Rain part 10.

Rain part 10.

Anne walked back through the kitchen and walked out from the mudroom door. She made a left, rounded the backside of the  house which brought her to stand outside of her bedroom window. Across  the wet grass on the edge of the property line stood the young, tall and still very wet maple tree Jack had planted for her. A lanky teenager of a tree. 

      

*****

When their frenzied energies  were finally all spent inside Jack’s pick-up truck that afternoon, Anne found herself fully clothed, well almost, straddled on top of a man she had only met the day before and she didn't have the tiniest inkling what her next step would or should be except….except her very strong desire to die or magically disappeared like the fog. The fog! It was….gone! Through the fog-free back window of the cab of the truck, Anne could see the mouth of the alley clearly. Oh….

      In her haste to dismount from her position atop Jack, Anne bumped her head against the cab’s roof and her right foot  got caught in  the stirring wheel. 

      “ Anne, are you alright?” Jack use one arm to steady  her while using the other to free her right foot. 

      “ The fog Jack, it’s…. gone.” she said, avoiding Jack’s eyes. She knew her face was turning as red as a cooked lobster. “People…. can see us. “ 

      “ I don't mind.” Jack said calmly. 

      “ People see us. People say something. People talk. People judge. People….” 

     Anne couldn't finish her rambling, Jack used his both hands to hold her face and forced her to look at him. Their eyes met. His eyes looked at her solemnly. Anne thought he would kiss her while telling her how those people didn't matter to them. But she was wrong on both counts: Jack didn't kiss her or tell her anything, he asked a question instead. 

     “ The people you talk about…are they from this earth….or people from the alien-spaceship? “ 

     What….?

    The corner of Jack’s mouth made a slight upturn, the beginning of a smile. Anne couldn't help but to smile back. Jack was smiling too. Then, with ease, he helped her get off of  him and gently deposited her on the seat next to him. He straightened his clothing. Following his example, Anne did the same thing. 

     “Are you alright? “ he asked. Anne nodded her head. Then just then, Jack leaned into her and kissed her. “ If you need to talk about what happened, I’m here.” 

     There were so many emotions, so many words Anne wanted to say but she didn't know how, but when she looked into Jack’s eyes, she felt how unnecessary her words would be. Jack understood it all. Jack somehow had that connection with her. 

    They continued their affair through out the rest of the hurricane season that year. The time Anne finally able to make that trip to tell her parent how happy she was although her marriage to Thomas had fallen apart, she did mean it. She was happy. Very happy with Jack. 

      She always had been someone’s good daughter, wife or mother. But with Jack, she could be just a person. Jack never asked her to be anything but to be herself.

       If she wanted  to have a spaghetti sandwiches with a load of pickles, she could make and eat them. No comment from Mr. Jack River, who was seated across the table from her and  ate his spaghetti with a fork twirled on a spoon. 

       If she had the urge to express herself by painting orange elephants  and green-skin men as their handlers,  Jack would say how original and beautiful her colors were. 

      If she didn't want to do anything but lay in bed totally unkept, Jack had let her be or climbed to bed to keep her company. 

      Those were the happiest months of her life. But of course, they never mean to last. A few days before Thanksgiving Day, Thomas had returned home. The Miss. Nathalie Something or Other had bored him. 

******

Thomas Sutton, no doubt was a savvy businessman and political maneuvered, but he was at his savviest as a general who only goes to war when he absolutely, positively know, he will emerge as the victor.

     Thomas return home to his wife with a complete arsenal to win her back. A team of interior decorators were hired to decorate the house for Thanksgiving’s celebration.  He talked to their youngest son’s school master, to let the boy come  home a week earlier than the other students. He bought countless gifts for their two daughters who would be home from colleges. He bought a whole set of jewelry for Anne. They sparkled expensively in their black velvety boxes like the stars on a clear sky, so many and so brilliant. And for a sure win, Thomas had invited Anne’s parent to stay with them  during the holiday, from Thanksgiving to Christmas. 

     Anne  couldn't argue with her husband when her  children within ear shot. The children were happy to see their parent back together, how could she disappoint them? Look how sorry their daddy was, they could see it from the lavish gifts. And how could she hurt her parent by rejecting being a wife again. Even if it meant being the wife of a husband who had left her for a younger woman far too often. At least she could again claim her place as a married woman, a respected position. That was her parent’s belief.

      By Valentine Day in  the next year, Thomas had found someone new but their oldest daughter had lost her first love, so it was Anne’s duty to be there for her daughter. Then that summer, Thomas’ only sibling and her family perished in a plane crash somewhere in Montana. And that tragedy was followed by her father-in-law suffering a series of stroke. Anne couldn't leave. Her duty to put her family above her own needs was her life. But, in the special place in her heart, where happy memories and hope and childhood wishes were stored, there was Jack. 

        She followed his whereabouts through the website for his volunteer work. Jack and his selected crew did a lot of volunteer works, cleaning up then rebuilding devastated communities across the country. Volunteer works needed lots of volunteers, the website was set up to register those temporary volunteers. When the next hurricane season approached, Anne decided to follow the hurricane to find her Jack. 

    

     

      

     

 

Rain part 9a of 16.

Rain part 9a of 16.

Anne left the bedroom and called for Moose. And as always, the tan colored, one hundred and twenty pounds mutt whose head almost reached Anne’s chest while she stood on all fours, bounded to her in a heart-beat. Moose was a full-grown dog, but acted more like a restless puppy. Her tail excitedly wagged side to side. Her brown eyes looked at Anne with full anticipation. While she nuzzled her nose into Anne’s side, the big dog saw Thomas standing in the back ground. Her tail stopped wagging for a brief moment.

     That morning, Jack had dropped Moose off at the groomer in town who was also offered boarding service. Jack was supposed to be going to  California for a couple of weeks. So, Moose wasn’t there when Jack was murdered. But somehow the dog’s love for his master giving her the extra sense to recognize her  master’s murderer. In the two years that Moose had stayed with the Sutton’s, she never showed aggressive behavior toward Thomas, but she definitely kept her guarded distance from the man.

     Moose returned her focus back to her mistress. Her tail wagged faster, her tongue lolled out.

      “ You’re ready to go outside, aren’t you Moose?” Anne ruffled the dog head. Moose was  such a beautiful dog of mixed breed, a face like Labrador, a body as big and tall as a Great Dane and a thick  coat like a husky.  Jack had adopted her during one of his trip to help clean up a community devastated by tornado in Oklahoma. In the two weeks Jack was there, the ownerless-dog had followed him wherever he went. 

      “ We’re off.” Anne told her husband. 

      By then Moose had bounced to the mudroom door by the kitchen. Her red leash was hanging on the peg by the door. Anne slipped off her house slippers, then put on her walking boots. “ The rain dampened your day, didn’t it, Moose?”

      Moose’s desire to spend time outside was palpable through her excited behavior, circling her own self in anticipation. Her nail clicked against the mudroom’ tiled floor. 

      Anne picked up the leash and reached out for Moose’s collar and then opened the door. For a second, Moose hesitated to take that first step through the door as thought she sensed something was not right. Her brown eyes looked up at her mistress. Anne patted the dog’s back, giving her the assurance she needed, and the dog immediately took off.  She  ran outside without a backward glance like a kindergartener during recess time, leaving her red leash lying limp on the floor. Anne stared at the leash; she had taken the first step in her game. 

*****

“ You don't have to do this.” Through the open mudroom door, the slightly cooler August  air with its mixed of earthy scents of damp grass, freshly broken tree branches, fallen leafs and left-over rain, brought Jack’s presence back to her. 

     “ I have to.” Anne said. 

    “ If you do this, it's going to change you forever.” 

    “ He had changed me, Jack. You knew that.  Now that you are gone……” Anne took a deep breath, shook her head and swallowed the raw and deep hollow feeling she always felt whenever the realization of Jack absence on this earth, came to her. 

     “ I won't deny the fact that Tom had hurt you in every which way a husband could. But he won't harm you.” Jack tried to reason. 

      “ A car accident, a house that almost blew up, what do you call that Jack? Coincidence? Come on, Jack.” 

     “ Tom is not a murderer, Anne. “ Jack said, semi-defeated. 

     “ He murdered you.” Anne said and with that, she  closed the mudroom door. Shut away Jack and all his reasons. Shut away her reasons too. She had planned this. She would going to see it done. 

*****

 

Rain part 9b of 16.

Rain part 9b of 16. 

Anne picked up the leash and hung it back on the peg by the door before she walked back to her bedroom through the kitchen. She made a very short stop at the first set of cupboard to her right reached for something behind the various coffee mugs that lined the cupboard and tucked the small item she retrieved in the pocket of her jeans.

      “ Tom….” she called and walked to find her husband in their bedroom in the process of changing his pair of khakis to a pair of jeans better suited for the backyard’s BBQ at the Morgan’s “ I didn't hook up Moose’s leash correctly, and she ran  outside without a leash” she said. 

     Thomas, raised his eyebrows, very unhappy hearing her news, “ That damn dog,” he muttered. 

     Thomas Sutton had never been a dog person. They had owned a couple of dogs once, part of the show of country-people-with-their-dog kind-of-thing. But Thomas never really took care of the dogs. He didn't even knew when the dogs were no longer with them. 

    With an apologetic smile Anne said,” I think Moose will be at the Graham’s again.” 

    The Graham’s  had purchase Jack’s former house. But they were staying in the city waiting for their first baby’s arrival, so their summer house next door to the Suttons’ was empty. “ You know how unhappy they were when Moose ruined their landscape last time she was loose over there. I will get Moose then walk to the Morgan’s through the trail. You go on ahead take the car and drive to the Morgan’s.” 

      Only a dozen houses dotted the hill on the western shore of the man-made Morgan Lake. The Morgan’s calls them ‘The Dirty Dozen’. Each house sat exclusively hidden, protected by the private drives that set them apart from the winding mountain road that the public use to get to the other side of the lake where Atlantic Ocean lay. Each house boasted this level of privacy, consequently, each had a very long driveway. But the backyard’s of the homes were connected by a private packed dirt-and-gravel trail. In most cases, it was faster to reach your neighbor’s homes by walking the backyard  trail than driving through the well-paved mountain-road out front. 

     Tom debated with himself the wisdom of his wife’s suggestion but in the end, just like Anne hoped he would, his own gallantry won. “ No. I’ll walk with you.” 

     “ How are we going to get home later?” It is a different story to walk the trail in daylight and while sober, than to walk the trail in the dark with some alcohol in your blood stream.

     “ We can borrow one of the Morgan’s car.“ 

    “ And Moose? Do you think the Morgan’s will mind?”

    Tom shook his head and gave his wife one of those charming smile of his. “ Darling, they have more dogs than anybodies we know.”  

    Anne couldn't help but to return his smile. It was true. The Morgan’s had a penchant for getting a dog or two every year. They have more dogs than the total number of their descendants. 

    Anne looked at her husband and felt the uneasy pang of guilt inside her heart. How sweet her husband was at that moment. His charming smile and his gallantry to keep her company walking the trail. Thomas had always been a true Southern gentleman.  All those years with three beautiful children they had   and now a grandchild and another one on the way, Thomas never failed to look after her, his precious wife. But that was it. She  was only a precious wife. Thomas was never able to see her as a person who had her own right. The right to feel hurt, the right to be happy. Or not to be his wife anymore. 

    “ Alright. “ Anne said, “ I’ll go ahead looking for Moose. Meet us on the trail’s first bridge.” 

     “ Okay.” Thomas said and flashed her another smile, as thought to say, ‘ Meet me on the bridge’ how romantic it sounded.

    Anne turned back to the kitchen. A pinch of doubt suddenly sprinkled the resolve of what she was about to do. She had been a good daughter, a good mother, a good wife. Why couldn't she stay  that way? She shook her head. No she she couldn't, not after what had been done to her.