Chapter 5: Carol

When she listened to her heart, she knew her marriage was solid, the family would be all right. Listening to her head, however, happened far more often, and she was sure all was tearing itself apart, never to be mended.

It wasn't just she missed Harry, although his absence was a hole in her sense of self, and her sense of the family. There was so much tension, so much fear, so much anger ... no one was who they should be anymore.

Except for Rachel. The arrival of Eddie's little sister brought a purity and a peace in the midst of everything. Rachel's belief in Eddie's safety and eventual return was so certain, and she was kept isolated from any other issues, that her room was visited often by those in need of an oasis. Rachel's trips to the pool were very well attended, and her wheelchair excursions frequent.

It wasn't hard to hide anxiety and stress in Rachel's presence. She was joy personified ... and on those occasions where she was having a bad day, or was sick, Merry and Annie Beth let it be known she wasn't accepting visitors. No one except the two nurses, and Tamara really knew what Rachel's bad days were like, but everyone was very accepting of the reality of her situation.

Rachel was an angel who wouldn't be with them forever, making every good moment precious.

So Carol cherished her time with the woman, spending what time she could spinning stories for her or swimming with her.

Because otherwise, Carol had a very difficult time listening to her heart, and passed her days either numbly following Margo's or Kelly's orders, or curled up in her own room, miserable.

Sleeping didn't come easy; it barely came at all, which left Carol awake in the dark far too often.

Little sub, you have lost your way for no good reason. All will be well in the long run. You, above all others, know this to be true.

"Shut up, Madame," Carol replied, staring into the darkness. "You're dead and gone, nothing more than one part of my mind talking to the other." She began to cry. "I don't know anything."

"Should we even bother with any kind of Thanksgiving celebration?"

Everyone at the table looked at Carol as if she was possessed.

"I can't think of anything we need more than a reason to remember all we have to be thankful for," Margo said.

"I can't think of anything we need less than to lie to ourselves," Carol said, breaking into tears and running from the table.

Her feet carried her along a familiar path, down into the basement, to look at the murals and redecoration that had driven Harry out of the hole in the ground and into the house above ... and then away. This time, she thought she'd stay a while.

Margo had explained it to her, made it clear he seriously needed to be alone, and maybe once upon a time, Carol could have understood that, both emotionally and intellectually.

But now she'd brought the hole in herself to the hole below the house, closed the door behind her, engaging all but the final lock, and sat in roughly the middle of the vast underground space and screamed until she couldn't scream anymore, then sobbed almost soundlessly until she was exhausted.

Lying on the hall floor she slept, her dreams ugly and twisted.

When she awoke, some unknown amount of time later, she could hear the faint echoes from the intercom speakers all over the basement.

"Carol, please, honey, let us in..."

Listening to Kelly's pleas she padded down the hall to the great door, opened all the locks, and swung it open.

"What?" Carol rasped, her voice almost completely gone.

"We're all worried about you, sweetie," Kelly said. "Big Mama's called the Karghold to get a message to Harry. In the meantime ... Doc Susan's waiting for you in the garden."

"I don't have anything to say to Susan," Carol said, trying to push past Kelly, trying to get back to her room and the comforting darkness.

"Little Cunt," Kelly barked, slapping Carol's face so hard she spun halfway around, "you get your ass to the garden now. Fucking run!"

Against her will, motivated by the training and lifestyle choices that had become part of her psyche, Carol ran toward the garden.

For almost an hour, Carol sat silent, staring down at the walkway between the benches she and

Susan Lowenstein occupied, across from each other.

Finally, in a small, rough, and breaking voice, Carol said, "I know better. I know we'll be okay in the end."

"Will you be?" Susan replied. "No one can foretell the future."

"True enough, I suppose," Carol said. "I believe we will be. My heart tells me so."

"And I know you trust your heart," Susan said. "So why aren't you trusting it now?"

"My brain is getting in the way. Harry's gone, and I can't comprehend why. It's just such a foreign response ... nothing we've had to face before has made him run, and I know all the reasons, Margo's explained it all too many times, but it's not only nothing Harry's done before, it's something I simply can't comprehend. Trouble draws a family together, and him running away ... I feel like he's abandoned us, and if he can do that, who says he can't just leave us forever?"

"I think we may have to redefine some terms here," Susan said. "To me it sounds like your heart isn't the part that knows things will work out. That's your brain talking, and it's probably right, in the long term. I think emotionally you're convinced he's gone forever. Try looking at it that way, let me know what you think?"

In less than a minute Carol was in Susan's lap, being held by their therapist and friend as Carol cried.

Carol had never been to the Karghold, and after Devon passed responsibility for her over to a driver and two guards, the little woman found herself being helped into the back of a jeep that took her through the rough scrub of the Texas Hill Country, following what she hoped wasn't a trail. Trails were supposed to be smoother than the surrounding terrain, and visible. The route they took was neither of these things. She clutched her small overnight bag, and bounced against her seat belt and shoulder restraint as she worried about the vehicle flipping over and killing them all.

"First time out here?" the driver, she thought his name was Rick, asked her.

"Y-y-yeah," she stammered as the jeep ran over a stretch of ground that looked like a natural washboard.

She glanced back to see the guards standing up in the back, although they were hooked on to the roll-bar.

"Is this the route you take to intimidate new visitors?" she asked.

"Nah, this is just the only way to the cabin. Your man wanted solitude, and that's what he got. Old Sal, the slave that sees to him, makes this trip twice a day, from a different direction, but it's no smoother. One thing I do need to impress on you, is don't go wandering around without good stout boots on, like that pair you're wearing. We have snakes out here, and while the hold's doctor has anti-venom on hand, she doesn't like using it. Also, your man hasn't reported any scorpions in the cabin, it's really pretty solidly made, but they do occasionally get in, so shake your shoes out before you put them on. Scorpions we've got out here aren't deadly, but their stings are painful."

Carol reflected that their new home, in the river bottom below the hills, had the same problems, but with all the activity around the house, snakes and such stayed clear. Out here...

"I'm not feeling all that comfortable with the idea of being all the way out here," she said, mostly under her breath. The driver heard her nonetheless.

"You're a city girl, I take it," he said, smiling.

"Afraid so."

"Don't worry, it's not likely you'll run across snakes around the cabin, not with Harry being there, plus there's dogs up there with him. Just be careful on any hikes away from the cabin."

"Not planning on any," she said, wincing as she was jolted so hard she almost lost grip of her bag.

"Probably wise," he replied. "See up there? That's the cabin."

"That's Gottfried and Helga," Harry said as the two German Shepherds circled her after he opened the door. "Settle down, guys."

The two dogs went outside as he showed her in.

"Humble," she said, eyeing the comfortable interior of the cabin.

"And simple," Harry said, gathering her into his arms for a hug that was wonderfully, comfortably long.

When the hug finally ended, he gave her a tour of the cabin, all without moving.

"Kitchen in the corner, toilet's behind the little door next to the tub, office over there, bed ... well, like everything else, it's pretty obvious where it is. There's your tour."

"Still, not too rough, so long as you don't have a lot of company."

"No, it isn't. Thankfully, they ran water and power lines out here, buried of course. There are cabins far more primitive out here for those who truly want to rough it, but I'm not feeling that frontier-sy. The toilet takes a little getting used to, old septic tank, so no flushing used toilet paper of any kind. Blissfully, the used-paper can is pretty airtight."

"So, had any issues with snakes, scorpions, things like that," Carol said, eyeing the floor.

"No ... well, the occasional scorpion maybe, but you'll notice I'm wearing my shoes. I take them off for bath and bed, and don't put them back on without shaking them out. And so far, I've caught two scorpions thinking my funky footwear was a nice dark place to hide, decisions that proved fatal. I keep the dogs inside with me at night, I think they help convince hostile insects, or whatever scorpions are, to go elsewhere. They've done a real good job keeping the snakes away..."