The Great Escape: Boundaries

As we walked into the house, I sighed in relief. It felt so good to be home, but at the same time I was looking forward to a good night’s sleep. Between the necessary checkups from the nurses, having a fever and food poisoning—were just some of the reasons that I was exhausted in the first place.

Of course, I was also told that I took on too much. I never believed it to be true, until this moment. When I was surrounded by friends, and realized that never accepting second best wasn’t always the greatest option.

Now I walked into the house with my husband, as he grabbed my hand to pull me back. “You know I married you for better or worse. It seems like we’ve had worse days than better.”

“Is this your way of apologizing? Because if you are, then it’s working.”

He sighed, as he closed the distance between us. “You know, I’ve never been good at the 

whole speaking thing, even when we met.”

“I know. And when I married you, we both agreed to overlook all the flaws, and deal with them when we got there.”

“We should.” He closed the distance between us, his hand stroking my cheek. “What would I do without you?”

“You’d be a very lonely man.”  

“So, how about I show you just what you mean to me?” Looking into his eyes, a flame had sparked in his eyes.

I got over the initial shock. It had been so long since we had a moment to ourselves. “Right now?”

“If you’re up for it.”

“Mm . . . I’m thinking that I should get sick more often.” I put one hand on his chest as he leaned in and kissed me with a hot fiery passion. “I’ve missed this.” I offered breathlessly as we came up for air. He smiled and scooped me up in surprise and carried me upstairs with laughter echoing in our empty house.

Before we knew it, our bodies were tangled in sheets. Sweat gleamed over our skin as we lay close together. “We should do this more often. I forgot how good you were in bed.” He offered, turning to look at me. “But you know we’re going to have to talk about what’s eating you. How come you took the pills?”

Sitting up, I held the sheet against my body. “I was lonely, Kevin. You spend so much time at the office that I’m left in this empty house, by myself. This time I wasn’t taking them because I was overwhelmed, but because I don’t feel like anyone needs me anymore. When 

Patrick went off to college, it wasn’t so bad because we still had Sophie.”

“And when Sophie left, you had no one.”

Sinking back into the pillow, I sighed. “We hardly have the time to visit, let alone that we go visit them. You deploy so often that I don’t know if I’m going to be able to come home to you either.”

We sat in silence and I sunk back into the pillow.  He sat up and kissed me again—deeper this time. We were panting, when he sat back against the bed, and I leaned against him. I traced a scar on his arm that had been received by falling out of a tree as a child, not because of his career.

“I’m sorry, Key.” Kissing my head, he drew me close, so my head was resting against his chest.

“Hmm?”

“You know what your mom told me right before we married?” I shook my head. “That if I ever hurt you, she would come back to haunt me.” Tears sprung to my eyes. My mom who had died from complications of Alzheimer’s disease, a couple years after I had gone to rehab—was usually laid back. I’m sure my father would have agreed with her reasoning, especially since I was their only child.

“I would have expected that from my father, not my mom.”

“Later that night, she cut into our dance—“

“I remember that. I think that’s the first time I really saw you laugh.”

“Your mother was something special.” He grabbed my hand and played with the wedding ring. “But you were something beautiful. Still are.”

I couldn’t help but grin, and sighed into him as I blinked back the sleep in my eyes. “She had a good sense of humor. I don’t think I ever got much of that. What I got from her was a sense of organization.”

“I can believe that. Not to mention that she gave me one very hot wife—who is making me a very hungry man.”

“That reminds me . . . I was supposed to go to the store, before I got food poisoning.”

He sighed into me, kissing my fingers tenderly. “I’ll go later.”

“And forfeit time with your loving wife?”

He turned and kissed me long and hard, as I sunk back into the pillow. “I think she’ll forgive me. Besides, I would hate for her to starve.”

I grinned pleasantly. “Then please, show me how not to starve.”

After another round, we both showered and got cleaned up. He waited until I was done, and then left to shop. I probably wasn’t asleep more than ten or fifteen minutes, when I got a second wind. With my book open, I had just turned a page when there was a knock on my door.  When I opened it, I was slightly surprised when I found Roxy LeBlanc with a container in hand, and dressed in a red dress shirt and jeans.

 “Roxy—“

“Hey, Jackie. I hope that I didn’t wake you.”

“No, I was actually just reading.” I opened the door wider. “Please, come in.”

“Thanks.” Her heels clicked on the floor. “I heard that you were in the hospital, so I thought you could use some soup.”

“I was. Thank you. But you really didn’t have to bring anything.”

“It was nothing. It’s just plain ol’ chicken soup. You can put it in the fridge and eat it when you feel like it.” Looking around, Roxy marveled at everything. “I didn’t realize how beautiful this house was, until now.”

“Thanks. If it weren’t for Denise and Claudia Joy, we would have found ourselves homeless.”

“Yeah, Trevor and I just found a new home ourselves.”

“I heard about that. How are you settling in?” Taking the container, we walked into the kitchen and I placed it on the middle shelf.

“Besides all the boxes that are scattered around my house? Between work, children and FRG, I really haven’t had much time to unpack anything.”

“Have you considered asking for help?” She looked at me in surprise as I gestured her to sit. 

“It’s just something that I’ve learned in the last couple days.”

Roxy gave a small smile. “Well, Trevor has been helping a lot more—so have Finn and TJ. However, there are only so many things they can do before they start breaking things—the boys, not Trevor.”

“I meant your friends.”

“Right.” We both laughed. “Usually I get so into something that I usually forget to ask for help. Does it get any easier? The whole moving around thing?”

“Packing does. But actually moving, doesn’t. I would pretty much pack by myself, and then hire someone to load everything up into the moving truck.”

“Wow.” Roxy sat back in her chair. “Hardly surprising. You’re like superwoman.”

“I’ve started to believe that’s not as true as it sounds.”

“I don’t know about that. I go crazy sometimes with two young kids. I think you’ve done more than I ever will.”

“Believe when I say that I had my moments. My dad was in the army, so I had some experience moving around, before I met Kevin. Of course when I had Patrick and Sophie there were moments when I would have liked to drop to the ground and not get up. Makes me wish that I had been here at Fort Marshall a little sooner.”

Nodding in agreement, Roxy leaned her head against the palm of her hand. “Why here?”

“The friendship that you all have with each other, you have a bond that I never had. 

Wherever I went, I felt like we were strictly business friends. Speaking of business, I would still like to help on Friday.”  

“You do. Aren’t you supposed to be relaxing?”

“For at least a day or two. I figure that I’m on the mend—so I can help with whatever you need. I’ve already looked over the notes, so I’m up to speed with what we’re going to discuss.”

“I’m glad, because I’m going to need all the help that I can get.” We both stood and walked to the door. “I should get going. I’m supposed to pick up a few hours of work, before picking up the boys at school.”

“Let me know if there’s anything I can do.”

“I will let you know. In the meantime, take it easy.”

“I will.” With that promise, I gave a wave and closed the door. As I was sitting down, a pink album poked out from the bookshelf. It gave my stomach butterflies, but I picked it up anyway.

I began looking through the album, and smiled. This particular album was one that Sophie had given me for Christmas. She had come in early one morning when we were living at Fort Hope, with this in her hand.

“I almost forgot to give this to you.” Her blonde hair was pulled back into a ponytail, and she was wearing a long sleeved, white shirt with her school’s logo on it.

We looked at every photo—laughed and reminisced for hours. Finally, we got to the last page. “Is this your ultrasound picture?” The black and white picture had been cut around, so none of the hospital information was shown.  

“This isn’t an easy thing to tell you mom. But I was pregnant.”

“Was? Sophie Jacqueline Clark—why didn’t you say anything?”

“It was an accident mom. I met this wonderful guy, and then we ended splitting up—and when I was trying to figure out what to do, I ended up losing the baby.”

“When did this happen?”

“Just after I got into college.”

“Sophie.”

“I didn’t know what else to do.” My twenty year old daughter had tears running down her 

face. I wrapped my arm around her and let her cry it out. “Are you mad?”

“I’m a little surprised. Does your father know about this?”

“No.” Wiping her eyes with her sleeve, she sniffled. “Dad would have killed me if he knew. You know that right? It would have ruined his career to know that his daughter got pregnant.”

“Key?” The garage door closed and brought me from my thoughts. He was closer than I thought he was, and I heard his heavy footsteps trail into where I was sitting.

“What are you looking at?”

“An old album that Sophie gave me.”

Before I could protest, he took the album from me and started flipping through it. “How come I’ve never seen this before?”