Practice Run (Mount Faith Series: Book 5)

by Barrett, Brenda

  "You think that way?" Marcus asked, shocked, "but you were strict with us. You made us go to church, you made us participate, and you forced us to read our Bibles."

  Bancroft nodded. "Oh yes, and those were all good things. The opposite way was to let you do what you wanted. That's always a dangerous way to go about child rearing. Children need boundaries and they need firmness."

  Your mother and I agreed on a middle ground. We wanted all of you to have the basics, built a firm foundation in the Lord. After that, you had to make up your minds whether you were going to go with what we taught you. You were raised as a Christian; I have no apologies for that. Oliver and I were grown the same way except stricter.

  When I was a teenager in Parotee, we even had a Chastity Class. You know, where sex was a bad word and purity until marriage was the byword. The point is, the class was not a bad idea. It's just that we joined the class not because we really believed it but because we thought it would please our elders. Taj was conceived on the way to one such class."

  Bancroft laughed softly. "And the truth is, I was just seventeen, and so was Annette. I did not love her. I was just curious about sex… hated myself after it."

  Marcus frowned. "So, why didn't you marry Annette?"

  Bancroft glanced at his son. "I would have married her if my parents had insisted, but they did something that was really weird for them. They tried to take care of the problem by hiding her. They arranged for the child to be aborted, I, on the other hand, was young, stupid, and very happy that I had somebody taking care of my problem. So I did nothing; I barely thought about it.

  I left Jamaica, went to college, and moved on. I met your mother in the third year of university. I loved her; she was the one. I would have missed out on being with her if I had married Annette. I probably would have been miserable; I would have compounded a mistake by making an even bigger mistake.

  Marriage is not supposed to be done to make a mistake legitimate. I don't have any statistics, but I know that those marriages never usually last. How can it? Sometimes they don't even know each other in the first place and are not compatible. You can still do right by your child without marrying his or her mother."

  "But on the other hand, I have been living with Tiffany for the past three years. That shows I am committed to her, and that I must have some feelings for her," Marcus said slowly. "I might not feel it now, but I should. It's just that my mind is swamped with Deidra."

  "You lost six months worth of memory," Bancroft frowned. "A lot may have happened in six months."

  "And obviously a lot did," Marcus said, "I love Deidra and slept with Tiffany and now I am going to be a Dad. Why is that scenario so convoluted?"

  "That brings us back to your upbringing," Bancroft said smugly. "If you had listened to my counsel, you wouldn't have flown the nest so soon and gotten involved with that Tiffany girl. I was against you living with her. She was too sexually liberated and didn't stay in a relationship for more than two minutes. I still believe she targeted you."

  "She was my first girlfriend," Marcus shrugged, "I enjoyed spending time with her."

  "There is some hint of the past tense in your speech. You 'enjoyed spending time with her,'" Bancroft said gleefully. "I can only hope that you will come to your senses about this girl after all."

  Marcus shook his head. "It means I'm confused. I can't shake the fact that I need Deidra, but I also need to be responsible and to take care of my child."

  His father patted his hand. "You have time to think about it. Don't make any rash decisions."

  Chapter Fourteen

  Kylie's all-white wedding at The Blue Lagoon went off without a glitch. Deidra had planned something personal and low-key, just as Kylie had wanted, but didn't quite know how to do.

  It was beautiful, simple, and mercifully brief. As the maid-of-honor, Deidra had to face the congregation, and Marcus had been at the front, in a wheelchair.

  Marcus in a tuxedo was all kinds of handsome—the wheelchair had not diminished his magnetic presence one bit.

  Kylie and Gareth had only invited their family and close friends, so it was a small intimate crowd. Deidra had lobbied that Tiffany not be invited. Kylie had been only too pleased to acquiesce to that request. No Tiffany and no Jackie, Gareth's ex-wife.

  Deidra wandered off from the small gathering as soon as the pictures and toasts and inane small talk were over. She sat down on the deck, hurriedly taking off her white slippers, and trailed her feet in the water.

  She could understand why Kylie had gone on and on about Portland, and about Blue Lagoon in particular. It was beautiful with all its vibrant colors, deep blue waters, deep green trees, and golden sunrays playing in the water.

  She usually tried to avoid the low-key spots in Jamaica, but now she was finding that her tastes were gradually changing. She was now fine with low-key. She was fine with anything really. She hardly had any extremes of emotion these days. She had moved out of the Bancroft's house and back into her own place soon after she heard about Marcus and Tiffany's impending addition to their family.

  Contrarily, this year she had made plans to spend the Christmas holidays in Mount Faith instead of with her grandmother in New York—the second year in a row without her family at Christmas. Last year she was being punished and couldn't afford it. This year, she just didn't want to be around people.

  This wedding had taken a lot of effort to plan. She found that when she was sad, things seemed to drag along. People talked and she couldn't hear them, and there was a constant pain in the region of her heart. She was meaning to go and check it out. Maybe she had a heart condition and she was going to die.

  She flicked the water with her toes and placed the glass she was holding on the deck. She didn't even know what sort of drinks had been in there, she had drunken it without really tasting it.

  The buzz of people talking and laughing in the distance suddenly came back to her and she leaned back on the deck with her hands. Her hair had been caught up in a fancy bun and she loosened the pins one by one until her hair unfurled, a light breeze teasing it around her face.

  She wished the sunlight rays were not so weak and that the late afternoon sun could have warmed her up a bit more. Maybe then it could warm up her cold, cold heart.

  She heard his wheelchair squeaking as he rolled down the deck. She considered getting up and leaving. She didn't want to talk to Marcus. She never wanted to talk to him again. Ever.

  One of the wheels of the chair stopped beside her hand. She didn't turn her head to look around.

  She closed her eyes and inhaled. He was wearing Clive Christian 1872. She loved that scent on men. She could inhale a man wearing 1872 all day, but not this man beside her.

  He had a pregnant girlfriend, and he had lost his memory of her.

  "I remembered something the other day," Marcus said to her, watching transfixed as her hair danced along her spine. "It was about you."

  Deidra stiffened. She was not going to talk to him, but she was curious. She looked up at him.

  "I remembered us having a conversation about rules."

  "We did," Deidra said, "the first day we met."

  "Ah," Marcus nodded. "The memory came and then it left just like that." He snapped his fingers. "I was thinking about it though. I had a long talk with my Dad the other day and I have come to the conclusion that there was no sense following rules because others tell you to. We rebel against rules because we don't know the source of the rules, why they were made, or even the person behind the rules."

  "Where are you going with this?" Deidra asked.

  Marcus sighed, "I left home because I rebelled against my parents rules. I hated the rules, but now I am finding out that they prevent us from pitfalls and making mistakes."

  Deidra nodded, "I grew up without rules, so I appreciate them now. Go figure."

  Marcus mused. "I grew up with rules, but it's just now that I am appreciating them too."

  "Good for you," Deidra said, "I guess now t
hat you are going to be a father you are changing your thought patterns."

  Marcus cleared his throat. "I will accept the responsibility of fatherhood and try to be the best Dad I can be."

  Deidra clenched her teeth and turned her head away from Marcus; his 1872 perfume was still in her head, though, and she felt this urge to get up, sit on his lap, and wail. It was unfair. He was going to be a father and stay with Tiffany.

  "Deidra," Marcus said softly. He wished that he could sit beside her on the deck, but his foot was elevated; he was not supposed to bend it or shift it much.

  Deidra didn't respond. "Go away, Marcus."

  "Do you know the song? If loving you is wrong I don't want to be right?"

  Deidra sniffed. Tears were stinging her eyes, and she was willing them not to fall. She couldn't speak. Her voice was all choked up and tear-clogged.

  "Well, I was thinking of the song while I saw you standing there beside my sister today. My Mom used to call that song a wicked song when she heard it on the radio," Marcus chuckled, "but the lyrics are just so ‘me’ today."

  Deidra grimaced. "You don't remember me. You don't know if you love me. And in that song, I would be the other woman? The one that is not at home? No thanks."

  Marcus cleared his throat. "I'll move out from the apartment. When I am doing rehab next year, I'll live near the rehab center."

  "I don't want to be with you," Deidra swallowed, "not like this. You declared your love for me before," her expression was pinched, "and yet Tiffany is pregnant."

  "It must have been a mistake," Marcus said, feeling inadequate to defend himself. He just could not remember.

  "Mistake... oh no... no... no... it's not a mistake," Deidra got up and grabbed the glass she had put down and her sandals. "It's life. These things happen; you love one girl and sleep with another. We were just not meant to be together. I am going to try very hard to move on. I am going to forget you. I am going to be happy. One day too, I will have my own family and a guy who really means it when he uses that four-letter 'L' word, and he's not going to be living with another woman or have a kid with her. I will be the center of his world. He will want only me. We will grow old together and have fun together and when I am all wrinkly and gray he'll still want me."

  Tears were coursing down Deidra's cheeks. "I don't want to be a step-mom to Tiffany's child or be embroiled in any baby-mama drama. I deserve better than that. Whatever it is that we had ends now."

  Marcus' eyes were damp when she walked away. She was distraught and he was impotent to do anything about it. He dearly wished that he had lived his life a different way, and that he had met Deidra before Tiffany. Actually, he wished that there had been no Tiffany.

  The resentment boiled up in his mind. Why did he have to be in that accident? Why did he have to lose his memory of the most important part of his life?

  The answers were just as elusive as his patchy memory, and he sat out near the edge of the deck heartbroken and sad.

  Even when his brothers came to sit with him and they were talking, albeit somberly, and even when Micah patted him on his shoulder sympathetically and Adrian started reminiscing about when they were little, he couldn't find the energy to demolish the heavy dark cloud of depression that was enshrouding him. He couldn't easily dismiss Deidra's tear-stained face, and he couldn't easily repress the pain he felt when he thought about her finally walking away from him.

  Chapter Fifteen

  "He's depressed," Marcus heard his physiotherapist, Archie McAdam, say to his coach, Griffin King. "I have been working with him since March, and he's fine to run again. If you ask me, his issue is not physiological. His leg has gained back the strength. He is just refusing to run."

  "He has had amnesia since December." His coach was trying to talk quietly, but Marcus, who was sitting right outside the door, was hearing him clearly.

  He just did not really care anymore. A few months ago, if you had asked him what would be the most important thing to him, he would have said running again. Now, he just couldn't shake that feeling that came over him when Deidra walked away.

  The girl took a piece of him when she left. Then there was Tiffany, who had gone ballistic when he told her that he no longer wanted them to be together. He had told her the day after Kylie's wedding. He had also pleaded for some time. Tiffany had completely disregarded that request and had taken to calling him every other hour.

  He just could not sum up the energy to even like her. She was living in his apartment, and he was living in a rented house near the rehab center. He figured that she was happy with that arrangement because Tiffany did not like to see people who were less than perfect. Seeing him in a wheelchair or on crutches was something that she could not bear.

  He shook his right leg. The physio' was right; it was okay. If he put in some hard training, he could make it to the Olympics next summer. His memory wasn't okay though, and that troubled him. He heard his coach whispering the same thing. "He lost six months worth of memory when he met into this accident. Maybe that is depressing for him."

  Archie cleared his throat. "All I know is that his leg can move; it's not a hundred percent, but it is getting there. I would recommend getting him a psychiatrist."

  Griffin sighed. "A psychiatrist to get Marcus Bancroft, the most self-motivated athlete I have ever coached, to run again? I don't know; maybe I should because this is ridiculous. This accident has set us back quite a bit in our training for the quarter-mile, and we were making such good progress."

  Marcus heard Coach King approaching, and he leaned back on the wall, looking out into the lobby blankly. The physical and the mental really did go together. His leg was feeling fine. Not even a pinch, but his mind was in turmoil.

  He watched as coach came out from the office and nodded to him. "Let's take a walk."

  Marcus got up. "Sure."

  They walked around the 200 meters indoor track. Griffin did not start talking until they reached 50 meters in.

  "You are one of my best athletes," he cleared his throat, "and you were going places. Archie says I should get you a psychiatrist."

  Marcus shrugged. "I don't think I need one."

  Griffin grunted. "I don't know. So... er... what is going on in your life?"

  "You are going to be my psychiatrist now?" Marcus asked incredulously.

  Griffin chuckled. "It's worth a shot. I am no expert on head problems, but I don't want your career to go down the tubes. So humor me."

  "Well," Marcus rubbed his forehead, "Tiffany is pregnant, six months and one week pregnant."

  "I know that," the coach said impatiently. "How do you feel about her pregnancy? Is that what has you in a funk? I know that fatherhood can be frightening at first, for some men ."

  "I don't feel a thing." Marcus shrugged. "Well that's not true. She is pressuring me to marry her. So, I feel pressured, and hemmed in, and uncomfortable. I feel as if I dislike Tiffany."

  "And?" Griffin asked puzzled, "what happened with you two? You lived together. You love her."

  "We lived together. I love somebody else," Marcus said. "The girl I love has deleted me from her life, blocked my calls, my emails, everything. She has moved on."

  Griffin stopped. "So you have one girl pregnant and you love another?"

  "Something like that." Marcus slowed down and started stretching. "I can't move on. I feel like I am stuck in a rut. I need to do the honorable thing and marry Tiffany and live with her and the new baby, but I can't. I can't even get back my memory. I get little flashes of my six months but they are just flashes. Like, I remembered something from my trip to Africa. I remember the Cape in South Africa. I was looking at some lavender flowers and thinking about Deidra."

  "Her name is Deidra?" Griffin asked contemplatively. "Deidra what?"

  "Durkheim." Marcus sighed and stretched his hamstrings. "I have not managed to shake Deidra from my mind. I don't know. Maybe she is killing my career."

  "Is she related to Senator Durkheim?" Griffin asked interes
tedly.

  "Yes." Marcus nodded and then straightened up. "That's her."

  Griffin indicated with his head to the track. "Do a practice run for me. Ease back into it. Do a light jog."

  Marcus shook his head. "Maybe tomorrow. I am not feeling so well today."

  Griffin sighed. "Ah, come on, Marcus. We have a lot of work to do and we really need to get you back in running shape. A practice run is all you need to unlock this psychological block."

  Marcus looked at the track and shook his head. "I'm serious about not feeling well, I'll try again tomorrow. My legs feel fatigued."

  "No. It's your head that's fatigued." Griffin huffed. "I am going to have to book you with a psychiatrist if this fatigue doesn't work itself out."

  "No," Marcus shook his head. I just need Deidra. He didn't say that out loud though. He didn't even know why his mind thought it.

  "Well something has got to be done," the coach growled. "I'll keep in touch."

  He stomped off and Marcus watched him, willing his feet to run around the track. He could run. He did it on the treadmill in the rehab gym, but he couldn't make himself run now. He walked off in the direction of his coach, albeit with less of a huff.

  *****

  His phone rang when he was in his car, ready to back out of the parking lot.

  "Hey man." It was Norman. "What are you doing today? Still at rehab?"

  "Nah," Marcus said, "just finished a session."

  "Want to come to Sheena's birthday party?"

  Marcus grunted. "I don't feel like hanging out much."

  Norman hissed his teeth. "Man, I am not used to you and this antisocial attitude since the accident. You need to get out more."