So much pain and desperation that I’ve refused to see for so long.
“I wasn’t sure if you would come,” she says, unknowingly twisting the knife harder. Her voice holds no accusation, though. She has simply lost faith in the one person who should have been standing by her side the whole time.
I push out a long breath full of regret and guilt. My eyes plead with her to hear me out. “Jolene…” My voice cracks. Fuck. “I’m sorry.” Those two words don’t even come close to saying everything I want and need to say. We use them so easily most of the time, usually when we’re making a shallow apology asking for forgiveness. They don’t feel like enough today.
Her eyes close slowly and she exhales. When she opens them, tears slide down her face. “You believe me?” Again, no accusation.
I don’t rush my answer. Instead, I attempt to find words that truly express my feelings. In the end, I fail to come up with anything better than my simple, honest truth. “I do. I should never have stopped believing in you. And for that, I will never stop feeling guilty.”
“I didn’t think you would come,” she says, reiterating her earlier statement. Heaving sobs fill her, and her body shakes while her tears fall and she gulps for breath.
“How could I not?”
How could I leave the mother of my child alone in her hour of need?
Indeed.
How the fuck could I have done that?
We sit staring at each other, both unsure of what to say and of the path forward.
I’ve spent the last three days going over and over our marriage. Wondering when the hell I lost my soul. When did I become a man who could turn against the woman I once loved? I’ve found no good answer to these questions and so I continue to beat myself up over it. I don’t think that will stop anytime soon. I’m certain that every time I see Jolene, guilt and loathing will consume me. I’m certain that the rest of my life will be spent trying to right my wrong.
“Callie hasn’t been to see me. I thought she would,” she finally says.
“I haven’t seen her either.”
She frowns. “Why not?”
My turn to frown now. “She told Mum instead of me. She didn’t think I’d believe her.” She was right, too. I wouldn’t have. I fought Mum on it tooth and nail, but for all her faults, my mother is the one person I’ve always allowed to have the last word. In the end, I listened because it was far easier than continuing to argue with her.
She continues to frown. “I don’t understand, Luke. Do you two not talk about this?”
I lean forward. “Did Callie tell you we broke up seven weeks ago?”
Her eyes widen. “No.” She shakes her head as she wipes her tears away. “I didn’t know.”
I shift the discussion. Talking about the woman I love to the woman I used to love isn’t something I want to do. “The lawyers are working on your case now. They’re going over all the evidence again. They hope to find some DNA that will prove it was Alanis. Once they feel the new evidence is strong enough, they’ll apply for leave to appeal. Apparently that can take a couple of months to be heard, depending on how busy the courts are. If they grant the appeal, we have to then lodge an appeal against conviction. The Crown will have to test the evidence also. It could take anywhere from nine to twelve months for the date to come up for the appeal.” I pause for a brief moment. “I’m so sorry, Jolene, but this could take a year or more to work through.”
Her tears flow heavier. Her voice is strangled when she speaks. “It’s better than the years I’m looking at now.”
I nod but I don’t reply. My thoughts are stuck.
The next words out of her mouth stun the hell out of me. More because of the raw emotion I hear than the actual words. “Will you please bring Sean to see me now?”
I sit up straighter. “Of course. I’ll bring him as soon as I can book a visit.”
“Thank you.”
I didn’t expect to hear desperation over visiting with her son in her voice, but that’s exactly what I’m hearing. I shove my fingers through my hair and lean back in my seat. “I didn’t think you’d ask to see him so soon.”
She watches me through those sad eyes that are still killing me. “Just like I didn’t think you’d come,” she says softly. “I think maybe there’s a lot of things neither of us thought that are true, Luke. I wonder if we’ll ever get through them.”
Fuck, this Jolene is not the woman I was married to—not in the beginning and not at the end of our marriage. She’s matured and lost the bitchy attitude. I guess prison has broken that out of her and forced her to grow.
I place my arms on the table. “We can’t go back, Jolene.”
Her eyes don’t leave mine. “I know.”
“But we can make a new start and do better as friends and parents.”
Her smile is sad when she nods. “I hope so.”
As I walk out of the prison, the heavy load I’ve carried for the last couple of years feels lighter. Only slightly lighter, but for the first time since it has weighed me down, I’m not struggling to breathe.