The Shadow Wife

  “It’s the E.R.,” she said, and Joelle nodded.

  Writing her own notes, Joelle listened to Rebecca’s end of the phone conversation, wondering if the case might be something in which Liam would need to be involved. She couldn’t tell, since Rebecca was doing more listening than talking.

  Rebecca hung up the phone. “Have to run,” she said, standing up. She smoothed her skirt with both hands, then picked up her notebook and pen. “They’re paging Liam, Joelle, but you might eventually need to be involved in this. A car accident’s coming in. A pregnant woman, thirty-eight weeks, and her husband. Husband’s okay, but the woman isn’t expected to make it. I’ll have to meet them in the E.R. to see if we can save the baby.”

  “Let me know if the baby ends up coming here,” Joelle said. If the child survived, it would most likely be rushed to the neonatal intensive care unit, and the case would certainly become hers.

  Right now, though, it was Liam’s. She pictured Liam trying to handle a situation in which a wife dies, a baby lives, and a husband grieves. Standing up, she closed the medical chart and rested it back on the lazy Susan. Too close to home for him, she thought. This would kill him. She headed down the hall in the direction of the emergency room.

  8

  LIAM WAS ABOUT TO LEAVE THE E.R. TO HEAD UP TO THE CARDIAC unit when Rebecca Reed whisked past him. She touched his arm as she rushed by.

  “Don’t go yet,” she said. “We’ll need you.”

  “What’s going on?” He heard the sirens outside the doors of the E.R., but Rebecca didn’t stop to answer him. Typical Rebecca.

  One of the nurses who had overheard their conversation stopped briefly near Liam as she headed toward the front door.

  “It’s a car accident,” she said, glancing in the direction of the ambulance. “Husband is all right, but the wife went through the windshield and died on the way in.” She started walking again, then added over her shoulder, “And she’s pregnant.”

  Liam stood near the corridor that led from the E.R. to the rest of the hospital and felt the numbness come over him. This happened to him every once in a while. It was not an emotional numbness, although he supposed that was part of it. Instead, it was a literal paralysis that started in his feet and rose to his chest until he could barely pull any air into his lungs. He stood there feeling thick and stupid and wanting to escape. He could leave and pretend he had not been caught in time to handle this case, to deal with the husband who was “all right.” That husband would never be all right again.

  Unable to move, he watched as they wheeled the woman into the E.R. toward one of the treatment rooms. Except for one streak of dried blood on her temple, her injuries were strangely invisible, and her belly was huge. Her husband walked next to the gurney, limping, perhaps from an injury suffered in the accident, and clutching his wife’s lifeless hand. They were both in their thirties, Liam guessed.

  One of the nurses left the side of the gurney to step over to Liam. “Take care of the husband, okay?” she said, and he wondered if she could see the panic in his eyes. “He’s physically fine, but emotionally—”

  “I’ll do it.”

  Liam turned at the sound of the voice behind him. Joelle.

  “I heard what was happening,” she said, touching his hand, then quickly drawing her fingers away. “Since the baby will eventually be in my unit, I thought I’d come down and take over. If that’s all right with you, Liam.”

  He doubted his face could mask the gratitude he felt. She knew. She’d heard about the case, and she knew he would not be able to handle it. And she’d come.

  “Thanks,” he said, or tried to say. His mouth was too dry to get the word out, but Joelle had already moved past him.

  Still holding his wife’s hand, the man tried to stay with the gurney as the staff wheeled it through the doors to the treatment room, but the nurses shook their heads at him and told him to let go. Liam watched as Joelle took the man’s arm, speaking quietly to him. Finally, he let go of his wife’s hand and stood next to Joelle, wearing that shocked, this-can’t-be-happening-to-us look on his face that Liam knew all too well. Joelle and the husband watched the doors to the treatment room swing shut, and Liam turned away before he saw any more.

  “What shall we do tonight, Sam?” he said as he drove out of the nursing home’s parking lot, hours after the situation in the emergency room. He glanced in the rearview mirror at his son, who was buckled into the car seat. Sam didn’t answer him. He was seemingly fascinated by the handle of the door, poking it, patting it, and Liam smiled.

  He was better now. He and Sheila and Sam had had their visit with Mara, and he’d managed to block the incident in the E.R. from his mind. Whenever it threatened to slip in, he thought of Sam. The ruse—replacing a negative thought with a positive—worked every time. Almost.

  Now came his favorite part of the day, his time alone with Sam. Sam was pure joy. He knew nothing of sorrow, nothing of the sad circumstances of his birth. Liam checked the rearview mirror again, enjoying the traces of Mara he could see in his son. He had her incredibly dark eyes and fair skin, but more than that, he had Mara’s spirit. It was obvious in the way he took on every new challenge with optimism and excitement.

  Liam pulled into the carport of his cottage and lifted Sam out of the car seat. The maid would have come today, he thought. Good. He liked the lemony-fresh smell and the sense of order she left behind. Sheila paid to have her come once a week—one more thing for which he was beholden to his mother-in-law.

  He and Sam ate dinner, then went out in the small backyard to pull a few weeds in the garden. At least Liam pulled weeds, while Sam pushed his tot-size lawn mower back and forth over the lawn. Then, while it was still light out, Liam got the bubble solution and the huge bubble wand Joelle had given them from the kitchen. He sat on the patio and blew bubbles for Sam to pop and chase in his gawky toddling run. Every time a fresh bubble slipped from the wand, Sam laughed, a tinkly, golden sound that made his eyes crinkle and showed his pearly little teeth, and Liam felt like blowing bubbles forever just to see that happiness in his son’s face.

  But finally he noticed it was growing dark out, and he screwed the lid on the bubble solution. Sam’s face fell in disappointment.

  “Let’s play with the blocks,” Liam said quickly, standing up, and the little boy brightened and headed for the back door.

  Inside, Liam dumped the round canister of large, colored blocks onto the carpeted living-room floor, and Sam instantly grabbed one and set it in front of him, then reached for another. They’d played with the blocks nearly every night this week, and Liam could see Sam’s abilities growing. The first night, Sam had just watched Liam build a tower, then gleefully knocked it over. But the past few evenings, he was building towers himself. Well, not towers, exactly, but he was piling one block on top of another, at any rate.

  “Let’s see how many blocks you can stack tonight, Sam,” Liam said. “Last night you got to three before they fell down. Remember? One, two, three.” He showed him his three fingers, then the three blocks, but Sam seemed disinterested in the number game. He was building, and in a moment he had three blocks stacked, if a bit precariously.

  “That’s fantastic, Sam,” Liam said, and handed him one more. “Can you put this one on the pile? That would make four.”

  Sam clumsily set the fourth block on the pile, and the stack quivered for a moment, then tumbled over, making him laugh.

  They played a few minutes longer, but then Sam stepped over the blocks and fell hard into Liam’s lap.

  “Oh, you wanna wrestle, do you?” Liam said, lying back on the carpet. Sam crawled on top of him, letting himself roll and fall and climb, using Liam’s body as a jungle gym. Liam had to do very little. He thought about all the toys Sheila had bought her grandson, which were piled up in Sam’s room and in the corner of the den. Totally unnecessary, Liam thought. All this kid needed for entertainment was a dad lying on the living-room floor.

  “Aya-pane!” Sam
said, patting Liam’s knees.

  “You want to be an airplane?” Liam said. “Well, I don’t know about that. Do you know how to fly?”

  “Aya-pane!” Sam giggled as he pounded harder, his hands a mere feather’s weight against Liam’s knees.

  “Ok, Sammy-Bananny, you asked for it. Assume the position.”

  Sam leaned against Liam’s shins, and, holding the little boy’s hands, Liam raised his legs into the air. Making airplane noises, he flew his son this way and that, while Sam laughed and shrieked, his tiny hands gripping his father’s for dear life.

  “Uh-oh!” Liam said. “We’re hitting turbulence. It’s going to be a bumpy flight.”

  Sam let out an anticipatory squeal even before Liam started the bouncing motion with his legs. Turbulence was great for his own abdominal muscles, he thought to himself. Good thing, too, since he hadn’t been to the gym in over a year.

  Finally, he lowered his legs and Sam fell on top of him with a thump.

  Liam groaned. “Rough landing,” he said.

  “More, Dada,” Sam said, begging for more even though he was lying, exhausted, on his father’s stomach.

  Liam laughed. “That’s enough turbulence for one night,” he said. “I think it’s bath time, now.”

  Sam stood up. “Bose!” he said.

  “Right. We can play with the boats in the tub.” Suddenly tired, Liam needed a few token tugs from Sam to get him on his feet.

  He gave Sam a bath, then brought him into his own bed so they could look at a book together. Liam rested on a stack of pillows piled against the bookcase that served as a headboard, Sam on his lap, as they turned the pages. Finally, after two picture books, in which Sam had to name every single item in every single picture, most of them in a language only Liam could understand, the little boy’s eyelids began to droop.

  Liam set the books on the night table, settled lower into the pillows and turned his sleepy son so that he was resting against his chest. He kissed the top of Sam’s head through the blond curls, the scent of baby shampoo comforting in his nostrils. He felt like hugging him tightly, but didn’t dare for fear of waking him. When Sam was still like this, Liam felt a fragility in him, a need to protect him, always, from anything that might hurt him.

  “I love you, Sam,” he whispered into his son’s clean hair.

  If only he could share Sam with Mara. He wanted that more than anything. Of course, he did share him with her, as much as was possible. But when he was honest with himself, he had doubts about what sort of mother Mara would have been. She’d never had an interest in children and had been nothing but candid with him about that fact. Maybe he was kidding himself to think she would have been as smitten by Sam as he was.

  He’d told Mara about Sam’s first steps and his first words, but Mara had only smiled her simple smile, the same expression she would have offered if he had said that Sam had been hit by a car. Once, he’d put that theory to the test by telling Mara he had some sad news.

  “Your mother died,” he said.

  Mara smiled.

  “She was in a car accident.”

  Smile.

  “I made that all up, Mara,” he said quickly, upset with himself for even putting the awful thought into words. “Your mother will be here to visit you tomorrow, as usual.”

  Mara’s constant smile, though, encouraged Sam to relate to his mother, and for that Liam was grateful. How long would that last, though? For how long would Sam be able to relate to her so easily, so unassumingly? Liam thought of the future—the first day of school, Sam’s teen years, his graduation, his leaving home, his wedding. When he pictured himself in the future, he was completely alone with his son.

  He would always have a wife whom he loved, but who could never truly be a wife to him. Not in any way. She could not be a friend in whom he could confide or a partner with whom he could share life’s joys and sorrows. Nor could she be a lover to hold him close, to touch his body the way he hungered to be touched. He still reached for Mara in the middle of the night sometimes, only to find the cool, empty space on the bed where her body should have been. Confused for a moment, he’d turn on the light and then remember, and he’d want to scream and punch the walls. He had lost so much.

  Sometimes, people who didn’t know what had happened, people in the music world, perhaps, would ask him why Sommers and Steele was no longer performing, and he’d have to explain. He and Mara had formed their little two-person folk group shortly after meeting, and they’d been fairly popular on the local club circuit. They both sang quite well, especially together, and they both played acoustic guitars. Mara would play the piano when one was available. People had commented on how well matched they were. Joelle had known that even before he and Mara had met. If it hadn’t been for Joelle, the two of them never would have been together. Liam told himself that he didn’t regret their meeting, that a few years with Mara was worth what he was going through now, but he wasn’t sure. He never sang these days, not even in the shower. He hated the sound of his voice alone. It had been Mara’s harmony that had made his voice whole.

  Liam breathed in the scent of Sam’s hair again. He should get up and carry him into the nursery, but he felt weighted down on the bed, and he remembered the case in the E.R. What would he have said to that devastated man if Joelle had not rescued him? At least your wife died. That’s what he would have liked to say, and the thought made him feel instantly guilty. It was true, though. At least that man would have a fresh start. He had the hope of happiness. Liam would have explained to him that the baby would become his world. His reminder of his wife, his source of laughter and hope. But he knew those words would not have been helpful. Mara used to say she thought therapists who had “been there,” who had experienced the issues their clients were struggling with, were rarely as helpful as those who had not. They’d argued about that. An intellectual argument, the sort that was frequent between two bright and opinionated people. Now, though, he understood what Mara had meant. When he visited her earlier that evening, he even told her she’d been right, but her vacuous smile let him know she didn’t understand his words, much less the meaning behind them. He told her he would have been of absolutely no help to that man. He might even have done some harm, if not to the widower, then to himself, by trying to handle that family’s crisis.

  Thank you, Jo.

  Joelle had been so wise to know how that case would have affected him, and so truly loving to come down to the E.R. to save him from it.

  He wouldn’t have survived this past year without Joelle. Their relationship had been one of respectful co-workers and good friends before Mara’s aneurysm, but Joelle quickly became his main source of support afterward. She shared his grief. She could get inside it with him because she loved Mara, too. She understood the reality of what was happening. She knew what the future held for Mara, as well as for him, and she let him talk about it, opening the door to his fury, and sometimes his tears. Not like Sheila, who never, not once during the past fourteen months, acknowledged Liam’s dilemma of having a wife, yet having no wife.

  “Because she’s Mara’s mom, Liam,” Joelle had said to him. “She’s too busy seeing what’s happening to her daughter. She can’t see how it’s affecting you. Give her time.”

  But he feared Sheila would never understand, no matter how much time passed. She had cared for her cancer-ridden husband for five years at home before his death, sacrificing her needs to take care of his, and Liam knew Sheila expected nothing less of him.

  Liam and Joelle had never directly addressed what was happening to their relationship, but they grew closer over the months, stopping in each other’s offices at work for a bit of conversation and talking on the phone every night. Most of the time, he would call her. Other times, it would be the reverse. Either way, those calls became a routine, and if for some reason he wasn’t able to talk to her before going to bed, he would lie awake for hours before he could fall asleep.

  They taught each other to smile and l
augh again. To a grieving person, nothing was more seductive than laughter. Then there were the hugs, of course, the comforting embraces between good friends. At some point, though, those hugs became longer, tighter, followed by lingering touches. Her fingers would slide over his shoulder or wrist, his hand would brush an eyelash from her cheek.

  He missed her. He missed talking to her every night. There was a vacuum around him at night now, after Sam fell asleep and he was alone with his thoughts.

  He looked over at the phone on the night table, then shook his head. If only he hadn’t allowed things to get out of hand, he could still have that friendship with her, that wonderful relief of confiding in someone and being heard. But there was no going back. He knew better than that. Just eating lunch across the table from her in the cafeteria set up a guilty longing in him. He loved Mara deeply, but sometimes what he felt for Joelle went even deeper, and that scared him.

  Reaching behind him to the bookshelf, his fingers found the book of meditations she’d given him. He leafed through it, Sam still asleep on his chest, looking not for a particular meditation, but for the picture he kept tucked between the pages. The photograph made him smile when he found it. He and Joelle had taken Sam to the Dennis the Menace Playground, more for their entertainment than Sam’s, because he was far too young to make good use of the park. Most of the photos from that day were of Joelle and Sam together, but in this one, Joelle was alone. She sat cross-legged on the ground near the playground’s giant black locomotive, grinning, her chin raised in a way that gave her a teasing, insolent look. Like Mara, she was dark-haired and darkeyed, but that was where the comparison ended. Joelle looked like a kid. She’d worn her thick dark hair in braids that day, and her grin in the picture was wide and uninhibited. She was not a kid, though, but a flesh-and-blood woman, with a woman’s body and a woman’s heart.

  Liam glanced at the phone again. What would it hurt if he called her to thank her for coming to the E.R.?