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He escaped into the hall, but she shouted after him: “You said you wanted help improving your life, so let go of your foolish pride, and accept God’s commands. Don’t use doubt as an excuse to keep your bad habits.”
Ed looked across the open water. Part of him believed he failed Helen’s challenge to pull his life out the gutter. Another part of him doubted he could survive trapped with this holy-roller. He disliked remaining indecisive in his attitudes toward her, and he told himself strong people reached decisions and held firm. Some aspects of her message sounded wise (reconciling with his parents, trying to forgive his enemies and returning to school to finish his degree), but her overall approach reminded him of “God hates fags” signs at a military-funeral protest. He asked himself why he had been such a weakling, expecting someone like Helen to save him. He compared himself to a child who knew better than to wet the bed but remained indifferent to sitting in his own excrement.
He decided to fight back against the incessant self-blame. Had Helen saved him? No, he’d saved himself by breaking through his complacency when no one else possessed the courage to save a stranger’s life. Hadn’t the onlookers called him a “hero?” He resolved to force himself to remember this brave deed, instead of indulging in self-pity.
As the sun lowered toward the water, his watch chimed, and he noticed it was time for dinner. He looked forward to the all-you-can-eat buffet and swore he wasn’t going to let Helen purge his soul of gluttony, too. When he returned to the room, he found her, crying faced down on a pillow.
He wanted to shake her. “Why am I to blame?”
“Not you. Jonathan sent someone for me. God told me.”
Ed squeezed the doorframe. “I’m sure you’ll be fine. I’m going to supper.”
Helen’s hair reminded Ed of a bird's nest as she spoke. “Years ago, I called Jonathan and threatened to move out and divorce him. A man with a gun appeared in our home and forced me to swallow a bottle of sleeping pills. He said my death would look like a suicide. I swallowed pills but threw salty water in his eyes and ran to a neighbor’s house for help.”
He doubted she could mix salt and water during a physical struggle, but he didn’t care enough to probe. “Let’s go eat.”
“My husband had me locked up in a mental hospital and wouldn’t let me out until I promised to stay with him. When something happens to me, remember Jonathan lives on East Mandell Street in Alexandria and hides a key in a magnet under the barbecue pit. The alarm code is 6348. He keeps a loaded pistol in the shoe box on the overhead shelf on the right side of his bedroom closet.”
Helen handed Ed a sheet of paper with a hand-written street address and the other information she just mentioned. Her invitation to murder made him crave another drink. He didn’t believe her and didn’t want to ruin his vacation with any more stupid melodrama. “Why are you telling me this? Nothing’s going to happen to you.”
“I want you to be safe. You’re the chosen one. It’s my duty to protect you.”
He remained silent as they walked to supper and sat at a table near the buffet. A retired couple from Utah soon joined them. The husband wore thick eyeglasses and a white short-sleeved dress shirt. The wife wore a golden cross on her blouse. During supper, Ed winced as Helen returned to her slogan: “Trust God’s love; believe His power; be His hands.”
The husband, who said he was a retired funeral director, agreed with Helen. To Ed’s surprise, Helen seemed to get along fine with the couple as she blabbered about the “end of days” and rattled off Bible quotes.
Helen’s smile had melted into a scowl by the time Ed returned from the buffet with a third plate of Alaskan king crab legs. He waved goodbye and left the table as Helen ridiculed the Utah couple as Mormon “cult members” who “try to baptize their dead ancestors.” Her dogmatic views had an unmistakable tinge of malice. Her self-righteous lecture reminded him of Jonathan Edwards’ Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God sermon when Edwards explains how the saved will delight, watching nonbelievers suffer eternal torment.
Ed took the glass elevator up to the casino, purchased $200 worth of chips and ordered a whiskey on the rocks. By the end of his fourth drink, he lost all of his chips at a blackjack table. He wanted to do his best to avoid Helen for the rest of the night. She could keep her monopoly on truth and salvation all for herself. He decided to demand a separate cabin.
When he returned late that night, she leapt up out of bed, wearing nothing and pressing her goose-pimpled skin against him. “Don’t leave me. I need you. You’re the only friend I have."
He tried to push her away. “You were incredibly rude, damning strangers to hell. If anything, your god-talk persuaded them against you.”
“I’ll stop. I played that role for you. I thought you wanted to purify yourself.”
He couldn’t understand: Did she really expect him to believe all her sermons had been part of an act? “I want a separate room. I’m here to have fun. I’ve wasted enough time worrying about life after death and other crap I can’t control. Does a young Olympic athlete squander his time fixating on his final heart beat? No, he struggles for excellence in the only life that matters.” Ed realized he sounded drunk then he hoped to drink until he passed out in his own bed.
“I made a mistake. You’re right. I’m sorry for embarrassing you.” She told him she had not been taking her medication and rattled off eight weird sounding names, including Haldol and Throazine. “I have them in my suitcase. I’ll take them now.” She opened her suitcase and swallowed several pills. His resolve disintegrated as she pulled him to the bed and unbuckled his belt. Crazy or not, she was beautiful and skilled in many ways.
The fun-loving side of this mystery woman seemed to return as fast as it had left.
For the rest of the trip, Helen continued taking the pills in her suitcase, and her behavior took a dramatic shift: No more god-talk. Sex became permissible and better than ever. They both drank through hangovers.
As the ship neared its final destination, he wished he could halt time and continue their care-free honeymoon. He looked out the balcony window at empty beer cans and other debris on the shoreline as Helen hugged him and tried to assure him of their “wonderful future” together. Now, the awe-inspiring views of the shimmering tropical beaches were gone. He dreaded the so-called real world that awaited him: his father’s disappointed stare during an awkward reconciliation, the beeping of alarm clocks and the judgmental eyes of April’s surviving friends and family. He struggled to believe he was back in control of his future or believe Helen’s wealth would make him happy.
Chapter 8: Too Weak
When they returned to Washington D.C., Helen found a three-bedroom luxury apartment for them near the Smithsonian National Zoological Park. She also leased him a blue convertible Porche and set him up with hefty checking and savings accounts.
Feeling the need to reciprocate, he agreed to moderate his drinking and started jogging with her every evening before supper. In the back of his mind, high-pitched voices taunted him for “delusions of self control.”
One night, while they drank wine on the balcony, she apologized again for her “erratic” behavior on their vacation. “I promise never to talk about religion. Do you forgive me?”
“I don’t mind discussing anything every once in a while, but please don’t condemn people to hell because they don’t fit a certain mold.”
Her eyes lit up, and she put her glass on the table. “The other day I read a news article that claimed seven out of ten Americans believe in a devil and hell.”
