The Shooting at Our Merciful Lord

I looked around the other jamb. There was Karen Ann again. The guy was looking out the window. I was close enough to Dylan to grab him. Still, the pistol was in the guy's right hand pointing down near Karen Ann's head.

His back was mostly toward me. Did he have a vest? A packed suicide vest would kill us all if it went off. I saw no evidence of one, just a cotton jacket, and his hands were in sight and no obvious trigger.

As he looked again outside, I heard sirens in the distance. He was really concentrating now, 8 or 10 feet away from me looking hard. When it became obvious the police were coming here, he might start shooting. I took a breath and moved.

I took three steps running and hit him as hard as I could with my right shoulder, my right arm around him to keep him from raising that pistol. I was remembering a football coach saying, "All you think is CRUSH!" I yelled it as I hit him: "CRUSH!" We both went through the window in a welter of drape and glass and old, double-hung, casement wood.

We were on the porch and he was under me. I didn't want the guy to get up, so I was pounding on him and I thought I knocked his pistol away. I was furious, and it took him a few seconds to get his bearings, but he was scrabbling with me.

He was bigger, stronger, and my right, natural hand had nothing to it. He was solid. He rolled us to our sides. The porch light came on. I flailed at him, using my left and right hands, knocking his head into the painted wood porch floor once or twice, yelling and angry, but my right hand was limp and powerless and I knew when he regained his composure he would win this fight. I was becoming desperate, my mind a jumble of hope for the police or God or something. He was pushing on my chin, bending my head back and painfully so.

Then Maria was there with the pistol in her hands. She fell to her knees on the broken glass behind his head, I heard her gasp at the pain. She pointed the gun at the ceiling with both hands and "bang!" fired a round into the porch roof, the sound rending the night. We stopped at it. I felt him hesitate, and there was silence but for sirens a few hundred yards away. Then she jabbed the muzzle hard against the crown of his head, and said, loudly, forcefully, almost yelling, "Mister if you move I will shoot you cold as any stone!" He moved a bit from a deep breath right then, so she jabbed his head hard with the barrel and declared, "Don't you fuck with me!"

Maria.

All the wind went out of his sail. My left hand was on the side of his head, pushing it into the wood floor. He stopped struggling and sank into the wood. He was conscious but stunned; blood streamed from his head where I had banged it. He looked defeated, but I didn't care for appearances. I struggled away from him with my left hand pushing the side of his head into the floor, hastened up onto my knees next to Maria, and felt the same sharp pain she must have felt of knees on broken glass. Some of my weight was on his head through my left hand, next to the weapon.

"Maria, I'll take the pistol." I tried to sound calm, matter of fact, in control. She transferred it to me without looking anywhere but at the assailant, keeping the muzzle against his head with some force. I kept it against the guy using my left hand then, my right weakly supporting, and I would have pulled that trigger if he'd twitched a muscle. Maria stood and went into the house just as the police pulled up.

"Help, Officers. Help me, please," I said, calling out.

They came with guns drawn and ordered me to drop the weapon. They were a man and a woman.

"Not where he might get it," I said loudly. I put it down and flung it away along the floor. I raised my hands.

I hurt. I was cut and bruised, but we were all alive.

Maria and Karen Ann came out, each carrying a kid, Maria with Hanley and Karen with Dylan as more police cars pulled up and officers came charging. Karen Ann had tape hanging from her hair; Dylan and Hanley had tape hanging from their hair also. Karen was saying it was the guy on the floor they should arrest, the one officer recognized me, and finally I was able to lower my hands.

Karen Ann and Maria were around me with the kids, then, and my arms were about them.

"You okay?" I asked Maria.

She leaned into me. I felt her nod.

Karen Ann, to my right, spoke rapidly with excitement and relief, "I thought he was going to kill us. I couldn't think of a way to tell you." She was against me, and had tears down her face, but she was not debilitated. Her eyes were open and clear with determination to protect her children and herself.

"You did. You told me to be careful."

She looked at me with her head cocked. She didn't remember saying it.

I hugged Hanley then, too, clutched in Maria's arms, and Dylan, but I wouldn't let Maria go. She was shaking, and I thought she might be crying, but she wasn't.

"Quite a night," I said quietly to her hair.

She said, "I didn't want to face the world without you."

"You saved our lives," I said.

I felt her nod. I didn't want to move.

"I'm not sick anymore."

"No, you aren't."

She paused as police were moving the prisoner about, cuffed.

"I think I'll be a good mom."

I took a breath and squeezed her, knowing she had beaten back her demon a little more. She probably smiled, but her face was against my chest so I couldn't tell.

Chapter 12: Resolutions

For a week I worried Maria would miscarry from the excitement and stress of the hostage affair. She didn't.

It was three weeks after that my cell phone rang; I saw the number and dread swept through me. I forced myself to answer. Maria was with me and heard my side of the conversation.

"John? This is Karen Ann."

"Yes, Karen?"

"I'd like to invite you and Maria over for dinner. With the kids, although I'd rather they be napping. There is something I'd like to talk over with you."

"Karen Ann, I don't..." I said.

She was insistent. "I need to say thank you again, and I have a problem. I'd really like to speak with you. Both of you."

"I don't want to see your parents. You understand that? Never," I emphasized.

"Of course. Just me and the kids."

"Okay."

I put the phone down. Maria sat across from me at the kitchen table.

"Why," she asked, "are you so angry at her parents?"

I thought about it for a moment. I'd been acting on instinct, just knowing I didn't want them in my life. It came to me after I thought about the hope and dreams I'd had for Karen Ann at the inception of our life together. I'd seen her parents as help, support. "I think it's because they gave her away at the wedding. To me. It became my job to provide for her, my job to protect her. It was their role to defend our marriage as long as I was faithful to it."

Maria nodded. "It's sad. The whole thing."

*

The next Sunday around two we knocked at the door of the old home. The window had been repaired. I wondered if it was covered under homeowner's insurance.

Karen Ann greeted us, shook Maria's hand, and had us go straight to the table. The children were napping, she said. We ate lasagna and drank coffee. Maria refused, telling Karen Ann that she was two months along and avoiding caffeine, receiving congratulations and a glass of water.

"That's good news," Karen Ann said. She sounded sincere, but I'd heard her say "I do" once, and that had sounded sincere also. She said, "You knew you were pregnant when..."

"Yeah, that same day the terrorist was here," Maria said.

Karen Ann nodded slightly and took a breath.

"John, Maria, my mom is not in good health. My dad is okay, but you know, John, that he is not the warm kind. My parents have been my safety net since our divorce, but Mom is probably not going to be able to take care of kids if I were incapable. That's what I want to ask you."

I looked at Maria, looking for a clue as to her feelings. She was looking at Karen Ann, eyes bright. That's a very scary look for any husband to see in his wife. She knew how I felt about Karen Ann. I wondered how Maria would feel after this talk.

"You're worried about the kids if you were sick or died or something?" I asked.

She was nodding. "My parents understand why you don't want to see them, John, and they agree it's for good reason..." She was upset and needed a moment. "But they suggested you." She stood up, went to the refrigerator and picked up a sealed envelope from on top. "They asked me to give this to you. They hope you'll read it. It's for both of you, I know you've never met them, Maria. Maybe, someday." She slid it across the table to Maria. "Later," she said. She sat again.

"Is this just foresight or is there a reason that something is likely to happen?" I wanted to know if she was sick.

"I need to go to a program," she started to say, staring at the wall. She stopped and looked right at us. "I need to go to rehab. I've been drinking and I have to go. My principal gave me an ultimatum. My job is on the line, I'm overwhelmed, and I can't stop. I can't leave the kids with Mom anymore. Not for more than a day. Anyway, after the hostage thing, I decided if anything happened to me, I'd want you to have the kids. You and Maria. Both. I would be grateful if you'd agree. I know after what I did..."

She just shook her head and said no more.

Maria said, "You're asking us to watch your kids while you're in rehab? And then you want to name us as your kids' guardians if anything happens to you?"

"Yes. I believe in you. Both of you. I saw you tear through that room, Maria, and you saved us... And the way you held Hanley after you cut the cords. Please consider it."

I said the first thing I thought: "If it ever happened, I'd never take them to their grandparents."

Maria looked at me, and for the first time in our relationship, I thought she was disappointed.

Maria said to Karen Ann, "Your parents live in town, right?"

"Yes," Karen Ann said, "not far."

Maria was making plans already, plans to get around me. She'd get the kids to their grandparents if I wouldn't. She knew I'd not stop loving her for doing something she thought was good. Even I thought it was good, I just wouldn't do it. I realized she wasn't scared of Karen Ann with me. She wasn't scared of the love I felt for Hanley and Dylan. She was secure in my love for her.

I had that most terrifying of wives: an equal.

Taking a deep breath, Karen Ann said, "If they're ever orphaned, I'm asking you to raise them as your best judgment guides you. All of their inheritance would be in your control. Right now I'm asking you to take care of them for a few months while I get straightened out. My parents aren't part of this. It's my choice, and if you don't want to visit my parents, then don't."

Maria looked at me. "They're kids, John. You could have a closer relationship with them."

She knew my soul and my mind before I did. I hated that. I kept my expression dour, serious.

Karen spoke quietly, "I have nowhere else to go; there is no one else in my life. I'm not asking you to adopt them, if the worst comes to the worst. That would be up to you. I know some good parents at work, but... I want my kids to be good. Not like their father. Not like me. Good. You two are my first choice, but also the only ones I'd choose. Both of you. If not you, it would just be the luck of the draw." She looked from the one to the other of us as she spoke.

She was changed. She had been profligate and now was alcoholic, admittedly. From what she said, her dating life was almost nonexistent for all the responsibility of raising the two kids, keeping the house, and working. Perhaps because of all that, she had developed one virtue: she loved her kids. Perhaps it would lead to others. She was confident that one thing about me would never change: I'd rather roll a ball on the floor with a toddler than do just about anything else. I'd never turn my back on a kid in need.

Karen Ann was trying to salvage her life. How much strength, how much desperation, did it take to admit her mistakes toward me? She implored us. I had been helped by two priests, a doctor, a lawyer, a class of people in Cleveland. I'd been emotionally thanked by a grateful husband and father, a high school writer, cops, hostages. Perhaps it would not be easy. I smiled to myself, looking at my hand in Maria's, remembering a guy who taught philosophy but did not wear socks. What DO I deserve?

I looked right at Karen. I was silent for a moment and then asked, "How long for the rehab?"

"Two months maybe, but it's case by case so... Summer." She shrugged, embarrassed but heartened. She knew I was considering.

I saw the determination in her, the concentration on what I said. She was worried about her children and only her children. She was listening for one thing: would we do it or not?

I said, "We will never be close, Karen Ann. You and I. I'm not your friend. Some things are forever, and the things you did were... unforgettable if not unforgivable." I hesitated, thinking about what I should say. I shook my head as she nodded hers. It would always have an awkwardness, and perhaps the kids would see it. Maybe she'd find a guy and all this preparation would recede into the background of our lives.

I felt the little woman on my left, felt her confidence in me. She knew me and loved me. Byron was right: the greatest joy was knowing you were loved. It would be frightful not to live. Maybe I could be worthy of it.

I saw the hope in Karen Ann's eyes when I stopped talking. She had not heard "No."

I turned to my wife. "We should talk."

Maria looked at me, squeezed my left hand with her little ones, and smiled. "Yes. We should."