Weeks can pass in an instant without you ever realizing they took place if one isn't careful. This is a tale about just that. In that one instant your life can take a drastic change for the better or worse and your hopes and dreams either crushed or realized.
As Chad headed home that fateful night repeatedly dialing home and his wife's cell phone number without answer he started to get a bit worried. He hadn't talked to her all day which was highly unusual but still happened on occasion. But there was something more bothering him, a welling deep in the pit of his stomach and he knew, just knew, that something was amiss. As he pulled into the parking lot he could feel the dread growing even more within himself.
Chad got out of the car and noticed the sheriff's car in the lot but without the lights twirling and flashing it drew no real reason for hesitance at the moment. He walked through the doors to his building and slowly climbed the steps to his third floor apartment. As he crossed the threshold of the hallway there stood an officer knocking on his door.
Now as everyone knows that momentary fear that he had done something rushed to him and he wanted to bolt. But Chad knew he had done no wrong, his days of doing silly things that could have even warranted an officer at his home were long, long, gone.
"Can I help you officer?" Chad asked with a inquisitive voice.
"Are you Mr. Chad Smith?" the officer queried?
Still hesitant but prepared, "Yes, sir I am, may I ask why you are here?"
"Son can we go inside and sit down I have some things that you need to hear and this hallway doesn't seem like the best place to do it?"
Chad nodded and slipped past the officer and unlocked the door, looking for any sign of his wife and children, although none were apparent he figured perhaps they had stopped for takeout and would be home any minute.
"Chad, I am afraid I have some bad news," the officer started, "Your wife and children were in an accident a few hours ago down on 95 North."
Chad's fears were suddenly a reality and those were the last words he would hear for a few days that would sink in. He had somehow managed to block out all the rest of what the officer had told him. He knew that it wasn't just an accident and injuries, or the hospital would have called him. The officer had come to inform him that he was now a childless widower.
The family had come from Ohio to rally around him and give support as well as some of his co-workers and friends. His job was going to be held for him indefinitely he was told and yet the worry was already setting in. He knew that Aimee's life insurance policy would set him up for quite a long time but, he had of course hoped that neither of them would ever be able to cash in on these policies. They had flown the bodies back home and had a closed casket funeral and then without a much time passing he was back in the apartment. Chad realized that there was no reason to stay here any longer but he couldn't bring himself to move out. This was the last home he had shared with his girls and he had to cling to that as long as he could. There was no way around that in his mind. This was still their home and he did find himself many times lying on his eldest child's bed clutching her favorite stuffed animals with tears in his eyes.
Two weeks after the officer had been knocking at his door another knock came. Chad didn't want to answer it and he sat on the couch watching the girl's favorite movie reminiscing about all the times they had watched it together. The pounding at the door persisted but he couldn't bring himself up off the couch to answer the door, he wished to be left in his solitude to wallow.
Just then his phone rang and he decided he had best answer it, hopefully it was someone he could just talk to, a salesperson who would not be able to hang up once he began to let it all out or anyone that might just be calling. He didn't want to see anyone but he was finally ready to let it all out.
Picking up the phone he looked down at the caller id log on the display window and saw that it was Chris. His boss from work and a friend who had always been there before. Slowly he waited till the final ring would come prior to the answering machine to pick it up and then he click the talk button.
"Hi Chris," he said in a voice he barely recognized himself.
"Open the fucking door, right now Chad," she ordered him.
Chad suddenly realized who was there and he got up and flipped the locks on the door. "Come on in," he whispered into the receiver.
Chris took one look around the house and could see the disarray that had happened to the house in the last few weeks. There were bottles, plates, dishes, and clothes strewn everywhere around the living room and a glance down the hallway showed more of the same. Taking a deep breath she began to speak to him.
"Chad, you need to talk to someone, as long as I 've known you, you've been strong and a leader and never been one to let yourself go. You haven't shaved obviously in two weeks and this house is a mess."
"Chris thanks for coming but I don't need any lectures right now, did you come to tell me my job is gone now?" he asked.
"No, you dumbass I came to listen to whatever you say and get you back on your feet and out into the world again. We could care less how long you take from work, we know what you're going through..." Chad stood up a look of anger taking form in his expression, "How the fuck do you know what it's like to lose your wife and children all in one fell swoop Chris? How do you know what it's like to go to work after kissing the three of them goodbye in the morning and then coming home to find an officer waiting to tell you your family is dead? Hmmm? Just how the fuck do you suppose you know what this is like?"
And then it happened, the dam broke and the tears burst through. Chad began to sob and weep like never before the past two weeks, the sudden rush of emotion too much to bear alone anymore. Chris rushed to him and wrapped her arms around him, pushing him down onto the couch and holding him close. It broke her heart to see him like this, always the leader and the consoler he was, to now see him so weak and vulnerable was perhaps one of the most shocking things she had seen in her lifetime.
"It's ok, let it all out Chad, I let Sharon know that I was coming over to see you and that I was probably taking a day or two off to try and get you back on your feet again. She said that was fine and to do whatever I had to, we need you back whenever you're ready and not just to work for us but to bring life back into the schools you work in and the office. The big boss has already approved for you to be in the office as soon as you wish, so that if being in schools is to hard on you, you can stay with the company."
Chad wept now even harder, realizing that he had been such a prick to everyone these past two weeks, just shutting them all out and then closing up to them all. He felt Chris' hands caressing his back in a soothing manner and then for the first time in two weeks he just passed out. A deep sleep that was too long in coming, one that he hadn't let himself have thus far. But feeling anyone's arms around him right now was so comforting that his mind just shut down and ordered him to sleep.
Chris felt his sobs stop abruptly and then she concluded that he had passed out, sheer exhaustion must have overcome him. She had seen the bags under his eyes and knew he had put himself through so much grief lately without release that this was exactly what he needed. She waited there with his head on his lap for a few hours before sliding out from underneath him and getting a blanket and pillow. Then she set out to straighten the place up.
Late the next morning Chad awoke on the couch with a bit of relief as he looked around, rubbing the sleep from his eyes and seeing that the room had become clean as he slept. He searched for Chris with his eyes and then peered over the end of the couch, there she was eyes closed a blanket around her and sleeping peacefully beneath him on the floor. He got up and stepped over her and went into the bathroom, as he looked at himself in the mirror he realized how horrible he looked now. Two weeks of beard growth a full head of hear taking root and a pale complexion as a result of his constant indoor confinement.
Chad turned the shower on and stepped out of his boxer briefs. He felt the hot water spraying his body and it felt like it was washing away some of the hurt with it as he cleaned himself. He knew he would have to shave but couldn't find the energy to do that yet, the steaming water was making him tired again and as he rinsed off and stepped out of the shower there was a knock at the door.
"Hey, I gotta pee," Chris said as he peeked out the door.
"Ok give me just a second and I'll be out," Chad replied.
Quickly he grabbed his towel and dried off and then wrapped it around him as he opened the door. "All yours Chris."
Chris walked through the door rushing past him but she didn't fail to notice his wet body, muscular but not to muscular for her taste, and then she pushed the door closed to pee in peace. As she turned on the shower after using the bathroom she felt a tingle, a slow steady one building inside her body. She hadn't had sex in months and her fiancee' had called a week before and announced that he had decided to not return after his deployment, he was extending for another year overseas and he told her that she needn't wait on him any longer. Chris had been slightly relieved and extremely saddened by all of that information but in the way he had relayed it the impact wasn't as profound as she had expected. He had told her all this and then just hung up, it was so matter of fact, and done in such a chicken shit way that she had tossed all their pictures, cried and burned the rest out back behind the house that night, and that was all it took for her to be over it.
Normally she would have called Chad, and talked to him about everything, at least prior to all of this happening with his wife she would have. But now it wasn't the same, their dynamic had changed. Suddenly the two forces that had always seemed to spur the spark between them, the ability to flirt without fear of any intimacy or just harmless teasing were gone.
Chris shut that part of her mind down though, she knew that Chad wouldn't want to bed another woman for a long time and no matter how much he had teased her in the past, and sworn if her fiancee' left her he'd get her in bed didn't hold any truth. Nor was she about to tell him that this inhibitor had been removed from their relationship. In time perhaps she would share that with him but for now she was thinking of what she could do to cheer him up and get him back out into the world.
