Page 57 of Pages of My Heart

Now it’s Thursday and the images keep coming. Sometimes it’s the lady in the street. Other times, it’s the source of his pain. Either way, his heart races, his body shakes, and it feels as if he will surely die—but then he doesn’t. So, he drinks again.

The whisky hits the spot, his body softening as the tension in his muscles melts like snow under the rays of a winter sun.

His body warms and his mind drifts, hazy, until there are no thoughts at all.

Numb. Numb is good. He moves through the house until he ends up on the bed, bottle close by on the nightstand.

Turning onto his side, he catches Thomas’s scent.

He missed that while he was gone. Pressing his face into the pillow, he inhales deeply, then lies on his back and undoes his trousers.

He’s getting better at undressing, if nothing else.

Sliding his hand into his briefs, he caresses his dick and balls.

It’s nice. Comforting. He closes his eyes. He’s so tired.

It feels late when he wakes. Checking the clock, he realizes Thomas will be home within the hour.

He urgently needs to piss, so he hauls his body up, taking a final swig from the bottle before hiding it away in the drawer of his nightstand.

His head pounds all the way to the bathroom.

Over the last week he’s learned how to get his dick out of his pants with one hand and then back in using just the zipper.

But right now, his trousers are already undone, and he can’t manage the button or the belt with one hand, so he’ll have to wait until Thomas returns to help.

He watches himself in the mirror—washing one hand with his pants hanging open—and he begins to laugh. Because it’s funny, ain’t it? Funny how he could rebuild car engines, and lead a platoon into battle, and knock someone out with a left hook, and now he can’t even dress himself.

“Look at you,” he says to his reflection. “Good for nothing son of a bitch.” The punch takes him by surprise. He hears the mirror shatter well before he registers the pain.

And that’s how Thomas finds him forty minutes later, sitting on the edge of the bathtub, fragments of mirror scattered everywhere, and blood from the cuts on his knuckles still dripping onto the white tiled floor.

He cannot find the strength to calm Thomas, who sees the blood and the large shards of glass and thinks the very worst. And of course he would.

Charlie manages to say, “I’m okay,” but Thomas doesn’t seem to hear it over his own screams.

Day 19: Charlie

“How’s your hand?” Evie lifts Jonathan out of the baby carriage and takes a seat in the sitting room.

Charlie sits in the other chair, watching as Jonathan squirms on Evie’s lap. “Better. Tommy’s concerned the doc didn’t get all the shards out, but it’s fine.”

Jonathan recently had his first birthday, and he’s begun taking his first steps. Evie puts the baby down on the floor and he giggles with delight. “Why don’t you hold him for a bit?”

“You know why, Evie. I might drop him.”

“Well, let me put him on your lap.”

“He looks like he wants to walk. Just leave him—”

But Evie ignores him, scooping Jonathan up and placing him on Charlie’s lap.

The little boy smiles, hand reaching out to touch Charlie’s face.

He is suddenly aware of the alcohol on his breath, shame making his skin flush hot.

“Hi there, Johnny boy,” he says, gently patting the boy’s back.

Jonathan’s attempts at words soften his hardened heart, and he instinctively pulls his nephew closer to his chest.

“Jonathan, that’s your Uncle Charlie. Can you say Uncle Charlie?”

Jonathan’s head turns toward his mother. “Mama, Mama.”

“Say Un-cle Char-lee.”

“Un un un,” Jonathan chants, clearly pleased with himself.

Evie beams with pride. “That’s it. Uncle Charlie.”

Jonathan stands in Charlie’s lap and pulls on his hair. “Ow!” he says, screwing up his face in the most comical fashion he can manage. The sound of Jonathan’s laughter fills the room.

And then he falls.

Charlie grabs hold of Jonathan’s arm, but it only manages to partially break the impact. Evie springs out of her chair, gathering Jonathan into her arms.

“I told you, Evie!” he spits out harshly. “You and Tommy are as bad as each other!”

Jonathan’s delayed cries are loud, and Charlie isn’t certain if they’re from the fall or from his loud outburst.

“Hush, baby,” Evie coos, bouncing Jonathan on her hip. “It’s all right. Uncle Charlie is just a little grumpy today.”

Unable to face the judgement in Evie’s eyes, he retreats into the kitchen, retrieving the bottle of gin he’s hidden at the back of a cabinet.

Once he’s wrangled off the cap, he gulps some down, the burn in his throat comforting, before he returns it to its place.

Back in the sitting room, Jonathan plays with the blocks Evie has laid out on the floor.

His face is still a bit red, but his crying has ceased, and he otherwise looks none the worse for wear.

Charlie sits, trying to avoid his sister’s accusing glare.

“Have you already started drinking today?”

He frowns. “Did Tommy tell you to ask me that?”

“He doesn’t have to. I can smell it on your damn breath! And who else can he talk to if not me? You expect him to deal with this all alone? He’s worried about you. Why are you shutting him out?”

Charlie shifts uneasily in his chair, averting his eyes once again. He barely looks at anyone anymore. “He doesn’t understand. None of you understand.”

“And drinking is the answer? Why don’t you help him understand by talking to him? Do you want to end up a mean drunkard like Pops?”

Charlie snaps his head up, not even bothering to veil his anger. “How could you say that? I’d kill myself before I end up like him. I love Tommy. I would never—” He breathes deeply, trying to control himself before he continues. “I would never lay a hand on him.”

Evie stares him down, expression furious.

“And that’s how you show him how much you love him?

By lying around the house drunk all day?

Do you know that after we heard you’d been injured, he spent every evening at my house?

He poured out his love for you, cried about his fear of losing you .

. . I’ve never, never in my life seen someone so in love.

And if I’m not mistaken, under all your hurt and pain, you love him just as much.

Do you know how lucky you are to have a love like that?

Do you know how rare that is? You’ve risked everything to be together, and you continue to risk everything, because you know as well as I do that they can put you in jail for it.

If that’s not the very definition of true love, then I don’t know what is! ”

Charlie’s eyes burn and he has to blink rapidly to stop the tears from falling. “But will he still love me when he knows what I’ve done?” His voice quivers. “What I’ve become?”

“Charlie,” Evie sighs, defeated, “you’re still you, no matter what happened in the war. Tom will always love you if you just let him.” Evie comes to sit on the arm of his chair, pulling him into a hug. “Please stop drinking.”

“I’ll try.” And he means it.

Day 22: Thomas

Not long after breakfast on Saturday morning, Thomas stands in front of the bathroom mirror trying to muster the courage to ask Charlie to do his exercises.

The mirror is brand new, having been replaced only a few days prior after Charlie punched it with his fist. Was Charlie trying to punch his own reflection, or was he experiencing some sort of hallucination?

Charlie refuses to discuss it, turning his back and silently walking away whenever Thomas tries to broach the subject.

Not that Thomas really wants to discuss it, truth be told.

He’s had his fair share of nightmares this week too.

When he closes his eyes, he’s taken back to that horrible moment he saw all the blood, terror exploding in his chest when he’d assumed Charlie had cut his wrists.

The nightmares are twisted and perverse, the faces of Charlie and his mother morphing from one to the other and back again.

Men in white dragging Charlie from the house.

His mother whispering in his ear, “You killed another one. It’s you!

You kill the ones you love.” Thomas isn’t sure how long he can go on like this.

All of Charlie’s disturbing behavior leaves Thomas feeling vulnerable and inept.

And Charlie is not getting better. In fact, he’s becoming far worse.

The nightmares occur every few nights and the sleepwalking has made repeat appearances too.

Thomas has noted a pattern—Charlie fights the enemy in their bed and is torn apart with anguish and guilt outside in their backyard.

Charlie always uses the same words, too, as if he’s trapped in a never-ending war that he is endlessly doomed to relive.

On top of the nightmares, Charlie now has moments when his breathing becomes so labored and his pulse so rapid that Thomas thinks he’s having a heart attack.

He holds Charlie tight in his arms every time it happens, but the moment it passes, Charlie shuts down and walks away.

All of this is compounded by Charlie’s increasing alcohol consumption, making Thomas fret all day at work, fearful of what he may come home to.

Often, he finds Charlie unsteady on his feet and his speech slurred.

Other times he has to run from room to room until he finds Charlie passed out somewhere in the house.

Thomas is incensed because it makes him think of his own deadbeat father, Patty, and of Charlie’s late father, good riddance, and of every one of those men destroyed by the allure of the bottle. It’s the last thing he wants for Charlie, but he has no clue how to help him.

Unsurprisingly, they have almost completely stopped having sex, and when they do, Charlie rarely climaxes.

For a couple who have always used sex to communicate their love, it is having devastating consequences.

Thomas isn’t sure if it’s the drinking, or if Charlie is no longer attracted to him, or, God forbid, if he doesn’t love him anymore.

It’s too frightening to face, so he pushes it deep down and tries to pretend all is normal.

He finds Charlie in the sitting room, his body oddly still and his eyes staring vacantly out the window. “How about we get your exercises done this morning? Then I thought we could take a walk, and tonight I’d like to take you to the pictures. We haven’t gone since you’ve been home.”

Charlie slowly turns his head, sad blue eyes looking up at him for a brief moment before flittering away. “I don’t want to go out. People will stare at my arm.”

“No, they won’t.” He keeps his voice soft. “You can’t even tell. And that’s why we should do your exercises, so you won’t have to feel like that anymore.”

“Maybe I’ll go for a walk.” Charlie closes his eyes, signaling he’s done with the conversation.

“That’s great. Now stand up and let’s get started.”

Charlie doesn’t move, but Thomas stands his ground, waiting.

Finally, Charlie pushes himself up from the chair, and Thomas gets into position.

The first thing they do is stretch. He guides Charlie’s arm forward and up, then lowers it back to his side.

After a series of these, he repeats the motion to the back and then to the side.

Charlie remains silent, standing perfectly still like a life-size doll.

“Okay, Charlie”—Thomas grabs the tennis ball off the mantelpiece and places it in Charlie’s hand, helping him curl his fingers around it—“see if you can squeeze it for three seconds today.” Charlie squeezes, his arm shaking with the effort.

“One Mississippi, two Mississippi, thr—” The ball drops to the floor.

“Well done, darling. Okay, only nine more to go.” Thomas bends over to pick up the ball, but when he stands up, Charlie is walking away. “Where are you going?”

Charlie halts in the doorway, then speaks without turning. “There’s no point, Tom. It’s not getting any better. Maybe this is what I deserve. Maybe this is God’s punishment.”

Thomas still has no idea what is at the root of Charlie’s intense feelings of guilt. “God’s punishment for what? For being a homosexual? Or for fighting in a war you were forced to join?”

Charlie shrugs. “Maybe both.” Then he continues down the hall.