twelve- Bed Sheets

It was a long weekend.  Nick left her alone to contemplate.  Her mistakes, her choice, and the sins visited upon her by her father.  Tuesday night, another empty day at work.  She wanted all day for Henry to provide what she lacked: satisfaction, contentment, maybe a little hope.

But lying next to the proud man on her four poster bed, Audrey wonders if he will ever do what’s necessary to truly be present in their relationship.  She doubts he knows that to get inside her deep enough to fix her, he needs to let her into the gaping hole buried in his chest.  She needs to see the cracks and what’s still holding him together.  It would help her believe that he can hold her together.

Audrey knows that there is never a forever.  Everything human must eventually fall apart.  Neither the feeling of love nor the ability to love can move a man to surrender who he is to the woman that he has.

But she could be wrong.  This she acknowledges.  Not all men are so closed, so unbending.  There are those who let themselves be seen.  But not this one, not Henry.  Not the man who she knows so much of now, who she wants to matter more than her self.

So it all comes down to what she has: a strong man, with a mind that chooses with conviction, a heart guarded but immense, and powerful hands that can give as much as they take.  And they can give, when he allows them.

What she has is a man who tells her that he loves her.  He doesn’t whisper the words like a secret important only to two lone listeners.  Henry regards their union as a fact, worthy of print and demanding to be read out loud.

Lying on her back, still weak from after-work-pre-dinner sex, she does not feel contentment, but she does feel satisfied.  She does feel a little lucky.  Not the same lucky as holding the winning ticket at the raffle; the lucky of winning the big prize.  She feels the lucky of being chosen; as if Henry won so many tickets at the arcade but he ignored the big prizes on the shelves and pointed to her instead, one of many trapped in a plastic basket beneath the glass counter.

‘Who needs contentment? Who needs hope?  Portland’s Most Eligible Bachelor of 2009 chose me!’  Audrey turns on her side to look at Henry sleeping face down on her lavender sheets.

‘And that’s hope enough!  He chose me… and he’ll keep choosing me, tomorrow and the day after.’  Her thoughts quiet down.  She kisses Henry’s shoulder and rolls off the bed.

In the living room, she goes back to thinking.  No longer about her choice to stay with Henry or how long till Nick speaks to her again.  It is a man that’s occupying her mind, but that man is her father, Frank Carlisle.  The formerly estranged patriarch has returned to the City of Roses to reclaim his little girl’s love, lost to him the day she turned eighteen and eight days.

It was an oppressively humid August 30^th, the weekend before her sophomore year began.  Soaked with sweat and tears, she looked up from her bedroom floor just in time to watch her father walk out, leaving her alone with an envelope of money thrown angrily on her floral patterned blanket.  The memory hurts.  She shakes it away and returns to her living room.

On the coffee table in front of her is an open envelope, addressed to her from her father.  She had read the letter inside countless times over the weekend, folding it up whenever Henry came over.  At night she quietly left him sleeping, and read the letter in the dim moonlight glowing through her wide living room window.  The letter was unexpected and after years of mutual indifference between them, any kind of contact was unwelcome.

‘He is my father’ Audrey tells herself.

‘But I don’t have to forgive him.  We’re not going to end up going on dinner dates and watching movies.  We’re not going to have father-daughter re-bonding activities.  I don’t have to forgive him…  I just have to talk to him.’  Audrey breathes a deep sigh.

‘He wouldn’t lie about dying…’  Audrey shivers slightly and quickly.

Suddenly she’s afraid.  She doesn’t know why—she does but she denies it.

‘He wants to talk, so we’ll talk.  I’ll call him tomorrow, no meeting up.  I’ll tell him I don’t have time for any catching-up bullshit.  Whatever he wants or wants to say, needs to be the first out of his mouth.  And no “I miss you” or “I know I’ve been gone long, but I’m back now for good”.  He wouldn’t say that if he was really dying…’  Audrey feels confused.

‘What does he want!’  She almost opens her mouth to scream, but shakes her head instead.  She calms herself then pulls the folded letter out of the envelope.  Tilting her body towards the un-curtained window, she sees the words clearly in the blue light.  She reads:

My fair little Audrey,

   

            Do you remember me?  I haven’t got an apology for you.  I haven’t got anything for you except the news that I’m back in Portland.  I won’t tell you where I’m living yet, just know that I’m close to downtown.  I would stay at the house in Beaverton, but I wanted to be closer to you.  You see, princess, I’m dying.  Don’t believe me?  Well then you’ll have to talk to me to find out.

            Here comes the part where I tell you how my life’s been since we started ignoring each other.  The company was bought out, I received an obscene amount of money, I traveled for a couple years, bought some houses, married and divorced, gave her an offensive amount of money (barely a dent in my account), found God, toured the third-world countries for places to “make a difference”, became jaded, lost god, started a couple of my own foundations (two sizeable dents), missed my daughter, and bought a ticket to PDX.

            But that’s just one side of the story.  I can’t wait to hear the B-side, the Audrey side.  I’m not going anywhere, princess.  I got money for three lifetimes, good men running my foundations, and a newfound love for this city.  Call my cell- 971-555-0829.  I’ll keep it on me.  Love ya’ Princess Audrey.

Dad

p.s. when you call me, please don’t call me Frank.

Audrey looks up from the letter in her hand.  She can’t help but smile.  She daydreams in the moonlit living room.  Of dinner dates and movie nights, Frank meeting Henry, picnics in Laurelhurst Park, and maybe she would call him dad...

Her smile fades quickly.  She’s back in her living room.  She folds the letter and returns it to the envelope.  With a long deep breath and her eyes closed tight, she picks her phone up off the coffee table and dials from memory.  A couple rings and he answers.  Audrey opens her eyes.

“Hey Frank…”

photo1:http://www.flickr.com/photos/eqqman/ / CC BY-NC 2.0
photo2:http://www.flickr.com/photos/the-jedi/ / CC BY-NC-ND 2.0