeks passed, my husband grew intensely and unpredictably violent. He threw me across rooms, choked me, forced me to have sex. He had fits of extreme jealousy if I even looked in the direction of another man. One day while I was driving down the highway, glancing peripherally at the other cars, he screamed from the passenger seat, “What are you looking at? Do you want to fuck that guy or something?” as he yanked up the emergency brake of the Chevy Z24 and grabbed at the wheel, attempting to put the car into a spin.

In a fog of disbelief and fear, I started my freshman year at Ithaca College with plans to study for degrees in music theory and performance. Mr. Casagrande’s letter had helped me gain acceptance into the prestigious school in upstate New York. My tuition was provided by a college fund I had inherited from our family friend Ewie. She was one of the few people our mom had confided in about Dad’s true behavior. Perhaps sensing we’d need the help, Ewie had left me and Chris money in stocks that had been put into our names.

“That money was supposed to be mine!” Mom had chided when I cashed in my shares. “Ewie only put it into your names to protect it from your father! That was my escape money!”

“Ewie was smarter than that” was my level reply.

It was a wonderful gift. Chris had managed his college fund astutely. Heading into his senior year at Emory, between the money he had earned from his jobs during high school and his wise investing of these funds from Ewie, he had doubled the size of his account and had plenty to last through graduation. He lived as inexpensively as possible, stayed focused on school whenever classes were in session, and enjoyed his adventures on the cheap during semester breaks.

I would not be as shrewd.

I didn’t make it through my first semester at Ithaca. Orientation week was riddled with constant interruptions from Patrick. The blaring ring of the community phone ceaselessly echoed through the dorm hall. I cringed each time a fellow freshman leaned through my open door:

“Ummm . . . Carine, you have a phone call . . . again,” then an uncomfortable pause. “From your . . .
husband
?”

I took the embarrassing walk down the hall to pick up the dangling receiver, Patrick’s voice still barking through it, yelling at no one.

“You’ve got to stop calling like this,” I pleaded. “I can’t even think straight and—”

“Who’s that guy who answered the phone?” Patrick interrogated. “Why is he in your dorm? Where have you been this morning? What did you do last night? Who were you with?”

“What do you mean where was I?” I answered. “I was here. Answering this phone every fifteen minutes!”

I had never known what it felt like to be in a drug-induced haze, but I imagined this was close to it. I missed classes. I didn’t make any friends. I rarely left my room or got more than fifty feet away from Patrick’s only means of checking up on me. He sent threatening letters and showed up unannounced. During one such surprise visit, he insisted I pull my funds out of Ithaca College and transfer to local George Mason University back in Fairfax, Virginia. He made me miserable at Ithaca, and since I certainly couldn’t earn an education from my dorm, I didn’t think I had a choice. I did think about how disappointed Mr. C. would be. But the person I was most concerned about disappointing was Chris.

Patrick and I went to the administration office together, and the woman who handed me my penalized refund check looked concerned. She eyeballed the stern Irishman hovering over me.

“You understand the choice you’re making?” she asked firmly. “And this is
your
choice?”

“Yes, of course!” I said as I signaled for Patrick to stop glaring at the woman.

I returned to Virginia with optimism, convinced that being together again would allow a less stressed Patrick to reincarnate into the gentleman I’d fallen for. I stayed in school at Mason, but I didn’t make it a priority, and I returned to my job as a receptionist at the Honda dealership. The violence and threatening behavior continued, and I fell into a deep depression. And like the good student I had always been, I excelled at the cover-up. I decorated our apartment; Patrick decorated me with some new jewelry. I replaced the perfectly good used Z24 with a brand-new speedy Honda Civic Si, white with gray interior, fully loaded. I went to music rehearsals with a smile on my face, usually accompanied by my devoted husband.

One night I answered the phone at work to hear a voice that both elated and devastated me. It was Chris. But he spoke to me in a way he never had before. He was drunk. He was extremely angry. He was not the only person on the line—-Jimmy was, too—and they were at the Windward Key house. I could hear Sam, who had recently moved to Virginia to further his education, in the background, trying to calm the situation. My parents had summoned them together during Thanksgiving break for an intervention of sorts, with the uninvited key subject not in attendance.

“Carine!” Chris screamed out in a voice I barely recognized. “What are you doing? Why did you marry that guy?” I was stunned, but still my mind raced. How did he already know I was married? How did my parents know?

“Chris!” I replied with desperate excitement. “I’m so happy to hear from you!”

A continuous wail then roared through the receiver, so loud that I had to remove it from my ear. Chris sounded like an ensnared tiger. Then his words came again. “Why didn’t you just marry Jimmy to get out of here? Who the hell is this guy?”

I heard “Oh, please don’t ask her that.” The familiarity and comfort of Jimmy’s sweet voice made me wish I was there with him. There spending Thanksgiving with my fucked-up family but safely in his arms.

“But, Chris, I’m not in love with Jimmy anymore.” The words were hard to choke out. I hated to lie like that. I hated for Jimmy to hear it. But I had to stand faithful to my decision to marry Patrick. I heard Jimmy groan and hang up.

“Mom and Dad found out what you’ve been doing! Why’d you leave Ithaca? You’re destroying your life!” Chris accused.

“But, Chris! No—please! You don’t understand!” I stood up and pleaded into the phone, tears streaming down my face, customers and salespeople staring at the pathetic exhibition.

Then there was just silence. He was gone again. I stared at the phone, ignoring everything and everyone else around me, including Patrick, who had been retrieved by coworkers. I couldn’t understand what had just happened. Why did Chris go to see
them
? If he knew where I was, then why didn’t he come to see
me
? Why didn’t he trust me? Did he not love me anymore? I felt the weight of the earth compressing me further into my shitty reality.

I sat back down at my desk, transferred all calls to the back operator, took a pad of paper from the drawer, and started to write. I wrote down everything that I wanted to say to Chris. I explained all that had happened, why I had to leave, how wonderful Patrick was, and what a great life I was going to have. I was on the right track; he would see. I mailed the letter the next morning to the last address I had for him at Emory.