“That makes sense,” she said quietly, listening to him, and watching him closely. She knew he had told her the truth. “And people do die and leave and disappear. It happens that way sometimes. But if you're the first one out the door, you wind up alone for sure. You don't mind that?”
“I didn't.” Past tense. Lately he was minding it a lot, but he didn't want to say that to her. Yet.
“You pay a big price in life for being scared,” she said quietly, and then added, “scared to love. I'm not so good at that myself.” She decided to tell him then. Just as he did with her, she felt safe with him. She hadn't told the story in a long time, and kept it short. “I got married at twenty-four. He was a friend of my father's, the head of a major company, a brilliant man. He had been a research scientist, and started a drug company we all know. And he was totally nuts. He was twenty years older than I was, and an extraordinary man. He still is. But narcissistic, crazy, brilliant, successful, charming, and alcoholic, dangerous, sadistic, abusive. They were the worst six years of my life. He was a total sociopath, and everyone kept telling me how lucky I was to be married to him. Because none of them knew what went on behind closed doors. I had a car accident, because I wanted to, I think. All I wanted to do was die. He kept torturing me, and I'd leave him for a day or two, and then he'd bring me back, or charm me back. Abusers never lose sight of their prey. When I was in the hospital after the car accident, I got sane. I never went back again. I hid out in California for a year, met a lot of good people, and figured out what I wanted to do. I opened the center when I got home, and never looked back.”
“What happened to him? Where is he now?”
“Still here. Torturing someone else. He's in his fifties now. He married some pathetic debutante last year, poor kid. He's about as charming as it gets, and as sick. He still calls me sometimes, and wrote me a letter telling me she meant nothing to him, and he still loves me. I never answered him, and I won't. I screen my calls, and I never return his. It's over for me. But I haven't had any inclination to try again. I guess you could reasonably say that I'm commitment phobic,” she said, smiling at Charlie, “or relationship phobic, and I intend to stay that way. I have no desire whatsoever to have the shit kicked out of me again. I never saw it coming. No one did. They just thought he was handsome and charming and rich. He comes from a so-called 'good family,' and my own family thought I was nuts for a long time. They probably still do, but they're too polite to say it. They just think I'm weird. But I'm alive, and sane, which looked questionable for a while until I ran my car into the back of a truck on the Long Island Expressway, and scared the hell out of myself. Believe me, running into a truck was a lot less painful and dangerous than my life with him. He was a total sociopath, and still is. So, I threw my biological clock out the window, and my high heels and makeup with it, all my little black cocktail dresses, my engagement and wedding rings. The good news is that I never had kids with him. I probably would have stayed with him if I did. And now instead of one kid or two, I have forty of them, a whole neighborhood, and Gabby and Zorro. And I'm a whole lot happier than I was.” She sat and looked at him and the sorrow and pain in her eyes was unveiled. He could see that she had been to hell and back, which was why she cared so much about the children she worked with. She had been there herself, although in a different way. He had felt cold chills run up his spine at the story she told him. She had made it sound simple and quick, but he could see that it wasn't. She had lived a nightmare, and finally woken up. But it had taken her six years to do so, and she must have suffered incredibly during those six years. He was sorry that it had happened to her. Sorrier than she knew. But she was still alive to tell the tale, and doing wonderful work. She could have been sitting in a chair somewhere, drooling, or on drugs or drunk out of her mind, or dead. Instead, she had made a good life for herself. But she had given up so much.
“I'm sorry, Carole. Some awful stuff happens to all of us at some point, I guess. Life is about what you do afterward, how many pieces you can fish out of the garbage and glue back together.” He knew there were still some big pieces missing in himself. “You have a lot of guts.”
“So do you. For a kid to lose his whole family at the age you were is a crippling blow. You never totally get over it, but you may get brave enough not to hit the door one day. I hope you do,” she said gently.
“I hope you do too,” he said softly as he looked at her, grateful for the honesty they had shared.
“I'd rather put my money on you.” She smiled at him. “I like the way my life is now. It's simple and easy and uncomplicated.”
