Chapter 3 ~
"Timmy? Timmy? Timmy, where are you?" Analiese tried not to panic as she rushed around the house looking for her son. "Timmy, please don't hide from Mommy! Timmy!"
The little boy still didn't answer.
Honey...of all the times for you to hide from me... Analiese finally came to a stop in the middle of the kitchen and tried to think logically. Derek would be home in a little over an hour, and he would be angry if everything wasn't perfect.
There were still the finishing touches to put on the meal, the dining room table to set and the appropriate bottle of wine to be chosen and chilled. Actually she should've already done that to ensure that it was the perfect temperature for her husband when he arrived; he would surely notice and say something when he took his first sip. Plus, she still had to freshen up and get Timmy dressed. She had to keep her wits about her if she was going to pull this off.
But she had to find Timmy first. OK. Where would he hide? There aren't that many places he could be. The thought should have calmed her, but it didn't. In a house as large as theirs, there were plenty of places for a five year old to stow away, and a lot of times—like right now—Timmy seemed to simply vanish. He would just be gone, causing Analiese to panic and Derek to yell and curse—mostly about how stupid she had to be if she couldn't even keep track of her own kid.
Maybe he was right. What kind of mother didn't know where her child was at all times? It didn't matter that, invariably, Timmy always turned up—as suddenly as he had disappeared—never the worse for wear. The important thing was that she had lost her son and a good mother never would.
The wafting smell of beef momentarily brought Analiese out of her panic, and she quickly went to turn down the temperature on the oven. Until she found Timmy, she wouldn't be able to concentrate on anything else, and Derek was going to be mad enough about the "state of his home" as it was. It wouldn't do to have his dinner's main dish inedible as well.
"Timmy! Mommy needs you to come out right now, please. You can't hide from me right now." Starting her search from the beginning, Analiese went through the house room by room, looking in every nook and cranny she could think of, to no avail. Timmy was nowhere to be found.
Where could he possibly have gone? He knew he wasn't supposed to go outside if he didn't tell her first, but maybe...she ran out into the backyard and around the house to the front, calling her son's name the entire way, and still he did not answer.
Panic began to set in for real for Analiese as she walked back into the house, picturing every tragic explanation possible. Could he have wandered outside and someone taken him? It was a crazy thought, but so was the fact that he had disappeared into thin air under her very nose. Just as she thought she would go crazy with all the possibilities, she entered the kitchen and gasped in surprise and relief.
There was Timmy, standing in the middle of the room, clutching his teddy bear and looking very sleepy.
"Timmy! Oh, Timmy!" Analiese fell to her knees, hugging the little boy as tightly as she could even as her relief made her weak. "Where were you? You scared me!"
"I'm sorry, Mommy. I felled 'sleep."
"You fell asleep?" Analiese chuckled. "I guess you played hard this afternoon; you earned a nap," and then she frowned. "But I looked for you everywhere. Where were you?"
Timmy's little face fell, and his whole body stiffened with fear, but he stood up straight and tried to answer. "I—I was…" He swallowed hard as his voice cut off and tried to speak again. "I was in…ina…"
"That's OK, honey. You are safe now; that's all that matters." Analiese interrupted her stammering son and held his stiff body tightly in her arms. "It's OK." It took another second or two for Timmy to relax, but she still held him until he put his arms around her neck. "I love you, baby," she said.
"I love you too, Mommy," he answered softly.
It broke her heart to see the fear he showed when she demanded an answer to a simple question. It broke her heart to feel the hesitance, the initial resistance in his body to her hug afterwards. Both were responses planted and cultivated at his father's hand. Derek demanded so much of him. His approach was so harsh and cold, and he gave nothing in return.
Analiese felt a huge burden of responsibility for the pain her son had to endure. Her own bad choices from the beginning had brought him into a life that she hadn't envisioned when she dreamt of the family she would have someday. It was why she spent so much time trying to make it up to him with extra hugs and kisses and an especially gentle hand; her child shouldn't have to pay for her sins.
But she didn't have time to mourn the dreams lost or the bad decisions that she wished she could take back. She settled Timmy in a chair at the table with a glass of juice and a kiss on his forehead. "Drink your juice, love, and please don't move from this spot, OK? I have a lot to do before Daddy gets home."
Timmy nodded quickly, his eyes serious and a little anxious. "I promise, Mommy. I will stay here; promise," he said again.
Analiese had to fight hard against the tears that were welling up inside her. A child shouldn't feel anxiety at the thought of their father coming home from work. She liked to think that he was too young to really understand exactly what was at stake if things weren't perfect when Derek arrived, but she knew that he wasn't. She had read all the books, and simple observations of her son's behavior convinced her they were right: children felt and understood more than they were given credit for.
Dropping a final pat on her son's head, Analiese rushed to finish the dinner preparations, but even as she worked, she couldn't get away from thoughts about the past. As had become habit as each dream and expectation she had ever had for her life had fallen at her feet, she relived every moment that had led her to this point.
She had been young, in age as much as in life experience. The life of an orthodox Jew is strictly ordered by the laws and traditions as set forth in the Torah. The laws extend to cover everything from practices and proper behavior in worship to what is and isn't acceptable in every aspect of practical everyday life. As a daughter of the rabbi of a synagogue in which the Torah was interpreted very closely, Analiese had lived her life in a glass box.
In a congregation as small as the one in which she grew up, every move she made was scrutinized and commented on—by everyone. If someone felt her skirt was too short or neckline too revealing, she would receive a disapproving look, and without fail, there would be a discussion about it with her father later that night. Also without fail, the discussion would end with the removal of the offending article of clothing from her wardrobe. If she talked too long with a boy, one would've thought she'd gone off and actually slept with him by the way people acted.
But those were only two examples. The books she read, activities she chose, hobbies she pursued, everything was or wasn't allowed based not only on what would be acceptable religious practice, but also on how it would be perceived by the members of the congregation.
Her attendance for worship services was also an issue of utmost importance. She had endured many lectures on the necessity of the rabbi's family setting an example with their lives, and it started with synagogue attendance. She was expected to be there whenever the doors were open and expected to stay until everyone else was gone or at least until one of her parents left. Usually it was her mother, as synagogue business or concerns of the congregants often kept her father busy until late.
Her mother, Katarina, had been her life line, trying to make things easier for Analiese as she could. Occasionally she would be able to change her husband's mind on a subject in their daughter's favor, but not often. She tried to remind him that their little Ana was more than Rabbi Joseph Mayer's daughter and that she sometimes needed her father more than the congregation needed their leader, but that was a reminder whose effect didn't last longer than a day or two; eventually the demands of his position would once again take over their lives.
When she was a child, all it took was her mother's homemade` gefilte or one of her fresh Pirushkes to make Analiese forget her troubles, but as she got older, she began to resent and resist the scrutiny and restrictions of her life more and more. And though she was everything a proper young Jewish woman should be on the outside, her mother knew the rebellion that was growing in her heart.
"Don't be so hard on him, my darling," she'd say. "He's just trying to do what is right." Or, "Perhaps he is a little hard on you, dear, but whatever your father does, don't turn your back on God. He will give you everything you need." Little did she know that her best intentions were only serving to fuel the fire.
It was after a particularly trying weekend that she met her husband.
Volunteering at a local hospital was deemed a perfect opportunity for service for Analiese, and even though she didn't let her parents know it, she really liked the work. She especially loved when she was assigned to the pediatrics floor to help keep the kids occupied, and she eventually requested to work only in that department.
She would never forget the day Derek Graven walked onto the floor. She wasn't sure what it was about him that struck her so in the beginning; standing beside the nurse's station, there was nothing that particularly stood out about him, but she couldn't take her eyes off of him. Maybe it was the way the nurses were scurrying around, whispering among themselves with knowing looks on their faces and giggling like school girls. It was obvious that despite how he looked that he was somebody. He asked for Bethany, and someone quickly went to find her. While he waited, he idly looked her way, and their eyes locked.
The connection had been instant. As bad as things had turned out, Analiese never doubted that particular moment; whatever drew him to her had drawn her to him. She could still feel the pull whenever she thought about it. In fact, he was still staring when Bethany walked up to him, and he had greeted her rather distractedly.
It always surprised her that Bethany hadn't seemed to notice; she was too delighted to see him, she guessed. When their discussion was over, and Bethany walked him to the elevator, he turned to look at Annalise one more time. Her experience was non-existent, but she recognized the look in his eye and the warmth in her belly. It was just that natural.
Analiese began to volunteer more and more hours at the hospital in hopes of seeing him again, but as weeks went by without a glimpse, those hopes began to wane very quickly, though she managed to learn quite a bit about him by listening and asking a few discreet questions.
He was a resident surgeon at the time. Bethany had met him when running an errand to the surgical ward, and he had stopped her on her way out. He was estranged from his father, but he never wanted to talk about it, so Bethany didn't know much about the situation or his family, though he did have six younger siblings. She was desperately in love, declaring him the sweetest man she had ever known.
"I swear, if he hadn't stopped me, I never would've noticed or thought twice about him. And I don't know why I agreed to go out with him the first time," she had remarked, "but, I'm so glad I did. It was fate, I guess. Just one of those things that was meant to be," she finished dreamily.
Analiese had dismissed Bethany's claims easily. She was sure that if things were as good as she said they were, the moment between the two of them would've never happened. The fact that he was estranged from his father added just another level of intrigue to things; was there anyone better to understand problems with one's father?
Any hope she had of seeing Derek again had all but died until she absently stepped into an elevator at the end of one of her shifts, and his voice sounded behind her.
"I've been hoping I would see you again."
Her heart had stopped in her chest, and when she turned to look at him, it was as electrifying as the first time.
They fell fast and furious after that—in secret, of course. Her parents would've forbid her to see him and he had to find the right time to break the news to Bethany. Analiese knew that the secrecy was wrong, and she was definitely wrong for dating another woman's boyfriend. And she was equally wrong that she didn't feel too sorry for Bethany when she came to work heartbroken over her breakup and her part in it.
But she couldn't find it in her heart to care about any of that. She needed to be with Derek, and he assured her that he needed to be with her too. The first time he asked her to sleep with him, she did with only the slightest twinge of guilt. She wanted him too much to deny him anything.
That need is what got her in trouble in the end. Needing to be with him more and more made her take greater and greater risks to do so, and eventually she had been caught out with him by one of the congregants. By the time she got home that night, her parents already had been told, and her father was in a towering rage.
It was the first and only time that he almost struck her. He raged over the embarrassment she had caused him and her mother and the damage dealt to his ministry. He nearly screamed about all the laws she had broken and demanded to know how she could care so little for her soul? And then her forbid her to ever see "that man" again.
If it had not been for that, Analeise would have found a way to bear it all; she had born the burden of impossible expectations all of her life. But to not see Derek anymore was a notion not to be entertained. She didn't know who was more surprised—her parents or herself—when she dared to stand up and defy him, but all the hurt and resentment of the past came pouring out as she became just as angry as her father and refused to back down. When her father ordered her to leave the house, she was already packing.
Derek picked her up and took her back to his place. He held her while she cried and promised that he would make everything OK. He told her that she didn't need to think about the life she was leaving behind ever again if she didn't want to because he would take good care of her; he would be her family now.
Thinking back over the memory now, Analiese always saw it as the beginning of the end. It wasn't until many years later that she realized that in all of his promises that night, he never actually said that he loved her. He never cried with her or said that he was sorry for the trouble he had caused. In her distress she hadn't paid attention then, but now she could clearly recall how uncomfortable he looked with the whole situation, as if he were getting caught up in something he never wanted or expected to.
In the past, she had always pushed that last thought out of her mind. Of course Derek loved her and was thrilled to have her as his wife—no matter how it had come about. But, these days, she wasn't so sure. Maybe she had been a passing phase for him, but for whatever reason he felt like he couldn't actually leave her without anywhere to go. Maybe he felt like he had been trapped and resented her for it. It seemed like the only reason that everything could go so bad so fast.
Tears filled Analiese's eyes as she looked in the mirror, finishing getting dressed for dinner just as she heard her husband pull into the garage. Everything was almost perfect for his arrival: dinner would be ready in a few minutes, the wine was chilling, the house was clean, and both she and Timmy were nicely dressed. Hopefully he wouldn't be in too foul of a mood.
This wasn't the life she thought she would be living with the man she loved so much. But it was the life she had made for herself when she couldn't see past how much she loved Derek and how many hours it would be until she could see him again. So, it was too late; she didn't have any place to go now.
Not for the first time, she wished she had taken her mother's tearful goodbye to heart instead of letting it strengthen her resolve: "Whatever you go, whoever you are with, don't forget God, my darling. Whatever you do, don't forget God."
"I don't forget, Mama. Not anymore," Analiese whispered.
But as she took her son's hand and led him downstairs, she had to wonder if God had forgotten her.