Left of Center

I can’t think now, five years later, why I had gone out that night, or what I wore. I only know that I didn’t have my girls, I didn’t want to sit alone in my house, and there was no more cleaning to do, or cleaning that I wanted to do. There was laundry to fold, but I left it in the dryer for tomorrow. This is an old house with creaky wood floors, and the shadows cast by the table lamps and a lack of ceiling light make it feel lonely. The dog was only so much company. My ex-husband had recently left. But he really doesn’t matter much.

I had a beer at home, but drinking in the shadows of a living room, in the glow of a TV, or in the desolation of a porch alone on a wicker loveseat with only crickets, doesn’t taste like it does with the life of human company. Not in despair, anyway. So I got in my car and drove to town, not at all drunk, but very mindful of the double-yellow line that is sometimes dotted. Watchful for deer and vigilant of other careless drivers because my mom had said a few days before that someone went left of center and killed someone I went to high school with. I couldn’t remember her so well, and I didn’t go to the funeral, but someone else had put a cross alongside the road and I felt sad seeing it.

I picked a bar at random. It was one of those that were in a large old brick building that was probably once a bank. There were luxury apartments on top up a few flights of white-painted wood stairs. I parked behind the bar in a neighboring bank parking lot and I smoked a cigarette, contemplating whether to stay or go home. I didn’t like going to a bar alone, and never thought I would. I watched the people on the small back patio smile and laugh. I could hear them with my window down, a collection of their voices, without distinct words. They were laughing, fogged in cigarette smoke through which a haze of yellow light cast upon their faces, making them look to be of another race. A happy race of people, however drunk and delusional.

I looked at myself in the mirror, fixed my makeup and put on lipstick for what it was worth. I took a deep breath and got out of the car. I walked across the parking lot like Jesus on Galilee, not arrogantly, only in my desire to be holier than I felt. Or just to feel whole again. To not be crucified in sorrow for another night. My shoes clicked across the parking lot so loudly that some of the yellow-faced people on the patio turned their heads and I felt their eyes upon me, and I felt something like a lamb walking amongst patient and deliberate wolves, but I said fuck them to myself and kept my eyes on the door. I wasn’t nervous, but behind that solid metal door painted a dreary shade of orange, was another world. I thought I could just have a few to take the edge off. To miss the girls a little less, to heal what was broken, or to at least numb it. To fill metaphoric holes. Maybe I would run across someone I knew from high school. A happy face goes a long way in a sad heart. Maybe I would have a good conversation or two. I never wanted to be here, away from my girls and divorcing, but life wasn’t interested in my plans, it seemed. And so, neither as a victim or a survivor, as nothing but another lonely soul thirsty for a drink, I went inside.

Loud music gushed out the door. The band on the stage to my immediate right played “Ring of Fire.” The brightness of a security light and the yellow lightbulb of the smoker’s patio died in the quick darkness of the barroom, and it took my eyes a moment to adjust to find an open seat by the bar. I ordered a Miller Lite and an impatient but benign wolf sat next to me and talked about something or other the awkward way someone speaks to a girl who is alone, trying desperately not to be too creepy and ignoring all signals I could give that I was not interested in him. I didn’t try to hear him over the music, I simply smiled and nodded my head periodically because he seemed harmless enough and I didn’t want to be rude over nothing. I looked around and didn’t see anyone I knew, but then to my left, there he sat, two or three empty barstools and a plastic trash can down, as alone as me. My excuse to look over at him was the barmaids throwing glass bottles in the trash. I would look down then up at him, and once in a while our eyes met over the sound of breaking glass.

I don’t know what I did first after I noticed him. I ordered another drink when I had just thought to leave. I waited for him to say something, anything, but he just sat there with a kind of easiness about him, a soft smile now and then all the while watching the band as though he were enraptured by cheap covers of a biker band. He looked peaceful, the kind of calm I hadn’t known in a long while. He looked over at me once or twice. I know because I caught him out of the corner of my eye, yet he did not approach me. Perhaps, he was just one of those patient wolves, but he didn’t seem like it. He seemed like no one I had ever met before. I finally said, “Hello, I’m Nikki.” And he said, “Hi, I’m George.” We shook hands. I noticed his eyes first. His dimples second. His smile third. He said he had thought I was with the guy next to me, the benign impatient wolf, and I said, “Hell, no,” and laughed.

His eyes were a door that opened and I saw through them life. Even in the dark barroom they were slate blue and I felt alive looking at him. I guess I never really asked myself then why he was there by himself, or what else was in his eyes besides peace, and why he hadn’t said something to me first. Nothing seemed to matter because in the moment I was reckless. We talked and later left the bar together and I asked him if he intended to kill me and he laughed and said that is a silly question to ask a killer, and if I expected such honesty from a stranger. I smoked a cigarette as we stood outside his car, and he assured me he did not intend to kill me, implored me to come, and that was enough for me. What was love at first sight, I asked myself on the ride to his apartment, sure he might kill me. Two imperfect perfect people, in the same emotional condition, in the same place in the universe, at the same exact time. A chance encounter. A perfect storm of circumstances and the eventual calm. Blue eyes in a dim barroom and going home with a stranger so not to go home alone, again. A beautiful stranger, a new door to another room with a view. A better view. And hopefully, a light that never goes out.

We made love that night, I will never tell my mother. We made love every time we met. When he came to my house it was filled with light, and shadows became romantic mood lighting and we sat many a night on the porch with a bottle of different wine and the crickets were a symphony, and laundry hardly ever got folded but for when he worked and I didn’t. There were always flowers in my vase. We were madly in love. 

But when his father got sick, he changed and we separated because the thought in me was that he didn’t love me the way I did him because I didn’t know what was changing in him, or regressing. A few months later, when his father died, I learned of it from a friend of his and I went over one night very late and we got back together and lived five years together. We have a beautiful little girl. And though for the most part, our relationship was filled with love, at times he got depressed and at times I wondered why. He left when I found out about the other girl, some meaningless girl, the reason he was depressed was due to the subsequent shame from giving her more than she ever deserved. He had no reason to, that I could understand, that he could explain, but he begged me to stay and I let him because I loved him though the life was fading from his eyes and the shadows in the house became lonely again.

It made no sense at all. None. Only that maybe he wished to destroy what was beautiful in our life. He said, one drink is too much and a thousand is too little. I didn’t understand at the time what he meant, only that it goes back to holes and abandonment and child psychology. A few months later, he said he got a message from God and changed his life. It was a song. Then a sign on the back of a semi-trailer. Then a letter-board at a church that said, “Will the path you’re on lead you home?” And a cloth that said “Look what I am making new again.” What was empty in him, was again whole. He apologized repeatedly, but apologies are only worth something when they are wanted, when their currency is valued. We went to church and they talked about forgiveness and he would hold my hand and I would cry without tears. I was all out of tears. It seemed as though he took his God from what had been in me and I was left empty. He was still polite, was still sweet to me and the girls, and he would lay next to me in bed and I could tell he wanted to make love, or to say something, but I couldn’t make love again the way we once did for I obsessed in the thought of what he had done. And I didn’t want to listen anymore. For a while, I was able to love him, but it passed in me and all I could think of is what he had done to me. I couldn’t think what he had done to himself. He had, in fact, killed something in me, thus, he was a killer after all. 

He said he wanted to go back in time and meet me again for the first time. He wrote poems and stories to me that I didn't always read. Letters he would leave me. Messages on a bathroom mirror. Flowers continued to fill my vase. He prayed to God he could go back. He said how it would have been different if so. How he wished God had come to him before we met. But had anything been different, we wouldn’t have met at all. Had my ex not left, had I not felt lonely, had he not decided to come, had the table lamps not cast shadows. The Lord works in mysterious ways. He patches holes in hearts. He gives and He takes away. He gives us signs sometimes when we ask, though he doesn’t always answer when we pray. But despite it all, I couldn’t forgive. I couldn’t patch what he had done in me and instead of peace in his eyes, I only saw other women. Meaningless people that should never have existed in our universe.

He moved out for the last time in February. After a while we stopped talking other than to pick up or drop off our daughter who seemed like the last common bond between us. Occasionally, he would look at me the way he did once, but he wouldn’t say anything. And occasionally, I would catch a tear in his eye when I picked our daughter up, but he would turn and walk back to his apartment. He stopped asking to come back and there were fewer and fewer messages saying he loved me and that we should be together. What was once so plentiful, seemed nearly extinct. 

I dated a few others, and was sure he had as well, though not certain. But there wasn’t that same life in them, that energy, but since they hadn’t betrayed me they were invited and given my time until I realized I didn’t love them, or they didn’t particularly care for my kids the way he did, or love me the same way, if at all. At night in bed with other men there was something missing in me. I thought to text him. To say, Come Home. I felt bad for thinking it. A few more months passed, and he stopped messaging me altogether and less and less I felt that I would ever know that feeling again. But my anger against him kept me trying to feel something out of nothing with others. Making love in my bed to another, then another, like someone at a factory testing parts for automobiles, hoping that this one would fit and replace the feeling and the laughter and love I once knew so well. But no matter how many nights, no matter who came and went, nothing came and went with them. And it seemed I was in some kind of purgatory and love was a lost cause. A rowboat with a gaping hole.

In part, I couldn’t ask him to come home because what would people think of me? I told myself all along that a leopard can’t change his spots, that the past is the best indicator of the future, and all that garbage they tell you as though every person in the world is exactly the same and no one is capable of change. It is those without God who say those things. Those that do not know the power and glory of Jesus Christ and what God can do to a human soul. They might say they are Christian, but when it comes down to it, they aren’t. I went back to church. I sat in services with my sister and began going regularly and it seemed there were more sermons on forgiveness than I ever remember.

A short while later, I forgave him for what he had done and started to understand that he did it because he was not whole, he was not with God, and there was the same void in him that I felt after he left. A void carved in him a long time ago when he was just a boy. I didn’t know him then, but I love him then because when you love, you love the entirety of someone from birth to death or else you are simply infatuated. And I understood what he had told me when he said that I helped him. I helped him find love, to see the light, and understand the true sorrow of betrayal, which led him directly to God. People don’t give enough thought to where people come from, or what is dark in them. They don’t care to be someone else’s light, so long as their own lantern is lit. We only seek a person for how they will benefit us, not how we can benefit them. Not how we can help to make them whole, but always in how they can help to make us whole. Love is both, or it is not. It is both helping someone, and receiving their help in kind. It isn’t blue eyes, or a dimple, or sex. It is understanding what lies behind them and deeper in the heart and being the light of someone’s body and soul.

I thought to send him that text again, but wasn’t sure how it would be received. So it remained unsent for further contemplation. But this evening, around 8pm on a Tuesday, I got a text from him and the messages are as follows:

Him: I was in an accident.
Me: Are you okay?
Him: Yes. I totaled the car.
Me: Oh, no! You loved that car!
Him: There are more important things.
Me: You LOVED that car!!
Him: I love you.
(1 minute lapse)
Me: I love you, too.
Him: Thank you.
Me: For what.
Him: For saying it. I always wondered. I always wanted to hear it.
Me: How did you wreck?
Him: Truck went left of center.
Me: My God!!!
Him: I am sorry.
Me: For what?!
Him: Messing it all up. Being in the dark.
Me: I forgave you. I am in Church now, George.
Him: That makes me happy.
Me: Me too!
(2 minute lapse)
Me: Do you need me to come get you?
(2 minute lapse)
Me: Hey, do you need a ride?
Him: No. I don’t.
Me: Well, I am coming anyway. Where are you?
(3 minute lapse)
Me: Where are you? Getting ready to leave...
Him: No. Stay home. Please. Thank you for being the light.
Me: I am coming...
(2 minute lapse)
Me: Where are you, George???
Him: I am at the bar.
Me: What bar?
Him: Our bar. The orange bar.
Me: Um. Are you serious??? What about the accident? Are you okay?
Him: Give her a kiss for me. You as well, beautiful lady.
Me: Where are you??
Him: You are here at the bar with me. You just walked in. Ring of Fire. That creepy guy is talking to you and you have looked at me twice already. Have to go or else I might ruin it.

I dropped the girls off at my mom’s an drove into town. He hadn’t texted back, yet. I texted a few more times asking where he was. Ten minutes later, I pulled into the bar where we had met. There was one guy on the patio smoking and looking at me. The yellow lightbulb was now green. There was no cover band on stage. No Ring of Fire. I went to the side of the bar where we met and sat down. Put my purse on the counter. Drank a beer. Maybe he was in the bathroom. Or maybe he had left. I thought he might have had a concussion or something, but surely he would text me back.

Me: Where are you???
Him: You’re smoking a cigarette. We’re going to my place. I love you.
Me: Where are you???

I drank half the beer and left. I tried calling him, but it went to voicemail. I don’t know why I didn’t call before. I tried again. Again to voicemail. It was foggy driving back home. I went a different way. The high-beams made it worse. There was a trail of taillights ahead. A row of stopped cars. I knew instantly this was where he had wrecked. I pulled off and put on my hazards and got out of the car and ran up the long line of cars. I could see his car crumpled and torn apart, worse than I had imagined. You could hardly tell it was even a car. The truck that had gone left of center was a semi. Two ambulances were parked catawampus and police cruisers blocked the road. Flares hissed against the black asphalt. An officer grabbed me before I got to what was left of his car. Where is he? I asked. That’s my boyfriend! I must have screamed it a thousand times because the cop grabbed and held me and tried to calm me down the way a father would. All I can remember is him saying Shhh! and the sound of those road flares burning against the road and the lights of the ambulances that twirled and played across the officers and paramedics faces. Where is he? I cried. Where is he? Is he okay? No one said anything.

I don’t know what happened just then. I was taken to the hospital in a police cruiser which trailed the ambulance. The ambulance didn’t drive fast, but its lights were still on. The phone was in my lap and I read over our messages again. He must have gone unconscious after he sent the last one. I called my mom. I called my sister. The ambulance wasn’t going fast enough. Maybe it was because of the fog.

In the hospital they ushered me into a room where I was by myself for a short while. They offered me coffee or soda. His mom was on her way, but she would be sedated and told later what happened. I suppose I knew he was gone when the chaplain came into the room with a Bible in his large hands. The way he took a breath when he sat down. I stared at his hands. He said “your boyfriend died instantly and suffered no pain” as calmly as that could ever be said, almost in a whisper. I didn’t think of it at first, but I said, no, no, he texted me! He said it wasn’t possible. And I said to look at my phone. But my phone had died so I couldn’t show him. He didn’t die instantly, I yelled, he texted me after and told me! He gave up the argument. His weary eyes accused me of suffering some form of delirium. A nurse came in and at first I was hostile. I argued with all of them. I broke down and they took me to a room and gave me what they called a mild sedative, which they said was equivalent to a glass of brandy. It’s the least we could do, someone said. They said a lot of things they always say to people. They say them practically every night. I don’t know who was in and out of the room until my mom came with the girls. Then I got myself together, for their sake, and we all went home.

I spent a day in bed. My vase was empty. Long shadows were cast across the rooms. The dog slept in his kennel. I folded laundry and took the recyclables out that night and the sound of the breaking glass bottles reminded me of the night we met, which gave me cause to look over towards him. I looked over this time, but he wasn’t there. I went back to bed and turned on my phone and there were the messages the chaplain said couldn’t possibly be. The police report said the same. Died upon impact. I didn’t show anyone the messages. I didn’t need to, nor did I want to argue. Whatever had happened was between me, him, and God. No one else. I kept them for myself. Wrote them out along with this account in a notebook. I put a picture of us in the front. Maybe when our daughter is older I will share them with her. The love was all that mattered. All that remained and it fills my heart.

I looked over our pictures. I logged into my old Facebook account I hadn’t been in for years to check his Facebook page to see what I had missed. It said he was last active 2 days ago, which made me cry tears I didn’t think I had left. There was a history of posts about love. Pictures of us and our daughter. There were 312 messages to me that I had never read. Love letters. Pictures of cute animals. Things he knew I wouldn’t see but sent anyway. His last post was the song “Three Little Birds” by Bob Marley. It was his first sign from God, he had told me years ago. I listened to it a hundred times that night before the sedative kicked in and I could sleep. Don’t worry. About a Thing. Every little thing. Is going to be alright. 

He gave me God back. He had killed me, but revived me again. He was my light that never went out. And before I put my phone down and fell asleep, I sent him one last text.

Come Home.