Tuesday

She wouldn’t make a mistake and betray him now. She sat at the back of the church with the next door neighbours, coworkers, and running group members and lost herself in the flickering shadows dancing behind candles in containers pieced together from tiny coloured glass tiles. She admired the beauty of the old ornate church with its rich dark wood, golden accents, and slightly sloping floor that created a movie theatre effect.

When she pictured this moment in her mind during the days leading up to the funeral she saw herself sobbing and slumped over in the pew immersed in the pain of loss. But now that she was here she only felt numb. In fact she felt a faint yet familiar almost angry feeling bubble up within her as she watched the family and friends at the front of the church. She wasn’t the one in the new black dress and the stylish grey wool coat being comforted by well wishers holding both her hands in theirs.

She picked out his mother easily. She stood motionless except for the occasional sweet yet pained smile at those who came to speak with her. She was clearly there in body only. The tall man with her must have been his father and although she had never seen him before he appeared to her to be a man who had aged years in just days. He had two sisters she believed but wasn’t certain, one younger and one older, and she was sure she saw them with their husbands and several small children. And she realized she didn’t know their names.

She was only an extra at the back of the church watching the main characters and she felt deeply, deeply empty. Here in this beautiful church, on this somber occasion, surrounded by strangers, she came to understand something very clearly that she had missed all this time.

~ ~ ~

She read an article on-line about the stages of falling in love. Stage two, it said, involved the establishment of routine – phone calls at the same time every day, dates on the same nights, frequenting the same places…

This familiar description made her smile. She would have to tell him that he was falling in love with her!

They had a Tuesday routine. On some Tuesday evenings it seemed he could do as he pleased. She never questioned the logistics of this. She just enjoyed that every second Tuesday he showed up on her doorstep holding a bottle of wine and dinner – shawarma, Thai food, juicy steaks for the BBQ… and he was always humming – Christmas carols, tv jingles, old tv theme songs she had long since forgotten. He never failed to make her laugh. He was part sophisticated man, part silly little boy.

In the winter his hair would be disheveled from the hat he removed just as she opened the door. She’d lovingly tame the little bits of hair standing on end. His cheeks would be rosy, his eyes smiling.

In the summer he’d smell like beach, and breeze, and warm cotton.

Winter or summer he’d be stubbly after a long day at work. And there was always that smile – like he had been waiting a lifetime to see her. The moment she opened the door time stood still.

On more tempered Tuesdays they met for lunch. Some weeks they met at a restaurant she called the lazy person’s buffet – an ornately decorated Indian restaurant that was large enough for them to be swallowed up in and vanish.

They served a buffet meal but the waiters brought it to them in little bowls. There was no actual buffet table to visit. The food was authentic and fantastic. The dark lights and enveloping scents were comforting.

The first one to arrive ordered the non-vegetarian buffet and afterwards they always ordered Indian spiced tea and they sipped – and talked – and laughed until the tea was gone and then walked to their cars to say their goodbyes with a wave. It felt perfectly normal now after so many years to never touch in public.

Some weeks they met at “Bob’s” for lunch or sometimes a late afternoon drink after playing hooky on a Friday afternoon. Bob’s was a dumpy little restaurant that served great burgers, draft beer in cheap glasses, and sported old fashioned pin ball machines. In this place – far from the sophisticated streets of their work places – they were a couple.

They referred to the friendly, elderly man who always greeted them with excitement as Bob despite the fact they had once heard his wife call him Stan in an irritated voice from the back room. They always arrived separately and to whichever one arrived first Bob would say, “order now or wait for your sweeatheart to come?” She loved that in this secluded place he would wrap his arm around her shoulder and agree with Bob when he told them what a nice looking couple they were.

They normally ate their lunch while competing for grand supremacy at the Dragon of Death pinball machine – the food and beer propped up on narrow shelves along the wall, their jackets thrown over an old wooden stool.

She liked to tease him about his pin ball skill, he liked that he normally won. “Listen old man. I think we should tone down this competition a little because I’m worried about your heart. I think I should take it easy on you.” She would taunt.

He would respond playfully. “Old man?! I’ll show you old man little girl.” He’d lean down and kiss her on the top of her head.

Bob always smiled at their banter as he dropped off a big basket of fries or another round of drinks.

Every time he won he’d raise his hands above his head and sing while doing a little jig. Even after years of this it made her laugh every time. She feel in love with him to a chorus of "we are the champions" while eating burgers and greasy fries in a dingy little place called Bob’s.

~

She looked at the stick – then looked at the box – then looked back at the stick. Her mind was swimming and she honestly wasn’t certain whether the symbol she saw in the little window meant she was pregnant or not. She wasn’t expecting this. She had only taken the test to stop what she felt was irrational worry about something next to impossible.

If she had known the test might come back positive she would have done it in the comfort of her own home not here in the washroom at work. Here she stood with her pants still undone loosely around her waist in the farthest of three grey metal stalls from the door. She hoped no one came in – she just wanted to stay here alone for a while. She sat down on the edge of the toilet and rested her head on her knees.

The rest of the day she picked up the phone several times an hour to call him, unable to focus on the presentation she was trying to finish. She was amazed at how close to 4 hours could go by and the only thing she had done was read a few emails and fiddle with her mouse. Each time she picked up the phone to call him she held it in her hands, leaned it against her forehead or rested it on her shoulder, and then put it back down again. The right thing to do would be to wait and tell him tomorrow in person over lunch or maybe she should wait in her car and invite him in to hear the news so they could have privacy – she needed a hug.

~

She had always dreamt of making love in front of a roaring fireplace on Christmas eve. Well, it was the Tuesday before Christmas eve and they were making love in front of her artificial fireplace – but it was close enough.

When she looked back on that night she alway remembered it as if everything was in slow motion. She had one hand on the back of his neck, her finger tips buried in his soft hair – the other hand on his chest. She was looking into his deep brown eyes with such passion she remembered feeling like she wanted to claw at him and pull him towards her. And he told her he loved her. She could still hear his half whispered voice in her head. She could still feel his soft warm hair in her fingers.

She pulled him towards her with such passion – both hands now on his face – and kissed him before whispering “I love you too” into the nape of his neck. It was delicious.

The present he brought for her was around her neck – a gold heart with a diamond that seemed to float magically inside. It hung on an almost clear, stunning rope. It was beautiful. The gifts he brought for their growing baby were beside them on the floor near the tree – a crib still in the box, and a huge stuffed elephant that was impossibly soft.

Later, still glowing from her fireplace fantasy she swayed in the fuzzy pink robe covered with elephants and hearts that he always teased her about with one hand on the heart around her neck, the other reaching out to lightly touch him on the back while she watched him put the crib together and place the elephant inside it leaning against one corner. “Keep this warm until the baby comes” he said. And she was silent – she never thought she could love someone so much.

~

The last message she left on his voice mail was silly. She was a bit nervous and when she felt like that she babbled. She talked to get rid of the sick feeling brewing in her stomach.

She had sent him an email that Wednesday morning while she ate her breakfast telling him how much she had enjoyed dinner with him the night before. Later that afternoon she had called him and left a quick voice mail. She ran errands on the way home and before she knew it she looked at her watch and it was 6:30 and she realized he hadn’t called. That was odd. She had expected him to call on his way home from work.

Thursday went by with no email or phone call and she started to get a jittery feeling in her stomach. She knew it was silly – he was just busy. But in the back of her mind she wondered if something had gone wrong. She really wanted to hear from him. She called and left a silly playful message to cover her unease. “You know, you left a trail of wet footsteps behind in my bathroom when you were here. What do you have against my bath mat? Call me.”

Friday she decided she would do something she had never done in 3 years. Instead of calling his cell phone she called his office and asked the receptionist to put her through. She was now genuinely worried and wasn’t going to go into the weekend without putting her mind to rest. She asked the elderly, yet perky sounding lady who answered the phone if she could speak to him.

There was silence – and somehow in that silence she knew everything. She knew her worries weren’t just an over reaction - she knew that the words she was about to hear would bring her to her knees. She waited in suspended animation for the lady at the reception desk to speak. Her hands were already trembling when the anonymous person on the other end of the phone finally spoke. "I’m sorry but he passed away suddenly Tuesday evening in a car accident. We’re all still in shock and I’m sorry to have to give you this information." She offered to put her through to someone managing his calls.

"No, no, that’s ok." She managed to say before hanging up and holding her breath.

~ ~ ~

The numbness left her as she walked to the car and when she reached it and closed herself into its safety she cried. She was neither friend nor family. She cried when she thought of how she had felt closer to him than to anyone she had ever known. She cried when she remembered his warmth and how he looked when she had rolled over next to him and watched him sleep. She could finish his sentences, order his favourite dish from a menu if he was running late, share books with him she knew he’d love, wear his favourite perfume, know just what to say to make him smile. But today, amongst his family and friends she realized she didn’t know him at all – didn’t know the colour of the sheets he slept in, where he put his car keys when he got home from work, if he had a favourite chair, his shoe size, what he ate for breakfast on a Sunday morning.

She had driven to the funeral worried that she wouldn’t be able to fight back tears for the very special man she had lost but she now rested her head against the door window of her car and sobbed for the man she never really had.