Promise Me

The story is told of a gentleman who was reading his newspaper aboard a train when the conductor shouted, “The brakes are out, we’re picking up speed and we’re going to crash into the station—everyone off the train!” The passengers began jumping off. As the conductor himself was about to leap he looked at the gentleman who was still casually reading his paper. “Aren’t you going to jump?” he asked. The gentleman replied, “I’m going to wait until I reach the station to decide.”

I should have jumped before the train got moving too fast.

Beth Cardall’s Diary

The next two months passed like a dream—but all dreams come with the expectation of waking. As the day (as I began to call it) came closer, I found myself struggling more and more with my decision to let Matthew go, and a battle waged in my heart. Didn’t I deserve happiness too? Didn’t I deserve love? Haven’t I given everything for my daughter? Doesn’t she want me to be happy too?

One afternoon I was watching Matthew teach Charlotte Italian when I found myself resenting the time he spent with her. I found myself resenting her.

Jealousy is as subtle as a weed. I didn’t notice its first inroads into my heart, but it was there, filling in the cracks of our relationship, growing stronger each day and cleaving us apart. I wasn’t just resenting her, I was resenting them, the future couple. More and more I found myself angry at Matthew. Why wasn’t he fighting for me? Why didn’t he at least ask me to stay? Had he ever really loved me?

It was mid-December. Matthew had gone down to Capri to bring back fresh fish for supper and had taken Charlotte with him. They were gone several hours longer than I had expected, and as twilight fell, I grew angrier with each tick of the clock. When they finally arrived home, I blew up at him. “Where have you been?”

“Amore,” he said. “Mi dispiace, the fisherman was a friend of mine and he offered to take Charlotte through the Blue Grotto.”

“While I just sit here alone wondering where you are?”

He leaned over and whispered to Charlotte and she ran off to her bedroom. Then he just looked at me, carefully reading me. “I’m sorry. I didn’t think you would care.”

“You didn’t think I would care or you just didn’t care.” I stormed out of the room to my bedroom, slammed the door and threw myself on the bed.

A minute later he knocked on the door even though it had no lock. “Beth, can we talk?”

“Vai!” I shouted.

He didn’t speak for a moment, then he said gently, “May I please come in?”

I was crying hard. He opened the door, then walked to the side of the bed and knelt down next to me.

I said, “Why don’t you want to be with me? Why are you spending so much time with her?”

He was quiet for a moment, then replied. “Beth, I’m not just saying goodbye to you.” He took my hand. “When I go back, there is no time left with her. This is the last time I will have with my wife.”

I had been so selfishly caught up in my loss and in my time that I had not even considered what he was going back to. I was filled with enormous shame. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. Please forgive me.”

“You don’t need to be forgiven,” he said. “I would never hold your love for me against you.”

He lay down on the bed next to me and put his arm across my back. When I could speak, I said, “It’s time.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes.” I didn’t want to look at him. “I’m so afraid.”

He put both of his arms around me. He held me while I cried. When I had finally calmed, he said, “We’ll leave Monday.” He kissed me on the cheek, then got up and left the room.

As soon as the door shut, I began again to cry. I could already feel him slipping away. He wasn’t mine and I was terrified to lose him.