Meet Francine Pt. 10
Sitting in this room, feeling like a rescued princess, Bunny tells me how he came to meet Rachel and, in his roundabout but beautifully gentle way, explains why Brannon acts the way he does.
Pictures in the hallway, photos we save but only look at once, of times we know will never come again.
I’m not sure what to expect. Bunny is leading me somewhere to something. His life once had a plan, of which I’m sure, and some evil happening tore it up, which made planning impossible.
“Working a farm is a long day, Francine. Especially a family run farm such as we had back then. Every hand is important, and though we did hire a couple of chaps at busy times, we managed a great deal of the work on our own. But there were subtle changes happening with Rachel. At first, well I didn’t think too much about it, which was a mistake. Rachel would go missing, telling me she needed groceries, or a dental appointment, but always on a Wednesday and a Thursday. For a couple of years… this is after we came to terms that we wouldn’t have a child of our own… Rachel wanted time away from the farm. We had started to make some money, supplying hay and milk, and so I kept the hired boys on to help. It wasn’t until I bumped into Peggy Worthen, a primary school teacher, who told me that Rachel was a wonderful preschool assistant at the Dervaig Primary School. She had kept it secret from me, even lied to me. As I said, Francine. I was heartbroken. Some need in her, some ache, could only be responded to by being near the wee bairns. Rachel had been helping out there for over three months. I never knew anything about it.”
He pauses. Should I say something, anything, but what?
“That must have been tough on you, Bunny.”
“Aye, lass, not that she wanted to be with the wee bairns, but keeping it from me.”
“But you know there must have been more to it, Bunny.”
“Aye, but I was so damned stupid not to have recognized the pull she had for us to have our own child. I was able to bury the disappointment in working the farm. We sat down and had talk about what I’d learned. Rachel was very closed, ashamed, I think, that she had been unable to tell me. I guess the real hurt was all about that. There is nothing I wouldn’t have let her do, nothing. I could manage the farm if it meant she was happy. Once it was out, things got better. The farm was picking up, I managed very well with the help, and Rachel started to teach dancing to the wee ones at school.”
“That’s wonderful, Bunny.”
“Indeed, it was, lass. We were able to talk about adoption, and even made inquiries. But then it happened. Rachel was returning to the island having performed in Edinburgh, she had relit the flame of her passion and returned to the stage with the Edinburgh Ballet. It had been raining for two days, and Rachel’s car had slipped off the road. She tried calling but there was no signal, so she started to walk. It was about eight-o-clock in the evening. He stopped to offer her a lift. She must have been cold and soaked through. It wasn’t her way to go with a stranger. Rachel was almost beaten to death, the surgeon performed surgery on her jawbone…”
As Bunny recounts this terrible event, his eyes take on a fiercer gaze, and his face, earlier pale, is reddening. There is an anger hidden, wrinkled, and flaming.
“…she was in hospital for a week with her injuries. She came home, and silence penetrated every room in the house. Her jaw was wired, her right arm in a plaster, and seventeen stitches in her skull. She looked nothing like Rachel. Her eyes bulging, black and blue, cuts and scratches, fingernails ripped out. I wanted to sit with her every minute, but I needed space to cry, scream, out of a wild necessity.”
I want Bunny to stop recalling; the pain in his voice is killing me. This so gentle being is torturing himself.
“Bunny, I’m so sorry,” I say as my cell phone rings.
Damn the woman, it’s Gilda.
“Take your call, Francine, I’ll get another log for the fire.”
“It’s my aunt, Bunny. Really, it’s not an important call. It can wait.”
Bunny smiles. “Eat another shortbread, lass. I’ll be back in a moment.”
It is hard to understand how such a brutal encounter can happen to one who is a gentle soul. I recall being attacked when I was young by our next-door neighbour’s boy, Rupert. I was six or seven when I picked up a toy he was playing with. Rupert picked up a teddy bear, no pun intended, and started bashing me with it. I remember starting to cry, and Rupert was shouting, die, die, die, and each time he’d hit me with this awful stuffed beast, and no matter how I tried to parry the blows, he just kept going. Luckily, Dad heard me crying and came to see what was happening. He grabbed Rupert by the ear and led him back home. He wasn’t allowed to go again for a week. Daddy kissed me and told me I would feel better soon. That’s the most anyone has set on me physically.
“The wind is getting up out there, Francine. Do you want a blanket?” He asks as he comes through the door with some sturdy logs. “Brannon cuts these for me. He’s very good about it,” Bunny says, stooping down to place one on the fire and the other on the hearth. “This fire will be roaring when Brannon arrives.”
I’ve never known a man with such a touching and wonderful innocence as Bunny, and I thought the world of Dad. He has kept the dimple indents in his cheeks, has a full head of silvered hair, and his arms retain muscle, with protruding veins like wickerwork when he uses them, as he is doing now.
“Bunny, this is very difficult for you. You don’t owe me an explanation. I’m so grateful to you.”
“Francine, can I ask you something?”
“Are you attracted to Brannon?”
“Bunny, what a strange question, I’ve only known him a couple of days. I cannot imagine a woman who would not be, he’s tall, handsome, and has tight buttocks,” I say, laughing out loud.
“I fell in love with a woman I saw in a window, ran after her, wanted to make her mine. It happens, Francine.”
“Bunny, your son is very attractive. I like him immensely. But you assure me I should be careful, that he isn’t emotionally available.”
“Yes, that’s true. He once was, Francine. Events changed him. I’ll help you understand. First, I’ve never known Brannon to call on anyone, but he called upon you with food, welcoming you to the island,” Bunny says.
“He did. It was so sweet, and it couldn’t have come at a better time. I had nothing in my fridge.”
“Don’t get me wrong, Brannon is a kind person, giving, he’s a terrible person when receiving. I can help you understand him,” he says.
“I would like to know him better, Bunny, of course. He’s shown me nothing but kindness.”
“Two months after the attack, Rachel discovered she was pregnant. Naturally, as I have told you, the baby could not be mine. A visit to the hospital confirmed it,” Bunny says almost matter of fact.
“There was no question but to arrange for Rachel to have an abortion as soon as possible. When I mentioned the word abortion to Rachel, that we could take care of this and not have that monster's child, the woman I knew disappeared. It felt like an alien had taken her over. She insisted on having the child. How does a husband deal with such an absurdity? I didn’t do it very well and was determined to change her mind. I did not want a child reminder of that hateful day when my wife was violated and ripped open by an animal…” he says, eyes now sparking, not easy, tense.
“Where is my wife hiding in this body, making these disgusting decisions without thought for how I felt. I couldn’t give her a child, so she is going to accept the child of a man who raped her! I cannot explain any of it to myself, this woman who showed marriage nobility, pure, familiar, then wants to bare the child of an animal; an animal that tore her up, almost killed her, took from her the wonderful innocence that all people are good. There is no name for this anguish I felt. I shed more tears than God had a right to ask. I went down in the dust, cried out all the tears in my body. It was too much to ask,” Bunny says, tears rolling down his cheeks unstopped.
“I was very upset and dumb, I couldn’t speak my hurt, it was too much for my throat. I knelt by her bed and pleaded for this not to be so, that we would adopt immediately. I fell on the floor, dragged myself across the carpets in anguish. How could my wife not show me mercy?”
“Oh Lord, dear bunny. This is unbearable. I don’t know what to say, what can anyone say?”
“My guilt, to this day, Francine, I would have left her, left my marriage, but she was still so broken, her jaw still wired, helpless, and I wanted to leave her. I wanted to kill the child; I could have done it myself. I honestly thought, calm down, she will change her mind, but it will have to be soon. If not, we should agree to let the child go, never let her eyes see the child. The new mother would never know that the child is a child of rape. Our home was a tomb, so quiet, still, and I prayed every day that this was not a child we would ever set eyes on.”
