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| Orestes Pursued By The Furies. John Singer Sargent. 1921 |
Planning Roman's funeral brought up a slew of sadness as one might expect. But a less obvious reaction that dominated me during those days, was a sensation of bone crushing guilt. It came in waves when random flashbacks popped into my mind. Each wave hit me like a rogue tsunami. Every return brought with it swirling questions, doubt, and sinking regret regarding some of my own actions from the beginning of our relationship up until the days leading up to his passing. In retrospect, I see that none of my actions were particularly rotten or horrible; never had I consciously set out to hurt Roman. But the dawning realization that nothing could be repaired now that he was gone, was a very sobering and painful pill to swallow. Consequently, I became fixated on the agonizing desideratum of knowing weather or not he died happy. I recognized that I could not possibly know for sure, yet still, it consumed me. The thought was like a skipping record in my head, "Did he have a peaceful mind when he left this life? And if not, was I to blame?"
During our last conversation, Roman told me he wanted to start counseling so that he could understand what caused him to cheat. He said he wanted to give me the answers I deserved. It was quite a step for Roman, being that he had never been an emotionally connected person. True to his word, he indeed met with a therapist the next day - on the afternoon before the run that took his life. And his therapist became the one person who could possibly help subdue my guilt. I found her name by finding the microfilm of the check he had written to her for his co-payment. I called and left her a message that must have sounded crazy. Sobbing like a loon on her voice mail, I explained that he had passed away. I recall blubbering about needing to know if he was happy when he died...about needing to know what he told her on the last day of his life. She was kind when she returned my call, but she would not tell me what he talked about with her specifically. All she would say was that he was "confused," claiming "confidentiality" prohibited her from telling me. She said the "estate holder" has rights to confidentiality after a client dies and was unsure about what she could say. She and I both knew that as his wife, I was his next of kin and accordingly, was also the "estate holder" by default. But I did not push her to tell me. I must have sensed her intention to protect me. From what, I did not know at the time. She tried to comfort me by focusing on the positive conversation we had before he died. She confirmed that Roman spoke to her about feeling good when he left my apartment. That is all she would say though, so I was left to my own devices.
The thought that Roman spent what turned out to be the end of his life, in an unhappy marriage to me, was agonizing. I worried that I had cheated him out of his youth when I knew better than to marry him so young. Graduate school took up so much of my energy during most of our marriage and I felt terrible guilt that I had neglected his needs; that I had been distant - that I had been a bad wife. Especially during times when I found his lack of social prowess off putting. And the doubts that I held all along, started feeling like the cause for the chaos that had entered into my life. What's more, in assembling the photo montage for Roman's service, I stumbled across a box of old notes and letters that he had written to me over the years. Most of which, I had long forgotten, but one of which made my blood run cold when I read Roman's words that said he felt ignored by me at times. It was a note he had written to me after we had a rare argument just before we got married.
Reading that note in the days after his death felt like I was communicating with his lonely ghost. Just as I had casually said to Roman the day before he died, I now felt as though I was actually being haunted by his ghost. His was a ghost I could not quell. It was a ghost that brought me to such a state of despair after I processed his letter, that my mom literally hugged me and rocked me as I sobbed. Grief had regressed me back to that complete helplessness...like an infant. And my tears were powered by sadness and guilt that was so incontestable, that I thought I could somehow use it to will Roman back to life. I was desperate for his reassurance, but the ghost that taunted me was intangible. I knew I would never get the kind of comfort that I sought, and because of that, I thought I might die - right then and there. I wanted to die in those moments. I felt undeserving of life. My thinking was not suicidal, but was certainly illogical. I was immersed in grief. And my anger toward Roman for his affair flipped inward. I blamed myself for everything. The hours that followed my discovery of his notes were the most sorrowful of my entire life. I am grateful now that my mom was with me when I found them. She talked sense into me as she held me. Sense that I had all but lost in the haze of the moment.
So having gone through such a painful period of self blaming and regret, the anger that I emerged when Roman's co-workers snubbed me at his memorial party was palpable. What's more, when Roman's Cingular bill arrived four days after his funeral - after I had just poured my heart into his eulogy and sobbed uncontrollably with regret, to the point of being rocked like a baby by my mom - and I saw the phone calls to and from Roman's cellphone, by and from a number I did not recognize...when I read the bill closely and saw that he had made and received calls lasting anywhere from two to five hours long...when I saw that he made a call to this number just before arriving at my door - just before I noticed the look of love on his face...when I saw that he made a call to that number minutes before going on the run that he never returned from.
I knew.
I turned inside out...again.
Further, after I called the number and spoke to the person on the other end, I raged. The fury that enveloped me once I hung up from that call was unlike anything I had yet experienced; or have experienced since. It was anger that boiled my blood to the point that I could not stand still. Now, having gone through it, I know for sure that spontaneous human combustion does not exist. Because if it did, I would have burst into flames right there from the fuel ignited by my own internal detonator.
