Morning walk

Nothing had been said since the discovery of the photo. That night both she and her husband went to bed without saying a word about it. As they slept it seemed that the bed had separated moving them to different realms. Finally, after tossing in bed most of the night daylight broke and Margie decided to take a walk. She placed Adam into some warm clothes, and then gently folded blankets around him as she set him into the stroller. John and the older boys would be asleep for at least another hour and she needed this time to think and talk. She didn’t expect an answer from the babbling baby but maybe somehow she could get answers to her burning questions.

As she stepped outside Margie was kissed by a short cold wind. Compared to how she had felt last night, this wind’s kiss was welcomed and relieving. At this point in time she opened her conversation.

“God, how could you do this to me? What have I done to earn your scorn?”

A wind whistled by and seemed to answer her. What she heard was, “Sssssssssssssssssscorn?”

With a heavy sigh she said, “Are you going to play innocent too?”

Her thoughts raced back to the night before. How her husbands words had stumbled when she confronted him about the picture on the camera. She thought about how John had first tried to suggest that she had taken the image, or that she was lacking memory of this event. Then she could see in her mind how he stumbled in his speech when she confronted him with the idea of it being his child.  Did he honestly think he would be able to convince her it was a friend’s child that she could have missed placed a memory of entering into a hospital. Was he so involved in this lie that he failed to consider the fact the mother had no head?!

A sharp wind smacked Margie’s face. As she rubbed the sore spot the wind again whispered to her. It hissed out the words, “Chaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaance? Deceptioooooooooooooooooon. Disssssssssssssscovery?”

Margie thought more about the baby girl photo, the mystery woman, and her boys. She was still overwhelmed at the discovery of her husband’s affair and how he tried to play it off as her mistake. She knew that the revelation was not meant to come about this way. John would have tried something more deceptive. Maybe he would have found a way to introduce the two knowing his wife would go crazy talking babies with the adulteress. Maybe he would just continue to have his one night out a week and never say anything until the baby was old enough to call and look for him.  The picture being stored on the camera had to have been God’s work. But what is she supposed to do now?

Her pace picked up as she started to walk down a hill. The stroller tried to pull ahead out of her grip. She could feel her fingers slipping and it felt much like how she felt towards her marriage. Her thoughts raced as she stepped down the incline. Her strides picked up pace so she could once again feel in control of her stroller. As she progressed Margie started sobbing. Finally, as she came to a more level stretch, she cried out, “But, God, what am I to do?”

The wind seemed to have her and she felt alone without it to accompany her home. She felt comforted that this had happened for a reason. Now the deception could not continue. She had a difficult road ahead of her and the still, cool air lacked comfort. She turned around and starting pushing the stroller back up the hill. Ideas of what should be done started filling her mind. Sharing her husband intimately with another woman was a subject on which she was not willing to compromise. The time had come for her to pray for guidance and to seek the help of someone out side this triangle.

It seemed like it took such a short time to make this morning walk, as she approached her home, the lights were on and she could hear the older boys arguing for the television remote. The minivan sat in front of the house idling, exhaust steam billowed up by the only bumper sticker that was placed on it. It had used to say “Trust God”, but now the text was fading and the edges were peeling. She thought about how much those words once meant to her. She stepped up to the door and a soft breeze tossed her hair into her eyes, she felt uneasy as she opened the front door. At that moment her confidence at the bottom of the hill was waning and she started to doubt what she heard in the wind. But now her faith was wavering with the recent discovery. “Trust God,” she said as she pulled Adam out of the stroller. “I wish I could fully trust God, but I fear that this is the hardest trial to over come.”