Читать книгу Her Sister's Child - Cynthia Thomason, Cynthia Thomason - Страница 8

THE SOUND of the front door closing roused Tina from a drowsiness brought on by having drunk too much wine. She glanced at the clock by her bed. 2:18 a.m. Wayne had promised to be home by midnight, but Tina had known he wouldn’t be. She reached beside the bed, picked up the bottle she’d set there a few minutes ago and tipped it to her lips. It was the last swallow and it tasted bitter. She dropped the empty to the floor, rolled it under the mattress and heard it clink against the other one she’d hidden there a couple of hours ago so her daughter wouldn’t see it.

Wayne’s heavy boot connected with the partially opened bedroom door, swinging it wide. He stood a moment, squinting against the soft light of the bedside table. “You still awake?” he asked unnecessarily.

“You promised you’d be home hours ago,” she said.

He closed the door, strode awkwardly to the middle of the room. “Don’t start, Tina. I’m beat.” He slipped his T-shirt over his head, tossed it onto a chair and unzipped his jeans.

“Where have you been?” she asked, knowing she wouldn’t believe the answer.

“I told you. I met my brother at the pool hall. We had some wings, played a few games.”

“Until two o’clock in the morning?”

“Yeah, until then.” He stepped out of the jeans and threw them on top of the shirt. She caught a whiff of something floral and cloying.

“Daryl sure smells good these days,” Tina said.

Wayne crawled between the sheets. “I’m going to ignore that. There were women at the bar.”

“I want you to tell me where you’ve really been all this time.”

He rolled onto his side. “Turn out the light.”

She sat a little straighter, the effects of the wine making her dizzy and nauseous. But she couldn’t give in now. All evening she’d planned this confrontation. No, she’d planned it for weeks and tonight it was going to happen. She jostled his shoulder. “Wayne, we need to talk.”

He tensed, but didn’t turn toward her. “Fine. You talk. But I’m going to sleep.”

A single tear slid down her cheek. She wiped it away. “I’m miserably unhappy.”

He yawned. “What else is new?”

“No, I mean this is serious. I…”

“Go to sleep, Tina. We’ll talk in the morning.”

She trapped a sob in her throat. “This can’t wait until morning.”

“It’s gonna have to.” He punched his pillow hard. Tina flinched. “Now either go to sleep or leave me alone so I can.”

She waited at least a minute, hoping he would move, say something else, look at her. He didn’t. The clock read 2:22 a.m. when Wayne began snoring.

Tina got up, smoothed her nightgown down her body with damp palms and went into the bathroom. Grabbing the sink for support, she looked at her reflection in the mirror. When had she grown so old? So sad? So worn-out from the task of living each day?

She stumbled in bare feet to the living room and took an envelope from the old oak desk scarred with cigarette burns. She’d sealed the envelope a couple of hours ago. Somewhere in the back of her mind was the faint hope that she wouldn’t need the note, that something would happen to change her mind. Foolish hope. That’s all it was. She picked up a pen and wrote “To Wayne,” and leaned the envelope against a picture of her and her daughter on the fireplace mantel.

She walked into the tiny second bedroom of her run-down cottage and stood by Katie’s bed. The child slept peacefully, unaware of the tears flowing down her mama’s face. Lately, Tina knew, Katie’s dreams had been the only place the little girl found true contentment. Kids sensed when something wasn’t right, when their worlds were about to crumble, when a parent could no longer be counted on to fix the problems in their lives. Tina had disappointed Katie too many times.

She leaned over the bed, brushed a few tangles of golden blond hair off Katie’s brow and kissed her cheek. “I’m so sorry, baby,” she said. “But everything is going to be better now. I promise.”

Tina took one last long look at her daughter’s face before she left the room. Wayne would do the right thing. At least she could depend on him to do what he needed to for Katie.

She walked through the house, feeling weightless, free, sure of her course for the first time in years. She went out the rear door and headed toward the lake. At the edge of the water, she stopped and looked back at her house. The roof over the small porch sagged from neglect. The shed still lay in ruins from the last tornado, its sad contents rusting on red clay where only weeds survived. Nothing in Tina’s life was ever fixed. It all simply rotted away, little by little, day by day. But she could stop the decay from destroying her daughter. At least she could do that.

She looked up at the Tennessee sky sprinkled with a thousand stars and stepped into the water, still warm from September’s Indian summer. She walked straight ahead, enjoying the feel of her gown rippling around her ankles, her calves, her thighs. The worn flannel was as soft as a petal, clinging, protective. When the water reached her breasts, she spread her arms, inviting the earth’s most basic element to claim her, opening herself to the calm that awaited.

Water lapped at her chin, her nose. She opened her mouth and let the lake flow in until the stars disappeared.