over the years this had become increasingly annoying to her. In college Maura had gravitated toward Pete’s frat-boy, life-of-the-party personality. He had been so like her gregarious father in some ways, always ready to dazzle with a good story or make a self-deprecating remark followed by a perfectly timed punch line. She’d loved the raucousness of him, the spontaneous entertainer side, which was such a nice yin to her quieter yang. After James was born she had tried to lodge a firm protest, expressing her desire for more family time, more attention from him, and she’d even suggested they see a counselor, but Pete had bristled at that. Especially after the birth of Sarah, his simplicity, formulaic life, and unchanged adolescent drinking rituals seemed merely juvenile. Each time she had registered her need for him to change, she’d largely been met with a joking resistance or occasional lip service.
And in the years that followed, Maura had mostly held her tongue about the drinking and gradually about other things as well until she had submerged whole parts of herself from him. She and Pete had lost that easy access to each other’s deeper thoughts and emotions. Part of her wondered if he had even noticed the growing gulf between them. Now in the wake of their son’s death the pace of his drinking seemed to have lurched stealthily forward—a few fingers of vodka refilled at home, the beer bottles piling up in the recycling bin, the sound of a toppled stool as he entered the dark kitchen after his now more frequent evenings out.
It felt as if she and Pete had exhausted all there was to say during the weeklong period that they’d hovered over their son’s hospital bed, taking turns holding his hands and talking to him. In those brief hours they were united by the logistics of fear and grief, alternately bucking the other one up, getting the cafeteria coffee, and quelling each other’s tears with hopeful platitudes.
Maura thought again about Pete’s spontaneous accusation at the hospital. Though he had never said anything more about it, had never raised those questions again in her presence, the guilt hung around her like a shroud.
She knew couples could and did survive losses on all scales, but could theirs? Could it continue when one person was holding back, harboring a secret? She pushed that thought away. She had no interest in rehashing that past or conversely in thinking that far ahead. It took all of her concentration just to stay here in the present. James’s death was so recent, so fresh, right now it was an enormous effort to plant both feet on the floor each morning and haul her reluctant body out of bed. She couldn’t begin to examine the fault lines in her marriage now.
Insomnia was taking its toll, making it difficult for her to focus on simple tasks, let alone think about the future. Lying in bed, Maura would will her mind to fill with imagined scenes of tranquility, empty stretches of beach in California, remote mountains in the Pacific Northwest, waterfalls in Hawaii, vistas both familiar and unvisited. She would force her mind to take refuge in those places. And then when the visual imagery exercises didn’t work, exhausted by grief, Maura would pop a sleeping pill, which brought sweet and almost instant relief, a chloroformed curtain that silenced her mind and snuffed out all dreams. She worried that she was becoming reliant on them to sleep at all. Addicted. She’d begun to wake up at 3:00 A.M. and would often take another half pill just to drift back off.
Last night, Ryan had come into their bed in the middle of the night and she’d woken, groggy from the sleeping pills. She could hear the TV blaring downstairs and assumed Pete had fallen asleep on the couch. It was increasingly becoming a habit.
“I’m scared, Mommy,” Ryan had said. And she could feel the slimness of him, his insubstantiality as he crawled next to her under the covers. His knobby boy knees and limbs were like a
And in the years that followed, Maura had mostly held her tongue about the drinking and gradually about other things as well until she had submerged whole parts of herself from him. She and Pete had lost that easy access to each other’s deeper thoughts and emotions. Part of her wondered if he had even noticed the growing gulf between them. Now in the wake of their son’s death the pace of his drinking seemed to have lurched stealthily forward—a few fingers of vodka refilled at home, the beer bottles piling up in the recycling bin, the sound of a toppled stool as he entered the dark kitchen after his now more frequent evenings out.
It felt as if she and Pete had exhausted all there was to say during the weeklong period that they’d hovered over their son’s hospital bed, taking turns holding his hands and talking to him. In those brief hours they were united by the logistics of fear and grief, alternately bucking the other one up, getting the cafeteria coffee, and quelling each other’s tears with hopeful platitudes.
Maura thought again about Pete’s spontaneous accusation at the hospital. Though he had never said anything more about it, had never raised those questions again in her presence, the guilt hung around her like a shroud.
She knew couples could and did survive losses on all scales, but could theirs? Could it continue when one person was holding back, harboring a secret? She pushed that thought away. She had no interest in rehashing that past or conversely in thinking that far ahead. It took all of her concentration just to stay here in the present. James’s death was so recent, so fresh, right now it was an enormous effort to plant both feet on the floor each morning and haul her reluctant body out of bed. She couldn’t begin to examine the fault lines in her marriage now.
Insomnia was taking its toll, making it difficult for her to focus on simple tasks, let alone think about the future. Lying in bed, Maura would will her mind to fill with imagined scenes of tranquility, empty stretches of beach in California, remote mountains in the Pacific Northwest, waterfalls in Hawaii, vistas both familiar and unvisited. She would force her mind to take refuge in those places. And then when the visual imagery exercises didn’t work, exhausted by grief, Maura would pop a sleeping pill, which brought sweet and almost instant relief, a chloroformed curtain that silenced her mind and snuffed out all dreams. She worried that she was becoming reliant on them to sleep at all. Addicted. She’d begun to wake up at 3:00 A.M. and would often take another half pill just to drift back off.
Last night, Ryan had come into their bed in the middle of the night and she’d woken, groggy from the sleeping pills. She could hear the TV blaring downstairs and assumed Pete had fallen asleep on the couch. It was increasingly becoming a habit.
“I’m scared, Mommy,” Ryan had said. And she could feel the slimness of him, his insubstantiality as he crawled next to her under the covers. His knobby boy knees and limbs were like a
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