Painted Passion

by Latisha Brandon

  Ashlyn screamed to get his attention. She recognized the look on his face. He was just getting started. “Kevin, that’s enough. Mom, what has come over you?” She looked at her mother in disbelief. “Apologize to Kevin.”

  “Save it. Keep your apology. It’s not warranted. You were simply stating how you feel. Any apology from you would be hypocritical.” He was so calm, as if he had come to some profound decision and could live with the consequences.

  “Of course she has to apologize. Her belittling remarks have gone on long enough.” Ashlyn felt hot, agitated, and her phone wouldn’t stop vibrating. She read the screen, instantly recognizing the number. She answered, wondering why Kevin’s father was calling her and not Kevin.

  Ashlyn walked away from the silent and seething table, answering the phone. “Hello.”

  “Ashlyn, thank God. Where’s Kevin? I’ve been trying to get in contact with him for two days.”

  “Kevin’s right here. Is everything okay?”

  “No, it’s not. I need to speak to him.”

  Ashlyn walked around to his side of the table. It felt as if she were crossing a gulf. She handed him the phone. “Kevin, your dad needs to speak to you. He’s been trying to reach you for two days.”

  His fingertips grazed the softness of her inner palm and he let his fingers linger.

  She stood by his side as he spoke to his father, reading the expressions on his face.

  “Hey, Dad, what’s up?”

  “Boy, I’ve been trying to find you for two damn days.”

  “I know you haven’t been able to contact me, but you have no idea what I’ve been dealing with here. I plan on flying out tonight.”

  She didn’t hear the rest of the conversation. She quit listening when she heard he was leaving. He’d never even told her. How could he leave without telling her, his wife? She felt betrayed and angry. But she realized most of the anger was geared toward her mother. Ashlyn’s head flew up at the added volume and frantic note in Kevin’s voice.

  “What? No…no…that’s impossible! I just spoke to Calvin!” Kevin yelled.

  Ashlyn searched her brain for a reference to Calvin. She remembered him, a childhood friend of Kevin’s. He’d moved to Philly from Oakland. He was the one who taught Kevin to board. He was also the one Kevin was riding with when he was arrested. Calvin had stolen the car and fled the scene.

  “A gunshot wound…to the head? Armed robbery?”

  Ashlyn could only hear Kevin’s side of the conversation.

  “When’s the funeral? I’m on my way. Tell his moms not to worry about the cost, I have everything covered.” Kevin paced the long length of the room, ignoring her and her parents. “She shouldn’t worry about the mortgage or the car note,” Kevin reassured his father. “I’ll take care of everything.”

  Ashlyn knew Calvin didn’t work. So how had he been able to assist his mom with the mortgage and the car note? Illicit means, obviously. How different Kevin’s beginning was from hers. That could have easily been him shot dead over money that belonged to someone else. She wondered what had pushed Calvin to go the opposite way from Kevin. She’d never met Calvin. Kevin had sheltered her from him, just like her parents. Did they all believe her so weak? She wanted to walk out and leave them all there to rot in their self-righteousness.

  She loved Kevin, but he was temperamental, and a know-it-all. It was forever his way or no way. She understood why, but he needed to understand that she had existed thirty-three years without him.

  She loved her mother, but her mother hid behind her fear. She loved her father, but he, because he loved his wife, took her side.

  A person Kevin had known for the majority of his life was now gone, banished to some distant heaven or hell, annihilated in the blink of an eye. The next time Kevin saw Calvin he would be in a coffin, surrounded by funeral flowers. They had grown apart over the last few years, but they still kept in contact. When LBK Boarding was getting off the ground, Kevin had invited Calvin to Burlington to be a part of the business, but he had declined.

  He’d told Kevin he was handling his business at home. Kevin knew his business was illegal, but he’d stopped lecturing Calvin a long time ago; it did no good. It eased Kevin’s mind and soul to hear from him every few weeks, to know that he was at least breathing. The numerous times he had been caught and imprisoned, Kevin sent him commissary money and had visited. Kevin didn’t know how a man could survive behind bars. The air was tainted…it corroded the brain.

  He ended the conversation with his father, sliding back into his seat. His head was throbbing, and Kathryn was making it worse by boring holes into his skull. He knew Ashlyn hovered at his shoulder, at his back.

  She touched him, rubbing in soothing circles. She had a touch that could bring him to his knees. “Let me pack my bags and we’ll leave. I’ll help make funeral plans.”

  “Absolutely not. You will not leave the peace and security of your home to traipse off to some thug’s funeral. Have you lost your mind? You just got home. Let Kevin go.” Kathryn continued to drink her coffee, trying to hide the trembling of her hands. If Ashlyn left now, months, if not years, would pass before they saw her again. If only she had come home alone.

  Kathryn hated airing dirty laundry before a stranger. She hadn’t been able to catch Ashlyn alone. She was too preoccupied with Kevin. “Ashlyn, you usually stay through New Year’s. This year shouldn’t be an exception.” Kathryn gestured to Kevin. “How much do you truly even know about this person? Obviously, he associates with known criminals. The funeral is probably going to be full of the parasites.”

  Before Ashlyn or her father could put Kathryn in her place and defuse the situation, Kevin jumped up, knocking the heavy wooden chair against the wainscoting. The loud boom resounded through the room. “Why are you so cruel?” Kevin demanded of Kathryn. He turned to Ashlyn. “I’m leaving. Forget your bags. Let’s just walk away and not look back. We cannot exist with her standing between us.”

  Ashlyn raised her hands, trying to get cooler heads to prevail. “We all need to calm down. Dad, could you please take Mom and leave Kevin and me alone for a moment?”

  Kathryn walked to where they stood. “No, I refuse to exit so he can talk you into leaving.”

  Liam grasped Kathryn’s elbow, gently talking to her. “Come on, Kathryn, give them some time. Kevin has just lost someone important to him.”

  Kathryn refused to be dragged from the room, so she exited with her head held high, telling Ashlyn as she left, “You have twenty minutes and then I plan on returning.”

  Kevin turned to Ashlyn. “There’s nothing for us to discuss here. Let’s just go.”

  “The entire point of us coming here was for you to get to know my parents.” The very idea of leaving without resolving the issues with her parents caused her panic.

  “Your mom doesn’t want to get to know me. She assumes she already does. Every negative statistic about black men she ever read or heard she believes sums me up. Wake up…it’s either her or me!”

  Would love place her in such a precarious place? “How could you ask that of me?” Yes, she loved him, but he expected her to walk away from her mother. She would never ask that of him. She believed he was being selfish.

  Kevin gazed at her as if he could not believe her stupidity. “How could I ask? I can ask because I’m your future. You exchanged vows with me, not your ignorant, class-driven mother.”

  “Now you want to remember your vows. What about your vows when some woman was standing over me? What about your vows when you left me standing on the steps and you ran to the third floor like a child? What about your vows then? You’re a damn trip. Throwing vows up in my face! This is my mother we’re talking about.” Ashlyn cut him with her eyes.

  “Your mother is a menace, and you’ve been taking her side since we arrived.”

  “You’re being ridiculous, and I refuse to even dignify that statement with a reply.” Ashlyn began running her fingers through her hair in agitation, hairpins
pinging against the floor. She unbuttoned the top two buttons of her shirt and discarded the corded green sweater.

  “What’s ridiculous is the fact that you’re still trying to please your mother. That old bat will never be satisfied until she has driven a wedge between us. She will never accept me as your spouse.”

  “You have to be patient and give her time. This,” Ashlyn waved her hand between the two of them, “was not expected, Kevin.”

  Kevin walked toward the door. “I have no more time to give. From the very beginning I’ve had to chase you, break down your walls, apologize profusely, and the last straw, deal with your neurotic mother.” Kevin thought Kathryn belonged on medication.

  “What does that mean?”

  “It means screw it…I’m out! You leave with me now, or I’m washing my hands of the entire experience.” Kevin couldn’t let Ashlyn know how hurt he was by her defense of her mother. He would never let his father, his brother, or any of his friends say one negative thing about Ashlyn. Why couldn’t she simply say I love you and leave with him? She was clinging to the past.

  “Do you honestly believe I’m going to walk out of this house with you and your nonchalant attitude? How do you chalk a marriage up to a loss? What are you going to do, walk out and go back to dating ‘actresses’ and centerfolds?” Tears were streaming down her face, but he acted as if he didn’t see. Right now all she could see was the stereotypical male who jetted without a care in the world.

  Kevin went for the jugular. “If I have to.” He felt her pain, but he delayed a reaction to it, just as he had when his mother died. If he let his reaction show she would see him fall to his knees. His pride wouldn’t allow it, so he blocked out her gut-wrenching sobs and said, “I’ll see you in about five and a half months.”

  “Go…leave…I knew you would eventually desert me. Screw as many chicks as you can sustain. I took you at your word, but your word is worthless.” Ashlyn was still screaming even after he left. “You’ll be seeing me even before five months. If you think I’ll slink away into the back of your mind and suddenly reappear when it’s time for me to give birth then you’re a delusional fool. I loved you.”

  * * *

  “There, there, Mama is here now. Dry your eyes, there’s no need to cry. He’s gone now.” Kathryn offered her daughter the comfort she believed she needed after making such a horrendous mistake and marrying a man she barely knew.

  Quietly Ashlyn sat at the white vanity in her room, the same place she’d slept as a child. She hardly recognized herself in the mirror. How far from grace she had fallen. Her mother picked up the silver-backed brush from the table. When Ashlyn was a child her mother would brush her hair every night while telling her a bedtime story. She felt the bristles touch her scalp and it sent a shockwave through her brain.

  Ashlyn knocked the brush to the floor. “I’m no longer five, and this isn’t going to end pretty.”

  Her mother recoiled. But Kathryn was never one to give in easily. “I asked your father to start the divorce proceedings.” She spoke as if Ashlyn were not standing before her seething.

  “There won’t be an annulment or divorce.” Ashlyn walked to the phone beside her bed and dialed a zero. Smith answered and Ashlyn told him, “Smith, have one of the maids come and pack my luggage. I’m leaving. The sooner the better. Please make me a reservation at Hotel Allegro. Thank you.” She chose it because it was eco-friendly and luxurious.

  She would go there and lick her wounds at night and walk the Chicago Loop during the day. Maybe she would relocate and come home to be closer to her family, especially her father. Her mother obviously was losing her mind. Ashlyn wouldn’t hesitate in having her committed.

  However, she didn’t want to leave Atlanta. She had family and friends there: Bernie, Dawn, Haile and Laney, William, Makayla. Makayla loved Chicago, especially the jazz clubs. Nevertheless, she would put up a fight if Ashlyn decided to come back. Ashlyn thought about irrelevant things so she wouldn’t focus on the fact that her husband had just left, she was pregnant, and her mother was becoming someone she had little respect for.

  “What do you mean, no divorce or annulment? You cannot remain married to that person.”

  “That’s exactly what I mean. No divorce, and if Kevin thinks he can sever this union by serving me with divorce papers, then he has another think coming. I will drag the process out in litigation for years.” Ashlyn stiffened her spine and her legs. She couldn’t afford to break down now. She was afraid she had chased him away. She should have left when he asked. Damn, she was so alone, and the only man she ever truly loved had just fled.

  “Ashlyn, there’s no need for you to leave,” her mother whispered. “We have a lot to discuss.”

  “We do have much to discuss, Mother, like how you insisted I live in a colorless world,” Ashlyn shot back.

  “What do you know about trying to raise a child in a world divided?” Bitterness fueled her words. She looked at Ashlyn as if she were naïve.

  “I know you should’ve stood strong and protected me, yes, but not hidden me away.”

  “Have you ever been called out or spit on by a person who looks like you? Have you ever had to throw yourself in front of a loved one to protect them from an attack? Have you ever been sneered at? Stood by while your child was jokingly but cruelly called albino, or any other unimaginable name? What do you know of being thought of as the maid or nanny when your child’s skin is not like yours?” She’d waited too long to have this talk with Ashlyn, but better late than never.

  “I recently had a woman call me a partial.” A bit of righteous indignation seeped out of Ashlyn. Her mother looked aged and frail.

  “And how did you handle it?”

  “I knocked her on her ass,” Ashlyn candidly told her mother.

  “Oh, Ashlyn…fighting…you’re just like your father. I raised you to be a lady. A lady fights with her words.” Kathryn sat in a chair before the lit fireplace, patting the seat opposite her for Ashlyn.

  Ashlyn sat with her mother, turning toward the fire. “And sometimes something heavier than words is needed. I refuse to be a doormat. You never gave me enough credit,” she mumbled with a great deal of sadness. “Kevin is the same way. I’ve always been a fighter, and I don’t just mean physically. There was no need for you to cower.

  “I’ve been to places and seen things that would give you nightmares. I’ve jumped feet-first into the world you have tried to hide me from and survived all it has to dish out.” She told her mother the things she had been holding back, feeling lighter with every word.

  “Is that why you married Kevin? To get back at me? Do you resent me so much?” Kathryn wiped the tears from Ashlyn’s face, pulling her red tresses behind her ears the way she did when Ashlyn was a child.

  “No, Mother, I don’t resent you, but I do resent the hell you’ve created in my marriage. I resent the fact that both you and Kevin asked me to do the unthinkable, to choose.”

  “Where are you going now?”

  “To give my father a proper goodbye. He doesn’t deserve to see me rush from the home he built for us. I held him at a distance in the past, but I won’t anymore.” Ashlyn kissed her mother’s cheek, bending so they were eye to eye. “I’m going home to Atlanta. I have a baby to plan for.”

  “Sassafras, you’re pregnant?” Kathryn held her, afraid to let her go. A grandchild. The ice in her thawed.

  “Yes, elatedly so, but I won’t have this child, or any other child Kevin and I have in the future, living in fear. So that means you’ll show the proper respect to Kevin, because he’s a permanent member of this family. I plan on filling this big, empty house with grandbabies, so get used to it.” Ashlyn could see a child with Kevin’s soulful eyes—Adara’s eyes—sliding down the stair railing, sliding on the marble floor in the foyer and attempting to climb the ladders in her father’s library.

  “Ashlyn, Kevin’s gone and he may stay gone.” Finally Kathryn realized the havoc she had caused in her daughter’s marri
age. She had been just as menacing as some people had been to her and Liam in their past. It was time for her to get out of Ashlyn’s life, or she would very rarely see the children Ashlyn and Kevin could potentially have.

  “Oh, no, he’ll be back, even if I have to drag him back,” Ashlyn said fiercely.

  EPILOGUE

  The brilliant orange sun sat in the center of the sky. The streets were bustling with activity, but his world seemed to be at rest. Could it be because his villa lay high in the hills? Green vegetation surrounded him. He hadn’t spoken to another soul in four months. Kevin scratched his chin, which was covered in a heavy beard. He hardly recognized himself. Gone were the fly GQ clothes; he had taken his life back to basics. He shocked himself by rarely eating meat. Sao Paulo was an artistic haven. He breathed in the fresh, unpolluted mountain air.

  His father called him a hermit. He couldn’t tolerate living anywhere else. He saw her image and felt her presence in every surface. In her fourth month she started sending him pictures, a visual diary. She was doing basic everyday activities, weeding the garden, taking Fancy on walks, cooking at the stove…decorating the nursery. The walls of his villa were plastered with those images. Kevin studied them for hours. The packages had begun showing up three months ago, along with his groceries. How had she found him? He’d told no one where he was.

  She sent him care packages containing scented oil and candles, her favorite music, books…sonograms. He turned the sonograms this way and that, trying to decipher the blurry image. The head appeared massive, the tiny fingers reaching.

  Kevin assumed she would cut him off at the knees for the cruel things he’d said. But she acted as if nothing had happened and he was away at war. What he was doing in actuality was hiding in self-pity and creating some of the best art to ever come from his fingers, coming from the weeping in his soul, the remorse in his mind, and the passion in his heart.