David, Sally, and Clifford exchanged presents just after sunset on Christmas Eve. Days earlier, David had invited them and Joshua to Christmas Day dinner, but said he had plans for Christmas Eve. I know Sally doubted the existence of David’s “plans,” but she didn’t push him.
David gave Sally a day at the spa (Martha’s suggestion), which she liked, and a pair of Tiffany porcelain pet food bowls for the new kittens (his own idea), which she loved. He also gave Clifford (with Sally’s permission) the gift of a year of horseback riding lessons. Clifford was so excited that he couldn’t stop talking about them.
Sally and Clifford gave David a framed photo montage of all our animals to put up in his office, “to remind you what’s always waiting for you at home.” It was exactly the right gift for him at exactly the right time.
Sally also left each of the animals one wrapped present under the tree and gave the three dogs a kiss on the forehead, holding a sprig of mistletoe above each one as she did so.
Now, standing at his front door on Christmas Eve, David helps Sally and Clifford with their coats and kisses Sally on the cheek. “Merry Christmas,” he tells them.
“You sure you’re—”
“Really. I’m fine,” David says, cutting her off.
“You call me on my cell if you need anything.”
“Thanks, Mom,” David says with good humor. Sally smiles at him and then walks with her son down the steps.
After David is certain that Sally and Clifford are gone, he takes a stack of moving boxes from the garage and carries these back to our bedroom. The dogs take positions on the bed to watch David work.
Then my husband opens the doors to all the closets and the drawers to all the dressers and stands by the bed in the middle of the room. All my clothes are now in full view to him—my jeans, dresses, shoes, shirts, blouses, panties, socks, clothes that fit, clothes that got tight on me after I went on a junk food binge in the weeks following 9/11, and clothes that swam on me during and after my chemo.
David removes a pair of my jeans from the closet and, holding them close to his face, inhales deeply. Then he carefully folds the jeans and puts them into one of the boxes.
At eleven fifty that same evening, David stretches and surveys his work. All my personal items from the bedroom and the bathroom have been carefully packed, and he has just started on the living room. The dogs have fallen asleep.
David walks into the kitchen, pulls a bottle of Veuve Clicquot champagne (my favorite) from the fridge and two champagne flutes from a cabinet.
He calls for the dogs and all three of them follow him, the champagne, and the glasses out the back door and up into the barn.
The barn is silent as David enters. He yanks a bale of hay into the middle of the floor and drops down on it. Then he opens the bottle of champagne without allowing it to pop and pours it into the two glasses balanced on the bale.
Skippy jumps into David’s lap and quickly settles into a comfortable half sleep while Chip and Bernie lie at his feet. Arthur and Alice peer into the barn from the adjacent paddock, curious about the late-night goings-on.
David checks his watch. It is now midnight. He lifts a glass into the air. “Merry Christmas.” He takes a small sip from his flute and closes his eyes.
I remember another Christmas Eve in this barn. David, handsome in his tuxedo, and me in the one formal gown I owned, entered the barn holding hands and laughing at the behavior of the people at the party we’d just left. The dogs followed us.
In a long relationship, there are just some nights when you’re more in love than others. Perhaps it is the way the women at a party looked admiringly at your husband, or the way your spouse always made sure you had a glass of champagne in your hand, or even the way he saved you from a boring conversation with a narcissistic jerk. Whatever it is, you realize that you not only love him, but you’re proud to be with him.
This particular Christmas Eve, David was the love of my life and I couldn’t imagine what I’d do without him.
“Christmas Eve, midnight, and about as close to a manger as we’re ever going to get,” David said to me, pointing to Arthur and Alice and then nodding to the dogs. “If these guys don’t talk now, then they never will.”
I smiled back at him. “They’ve all been chatting with each other since we walked in. Don’t you hear them?”
“Hmm,” David said, playing along. “Perhaps they’re mumbling.”
I turned him to me and kissed him on the mouth. Then I tapped him lightly on the forehead. “Perhaps you need to listen to them a bit harder. Less head, more heart.”
“I think I need a little more incentive,” he said.
I kissed him again. “I love you, you know?”
I don’t recall if David answered. He rarely spoke in those words, as if just by giving voice to his feelings he might put them in jeopardy. He counted on me to speak for the both of us and I was happy to do that for him.
Tonight, when I see David’s eyes flash open in the barn, I wonder if my words are what he has allowed himself to remember. Who will speak for him now?
While David ponders the quiet of the barn without human companionship, Cindy sits alone in her Cube in the dark and empty laboratory at the CAPS facility. The lab—for so many months an ever-beating heart of activity—evidences only the silence of abandonment.
Cindy’s head hangs to her chest. The shine of curiosity once inherent in her eyes has been replaced by loss, boredom, and hurt. She smacks her doll on the floor of the Cube again and again and it echoes through the hollow lab.
In a far corner of her cage, a pile of feces is visible. Humiliated, she refuses to look in that direction.
Cindy turns to face herself in the long mirror. With one angry scream, she pounds her fist against her own reflection until spiderwebs of fracture distort her beautiful image.
Can’t you at least hear Cindy? Can’t you see the images I cannot ignore? Try, David. Now that you know my truth and my shame, don’t let this innocent being perish because of apathy. At least try to listen to her.
But David, trained for years to listen for the slightest inflection in a witness’s answer, hears nothing in the barn he deems meaningful. He scoops Skippy up in his arms and, after one last look into the four corners of the still barn, turns off the lights and heads toward the house with the other two dogs following sleepily behind.