Read an Excerpt
Ivy Jones-Miller sat on the side of her bed. In one hand she held a
picture of her husband of eleven years; in the other, a copy of the documents
filing for a divorce from him.
She had to admit the reality: she still loved
Raymond Terrell Miller. He had been part of her life since she was ten years
old. For sixteen years, their families lived next door to each other. Both
families had been members of the Cathedral Of Faith Christian Center in Camden,
New Jersey, where Ivy's grandfather was founder and pastor. They had grown up
together. And she honestly couldn't imagine what her life was going to be like
without him in it.
With tears streaming down her cheeks, she released the
documents and watched as they slipped down to land near her feet on the plush
carpeted floor. Hugging the photograph to her breast, she willed herself to
accept that this was the end of her life with Ray.
The feeling had to be
worse than death itself.
What she was realizing was that all the material
possessions she and Ray had accumulated meant nothing if he was not here to
share them with her. She had been willing to give up this tremendous house with
its breathtaking view of the lake, a view she had enjoyed for many years from
the bay window in the morning kitchen. The Bentley, the Mercedes, and every
piece of jewelry she owned - she would have relinquished it all, gladly, just to
have him with her again.
Yes, just to have Ray in her arms and back in her
life the way it used to be, she would be willing to live like a vagabond.
And here was the ultimate irony, even though she was willing to give up
everything, he still didn't want her anymore. He had told her, his voice flat
and distant, to file for a divorce; and since that day he hadn't slept in their
home.
Ivy looked over at numerous pictures of Ray and herself that were
sitting on her dresser. She walked over to them and stared at each, one by one.
"I hate that I ever met you," she said out loud as she looked intently at his
image. She picked up the heavy gold-framed photograph and after staring at it a
few moments more, she pitched it against the wall on the opposite side of the
room. She watched as the glass shattered against the wall, falling onto the
carpet.
She turned her attention back to the other photos. "I hate you," she
repeated. The three words came from her lips; but in her heart, that was far
from the truth. "Oh, God, what am I going to do?" She crumpled to the floor. The
truth was she wanted to hate him. She needed to hate him. It was too hard to
accept, otherwise.
After a few minutes of self-pity, the anger surged back.
She stood up and grabbed a crystal-framed photograph of Ray in his Redskins
uniform. She dropped it to the floor and began to stomp on it, over and over
again. Each time her foot smashed onto the picture she said a word. "I," stomp,
"hate," stomp, "you," chanting it over and over again, trying her best to make a
lie the truth so the pain in her heart would go away. "Damn you, Ray. I gave you
the best of me. I gave you all of me. I'm the mother of your children. How could
you be so cruel?"
She cried until she was spent. Then as the tears began to
subside, Ivy stood and swung her arm over the dresser, flinging everything on it
to the floor.
"What am I going to do?" She murmured the words out loud. "How
am I going to live without him?"
She hadn't told a soul that Ray had left
her. Perhaps telling someone would make her face the fact that it was truly
over. Her guess was that everyone would be shocked, especially when they found
out that she and Ray were divorcing. She came from a Christian family that did
not divorce.
How was she going to explain this to her family? She was a
minister's daughter. Her family believed in until death do you part - and so did
she: it would have been that way, too, if she had her way.
But the choice
was out of her hands. It's in God's hands now, she thought. She would have to
stop all this crying and be strong and face the fact that she had done all she
could to save this marriage. The final papers were signed and had been delivered
to the attorney; it was time to inform the people closest to her. Maybe after
she opened up and shared her grief with the people who really cared about her,
she could begin the healing process, begin to become whole again.
First she
needed to tell their children. Ray Jr. the oldest, was nine, Solomon, was five,
and the twin girls, Tamara and Terra, were three. Ivy wiped the tears from her
eyes with the back of her hand, took a deep breath and commanded herself to get
it together.
It was time that she accepted that Ray had left her and his
entire family a long time ago, long before he voiced his desire for a divorce.
Filing the paperwork only made it official.
Ivy knew that she didn't need to
blame herself, at least not entirely: there was enough blame to go around. Other
women. Drugs. It has been nearly two years since Ray's last attempt to rid his
life of the drugs. After failing to complete three different programs at three
different facilities, her father, the Reverend James Jones, had recommended the
Faith and Hope Drug and Alcohol Rehabilitation Center. Reverend Jones was now
the pastor of Cathedral Of Faith Christian Center and he knew people who had
attended the Center; he had suggested this facility because of the highly
successful completion rate of their clients. Through his work with the
inner-city youth at the Ray Miller Youth Center, he had sent many others through
the drug program offered at Faith and Hope.
Nevertheless, Ray had yet again
failed to finish the program.
How could all this have happened right under
Ivy's nose? How could she not have recognized the warnings? All the signs had
been there, right in front of her. Had she been in denial? Or had she simply
been deaf to anything that threatened her marriage, her happiness? When they had
first started out, she would never have thought in a million years that Ray
would be stupid enough to get himself hooked on any drug, especially one as
addictive and harmful as heroin. .......