Chapter 12 – Jasper
"Good morning, beautiful. I had another dream about you last night. Want to hear it?" Jasper asked the moment he walked into his latest therapy session.
Dr. Platt sighed. "Good morning, Jasper. You seem to be in good spirits."
"Yeah, well I had a good dream. Want to hear about it or not?"
"Of course, I do," she replied, trying like hell to not let him hear her internal groan.
"Okay, so you were a famous book author. I'm talking really famous, like the top of the best seller lists. Anyway, I saw you on a talk show or something, and I got the biggest crush. Alice made fun of me, of course, and agreed that you would be my one free pass. You know, if I ever got the chance to meet you, she wouldn't divorce me for fucking you. A free pass. Hers is like… Brad Pitt or some shit like that. Anyway, I actually do meet you, and… Wait, maybe this wasn't a dream after all, maybe this was on a sitcom I saw once. I don't know. I think I fell asleep with the TV on or something."
"Jasper, can you tell me how you have been doing since the last time we talked? Have you been by your parents' house yet? Even for just a few minutes to check in?"
"No. You know my mom," he said dismissively. "Well, you don't know her know her, but you know from what I've told you about her. She is neurotic. She would have a hard time dealing with… this," he said gesturing to his unkempt state. "Besides, she loves Alice like a daughter. She would just tell me I need to fix it."
"And how do you think you would respond to her about that?" Dr. Platt questioned.
"Like I've told you, I tried to fix it," he said, getting upset. "I keep calling her and she won't pick up. She never replies to my texts. She is done with me. I think she is probably seeing someone new."
"Okay… Jasper, the last time you were here, you discussed her pregnancy. Can you talk a little more about that?"
"What do you want to know?" he asked somberly.
"Anything you're willing to tell me," she said encouragingly.
He thought about it for a minute, but his blank stare made Dr. Platt think he wasn't going to respond at all. And then, seemingly out of the blue, he began telling her a story about Alice and his mother.
…
"Just, whatever she says…"
"I know," Alice assured her husband. "Babe, this is not the first time I've met her."
"Yeah, but you're getting towards the end of your pregnancy now. I just don't want her to upset you."
"She is harmless," Alice said unconcerned.
Jasper's parents were harmless, but his mother was intense. She insisted that Alice call her mom, despite her initially feeling uncomfortable about it, and she tended to insert herself where she wasn't exactly wanted. It was safe to assume where Jasper got his tendency to be overwhelming from.
"Oh my good, look how huge you are!" his mom said the moment they opened the door for them.
"Hi mom," Alice said, still feeling a wave of awkwardness from calling her as such.
"Ma, behave," Jasper warned her.
"I know, I know," she assured her son.
They both hugged his father too, but his mother quickly escorted them into the kitchen to have lunch.
"Can I just say, you are absolutely glowing?" his mother said excitedly as she served the food.
"How have you been managing?" Jasper's father asked, just trying to get a few words in before his wife could take over the conversation completely.
"Oh," Alice sighed. "I'm so uncomfortable now. It's been hard to sleep with this big thing… but I'm excited. It's almost time."
"And you still don't know the gender?" his mom asked. "I thought they had better technology now. My friend's daughter found out what they were having at like four-months along. I really need to know so I could start shopping for baby clothes."
"Like I told you before, Ma, we are waiting to be surprised about the baby's gender. You will just have to buy neutral stuff if you can't wait," Jasper told her.
"Oh, that is so boring! I know, I'll just buy a bunch of girl and boy stuff and save the receipts. I already have the crib, and a changing table, and a jumper, and bottles, and everything else a baby could need."
"You do know the baby won't actually be living here with you, right?" Jasper asked, only mildly disturbed.
"Oh, but I'll be watching it enough. You know, they did a study that proves grandparents live longer when they babysit their grandkids. Honey, I plan to live a long time, so you just bring me that baby any time you need a break. I can even take it overnight so you can get some rest."
"Okay, I will definitely take you up on that," Alice said sincerely.
"You are too precious for words, you know that?" his mom asked. She came around and placed her hand on Alice's belly, and smiled lovingly. Despite her overbearing ways, Alice did have a fondness for her mother-in-law. Losing her own mother at such a young age had made Alice almost desperate for that maternal figure, especially now, when her own journey into motherhood was about to begin.
"Now, I hope you're not offended, but I have to say this. I'm so glad your parents are dead," Jasper's mother said to Alice, shocking the hell out of Jasper to the point where he spit his drink out over the table.
"Mom, what the hell?" he yelled.
"I'm sure she is going to explain," Alice whispered, trying to calm her husband.
"Dear?" Jasper's father asked, dumbfounded himself.
"Oh, come on," his mother said exasperated. "She knows what I mean."
"No, she really doesn't," Jasper said irritated.
"All I'm saying is that I've always dreamed my son would marry a woman with dead parents… You know, so I don't have to share the grandkids. You know what I mean," she said defensively.
Jasper let his head drop to the table in shock and embarrassment, but Alice just laughed. The woman had said it so innocently that Alice was almost glad for her.
"Oh, stop that," Jasper's mother said to her son. "She knows what I mean."
Jasper continued to theatrically bang his head on the table, his father was visibly embarrassed, his mother sincerely didn't see the issue with her statement, and Alice continued to laugh at the entire thing.
When lunch was over, Jasper couldn't get his wife out of that house fast enough, but Alice was almost hesitant to leave.
"Don't be so hard on her, Jazz," she said as they began walking away from his parent's home.
"How could I not be hard on her? Who the hell says something like that?"
"She didn't mean it maliciously," Alice defended her.
"Yeah, but damn. No wonder I have fucking issues. My mother is a nutcase."
Alice giggled again. "I know she is a little…"
"Idiotic?"
"Brazen," Alice corrected him. "She really does mean well."
"Aren't I the one who is supposed to be defending her to you?" Jasper asked with his lips curled at the ends. "I mean, she's my mom. It's your right as a wife to hate your mother-in-law."
"But I don't hate her. She loves hard… just like her son."
"And my dad barely speaks. It's seriously a wonder how they even got together in the first place."
"You're like him too," Alice pointed out. "You don't always have a lot to say either. You love hard like her, but you're still gentle like him. I'd say they did a pretty good job raising you. I hope we can do half as well."
"We are going to do way better than them," Jasper assured her. "I'm going to be a far better father and husband than he was, and you won't be anywhere close to as overbearing and crazy as my mother was."
"You give me far too much credit," Alice told him.
"So, now that the obligatory lunch with my parents is done. Where to next?"
"We have the rest of the day open. Let's do something fun," she suggested.
"Anything you want, my love."
"Well," she yawned. "I kind of just want to walk for a bit. Enjoy the quiet while we can."
"Then that's what we will do."
…
"Sounds like you guys were happy?" Dr. Platt questioned, in an attempt to lead Jasper to the place where everything went wrong.
"We were happy. We were really fucking happy."
"You said she was close to her due date during the time of this story? Can you tell me about what happened next?" Dr. Platt questioned carefully.
Jasper's face went blank again, but when he refocused, it was not on Alice's departure from his life as the doctor had hoped.
"So, I knew this guy in jail. I mean, it wasn't jail, it was that loony bin they stuck me in after I drove my car through the building. Anyway, he was hot. Like, if I was into dudes, he would have been the thing of wet dreams, you know what I mean? Anyway, he had a face that should have been on a magazine…"
"Okay?" Dr. Platt asked when Jasper paused.
"Anyway, he was a drug addict or something. A manic depressive. He had all these big dreams for himself… but he struggled. On the day he was released from that place, he OD'd and died. Pretty tragic. He was very handsome. Could have really made something of himself."
"That is sad. How does that make you feel?"
"Like I said, it was tragic."
"But, how did the news of his death make you feel?" she pressed.
"Jealous," he said emotionlessly.
"Jasper, we need to discuss this. Why would you feel jealous over his death? Do you feel as if your own life holds no value anymore?"
"No, I don't mean that. I was just kidding," he said with a forced laugh. "The guy isn't even dead. He like, OD'd, but they got to him in time. Sometimes I just say stupid shit. I guess I get that from my mom."
"Jasper, why did his death make you feel jealous?" Dr. Platt pressed, refusing to let him spin his way out of it. "Tell me what led to the end of your marriage. You said she was happy. Why would she leave you if she was happy?"
"Because," he said, feeling like the room was suddenly caving in on him. He didn't want to talk about it. He wouldn't even allow himself to think about it, but that damn doctor just kept pushing. Every word she said was like a dagger to his heart, and with each blow she was bringing those memories forward into his mind. He tried to fight them off, but he just wasn't strong enough.
"Because she wasn't happy!" he admitted with tears pouring down his face. "Because maybe she wasn't ready to become a mother. Maybe she resented me for it. Maybe she just wanted to get as far away from me as possible!"
"Jasper, what happened to the baby?" Dr. Platt asked gently yet sternly. She was still trying to dig him out of the deep psychotic break he had fallen into. She would never understand why he was discharged from the hospital before he was ready. Clearly, he was lost in a delusion that he couldn't find his way back out of. She had given him time to figure it out for himself, but it wasn't working. He was just getting worse, so she needed to do something drastic. She needed him to admit what happened so he could finally begin to heal and move on.
"Jasper, what happened to the baby?" she asked again.
"Nothing!" he cried. "Nothing. Alice took the baby when she left."
"Jasper, what happened to the baby?" she repeated.
"Alice didn't even want the baby, but she took it. She took it and left me. Why did she do that? Why?" he sobbed.
"Jasper, what happened to the baby?" she asked yet again.
"It died!" he spat. "It died, so she left."
"Jasper, tell me what happened to the baby!" she demanded one last time.
"I don't know!" he shouted at her. "Alice was mad at me. She was scared. We left my parents' house, and we were walking and then…"
"And then?"
"She… she… she wasn't scared," he said, making no sense but Dr. Platt could see the clouds in his eyes abruptly lift. His tears stopped flowing and he became extremely calm. "She was happy. I remember now. She was excited about the baby. She worried about being a good mother, but… after talking to my crazy mother, and knowing how well I turned out, she realized she could do it. It was like… this huge weight was lifted off her shoulders. She was practically bouncing with giddiness. My mother's ridiculous comments at lunch had made Alice relieved. It was the calmest I had ever seen her."
"And then what happened?"
"She knew," Jasper said quietly. "We agreed to not find out the baby's gender, but she had accidentally seen it on our last ultrasound. On our walk that day… she told me we were having a girl. A little girl."
One more tear rolled over his cheek.
"That was it," he continued. "She… she… she told me we were having a girl, and then she stepped backwards into the street," he said slowly as his memory of that day began to clear. "I couldn't reach her. I tried… I tried to reach her, but that god-damned bus… No!" He screamed and squeezed his eyes shut to prepare himself for the onslaught of pain.
"Jasper, it's okay. You are in a safe place," Dr. Platt said softly. "Alice was happy. She wanted the family you two were creating. That's what you said, right. She wanted that baby girl. She would have wanted you to take care of her."
"No…" Jasper said. His voice was trembling with the echo of his shattering heart. "No, she wasn't happy," he said, reverting back to the lie he told himself. The lie he forced himself to believe because it was the only way he could survive it. "She was mad. She didn't want to be a mother."
"She wanted that baby, Jasper. You told me she did. You said she was happy."
"No," he said, getting off his seat and grabbing the backpack he brought with him. "No, she hated me for getting her pregnant. She left."
"If she left, where did she go, Jasper? Where is the baby?"
"She took it. She left," he said, his voice stretched thin as if he had been screaming. But it was a scream he had only felt on the inside. A scream that echoed through his chest and straight up his spine and into his mind. A scream that would never end for Jasper… "Alice left me," he said, suddenly becoming emotionless. "She left and she is never coming back."
"Jasper, Alice is gone, and she isn't coming back," Dr. Platt confirmed gently. "It was a horrible, tragic accident, but miraculously, your daughter survived. She is alive, and your parents have been taking care of her for the past six months. She is waiting for you to get better. She is waiting for her father to come home. You have suffered an unimaginable devastation, but there is still joy in your life to come. You just need to go home."
Jasper had remained quiet as Dr. Platt spoke, but the emptiness in his eyes proved he wasn't really listening.
When the buzzer rang, signifying the end of their session, Jasper reflexively bent down to grab his backpack off the floor, and turned to head for the door.
"Jasper, please don't leave. We need more time today. If you want, I can call your dad to come pick you up. He can bring you home to finally meet your daughter. Your parents are so worried about you. Just wait…"
Jasper slowly turned back to her, but there wasn't a single flicker of light left in his eyes. "There is no more waiting," he said evenly, before reaching inside his backpack and pulling out a gun.
Dr. Platt didn't even have time to react before he brought the barrel to his mouth… and pulled the trigger.