Torn Souls

This particular December morning was the kind of cold which made your teeth chatter and your breath freeze. It was not usual for December nor was it unusual for Emma to be sitting in her blue and white car which could have come straight out of a nursery rhyme. Emma was waiting for a familiar face to appear in front of the cafe where she sat on the one way street. She knew that sooner or later that face would appear and she would do what she always did on any other given day. Emma didn’t have to wait too long. Twenty minutes later there he was. He had gotten out of a red car and of course, as usual, the same woman was driving. They kissed, a tiny peck on the lips, and he jumped out of her car. She drove off in a hurry and he jogged right passed his wife Emma to his car. Emma got out of her car the minute she saw him jogging by and he did not miss a step. He knew that she was going to try to catch him and he also knew that she would not. He could out run his petite wife with her flat feet in his sleep. She had no chance of ever catching him that way. 

“Come back here you cheater!” Emma yelled so loudly some of the customers in the cafe turned their heads to look in  the direction of her voice.

Headly, her husband of over 19 years did not turn around. He just kept jogging to his car. He reached his car and swiftly got in and drove off. A smirk appeared on his lips as he pulled out of the parking space. 

Emma and Headly had played this game so many times. Before they married Headly had cheated but he told Emma it was a one time thing and he would never do it again. Emma doubted it and she knew that he lied twelve days after the wedding when she saw him coming out of a gray apartment building. The door of apartment number two opened and out came Headly, red faced. Emma had just happened to go down that street on her way home from work. Emma turned her car around in the middle of a busy street and almost caused an accident among many blowing car horns. Headly was just getting to his car and driving off.  He hadn’t even noticed Emma trailing behind him  with a car in between them until she rolled down the window, blew the horn, and yelled loudly.

“Come back here you cheater!” 

There was no chance of Headly hearing her over the traffic or responding to her commands even if he had heard her. 

Emma was a petite woman, barely five feet tall. She had short brown hair cut into a bob which always seemed to have strands of hair falling into her eyes. Her big brown, wide eyes were her best feature along with her small perched lips that shaped in heart. She never wore makeup and she was more comfortable in sweat pants and sneakers. But, she had to dress up and put on some make-up when she went to her job as a receptionist downtown. She hated her job but it paid the bills and especially paid them during the times when she briefly kicked Headly out of the house. Together they shared one daughter, Wendy and one dog, Sparky. Emma had wanted more children but she decided that one was enough for her after she had Wendy.  She made sure that Wendy didn’t know about her dad’s cheating. She didn’t want her daughter to grow up thinking that her dad was a cheater, although that is exactly what he was. 

Headly knew that he should not have gotten married. He was not really in love with Emma when he married her. He thought that she was cute, a good person and would make a good mother to his children. He never intended to stop seeing other women and he told her that when they were dating. She laughed at him but he was serious. He was a few inches taller than Emma, at 5’8 inches tall and was not that good looking by the world’s standards. He had short black curly hair, a big nose, and peach fuzz that took permanent residence above his lip. Later in life he had to wear glasses which he thought made him look like his version of a nerd. His charm was not in his looks, it was his words. He knew the right things to say to anyone including women. 

The first time Headly was caught cheating he was at a donut shop with his friend, Susie. They were eating glazed donuts and sipping on hot coffee. They planned to go to her house after. They were waiting for her husband to go to work. He told Emma he had some errands to do on that hot summer day in July. He gave her a peck on the cheek and headed to his car parked in their driveway. He had no idea that she had followed him. He didn’t know until he came out of Susie’s house. He took two steps away from Susie’s door and there he was face to face with his wife, Emma.  She didn’t say a word. She didn’t have to. Her face said it all. Emma’s face was a bright red and she had the “if looks could kill” look in her eyes. If her eyes could shoot daggers they would have.  Headly brushed past her and didn’t say anything. They drove home in separate cars and she proceeded to pack his things as soon as they entered their modest two bedroom house on the corner of Tenth Street. That was the first of a handful of times Emma would pack his clothes after being caught cheating. 

Emma raced back to her house and sat down at the kitchen table. She waited. She knew that Headly would not be far behind her. She heard the key unlock the door and she swirled her chair around to face the kitchen door. The door swung open and Headly stood there about to confess his sins again until he noticed something different. He noticed something that he had seen before but now there were more suitcases. The suitcases were on the other side of the kitchen door near Emma. Emma said nothing. Headly said nothing. He picked up one of the black suitcases with the wheels and the broken handle and rolled it a few inches towards him. 

Emma glared at him and when the last suitcase was rolled out to Headly’s car she finally said something. 

“Headly, this is the moment I would say come back here you cheater. I have said those words so many times over the years. I thought that I wanted you back. I thought that I could not do any better than you. I thought that I could change you. I thought that in spite of your cheating ways that you could be a good father. I thought about a lot of things. I thought that sometimes you were a good father and a good husband but now I think that sometimes is not enough. You are not enough. I am enough and I will never ever yell at you to come back again. So, the last time you heard me yell at you to come back you cheater was the last. Now, someone else can have those words. I wish you well. Good-bye.”

There was nothing more that Headly or Emma could say. That was the last time he would ever cheat on her. It was good bye for good.