Early autumn in Indian Rocks Beach was a peaceful time. Too early for the snowbirds who routinely flock to Florida's warmer climate. Too late for the summer vacationers. And peace was just what I needed right now. The previous six months of my life had been pure hell. Stress to the 10th degree. All because the man I married turned out to be a philandering idiot.
I'd been working as a manager in a large department store and it fell to me to close the store on a Wednesday night. Even though it was a necessary evil, I didn't like closing. Since my husband, Ben, had switched to working third shift because of the pay differential it meant that I had to clear out of the house in the morning so as not to disturb him while he slept and it cut into what little personal time we had together. I resented his decision, feeling that we really didn't need the extra money as much as we needed our evenings together. It also angered me that he made the choice without discussing it with me first.
That morning I spent a couple of hours at the library and then went to the gym to work out. Since becoming the store manager, my eating and exercising habits had pretty much fallen by the wayside and I needed to get back into the groove. I showered at the gym but then slipped home to change into my business attire. Though I tried to be quiet, I knew Ben was aware of my presence by the way he tossed and turned in bed. I departed quickly, stopping to eat lunch at a neighborhood diner on my way to the store.
I was dog-tired when I got home that night. My feet hurt from being in high heels all day and my brain was spinning from looking at budget reports. I peeled off my clothes and threw on an oversized T-shirt to sleep in. Wearily I staggered to the bathroom to wash my face, brush my teeth and take out my contact lenses. The day had been cold and damp so I also took a cold pill as I could feel my sinuses begin to congest. When I finally fell into bed, I hadn't been there more than a minute before I was fast asleep.
To this day, I don't know what woke me up. I can only attest to the fact that my eyes opened and I realized it was still dark outside. When I squinted at the clock, I was barely able to make out that it was just after 5:00am. I was about to roll over and go back to sleep when I heard a noise downstairs. Someone was trying to get in the front door and wasn't being too quiet about it. I reached for the cordless phone by the bed but it was gone. Ben must have made a call earlier in the day and then just set the phone down where ever he ended up in the conversation. It was a habit of his that drove me nuts and now it was having potentially dire consequences.
Fear turned my mouth to cotton and it's probably just as well that I was unable to call the police. I'm not sure that I would have been able to say anything to them anyway. My heart raced even faster when I heard footsteps climbing the stairs. Our neighbor's home had been broken into the week before and I was afraid we were about to be the next crime victims in the subdivision. As the footsteps got closer to the bedroom, I reached under the bed and pulled out the shotgun that Ben insisted we keep there. My hands trembled and I watched the doorway. I'm not a great marksman but you don't have to be when you're using a shotgun at close range. A figure appeared, framed by the portal and I cocked the gun and snugged it tight against my shoulder. The figure paused for a moment and then moved again. In that instant I pulled the trigger.
A deafening boom split the air and I heard a distinct thud as a body fell into the wall and then crumbled to the floor. My hands were shaking so badly that I nearly dropped the shotgun. Once I got it safely to the mattress I reached for the lamp and almost knocked it over in my attempt to turn on the light. What I saw when the room was illuminated made a strangled scream emerge from my throat. There was Ben, lying in a bloody heap just inside the doorway.
Normally, I am the best person to have around in a crisis as I can usually keep a cool head and a calm demeanor no matter what, but this sent me over the edge. I ran around the upstairs looking for the phone for several minutes before it dawned on me that I might have more success if I could see. I cursed my decision to wait until the weekend to go into the optician to pick up my new glasses and fumbled to get my contact lenses back in. With normal vision restored, I was still running around the house like the proverbial chicken with its head cut off. It was a full fifteen minutes later when I finally found the phone (in between the sofa cushions) and was able to call 911.
That day I learned that even at 5:30 in the morning, the sight of police cars and ambulances in front of your house will generally bring out the neighbors. The gentleman who lived across the street came over when he saw me standing outside, still wearing just my nightshirt and shivering in the cold. He wrapped a big blanket around me and then stayed by my side while the police questioned me at length about what had happened. I thank God that David was there. He was an attorney and although he limited his practice to real estate development, he knew that I was potentially in a great deal of trouble and advised me not to say anything further until I had legal counsel. At first I balked. I'd done nothing wrong and I wasn't under arrest so I didn't feel the need to have a lawyer. But he, in his calm but insistent way, got through to me. Fortunately, he had a friend who did a lot of defense work and Randy came over almost immediately.
I still don't know whether that was a good thing or not. I wonder, if I'd just cooperated with the police to begin with, would they have simply ruled it an accidental shooting and gone on with their business? Was it the fact that I clammed up and got a lawyer over there within the hour that made them dig deeper? Who knows? I can only say that it was the beginning of nearly six months of hell.
Even though I knew objectively that I'd done nothing wrong and that Ben could have identified himself when he heard me cock the gun, I still carried a ton of personal guilt over his death. It was common knowledge among family and friends that Ben and I didn't have the ideal marriage. We fought regularly and usually over the smallest of things. When it was revealed that Ben hadn't gone to work that night and had, in fact, spent the night with his girlfriend, I was accused of having killed him in a jealous rage. Never mind the fact that it's pretty hard to be jealous when you don't know your spouse is stepping out on you. And the fact that I was the one who had arranged for us to see a marriage counselor weighed only marginally in my favor. In the end, I was completely exonerated but an emotional wreck. Surprisingly enough, it was Ben's oldest sister who came to my aid and suggested that I just get away for a while.
My therapist agreed and so I took a leave of absence from my job, left the damp dreary Midwest and headed to Florida. I'd been to Indian Rocks Beach two years before with a couple of my girl friends. Something about the magnificent sunsets over the Gulf of Mexico pulled me back now that I really needed the serenity and I called the realtor who had rented us the condo. Virginia was wonderful and found a small apartment that fit my needs perfectly. Most of the other tenants in the building were middle-aged, like me or older. The odd ducks were the three young men who shared a unit nearby.
I noticed them one night as I was sitting on my balcony drinking a beer. They were cooking on a small grill and obviously having a good time. One of them shouted over an invitation to me. I had to admit that the food smelled very good but I suspected that I was at least 20 years older than they were and didn't want to become their den mother so I waved them off and continued to watch the sun sink below the horizon.
After nearly 20 years of working full time, two of which were also spent in pursuit of my MBA, forced inactivity didn't come easily to me. The first few weeks I spent reading. So many novels I'd wanted to read over the years and now I had the time. I'd always been a fast reader and devoured every word. But after a while, I found I didn't even want to look at a child's picture book. Playing gin rummy with the seniors in my building every day wasn't that appealing but I did it just to avoid becoming a hermit.
I continued my nightly ritual of watching the sunset from my patio while drinking a beer. I only allowed myself to drink one per day and only at that time of day. I knew myself well enough that if I didn't place that restriction; I'd end up drinking far more than I should. Most nights, at least one of the guys was out on the balcony. Sometimes they were cooking. Sometimes they were sitting and drinking as well. They always waved to me and, if they were grilling, they'd extend an invitation to dinner that I would decline.
One Friday night, as I was walking to the fridge to get my beer, there was a knock at my door. I certainly wasn't expecting anyone and couldn't even begin to imagine who it might be. I opened the door to see a young man holding two beer bottles. When my eyes adjusted to the dim light of the hallway I could tell that it was one of the neighbor boys.
"Hi," he said, "Since it didn't look like you were gonna come visit us, I was hoping you wouldn't mind if I dropped by."
On the one hand I was a little put off by his persistence. On the other hand, he was exceedingly polite. The few times that we'd bumped into each other in the parking lot or even when I was taking out the trash, he was very respectful, said a quiet 'hello', smiled and moved on. I'm sure he felt that he'd given me plenty of opportunities to introduce myself. Granted, a more experienced guy would have realized that I just wanted to be left alone, but there was something about his warm, genuine smile that demanded an acknowledgement.
"Well, since you thought to bring along the LaBatts, I guess it's okay to let you in," I said as I stepped aside and allowed him to enter.
He walked all the way to the patio door before he turned around to speak to me.
"Yeah, I noticed that seemed to be your brand."
"That's the nice thing about the higher alcohol content of Canadian beer. Twice the buzz for the same volume," I responded as I walked towards him.
He opened the sliding door to the patio and stepped through the portal. I wasn't sure just where this encounter was headed. The quiet, almost bashful young man that I thought I knew was changing before my eyes; adopting a supremely self-assured and commanding presence. But since he did still have the beer in his hand and since we were on my home turf, so to speak, I wasn't really alarmed just puzzled, and so I followed him.
When we were both on the patio, he looked around and noted how sparsely it was furnished. A single lounge chair and side table were the only functional pieces of furniture. Most of the space was taken up with huge pots full of flowers, herbs and other plants. It was one of the things I missed during a normal Midwestern autumn and winter and I was determined to have an abundance of color and scent around me now that I was in a warmer climate.
