Love Shadows

“I am?”

“Yes. You even laughed with us. So if the water makes you happy, we need to be here more and less at home.”

“Now that you’ll be here every day with Red, maybe we can make that happen,” he said.

Annie smiled at Luke, but he pretended to be concentrating on his rowing. Once again, Luke realized he wasn’t being the father to his kids that he’d been when Jenny was alive. He remembered laughing and horsing around with them every day. He’d often commented that their house was filled with happiness.

Guilt pressed its iron grip into his shoulders— it had become a familiar pain. Before Jenny died, Luke had been an exemplary father. Now he didn’t come close to making the grade.

He’d been blaming the universe for all his anguishes, but his apparent failure as a father was his own fault.

By the time they reached the shore and tied the boat to the dock, Luke’s anger at himself seared his insides like a brand. He didn’t know how much longer he could endure this kind of torture. And he didn’t have a single clue how to deal with it.

CHAPTER SIX

MONDAY MORNING AT the construction trailer brought the usual phone calls from disgruntled customers and demanding suppliers who wanted to be paid. Luke had already been to a small residential jobsite and briefed the crew on their jobs for the morning until his return at noon. At the moment, he was on the phone with the manager of the lumber company who had been shorting them on the deliveries for the past month.

“I’m telling you, the four-by-eights are not here and neither are the two nail guns I ordered. And you never replaced the missing joists from last week. So what’s the deal? Your warehouseman can’t count? Does he need glasses? ’Cause if he does, I’ll personally buy him a pair so we can get this right! Now what are you going to do for me, Mick?”

Just then, Jerry walked into the trailer. Out of the corner of his eye, Luke could see him reacting to the last blast of angry words Luke was firing into the phone. The argument ended with Luke spewing a string of expletives and cutting off his conversation in midsentence.

Luke stared at Jerry’s pursed mouth and troubled expression. “What?”

“You get what you wanted from them?”

“Not yet.”

“Surprise.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You need to work on your people skills, my man. That, and you need to cool off.”

Luke swiped his face with his palm. He was surprised when it came away with sweat. “Guess I got worked up.”

“Worked up?” Jerry harrumphed, went over to the coffeemaker and poured them both a mug of black coffee. “We need to talk.”

Luke’s eyes nailed Jerry’s. “You firing me?” Luke’s hand shook when he took the mug from his boss.

“No.” Jerry leaned against the blueprint table and hoisted one leg over the edge. “This,” Jerry said, nodding toward the phone, “isn’t about some missing boards.” Luke opened his mouth to make a retort, but Jerry held up his hand. “I’ll take care of the lumber company. Or the thief in our own midst, if that’s the case. But right now, you need to talk to me.”

Luke lowered his gaze to the muddy wood floor and was struck by the fact that this company had become more than just a paycheck to him. His work was physical, creative and demanding, and it had kept him from losing his mind over the past two years.

“I don’t know what to do, Jerry. I should have pulled out of this by now. I shouldn’t be feeling this God-awful ripping and shredding I seem to go through every single freaking day,” he said, punching himself in the stomach. “And it’s gotten worse in the past six months or so. I think about Jenny all the time. All the time.”

“I know,” Jerry said, looking down into his mug.

“I’m hurting my kids,” Luke continued. “Half the time I don’t even know they’re around. The other half, I’m barking at them, criticizing them for stupid little things they did or didn’t do. They’re just kids, for cripes’ sake. It’s gotten so bad that they’re changing their behavior because of my outbursts. They hang their heads a lot and don’t look at me. I see Annie giving Timmy hand signals not to talk about certain things when she thinks the subject will upset me. Annie’s built this tent in her room out of blankets and chairs and whatnot, where she goes and hides when I get angry or talk about the bills. God. The bills.” Luke raked his hair. “You can’t imagine how tough it is to make ends meet.”

Jerry stood up, put his coffee mug down and reached into his back pocket for his wallet. From underneath his driver’s license, he pulled out a crumpled business card. “I’ve been saving this for you for two years. I knew eventually this moment would come. When you would need help, I mean.”

Luke took the card and read it. He burst into sarcastic laughter. “A shrink? I just told you I can’t afford peanut butter! Forget it.”

“Margot is a friend of my wife’s. She runs a free bereavement counseling group on Wednesday nights. I can get all the details for you. It’s not as good as a one-on-one, but that can be expensive.”

“Free, huh?”

“You’ll like Margot. She’s brilliant and compassionate.”

Luke looked down at the card. “I’ll think about it.”

Jerry picked up his coffee. “Luke. You can’t go on like you’ve been. I’ve had complaints from some of the guys in the crews about your drill-sergeant tactics with them. Something has to change, Luke. You have to change. This is eating you up.”

Luke’s eyes bored straight into Jerry’s face. “You’re right. That’s exactly how I feel. Physically sick inside.” He looked at the card. “I’ll give her a call.”

Jerry walked over to the desk and lifted the receiver, shoving it toward Luke. “Good idea.”

* * *

SARAH ARRIVED AT the cheery meeting room in the library, carrying a dozen cupcakes from Maddie Strong’s café. She met Margot Benner, the counselor who would be leading the bereavement group, a bright, happy-looking woman in her mid-fifties with streaked, blond hair that she wore in a French braid.

“Thank you for the cupcakes, Sarah,” Margot said, motioning toward a refreshment table under a bank of huge windows that looked out onto the library’s lushly planted gardens. “I provide coffee and tea for everyone, but this is a real treat.”

“Maddie makes the best,” Sarah replied with a smile.

There were eight folding chairs arranged in a circle. Each held a blue folder with reading materials and book lists. All books, of course, were available in the library.

Within minutes, five people came into the room and introduced themselves to Sarah and Margot. Alice Crane was in her mid-forties and had lost her fiancé in a car accident one week before their wedding. That had been a year ago, Alice explained.

Pete Grobowski’s wife died of a heart attack a month ago. She was sixty-three, he said. Robert Bell had been the caregiver for his father through six long years of Alzheimer’s disease. Julie and Mary Patton had lost their mother on Christmas Day. Sarah conversed easily with all the people in the group, and as far as she could see, they all appeared to be coping fairly well with their losses. Or they’re darn good actors, she thought.

Just as everyone was sitting down, the meeting room door opened abruptly. A tall, lean, young man with broad shoulders and thick, dark, brown hair entered the room. He wore a faded blue-and-white-striped, button-down shirt that he’d tucked into his worn-looking jeans. He barely looked at anyone, and went straight to a chair directly opposite Sarah and sat down. He folded his hands and stared down at them.

Sarah recognized him immediately as the angry man with the two children at Puppies and Paws. She was curious as to why he was there. Perhaps he’d lost one of his parents, just as she had. He looked awfully morose, with no greeting smile for the others. She wondered if she looked like that to her friends. If she did, there was no wonder they were worried about her.

The man kept folding his hands one over the other as if he couldn’t get it right. Then he clasped them to his thighs and looked up at the people in the room. For the first time, Sarah noticed that he was rather good-looking, with brilliant blue eyes that shot right through her as if he were a hawk seeking out prey. She wondered if he recognized her.

Then he looked back down at his hands, which were pressed deeply into his legs as if he were holding himself to the spot. She wondered if he was angry again.

Margot walked to the center of the circle and introduced herself formally to the group, explaining that she was a psychiatrist who had been practicing privately for over twenty years.

“I conduct these bereavement groups once each quarter, free of charge, because I had a death in my own life that was so traumatic for me, so depressing, that I withdrew from my family,” Margot told them. “Frankly, I withdrew from everything. I sat in a rocking chair and stared out a window for over half a year. I went through my days in a fog. I couldn’t hear what people said to me and most of the time I didn’t acknowledge their presence. If it hadn’t been for a friend who happened to be a counselor, who dragged me back to reality, I never would have pulled out of it.”

Margot instructed everyone to introduce themselves to the group and mention only their relationship to the person they had lost.

Alice Crane went first. Sarah was next, and explained that her mother had recently died of cancer. Sarah hadn’t finished her sentence when she heard a derisive snort from across the room.

Luke lifted his head. “Sorry.” He dropped his head once more and then shook it. He stood immediately. “Sorry. I can’t do this. My coming here was my friend’s idea. This kind of thing isn’t going to help me.”