Karen's Storm, a Short Story About Choices and Consequences

I looked on as the weather changed in his eyes. The clear blue darkened to stormy slate and the color drained from his face. Then I saw his fist rise swiftly as the wind itself, and before I could move, he struck me! This sky eyed man with whom I lived and loved hit me with his hand. That same hand had placed a wedding ring on my finger, smoothed my hair when I had morning sickness and had held our child as she lay dying. How could that same hand now betray me?

It was like watching a sunny summer day morph into a rain drenched thunderstorm. The shock of being struck by lightening lingered and my heart felt numb, yet oddly full of pain all at the same time. Somewhere deep inside I had known this day would come and that it would change everything. Still I yearned for more time and ached for my husband to love me one more time before the skeleton of our relationship was ripped away.

“Why?” I asked tremulously. My husband strode toward me and I cringed involuntarily until the tree caught me and I could go no farther. My mind whirled in keeping with the raging tornado that had suddenly taken over my life. “Why?” I asked again.

“Because I know,” he replied in the coldest voice I had ever heard. My blood chilled and I shivered. I already knew the answer that would come forth and dreaded it.

“You know what?” I gasped through lips that were already swelling with bruises. My voice sounded thick and slurred, almost unrecognizable. My throat was so dry and tight that it ached.

“I know about Laura.” He said the words so softly that they almost didn’t exist and I tasted the bitter copper taste of more fresh blood as I bit my tongue.

My blood ran cold as an arctic river and I shivered as if the temperature was freezing instead of a balmy seventy eight degrees. “You know what about Laura?” I managed to push the words out though I just wanted to sink to the ground and wail until the leaves fell from the trees to pile on the ground and the birds fled screeching for safety.

“I know you were drunk when the accident happened. Only it was no accident, was it Karen? When you put our baby in that car, locked helpless into a car seat, it was a deliberate choice. When you got behind the wheel, knowing you were drunk you CHOSE to kill our baby girl. That makes it a choice and no accident. How could you?” He screamed at me and the look on his beautiful face was unbearable agony. “In all the times I found you drinking, you never even one time drove with her when you were drinking. Why, why, why, that day?”

All I could do was gape at him in horror and pray silently to die right there in that moment. He stepped even closer and I could not summon the strength to flinch when he struck me again. God knows I deserved it and so much more. The pain was a bittersweet release of secrets finally revealed and a life lived together was over. It was almost a relief. But how had he found out the truth?

“How did you know?” I could hardly bear to even ask what I really didn’t want to know. “How long have you known?” I had to lean against the oak tree so I would not fall as I asked the questions.

“Just now,” he answered. “You let it slip just now. How could you take that risk? You had two car wrecks before and they happened because you were drunk and driving. How could you put that precious baby in there and just kill her?” He looked drained now with no anger left, just showing a wretched distaste as he stared back at me.

My heart beat like a restrained bird trying desperately to free itself. I wished it would simply stop and lie still as my daughter did in that grave. “I was cooking dinner while Laura took her nap and I had a few glasses of wine. I thought I was okay to drive. I needed tomatoes for the salad so when she woke up I decided to go to the market. She held her arms up to me and hugged my neck as I buckled her in and she smelled like milk, sunshine and love. Then it just happened somehow. I lost control of the car and the wheels left the road. Then we were flipping over and over and over. When I woke up the emergency workers were cutting me out of the wreck. But how…” The words just would not come.

“You just said that you have not had a drink since the day of the accident. That look of guilt on your face said it all. You should have been drinking even more to assuage the grief a little. The Karen I knew would not have been able to resist a bit of liquid nerve potion. I wondered how you managed to sober up so well and so fast. I foolishly thought you were being strong for me. But you were just wallowing in your guilt and punishing yourself. Being sober is the only way you can feel the pain you need to feel.”

“Oh my God.” The words just slid out and fell between us like trembling drops of rain on a pond. “I am sorry, so very, very sorry. I have wanted to tell you every minute of every day. At first I kept waiting to be arrested but in all the chaos no one ever stopped to think I might have been drinking. They all just considered it a tragic accident. And I was so frightened and sick. Then later, I wanted to tell you. But how does one say the words that will destroy what little is left of a family? I have barely lived through this and prayed every day for courage to kill myself. Then I would think of you and want to live and feel you beside me in bed at night. It didn’t matter that you never held me or touched me in passion; never made love to me. I could feel your warmth and listen to you breath as you slept. Sometimes I would gently lay my head on your chest and hear your heart beat again. I couldn’t tell you and see the look on your face-this look-on your beloved face. Don’t look at me like that! Please, please know how I hate myself.”

“You could not possibly hate yourself more than I do at this moment. Nothing you could ever say or do will bring Laura back and I can never forgive you. I hope you see her face as it was there in the hospital, bloody and cut, her poor little legs broken and one arm torn away.” Then the only man I had ever loved, the only man I had ever made love with turned and just left me there, kneeling on the grass as if in prayer, weeping. I wept for hours, enough to wash away my flesh down to the bone, enough to imprint regret that could never be erased from my heart and left only a salty bitterness, enough to shape a marked mother into a pillar like Lot’s wife.

Finally I was somehow able to pull myself up and turn toward the big white house with wrap around porches. The yellow shutters gleamed and reflected the sun that somehow still shone from above. As I tried to walk, my knees buckled and I stumbled several times before I could stagger into the house. Stepping inside I saw myself in the mirror and wondered for a moment who that haggard old woman could be. When I grimaced at her, she mimicked my motions and I saw myself for who I had become.

Turning away, I managed to get up the stairs, the same ones I had descended on my wedding day. There, down the hall was what I sought. I threw open the door to our child’s room, the door that had been closed for nine months now. Ironically, that is the same number of months that I carried her in my womb; felt her heartbeat and those tiny kicks. She had been the easiest baby to birth and to care for. My breasts ached as I remembered her feeding from them, receiving from me what no one else could give her. And the center of my body, the womb that had cradled her so carefully, cramped with memories of her birth and the faint sounds of gurgles and giggles.

My ears strained to hear tiny footsteps in the hallway but there were only her lost treasures she had left behind. Her ballet slippers hung by a ribbon from the dresser and the jewelry box with a dancer sat there all dusty and lonely. I rubbed the top with my palm and turned the key on the bottom. She twirled and some mechanism inside played Over The Rainbow. Suddenly I couldn’t catch the scent of her and sucked in air madly trying to smell baby powder and shampoo; grass and lip gloss called Peachy Poo. It was no use. Her little girl smell was no longer in the air and I flew to the closet, grabbing handfuls of her clothing, shoved my face into them desperate to find that scent again. Nothing! Pulling down hangers of jumpers, tartan paid and white shirtwaist frocks, I sank down and gathered little shoes by the armful. There were the Mary Jane’s that she loved with scuffed toes and her sneakers that still sported the daisies Laura had painted on them.

Rising with a groan, I carried an armful of a lost little girl’s legacy and fell across the little pink twin bed. The pillows were plumped and ready for a head that would never again lie there and the lace curtains at the window were open because she loved the light. I held a fuzzy teddy bear and a Raggedy Ann doll that Laura had loved and kissed every night. But her little Lambie was not there to cuddle. Laura had slept with it every night of her life and now it rested in her arms throughout eternity. They were forever together in a grave coffin of rosewood, covered with black dirt and a flame on top that never went out.

That was Brett’s doing. I was still in the hospital when my baby was buried. I had been taken in a wheelchair to the Pediatric Intensive Care Center where she lay still as a porcelain doll. Her curly hair was matted and dark with something that I couldn’t bear thinking of. Tubes snaked in and out of her thin little body, legs and even one in her throat. I fainted into darkness and was back in my room alone when I awoke. Brett barely left her side and I hardly saw him.

“It was my fault! My fault! How could I be so careless with that great gift? Oh God, please let me die!” But my heart just kept on beating and I knew I must live so I can suffer for the rest of my life. Is there any redemption for people like me?

So I arose after a long while. The sun was setting and Brett had not returned. I went into that lonely room where two forlorn people had lain side by side, unable to reach out for comfort or to give grace. I packed a small suitcase, taking only the essentials and a framed photo of a forsaken and broken family then walked out of the house that love built and bitterness tore down. I knew I would never step foot in there again.

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A thin man with straggly hair left the podium and sat down while scattered applause rang out in the dank basement air. “Would anyone else like to speak?” asked the leader. A tall blonde woman with scars on her wrists stood up and walked up front slowly and hesitantly. “I would. My name is Karen and I am an alcoholic….This is my story.

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This story was written using a prompt which was "I looked on as the weather changed".

©® Mon Oct 31 22:49:28 UTC 2011b.barnes