Anywhere With You (15 page)

Jack

What are the odds?

Perhaps I’m stupid. Or maybe, I’m just slow, but The Grand Canyon was the first place during our trip together I’d realized that Amelie and I weren’t going to get our happy ending. In a sense, I think I’d known it all along. But this was the first time I really felt it down in my bones.

We were sitting in the Jeep staring out at the low clouds that had filled the canyon. We’d driven all this way and there was nothing to see—but thick white clouds blocking the entire reason for our visit

“What are the odds?” Amelie asked, her tone conveying that she was clearly trying to cheer me up. “We go to the desert and it rains. We come to The Grand Canyon and it’s filled with clouds. We have interesting luck…”

I liked it when she used the word ‘we.’ “Yes, our timing tends to be a bit off.”

She looked at me, took a deep breath, and then shifted in her seat to face me. I watched as she folded her feet underneath her. “We could give the tourist’s another show…”

“We could…” I replied.

Amelie swallowed. “There’s something I need to tell you.”

I wasn’t in the mood. I turned my attention to the windshield and watched the raindrops spatter it, one by one. “I hate it when you say those words. It never turns out to be anything good.”

“I know.”

I refused to look at her.

“Jack?”

“Hm?” I muttered, still unable to look her way.

“I did what you said,” she told me, before she took a deep breath and let it out. “I requested a transfer and I got it.”

I could tell by her tone that this wasn’t good news. Also, that it had nothing to do with me. And yet maybe everything.

“They’re sending me to Australia.”

I looked at her then. “Australia?”

She gulped. “Yes.”

“Well, that’s about as far as you could get.” I huffed, once again, shifting away.

“Yes, I know. But it’s an assignment I need to take.”

“I’m sure it is…”

“It’s not like I’ll get another opportunity like this—”

“How long?” I demanded cutting her off.

“Eighteen months.”

I shook my head. “No, I meant how long have you known?”

She considered the question for a moment before answering. “Since Telluride.”

I pursed my lips. “Telluride was five hundred miles ago.”

“I didn’t—I don’t want to ruin our trip.”

“And yet.”

“I wasn’t expecting this, Jack,” she said and her voice broke.

We sat in silence staring out opposite windows for several minutes.

“You could come with me.”

“I can’t,” I told her.

“Why not?”

“Because after Australia, it would just be somewhere else.”

“Would that be so bad?”

“Yes, Amelie. Yes, it would. I have plans here. I have a life here.”

She sat quietly for a moment and then she uttered the words that would haunt me for longer than I cared to admit. “I understand. And I hope you will, too.

It would take a long time before I would come to terms with her leaving again. Eventually, I would understand. In the meantime, I just played pretend.

Thankfully, for a few perfect moments, the clouds parted and then cleared just well enough for us to get a look at the Grand Canyon—and snap a few photos in the process. Looking back, those photos would forever signify the magnitude of what it meant to wait something out.

Having gotten our fill of the expanse of the Canyon, Amelie requested that we head down to Sedona. Along the way, she and I both seemed to tread carefully, putting our best effort forward, tiptoeing around minefields at the expense of what really needed to be said. We kept things light.

We arrived in Sedona just before sunset, and instead of checking into our hotel, we decided to drive around as Amelie desperately wanted to find the perfect spot to take photos of the setting sun.

“I thought we were going to camp,” she murmured, staring into her camera lens as she pointed it out the passenger side window. “You bought all of that stuff.” She sighed, as she lowered her camera and glanced toward the back seat. “And we haven’t even camped.”

“Yeah,” I said flatly, “I changed my mind.”

She shook her head slowly, her eyes on my face, reading me. “What a waste,” she said.

“You have no idea,” I told her.

I waited for a response, but instead, I watched as she changed out her lens, climbed out of the car, trekked up the embankment, and shut me out.

Dear Jack,

I’ve stopped all medication. The doctors have said they couldn’t give me a definite timeline of how long I’ve got, even with the medication—but I know it likely won’t be long. Honestly, it never would’ve been long enough, anyhow. I haven’t told your father I’m not taking my meds. He would be livid, and sometimes, in life, and I guess in my case in death, you have to do what’s right for yourself even if it’s not right for those you love.

I understand that your dad wants me to continue to fight this. And I understand why. But what I’ve done this past year and a half one could hardly call living. I’m a prisoner, trapped inside a very weak and frail body, and I simply refuse to go on like this. It’s incredibly hard to explain—but the best I can come up with is one morning, the morning I decided I’d had enough, was the same morning I had an epiphany of sorts. I realized, in my current state, I’m too small for this life. There are so many things that I want to hang around and see—namely you—as you grow up, but I can’t go on like this. I watch your little face as I suffer, and I know it isn’t right. A boy should not have to watch his mother fade away into nothingness. A husband should not have to put his dreams aside to care for a frail and hopeless wife. You both deserve so much better—even if you’re unwilling to admit it. I want to see you out there, outside playing baseball or hide-n-seek with your friends. Not in here as you are now, sitting beside your bedridden mother. It’s not fair to you. And as for your father, he needs to find love again. Someone who’s his equal. Because that’s what he deserves.

Many will say my throwing in the towel was selfish and cowardly. But I can assure you, it is not. Giving up is the most unselfish thing I’ve done in all my life.

As time goes on, and you become a man, I hope that you will fight like hell for what you want. But if there comes a time, where doing so means giving more—or getting less than you deserve, then I hope you’ll think of me. And I hope you’ll understand.

Love,

Mom

I read her words as I waited for Amelie to get back to the car. She’d trekked further up a hill, and I could just barely make out the faint outline from where she was perched trying to get the shot, as she’d put it. By the time she’d finished up, and made her way back to the car, I was sobbing. Startled by my state, Amelie stopped halfway inside the door and paused for a moment before slowly climbing in. Once she’d closed the door, she adjusted herself in her seat and then placed her hand on mine. “I’m sorry, Jack.” I looked over at her and then away. I don’t even think she knew what she was apologizing for, but the words she chose seemed to be the only ones appropriate for the situation.

I gazed out the window and considered how breathtakingly beautiful Sedona was despite the fact that the world around me was falling apart as I knew it. I missed my father immensely, even though our relationship had often been complicated. Through my mother’s words, I’d come to see him in a new light. And there’s something about losing a person forever that paints a different image in your mind. Their lingering absence clarifies the future and puts the past into perspective. One you couldn’t have known before.

In spite of the fact that it’s hard for one to see beauty when one is in so much pain, I sensed that Sedona was a spiritual place. It seemed to me to be the kind of place one goes either to heal or to find themselves again—maybe a little bit of both. I realized then that whenever I thought back on this trip in the future, Sedona would be one of the places that would always stand out most for me. Of all the places that we had stopped along the way, it turned out to be one of my favorites, second only to Telluride. Aside from everything else that took place, the landscape there was like nothing I’d ever seen. The colors—the reds and the purples more vibrant than I could have imagined. Not to mention, in all of the photos I’d seen over the years—not a one of them had done justice to the actual thing.

I looked over at Amelie then and wondered about the photos she’d taken. As I studied her face, I could see that she had been watching me—trying to discern exactly what to say. I was grateful when she said nothing.

In the middle of dinner, my phone rang. It was Jane, and this happened to be the third time she had tried to reach me that day alone—and for some reason, instead of once again sending it to voicemail, I decided to take the call. I answered, placing the phone on mute as I exited the restaurant.

Once outside, I perched myself against a column and pressed the mute button to turn it off.

“Hey, Jane, what’s up?”

I could hear the hesitancy in her, even before she spoke. “Jack.”

“Hello?”

There was a short pause. “I’m here,” she said, her voice muffled and underwater. It sounded as though she were underwater—somewhere far off. “Listen, I don’t remember when you said you were going to be back in Austin…”

I don’t know why I said what I said when I said it. I hadn’t even fully thought the idea through myself—at the time, it was just an inkling I had—something I thought I might want to do. If nothing else—it seemed to be a short-term solution to what seemed to be a long-term problem. “Um…I’m not sure. I don’t think I’m planning on coming back just right away.”

“Really?” she asked her tone conveying surprise and something else.

I sighed, all of a sudden very anxious to end the call. “Yeah, I’m thinking about moving to Colorado for a bit.”

“Oh,” she said, her tone flat. I heard her inhale sharply and then let it out. “Well, in that case, I guess I shouldn’t beat around the bush…” Her words came out all jumbled together, fast, as though she hadn’t quite thought them through. “I’d wanted to tell you in person, but given the circumstances…well… I guess I should just say it… I’m pregnant, Jack.”