The Breaking Point. Mariella Starr

Walking Tour. He’d never denied the house had charm and character.

      Still, there were ten steps from the sidewalk to the yard, a thirty-foot walk to another twelve steps up to the front porch. Once you entered the front door, you were faced with a two-story winding stairway, and each landing was graced with a crystal chandelier. There were eight large rooms in the house and four small ones. There was a powder room on the first floor, tucked under the stairwell, and luxurious bathrooms, on the second and third floors, although they were shared bathrooms for each level.

      Ales checked and rechecked the emergency brake, leaving the truck and opening the passenger side for Ricco so the heavy door wouldn’t slam shut on him. All of Hancock was hills and mountains. The deep valleys between them were where the historic canal had accessed the Potomac River. The C&O Canal was now a historical National Park.

      Jill answered the door and hugged her brother and nephew. “Go on in, Faith is in the sunroom.”

      Ricco ran ahead, as Jill and Ales heard Faith’s excited voice. When they reached the doorway, she was smiling, and Ricco was hugging her.

      “Easy,” Ales said. “Remember, she’s still sore.”

      Faith looked to the doorway and saw her husband, and she smiled at Ales, too. He looked worried, as she thought he should. She was feeling better, and she’d had a few weeks to work through her thoughts. She didn’t count the weeks she’d spent in the hospital or most of the following one. She hadn’t been able to string two thoughts together cohesively during that part of her recovery.

      She and Ales had come to an impasse in their marriage. She wasn’t sure of any solutions yet, but she was hoping their years together, eleven in marriage, wouldn’t be lost.

      Jill came to the doorway, smiling at her nephew. “What? I don’t get any attention from one of my favorite boys, and I baked chocolate chip cookies?”

      “Cool, my favorite!” Ricco exclaimed. He kissed his mother and then ran to his aunt and hugged her.

      Jill winked at Faith and gave her brother a shove further into the room.

      Ales stood drinking in the sight of his wife. She looked so much better than when he’d seen her last. “Am I welcome?”

      Faith nodded, and he walked over to the divan and sat beside her. He looked her over carefully. “The stitches are gone,” he said, raising his hand to her forehead, but not touching the still raw-looking hash marks at her hairline.

      “They were taken out last week,” Faith said. “They said it wouldn’t hurt, but they lied!”

      “How are you?” he asked.

      “Better,” Faith said.

      “I’m scared, Faith. I don’t think there’s any other word that describes what I’ve felt since you left. I don’t want to lose you. I love you.”

      “Do you?” Faith asked. “We’ve been on different paths for quite some time. I’m not sure we can fix what needs to be fixed.”

      “We can fix it,” Ales insisted. “I know you’re still hurting and upset. Please, stop shaking your head. We have to work through this. I can’t bear the idea of losing you because of my stupidity. The last couple of weeks have been a major wake-up call for me.”

      “I’m not so sure,” Faith said. “I can’t remember when things began to shift. I think it started when Ricco was little when I was staying home and not working. I don’t know when I started closing myself off with resentment, but it’s been growing. You’ve been wrong about things, but I’ve been wrong too. I should have stood up to you more, fought for what was important to me instead of letting that resentment fester.”

      “My mother,” Ales said, but she shook her head.

      “She is a discussion we will have, but not today,” Faith said wearily. “There is a great deal, I have to say about that situation, but I’m not strong enough to face it yet. Thinking about Cybil, and what she did, throws me into an angry funk.”

      Ales nodded. “I am sorry for so many things. I don’t know when my ego started getting in the way of our relationship.”

      “I do,” Faith said with a quirk of her lips that was almost a smile. “I’ll tell you too, but not just yet. How long are you staying today? Can you leave Ricco here for a few days?”

      “Ricco can stay, and I’d like to stay too. I’ve cleared my schedule for a month,” Ales said.

      “What?” Faith exclaimed in surprise. “Summer is your busiest time!”

      “A full month,” Ales said. “You’re on medical leave, and Frostburg has already hired a replacement teacher to take over your summer class. Tyrell and I hired a young architect we’ve been working with as a subcontractor. You’ve met him, Andrew Chevron. He’s talented, and he’ll be working the day-to-day jobs with Tyrell. I may have to check on the designs occasionally, but I can do that from here. I swear I won’t go near my computer until after you are asleep unless I get a call that one of our buildings is collapsing.”

      Faith shook her head. “You can’t do it, Ales. I know you.”

      “Yes, I can, and I will,” he said firmly. “We need time, Faith, and if it takes longer, I’ll give you longer. I’m willing to do whatever it takes to make our marriage solid again. We made promises to each other.”

      “Some problems are beyond fixing,” she said.

      “I can’t listen to talk like that,” Ales said. “You’re my wife, and we will work on fixing what is broken! All we need is time and compromise.”

      “A lot of compromise,” Faith said. “And, I’m not going to be the one doing all of it. Are you sure you’ve thought this through?”

      “Yes, I have,” Ales said. “Ricco and I need to be here with you. You need to talk, and I need to listen. I needed this kick in the ass. There are so many things that I haven’t even bothered to discuss with you. I assumed I knew what was best for our family. I think I was channeling my father, but that’s not going to work for us.” Ales gave Faith a stern look. “This doesn’t mean you get to run over me. I’m still me, and my beliefs are still the same, but we need to start acting like a couple again, a team that is working together.”

      “Does Ricco want to return to the camp?” Faith asked.

      Ales shook his head. He started to speak, and his voice broke. “Baseball camp is one more item on a long list of my failures. You said to wait until he was ten, and let him make that decision. I sent him to camp because he was the best in his Little League.

      “Ricco loves to play baseball, but he’d rather be playing in his Little League. He hates being one of the youngest kids at camp, and he was being picked on. He cried when he told me.” Ales got to his feet and walked over to stare through the window. When he looked over his shoulder at his wife, there were tears in his eyes. “I’m the one who should have been in that accident. Maybe a hard whack on my head would have knocked some sense into me sooner.

      “I sent our son to an environment where he was being bullied because of my ego. Because my son being good wasn’t enough for me! I had to try to make him the best! What’s wrong with me?”

      Faith got to her feet slowly as she did these days. She went to her husband and circled her arms around him, laying her face against his back. The feel and smell of him were comforting. Ales had his faults, but so did she.

      “Ales, you can’t take on all the blame,” Faith said. “You are responsible for a lot, but I haven’t been perfect either, and Ricco should have told us. If his allegations of being bullied are true, we’ll have a sit-down with the camp supervisors and tell them what is what. We both need to listen more and pay attention to his needs, as well as our own.”

      “Dad!” Ricco was at the doorway to the sunroom. “Come on! We have a U-Haul to unload!” He disappeared when Jill