50 Years in Polygamy: Big Secrets and Little White Lies Page 39

  “Yes. He said that’s why you dumped him, but like you, I’m not looking for anything more than a friendship either. Do you think you’d like to meet me for some pie or something and we can gab for a while?”

  I smiled. At last I might have someone in Cedar City to hang out and talk with.

  *****

  The first week of March, a week after I’d been up to Bluffdale for a weekend, Mark came down with his two best friends. Before they came down, he’d explained for quite a while, he and Diane had been double dating with Norma and Jared. The foursome had been spending a lot of time getting reacquainted. Mark told me Diane had done her best to keep him away from her lifelong friend, Norma. After all these years, according to Mark, Diane still felt jealous because she knew of Mark and Norma’s long-ago crush on each other.

  “Until lately,” Mark said, “all Jared and Norma heard was Diane’s opinion of you. Now that they’ve heard what I have to say about you, they want to come down with me so they can get to know you better.”

  “No!” I immediately said. “In the first place, Norma and Diane are best friends, so I don’t trust this idea at all. Norma probably wants to hear what I have to say, so she can tell Diane everything I do or don’t say. And secondly, I agree with Diane. It doesn’t matter how long it’s been since Norma babysat for us and you two wanted to get married; for some reason, I just don’t have a good feeling about it either.”

  “There’s nothing for you to worry about,” Mark persisted. “Just give them a chance. They’re great people. I know you’ll like them.”

  I always liked Norma—I just didn’t trust her in my life! It could have been because of her fling with her husband before they were married, when neither of them seemed to give a rat’s ass about Jared’s first wife, Callie’s feelings. Also, years previous, my sister Francine’s sister-in-laws warned her not to trust Norma, since they felt that while she acted like a friend—she was busy chopping you into pieces behind your back. But more than anything, my reservations were because I didn’t want to hurt Diane.

  “Give them a chance, Sophia,” Mark said. “I’m sure you’ll find out you’re wrong.”

  To please him, I gave it a go.

  In the early afternoon after Mark, Norma, and Jared arrived; the four of us sat in Jolie’s family room and visited for hours. We laughed and discussed life. We shared our philosophies, thoughts, and feelings. We talked about all of our kids. And we discussed Diane—about whom all of them claimed to have become an expert. Mark, Norma, and Jared flooded me with information about Diane’s kids, her insecurities, her life, and what they felt were her defects of character. I cried, when according to their claims, Diane felt everything gone wrong in her life was because of me. I knew she and I had normal jealous feelings, but that news cut me to the core.

  Most of what they said about Diane was more than I ever wanted to hear. I hurt for her and her kids.

  “Just in case you were worried,” Norma said.” The information they confided in me was intended to smooth over my concerns. They said I could trust them to keep quiet about anything I might say and anything that would go on between the four of us. However, it created the opposite effect. They—especially Norma—had been bad-mouthing her dear friend Diane, to me. So why would I think it wouldn’t or hadn’t already gone the other way around?

  The next morning, Norma and I hiked to the foothills and partway up the mountain paths I’d frequented and grown to love. There, she told me her spirit guide had revealed to her that Mark was to be her best friend and support. The reason for Mark’s special calling was because she’d also been told by her spirit guide she would die sometime within three years. Not only could Mark help her cope with her imminent death, but he would also be able to care for and comfort her three little boys more than anyone else. “Since he lost his own mother at a very young age, he knows and understands what my little boys will be going through,” she said.

  Suddenly I knew why Mark had been absent and evasive for so long. No wonder he’d been too busy to come see me for five weeks! I bit my tongue not to scream out loud. I was angry he hadn’t told me about their “divinely bestowed friendship?”

  Her death, Norma said, was so Callie, Jared’s first wife, would go back to him. Norma explained, her guide said the only way that would ever happen was if Norma was no longer in Jared’s life. Norma said she was willing to sacrifice her life for Jared and Callie’s sake, since she believed they were soul mates or “twin rays” and should be together forever.

  “If Callie ever wanted to go back to Jared and it was about you being in the way, then why don’t you divorce him? To die and leave your family and kids just doesn’t make any sense.”

  “I don’t understand it all,” Norma replied. She thought perhaps Callie wouldn’t feel comfortable going back to Jared if she, Norma, was still alive. She was just going with what she was told by her spirit guide, and would need a lot of love and support during her coming ordeal.

  Norma wanted to know how I felt. It sounded crazy and ridiculous to me, but I knew I had no right to spurn her beliefs. They were hers and she had a right to them, no matter whether I thought she was right or wrong. I was sure everyone would feel the same way about me changing my name. All I could do was be truthful with her.

  “I think your spirit guide is off her rocker.” I laughed teasingly. “But just because it doesn’t make one bit of sense to me doesn’t mean your plight isn’t real. And in spite of your concerns and deep fears about dying and leaving your boys, I believe the death you’re feeling isn’t a physical death at all, but a huge change in your life—possibly a divorce or the death of your marriage. And as far as your friendship with Mark goes, you are both grownups and old enough to make your own decisions. In fact, it looks like both of you already have, even without Diane’s or my approval. But believe me, Norma, what really bothers me the most about all of this is you two have kept this secret from me, Jared, and Diane. If this ‘friendship’ is really appropriate, there should be no reason to keep any secrets about it. Jared especially has a right to know about all of this! He is your husband and the father to your boys!” I paused, then told her from the bottom of my heart, “Norma, in all the years Diane has been married to Mark, I’ve known of too many times he has lied to her, or kept things from her to avoid conflict or jealousy. He would justify it when I’d get mad. I told him I wanted and needed him to always tell me the truth no matter what! I’d tell Mark, ‘It doesn’t matter to me what you do, did, or didn’t say that would ever break my heart or cause jealousy and pain. I’d still want you to tell me the truth, because I know I’d be wounded a million times worse if I found out you lied to me, or were deceitful like you have been to Diane. Any day, I would rather hear the truth from you even if it causes me excruciating pain, rather than ever have you lie or be deceptive to me!’ That’s how serious I feel about it, Norma! I think Diane, and especially Jared, have a right to know what’s going on.”

  “They just can’t know about this, Sophia. They won’t be able to deal with it or understand the information,” Norma claimed. “It’s just not the same with Diane and Jared. I just can’t tell them, at least not right now. Besides, Diane isn’t like you. She doesn’t want to know about anything hurtful. She keeps her head buried in denial. Maybe someday things will be different.”

  No matter how many reasons I gave for Norma to tell Jared and Diane, she came up with just as many to cancel them out. Not one of those reasons for her secrecy felt reasonable or acceptable to me, but that was Norma’s way of thinking.

  All weekend long, and for the rest of Sunday before they returned to Salt Lake; Mark, Norma, and I listened to Jared’s sometimes entertaining stories, which he embellished and elaborated with each retelling.

  A few weeks later I met another friend on the phone. Lyle called to talk to Jolie. They talked once after an online dating service connected them, and then Jolie started dating someone else. I explained Jolie was living in Salt Lake to get a nursing degree a
nd I was staying at her house to get my teaching degree from SUU. That phone call set in motion significant changes in both Lyle’s life and mine.

  CHAPTER 42

  Cedar City and

  My Mother’s Death

  2001

  My plans were to take several classes during the summer so I could finish school in the fall rather than in the winter. Things weren’t meant to pan out that way. My soul knew there were other things in store and I had to be home, and it miraculously worked out so I ended up with a six-week summer break.

  On my way home I met Mark in Salina at the gas station. He was on another camping trip with his new large family of friends: Jared, Norma, Diane, their kids, and some of mine. He and I headed up a canyon for some afternoon delight, but for the first time in ten years Mark was impotent again. Some of our most thrilling times were out in the wild, which was an aphrodisiac for us. I was hurt and angry while he tried to guess why he just couldn’t make things happen. He had a dozen reasons. Among them was his angst about what everyone else thought might be taking him so long. On the drive back to my car I asked him if he and Norma had ever been tempted and wanted to have sex together. He hesitated then answered. “I’m married to you and she’s married to Jared!”

  “So, you didn’t answer my question, Mark,” I said.

  “Yes, I did. Anything that goes on or doesn’t go on between me and Norma—or anyone else, for that matter—is none of your business! If we keep it like that things will be okay.”

  “No it won’t be okay!” I yelled. “Just because you think you can keep your life a big secret doesn’t mean everything will be okay!”

  I climbed in my car and left without hugging or kissing him. I started to cry. The rest of the way to Salt Lake, I listened to the radio and sang to my heart’s content.

  Since leaving in January, Mom had been minimally healthy. On my previous weekend visits home I’d spent as much time as possible with her. This time as soon as I got home for the summer, Mom started a rapid downhill slide. It was as if her body and soul were telling me, “We waited as long as we could. Now it’s time for us!” Mother couldn’t breathe or sleep well at night. She complained of pain nearly all the time, yet couldn’t identify it or where it was coming from.

  On July 26th, my sister-in-law Ruth, (my mom’s nurse/caretaker), my father, and I sat with a hospice facilitator while she explained the processes and care we could expect from them. Dad signed all the necessary papers, while I walked outside with Ruth before she went home. Then Mom and I waited together while a hospital bed was delivered. Aunt Eleanor dictated where she thought it should be set up, and then we made up the bed and tucked her in. Other than Mom’s episodes of not feeling well, she was her usual happy, precious, tired, thankful, restless, forgetful, beautiful self.

  Later in the day, a nurse came to discuss the medications Mom would be given to help her relax and to be pain-free and comfortable. I held my mother’s hand while I sat next to her on the edge of her hospital bed. The nurse asked her if she was allergic to morphine. She said no.

  She asked me if my mom was allergic to morphine, and I said I didn’t think so. But within minutes of the morphine injection, Mom’s arms started jerking and flailing up and down. Her eyes start rolling in her head, and when I screamed at the nurse to do something she didn’t seem at all alarmed. She said Mother’s reaction was common—that it had something to do with her muscles relaxing so much.

  “She’ll be okay. Her jitters will soon subside and she’ll be resting like a baby.”

  Her words didn’t help at all and I panicked. Mom was fine ten minutes earlier and she was getting worse by the minute.

  Ruth returned within minutes and started yelling, “Did the nurse give Mom morphine? Did she? Mom’s allergic to morphine!” Then Ruth asked the nurse, “How much morphine did you give her?”

  “Twenty mg’s,” the nurse replied.

  “That’s way too much morphine to give anyone!” Ruth shrieked.

  Her nervous, aggravated words directed at the nurse became a jumbled-up mess in my shocked and confounded mind.

  “Dear God!” I cried out. “Oh, dear God, what is going to happen to Mom?” Amid Ruth’s ranting, I remembered Mom had told me many years ago she was allergic to morphine.

  When Dad came back and was told Mom had been given morphine, he too was appalled. “I didn’t remember to tell the nurse,” he wailed over and over again.

  He lay next to Mom, holding her, and explained how close she’d come to death when she was given morphine during my sister Lucinda’s delivery. Ruth called the nurse to come back, but the nurse assured her Mom would be okay. With good news, and Mom finally calming down, I rushed a few miles into town to get some lunch for everyone.

  How could I have forgotten Mom was allergic to morphine? I scolded myself over and over again. I couldn’t shop. By the time I’d rushed back, her room was full of people, all gathered around her bed. My knees nearly buckled under me when it dawned on me what was happening. I screamed, sobbed, and moaned. “No! No, this can’t happen! Mom was just fine! No, she can’t die yet. She’s got more time left!”

  Ruth held me tightly and whispered, “Our mother has been waiting for you to come back, so you can tell her goodbye.”

  I backed up. “No! Don’t just stand there Ruth—do something! Give her back her oxygen! Stop her from gasping! She isn’t supposed to die yet. Help her, Ruth! You know what to do.”

  Calmly, and as true to love and life as she is, Ruth told me again, “Sophia, your mother isn’t in any pain—she’s unconscious.”

  “I don’t want my mom to die now. I ran to her and fell over her chest. “I’m sorry we didn’t remember your allergies Mom. I’m so sorry I left you! The nurse told us you’d be okay. Dad thought you would be okay. I want you to stay alive!”

  “Please, Sophia,” I heard my brother Shane whisper as he placed his large hand on my back. “Our precious mother needs you to let her go now. Tell her goodbye.”

  Sobbing, I hugged Mom and kissed her shoulder, her face, her eyes, and her arms. I was sure she didn’t care. “If I have to . . . if I have to let you go . . . but only if it’s really your time, Mom. Is it your time to go?” I gasped and sobbed. “If you know it’s really your time to go this time, then I have to tell you goodbye.”

  I sat in my mother’s sitting room on her favorite pink reclining chair while her body was getting cold and rigid on the hospital bed in her room. Every inhale and exhale sliced away at my lungs and throat. I felt so remorseful and crazy, I needed to slither out of my skin and disappear—to become null and nonexistent. My head throbbed and my eyes ached from crying so much.

  Everyone was sure things had happened just as it was meant to. “Because all three of us forgot about your mother’s allergy to morphine, I believe it was nothing less than a gift from God. The nurse believed Mother would be okay in a while, and even Ruth, who did remember, was gone at the very time her presence would have stopped the injections and prolonged your mother’s life,” Dad told me.

  “Just know this,” Auntie Amelia said. “She no longer has to stay and suffer in bed and in this life any longer. Now your wonderful mother can be with her family and loved ones on the other side. Everything that happened today—the whole day of events—were part of God’s divine plan. Everything went exactly the way He intended it to go.”

  After many long weeks, months, and years I finally accepted those explanations. Maybe it had something to do with her soul’s decisions, more than the God she still revered. Either way, one day I saw Mom’s eyes twinkle, and heard her giggle. “Hey, Sophia, wasn’t that great? My soul arranged a top-quality escape artist for me! Can you believe that amazing feat—to mess with your minds, and make all of us forget about my allergy to morphine? One minute I was there and the next minute I was gone. Wow, all in the blink of an eye. I hope it goes fast for you when you’re ready to exit this life.”

  I giggled out loud, knowing she could hear and see me smiling to
o. She’d done her time. My mother definitely deserved a death that was as quick and painless as possible.

  *****

  In the middle of August, during my return to Cedar City, the “powers that be” adorned me with an incredible gift. I received a call that rocked my world. (Oh, yeah, I finally had one of those traveling telephones I always dreamed of.) If I could move in right away, I could live in an apartment, since no one above me on the waiting list could relocate for over a month.

  Sometime back in May, Jolie had moved back into her home with her kids, and I needed to find another place to stay. For four or five weeks before I went home for the summer, I got to stay with my precious sister-in-law and her husband in St. George. The long drive and gas was a hardship, so I did some more legwork. I applied for a student-housing apartment as an unemployed, self-reliant mother and student. When I was at the bottom of the list of twenty-five or so, I visited the homeless shelter and made arrangements to stay there and in my car. Nothing but my children would stop me. I’d come this far and I was determined to get my bachelor’s degree. The apartment offer was a grand gift from the universe. I was so grateful, I cried happy tears for weeks as I moved in and set up my own quiet study space.

  Up to that point in the year, my suspicions were confirmed. It had been and was obvious to nearly everyone in our lives how inseparable Jared, Mark, and Norma had become. With information from the three of them and other family members and friends, I knew the majority of Mark’s off-work time—his days, nights, and weekends—had been and were still being spent with his bosom buddies and confidants.

  Throughout my spring, summer, and fall visits home and phone conversations with Norma, she told me about the feelings and behaviors of just about everyone we knew. She assured me her knowledge was because she knew these people better than they knew themselves.