Resurrection Read online

  Evelyn Montgomery

  Resurrection

  Copyright © 2020 by Evelyn Montgomery

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise without written permission from the publisher. It is illegal to copy this book, post it to a website, or distribute it by any other means without permission.

  This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

  Evelyn Montgomery asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

  Evelyn Montgomery has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of URLs for external or third-party Internet Websites referred to in this publication and does not guarantee that any content on such Websites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate.

  Designations used by companies to distinguish their products are often claimed as trademarks. All brand names and product names used in this book and on its cover are trade names, service marks, trademarks and registered trademarks of their respective owners. The publishers and the book are not associated with any product or vendor mentioned in this book. None of the companies referenced within the book have endorsed the book.

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  Dedicated to every one fighting the silent battle in their mind.

  Because I have been there.

  I have heard the voices.

  been haunted by the demons,

  & then overcame it all.

  To all of you suffering through the silence. Take courage & fight.

  It only controls you if you allow it.

  You are stronger.

  Hope. Start to live again. Breathe again. And know that you are not alone.

  Reach out for help because there is always someone there who loves you.

  “Always has. Always will. Forever.” - Justin Gatz

  Contents

  Foreword

  Preface

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Acknowledgements

  Foreword

  “If you want to show me that you really love me, don’t say that you would die for me. Instead, stay alive for me.”

  – Unknown

  Preface

  Publisher’s note: Warning. This book contains triggers for suicide and self-harm. Reader discretion is advised.

  Chapter 1

  Rose

  One. Two. Three.

  Breathe.

  I will the voices to stop. The ones that haunt me day and night and every second they can in between. I hear my daughter’s cry echoed by my son’s laughter and know I need to go out there. I know I need to make sure everything is alright, but damn it if I can’t pull myself up off this floor in the tiny closet me and Michael used to call our own.

  I look up and see his fatigues. Tears prick the back of my eyes as a burn quickly rises in my chest.

  It’s not possible.

  A little more than 6 months later and I still can’t believe he is never coming back. Never coming home to me and our son and will never get the chance to meet his daughter who came just three short weeks after his passing.

  It’s quiet in my mind for the first time in hours, but the noises that rage out in our little living room have me finally pushing myself up off the carpet and slowly putting one foot in front of the other. The scene that unfolds when I turn the corner makes me wish I could turn right back around and continue to hide where I finally found peace, if only for a few seconds.

  Worthless. You have to hide from your own children? What kind of fucked up mother are you? Michael would be so ashamed.

  I shake my head and try to will the voice to stop as I blink back the tears that finally decide to fall and I make my way over to Olivia in her highchair. Hanging over the edge, she is screaming at the top of her lungs while her little brother, Liam, spins in circles in front of her with his favorite truck making all sorts of loud noises.

  Wiping my eyes, I pick her up and try and steady my nerves.

  Quiet. The voices are quiet. But for how long, I wonder as anxiety kicks in and I walk with my daughter in my arms to sit in Michael’s favorite recliner. The tears fall harder as I clutch my daughter to my chest and swear I can almost smell him, hear him, feel him in the small house we used to call our home.

  To make matters worse after his passing, his life insurance policy went to his mother. His mother who took it to support her needs, such as railing blow up her nose like it is going out of style. Her grandkids the furthest thing from her mind.

  I didn’t need the money. Nothing could replace what I lost. But our kids… I shake my head not wanting to think about how losing him has made them lose so much too. I look around this small living room and wonder if this place will ever feel like a home again.

  The demons that fill my head, the emptiness that crowds these four walls daily and nightly, and the loneliness and load I am forced to carry alone with our two children will never make it a happy home, not ever. Not like it once was.

  The walls close in on me. The thoughts get louder. My daughter’s cry and my son’s laughter meld together until I feel like I can’t take anymore.

  Maybe you shouldn’t take anymore. Maybe you should end it. For yourself, your daughter, your son. Put you all out of your misery. Come over to where it is finally quiet in the darkness where it won’t hurt any longer.

  My body shakes. Goosebumps rise up my arms. I look down at my daughter and wonder what the fuck is wrong with me? What the fuck is wrong with my head?

  Make it stop! Please someone make it stop!

  But I’m all alone with no one to pull me through but myself. I rise out of the chair and make my way to the TV stand across the room to retrieve Olivia’s pacifier. With shaky hands I place it between her lips and sway back and forth hushing her in my arms.

  Just a few seconds of quiet. Please. I beg of you.

  What is wrong? You can’t take being a mother? You knew when you signed up for this shit what it would take! I thought all you ever dreamed of was to be a mother? What a joke! You can’t even stop your daughter from crying!

  “Stop it!” I grit out through heated breath, trying to talk some sense into myself. I am not going crazy. I am totally fine. It is just the loss, the pregnancy, the realization that I will forever be alone with no one to help me. To stand by me.

  I look at the clock and see the time. Damn it! I have 30 minutes to get myself ready, get the kids ready, get them to daycare that I can’t afford in a shitty part of the neighborhood I know Michael would roll over in his grave if he ever saw, and somehow get to my new job and pretend like the voices are not ruling my damn life. A new job I need like crazy as the bills continue to pile and the only family I have to turn to is a long distant Aunt who lives three hours away. All of our friends I avoided after Michael’s funeral, and
I wouldn’t blame them if they never wanted to talk to me ever again. As the heaviness of my choices weigh on me, I start to walk towards the bedroom to lay Olivia down and step on one of Liam’s Legos.

  “Fucking hell!” I yell out in a loud shriek.

  “Fucking hell!” Liam echoes.

  Are you kidding me? I look at him as more tears spill over!

  “Fucking hell! Fucking hell!” He begins to yell as he runs around the living room with his truck in his hand.

  “No, baby, don’t…” but my thoughts are cut off as the voices start again.

  Pathetic. You call that being a good mother? Michael would divorce you so quick for the shitty excuse for a parent you have become.

  “I didn’t mean to,” I cry softly in the space around me as I fall against the wall behind me and drop to the floor. Olivia’s pacifier falls out in the process and her loud shrill yell somehow rises above my son shouting the phrase over and over again that I accidentally just said.

  I look up at the time and see I know have 25 minutes to get my shit together and somehow make it to my first day of work.

  I won’t make it. I can’t. Not today.

  Call in sick. Stay home. Stay where no one can see the mess you’ve become. The fucked-up excuse of a woman you’ve let yourself be. You call what you’re doing mourning? You never had what it took to be a wife and mother, and you’re just now finding out the truth!

  “Stop it,” I say aloud to myself, as my son still spins in circles. “Stop it,” I yell a little louder, but the chills spreading over my skin drag me under with them. The dread the voice will begin again sets in. Fear rises in my chest. Anxiety at an all-time high. “Stop it!” I yell as loud as I can.

  My son stops abruptly, thinking I am talking to him. Tears fill his eyes. His cries match Olivia’s in my arms as he stands in front of me and I realize the voices are right. I am a fucked-up mother and I don’t deserve them, either of them.

  Told you. Pitiful. What a waste of life.

  Justin

  Leaves crunch under my feet as I make my way into town. I don’t know what is more pathetic, the fact that I can’t keep my shit together after deployment to stay around the little family I have left, or the fact that I am now forced to walk to work on this cold, wet, rainy October day because I left everything behind in Knoxville one night in a desperate attempt to not be reminded of the shit in my past.

  They teach you how to fight. They never teach you how to come home.

  I shake my head and look up at the sky. The sun is peeking through the clouds and it glistens off the puddles the morning rain left on the street below my feet as I make my way towards Ball Ground, Georgia. Pulling my jacket closer around me as a wind blows past, I shove my hands in my pockets and wonder just how much further it is into the tiny downtown that I now call home. I’ve only walked it a few times before, having only recently taken my editor position at the local newspaper, but damn it if this doesn’t feel like forever. One thing the service was good for? Getting a degree I never thought I’d be able to achieve after having to drop out of college a year shy of getting my diploma. But even with that accomplishment, the way life twisted and turned, and the reality of what I am now forced to deal with still blows. No matter what way you look at it.

  I glance up at the cloudy sky and breathe in deep. Silence. Silence is all I know, and yet I find comfort in it. One thing the Navy Seals taught me was the damn 40% rule, and hell if it isn’t true. Possibly even the only damn thing that has kept me sane since the shit I went through overseas.

  When your mind is telling you that you are done, you’re actually only 40% done.

  Hell if that isn’t the damn truth.

  Nearing a bend in the road, I come to a stop when I hear crying coming from the house in front of me. I train my ear to listen to the sound. It’s a baby’s cry. No big deal. But then I hear another yell. A woman. A little quiet at first, but the damn words her beautiful voice shouts ring loud and clear the second time, calling to a place deep inside me I never knew existed.

  “Stop it!”

  My feet have a mind of their own as I jump the little fence separating me from the front door of the tiny house and quickly take the stairs two at a time as I climb up the front steps. Powered by a force unknown to me, I don’t bother to knock as I plow against the door and it swings wide open. I look to my right and see nothing. A glance to my left and I lock eyes with a woman who is fallen against the wall, clutching her child tight.

  In two short strides I am at her side. She flinches when I come near and tries to back away as I clutch her shoulders in my hands.

  “Ma’am, are you alright?” But she doesn’t say a word. She stares at me with those wide, blue, breathtaking eyes, and I swear my heart skips a fucking beat.

  It has to be the adrenaline.

  I hear a cry behind me and turn to see a little boy for the first time. He looks scared as shit, and it pulls to another place deep inside me, reminding me of my youth and all the crap I tried to escape in the Navy.

  “Don’t worry,” I say, turning and facing his way. “I am not going to hurt you.” His crying slows a little and I thank God for that, because between his crying, and the tiny little baby in his mother’s arms, I don’t think I could take much more. Turning back to the woman, I notice fear creeping across her face as a shiver breaks out across her skin. Standing, I look into the bedroom just beyond where she is sitting and wonder where the fucker is at that she has to be afraid of.

  “Where is he?” I demand harshly on instinct. Looking back down at her, her eyes look perplexed and it completely throws me off, but I continue anyway. I make my way into the bedroom and take a good look around. Glancing in the bathroom and closet, I come back to the living room just as the woman rises to standing. She stares at me in confusion before putting a pacifier back in her daughter’s mouth and finally succeeding in making the crying stop. Her son runs to her side and I watch as he sniffles into her leg.

  I take long strides across the room to the other side of the house and glance in the only other room this tiny shack has to offer. Boy’s toys are thrown everywhere, and I have to sidestep my way through to make sure no one is hiding in the kid’s closet.

  Nothing.

  Coming back out to the living room, I take a look in the small kitchen and finally meet the eyes of the woman in the corner when I am confident there is no one around. She questions me with those damn eyes that pull to a place inside me I’d rather forget, the place her voice called to, but the fear that once filled them is gone. With her baby clutched to her chest and her son at her side, her posture finally softens.

  Then I see it.

  My eyes dart to the mantel on the fireplace. The fucking symbol I’ve been running from stares me back in my damn face and pierces my heart like it’s the first fucking time. The folded flag. The dog tags. The picture in a frame next to an urn. My eyes dart back to hers, and it doesn’t escape me that she saw where I looked. She straightens her spine, as only a soldier’s wife would, and stands tall.

  I nod my head before standing straight. With tears in my eyes, and confident that she is in no danger, I salute her. I watch as she fights back tears before giving me a sad nod. I look to the floor and swallow over a lump in my throat, unable to meet her eyes.

  “Thank you for your service,” I whisper. Turning, I leave quickly and slam the door behind me. I know all too well the demons she faces, and hell if I can fight hers and mine at the same time.

  Chapter 2

  Rose

  Purse? Check. Teeth brushed? Check. Pens, notepad and miscellaneous office supplies I convinced myself I needed even though they probably have, check. Nerves, shaking hands, wobbly feet, breath that won’t come fast enough, triple check.

  Voices. Quiet. But for how long?

  Exiting my car in a hurry, now close to 10 minutes late my first day on the job, I walk towards the front door of the newspaper wondering just what I was thinking when I applied for the position o
f receptionist. The last time I held any sort of job was when I was 16 right before I met Michael and I worked at the local burger shack. This is completely out of my league. I have no clue how to do half of the things that I lied about in my interview.

  Plus, I have never even met my boss! I was hired by the publisher, and while technically he is the higher management, he only comes through town a few times a month and I will be working daily with the editor who was in the process of moving to our little town when I had my interview. Hence his absence.

  I trip over the first step as I close the distance between me and the office. I don’t even think I am breathing as I stare at my reflection in the mirrored glass in front of me. My brown hair blows in the wind and I glance down at my slightly fuller figure, thrown together with what kind of business attire I could find at the local thrift store that wouldn’t cost more than $20. I still carry most of the baby weight and maybe a little extra from all the stress. Sadness creeps into my posture, but I push it back as I straighten my spine and grab the door handle. Pulling the door open, I go to take my first step inside when I hear it.

  Failure. You were always a failure. You won’t last a week here, and it won’t be long until that warning you got last week from your landlord becomes an eviction. You and your kids will be out on your ass. Loser. Deadbeat. Useless. God, and to think you call yourself a mother.

  I close my eyes and swallow over the lump in my throat. Not now. I can’t afford to fight this now. Not when I need my head to try and act like I didn’t lie my ass off to get this job.

  Opening my eyes, I stare into an empty space. No one. That is odd. I see cubicles and hear the clinking of keyboards, but I don’t see anyone around that I can ask where to go or who to talk to in order to let them know that I am here. That I am ready, if only until the voices start their assault again.