Lone eagle

Andy had suspected that something was wrong then, but there was nothing he could do about it from Europe. He had had to wait till he got home. “Do you have any idea how desperately insecure she is? How frightened? How unbalanced? I don't suppose she told you she tried to commit suicide after she left you in New Jersey.” As he said the words, Andy knew he had hit his mark. Kate had told him when they first met again how consumed by guilt Joe had been, how painful that had been for him. “Intolerable” was the word she used. And at what Andy had just said, Joe looked like he had just dropped to his knees.

“She what?” He was stunned.

“I didn't think she'd tell you. It was on Christmas, I think. We hadn't met again yet. She was in the hospital for a long time.” Andy was shameless. But he was a desperate man. And he was convinced that if he could get Kate away from Joe this time, she would be his for the rest of his life. But he didn't know his wife. The only way to have wrested Joe from her would have been to kill her or him.

Anything less wouldn't have worked. She loved Joe that much.

“I can't believe that.” Joe looked appalled, and Andy looked sad. “A mental hospital?” This time Andy nodded, seemingly unable to speak he was so chagrined. But the poisoned dart he had aimed at Joe had done its job. The venom was coursing through Joe's veins. The very thought of her committing suicide because of him was more than he could bear. It terrified him and would have made him not only the bad little boy he had been accused of being as a child, but a truly evil man as an adult. And a hidden fragile part of him could not allow him to risk that, just as Andy had hoped.

“What are you going to do about her wanting more children? She told me only yesterday she wants two more.” Andy continued to hone in with blow after lethal blow.

“Yesterday?” Joe looked shocked. “I think you must have misunderstood. I've been very clear about that.”"

"“So has Kate. She's a lot like her mother, in a far subtler way.

” Andy also knew from Kate how much Joe had hated Liz. “And we haven't spoken about the most important issue to me, my son. Are you really prepared to bring him up, to play baseball with him, to sit up with him at night when he has an earache or a nightmare or he throws up? Somehow, I don't see you doing that.” Andy was letting it all sink in. And Joe looked visibly sick. He and Kate had discussed none of those things. Or at least he thought they had. She had said she would be content with only one child, and would have a nurse for him so she could travel with Joe from time to time. But Andy was painting a far more vivid picture than she ever had. Particularly of Kate. The knowledge that she had attempted suicide when she felt abandoned by him three years before nearly drove him insane. It was guilt of the purest kind, and highly toxic to him. “So where are we now, Joe? I don't want to lose my wife, or my son's mother. I don't want her feeling abandoned when you travel and perhaps trying something foolish again. She's very fragile, far more so than she looks. It's in her family. Her father committed suicide after all. She could easily follow in his footsteps one day.” It was an evil trick to play on Kate, and such a cruel one. She had no idea what Andy was doing to her, in Joe's eyes, or to Joe. Andy was playing all Joe's worst fears like keys on a piano, and Joe was so anxious he could hardly speak. All he wanted to do was run, and all he could remember was Clarke describing her as a bird with a broken wing. Joe had no way of knowing that Kate had never even contemplated suicide, and no matter how unhappy she'd been over him, it had been the farthest thing from her mind. But Andy's ploy had accomplished just what he had wanted it to. No matter how much he loved her, Joe realized again now that marrying her was not a responsibility he could undertake. He had known that before. And Andy had convinced him with a few brief brushstrokes that he'd been right. He was gone.

“So where are we now?” Andy asked innocently, in the guise of talking man to man. But what he had done was not worthy of any man. It was something Joe would never, ever have done, to her, or anyone else. But his own fears were so rampant, he couldn't see Andy's ploy for what it was. The act of a desperate man. He took it as truth. And he wanted to cry as he sat at his desk.

“I think you're right. I think no matter how hard I try, the way I live my life, and have to with my work, will cause her irreparable damage. Imagine if she killed herself while I was on a trip.” He couldn't even bear thinking about it, the very idea made him feel sick, and overwhelmed.

“I think she could,” Andy said thoughtfully, as though weighing the possibility, as he met Joe's eyes. And all he could see in Joe's eyes was fear.

“I can't do that to her. At least you can keep an eye on her.