Find a Way to My Heart

Once again, I took Randi's invitational theme "Sharing is Caring" a little too literally. This story is in two parts -- the first much, much darker than the second. However, without the first part, the second doesn't make much sense, so please, bear with it.

Very grateful for her editing assistance.

Part 1 -- Something happened on the way to Heaven.

There are moments that change your life, that define a big part of your story. You know what I mean, right? Graduating from school, your first kiss, the first time you have sex, getting married, the first time you sign on the dotted line to own your own house, holding the baby in your hands for the first time, and gazing into their eyes, stuff like that: pivotal moments.

I remember one of the biggest in my life. I wish I didn't, but I do. Every detail is etched in my memory, like it's chiseled in stone, mute tableaus of horrific narrative, one step after another.

No, it's not a cheating wife story. There are enough of those. I don't need to add to them.

I loved my wife. I did, I really did, and she loved me. Well, she gave every indication of it, so I operated on that assumption. We can never really know people, only what they choose to tell us and show us, and by all those measurements, yeah, we were happy. I wouldn't say it was the greatest; bitter experience—prior to my marriage, I mean—has shown me that no one has a perfect relationship. Anyone who tries to make you believe it is lying: to you, or more likely, to themselves. Barack and Michelle might look incredibly happy, and I believe they are most of the time, but they have their bitter knock down drag out fights, just like the rest of us. He says or does the wrong thing and she is pissed at him for days, just like everyone who has ever been married.

That's the nature of the beast. Marriage is an imperfect institution. People are people, and by definition they make mistakes, take things for granted and all the rest of it. The only people who think it's perfect are natural doms and subs who happen to find themselves together.

For all that, we were happy; as happy as a Radio Producer (that's Auggie, my wife. August Jones, as she was, and when she married me, she became Mrs. Jonas Richards. Or "Mrs. You," as she put it) working for KEXB in Plano, Texas, and me, Jonas Richards, self-employed Video Editor, could really be.

We weren't hurting that much for money; Plano is a pretty cheap place to live, great housing, schools are okay, not terrible traffic, although it does get plenty hot in the summer, and we were doing fine together. Nice house. Two great kids - Leah, who was eight and Abigail, who was a precocious five. We didn't have a dog yet, although I was making noises about it happening at Christmas. We were currently in a back and forth debate about breeds. Auggie wanted a Cairn Terrier, and I wanted an Australian Shepard. Auggie was worried about the shedding. It's weird, the things you remember.

Things were humming along for us. Neither of us was particularly wild; we'd been married for eleven years, and we'd had some wilder moments when we were young, as you do. Sex in the restrooms at a night club, sex on the New York subway at 4AM, things like that. You know the sort of thing. Neither one of us was particularly adventurous in terms of other people; there were no hidden fantasies of ten-inch black cocks or anything like that. Well, on my side, certainly not! Hers? Well, she never mentioned any.

We were Mr. and Mrs. Average. She worked as a producer for a business reports show on KEXB, one of those AM stations that's all talk and mostly about Business and Finance. She'd fallen into it a few years previous when one of the PTSO moms had mentioned that her husband worked there, and they were looking for a producer. Auggie had apparently done some DJing at her college station, and with her MBA in business studies, she was a shoo-in. She was even making the moves to agitate to get her own show on the station. She'd have been a natural: Auggie was a great conversationalist. She could charm anyone, usually by just showing an interest. That and her wide smile, she had a great smile, all toothy white. When it was directed at me, that special smile, only for a spouse, you know the one I mean, right guys? The one that connects directly to you heart, and then races right on to your groin? Yeah.

Think a slightly plainer Geri Halliwell, from the Spice Girls, as she is now, with about fifteen pounds more, and you've got an idea of my Auggie. She kept fit playing squash, and I did my bit with rowing. Mostly in the basement, but it was a good workout.

Anyway. She was doing okay. I was, too. I did media studies at college, and I'd worked for a couple of stations in Texas in their video editing bays. After the last station basically fired everyone, I said, "Fuck it," and started my own gig. I had my own office space, three editing bays, four employees, one screening room and the $200k debt that I was slowly paying off to prove it. Work was good. We got all sorts of stuff to edit. TV shows, commercials, industry programs, YouTube stuff, even wedding videos. We didn't turn down any work. We even turned one guy's heart surgery into a movie, once. Strange world, but hey, it paid the bills.

Our kids, like most people, were the light of our lives. Leah was grown up for her age. I thought she was, anyway. Every parent thinks that, though, but I knew I was right. She was into ice skating, flower arranging, and Heavy Metal music. Yeah, that had me scratching my head, too. I made a lot of jokes about her being the mail-man's daughter, because I hate that noise, and I got poked in the ribs by Auggie when I did it.

Abigail was the apple of my eye, and she was desperately into Pokémon and anime. That damn Pokémon game. She was too young to have her own device, so it was loaded on mine and anytime we went anywhere, she just wordlessly held her hand out until I gave her my unlocked phone, and then she proceeded to drain the battery chasing down a... whatever the hell those things are called.

Both of them were bright eyes, blonde, never stopped moving, and one day I was going to have to buy a shotgun and we are going to have to move house to a place with a much bigger yard I could dig up, so I could bury the bodies of the assholes they dated.

The girls, Auggie and I made up our unit. Oh and Irv. Irv was Auggie's Dad. Irv lived across the way in Arlington, next to Fort Worth, where Auggie grew up. He was alone in life; Auggie's mom had just vanished one day when she was six, and it had taken the cops a month to find her, shacked up with some guy in Boston. Once Irv knew where she was, and that she was safe, he just waited a year and divorced her for abandonment. Auggie had never spoken to her mother since, returning all letters and parcels that came for her. She never forgave her mom, but she lived for her Dad. He kept pushing her away, in the best possible way, I mean, trying to make sure she had her own life, and she kept coming right back. She was there and she wasn't going anywhere. Funnily enough, I was fine with it. He was no competition for me, and honestly, I had a great relationship with him. All that crap about "I haven't lost a daughter, as much as gained a son?" With him, it was real. Irv was a character, though. He drank rum like it was water, he was a lady's man and he loved a flutter on the races. He could afford it, though. He'd sold a patent in his forties for some process for making wax, and he was still living off the proceeds, apparently. He wore gaudy clothes, was irreverent and loved his grandchildren fiercely. They'd go over and stay with him and then come home the next day primed with outrageous things to ask us. "What's a condom, Daddy?" Yeah, thanks Irv. I got him back though. Next time he came over, I dropped blue dye in the shampoo we gave him. He never even batted an eyelid, sitting at breakfast with fluorescent blue hair, and neither did the kids.

He wasn't afraid to have a beer with me, or drag me to disreputable strip clubs on occasion. I'd get home from those evenings, look guiltily at Auggie and she'd stand there, arms folded, shaking her head sadly, but with a little smile that I knew meant she was just glad her dad was still alive and kicking. In time to the music, most of the time, too.

I was from Chicago, originally, the south side. I met Auggie when I was 25, when I first moved to Texas for a job. She'd just come back from a stint in LA, where she'd gone to university. She hated LA, and from what I understand, LA hated her right back. She'd missed her Dad, and just wanted to come home. On the plus side, she did make a lifelong friend, who ended up moving out to Texas with her. No, not like that. I wish!

We dated for eighteen months before I popped the question, and after the wedding, we moved to Plano, and we'd been here ever since. Happily living the American Dream, or as much of it as we could afford, anyway.

Our first date had been to a Phil Collins concert, and our song together was one of his -- "Don't lose my number", which is a strange one to have, but at the time, after we'd just met, I made this big deal about ensuring she had my number. To be honest, it was part of my schtick at the time, a way of being remembered by the woman I'd spent all evening chatting up, and it grew into a bit of a legend. We went to the concert, and he sang that, and... well, the rest, as they say, is history.

But we both had a soft spot for Genesis and Phil Collins in particular. There. I said it. I know it's not a popular opinion to have these days, but there you go.

We fit together, though. Thankfully, we both had similar love languages. You know, that book that talks about the five love languages, which is how people express their affection for each other. I was mainly Touch, with Acts of Service and Words of Affirmation mixed in. She was mostly Quality time, with Touch and Words of Affirmation mixed in. We'd talked about it, and we both knew what each other liked.

She'd do little things for me, leave notes around, and hug me at least twice a day, and I'd make sure we always had a TV show that we watched together, and tried to walk with her first thing in the morning, after the kids were off to school. Ahhh, school! What a great invention. So necessary for parent's mental health. We'd gotten Abigail into an all-day pre-k school program, and it meant both of us had the day for work, without worry.

We had local friends; the closest would have to be Chuck and Barb. Barb went to college with Auggie in LA, and Chuck, her barrel-chested husband, worked for Fed-Ex, as a manager there. Barb was a slim flat-chested short-haired blonde, always clad in flowing clothes, and Chuck was funny and a good friend to me. We hung out a fair bit together, both as a foursome and as individuals. We even went camping once, but, for some reason, we never did it again, even though we'd talked about renting a house on the beach in San Diego or LA for a month. Barb had gone back to college to get her masters in hospital administration so she could move up in her job at the local VA, something she never stopped comedically lauding over Auggie, who out earned Barb two to one. Barb was one of the original "for the love of the job" people, whereas Auggie was as mercenary as they came.

We had other friends, though, Auggie had a book club and made me laugh since she was so intent on being the one who had actually read the book and had things to say about it. Every night, at least one chapter before bed. I was part of a group of guys who played poker once a month, and I was also in a bowling league, although why, I had no idea. I couldn't play for shit. Auggie did it as one of her electives in school and regularly hammered the crap out of me. It was an outside interest, it got me out of the house and I honestly didn't care how good I was when I was with the guys. It was more of a social club anyway.

Anyway. That's really enough background. You get the gist.

I remember that day. It was a Wednesday. I was due to pick up Auggie at the DFW airport. She been at a radio conference in Cincinnati. I'd kidded her about the old TV show before she'd left. She was due back in around four-ish, and I was running around in the morning, after dropping the kids off at school, trying to finish up an edit on a nature documentary for the Travel Channel, and been texting her, asking if the flight was on time and it was all good for me to be there.

The airport was only thirty to forty minutes away, and I was using Flight Aware to keep track of the flight. When I checked it at three, it said the flight was delayed, then at three thirty, it said it was canceled. I was like "WTF?" and immediately texted Auggie to find out what was going on. Had she got on a later flight? What? She was on American Airlines, flight 2610, due in at three fifty-five PM, what was up with the situation?

I got no reply, and I sent successively more curt and annoyed texts, and even tried calling her a couple of times, but it went straight to voice mail each time.

She was probably sitting in the airport bar, chatting up some traveling salesman or something, I was sure. She'd look at her phone soon enough. Given that, I didn't bother hitting the airport, and stayed at work until it was time to pick up the kids.

They usually went to Mrs. Broad, who was another older lady who worked at the school, as a dinner lady volunteer. She and Auggie were friendly, since Auggie was also the president of the PTSO, and therefore knew everyone and their business. Mrs. Broad had had five kids of her own, was now in her golden years, and not averse to 'earning a quick twenty' as she put it. It all went into her knitting hobby. There was nothing that woman couldn't knit. We'd set her a challenge one year, to do something Snoopy related. Three weeks later she had an entire knit tableau of Snoopy, Charlie Brown, Lucy, Linus and the gang. She'd even knitted a damn piano for Schroder to sit at. Irv had made some smart-ass comment about her knitting him the bar from Cheers when he saw it, and we'd had to physically restrain her from trying to do it.

She was stern, but an awesome baker, and the kids never failed to come home without pockets bulging with carefully wrapped up cookies or pieces of cake. At least they waited until after dinner to stuff their faces. They had a competition they called "Stuffy McStuff your face", where they competed to see how much they could fit in their mouths, and what faces they could pull, while filling either Auggie's or my phone with selfies.

I picked them up as usual, then I rolled home, stopping by Chik-Fil-A. Hey, the wife is not home, the kids will play, right? And Dad, well, Dad has had a long day. Dad wants peace, and some delicious chicken. Sue me.

The weekend before we'd been out with Chuck and Barb, and their two kids, Devon and Coraline, - Chuck was a huge Neil Gaiman fan, - and Barb indulged him way too much, at the local Dave and Busters. We could have a drink, the kids would go off and play video games, and everyone had a good time. We'd even managed to squeeze in some love play when we got home, vowing, as we always did when we were done, that "we needed to do that more..." I was more than ready to have an easy night, once we knew what was going on with Auggie.

We got home, and the kids vanished into the kitchen to eat, watching some cartoon on the TV in there, and I went into the living room and turned on the TV there. Auggie was a news junkie, so it was tuned to CNN. I muted it immediately, without really looking, and went into the kitchen to supervise the kids. Well, I say "supervise," it was more "see if I could steal a nugget or two without them noticing." That wasn't happening; those kids had eagle eyes, and I wandered back into the living room, checking my phone as I went. Still nothing from Auggie. What on earth was she doing?

I sat down to eat and gave the TV some attention, only to see it was a CNN special report. Some plane had gone down. Jesus. One of the scourges of our generation. Random nut job shootings and plane crashes.

I turned up the audio and sat down to my Deluxe meal. And that's when the bottom fell out of my world. I caught snatches of what the talking heads were discussing, and it was at the words "American Airlines crash," and "Due into Dallas at three fifty-five" that the sinking feeling in my stomach started.

I dropped the sandwich, picked up my iPad, and was on cnn.com instantly. That's when things really got bad. I read with that kind of dread you hear about, but don't really believe exists, that American Airlines flight 2160, from Cincinnati, Ohio, coming into Dallas Fort Worth, had gone down just outside of a small town called Fredonia in Arkansas. From all reports of the on-scene emergency services, the entire plane had been destroyed and flaming wreckage was distributed over two square miles. There were no survivors expected.

While I say I remember that day, I remember strange things about it: the strange thoughts that go through your mind, the random thoughts that fire as you try to come to terms with what you've just heard. What kind of dog would we end up getting now? Where were the kid's vaccination records, or their passports? I mean, none of these thoughts did me any justice, but in my defense, I was in the early stages of shock. I can see that now.

I remember thinking, "What do I do now?" What about the kids? Do I go to the airport, or what? Would they contact me?

I was in no denial. There was no "She wasn't on the plane. She's in some bar at the airport" thoughts. I'd tried to get hold of her, and failed, and now I knew why. I'd never get hold of her again. I remember the chill I felt, when I thought that. It was an acknowledgement that she was gone. We'd never see her again. Never feel her hug or see her smile, or hear a sardonic statement, or hear her complain about the quality of her wine, or...anything.

You can't know how you'll react to that till it happens. It's like being under fire, so I'm told. Everyone reacts differently.

I remember sitting there, breathing heavily, and then turning off the TV. I didn't want the kids coming in and seeing that. Kids. Yes. That's what I had to focus on. I needed to... what? Get to the airport I guess. That's where all the people who would have information would be.

Someone needed to watch the kids. Irv couldn't do it, he was on a three-day Vegas bender with some old army buddies. He went every year and then came back with outrageous stories that I was pretty sure were made up. Fairly sure.

Chuck and Barb were out on Date Night; they'd told us all about their plans, in nauseating detail over the weekend, so they weren't around.

That left a few people, but the best would be Mrs. Broad. I grabbed my phone and called, praying she would pick up.

"Hello? Jonas? Did the kids leave something?" she said, on answering.

"No, um, look, Sheila, could you do me a favor? Could you watch the kids again for me? Come over and just be here a bit?"

"Oh," she said. I could hear the hesitation in her voice. It was past seven o'clock, and I'm sure she had plans for the evening.

"Please, Sheila, I'm in a bind. Really need this. I have to get to the airport."

"They can't come with you?" she inquired. She knew that Auggie was due back today. "I'm sure Auggie would love to see them?"

Obviously, she hadn't been watching a TV herself.

"No. Look. I think..." my voice faltered a bit. "Look, a plane has gone down. American Airlines, and I'm pretty sure Auggie was on it. I need to get to the airport and find out what is going on."

"Oh...Oh!" exclaimed Mrs. Broad. "I'll be right over. Herb can get his own dinner. He's only watching some fishing show, anyway. You wait right there, dear."