Strange and Weird--just a pastime thing to write

Death Comes In Threes

            I hung up the phone and leaned back in my chair.

            “He shoulda known better,” I whispered to myself.

            Connie had called with news about Lee.

            “They’ve moved him to a hospice.  They don’t expect him to live out the month,” she wailed.

            “Oh, that’s too bad,” I said, trying to keep a smile from my voice.  “I will pray for him.”

            I hadn’t seen the connection, four years ago, when Harold died. 

Cirrhosis of the liver.    

That’s what they put on his death certificate. 

The man was a minister. He never took a drink in his life. 

            Harold was a persuasive man. 

Sweet talker.  It came with the business he was in.

            He whispered that I was beautiful.     

“Your soul shines from the inside out.”

We had to be very careful and not go out together in public.

            He liked to visit me Saturday nights.

            “Being with you gives me inspiration for my sermon tomorrow,” he always said.

One Sunday morning, as I sat in the choir looking out at the congregation, I noticed a lady smiling at everything Harold said. 
            After nine months of us being together, he was sweet talking her.

            I didn’t think she was all that pretty, but perhaps she had a beautiful soul that shone from the inside out? 

           He didn't come out to my house on Saturday nights anymore.  

           He said he was busy studying for his Doctorate.  They married the next year.   

Eighteen months later when Tim died, something clicked in my mind. 

I wondered if this was a coincidence. 

They said he had a massive heart attack. 

The man was a health freak. 

Four days a week at the gym. 

Running seven miles a day on Saturday and Sunday. 

Cholesterol at one-thirty-five and weight at one- seventy. 

I was told he had just had a physical; complete with imaging of his heart, Doppler sonogram on his carotid arteries and legs and an ultra sound of his aorta.

            “Tim was in perfect health,” his father said at the funeral home visitation.

            He shoulda known better.

Tim loved my sensitive, non-judgmental side. 

“You are the sweetest woman I have ever known.  You light up the room when you enter it.  You are so open minded, kind and sweet to everyone you meet.”

Tim seemed sincere. 

I introduced him to all my friends and they liked him.  I even bought a membership at the gym so we could work out together. 

Six months later, I found out he was having an affair with his personal trainer; Robert.

            Coincidence?

Two men whom I had a relationship with and loved.  

Two men who betrayed me and dumped me. Dead?

It would be a natural thing if I were eighty, but at fifty-five?

I wondered.

I was the common denominator.

It felt strange. 

It felt good.

            It was exhilarating.

I had power.

Now it was Lee’s turn.

Connie said he had a brain tumor.  The doctor’s had told him they “got it all” and with chemotherapy, he was cured.

I knew better.

Seven months later it was in his bone marrow.  His liver and kidneys were shutting down.  They moved him to hospice.

“Jane,” Connie had sobbed on the phone.  “They say hospice won’t take a person unless they have less than three months to live.  I talked to the nurse.  She said Lee only has a few weeks at best.”

Justice.

I sat in my chair and thought about Lee.

I met Lee Wrightman three years ago, shortly after Tim dumped me.  We met on the Internet and wrote back and forth for a couple of weeks.  I.M’d each other every night.  He wanted my phone number right away, but I wouldn't give it to him.

“I want to get to know you better,” I wrote.

“Why?  You think I might be a midnight stalker?”

“Might be,” I laughed as I typed my answer..

We hit it off right away. 

He had a great sense of humor, which I thoroughly appreciated.  He also had a way of complimenting me that made me feel like the luckiest woman in the world.

`“You know you are so gorgeous, Doll.”

He liked to call me Doll.

“I feel so proud every time we walk into the club, because you are on my arm".

I lapped it up.  Like a puppy with a warm bowl of milk.

We dated for two years. 

Spent every weekend together…at his insistence. 

My friends told me I was investing too much of myself in him.  They were just jealous because I no longer had time to join them and their frivolous luncheons.

“Don’t invest more of yourself than you can afford to lose,” one of my dear friends had said.

“I’m not about to lose anything.  Lee is committed to our relationship.”

Well, I said that to them…and I believed it.

Then, almost to the day of our two year anniversary, Lee said, “Jane, I feel like my foot is nailed to the floor.” 

I sat there calmly on his couch, but I could feel the red tide coming up from my stomach, into my throat, about to explode in my brain.

“What do you mean?” I asked sweetly.

“I feel like we spend too much time together.  I might want to go out alone on the weekend, but you are here.”

“But you invite me here for the weekend.”

He went on, “Even when I go out during the week…you are with me.”

“I’m not here during the week, Honey,” I laughed.

“Even when you aren’t with me physically…you are still in my mind.” he said.

That didn’t make any sense to me.

“If I happen to talk to another woman, dance with a woman at the club…I feel guilty.”

“Well, you should, ass hole,” I thought to myself.

I didn’t say a word.  Got up and went into his bedroom.  I opened the closet and pulled out the clothes I kept there for the weekends. 

Took off the sapphire ring he had given me for Christmas and put it in his under wear drawer where I knew he’d find it.

I went into the bathroom, got my shampoo and body wash out of his shower.  Took it all, stuffed it into my over night bag and walked out. 

Walked right past him sitting in his chair watching television and just kept on walking.

“Doll, where are you going?” he called.

“Home,” I quietly said.

That was the way it ended. 

I liked feeling that I had taken the upper hand. 

Left him before he could ask me to leave. 

Broke up with him before he had the chance. 

Power. 

I laughed all the way on my drive home.

Tears rolled down my face and blurred my vision, I laughed so hard.

When I got home there was a message from Lee on the machine.

“I didn’t want to break up forever…I just want to take a couple of weeks break so I don’t feel so smothered. Please call me back.”

Nah…you aren’t having it your way idiot. 

The end.

Then I came down off my high.

For the next ten days I hardly slept or ate. 

I didn’t leave my house. 

I didn’t shower. 

One night at three o’clock in the morning, I thought I was having a nervous breakdown. 

I cried until my sinuses were so congested I couldn’t breathe.

My throat was so swollen I couldn’t swallow. 

He kept calling me, but I wouldn't answer the phone. 

“He’s just not worth it,” I yelled to the empty room.

Two months later I found out through the club gossip that Lee and Connie were dating. 

I was livid with rage. 

It didn’t show. 

I have learned over the years how to put on “the face”. 

“Jane is the sweetest woman I have ever known.”  I knew that’s how they all felt about me.  I had heard them say it.

            When I saw Connie…“Connie, that’s wonderful,” I smiled as I gave her a hug.

“You don’t mind?”

            “Mind? No, Honey.  Lee and I just didn’t have enough in common to build a relationship.  You are perfect for him.”

            Now she was paying the price.

That bastard had hurt me and soon…he would pay the price for his actions.

I didn’t need a sleeping pill the night Connie called to say Lee was dying.

I slept like a baby.

I got up the next day and noticed what a beautiful day it was. 

Lee was breathing his last. 

Medicated on morphine out of his mind.

The tumor still growing in his brain.

His body turning yellow from the shut down of  his kidney's and liver.

I was enjoying a beautiful, sunny fall day. 

Connie, well, now poor Connie, she is in so much pain. 

Much like the pain I had suffered. 

I felt wonderful!

            As I sat at my breakfast table, I could feel it build in me.

A physical feeling coursing through my body.

            I even felt a small twinge of pain in the base of my skull from the exhilaration.

            He shoulda known better.

            I walked out to the porch, breathed in the crisp fall air and bent over to pick up the Mannion Falls Press. 

            I quickly scanned the headlines. 

No good news there for sure.

            Everyone was beating up on the President.

            I turned to the second section and an item in the obituary column caught my eye.

                                   

“Vern Stark died Thursday of burns

suffered on Saturday.  Mr. Stark

was filling his lawn mower with

gasoline when it exploded, covering

eighty percent of his body in burns.

                        Mr. Stark leaves behind his fiancee

                        Darlene Rose, his son, John and a

host of friends.”

Vern Stark. 

We had a wonderful relationship that lasted for four years. 

He was, and if I wanted to admit it, still the love of my life.

Two kindred souls.  So much alike it was eerie. 

The year before I met him, he had dated Darlene.  She had broken up with him which left him feeling depressed and withdrawn. 

I guess she was the love of his life? 

She had soon married and moved to Wyoming. 

When Vern and I first met, we talked about it and when I questioned him on how he felt about Darlene, he assured me.

“That’s all water over the dam.  She used me…she knew how to manipulate me and I couldn’t see it.  She wanted me when she wanted something from me and then when I thought our relationship was going somewhere…well…she pushed me away. I never want to see her again.”

Okay.  I was reassured.

Six months before Vern broke up with me, Darlene came back to town.  Newly divorced and looking for an old friend to talk to.

“It’s just a friendly lunch,” he told me.  “There is nothing to it.”

Then the “friendly lunch” turned into friendly dinners and friendly phone calls almost every day.

Then frantic pleas of, “The kitchen cabinet door fell off the hinges.  Vern, could you please come and fix it for me,” and off to Darlene’s he went. 

Just being a friend.

 It took me a long time to get wise.  Maybe I just didn’t want to see?

He was dead!

I wondered if he had suffered. 

Burns over eighty percent of his body?  He must have suffered horribly for those five days.

I put the newspaper down, leaned back in my chair and smiled.

Grinned, actually. 

Grinned so hard my cheeks hurt.

One by one, they were dying!

The phone rang.

“What? I can’t understand you,” I said.

“It’s Connie.  Jane…he’s gone.”

Connie was sobbing uncontrollably.  I could hardly understand her.

“What?  Connie…slow down.  Take a deep breath.  Is it Lee?”

“Yes…Jane…he died early this morning.  They said he would live a month, but his whole body shut down.  He was comatose.  I never got a chance to say goodbye. “

I frowned to keep the laughter out of my voice.

“Oh, Sweetie.  I am so very, very sorry.  I know how much you loved him.  I know that you are…suffering.  I am just so sorry.”

“Jane, I knew you would understand.  You are the kindest woman I know?”

“Have you had time to make any arrangements?” I asked.

“Well, I have talked to the funeral home and they said we could have the funeral on Monday.  Visitation will be tomorrow evening and again on Sunday.”

“Well Dear, you know I will be there for you.  You just call me when you have all the arrangements made and I will be at the funeral home with you for as long as you need me.”

“Thanks, Jane.  I have to go now and talk to his sister.”

“Please tell Annie that I send my sympathy.”

“I will Dear.  Goodbye.”

Good thing she got off the phone.  I could barely contain the giggle that welled up in my throat. 

That wouldn’t have been nice of me.

Now.  Right now--two past loves…both dead within a day of each other.

I thought…“Death comes in threes.  Wonder who will be next. 

Jim, George? Perhaps that bastard David?”

They could run, but eventually….

They all had the same “disease” in common.  Harold, Tim, Vern and now Lee.

I had known and loved them all and they had thrown me away.

They took the gift I offered them.  Unwrapped the shiny golden paper and threw it on the ground; stomped on it, kicked it aside and walked away.

Thrown me away like worthless junk. 

A used, fast food container thrown in the ditch.

I deserved to be treated better than garbage.

I felt the warm physical exhilaration start again.  Blood rushed through my body and into my head.  I could hear my heart pounding in my ears.

I would have no problem sleeping tonight.

                        Mannion Falls Press     

                        Police found the body of Jane Martin

                        in her east side home Saturday morning. 

They were alerted by her best friend

Connie Wilson after she had called

Ms. Martin several times, with no answer.

The coroner ruled death from a brain aneurysm.

                        Ms. Martin was a member of the Mannion Falls

Methodist Church, President of the Mannion

Falls Singles Club, and secretary of the

Willow Grove Ladies Golf League.

She leaves behind her beloved

                        cat Molly and a host of friends.