Filed to story: Love on the Sidelines (Natalie & Karl)
“They shouldn’t have let you come,” he choked, his voice trembling. “But, God, I’m glad they did. I was so afraid I wouldn’t get to see you again.”
“It’s not that bad,” I whispered. “You can write to me, and I’ll write back. In four years you’ll be out of the army and you can come home. I’ll wait, Karl. For as long as it takes. I love you.”
He shook his head then pushed me away gently. “You don’t understand, Natalie. I can’t come back here. Not for a long time. If I do, they can throw me in jail.”
“Then I’ll come to you, wherever you are.”
“No.” He lifted a hand to my cheek. “I won’t let you do that. Your family is here, your roots. You can’t destroy your life for me.”
“I don’t have a life without you.” I was desperate, frantic with fear as I realized what he was doing.
“Yes, you do.” He took a deep breath. “As much as I wanted to believe it, dreamed about it, it was stupid to think people would accept our being together. Now, it would be even worse. I’m not just trash, I’m a murderer, and they’ll always see me that way. I can’t do that to you. You have to forget about me, Peewee.”
“Can you forget about me?”
His eyes shimmered with tears. “No. Not if I live to be a hundred.”
“Then don’t ask me to do what you can’t.”
He caught me close again, buried his face in my hair. “Do it for me, Natalie. I need to know you’ll be happy if I’m going to have any chance of getting through this. Promise me. Please.”
“I promise you this. I’ll love you until the day I die even if I have to live without you. And if it’s fifty years from now, you come home, Karl Hayes. Do you hear me?
I’ll be waiting on you.”
He wiped away the tears streaming down my cheeks, and forced himself to smile.
“This isn’t a church social, Sweetheart. You aren’t going to be able to save me this time.”
“You knew?”
“I knew.”
Behind us the door opened and the sheriff came in, his gaze going from me to Karl.
“The recruiter is here and ready to go, Karl.”
While the sheriff unfastened the handcuffs, Karl kept his gaze on my face. “Stay here until I’m gone.”
I nodded, knowing it would only be harder for him if I watched him leave. “I love you.” I mouthed the words as the sheriff took him by the arm and led him toward the door.
Abruptly, Karl stopped. “Wait. Just another second, please.” The sheriff glanced at me and nodded. To my surprise, Karl reached under his shirt and pulled out the half-heart pendant. With his gaze fixed on mine, he slid the chain over my head. “No one should have to go through life with only half a heart,” he whispered.
I’m not sure I said anything out loud, but he saw the understanding in my eyes.
With one final, heartbreaking smile, he was gone, and it felt like my life was over. He may never have said the words, but with that one last gesture, Karl had given me my heart back while letting me know he wouldn’t have one without me, and the thought almost destroyed me.
I didn’t know then what the Judge had gone through to give Karl this chance, and it was probably a good thing I didn’t. I was in no shape to appreciate his efforts. You 87 see, the Judge still had a lot of influence with our law enforcement officials, and he’d exerted a lot of pressure and called in a lot of favors to keep Karl out of jail. If I had known, I probably would have hated him, blamed him for taking Karl away from me.
Clutching the pendant in one hand, I let the darkness that had been threatening at the edges of my vision creep in and cover me, and for a while I didn’t have to think, didn’t have to feel.
They took me home and put me to bed, Mama and my aunts fluttering around me like beautiful, useless butterflies. They mopped my forehead with cold clothes when the thought of never seeing Karl again made me nauseous, and they brought me bowls of soup that sat on the nightstand untouched until a skim formed over the top. They watched me with worried eyes and urged me to sleep, but sleep wouldn’t come. I lay awake through the long hours of Friday and Saturday, staring at nothing, replaying every moment of the last few weeks with Karl over and over in my mind, like a video tape stuck on a loop.
Finally, late Sunday night, I slipped out of the house, weak as a newborn kitten, and made my way to the barn on shaky legs. Once in his room, I wrapped his shirt around me and curled up on the bed that still held his scent, and at last I was able to sleep. It was the deep, dreamless sleep of emotional exhaustion, and though part of me was aware of someone coming and going, I didn’t wake fully until Monday night.
When I opened my eyes it was to find Aunt Jane sitting in the rocking chair, her head against the back as she watched me. She looked as tired as I felt.
“Do you think Karl would want to see you like this?” she asked quietly.
“He’s gone and he’s never coming back, Aunt Jane.” She straightened and arched her back until it popped. “So you’re going to curl up and die? Wake up, Natalie. Life isn’t kind, and we rarely get what we want out of it. We do the best we can, and we keep putting one foot in front of the other. You may not have Karl, but you’ve got a lot of other people who love you and are worried about you. It’s time you thought about them.”
“Does Mama know?”
“About you and Karl?” She shook her head. “Your mother is a kind, loving woman who cares about you more than life, but she only sees what she wants to see. She’s convinced herself, Darla and the Judge that you’ve got a virus, and the shock of what happened to Karl made it worse.” She stood. “I left you a sandwich and some soup. Eat it before you come back to the house.” When she reached the door, she stopped. “You might be interested to know Frank Hayes’s funeral is tomorrow morning. The state is burying him in the county cemetery.”
My head was spinning as I swung my feet to the floor, and I reached automatically for the tray of food. It hit me with staggering force that I hadn’t thought about Frank being dead a single time. But I thought about it while I ate, and the more I did, the angrier I got. I was going to that funeral tomorrow come hell or high water. There were a few things I needed to get off my chest.
It was a dismal day for a funeral, the sky overcast with periodic burst of a fine, soaking drizzle, but I was glad it was raining. It wouldn’t have been fair for the sun to shine on Frank Hayes’s last day above ground.