Chapter 21
Sully's heart was pounding so erratically that he thought he really might have a permanent problem with it after all was said and done. He was terrified. Matthew had come to him at the homestead shouting that Katie and the twins were in the store crying about how some man had taken their mother and made Katie call him "Papa". Matthew also said that Katie had also started to mention that the man had been mean to her mama, but Sully hadn't heard all of what he had said because his mind was already thinking back to the time that she had been abducted by Dog Soldiers and shot by the grieving husband with a vendetta against doctors. He wondered whether this incident was what the dream had been warning him about and he feared that he might find his wife lying on the ground clinging to life just long enough for her to assert one last time that he didn't love her.
As he approached the clinic, he could see Matthew's shoulders tense and he knew the young man was as worried about his mother as Sully was. He guessed that the movement of Matthew's shoulders had been an attempt to keep himself from sobbing or vomiting, both of which Matthew would have hated to do in front of Sully. At that moment, Sully knew that he had to be the first one in the clinic and that no matter what Matthew said or wanted, Sully needed a few minutes alone with Michaela to find out what had happened and to really assess her condition.
Thus, with only a few hundred feet to go until they reached their destination, Sully pulled ahead of Matthew and raced off to the clinic, leaving his infuriated son behind. Sully knew that this move would mean that he would have even more to apologize to Matthew for later, but he needed to see his wife. Something was wrong with Michaela besides their separation, although he knew their separation had left the door open for whatever she faced now and he knew he had to be the one to find out what it was and how to help her.
When he reached the clinic, he could hear Matthew close at his heels, ready to stop him from entering alone. Quickly he dismounted and tied the horse to the post nearest the clinic and ran to the front door, not bothering to knock or ring the bell. Luckily the door was unlocked and he was able to push himself quickly into the examination room.
His sudden entrance startled Michaela and she shivered and yelped like a frightened puppy, cowering in the crevices of her chair and whimpering as though something was going to come and do her further harm. Sully looked around and found no assailant, yet he instinctually knew that Michaela's reaction was not because of him, no matter how hard they had been fighting or how much Michaela believed he didn't love her and so he figured that someone had come to take the stranger away or that Michaela, being the strong woman she was, had been able to chase him off herself before any harm could come to her.
Somewhere in his mind though, he sensed that the last assumption had been too much to hope for as Michaela's cowed reaction now denoted an instinctual need to withdraw from whatever she felt could cause her more of the same harm that her attacker had perpetrated against her. Standing several feet from her crumpled form, he spoke tenderly and coaxingly to her, hoping his tone of voice would make her less frightened. As he spoke, he thought of how much Michaela looked like Katie when she was frightened.
"Michaela? Are you all right? What did he do? If he hurt you I'll…" he said starting to let anger creep in his voice at the last utterance, anger which prompted Michaela to shudder even harder. Her shuddering made Sully immediately remorseful for his outburst.
"I'm sorry Michaela, I didn't mean to startle ya. I should've…" I should've been here, he thought to himself. But to her he said, "I should know better than to get angry right now. I'm sorry," he said, his face showing how contrite he was.
"It's fine, Sully. I'm fine. Nothing happened. He didn't hurt me. I'm fine." Michaela couldn't think of what else to say to make her lie sound more convincing. In truth her chest was beginning to throb from the myriad of bruises Mr. Gregory had probably caused across and under her breasts and along her ribcage and sides. She couldn't tell Sully any of this, though. It wasn't proper for a woman to tell a man such things, especially a man who didn't care for her in that way. In the back of her mind she realized she was retreating back to the way she had thought of herself when she first came to Colorado, she knew she was behaving like the last ten years hadn't happened and yet these rational thoughts were so buried underneath all of the anguish of the estrangement from her husband and her assault that she couldn't force them to be part of her conscious understanding of herself.
"Michaela, the children were frightened. They told Matthew a man covered your mouth, held your hand and forced you inside. Katie even told him the man made her call him Papa. Who is he, Michaela, and why haven't you mentioned him before? Is he the man that's been calling you all those awful things? If he did this to ya, he's gonna pay for what he's done." Sully's voice was adamant, but he was struggling to keep his tone even and soft enough for Michaela not to be afraid of it or of him. She needed him now, he could sense it, but he had to make her believe he wanted to be there for her to love her with his entire heart. He had to try to reach her and now was the time. A second later, though, he realized that he'd missed his opportunity.
Michaela had remained silent through Sully's questioning, not sure what to tell him. She desperately wanted to cry on his shoulder and sob that he had been right in everything that he'd guessed and in everything he had relayed to her from the children, but she couldn't. Something inside of her was stopping her from telling him the truth. She wanted him to hold her tight and to kiss the pain away, but she felt as though she, somehow, deserved the assault and the distance from him because she was not the wife or the person he wanted her to be, not the wife or the person he could love, and so she repeated the simple sentence she'd uttered to Dorothy before,
"There's nothing to say, Sully because nothing happened."
The woods were cold and damp against her nightgown as she stumbled her way blindly through nearly five miles of brush. The sharp bushes scratched at her bare legs and the rocks cut her feet as she ran unconsciously toward him, tears streaming down her face. Her eyes were glazed over as though she wasn't seeing or comprehending any of what was around her. She seemed to be running on pure adrenaline and even that was fading fast as her lungs were burning from the combination of the speed and awkwardness of her unsteady gait and the sobs that continued to rack her body. As she neared the structure, she stumbled and landed hard, letting out a small squeak as her hip took the full weight of her weakened body.
The squeak was enough to awaken him from the light and unrestful sleep he had finally succumbed to only a few minutes before. Standing up quickly, he bumped his head on the top of the structure and stifled a curse as he rubbed the sleep from his eyes and followed the trails his companion had made out of the structure and toward the creature in need of assistance. Seconds later the man was beside his companion, taking in the fallen form of a woman sobbing in her nightgown mile from where she'd come. Without a moment's hesitation, the man lifted her into his arms, beckoned his friend to follow and walked back to the place where he had made camp.
As soon as he'd picked her up, the woman had begun to speak, not in the form of intelligent conversation but in the form of sobbed snippets, the jest of which the man could only catch if he focused on them intently. When they reached the structure, the man had placed her beneath it and tried to remove her from his embrace, figuring that she'd be more comfortable if he did so. However, the woman refused to let go of him and instead clung to him as one clings to their last hope of salvation. He finally gave up on trying to release her and encircled her with his arms as well in a mirroring gesture of comfort. He was careful not to mirror the intensity of her hold, however, as he thought that that might scare her more. The man could tell that the woman was having some kind of mental breakdown, and yet he wasn't frightened. He felt as though he was almost relieved for the woman as she seemed to be releasing whatever psychological demons were haunting her, though surprised she'd chosen to do it with him. He, however, was unprepared for what he heard when her ramblings became more linguistically coherent.
"My husband doesn't love me, but I love him so much that I can't live without him…I only wanted him to stay with me like he used to…the letter…he…left…I was writing to tell him…love him very much…wanted him not to go…not another trip…wrote down my feelings…hoped I could show him…love him very much…pregnant…alone…wanted him…babies moving…Katie was excited…big sister…so cute…missed her Papa…he doesn't love me…Mr. Gregory…husbandless whore…tried to rape me…horrible wife…needed my husband…labor…pain…twins…hurt so much…he didn't want to be there…burden…no middle name…wanted him to love me…couldn't tell him… so much pain…I love him…always will…he wanted divorce…I said it for him…children hurting…hold me…save me…stand by me…" She looked up at the man with a blank expression and muttered, "Thank you for saving me…he used to…I need him…stand by me."
Sully was stunned at his wife's revelation. She had no idea who he was or where she was. She only knew pain, fear and isolation. He had been wrong about so many things. If he was hearing her correctly, he must have read the letter wrong and this whole thing, including his wife's psychological state now was because of him. The weight hit him like a freight train in his chest and as he held his shivering wife, he couldn't breath. She'd endured a pregnancy alone, been stalked, molested and almost raped, raised his children and kept loving him all while trying to protect herself from a man whom she loved more than life itself but who had proved that he didn't love her by saying the four words no husband should ever say to his wife and abandoning her to be left to the wolves of the world and of judgment, first under the guise of providing for his family and then under the excuse of not believing he had one anymore.
The burden made him physically sick and as he went to turn his held to vomit, he noticed that Michaela was gasping for air and clutching her chest as though she were having a heart attack. He supposed, though, as he swallowed his own sickness, picked her up in his arms and rushed out of the lean-to towards his horse, that the ailment and the location of the onset of it were fitting considering that he had been the one to figuratively, and now literally, break her heart.
This is my first fan fiction and I would appreciate any and all feedback, so please feel free to review the chapter and any subsequent chapters if you think they are of interest either here or be orginal and comment on the "Stand By Me" thread of the fanfiction section of the Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman forum The link to the thread is: http/forum.drquinn.us/viewtopic.php?t3949
Thanks, Corinna
