"Why would someone so fantastic want someone like me?" she asked the darkness. "I'm broken in so many ways. I have nothing to offer anyone. Nothing. I can't even offer a 'clean' body like Sarah apparently can." Tamsin's many sins rolled over her, pressing down with their awful weight. She remembered all those seemingly magical nights in Bobo's arms. So simply and easily he had led her down the path. It had all seemed like her own idea at the time; all those honey-scented kisses; all those flights into the starry night sky on wings of ecstasy. What a pile of rainbow-colored garbage.
Those flights had ended in squalor. All those beautiful dreams had just been false fronts like in Old Western towns. Nothing of substance backed up the pretty cardboard flats. Bobo's honeyed words had been empty flattery. What made it doubly difficult was that even though he had taken the gift of her innocence and thrown it in the dirt, she had first handed it to him on a platter, with sauce.
She felt, now, the terrible burning guilt of a life thrown away on glitter and spangles. She had bankrupted her soul with acts, which, at the time, had seemed so natural and innocent. "I was in love! We got married, even. I wore a white dress and we didn't even elope to Las Vegas, like Bobo wanted to. Doesn't that count for anything?" She asked God that question, and yet she knew the answer already.
As much as she had tried to gloss over it, the guilt was still there, growing and festering like a pus-filled boil; leaking poison into the rest of her life. Maybe this was what had eaten away at her married relationship. The guilt had so poisoned every thought that neither of them could stand the sight of the other. And now Bobo was seeking the arms of other women to put a band-aid on his poisoned heart. Someone should tell him that band-aids never stuck to hearts.
Tamsin went to bed feeling like the wreckage of her life would bury her. Why hadn't she been lovable enough when she was cute and had two good legs? What did she have to offer anyone now? She made people uncomfortable just being around her. She thought back about how the doctor had squirmed when she had unloaded on him. Stupid girl! Why had she done it? He didn't want to see the pus-filled, maggoty mess that was the under-belly of her life.
He lived in the sunshine. With every whine and whimper, she was thrusting away the only person besides Sarah, who was still around to help her—who still seemed to care a little. But how could she pull herself out of the muck? It was like being in quicksand. The more she struggled and felt miserable and felt sorry for herself, the more people backed off and didn't want to have anything to do with helping her. Who knew, she might pull them into the quicksand too.
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