AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Justice can’t always be fair. And it’s rarely compassionate.” Or just, if Karl were being honest with himself. Watching Jenufa should have reminded him of that fact.
“Justice is a theoretical concept constructed by society and understood differently by different cultures. It’s only as good as the people responsible for enforcing it. But people do have feelings. They can be compassionate. And, by seeing the gray you can be a part of making justice more than a noble goal. You won’t always succeed, but it’s better to at least try.”
Karl pondered Malcolm’s argument for several seconds. “I never imagined you as a touchy-feely guy.”
“I have depths you will never uncover.” Malcolm’s laugh was full and hearty. “My wife will tell you that I can be as tenderhearted as the next guy.”
“Love really does give people rose-colored glasses.” The words came out false as Karl tried to follow Malcolm’s lighter tone and failed. If Malcolm noticed, he ignored it.
“So what does all of this have to do with Vivian living at your mother’s?”
Instead of answering, Karl stood and walked over to the laptop he’d been working on. Slowly, deliberately, he saved his work and closed the screen. Then he put the notes back in order. The sharp slice of pain through his finger meant he now had a paper cut along with the embarrassment of confessing his soul to his coworker.
Malcolm was silent until Karl stood back up. “What does all this have to do with Vivian living at your mother’s?” he asked again.
“She says she won’t move back while I still judge her for being fired.”
“But you no longer judge her for being fired. I don’t even think you’re certain of your position to judge her at all.”
“I don’t. I’m not.” Karl shoved a chair under the table. “I don’t care anymore.”
“Have you told her that?”
“No.” The next chair wasn’t sticking out from the table, but Karl gave it a shove anyway. The hard plastic of the arms clinked off something under the table. He shoved it again before moving on to the next chair.
“Have you at least told her that you love her?”
Shove. “No.” Shove. “She hasn’t told me she loves me, either.”
“Didn’t you learn anything about women in your first marriage?”
“Apparently I never learned anything about Jessica, much less something I could extrapolate to the greater world of women.” The next chair caught on something when he shoved it, and Karl caught the back of it in his gut. He had to take a deep breath before he could get the next words out. “This is the twenty-first century. I shouldn’t have to say ‘I love you’ first.”
“No, but what’s stopping you?”
She could be one less person he’d have to worry about driving down the road, at the mercy of drunk drivers, people texting and the old man who should’ve given up his license years ago. If a fireman did pull her broken body from a collapsed car, Karl wouldn’t have said “I love you,” and so the loss would hurt less. If she had to have a closed-casket funeral because the damage had been so severe, the face covered by wood wouldn’t be the face he had woken up to every morning.
“I just don’t think I can do it,” was the answer Karl gave Malcolm.
Marriage to Jessica hadn’t been this hard. But Jessica hadn’t been the wife he’d wanted; she’d been the wife he’d thought he was supposed to have. If Vivian really became his and he really became hers, how would he survive if something happened to her?
Malcolm stared at him for several long seconds before responding. “I didn’t take you for a coward.”
“Self-preservation hardly makes me a coward.” Didn’t it make him a survivor instead?
“Even if you don’t believe it makes you a coward, trying to preserve some sort of self that is much less than who you could be certainly makes you stupid.” Malcolm waited, one eyebrow raised, but Karl didn’t respond. Finally, Malcolm huffed in disgust and left the room.
If Karl could have done the same, and left the stupid part of himself behind, he would have.
