The Holding Place Chapter 3

Michael, 4 years later




I love sitting on a park bench and watch my young daughter play on the playground with other children. She is the captain of her own pirate ship ruling the high seas climbing high masts as she climbs the jungle gym. She is a princess in a faraway land, adored by her loyal subjects as she plays in the sandbox. She makes friends easily with her gap-toothed smile and gentle green eyes. She plays with her Barbie dolls with as much enthusiasm as she does when exploring the grass for grasshoppers and crickets. It is her childhood innocence that I love to watch and pray that she never loses.


Today is a special day for my daughter; she is turning four years old. Her thick, curly brown hair is drawn up with pale green ribbons that match the shade of her eyes. For the past five minutes I have watched her round cheeks grow rosy with the frustration of trying to blow up a balloon. Her aunt Claire, my sister, is trying to hide her amusement behind one of the balloons she is currently inflating. There is only an hour and a half left before the guests will be arriving for her princess-themed party. Only four years old and Norah expects nothing less than perfection.


I watch as my nephews Aiden and Alexander blow up the balloons with ease. The two boys are starting to accumulate a collection of balloons that are an impressive size for children of only six and four years old respectively. Norah is looking over at her cousins with jealousy as she continues to be unsuccessful with her attempts at blowing air into expansive plastic. She is huffing more with frustration than effort now as a quiver begins to creep along her bottom lip.


“Auntie Claire, this stupid balloon isn’t blowing up right!” Norah whines as she flings the limp balloon covered with her spittle upon the ground.


Claire looks down to her son and niece with a frown and walks over to Norah, who is now wearing a scowl to match the frustration in her voice. “Were you doing it the way I showed you? Lips tight and blow with all your might?” Claire asked the frustrated child.


Norah shakes her head of brown curls and stamps her foot on the ground, as tears begin to form at the corners of her eyes. “I have tried Auntie Claire, tried and tried, but I just can’t do it.”


I can overhear the conversation going on between the two of them and sense a magnificent tantrum is beginning to brew within the depths of my daughter. This is her first birthday where she understands that impressions are everything amongst her pre-school friends and this is a party that needs to be impressive to her peers. I should go over there and tell my sister that with Norah missing her two front teeth early due to cavities that blowing up a balloon will be impossible for the child. Claire does the best that she can with Norah but sometimes common sense cannot help but evade her. She has been blessed with children who acquiesce to all of her wishes and try hard to please her.


I have never been on the beginning end of a tantrum and a perverse interest to watch it grow to its potential full height comes to mind. Tantrums are something that Claire handles during the day while I am at work and by the time I come home she has already tucked my daughter into bed. Sometimes as I make my way down the hallway I will hear Norah peek through her bedroom door to stare at me as I pass, she holds her breathing hoping that I do not notice her. I pass by her door, hoping that she does not notice me either.


I am no fool and realize that Claire is at her wits end with my daughter’s. She will not say it aloud to me but I can see the need to escape her as soon as I come home. Norah is a difficult child and she does not let her aunt forget it for very long. The bite marks that she leaves on Alexander and the tantrums she throws over the most petty of things are beginning to overwhelm her. It is only a matter of time before Claire walks away from Norah and I. She is sacrificing her own family for mine.


The past few weeks left their mark on me as I slaved away even more than usual to make sure that I would be able to be here this afternoon. The prodding of Claire finally convinced me that Norah is getting older and is entering her formative years. She is growing faster than I want to admit and is starting to observe more of the environment around her. She is beginning to pick up on the nuances of life and soon I will be faced with questions that I cannot let myself overlook or ignore. Heaven knows it would be easier if I could.


My thoughts are broken by squeals of joy and I look up to see Norah bolting towards me, a bag of balloons in her hand. “Daddy! Auntie Claire said to come to you for help with the balloons.”


My chest tightens for a moment at the unfamiliar sight of my daughter running towards me. I hear the hopefulness in her voice instantly. She is terrified that I will reject her and send her back to her aunt. I am terrified that I will not see her, but the image of the one person I still cannot teach my heart to let go of.


She climbs onto my lap before I have a chance to say otherwise and she hands me the bag of balloons with an expectant look on her face. There is a sparkle to her green eyes, mesmerizing if one were to focus on them long enough. I spend so much time avoiding the pain that wrenches in my gut as I force a smile down at her. The urge to push her off my lap is unbearable but I grit my teeth as I begin blowing up balloons, making a balloon giraffe to make her laugh.


I feel the eyes of my sister on me as she continues to set up for the party under the pavilion. She is expecting me to send Norah back, as I do every time, but her words from a few nights ago that I cannot ignore my daughter forever echo in the back of my mind. I must accept that Norah will always look at me with the same green eyes that once light up my life or the smile that greeted me first thing in the morning. I need to embrace my little girl every chance I get, not run away from her.


My interactions with Norah are stilted and awkward. She has left my lap to sit down in a patch of soft green grass a few feet away from the bench I am sitting on. I watch her play with the balloon giraffe as she discovers the secret to static electricity and making her hair stand up on end. A part of me wants to sit down beside her and engross myself in her innocence, anything to keep that smiling glowing on her face. The other part of me, the bigger part of me, holds back, afraid of the little girl who encompasses a part of everything that I have ever loved.


Norah knows that there is something wrong in the way that I interact with her. She sees the love and attention that Aiden and Alexander get from their mother and father and she knows that this is not the same attention that she receives from me. Occasionally, I will give her a kiss in the morning as I make my way to work if Claire is late arriving in the morning. Norah knows that these are not the same kisses that she watches her cousin receive. She is jealous of her cousins and her subconscious is starting to let her know it.


I wish that I could be the father that she needs and deserves. Claire is right; she will not remain this precious little girl who is blissfully oblivious to the world around her. Soon she will realize that something is amiss that I do not tuck her in at night or kiss her good-bye in the morning. Right now this is the only relationship she has ever known with me and it is normal to her. Eventually she will hear other children in school start talking about their parents and Norah will have nothing to compare it to.


Norah has been looking forward to my coming to her party for several weeks now. She reminds me every chance she gets that this birthday she is becoming a big girl. The pre-school she started attending a couple weeks ago supplied the children that she invited. I know that she has went to pre-school every day to tell her friends that her “Daddy” will be at her party this year.


I run my hands through my hair and look onward to Norah still playing a few feet in front of me. She gives me a smile and a shy little wave. I catch the apprehension in her eyes and my chest tightens at it. She is unsure of how to interact with me. She is nervous that she will disappoint and scare me away. There is nothing in this world I wouldn’t give to try to make her see that it isn’t her fault that I am this way.


The day she came into this world was my happiest moment. Perfect and healthy, every parents dream when their child is finally born. Swaddled in a soft pink blanket I was the first to hold her. The moment she looked at me with that smile and head full of dark hair I knew that I was lost and that I would love her forever. I was so engrossed with holding my little girl that it took the frantic screech of a first time mother just out of labor demanding to hold her baby to tear my gaze from my little girl.


I know that I can no longer stay at this party. One look at my little girl and I find myself visiting the past, to a time before I became a lost and broken man. Leaving will shatter Norah’s heart and will infuriate my sister, but my emotions are stifling and I need to escape. I mull for a moment about going over to Norah and wish her a happy birthday. More than anything I want my little girl to have the birthday party of her dreams. She deserves that. She deserves more than a father who cannot look farther than the past. She deserves more than I can give her.


I walk past Norah and make my way towards Claire who is still setting up decorations in the pavilion. She looks over to catch the look on my face and instantly knows what I am coming over to say. I see her give a resigning sigh as she comes down from the step ladder and wipes the sweat from her brow. My sister has been so good to me over the past four years despite that all I have done to her is make her watch me break my daughter’s heart time and time again.


“Michael, you promised her,” Claire says, sadness tingeing her voice.


I cast my eyes to the ground, too ashamed to meet her gaze. I owe my sister more than I can ever wish to repay her. She is like a mother to Norah, loving her as if she were her very own. I cannot begin to imagine the life Norah would be living now had my sister not swept in and came to the rescue. It did not take my family very long to realize that I was falling apart and taking my little girl with me.


“I don’t know what you want me to say, Claire,” I reply.


“I don’t want you to say anything at all Michael. I want you to stay here and celebrate your daughter’s birthday with her.”


I grimace. Claire is not going to let me walk away lightly this time. I can see the hurt in her eyes and my chest constricts in guilt. “I just can’t, Claire,” I sigh. “Please try to understand that I can’t do this right now.”


“Do what, Michael?” Claire asks angrily. “Be a father to your little girl for once?”


I look up at her in surprise and disbelief. She has never tossed such a question at me before. This is a subject that she has tip-toed around lightly for the past four years. She has no idea of the pain that I have been through. She has never loved and lost the way that I have, but I cannot deny that she is right. I cannot remember a time where Norah came to me instead of Claire looking for comfort. She has never felt the love of a father.


“How dare you judge me?” I bite back. “You have no idea the pain I relive over and over again just when I look at her!”


Claire’s face softens at my remark and she collapses down on the bench beside her, running her hands through her hair. “Michael, I’m not judging you. I’m trying to understand. You don’t talk to anyone to let them know that you are hurting.”


“Do I really have to say it for you to see it?”


“Of course I see it, Mike. Everyone does but it’s been four years and everyone is at a crossroads of how to help you anymore.”


I am at a loss of what to say to my sister. The pain in her voice is palpable. She is trying to understand me but she never will. It is impossible for me to begin even trying to explain it to her when I do not even understand myself. I live so much of my life in the past that it is starting to converge with the present. My teetering sanity cannot handle putting emotions to words.


“Mike, we all loved her and miss her,” Claire says gently as she comes over to put her hand on my shoulder. “But she is gone. Norah is here and she needs you now more than ever.”


“That’s where you’re wrong, Claire. Abby is so far from gone,” I reply without thinking.


Claire gives me a doleful look at my unintended words. I cannot tell what surprises her more: the fact that she hasn’t heard me utter my wife’s name since her funeral four years ago or that I just admitted that I still don’t believe that she is gone. Claire will start to cry soon and she will want to wrap her arms around me to comfort me. I do not want her pity or her comfort.


“Michael, you can’t carry this with you anymore.”


“Carry what with me? Are you asking me to forget her?”


“No, I’d never ask you to do such a thing. Abby will always be a part of you, just as she will always be a part of Norah. I know that she wouldn’t want to see you like this, forever grieving. She would want to see you happy.”


“Happiness is a concept that I am no longerable to grasp. I wish you’d understand that. Tell Norah happy birthday for me.”


I abruptly turn away from her and head for my car parked about a football’s field away. Claire will not follow me. The guests will start arriving any moment now and she will not do anything to upset Norah. I curl my hands into tight fists as I feel a familiar rage come over me. I will think of my wife all night now and I will try to drown away her memory with the familiar and faithful bottle that is wrapped in brown.


Sometimes I am able to chase her memory away for a little while and other times I only manage to bring her memory closer to wounds that have not yet healed. I relive her last night on Earth in my head over and over again, trying to figure out where everything went wrong. I was so angry with her, yelling at her the entire way home, chastising her for her childish behavior. She never had a chance to say anything in her defense. Her reply was the crunching of metal and the shattering of glass.


I cannot recall how long I was knocked unconscious; I have been told that at the very least it was several minutes. The next that I remember is a paramedic coming to my side of the car, reaching through the shattered window to check me for a pulse. Abby’s body came to a rest on top of the hood of the Lexus, sprawled out in the most unnatural of ways. I need nobody to tell me what I already know; she is dead. Other emergency personnel are attending to the surviving wounded. The paramedic forces open my jammed door and lightly guides me to my feet once he is sure I can walk. I am in a state of shock and disbelief.


“Wait, my wife,” I say to the paramedic and begin to pull away from him.


The paramedic gives me an uncomfortable looks and says, “Sir, we need to take care of you right now. You will see her at the hospital.”


Somewhere in his mind his words register because I give him a nod and absently follow him to the waiting ambulance. I glance over my shoulder to view the mangled pile of metal that was once my car. I see that the passenger side is smashed in, the door almost touching the driver’s seat. It is just another cruel confirmation that Abby, my beautiful Abby, is gone.


An angry honk coming from behind me brings me back to the present. I realize that I’m blocking the exit from the park with my car and swiftly jerk the car into the left turn that will take me to my office. That is where I will sleep tonight since Claire made promise two years ago to not bring my misery home. She doesn’t want Norah to hear me crying in my sleep, where Abby comes back to me every night.