Never Look Away

I nodded hello as I got out of the Accord and headed for the door. “How’s it going, Lea

“Be a lot better if Lyall ever turns up,” she said. Lea

“No wheels today?” I asked. There was usually an old blue Ford Explorer parked next to Jan’s Jetta any time I drove by.

“Lyall’s clunker’s in the shop, so he borrowed mine,” she said. “I don’t know where the hell he is. Was supposed to be here half an hour ago.” She shook her head and rolled her eyes. “Honest to God.”

I offered up an awkward smile, then pulled on the office door handle, a cool blast of A/C hitting me as I went inside.

Jan was turning off her computer and slinging her purse over her shoulder.

“Lea

Jan said, “Tell me about it.”

We both happened to look out the window at the same time. Lea

Instead of getting in the passenger side, Lea

Lyall slithered out of the driver’s seat. He was almost bald and heavy-set, and his tank top afforded us a generous glimpse of his armpits. He slunk around the front of the Explorer, Lea

“Must be fun to be him,” I said as Lyall opened the passenger door and got in.

“I don’t know why she stays with him,” Jan said. “All she does is bitch about him. But you know, I think she actually loves the loser.”

Lea

Gina showed Jan and me to our table. Her restaurant had about twenty tables, but it was early and only three of them were taken.

“Mr. Harwood, Mrs. Harwood, so nice to see you again,” she said. Gina was a plump woman in her sixties whose eatery was a legend in the Promise Falls area. She, and she alone, possessed the recipe to the magical tomato sauce that accompanied most of the dishes. I hoped it was written down someplace, just in case.

“When did you tell your parents we’d be coming for Ethan?” Jan asked around the time we got our minestrone.

“Between eight and nine.”

She had her spoon in her right hand, and as she reached with her left for the salt her sleeve slipped back an inch, revealing something white wrapped about her left wrist.

“They’re really good with him,” she said.

That seemed something of a concession, given how she’d been talking about my parents only the other day.

“They are,” I said. It looked like a bandage wrapped around her wrist.

“Your mom’s in good shape. She still has lots of energy,” Jan said. “She’s, you know, youthful for her age.”

“My dad’s pretty good, too, except for being a bit, you know, insane.”

Jan didn’t say anything for a moment. Then, “It’s good to know that if something… if something happened to me-or to you-they’d be able to help out a lot.”

“What are you talking about, Jan?”

“It’s just good to have things in place, that’s all.”

“Nothing’s going to happen to you or to me,” I said. “What’s that on your wrist?”

She left her spoon in the bowl and pulled her sleeve down. “It’s nothing,” she said.

“It looks like a bandage.”

“I just nicked myself,” she said.

“Let me see.”

“There’s nothing to see,” she said. But I had reached across the table, taken hold of her hand, and pushed the sleeve up myself. The bandage was about an inch wide and went completely around her wrist.

“Jesus, Jan, what did you do?”

She yanked her arm away. “Let go of me!” she said, loud enough to make the people at the other tables, and Gina by the front door, glance our way.

“Fine,” I said quietly, taking my hand back. Keeping my voice low, I said, “Just tell me what happened.”

“I was cutting some vegetables for Ethan and the knife slipped,” she said. “Simple as that.”

I could see injuring your finger while cutting up carrots, but how did a knife jump up and get your wrist?

“Just drop it,” Jan said. “It’s not… what it looks like. I swear, it was totally an accident.”

“Jesus, Jan,” I said, shaking my head. “These days, lately, I don’t know… I’m worried sick about you.”

“You don’t have to be concerned,” she said curtly and studied her soup.

“But I am.” I swallowed. “I love you.”

Twice she started to speak and then stopped. Finally, she said, “I think, sometimes, it would be easier for you if you didn’t have both of us to worry about. If it was just you and Ethan.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

Jan didn’t say anything.

I was frantic with concern, but there was anger, too, creeping into my voice. “Jan, answer me honestly here. What kind of thoughts are going through your head lately? Are you having-I don’t know how to put this-self-destructive thoughts?”

She kept looking at the soup, even though she wasn’t eating it. “I don’t know.”

I had this feeling that we had reached a moment. One of those moments in your life when you feel the ground moving beneath you. Like when someone calls and says a loved one has been rushed to the hospital. When you get called in by the boss and told they won’t be needing you anymore. Or you’re in a doctor’s office, and he’s looking at your chart, and he says you should sit down.

You’re finding out something that’s going to make everything that happens from here on different from everything that has gone before.

My wife is ill, I thought. Something’s happened to her. Something’s come undone. Something’s wrong with the circuitry.

“You don’t know,” I said. “So you might be thinking about hurting yourself in some way.”

Her eyes seemed to nod.

“How long have you been having thoughts like this?”

Jan’s lips went out, then in, as she considered the question. “A week or so. These thoughts come in, and I don’t know why they’re there, and I can’t seem to get rid of them. But I feel I’m this huge burden to you.”

“That’s ridiculous. You’re everything to me.”

“I know I’m a drag on you, like an anchor.”

“That’s crazy.” I immediately regretted my choice of word. “Look, if you’ve been feeling this way a week or so… what’s brought this on? Has something happened? Something you haven’t told me about?”

“No, nothing,” she said unconvincingly.

“Has something happened at work?” After seeing Lea

“She’s… she’s always been hard to deal with, but I’ve learned to cope,” Jan said. “I can’t really explain it. I just started feeling this way. Feeling that I’m a burden, that I have no purpose.”

“That’s ridiculous,” I said. “You know what I think? I think maybe you need to talk to-”

“I don’t want to hear this,” Jan said.

“But if you just talked-”

“What, so they could put me away? Lock me up in some loony bin?”

“For God’s sake, Jan. Now you’re just being paranoid.” And again, I managed to pick a word I really should have avoided.