Secrets and Lies

by Annie Jocoby

  I put my bag down, and Luke did the same, and we then followed Michael into the living room. In the hallway leading from the kitchen to the living room there were pictures of the family. I stopped to look at one of them, and smiled as I recognized young Luke who looked to be about age 8 in the family portrait. In his mother, I saw where he got his eyes and his mouth. She had the same fascinating features as his son in this regard. Luke’s mother was a strikingly beautiful woman, and it dawned on me that I didn’t even know her name. Luke had only referred to her as his mother.

  Luke was standing right behind me as I gazed at the family photo. I touched it briefly and turned around. “Your mother was beautiful. What was her name?”

  “Olivia. Olivia Roberts.” He took my hand. “Come with me and meet the rest of the clan.”

  I took a deep breath and nervously followed him the short way into the small living room with the dark paneling and Berber carpet in white. There were four people sitting around a sectional couch. Two extremely handsome young guys who looked right around Luke’s age were sitting on the floor with their backs to the couch. One with short hair, one with longer hair, but they were clearly identical twins. The one with short hair, who I imagined was Mark, was dressed in a sweater and khakis. He had the same dark hair and dimples as Luke. The one with the longer hair, who was probably Chris, was dressed in a t-shirt and jeans, and tattoos covered his muscular arms.

  They both stood up when Luke and I walked in the room behind Michael, as did a beautiful woman who looked just a little bit older than Luke and the twins. Like everyone else, she had dark hair, but her eyes were decidedly brown, although there was a hint of green right around her pupils. She looked to be around 7 months pregnant. I would imagine she was Amy, although her husband didn’t seem to be around.

  The other woman on the couch remained seated, and eyed me warily. And, if Amy was beautiful, as were Mark and Chris, this woman was stunning. She surprisingly had on very little makeup, so her natural beauty shown through. She had chestnut hair that was faintly streaked with auburn highlights, and wore a tight cashmere sweater, black pants and high heeled boots. I surmised by her general attitude that this would be Serena. And she wasn’t really how I pictured her. I pictured somebody much more high-maintenance looking, as opposed to this naturally gorgeous woman who was sitting on the couch.

  Mark, Chris and Amy came over and gave me a hug after introducing themselves. Serena remained seated, looking at her nails.

  There was a chorus of “so glad to finally meet you!” “welcome to the family!” “your pictures don’t do you justice,” and other pleasantries, and I felt very welcomed by the three siblings, just like I had felt welcomed by Michael. And then I was urged to sit on the couch with them, an invitation that I eagerly accepted.

  As the three got to know me, peppering me with questions about how the bus ride was, how excited was I to be spending the holidays with the Roberts family, and other standard getting-to-know-you queries, Serena sat on the other side of the couch, not saying a word. I did see her eyeing me from time to time, while trying hard to look disinterested in it all.

  I glanced over to her, feeling uncomfortable that she was there, while not insinuating herself into the conversation, but Amy just waved her away. “Don’t mind her,” she said in a conspiratorially low whisper. “She’s in a pissy mood.”

  “I heard that,” Serena said. “And yes, I’m in a pissy mood. You would be too if your fucking husband just ditched you right before the fucking holidays.”

  Amy rolled her eyes, as did Chris. Of the three, Mark was the one who was just a little bit less effusive. He was friendly enough, but he seemed just a bit shy. Amy and Chris, though, treated me immediately like I was their best friend.

  After a little bit, Chris, Mark, Michael and Luke went into another room to play some foosball, which left Amy and I to sit and get to know one another, and we chatted like old girlfriends. But, after about twenty minutes of this, she was called away to pick up her husband, who was working on the docks that day.

  “Oh, crap,” she said, “I’m so sorry Dalilah, I have to leave. But I’ll be back in about a half hour or so.” She hugged me as she said “I’m so happy that Luke found somebody great. He so deserves it.”

  “That he does,” I said.

  I sighed as Amy left, and looked at Serena. She was glancing at me with a side-eye, one finger wrapped around her luxurious hair. She raised a single eyebrow, and I got up, uncomfortable, to try to join the boys in the foosball room.

  But, to my surprise, she got in her feet as well. I looked at her quizzically, and she stepped towards me and backed me up against the wall. She put both her hands on either side of body, and leaned down. “God, you are so sexy,” she said to me, as she planted a passionate kiss on my lips.

  I felt strangely drawn to her, as if she was catnip and I was a feline. So the kiss was titillating in a way that it shouldn’t have been and never was with Alaina. I momentarily lost my composure, before I pushed her away from me lightly.

  “What, you don’t swing that way?” she said. “I think you do. Maybe you have a best friend that you’ve experimented with. Huh?”

  I could feel my face flush warm. “No, I don’t swing that way,” I mumbled, knowing that she could clearly see that I was lying. And the fact that I was lying about that surprised me. I never thought of Alaina as being something that was a thing. In other words, I never thought that my flings with her meant that I was attracted to other women. But this woman...I shook my head. Luke had warned me that she was charismatic, beautiful and people were drawn to her. He didn’t warn me that she was quite this sexual, confident and bold. Not to mention apparently bisexual.

  “I have to find Luke,” I said, feeling my insides getting queasy. I gulped a little bit for air, and ducked underneath one of Serena’s arms and stumbled towards the bathroom. “After I use your bathroom.” I got through the bathroom door just as the puke came out of me. I barely got to the bowl on time.

  I looked up, and Serena was standing in the doorway. “Oh, come on. I’m not that repulsive. In fact, I think that you liked that kiss. I know you did. I could feel it.”

  I didn’t want to admit the truth, which was that her kiss was...not entirely unpleasant, and was just a little bit enticing. Much to my dismay. And I knew that my vomiting had nothing to do with her and what she did. She was magnetic. That was the only word that I could use to describe her. Magnetic.

  “No, it’s not you at all,” I said honestly. “I think that the traveling and meeting new people just...well, I think I might be a bit stressed out. More than I realized.” It was then that I noticed Luke was suddenly right behind Serena in the doorway, and he crouched down next to me, putting his hand on my back.

  “Dalilah, are you okay?” he asked. “You’re white as a sheet.”

  I nodded my head. “Yes, yes, I’m okay. I just need to lie down for a little bit before dinner, I think. All this traveling and everything that has been going on lately...I think that it’s all taken its toll a little bit.”

  At that, I went and laid down on the bed in “our” bedroom and turned out the lights.

  Chapter 38

  Luke

  While Dalilah slept in the next room, I entertained questions about her from my siblings. I worried about her a little bit, because she did look pretty pale, but I checked on her from time to time, and she seemed to be resting comfortably.

  I hoped that she didn’t catch a bug. That wouldn’t be the best way for her to spend her holiday, to say the least.

  “So, what do you think?” I asked them.

  “Cool, gorgeous, talented, smart,” Chris said. “What’s not to like?”

  At that, Amy came through the door with her husband, Jackson. She punched me lightly on the arm. “You did good with that one. She seems pretty awesome.”

  Even pop got into the act. “She’s a keeper.” And then he announced that Carolyn was on her way over to fix everybody Christmas Eve dinne
r.

  I looked around and saw that everybody seemed just as apprehensive as me. I felt like I was just a little bit less alone at that point, as it seemed that this was going to be a difficult adjustment for everybody. Especially Chris, who was staring down at the floor. I went over to him and put my arm around him, knowing what he was thinking. Because it was what he was always thinking this time of the year, and introducing a new woman into the mix no doubt made things worse for him.

  He had such a hard time with survivor’s guilt. No matter how much counseling he got, he could never understand why he survived and she didn’t. As much as I always wished that there was something that I could say or do, I knew that there just wasn’t.

  Chapter 39

  That night, after Carolyn made her introductions, and my siblings and I tried to make her feel welcome, save for Serena, of course, and Dalilah emerged from the bedroom after her nap, we all indulged in some Christmas dinner. This was our tradition, to have our big celebrations on Christmas Eve, which usually included all the standard ways of celebrating. Christmas dinner, followed by opening the presents and drinking some eggnog that was freshly prepared.

  Carolyn, for her part, seemed nice enough. And pop sure seemed happy. So, I warmed to her for that reason alone. I was starting to realize that wanting my pop to be alone, just because I couldn’t stand for anybody to replace my mom, was childish and silly. And it seemed that everybody else was good with her, too.

  Over dinner, pop asked me “so, Luke, how’s the art career going? Are you ready to join me on the boat yet?”

  I shook my head. “No, not any time soon. I’m going to still try to make a go of it.”

  Dalilah piped up. “And he will,” she said. “He’s going to be on everybody’s radar soon.” She and I had discussed, at length, the effect that Nottingham was going to probably have on my career, and that was something that we were going to have to strategize when we got back – how to get things moving again, Nottingham poisoning the well or no. It was going to be difficult, but not hopeless.

  I glanced at her, and she looked at me as she was about the drink her glass of wine. She took a sip, and then made a face and shook her head. She leaned over and whispered to me “this wine, it tastes funny. I think there might be something wrong with it.”

  I took a sip, and shrugged. “Tastes like white wine to me,” I whispered back. “Why? What do you think is wrong with it?”

  She shook her head. “I don’t know how to explain it, but it just tastes a little bitter,” she whispered, and glanced around, hoping that nobody was paying attention to what she was saying. “Do you mind drinking mine?”

  “Not at all,” I said, surreptitiously pouring her drink into my wine glass. I reached for the pitcher of water on the table. “Here, drink this instead. You’re probably still feeling a little queasy from earlier. I hope you’re not coming down with something.”

  “No, I feel okay,” she whispered. “Aside from the wine tasting funny that is.”

  I put my arm around her and put my hand in her hair. Amy looked at us both and smiled.

  Mark announced that he was accepted into a graduate program at UCSD for marine biology, and everybody cheered. “That’s great, Mark,” I said. “The Scripps program is an excellent one, I hear.”

  “It’s one of the best in the country,” he said. “And it sure will be nice to get away from these winters.”

  The dinner was delicious, of course, and, after the meal, Chris and I jammed on guitars in the living room, Chris having brought an extra guitar for me. We played standards that everyone knew, and everybody sang along. Even Serena, whom I caught watching Dalilah more often than I felt comfortable seeing.

  In all, it was a nice time. I caught up more with Chris, as I always felt just a little bit closer to him than to Mark. Mainly because Mark was always just a little bit standoffish. He did everything right, it seemed, and sometimes I felt just a little bit judged by him. Chris felt the same way, and it was harder for him, because Mark was his identical twin, so he really should have felt more connected to him than to me. But it was the other way around.

  “You doing okay?” I asked him, as we sneaked a few bong hits on the porch that night, after dinner and jamming. I looked behind me, and Dalilah and Amy were deep in conversation, while Serena was eyeing Dalilah and biting her lip. Hmmm, wonder what that’s all about. Serena was watching Dalilah the entire evening, and it just seemed a little off.

  “Yeah,” he said. “You mean about meeting Carolyn?”

  “Sure. And everything. I worry about you.”

  “Don’t. I’m doing fine. My band’s getting more gigs, and I swear, my song-writing has gotten fierce. At least, that’s what the guys tell me. I’ve learned to channel, man. Channel the darkness into my music. Grunge is making a comeback, too. Everything’s cyclical, and my music is going to be popular in another year or so. I’ve been watching the trends. So, yeah, I think I’m alright these days.”

  I nodded my head. “That’s good to hear. You know I’m rooting for you guys always.”

  “I know. Too bad you’re the only one. I swear, you’re the one person who gets me in this family. My own twin is such a fucking cop sometimes, you know? Man, we have such beatdowns with each other because I’m not living the life that he wants me to. Dad, too. They just don’t understand us artists.”

  “That’s the way it is, isn’t it? That’s why I’m so lucky to have found Dalilah. She gets it. She’s an artist, too, an amazing one. You should see some of the stuff that she has painted.”

  Chris took another hit from the bong and blew the smoke out, and waved the air a little bit. “Yeah, you’re lucky. Peg and I, well, we aren’t exactly seeing eye to eye these days. She’s on my ass to get a real job, just like Mark. No, wait, Mark is on my ass to go to college and be like his clone.”

  We both started laughing. “Oh, how much we have in common,” I said. “Get a real job, quit wasting your life, settle down, have a family,” I said in a mocking tone. “Well, I’m on board with the settling down and having a family part, not so much on the getting a ‘real job’ part.”

  We fist bumped and Chris said “Well, I think it’s time to socialize a bit more. I’m leaving a couple of days after Christmas.”

  “I think I’m leaving a day before you.”

  Then we went back in and everybody opened their presents, and then Dalilah and I announced that it was time to hit the sack.

  When we got back to our room, and both of us took off her clothes and got into bed, Dalilah said “so, what do you think about Carolyn?”

  “Nice, I guess.”

  “You’ve having a hard time of it, aren’t you?”

  I sighed. “It’s that obvious, is it? I’m sorry, Dalilah, I know that I’m selfish here. But I just don’t want pop to forget my mom. I mean, next thing you know, there’s going to be pictures of my pop and Carolyn on the walls, and none of my mom. It will be like she never existed. That doesn’t seem fair to me.”

  Dalilah stroked my hair. “I understand, Luke, and that’s a pretty common thing. Not wanting the parent to be erased. But what is the alternative? Your father living the rest of his life alone? As much as you don’t want to think of him with another woman, you also can’t expect him just to be celibate and miserable for the rest of his life. He deserves love and happiness, too.”

  “I know that, intellectually. But I can’t help how I feel. I just need some time, I guess, to adjust to all the changes there. He did kind of spring this on me and my siblings. They seem as bothered by it as I am.”

  “Of course, you need time. For what it’s worth, Carolyn seems like a great woman, and she really seems to love your dad. So, I hope that you can find it in your heart to accept her and accept her new role in your family and in your dad’s life.”

  “I will, Dalilah, I promise. I’m not that immature. But sometimes, I just want her back. I mean, I always do, but sometimes it just seems more acute. There is such a hole in my heart, a
nd it just hurts to see another woman trying to fill it.”

  After a few minutes, Dalilah broached another subject, and, quite frankly, surprised me. “Serena. You never told me she was bisexual.”

  I nodded in understanding. So that was what that whole thing was about. “Oh. I’m sorry for not bringing that to your attention. I guess I don’t really even think of her as being bisexual, so much as she just makes her way through just about anybody attractive that she can find. If that makes any sense.”

  “Yeah, that makes sense.”

  “Why, what happened?”

  “She kissed me.”

  I raised an eyebrow. “Do you want me to kick her ass?”

  Dalilah smiled. “No, of course not. But I think that you might be wrong about her. You’re a little close, so maybe you just think that she’s completely conscienceless and remorseless about her behavior. I sense that she’s more human than you might think.”

  “Why do you think that?”

  “I don’t know. I just get the feeling. She has human emotions, but they’re buried deep behind her wall. I feel badly for her, really.”

  I put my arm around her and brought her closer to me. “My Dalilah. Always seeing the good in people.” I felt my erection growing, and pulled away from her. I didn’t want to be disrespectful and fuck my girlfriend there under my pop’s roof, but, boy, was that difficult to do.

  Dalilah smiled. “Perhaps sleeping naked wasn’t such a great idea.”

  I kissed her. “Oh, what the hell. Nobody’s going to know,” I said, as I entered her slowly. “Just a quickie.”

  Of course, our “quickie” lasted the rest of the night.

  Chapter 40

  Dalilah and I stayed a few more days at Pop’s house, and I realized, by the end of the vacation, that I was actually happy that Pop and Carolyn were together.