But how, I wondered, was I supposed to make this happen? Yes, I knew that I had to court Jane again, but I realized that this was not as easy as I’d originally thought it would be. Our thorough familiarity, which I first imagined would simplify things, actually made things more challenging. Our dinner conversations, for instance, were stilted by routine. For a few weeks after talking to Noah, I actually spent part of my afternoons at the office coming up with new topics for later discussion, but when I brought them up, they always seemed forced and would soon fizzle out. As always, we returned to discussions of the children or my law firm’s clients and employees.
Our life together, I began to realize, had settled into a pattern that was not conducive to renewing any kind of passion. For years we’d adopted separate schedules to accommodate our mostly separate duties. In the early years of our family’s life, I spent long hours at the firm—including evenings and weekends—making sure that I would be viewed as a worthy partner when the time came. I never used all my allotted vacation time. Perhaps I was overzealous in my determination to impress Ambry and Saxon, but with a growing family to provide for, I didn’t want to take any chances. I now realize that the pursuit of success at work combined with my natural reticence kept me at arm’s length from the rest of the family, and I’ve come to believe that I’ve always been something of an outsider in my own house.
While I was busy in my own world, Jane had her hands full with the children. As their activities and demands grew more numerous, it sometimes seemed that she was a blur of harried activity who merely rushed past me in the hallways. There were years, I had to admit, in which we ate dinner separately more often than together, and though occasionally it struck me as odd, I did nothing to change this.
Perhaps we became used to this way of life, but once the children were no longer there to govern our lives, we seemed powerless to fill in the empty spaces between us. And despite my concern about the state of our relationship, the sudden attempt to change our routines was akin to tunneling through limestone with a spoon.
This is not to say I didn’t try. In January, for instance, I bought a cookbook and took to preparing meals on Saturday evenings for the two of us; some of them, I might add, were quite original and delicious. In addition to my regular golf game, I began walking through our neighborhood three mornings a week, hoping to lose a bit of weight. I even spent a few afternoons in the bookstore, browsing the self-help section, hoping to learn what else I could do. The experts’ advice on improving a marriage? To focus on the four As—attention, appreciation, affection, and attraction. Yes, I remember thinking, that makes perfect sense, so I turned my efforts in those directions. I spent more time with Jane in the evenings instead of working in my den, I complimented her frequently, and when she spoke of her daily activities, I listened carefully and nodded when appropriate to let her know she had my full attention.
I was under no illusions that any of these remedies would magically restore Jane’s passion for me, nor did I take a short-term view of the matter. If it had taken twenty-nine years to drift apart, I knew that a few weeks of effort was simply the beginning of a long process of rapprochement. Yet even if things were improving slightly, the progress was slower than I’d hoped. By late spring, I came to the conclusion that in addition to these daily changes, I needed to do something else, something dramatic, something to show Jane that she was still, and always would be, the most important person in my life. Then, late one evening, as I found myself glancing through our family albums, an idea began to take hold.
I awoke the next day filled with energy and good intentions. I knew my plan would have to be carried out secretly and methodically, and the first thing I did was to rent a post office box. I didn’t progress much further on my plans right away, however, for it was around this time that Noah had a stroke.
It was not the first stroke he’d had, but it was his most serious. He was in the hospital for nearly eight weeks, during which time my wife’s attention was devoted fully to his care. She spent every day at the hospital, and in the evenings she was too tired and upset to notice my efforts to renew our relationship. Noah was eventually able to return to Creekside and was soon feeding the swan at the pond again, but I think it drove home the point that he wouldn’t be around much longer. I spent many hours quietly soothing Jane’s tears and simply comforting her.
Of all I did during that year, it was this, I think, that she appreciated most of all. Perhaps it was the steadiness I provided, or maybe it really was the result of my efforts over the last few months, but whatever it was, I began to notice occasional displays of newfound warmth from Jane. Though they were infrequent, I savored them desperately, hoping that our relationship was somehow back on track.
Thankfully, Noah continued to improve, and by early August, the year of the forgotten anniversary was coming to a close. I’d lost nearly twenty pounds since I’d begun my neighborhood strolls, and I’d developed the habit of swinging by the post office box daily to collect items I’d solicited from others. I worked on my special project while I was at the office to keep it a secret from Jane. Additionally, I’d decided to take off the two weeks surrounding our thirtieth anniversary—the longest vacation I’d ever taken from work—with the intention of spending time with Jane. Considering what I’d done the year before, I wanted this anniversary to be as memorable as possible.
Then, on the evening of Friday, August 15—my first night of vacation and exactly eight days before our anniversary—something happened that neither Jane nor I would ever forget.
We were both relaxing in the living room. I was seated in my favorite armchair, reading a biography of Theodore Roosevelt, while my wife was leafing through the pages of a catalog. Suddenly Anna burst through the front door. At the time, she was still living in New Bern, but she had recently put down a deposit on an apartment in Raleigh and would be moving in a couple of weeks to join Keith for the first year of his residency at Duke Medical School.
Despite the heat, Anna was wearing black. Both ears were double pierced, and her lipstick seemed at least a few shades too dark. By this time, I had grown used to the gothic flairs of her personality, but when she sat across from us, I saw again how much she resembled her mother. Her face was flushed, and she brought her hands together as if trying to steady herself.
“Mom and Dad,” she said, “I have something to tell you.”