The Deep Roots
Just a few hours ago he had discovered the secret that Sam had striven to hide for the past twenty years. Now he knew why she had entered the police. Every cop had a deep reason that led him to choose this profession. Well « choose » probably wasn't the appropriate term. Whatever you could say, it was this job that chose you and not the other way around. You could always looked the other way but that was the truth. Before you save others, it was yourself you tried to save. For her, this indelible event that prompted her to devote her life to protect people and put the scums behind bars was the rape of her sister.
Inevitably, this led him to think about his own commitment, to what had gone wrong with his life and explained why he became what he became, namely the head of the FBI Missing Persons Unit.
The trigger was the suicide of his mother. Everything was engraved in his memory. The permanent scars seemed still so fresh that even now he could feel what had pierced him that day. Images ... the garage, the car, the hose, the lifeless body of his mom ... An odor... the smell of gas ... Sounds ... those of his sobs... The taste of salty tears ... These fragments that only belonged to him gathered like a kaleidoscope to form a picture of an unspeakable tragedy. His tragedy. So unspeakable that even Samantha only knew the outline, the few snippets he had had to give to his team the night when his road had crossed again the path of one of his worst nightmares since the Andy Deaver's case.
The last words spoken by Graham Spaulding replayed in his head, as so often for over 3 years. He had always known what Spaulding had told him that day before he died. But yet, to hear these few words had completely upset him. He did not know how to express it but the fact of hearing them pronounced, by this scumbag on top of that, had somehow made the whole thing more real. "You can not save everyone." The observation was cold, clinical, ruthless. The chilling truth had almost physically grabbed him.
That night he had saved the young woman. Doris. But his mother hadn't come back to him, his Doris, died in similar circumstances. Instead of soothe his pain, as if taking a revenge on the past, it did remind him that he had arrived too late to save his mother. The truth of Spaulding's words had struck with full force, like a sentence condemning him to an eternal suffering.
He had tried to promise himself to prove the perp wrong, but he knew that his quest was impossible. Anyway, the damage was already done. She might be dead and buried for 30 years, unconsciously every time it was as if he was trying to save his mother. He missed her. Sometimes terribly.
That evening he had told his wife, Maria. He told her how her mother had attempted suicide 3 months before succeeding and how, weak and desperate to believe her, he had said nothing to his father. He wanted to please her and don't put her in a nasty situation with his father. Things were already quite complicated so he chose not to add more tension and increase the stifling atmosphere.
At the time he had not dared to confront his father, but a few weeks later at the very moment he discovered his lifeless mother he regretted his inaction. He knew he was only a child ... that you could not ask a child to manage well in such circumstances ... that a child should never even be put in the situation where he found himself ... and that even if he had warned his father her mother probably would have managed to end her days ... but that did not comforted him by anything ... He would always have a doubt. A doubt that could not prevent him from feeling responsible. Responsible and guilty.
Of course he blamed his mother, briefly, then he blamed his father who had always been hard and shy to express his love. The father, who had forced him to hide his pain and weaknesses in a shell he still struggled to escape. The father who died without having learned the full truth surrounding the death of his wife.
But ultimately it was himself that Jack still blamed. He had many doubts. Who was he that his mom may abandon him? What had he done wrong? Or maybe it was something he had not done? What was certain was that he had not accepted his inaction after the first attempt of his mother. After all these years he still was unable to forgive himself completely and he had to live with it.
As for averting the fate he had promised himself to be a good father, attentive and present to his daughters. He did not reached that, at least it was his feeling. It was very hard to face what he considered as the greatest failure of his life. Was it written for the past to happen again? Despite all his efforts, he behaved not much better than his father. It was different but not much more successful. Of course, his daughters loved him. He knew it. But he did not manage to express all the love he feel for them and that made his heart beat. He had failed to resolve his problems and the demons of his past were never far away, lurking around.
He did not and would never really get over it but his job was his therapy. The suicide of his mother had permanently scarred him, led him where he was and still influenced some of his choices. He knew it and accepted it. As difficult as it was, it was his life, his past, and he could not change anything.
Who knows, he might perhaps one day share all of this with Samantha. In any case, he was now confident that only her could lead him to reveal his most intimate and painful thoughts.