In Search of Solomon's Wisdom, A Novel

By Lesa Stember

Emily, a young woman orphaned by tragedy, stumbles through each day holding on to the one constant in her life--Josh, a charismatic genius and alcoholic. Kara, Josh's older sister, carefully controls every aspect of her own life but the most heartbreaking--her infertility. Kara's relationship with Josh is strained when she learns that Emily is unexpectedly pregnant.

Months later, Josh accidentally overdoses on prescription pills he bought over the Internet, plunging Emily into a head-on collision with Kara, whose motivations are clouded by frustration with her infertility. The two women battle to place blame for Josh's death on one another and fight for custody of Emily's baby.

In Search of Solomon's Wisdom explores the depths of love, which is both immensely destructive and ultimately healing. Only when Kara and Emily see Josh and one another with clear eyes do they finally forgive him, one another, and themselves.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lesa Stember
• Release date: Nov 17, 2011
• ISBN: 9780595870868

Lesa Stember

Lesa Kelley Stember received a law degree from Emory University and practiced as a civil trial attorney for several years. She is now a full-time writer and mom and lives in Lititz, Pennsylvania, with her husband and two children.

Book preview

Part One

The Lord appeared to Solomon during the night in a dream and said, Ask for whatever you want me to give you.

Solomon answered, Give your servant a discerning heart to distinguish between right and wrong.

God said, I will do what you have asked. I will give you a wise and discerning heart so that there will never have been anyone like you, nor will there ever be.

I Kings 3: 5, 9, 12

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Chapter One

Emily

The mound under the sheets stirred, then moaned. I stood in the bedroom doorway with my hands on my hips and rolled my eyes. Why isn’t a twenty-nine year old man capable of getting himself out of bed? God, this was getting old.

Josh, get up! I shouted. It’s almost ten. You’re gonna be late.

The sheets erupted as arms and legs wrestled free. What? It’s ten? Why didn’t you get me up sooner?

I’ve been trying to get you up for a half-hour. How could you not hear that siren you call an alarm clock?

When I turned, a pillow hit me square in the back. Well, you obviously didn’t try hard enough. Man, Em, like you have anything else to do.

I’m not your mother! Get in the shower and I’ll make coffee.

I made it halfway down the hall before my head jerked back. My hair tangled in his fingers, Josh pushed me against the wall, his lips hard on mine. As his tongue slid into my mouth, I tried to think of all the reasons I hated him. I didn’t want to enjoy this, but my heart pounded as I melted into him. Our kiss was furious and savage—a collision of souls—and reminded me that I could never live without him. For as much as I hated him, I loved him even more. When we finally ceded to our need for air, he released me, nuzzled my neck, and placed his lips to my ear. Sorry for being an ass.

My gaze followed him as he spun and headed to the shower. I still loved how his t-shirt lay across his broad shoulders and how his neck curved just so. It amazed me how someone I had known for six years, someone who knew every inch of me and every secret, could still rouse me the way Josh did, regardless of the things we continued to do to each other.Ten minutes later, I sat at the kitchen table scanning the New York Times when he appeared with his damp black hair slicked back, his crisp, pressed shirt tucked neatly into his khakis, and his tie just so. I never grew tired of seeing him dressed for work. As I quickly scrutinized the headline story, I scrunched my face for effect. How interesting could the trial of some rich executive be? Still I feigned interest as Josh poured himself a cup of coffee and maneuvered around the table. When he leaned in to kiss me, I breathed in the sweet scent of soap and shaving cream. It astounded me how easily he rinsed off his hangover and the smell of stale beer and cigarettes.

Hey, Baby, I won’t be home ‘til late. The Wilmont wedding is tonight. The reception starts at nine, so it’ll be at least two before things wind down.

Tonight was huge for him. Not only was the Wilmont wedding the largest affair ever held at The Manor Club, but Josh had handled almost every detail for the bride-to-be who mistook his role as General Manager to include serving as her personal wedding planner. Although he complained, he reveled in the role. His knack for the business was remarkable, especially since he’d had no formal training. He finished one year of college as a history major before dropping out, then took a job as a waiter while waiting for his modeling career to take off. He fell in love with the business of big events after serving at a couple of weddings.

How many guests? I didn’t really care, but I wanted to hold him there a little longer.

325.

Well, good luck. Hope it’s not too hectic.

Never. What are you doing today? His promotion to GM last year included a pay raise, which allowed me to consider nursing programs. If only I could find the right one. I’d wanted to be a nurse for as long as I could remember. My mom worked at a hospital when I was a kid, and she had the softest touch and the kindest eyes. No matter what happened, she had the power to make everything all right. At least until my dad got sick. Then, no amount of nursing school had prepared her for what she’d have to do—watching him die. It broke her. I was only ten, and after he passed away, I lost her, too. She started working doubles at the hospital just so she wouldn’t have to be at home with all her memories. From the time Daddy died until I left when I was 17, I can’t remember seeing her much. She even worked holidays. She always worked Christmas. Somehow, in her sadness, she forgot that I lost him, too. She forgot all about me. She probably still hadn’t noticed I was gone. But I remember her touch and her eyes.

Josh supported my decision to go to nursing school, but as I continued to work part-time waitressing while I waded through the application process, he seemed annoyed with my abundance of free time.

I thumped the latest batch of brochures spread across the table. I’m gonna mull these over and try to pick a program.

Yeah, okay. I ignored his condescension. I’m working tonight until 1:30. Why don’t I pick up some beer on the way home and stick it in the fridge? We can relax when you get in. I wouldn’t sleep until he was home—until our bodies tangled, precluding escape.

Sure, whatever, but I’m not sure when I’ll be home. He leaned over and kissed me softly. Love you. With his kiss, my annoyance disappeared.

Kara

I bit my lip to seal my mouth and prevent the scream in my throat from escaping. Thank you, Doctor, for calling on a Saturday.

Well, of course, Kara. I didn’t want you to wait through the weekend. I’m just sorry the news isn’t better. Call the office on Monday and make an appointment. We’ll figure out what the next step should be.

Okay, thanks. I placed the telephone back into its cradle and leaned my head against the wall. The words echoed in my head, bouncing around, trying to attach themselves to my brain. The HCG was negative. Again. I wasn’t pregnant. Again. The fertility treatments failed. Again. Before the usual litany of self-pitying, angry thoughts could parade through my mind, the phone rang again. I took a breath. Maybe the doctor read the wrong results and had mixed mine with someone else’s. With a prayer on my lips, I slowly lifted the receiver.

Hello?

KareBear, it’s me. Josh.

Hey, Sweetie. Look, it’s not a good time. Can I call you back? His voice made my eyes burn with tears and my lips quiver.

Oh, okay. Well, Kare, it’s kind of important. When can we talk? His voice bore a desperation for which I didn’t have the energy. Not now.

I wanted to break down and tell him everything the doctor had said. I wanted to unload my anger and frustration, but I couldn’t. I needed to wrap my head around it first. I needed to accept that the crazy, expensive IVF treatment had failed again. After months of daily painful hormone injections, which caused intense mood swings, the doctor had placed four tiny embryos inside me. Four tiny embryos that had not survived.

I don’t know, Josh. Can you call me tonight?

No can do, Sis. Got a huge wedding tonight. I’ll be tied up until at least two in the morning. Hey, forget it. I’ll call you next week. Love you.

And he hung up.

My little brother had the amazing ability to catapult me right back into childhood and its inescapable vulnerability. I wanted to call him back and cry about why Jack and I couldn’t seem to get pregnant. I wanted to explode with anger over the fact that so many women accepted the news they weren’t pregnant with joy, while others learned of being pregnant and wept with sadness. Having a baby had become my obsession. I lay still every morning to take my temperature and track my body’s responses, turning our once passionate, intimate relationship into a scheduled chore with decimal points on a thermometer dictating our intimacy. When all that failed, we created life in a little dish. Several lives placed safely inside me, only to fail for some inexplicable reason.

I held the phone despite the buzzing dial tone and considered calling Josh back as he sat in his car on the way to work, needing me for some reason. But I had no strength or wisdom to give. Nor did I have the patience to hear him drone on about the love-hate, dysfunctional, co-dependent melodrama he called a relationship with Emily. I had yet to figure out whether Emily was poison for Josh or the only reason he was still alive.

I don’t know when I realized Josh was an addict. Maybe when I was twenty. He climbed into the backseat of my car when I picked him up from Junior High—a cloud of sweet smelling smoke lingering around him. His eyes were bloodshot and he wore a stupid grin that couldn’t be erased. Or maybe it was the night gasoline fumes slid under the seal of his bedroom door and into the hallway, alerting our parents that he’d passed out on his bed while sniffing gas. He was thirteen. Now, as his thirtieth birthday approached, his life spiraled down its predictable loop of self-destruction. The pendulum that swung precariously from sobriety to bottom feeding was reeling back in full force, about to slam him to the ground. I just didn’t know how many times he could get back up.

The tragedy of Josh’s disease was not in my loss or my parents’ loss or even in his own, but in the world’s loss. My little brother was a prodigy—a genius in his own right. Charming, handsome, witty, and remarkably intelligent, his potential was infinite. When he was twelve and computers were in their infancy, he created simple programs using binary code. Creative, he wrote poetry and lyrics laced with innocence and incredible insight, and he often put them to music he composed on the piano. But then, just as his life began, the floor of his world disappeared. He couldn’t shake the sorrow he was forced to endure at a young age, and his attempts to bury it deep within his soul and erase it from his memory killed his spirit and served as the catalyst for his addictions.

My first memory of Josh was not of Josh himself, but of carving his name in the old kitchen table. I was only nine or ten. He was two or three, and I adored him. It thrilled me to have a life-size doll that would smile at me and giggle when I would simply stick out my tongue. While the rest of the world whizzed past me, I could captivate him with a simple gesture. To him, I was the funniest person ever. The way his face lit up when I entered the room endeared him to me forever. Often when he cried, I was the only one who could make him stop. Some things never change.

I hung up the phone vowing to call Josh later at his office before he gave himself over to the mammoth wedding he’d been planning for a year. I plodded down the hallway to our bedroom where Jack slept—to break his heart again.

*****************

Chapter Two

Emily

After a pot of coffee and two hours on the couch contemplating brochures, I cracked open a few eggs to mix an omelet. As I went to add the cheese, the pungent smell filled my nose and I retched. I grabbed my mouth and ran to the bathroom just in time to avoid recycling my coffee all over the kitchen floor. Leaning back against the bathroom wall, I considered the last twenty-four hours. What had I eaten or done to deserve this? It couldn’t have been the bottle of wine I had last night. One bottle wasn’t enough to do this. The nachos maybe? I pulled myself up from the front of the toilet and looked in the mirror. I looked like hell. My short, spiky chestnut hair stuck out more than usual and the green of my eyes had disappeared into my pupils.

I trudged into the bedroom to dig some cocaine out of Josh’s stash, needing a boost to get me through my long shift tonight. I rummaged through his night stand and found bottles of pills, some I recognized and some I didn’t. Valium and Percocet were staples, but what were Darvon, Hydrocodone, and Flexeril? Where did he get these? I lined them up on the night stand side-by-side and stared at them in their accusatory line. He hadn’t really hidden them, but he hadn’t told me about them either. Or shared them. I jotted down the names and dosages. On the way to work, I’d run into Barnes and Noble and flip through the Physician’s Desk Reference. The PDR would enlighten me and give me ammunition for a confrontation.

What the hell. I popped open the Valium bottle and dumped one into my mouth. I could use a little softener before serving beer to the college kids who liked to grab my ass. I didn’t mind so much because they usually tipped better when I let them touch me. Men are so simple. Except for Josh, of course.

As I climbed into my car, my cell phone rang—the caller ID flashed Josh’s number.

Emily’s house of pain, I answered.

Mmm …that sounds promising. The kind of pain that precedes death or ecstasy?

Both. I laughed. How are you, Baby?

Fine. Just busy. I wanted to call before things got out of hand. The bride’s a real Bridezilla. I know she’s gonna have me tied up most of the night.

Oh, I’m jealous.

Yeah, well, if that’s how you like it, we can work on that when I get home. His voice was sultry. How did he do that? Touch me through a cell phone?

Actually, Honey, I’m not feeling so great.

His voice filled with concern. What’s wrong?

I don’t know. I hurled this morning for ten minutes and I’ve been pretty queasy ever since. Are you feeling okay?

I’m fine. Why?

I just thought maybe it was the nachos.

Hey …Maybe you shouldn’t go to work tonight if you’re feeling that bad. I couldn’t tell whether his voice contained measured concern or skepticism.Josh, I’m not trying to get out of my shift. I was really sick this morning.

God, Em ...Why do you always think the worst of me? I didn’t accuse you of faking it or anything. It’s just that you sound normal.

Whatever. I gotta go. I hung up, even though it would provoke a response and transform a tiff into a tantrum.

I cringed as my phone rang again. Yes?

Why the hell did you hang up on me? You are such a drama queen! I just wanted to make sure you’re okay. I was going to tell you not to worry about working tonight because the Wilmonts will give me a tip big enough to cover what you’ll make. I was just trying to think of what it could be, and you go and flip everything around, treat me like I’m an asshole, and hang up on me! Well, do whatever you want. Maybe I’ll see you after work, or maybe I won’t.

He hung up.

I hit the steering wheel with my fist. Why did I pick a fight with him? Because I was mad he had a drawer full of drugs? Or because he hadn’t shared them? Maybe it was PMS. My period was due any day and I always wigged out right before. Regardless of how monumentally wrong I might have been in assuming he was accusing me of faking being sick to get out of serving Neanderthals, I was right to be upset about the pharmacy I’d found in his night stand. I’d do my research and corner him about it later.

I pulled open the heavy double doors at Barnes & Noble, closed my eyes, and inhaled. I loved the way bookstores smelled. Coffee and paper and print. All things wonderful. I glanced at the New Arrivals perched at the front door and made my way to the café where I stood in line for twenty minutes to pay $3.50 for coffee with chocolate milk. The heat singed my tongue as I savored the bitter and sweet. Why were the best things in life always painful?

I took another big sip and headed for the medical reference section. I often lingered in this aisle and thumbed through books filled with fascinating pictures and beautiful words—words I would learn in nursing school and pictures I would one day understand. I caressed the books as I looked for the PDR. They were hard and soft on my fingers at the same time.

I found the PDR, hoisted it off the shelf, and lugged it to a nearby oversized chair. I plopped down cross-legged and settled it into my lap, balancing its weight on my knees. The words I read washed over me: These drugs slow down the nervous system and intensify the effects of alcohol …heavy use of alcohol with these drugs may cause an overdose …taking these drugs in combination with other narcotics can lead to a potentially fatal overdose.

What was he doing? How long had he been taking these drugs? Where did he get them? Was he taking them together? How often? How many? These were not the typical drugs we took just to elevate our minds and have a good time. These drugs could kill Josh, especially considering how much he drank.

Numb, I tucked the PDR back into its place and walked out, leaving my latte on the floor. I climbed into my car—my mind blank and unsure how to process what I’d just learned. In the six years I’d known Josh, he’d skidded between being a finger-shaking, sober stranger and a passionate, intense guy who liked to party. He drank too much and the cocaine and speed he sometimes took only compounded the effects on his body, but I didn’t like him sober. He tried too hard when he was sober. Every day was a struggle focused on not getting drunk.

He wasn’t just boring on those days, he wasn’t Josh. My Josh. The one who sat at his piano and composed music and lyrics in the middle of the night. The one who devoured me. The one who ruled a party with his humor and insight. He could talk about anything: music, politics, religion, current events. He was intelligent, introspective, and creative.

But not when he was sober. When he was sober, he looked at me with disgust. His eyes reflected his disappointment in himself and his life. Our life. His eyes pitied me rather than wanted me. When he was struggling to stay sober, it consumed every ounce of his strength and left him vacant and tired. It stole his soul.

So I found myself in the crux of a true dilemma. If I said nothing about the pills, he would continue to be My Josh. But if I believed the PDR, how could I keep silent? Surely he didn’t know what combining these drugs with the several beers he had each night could do to him or he wouldn’t risk it. Or maybe he knew exactly what he was doing. I rushed home to place the bottles back in the drawer. I needed time to figure out what to say to him.

I grabbed my mouth, ran back to the bathroom, and puked every ounce of my latte. Maybe it was the coffee. I took another bump of cocaine and left for work.

*****************

Chapter Three

Kara

Jack became a ghost today. The words that fell from his tongue onto my heart broke it with their weight, and he became transparent. His words muffled and I began to see through him, beyond him and our lives together.

Kara, I’m so tired, he had said. I just want to stop. Enough is enough. It’s been five years—so much money and disappointment. I just don’t think I can take it anymore. Every month is a letdown. You fall into a depression that lasts for two weeks and then the whole thing starts over again: the shots, the pills, the regimen. We don’t even make love anymore. Can we please let go of this? Some people just aren’t meant to have their own children.

Each word moved over me. How could we disagree on this? How could he say such things? If he loved me, how could he expect me to just give up on having a baby? Then, he said the words I’d prayed he would never say. We could adopt. This minimized everything we’d been through in the past five years.

Jack, why can’t we try just one more time? I’d begged.

Because we won’t get pregnant.

I closed my eyes, walked out of the room, and slipped into my car.

I drove all morning up and down the interstate. I didn’t know where I was going; I just needed to be alone. Where no one could walk up and ask what was wrong, why I was crying, and why my face wore the pain and frustration my heart couldn’t hold. My phone rang incessantly. Of course Jack called over and over, trying to reach me and make certain I wasn’t contemplating something far more stupid than wearing out my tires on the interstate. I answered once to ask for time to think. Time to decide.

My mother called a thousand times, but I refused to answer. I couldn’t handle the Oh, Honey. Well, at least you tried. and You and Jack are wonderful candidates to adopt and have the money. Maybe one of those beautiful Asian girls. and Well, I guess it just wasn’t meant to be and wasn’t part of God’s plan. There’s a reason, you know, we just don’t know what it is. As if somehow this idiocy would comfort me. My empty arms ached to hold my own baby—a tiny being with Jack’s pointy nose and crooked smile, and my strawberry blond hair and hazel eyes—a little person we’d created to share our lives with.

I pulled into a rest station for water just as my phone rang again. Josh. I contemplated whether I had the strength to listen to him drone on about Emily, but then realized it would be a distraction. I could count on Josh to be self-absorbed and not notice that my throat was closing up.

Hello?

"Hey, Sis. Listen, I spoke to Jack. I am so sorry. Is there anything I can do for you? Can I come get you? Do you want to get a