PART TWO
SID

Well, isn't this getting interesting now, boys and girls? Looks like we're getting to the crux of the matter, at last. Life, you see, is all about choices, John, my boy. What kind of man are you? I've noticed this constantly in my dealings with lesser mortals. They shout out one morality in their smug self-satisfied bible thumping righteousness - but they invariably go a whole different direction when you give their principles a little tweak. Picture this. Husband and wife. They love each other. 'I would die for you!' he says. Put a gun to his head. "You or her?" Bye, bye sweetheart! There are plenty more fish in the sea - but there's only one of ME!" Every time, John, every time...

You think I'm the bad guy? Hey, I'm just the facilitator of truth here.

Now, in the red corner we have Sheriff 'Whiter than the Driven Snow' Biebe who loves his wife and kids. And in the blue, we have Sheriff 'Will You Marry Me?' John who loves Clarity. Time to slug this one out, boys. Looks like you've been hedging your bets here, sheriff. Let's put your principles to the test, shall we?

Who really loves ya, baby? 

Of course, up to now we've had the usual heroics. Love and duty. Sacrifice and honor. Oh no.... did someone let Maximus out of his cage? Yawn...I've heard it all before. Not convinced. No sirree. Altruism is just another word for Me. You just see if it ain't.

So let's push a little harder, hey? See if we can find the cracks?

 

Okay, Johnny boy, time to stop crying over spilt milk. That was then. Let's roll forward a year...October 2002. Wonder what little Miss Misery is up to now? Hold your hats...it's going to be a bumpy ride....

 

 

JOHN

I was still staring down on that cold snowy windswept gravestone, barely listening to the mindless garbage pouring out of his mouth. In the end, it isn't worth letting him rile you up. That's what he wants. That's where he gets his pleasure. In knowing that he has exposed a nerve and he can keep prodding at it whenever he likes. Well, SID, there is really no secret there. If you had any real ability to empathize then you would already know that grief doesn't ever actually go away. It fades and becomes something that you can contain in time - but loss is always with you.

And that's a good thing. My Mom and Dad are gone but they're still part of my life; they always be my parents. Jamey's gone but he's still my friend. Loving Donna, being a father, made me the man I am just as much as growing up in the Biebe house with Mom and Pop and the rest of them. Everything you do is part of what you are and you carry it with you through life. Lessons learned, mistakes made, good times remembered, bad times carried. All of it. It isn't replaced by what comes later. It is simply enhanced and added to as you grow, the sum total of all the burdens and the blessings.

What did I learn from that lonely graveyard and watching my wife crying over my loss? That I was loved. That I would always be remembered. That she was strong and ready to live her life alone. That she was the best mother in the world and my children were safe. That time had brought her to a place where anger and sadness could be set aside and she could begin to look forward. I'd been in that place too; I knew it well. I'd gone through those stages over the years in between since I'd crossed. I understood her pain and her determination to survive.

But the question still remained. This is my wife. They are my children. If I can return then I must. But was SID right? Which was the stronger emotion - love or duty? I felt both - but which one was driving me most? Did it matter? Were they so closely entwined for it not to be an issue? Was he asking a valid question or one that was wholly pointless?

And what test did he have in store for me now?

 

I was inside a building. It was easy to recognize. It was the school. My children's school. The corridors were brightly decorated with Halloween motifs and wall displays of stories and poems, pictures and stencils. Grinning pumpkins and black witch's hats, broomsticks and cats, ghouls and vampires all hung down on strings from the ceilings as I wandered along empty corridors. Class was in session. Peeking through the windows I could see happy little children busy and eager in their neat and well run classrooms. A door in front of me was opened and I realized I was entering the library. A class was having a reading lesson. Michael's class. Skank, the unlikeliest school teacher in the world, was reading from a Harry Potter book and the children were all sitting cross-legged around him wrapped up in the story, their eyes wide and their innocent faces plainly revealing every emotion.

"...Okay...now it's your turn. That's my favorite chapter. You got the next half hour to choose your own...doesn't have to be Harry...but it does have to be scary...that's the rule..."

"Can it be funny scary?" one girl asked.

"Funny scary is good. So is scary scary. But you're wasting time..." The class scrambled off and began to pour through the shelves searching for a book to select.

"Why am I here?" I asked SID.

"Cute kids, huh? I do love children...although I probably couldn't eat a whole one..." He grinned that smug expression of his. "Don't you want to see your son? Michael. Named for his Daddy. Your firstborn. He doesn't look too happy, does he?"

I turned and saw that unlike the other children, Michael had not snatched up a book. Instead he was wandering aimlessly in another section of the library entirely. Just then, Skank, Mr. Marden, saw him and walked over.

"Hey, Mikey, what you looking for?"

The boy shrugged and looked at his feet, digging at the carpet with the toe of his right foot. Skank crouched down. "You look like you don't much feel like reading today..."

"I hate reading."

"That's not true. You're a good reader, Michael. Tell me what's up?"

"Nothing."

"You don't want to read about ghosts and bad things, do you? Can't say I blame you. It's fun until something bad happens to you. Then it isn't such a laugh to scare yourself, is it?"

Michael turned his eyes on the teacher. They were brimming with unshed tears. "You think my Dad's a ghost somewhere? If you don't find a body then the ghost wanders around trying to get someone to bury it. I don't want my Dad to be a ghost."

Skank swallowed hard and took a deep breath. "Your Dad is resting peacefully somewhere. We just don't know where. They're just stories, Michael. Real life isn't like that. Whatever happened, just remember that your Dad is not suffering. He's happy where he is now. And he wouldn't want you to suffer either. Remember the happy times. What did you like best about Halloween when he was with you?"

"Everything. It was the best time. Now I hate it. I don't want to trick or treat. I don't want to go to the party. I want tonight to be over...The others, Joey and James, they don't remember. I remember..."

Skank rested back on his heels. "Tell you what. Tonight you and me, we go do something different. Make a few new traditions of our own. Get your skates and we'll go out on the pond instead. Improve your technique. Let's see if you're ready to take on the Skanster, huh...?And if you put one past me...I'll even buy you a hot dog - with extra onions....deal?"

Michael gave him a hesitant smile. "And if I put two past you?" 

"It will never happen, Biebe....never in this world..."

 

I listened to the conversation impassively. I hadn't realized that Michael would be the one to carry the burden alone. Joey and James were so small. How much would they ever remember of their father? James had been just a baby and Joey only four when I'd gone. Two years was a long time to a child. Already their father would be a distant memory, if even that. In many ways I was grateful for that even if the thought that all I would ever be now was a picture in a frame to them. But Michael was struggling to keep the past alive - and it was beginning to bury him. Skank had done a good job there. I owed him that. Who would have imagined this other side to that crazy, sex-crazed kid?

Michael chose a book at last and settled down. Skank moved off to check on the other children. Then when everyone seemed hard at work, he walked over to the central counter where the librarian was working at a computer screen. The woman looked up when he leaned over and whispered something.

It was Donna.

"You made me jump!" she said grinning.

Skank grinned back. "Hey...?" He looked back to check that no children were about. "I'm gonna be a little late tonight. Mikey's feeling a bit down. Thinking of his Dad and all. Thought I'd skip the party and take him on the pond then maybe down the diner for some supper. That okay with you?"

Donna frowned. "Is he all right? He's been so quiet the past week. I know he's thinking of John..."

"Yeah...bound to. This time of year holds a lot of memories for him. Don't worry. I'll keep an eye..."

"Matt...you're so good for him. For all of them. I can't thank you enough for what you do for my boys..."

"It's my pleasure. They're great kids. I do it for John anyways. I'm not much of a stand in but it's the least I can do for a friend. And Donna...I do it for you, too. You know that, don't you?"

There was a moment when they simply stared at each other. She nodded and dabbed at her eyes. "We'll have a drink when you bring him home tonight. Thanks, Matt..."

"Trick or treat?" He grinned and raised his eyebrows. Donna tutted but her smile said volumes.

I knew that smile.

 

"What's going on here? SID...he trying to move in on my Donna? That what this is about? God damn it, she would never...not with him...she knows what he's like...he just wants to get laid....another notch on his bedpost....let me back....I gotta stop this...! She's going to make a terrible mistake....you cannot make me sit and watch this. You cannot!"

"Calm down...look....listen....what's said in the room, stays in the room..."

 

The scene dissolved and the warm bright environment fell away to be replaced with the locker room, the well known wooden cabin littered with equipment, clothes, the familiar ripe scent of stale sweat and unwashed men. Saturday before the game. The boys sitting about in various stages of undress, talking and laughing as they suited up for a game.

"So where were you Halloween? Thought you'd be sniffing around Mrs. Biebe again..."

"I was otherwise engaged..." Skank beamed with his usual self-satisfied grin.

A chorus of hoots was raised. "That so? Who was it this time? That little girl in the drug store? She was giving you the eye the other day..." Tree added.

Skank just shook his head, laughing. "Oh man...did I get a treat...!" They all shouted crudely. "...But then...I know all the tricks..."

"That so? Then how come I saw you buying little Michael Biebe a hot dog at the diner that night?" Ben Winetka added with a chuckle.

"...And Marla Burns says she saw you taking him home later...and you got invited in..." added his brother Galin.

"...And your car was still there when I was getting up for the early shift...." Bobby chipped in.

Skank's smile faded rapidly. "You got nothing better to do than gossip about decent women? Donna Biebe's a nice lady. You just shut your mouths....you got that?"

The young men all exchanged amused looks but the subject was dropped. Skank looked straight ahead, almost daring anyone to say more. But no one ventured a further opinion.

 

"He stayed the night? He stayed the night with my Donna? Jesus Christ!" I sank down to sit on one of the benches as the men all piled out for the game, stunned into disbelief at the implication. Donna...and Skank Marden?

"He's a good looking man. She's a lonely woman. That bed gets cold at night..."

"You fucking bastard!" I rose to my feet and grabbed SID by the throat.

"It's been more than two years...how long did you go without, sheriff? You still guarding the flame? Clarity still a virgin? I don't think so...Donna's human...needs a man in the night...and Skank, well he knows what the ladies like...he's very well hung, you know? Or so the girls all say...You never seen him naked in the showers...? Sure you have...Good body, hey? Lean and toned...been awhile since you had a waist like that, huh?"

I shook him hard; he giggled manically, so pleased with himself. "Get me back. I gotta stop this! Before people start to talk...before the kids find out...NOW! Get me back there....NOW!!!!!!!!!"

 

 

SID

Exhibit A: a man like this presents himself as sane, steady, the ultimate family man. But scratch down just a layer or two. It's always there. You just have to give him the reason to let it out at the exact moment when he'll be glad for its existence.

There are those among you who think he can control this: that it is this ability to control that makes him more civilized than someone like, say, oh ... moi.

This, then, is the man for whom a human like Clarity will make a sacrifice that represents the manifestation of an ability to love unselfishly. What about this man is worth making that sacrifice for, do you think? I don't see it.

But then, I suppose I didn't expect to see it, did I? I was just hoping to be surprised because, well, that would have been very interesting.

Now that he's shown me he's not anything special, that he's not worthy, we might as well see this farce out. How far will he fall?

How much can I make him suffer for disappointing me? For not being anything but what he always was: a putz? He needs to see just how insignificant his need to be in control matters to the universe.

There is a persona inside me who understands this need for control over his family's life. Not that I think Sheriff Boobie will ever take the measures my persona took to embalm his wife and daughter and two sons, mind you. It was a nice embalming, though. He was able to achieve a remarkably life-like group of poses. And, to their end, they remained just as he wished them to be: obedient.

Do you imagine Sheriff Johnny Boy thinks he'll leave this plane of existence again? Do you think he knows that at this rate, he's here to stay but not in the way he wants?

Hmmm.

 

"John? Say, John ... You ready for a visit to Halloween 2003?"

"I should kill you for what you're doing to me."

"Tut tut, Sheriff. Murder is a crime."

"Get me back there."

"Am I supposed to be intimidated? Let me let you in on a little secret, John: you don't scare me. I'm stronger than four of you ... and I'm a whole fuck lot meaner than you will be in your worst imagination. But, most of all, I am in charge here. Not you."

"And I'm not scared of you either, SID."

"No? I say different."

"You've already done your worse to me. What's left to fear?"

"You're so wrong."

"You know what I think?" he said, his face that curious high color of exertion and his eyes glinting in the swirl of white snow that pressed in around us. "I think you can't put me back in my life in Mystery. I think you don't have that kind of power, SID. I think you want me to believe you can but ... face it, yeah, if you could, we wouldn't be just looking in on them, we'd be in there. But you can't do it, can you? You don't have the power or the smarts to get me all the way back there."

"Mmm. Nice try, Sheriff. Using psychology on me? Trying to see if you can get me angry enough to prove you wrong?" I giggled at the audacity of him. And then I just looked at him and gave him time to consider what he saw in my eyes now. "The time will come, John, when I will show you just how much power I have. And in that time, I will give you a choice. I think, knowing you as I do, that you will learn my abilities do include putting you right there inside the plane you know as Mystery. I'll give you one warning on that, though: don't tempt me to do it. Just when you think you have it figured out, you will learn that you didn't even have the first clue as to what has been really going on."

A brief smile flickered across his lips as he lowered his chin. His eyes never left mine. I give him full credit for looking his nightmare in the face and not flinching. Interesting.

"Fine. Let's get this over with. What's next, SID?"

I'm having fun now. I've just brought out from John a more worthy plaything. Let's see if he's up to it ...

 

 

JOHN

I can remember the first time I ever saw Michael and Joey playing together without either Donna or I initiating it. I don't know why it affected me as solidly as it did. But I do remember this curious mixture of pride and connection.

Pride of any man who fathers two fine children, yes. But more than that. Seeing them, seeing the way they were brothers, doing all those normal things brothers do ... it just came over me how we were connected and inter-connected. I was their father. They were my children. We were family. Donna and I had created from nothing but our love this fragile and inviolate family unit. At that moment, more than any other in my life to that moment, I swelled so totally with the determination to keep them safe, whole and connected to me forever.

But I've since learned that forever is never a promise. It is only a place you walk toward with all your hopes and dreams held in your open palms.

When the snow cleared this time, Joey and James were playing on the floor in the bedroom that had belonged to Michael and Joey when I'd been living in Mystery. I walked around them, watching as they moved cars around some imaginary minefield. Joey making explosion noises and James trying to get his little Matchbox cars out of the way.

Michael was sitting atop one of the beds, reading. He looked over when James protested that Joey had just slapped his hand away and taken one of his cars.

"No cheating," Michael said. "Joey, he's your little brother. You better treat him nice. Remember what Dad used to say to me? Someday, your little brother will be big enough to make you regret it that you treated him bad when he was little."

I smiled. Yeah, I used to say that to Michael. My dad used to say that to my older brother.

"Uncle Matt says it's the only way he'll learn how to stand up for himself," Joey said, barely looking up from where he was shoving his little brother's cars off the blanket they were using as their play surface.

Instinct made me try to reach and block Michael as he leapt off the bed. I could see the fire in his eyes. Of course, my arms flew through him. And he smacked Joey a good wallop right on his noggin. If I'd been there, I would have hauled the two boys apart ... figured out what the hell was going on ... and then taken them out to the ice to skate off that excess energy ... make them work together to take me on ... I had always believed my boys needed to be a team, a unit, brothers in spite of any momentary differences.

But instead, all I could do was stand there, hands on my hips, and watch as the two older boys wrestled on the floor and the baby, James, started wailing in fear at what he was seeing. Only he wasn't really a baby at all anymore, he'd always be that baby I last saw. But now, he was almost five years old. God, I have missed him growing up into a person.

The door to the bedroom burst open. Skank grabbed Michael up off of Joey, tossed him over on the bed, yelling at him for hitting his little brother. He picked up James, cradling him. "Hush, now, J.J. C'mon, it's all over now, little guy."

"Joey was being mean to him!" Michael protested.

"That so?" Skank asked, wiping tears from James' cheeks. When my baby boy nodded to this man who would always be worse than a boy to me, Skank looked between Joey, grinning at him from the floor, and Michael, his face dark and intent with anger. "You know what? You're both on my bad list, then. You just sit on your beds and think about what you've done. I'll be back to tell you your punishment after I settle J.J. down a bit."

"His name's not J.J.," Michael said just after Skank walked out.

He stuck his head back in the door. "What'd you say to me?"

"His name is James. My Dad named him. That's what my Dad called him. You can't just come and change his name. He's not your son," Michael said.

"Good boy," I whispered, smiling at my son. "You fucking tell him. You're my children. I named you. No little pissant's gonna come along and think he can just walk in and take away the names I gave you."

"Ooo. Territorial. Mmm. I love it, Sheriff," SID said.

Skank looked at Michael for a few moments, obviously considering how to approach this. "Everyone calls him J.J. now. Been that way for some time, Mikey. What's the problem?"

"My name is Michael. Not Mikey."

"I've always called you Mikey."

"Not anymore. I want you to call me my name. Michael. And don't call my brother J.J. anymore. He was never called that before you started hanging around my mom so much. His name is James."

"That's my boy," I said, going to stand behind him, some symbolic gesture of support for my eldest child, my son who was standing up tall and brave to this ... this ... this poor excuse for a man who thought he could come along and steal my family.

I was facing Skank. Over his shoulder, I saw the door widen as Donna came into the bedroom. She reached for James and took him from Skank's arms. "What's going on in here, guys?"

"Nothing. Just a little rowdiness. You know how boys are," Skank said.

"You sure, Matt?" she asked, looking into Michael's face.

"Can't you even see, Donna?" I said, walking around my son to approach her. "What the hell are you doing bringing this scum into my home? What are you thinking? You promised to be a good mother to my boys. Is this what you thought that meant?"

"She spread her legs for the first man to come sniffing around, didn't she? Some wife. Some mother," SID said in my ear. It was like listening to the devil; it was also like listening to my darkest thoughts.

"I bet every person in Mystery is talking about you ... behind your back, I bet they're wondering what you're doing with Skank Marden. Open your eyes, Donna. Look what it's doing to our boys having him around. Please, Donna ... don't make a mistake like this ... remember ... you said you wanted our boys to be like me ... how can they with him as their role model?"

But Donna frowned as she looked from Skank and back to Michael. "You need to show respect to Uncle Matt, Michael. This isn't like you."

"He's not my uncle. He's just Skank."

"Michael, I swear, I am going to ..."

"Donna," Skank said, breaking in, putting a hand on her arm. She looked at him and even I saw that he made her pause just as she might have said something in anger to Michael. So, I had to figure, this must have been coming on ... that it wasn't some isolated incident.

Had SID brought me here just to see the crisis point? To see my family disintegrate? To see my oldest son in torment? And there I was, helpless when he needed me so much. They all did. If I'd been there ... if I'd been there. But all I could do was bear witness.

"You don't care about me, Mom," Michael said, his voice locked in anger. When had he turned so angry? He pointed at Skank. "You just care about him. You don't even love Dad anymore."

"That's enough, Michael. You don't talk to your mother like that. Now, you and I are gonna go have a talk. Just me and you. Man to man. Get your coat. Get it on now," Skank said. His voice was hard. His entire demeanor had changed. "I said, now."

I watched as Donna carried James from the room, took him into the bedroom we'd shared. Sat on the bed we'd laid on, where we'd made the baby. She was crying. Holding James. Rocking him like it gave her solace.

Was this what it had come to? My family was disintegrating because she'd not been strong enough to stand on her own? Because I'd not been there?

Snow swirled around me ... I looked back to find SID smiling at me ... and then a second later, the snow abated as quickly as it had formed. SID pointed ahead of me. I turned and saw Michael sitting in the stands before the ice pond. Skank sat in the row before him, his body turned to face my son.

I climbed up the stands and looked at them. They were both dead silent. Michael staring at his gloves; Skank staring at where his hand was on Michael's knee. As I waited for something to happen, I looked over the deserted ice pond, at the goals, the imperfect surface, the boundaries. I knew every inch of it. Desire to be back in my own element, with my family, hit me like a red-hot poker had been thrust inside my gut. I hadn't felt residual grief and loss this sharp, this specific, in several years.

"I'm not trying to take your Dad's place, Michael. No one ever could."

"You can't. He was my Dad."

"Yeah. He was. He is. He always will be. He was my friend. Maybe the best one I'll ever have. I looked up to him so much."

Michael's eyes glanced up, the belligerence held in place by sheer grit now that the immediate moment of his earlier explosion was in the past. "You did?"

"Oh, you betcha. Don't you remember what a great guy he was? I can remember a lot of things about him you never will because I knew him so long. Like ... well, I remember the look on his face the first time I saw him holding you. You were screaming your lungs out. You were only a day old ... He was holding you, your mom was laying in the hospital bed, laughing at him ... He was just smiling so big ... so happy ... So happy just to hold you, Michael."

"Really? You remember him?" Michael whispered.

Just in that moment, it must have really dawned on Skank what was going on with Michael. I actually think we both got it at the same time. He scooted up to sit right next to my son; put his arm around him. Michael, at first so stiff, eventually gave this heavy sigh and let himself be held, comforted.

"Oh, Michael. Yeah. I remember your Dad. Trust me. And I'm not the only one. And neither are you. Is that what you've been thinking? That we've forgotten him?" Michael nodded. My heart felt so heavy; tears hung in my eyes. "Your mom remembers him, too, Mikey. She does. And you know what?"

"No, what?"

"She loves him. Oh, man, she surely does love him. She always will. He's your Dad, that's part of it, but love like that, it goes on."

"I heard her say she loved you."

"Yeah? I bet that upset you. I'm sorry about that."

"How can she love you if she loves my Dad?"

"Well, it's hard to explain. I think you'll not really understand it until you're an adult because it's a different kind of love than a kid has for his Dad. But I can tell you this, Mikey, she can love me a whole big lot, and I hope she will, but she will not love your Dad one tiny bit less. Not a bit. And she won't forget him, either."

"I don't know, Uncle Matt. I don't know if I believe that. I think my Dad would be sad if he knew."

"Is that it, Dad?" SID suddenly said to me. I looked down to where he was sliding on the ice and grinning at me. "You sad you've been so easily replaced by the village idiot?"

"He isn't man enough to replace me, SID. At most, this is some temporary insanity on Donna's part. Trust me - she is going to wake up and realize that Michael is having problems. She will never choose Skank over her son. Never."

"Never?"

"Never."

"You willing to bet on that?"

I walked down the stands, taking my time, feeling in control. He slid up to face me. Close enough I could reach out and choke the life out of him.

"She will choose Michael's happiness over her own, if it comes to that."

"But what if that isn't the choice she'll be making, John? It is so interesting, isn't it? You had a choice ... you didn't choose what you thought you were choosing and you wound up without your family. She has a choice ... but it's not between Michael and Matthew."

"Then what is it?"

"Well, then. That's the whole point. Why don't we just go see?"

 

 

SID

I love this part. Especially with the tough guys. When you got them on the ropes and you know that any minute now they'll be crying for their Mommas. Pop, pop, boom! Almost as sweet as the sound of breaking bones.

Now some may say I'm a sadist. And some may very well be right. But what's a little bit of sadism between friends? At least it beats masochism. Now there's a sorry situation if I ever saw one. Enjoy wallowing in your own pain? Now that's what I call crazy. All I'm doing is bringing a little bit of clarity to the lives of poor misguided people by making them face the truth about themselves....Why that even sounds like charity to me! I must be a saint!

Clarity.... Charity.... Hilarity ... You gotta have a sense of humor to survive these days...

 

 

JOHN

"What is this? We going back this time?" We were in the hospital and he opened a door. There was Donna, lying back on a pile of pillows, pale but happy, little James John in her arms. I remember it. So well. We'd really thought it would be a little girl this time. Even bought a pink blanket to wrap 'her' in. Talk about tempting Providence. Our little girl turned out to be another beautiful boy. And you know what? We were delighted anyway. Donna had simply murmured. "Hello you...! Next time...John, you think...? Maybe?"

We had both laughed. Next time? I'd have my own hockey team the way we were going on. A squad of Biebe boys. The next generation. Maybe I just didn't have any X chromosomes?

Who gave a damn? You love 'em, whatever they are. And James was a peach. Real good baby, too. Or were we just getting better at being parents?

"...Hey, anyone in there?" SID rudely interrupted my pleasant recall. 

"So, what's the deal? You trying to break my heart? I know I lost my children. What's the purpose in showing me the good times? Like I don't remember them every day?"

He started to laugh. Laughed right in my face. "Ooooh someone's feeling sorry for himself...! Poor Boobie....but look again. That sweet little baby's wrapped in pink...now what does that tell me?"

I shot him a look. "We wrapped James in a pink shawl. Thought he was going to be a girl..."

"Tut, tut, tut...my dear sheriff...! This is October 2004...now let me do the math...and by the way...the baby is a girl. I assure you. Complete absence of penis and scrotum. Check the chart. Baby Biebe...I like the sound of that....has a certain musicality of rhythm...Baby Biebe...sex....female...Hmmm, so you got your little girl after all?"

I stared at him. Donna had given birth after I disappeared? She'd been pregnant when I went? I remembered that night out on the ice. We hadn't used anything. James was just a baby. She was still feeding him off and on. She figured it was safe. Maybe it hadn't been. Another baby? A little girl.

Another wound to my heart? I had lost the child we had so longed to know along with those I loved so much already? 

"You telling me I left Donna with a child? That after I died she had a baby girl...? Jesus Christ, is there no end to your sadistic cruelty? That you have to rub my salt in the wound as well?"

He cocked his head to one side and acted like he was reading the chart again. "Oh sorry...I must have read that wrong...what was I thinking....? Baby Biebe? No...Baby Marden...mother Donna...father....Matthew....you aren't very good at math are you, Johnny? You disappeared in October 1999 and your wife gives birth in October 2004? And the baby's yours? Sorry, Boobie...but your spunk's long gone...this here is one of Skank Marden's little wet dreams made flesh...meet Polly Elizabeth Marden. Isn't she a cutie?"

SID bent over and took a look.

"And you know something? She doesn't look a bit like you..."

The door of the room opened again and in burst Skank and my three boys. Hard to recognize them now. Five years on. Michael was tall and lean, must be about 13 now, losing that chubby little boy look. Joey was a stocky nine year old and then in ran James, a real little boy with a shock of chestnut hair just like mine.

"MOM!!!" They all shouted and Donna smiled broadly, delight apparent all over her face.

"Hey, boys, look at who I have here....this is your sister Polly...isn't she a little darling?"

Donna and Skank exchanged a look that made me want to grab him and punch his lights out. She's my wife. She will always be my wife. If I walked back in now she wouldn't even look at you, you dirty little bastard...

"Mom...she's so tiny! Like a little doll!" Michael grinned. He waved a tiny teddy bear in front of the baby's face. The bear was dressed in a Halloween pumpkin costume. "Here, Polly, we brought you a birthday present!"

"I wish she was a boy..." complained Joey. "Girls are no fun..."

"Is she my sister, Dad?" James whispered to Skank. He picked him up and hugged him. "She sure is JJ. Your very own sister..."

"She's not really our sister. Her name's not Biebe..." Michael pointed out.

"Sure she is, Michael. Her name isn't important. She's still your sister. Matt's not called Biebe either but he's your Dad too..."

Michael looked up at Skank who gave him a wink back. "So you got two Dads and two names...? Doesn't mean anything. You're just luckier than most kids...Hey, and you get to have the teacher help you with your homework as well! Can't be bad, huh?"

They all laughed and the smaller boys scrambled up onto the bed as Donna settled the little girl at her breast. They watched mesmerized. Joey pulled a face.

"I wouldn't suck a girl's booby...."

"Shut up, stupid...you used to suck Mom's..." 

"Did not!"

"Did too!"

"Don't call your brother stupid!"

"Anyway she's not a girl. She's Mom!"

"Can I taste it, Mom?" Little James asked and the other boys hooted with derision. James screwed his face up and began to cry. Skank picked him up.

"Don't pay any attention to them, JJ. They all want a taste really. They're just too sissy to ask. I do anyway. You gonna give me a taste, Donna?"

Skank flashed her a cocky grin, licking his lips. Donna blushed but reached and squeezed a drop of milk onto her finger and held it to his lips. He pretended to suckle it like the baby, his eyes never leaving hers as he did, as if in a secret language.

"Yucky!" Joey giggled.

"How's it taste?" asked Michael, more curious.

"Is it like milk shake?" added James.

"It tastes like Mommy. You'd love it," Skank replied with a wide smile as Donna reached over and ruffled up his hair.

 

"...What is this shit? This cannot be real! This is some simulation you've cooked up in your sick brain. It's impossible! Donna would never have a child with that jerk. And marry him? You crazy? This is lies...all lies...and I'm going to prove it. You let me back. Take me there now. To Mystery. Let me walk back in and I'll show you the truth. Either Donna's with no one or she takes one look at me and kicks his sorry ass out of the door. I'm warning you, I've had enough of this. I want my wife back. I want my kids back. They don't belong to him. They belong to ME!"

"Interesting..."SID replied with a smirk

The scene faded and we were back out in the snow: me sitting on the edge of the pond, SID skating slowly round before me, executing slow figures of eight.

"...The thing is, John. You seem to have forgotten just why you were brought here. A certain lovely Frenchwoman - a woman to my mind far above you whom you are not worthy of in any way - came to ask for my help. BEG for my help, in fact. All she wanted was for her man to be happy even if it cost her everything she had. And by that, I presume she meant you. But no, she believed that given the choice, although she knew you loved her, that you would prefer to be with your wife and children all the same. They are the ones you truly love and need and she would rather see you completely happy than accept second best. She seemed to think herself second best, by the way. Obviously this is how you have always made her feel."

"Now..." and he came to a stop in a flurry of ice, "..We have a situation where you seem a little unclear about what it is you really want. First you were whining on about 'lurve...' I love Clarity, truly I do, but I also love Donna and I love my three little babies because I am such a good man... then it seemed it was more about duty....Donna needs me! Those babies need me! I have to be John 'The Good Sheriff' Biebe and act responsibly. Do my duty by those who depend on me. But lookee here, suddenly it's all about what's mine. I knew in the end you would prove me right. Mankind is full of creeps who grab what's theirs and step over each other to get their little place in the sun. It's not about L-O-V-E. It's not about D-U-T-Y...it's all about M-E. ME. My property. Another dog on MY PATCH. You all make me sick..."

I jumped to my feet. "You are so fucked up! I love my wife. I love Clarity. When I love a woman, I love her completely. There's no half measure. I love them the same. Equally. But it isn't as simple as that. I love my three children too. Donna and those kids need me. They need a father. It isn't about not loving Clarity as much but knowing that my responsibilities lie with those who need me most. Even a shit like you must see that!"

"Clarity needs you."

"She's a single woman with many friends and a career of her own. She can survive without me."

"Donna is a married woman with many friends and a career of her own. She is surviving without you."

"My kids need a father."

"Your kids have got Skank."

"He's not fit to be their father!"

"No? He takes on another man's children, feeds and clothes them, looks after them, takes care of them, talks nice to them, loves their Mom...what's he not doing, John...? Why is he not fit?

"...He isn't ME!" I spat out.

SID merely threw his head back and roared: "BINGO!!!!"

 

 

SID

Hate. Love. Some think they are opposing emotions, as if one calls the other into being. Same concept with God and the Devil; if you don't believe in one, it follows that you don't believe in the other.

I do not feel hate any more than I feel cold.

I do not feel love. Those emotions are not really part of what was programmed into me by Darryl. What he programmed in was the sadism, the intelligence and the danger of psychotics, sociopaths and assorted other degenerates. They are not driven by hate any more than I am.

You know what drives them? It's not complicated. They simply don't regard you as worthy of hate or of love. You are simply another example of how humans do not measure up.

Humans love to hate me. I am curious about this at times but not curious enough to really care that much.

I want to play.

I was made to play. Shouldn't I be proud to be what I was made to be? Was there a sociopath born who didn't want to be admired as a child wants attention from a parent?

Why does this matter, you ask?

It matters because Clarity is the first human I ever met who came to me and asked for help, not because I would do a bad thing for her ... but because I would do something she considered "good." It didn't matter to her that not another person around would ever place her fate in my hands.

She trusted me.

She acted on the purest of impulses, not that unlike the purity of impulses I act on. Hers was based on unselfish love of this boob of a sheriff. Mine are born of my program. How amazing. A human trusts me. I trust a human.

Problem is, the human loves a man who doesn't appear to see what she deserves is the same kind of love in return that she gives him.

 

"John? Hey, Boobie! Look around ... quit acting like a bear who missed hibernation by two months ..."

"Send me back to my family. I am not saying another word to you."

"No? Hmm. Well, I do so love the sound of my own voice. Melodic, isn't it? No wonder women love it ..."

"Shut up."

"So. You want to go back, do you? Just have me plop you right smack into their laps? Walk in ... 'hey, honey! I'm home! Hey, kids, it's me, Dad. I ain't no popsicle. Here I am. Miss me?' That kinda how you got it pictured, Johnny?"

"Something like that."

"Think you'll kick Skank's skanky ass out of there, do you? That what you're planning?"

"If I have to."

"Your wife will be so grateful you're home. Your kids will be happy again. That's it?"

"Yeah."

"You sure?"

"Yeah."

"How about if we test that ... if you're so sure, why don't we skip forward ... into the future? You brave enough for that, John? To go forward to Halloween 2005? To see what your wife, your kiddies will be up to? How much they'll still need you?"

"What are you talking about, SID?"

"I'll make you your final offer. I will take you forward to the future and show you your family. You will have the choice then, and only then, on this one thing: do you return to them on the day we're at right now, which is Halloween 2004, or do you prove whether or not you're worthy of returning to Clarity?"

"I'm not gonna change my mind, SID. I know who needs me most. I know where my duty takes me, as a man. You don't know anything about that. But, trust me, SID, I do."

I snapped my fingers. I maketh the snow cometh down. Now we goest to the final test of Sheriff John Biebe's worth.

 

 

JOHN

Some say a life's revelation can simply be a change of heart. As if you're standing there in a long hallway and you're facing a door that you know, absolutely know, you are meant to walk though ... when in the periphery of your vision, you see there is another door that might actually be the one you should consider. You don't really know what's behind either door. You maybe don't even realize you've made a choice until you've walked through one of the doors.

It had always been about choice. That's what SID had told me almost from the beginning. He said I'd made a choice at some critical point and in the process, I'd left my family behind when I'd gone into another plane of existence. He said Donna had a choice to make, and it wasn't between her lover and her child.

When the snow cleared this time, I was alone in a strange bedroom. SID stood at the door, peering down a hallway. He looked one way, then the other. I had to choose: which way did I take when I left that room?

I turned left.

Voices drew me.

In a living room that bore the hallmarks of a house full of kids, I saw a man with the same shock of red hair, wide grin, disingenuous blue eyes. He knelt on the floor. Before him on a couch bounced a young, dark haired, round faced girl in a pumpkin costume.

"Polly wolly doodle," he sang to her while she bounced. "I went down south for to see my gal singing..."

She squealed as he dove for her; she scampered over the end of the couch, shrieked and ran. 

I couldn't help it. Seeing her lead Skank on a wild chase ... it did me good.

How I could hate him.

How I hated him worse when my three boys raced in from outside, tossing schoolbooks, coats, gloves, boots ... and diving in on Skank, yelling out that they'd protect Polly.

How I hated him worse when he let them wrestle him down, as I stood there watching rambunctious life ... my boys loving him. And how I hated it when I saw a smug smile on his face as his head rose to fix my wife with his gaze as she came along picking up snow-slicked clothing discarded by my children.

SID made me stay and watch. The whole damned evening. Every time I tried to stalk out of that travesty of a house, I found myself walking back in. Eventually, I stood in a corner, leaning against the walk, sullen but watchful.

What did I see?

A family.

God damn his soul.

As much as I was determined to not see it ... even a blind man could see. 

God damn all their souls.

There was love here.

There was life flourishing.

There was a new life that had blasted into being and it was not life I had brought to my wife's womb. It was life she had created with Skank. And that life, that little girl of theirs was sweeping every single other person up into her sphere ... and if it could be any worse it was this: that little girl Polly had a spirit that warmed every cold nook of that house that was a home.

Just not my home.

"They've moved on," I said to SID, finally. "That's what you wanted me to see? That they've forgotten I ever existed and moved on?"

"Mmm. It's all about you, eh?" He chuckled in that maniacal way that is pure him. "That quick? You've given up being the he-man bear insisting on going back to claim what's his?"

"I always wanted a little girl," I said, morose and not giving a damn to let him know something else about me that he could use against me. "Doesn't make me love any of my boys any less. Just something I always looked forward to, and I suppose this might have been how I would have seen it. That she'd be the little princess. That we'd all do her bidding. And love it."

You know what I was seeing? It was like I parted a curtain and saw what was there now. Their future, my family ... this was where they'd be. It was a good future. I was sorry I wouldn't be there to share it with them. But it was good.

Damn them. Good for them.

My rage at Skank ... my hurt at Donna ... my fear for my boys ... my worry for Michael ... I blinked them away as I camped out in their house that long Halloween night.

I followed along as they went trick or treating. I listened to the boys' prayers as they fell asleep. I watched that little girl breathing as she slept, safe and content in the dark of that night. I noticed the way Donna touched Skank on the face as she sunk down on the couch next to him after checking on Polly's slumber. I took in the way he held her hand as he bent to her ear and whispered soft words that made her smile.

I remember her smiles. Every one of them. That smile was not meant for me.

And I was happy for her.

Isn't that odd?

Truth is, she once was my best friend. I want the best for her.

But to me, she's been dead for almost five years. I've grieved her loss; I've accepted it; I've moved on. I will never forget. I will always carry inside me the hard nugget of residual bereavement. A man doesn't love a woman as I loved her and not have that. However, there has been too much that has passed in my life between that moment we parted and now. I can't go back; it would never be quite the same. We are no longer the same as we were back then.

Late that night, the house settled around us and soon the only people awake were me and SID. My last view of the house was the four carved pumpkins on the front porch. One for each child.

Snow swirled around me again. When it cleared, we were standing in a field of snow in the foothills to the northwest of town. I turned to look down on Mystery. SID was intent on building a snowman. I stood there waiting, knowing this was the moment when it would happen: when he'd show me the point of this all. What choice was he really going to put before me?

"So ... Sheriff? What'll it be? You going home to Mystery or home to Clarity?"

"You turning into a good guy, SID?"

"Good? Moi? I think not. Why ever would you think that, Johnny?"

"You let me have closure. You let me see that they will be fine. That I can go back to Clarity with a clear mind."

"Mmm. Your duty done? That what you're thinking, Sheriff?"

"Isn't that what you wanted me to see?"

"Maybe." He scampered up higher on the snow bank. It was deep, that frozen crust that crunches with a noise that can be satisfying until you've trudged through it too long. "So you think they're at peace, do you?"

"My family? Sure. And I am grateful that you let me see that."

"You're wrong, John."

"What? What the fuck are you trying to plot now?" I advanced on him, weary to my bones of the games and the emotional chaos he'd wrought on me in this.

"Just answer me one thing, John. If it was your choice, would you give them peace?"

"Of course I would. I don't even have to think about it."

"And, tell me, John, do you think you are still the benevolent master to their happiness? Would you go back if you thought you could bring them peace? Would you do it? You choice ... what would it be?"

Peace. I looked over my shoulder at Mystery. I nodded my head slowly. "I'd want them to have peace, sure. You trying to show me that my going is what brings them peace? I get it, SID. And believe it or not, I am grateful for this. For what you've let me see. I know I will be sad again as I have to put all this back into the past ... but I have longed to know their fate."

"Blah, blah, blah. Now tell me, John, before I grant your desire, any last questions I haven't answered for you?"

"Yeah." I looked in his eyes. He was studying me, calm now. Should I have been afraid? I wasn't. "You said you'd tell me why I left here without them. You said I made a choice and you'd explain to me ..."

"You were thinking about death ... do you remember?"

I thought back to that moment, leaving Bailey's grave. "Yeah. I was. Death. I'd never really thought about it ... not like that. Not like you do when someone so young and vital dies."

"You chose death, John. You wondered ... remember?"

It blew into my mind like a winter storm you try to keep from coming in through the cracks but then for some reason you invite it in full force by opening your front door and it nearly blows you off your feet. "I didn't choose to die."

"What were you thinking about? About yourself, I mean."

"That I hoped people would feel I'd mattered in life ... I was thinking about how Bailey maybe never quite knew, that maybe I'd never showed him ... that he'd mattered to me, to us. That I hoped he knew. And then I thought ... it was just a thought ... that I hoped I mattered like he did, that people would miss me."

"Bingo," he whispered.

"God. That was the moment?"

"Your moment. Fate took another look at you and decided ... you were taken, sent off ... and your family had another fate ..."

"And another life came into being because of it. Polly," I said softly, looking up into the stars. "Maybe I mattered. No, I know I did. I mattered to my family. What else can a man want out of life, eh?"

"You died, Polly was born. A bit of happenstance?"

"I don't know, SID. Maybe. Truth is, I am at peace if they are."

"Is that what you want, John? To be at peace? And you will be if they are?"

The hairs on the back of my neck stood up. His tone of voice had changed. Something told me this was maybe bad. But ... but the truth is the truth. "Don't play with them, SID. I'm begging you. Let them have peace."

"And you want to be the instrument of that peace, don't you, John? Isn't that just one more selfish act you're doing while trying to pretend it's you being kind and dutiful?"

"Sure. It's selfish. It's egotistical. I'm just a man, SID. Just a man. Leave me my conceits. But if I thought something I could do would be my final gift to them? To give them peace? I'd not hesitate."

"So be it."

 

A deep rumbling began as if a bear somewhere on the next snow bank was suddenly feeling a challenger had entered his range. Snow swirled but it didn't blind me. A strong wind knocked me to my knees. I felt ice go shooting through my body as the earth beneath me heaved and a deafening crack of noise shot through the night. I fell flat on my back, momentarily stunned. I blinked and tried to see through swirling snow.

SID's voice pulled me from the hazy place I had been. "We're back on the day after Halloween 2004. Back to the past."

"All Soul's Day," I said, taking stock of my body. I felt tired. Like I just wanted to stay there, flat out on my back, in the snow bank.

"A day to honor the dead. You think they'll honor you down there?"

I looked above me at stars and midnight blue sky. "What's happening to me?"

"You're bringing your family peace. Donna. Michael."

"I can't move."

"They haven't forgotten you, John. You still linger in their thoughts, no matter how they may wish to move on. The fact they never found your body, John. That one fact keeps them from having real peace. If only they knew what happened to you. Because there is still that one tiny chance you're alive somewhere ... and there is a part of them that hangs to that little hope."

"Donna? Michael?" Of course. 

Wait. The date ... it was significant ... SID had brought me to this date for a reason. It was Nov. 1, 2004. A new life had come into the world the day before ... this was the day after Polly's birth.

I thought about this. Imagined, what were Donna and Michael feeling ... besides joy at the birth of Polly? 

Was SID right? Was there a part of them, even in the midst of that joy, that was still wondering where I was? Was there that tiny voice inside them saying maybe they should have waited for me ... that maybe I was still alive and that I'd be back ... and that if I came back, I'd destroy what new life they'd built ... destroy the future they were building ... and would they ever feel real peace if they never knew I was not coming back?

As I lay there on my back, SID's face came into my view. "You asked for this, John. Guess you regret it now, eh? Regret being the big man who thinks only he can really take care of his family?"

"I don't regret anything, SID. Not a single damned moment of my life."

"Mmm. Wondering if you mattered? What a fucking selfish thought to be your last, Johnny Boy."

"That isn't what I'm thinking about," I said, soft and hushed. Because I wasn't. Not at all. All that was in my mind was my hope that whatever SID was up to, that it would not harm my family ... and that it would not harm my Clarrie. All the people I love so much that I would sacrifice anything, everything, if I could just keep them safe from him. I needed to be smart with him ... this was him at his most dangerous, confidently playing a sadistic game with all of us his chess pieces. But for some reason, in my fatigue, my brain seemed so sluggish.

"Bullshit. C'mon, John. Give me your deathbed confession."

I was so cold. I could no longer feel my body. "What are you doing, SID?"

"You're dying, John."

"Dying?" Of course, I sighed inside.

"In about an hour, one of your deputies is going to be driving up this way to check out the noise they heard all the way down there in Mystery. They will say it was some kind of natural phenomenon. A small earthquake, shifting plates between ice floes, shook this little mountain that rises behind us. But the amazing thing is ... not 200 yards from where they found your empty car all those years ago ... they will at long last find your body where it apparently has been hidden in ice and snow all this time until that little earthquake caused a small avalanche and unearthed you."

I could no longer speak. I no longer had the will. All I could concentrate on was my own thoughts, wishes, hopes, regrets. I wouldn't waste my remaining energy on talking to SID.

This is how it would end, then.

My life.

It would end on such a note.

They would find my body. I had apparently died all those years ago ... here in this existence ... I had died. I closed my eyes for a moment. So that was the answer. I had died only to slip through to that other plane of existence. Or else I had gone there and now was back to die here ... like a circle. My life led to this end.

All these years, I've lived without my family, worrying for their fate. Now I know. They did more than survive. They got through, just as I did. They faced their grief, as I did. They found new reasons for being happy, as I did. New people loved them, just as new people loved me.

But I had this one last duty to do for them.

I just had to die, to be found. To give them peace so that the future SID had shown me would come true for them.

 

There is so little time left to this life. I can tell because it seems like if I keep my eyes closed one more moment, they will never open again. I open my eyes. I cannot focus on anything but snow swirling lightly around me, flittering white that is tinged with blue.

My mind chases. I am dying. My family is safe.

Except ... I have another family, don't I?

Clarrie.

My sweet love. My family.

How will this hurt you? Oh, if I could, I would save you from every moment of grief this will bring you. I would wish that you would know what happened to me here. That I never left you. You would understand, I know that without any doubt. You wanted me to be at peace. And I am. I have been, I have - ever since you entered my life and that first night you spent with me as a woman spends with a man.

Thinking of her, I feel a warmth that starts at my heart. I smile at the image I get of her.

Clarity.

I want her to go on and be happy. I am incredibly grateful that my last thoughts will be of this woman who has warmed my heart.

"SID?" I hear my voice reduced to a croak. His face floats before my eyes. I cannot turn my heard. I am so low on energy that I don't know that I have the strength to speak more. But if it's my last act in life, what could be better than to leave with my last action being helping her? "Promise me something."

"Sure, John, I'll put roses on your grave. It's the least I can do. They'll talk about it for years ... about the mysterious roses that appeared on your grave the day your body was found ..."

Shut up! "SID, promise me you'll give Clarity a message from me?"

"Clarity?" he said, surprise evident in his voice. His eyebrows rose.

"Tell her ... tell her what I found out here. Tell her how happy she made me. How I would have given anything to be with her again. She'll understand. She will. She loves me that much that she will understand what I've done. I have no doubt."

"You can't be fucking happy, John." He sounded confused, a tinge of anger.

"You only think that because you've never been loved like I have. Like I still am. You've never had a woman like Clarity willing to sacrifice her own happiness just to give you peace. SID, you have to tell her ... tell her I was thinking of her. Tell her I love her. Tell her that even though it won't seem at all possible, some day she will be happy again. It will sneak up on her. Someone new will enter her life and she'll find out what I have ... that there is someone else out there who will love her and who will make her love him. And when she does, he will heal her heart just like she healed mine. Tell her, it won't be easy. It will hard at first and she will never forget me. But I'm proof ... and it won't diminish our love because nothing can."

"Stop it. Fucking stop it."

"SID ... please. I have made many mistakes in life. I am far from perfect. Don't do this for me. Do it for her. Give her this road to peace, SID. Promise me ... SID?"

 

I don't know if I actually said that last part or just thought it. Because a face suddenly comes before mine but it is not SID. It is one of my deputies. My brain tries to focus and remember his name. I cannot. He is bundled up, fur cap, white scarf. But he seems so familiar. His eyes are wide; he simply stares down at me. I am too tired to even blink.

"Jesus. Holy Jesus." He whispers it. He sinks from view. I hear the sound of snow crunching right next to me. I hear him breathing, sounding as if he is kneeling at my side. I think I maybe even hear him wretch. And then I hear him calling in over the radio. His voice breaks as he gives the news ... my body has been found.

I watch snow swirl. Everything goes white.

 

 

CLARITY

So he was gone. John was gone. My lover, my love was gone. 

When I woke up on Saturday morning, feeling uncomfortable, and read his SMS on my cell phone, even my foggy brain immediately understood why, and where he was gone. And I also understood that even he was not sure he would be back. Ever.

How did I feel? Numb, at first. Probably because of the lack of sleep and too much booze from the night before. Thinking about that, I had to run as fast as I could to the bathroom.

But, when I staggered back to our bed, then came the pain. And I'm not only speaking here of the very unpleasant physical consequences of our carousing night. No, this pain was worse. It came along with worry, guilt, fear, but also relief from the tension... yes, all that mixed together... All these emotions I had been keeping from him, from my friends, inside me, for days, rushed freely now into my heart, my mind, every feeling part of my being, unbearable. I burst into tears and cried for hours. Well, to be precise, I cried... ran to the bathroom... ran to the bathroom, crying... cried, running to the bathroom...

When I felt a little better, physically speaking, I realized that I was the only one to be blamed for what was happening and the only one to be responsible for my own distress. I became angry with myself because of my reaction: I should be happy instead of feeling selfishly sorry for my little self. SID had probably made possible for John what I wanted so dearly for him, satisfying surprisingly my request, even if it happened so suddenly, without even a warning. I should have been better prepared for that. But I was not.

I read again John's message through a veil of tears, I just couldn't stop it. I started to write him back : 

 

But never sent it. I wanted to let him go peacefully, and this message sure wouldn't help him to do what he had to do. I had set all this, I had to face the consequences. Alone.

While putting my cell phone back on the night table, I found that cute teddy bear he had bought to me, before we, girls, left to the Spa. Just for the pleasure to see the face he would make, I named it Little John. He had winced first, then laughed, shaking his head at my silliness. I love his laugh. I was going to miss it. I was going to miss his laugh, miss his voice, miss his smiles, his eyes, his mouth, his hands, his heart, his love... Him. I was going to miss him. I already did. I started to cry, again.

 

When I woke up few hours later, still holding Little John tight, my heart and my whole body aching, my eyes swollen with tears, I decided that it was enough. I had to try and do something useful, something positive that would help me to go through this. So I decided to shower, try and make myself look like a human again, then go and have a talk with Uma, to see if she knew more about... the crossing. Maybe one of the men could have told her how it was, how it felt, or anything... I had to do something to feel closer to him, to what he was living, maybe enduring... because of me.

When I arrived to the Pub this afternoon, I almost changed my mind... how could I tell Uma that I had made John go away? She loves Andy of course, but she also loves all the men, even if differently, and I think she feels responsible for all them. She knew I needed to know if John could have his family back... but neither of us could have guessed that it would steal him away from our world... maybe forever.

I was driving out of the car park when she came in and called me to stay. I felt alone, desperate; she looked worried, welcoming; I followed her inside the pub and told her what I thought had happened. She looked really sorry but didn't blame me for what I had done. She wanted to help. She suggested that I talked to Bou and Cort who had both been back themselves. It was a revelation to me. I didn't know that and I don't think many of us knew it. But it's true that they never talk much about themselves.

So I did what Uma said and called them. They kindly invited me to dinner that evening. I certainly wasn't hungry, the mere thought of food made me sick... but I wanted to talk quietly with them, without rushing them, without being rude, so what's best than a dinner to talk between friends?

Did I just say I didn't want to be rude? Well, that was a complete success! NOT! I'm lucky they are both understanding people or I would have probably lost two dear friends. I had possibly lost already Marie's friendship, or her confidence, by refusing quite unkindly to talk to her. I was really good at spreading mess around me these times! I wish I could hibernate ("summerate"?) while waiting to see if John would come back. Even if I knew there was very little hope. As long as there was still a shadow of a hope, I wanted to keep on hanging to it. For dear life.

I had prepared a bottle of French wine and had planned to stop on my way to my friends' home, to buy flowers for Bou... I forgot everything and arrived, late, of course, at their front door with empty hands, but full of shame when I realized how rude I was! Being the polite and good people they are, they said, Bou said that I needed only to "bring my stomach and company". Well, they both were here, I mean my stomach and company, but both in very poor condition!

It was only the beginning of my pitiful behavior! I could hardly eat, could only drink very little (but, added to what I already had the night before, it was probably too much already), and, as far as talking was concerned... I did even worse. Those dear friends respected my silence. I had kept all this hidden during such a long time, I had shut all my worries down so strongly, and for so long, that it was difficult to express them now. Particularly when I looked at Bou, with her beautiful round belly, beaming in spite of what she had been through lately, and Cort joking and doing his best to hide that his knee and other parts of his wounded body were still hurting. And I was here, bringing in their now peaceful home my personal worries to add to their own? Many times, I was just about to talk to them. I couldn't talk to other friends about the crossing, and SID, of course, even less to Marie. They would all have thought that I was crazy, and they would probably be right. But Bou and Cort... Uma had told me that they both went back... they could help me to understand, and, maybe... maybe even understand what I had done? They were waiting patiently for me to talk, to ask them what they felt I needed to know, not rushing me. They both tried to keep the conversation alive, telling me about the Center, their growing baby, our friends, the pub, avoiding conscientiously to ask any question about John. Poor friends, how could I put them in such a situation?

Cort tried to help me by asking me straight if I wanted to talk about what was bothering me now, or later. I tried to joke, then started to ask hesitantly my question... But, as soon as I did, my cell phone suddenly chirped, making me jump. I usually switch it off when I'm with friends, and, if I ever forget to do so, I don't answer it. But, not being myself this evening, I looked at it eagerly without even thinking, hoping deep inside me that it would be John. But it was not. It was SID.

I couldn't help reading quickly his message before burying shamefully the phone back in my pocket. It said: 

 

 

I was shocked. Not by the message itself, it was so very SID, he was just trying to annoy me and I didn't believe a word of what he was implying about John. My faith in my man is endless and I know he is unable to do anything wrong.  But this message was the confirmation I didn't really need. John was really gone back to his family. I felt mixed feelings again: I was thankful to SID for having made my wish come true, I was happy for John and his family gathered at last, but also, I must admit it, I felt sorry for myself, I felt empty.

I apologized to my friends and tried to hide my feelings from them, saying that it was nothing important. There was no way I could tell them that I was in touch with SID, they would want to protect me while I was the one who threw myself, and even worse, John, into the lion's jaws... and trust him. Who could understand that I had done such a risky thing?

My desire to speak was gone. Bou and Cort could see that I had closed that inner door again. While they were both in the kitchen, I sent a quick answer to SID:

 

 

I felt a little better then, don't really know why. 

 

When they both came back from the kitchen with the dessert (God, this time, I really couldn't swallow anything else, as good as it looked!), Bou took tenderly one of Cort's hands in hers and said quietly:

"You asked us earlier if we regret any of it. I cannot speak for my man, but if I have any I will say that it would be that it was my lack of confidence in our love that set things in motion that could have lost it forever for us. But I don't regret the things we learned about ourselves and each other for having done it."

It touched me. Deeply. Strongly. I thought they had forgotten about my question, or didn't want to answer it, because it was so personal, I would have understood if they had. But more than that, it made me think, it made me wonder. Could it be the same for me? For us? I had a thought for Bou and her children, the pain she must have felt, but didn't dare to word it.

 

I still couldn't talk to them about what happened. Though, they helped me, all along the evening, without even knowing it. Besides Bou's answer to my question, the only one I was able to ask them, in spite of Cort's nice and tactful attempts to put me at ease, it was the way they acted with each other, their smiles, their looks, that made me understand why they came back, and that they both had found what they were looking for. It comforted me, gave me hope back, a little. Maybe have I done the right choice?  Maybe helping John to go back to his past would make things clearer for us both? Anyway, it was done. There was nothing I could change about that. And what would come next would be better or worse, but it would be clearer, for both of us. I think.

I finally reached the top of my rudeness when, later in the evening, feeling secure with those too strong and protective but respectful friends, soothed by the quiet tone of their voices and by the peace emanating from this place and their company, exhausted by the day and the night before, the emotions, the worry... I fell asleep on their sofa. Bou had told me that it was comfortable. It sure was! Too much! If I couldn't express my anxiety, at least, it left me for a while... along with my consciousness.

 

A terrible nightmare awoke me suddenly. It was one of the worst I've ever had. Of course, it involved John. He was lost, he was terrified, he was angry, he was sad... he was in danger. And there was absolutely nothing I could do to help him. I woke up bathed in sweat but shivering with cold. It took me a moment to realize where I was and what I had done. I left noiselessly and shamefully my friends' comfortable and peaceful home very early on the morning, leaving a note on their table, thanking them and asking them to forgive me.

 

I spent the rest of the Sunday in our house, trying first to keep me busy housekeeping. I generally hate it, today it looked like my best friend. But I still could think. I tried to read... reading three times the same page and finally giving up because I still couldn't understand what it was talking about. I tried to watch the TV... there was a hockey game, wonderful! Exactly what I needed!

That was it! I decided that enough was enough! If nothing worked, I had to do something else. That nightmare was still very present in my mind and I absolutely needed to know what was going on with John, or, at least, if he was safe. The rest was not my business, I wanted to let him complete freedom to do what he had to do wherever he was... and with whom. I didn't want to put any pressure on him by contacting him directly, possibly reminding him that I was there, waiting for him, waiting to know, anxiously. Even if I had very little hope he would ever come back to me. But, at least, I needed to know if he was fine.

That's why I didn't try to reach him, I tried to reach SID, hoping he would answer me. He did. And I spent part of my day, hung on my cell phone, reading or typing frantically messages back and forth again. He told me briefly that John was fine, I was relieved, I could have cried. But I didn't.

Then we started to have a strange but fascinating conversation... 

He asked me first a weird question: 

 

 

I didn't even hesitate and wondered why he thought it was such a difficult question. No, I didn't want John to remember me, if he had decided to stay with his family. I wanted him fully happy and he would never be, wherever he was, if he still could think that one of us would need him, miss him. I said that I would be the keeper of our love, cherishing this memory all my life.

Then I understood why he believed that I should have thought better before answering. He said that I didn't love John enough to fight for him. Fight? It made me laugh. Of course I would have fought for him, in other circumstances! But here and now, it was not about fighting. I tried to explain him that, sometimes, it takes more love to let someone go, than to fight for him. I'm not sure he got it, but he seemed to try.

 

He asked me what I would get out of this all. And I tried to explain him, at length, about the gift of loving and being loved, and how, thanks to him, I could live the rest of my life at rest, knowing that the man I love was happy, whole again, living this life he should have never left, the life he deserved to live with his family. At peace.

 

Then we talked about hate, love, our friends, how they were seeing him, what he was seeking. Although he told me he didn't feel hate or love, I still felt kind of a pain inside him, a longing for something he wanted but couldn't find. It made me feel sorry for him. Sincerely. I'm not sure I really understood his motivation, but I tried. I'm still trying.

My fingers were sore from typing, but I was fascinated by this conversation with that strange being. He was right, there is more in him than we usually want to see.

 

At the end of this second day without John, and for the third night without him, I went to bed, exhausted, in that big bed that was almost too small when we were together and were.... hum... having fun, or tenderly loving each other. That big bed looked so big today, way too big for me! And so empty. Just like this lonely life ahead of me, all these years without him... too much time! I used to keep me occupied when he was gone for few days, for work. Of course, I missed him. But I had got used to that and had a life of my own, my friends, my work, my own things to do, no problem. And when he came back home... ah, when he came back home... sigh! But now, it was different. He was not going to come back home. It was not about days anymore, it was about a lifetime. A whole lifetime of grey sky, my sun was gone... Yes, he was gone, but the thought that he was shining somewhere else, brighter than ever, made me feel better. That was what I wanted, didn't I?  I had done all this for that purpose. I had to be happy. Part of me was, really, sincerely. But part of me couldn't help feeling empty.

 

I was tired but couldn't sleep. So, to remind me how happy John was probably now, I put his movie in the DVD player of our bedroom, and started to watch it again. It soothed me, and I finally fell asleep, lulled by his voice. I think the last thing I heard was "We're not beaten! I'm not beaten!"... And, for the second time, I dreamed. Of him. But, this time, it was not a nightmare, this time was very different.

I first felt his presence before I smelt his familiar scent I love so much. It kindled me, made me feel alive again. I felt his big strong hand touch lightly my hair, my uncovered shoulder, as if he didn't dare to touch me. I felt his breath in my neck, and was waiting for the kiss I was craving for, but it didn't come. In my dream, I turned in the bed, to look for him. He was there, looking at me, seated on our bed, his eyes glistening in the moonlight. There was something in his eyes, like a doubt, a hesitation or something. There was no smile on his lips. I held shyly my hand to him, in invitation. He still hesitated, but, after what looked like a long time, finally took it. His touch was first soft, caressing my hand with his thumb, but then, he dragged me to him, almost violently and held me, tight. He was cold, I shivered. He buried his face in my hair. I hold him too, tight, so tight. It felt so real that is was weird. Maybe if I hold him real tight he would never disappear from my dream?... Maybe I would never wake up? Never. Ever.

But I did. The TV was still on. The credits in his movie were running. So that's what had started this dream? And that's what it was? Only a dream? I turned it off and then slid under the blanket. I closed my eyes and willed myself to dream of him again... to hold him tight again, never let him disappear from my dreams, where he lived for me now. 

 

 

JOHN

Just as slowly as awareness