by Jewel E. Ann
“Rodney, help me get him up.” My mom presses a napkin to Kai’s face.
My dad shakes his head. I’m sure the only reason he helps Kai up is so he won’t have as much blood to scrub out of the grout later.
I look around, but I can’t find Oliver. “Oli?” As I start toward the stairs, I see him coming down them with his bag in hand. “Where are you going?”
He pulls his wallet out of his pocket and hands me a fifty. “Here’s some money for the train.”
I don’t take it. “What are you doing? I don’t want your money. Where are you going?”
“Home.” He keeps walking.
“I don’t understand. You’re just leaving me here?”
“Yep.” He opens the front door and heads to his car.
“Oliver, stop!”
He shoves his bag in the backseat and then gets in the driver’s seat.
“Stop!” I grab the door before he shuts it.
“I’m so sorry. Kai’s an asshole. But I stuck up for you, for us. Why are you leaving and punishing me?”
He rests his hand on the top of the steering wheel while looking out the windshield. His unwillingness to look at me is painful. “You told him I’m married. You told him Caroline is in a mental hospital!”
I jump at the angry snap of his voice. “I didn’t.” I shake my head and wipe a few errant tears.
Now he glares right at me. “Bullshit! I’m sure you couldn’t wait to call him after you got out of the hospital.”
“I’m not lying. I didn’t tell him.” I keep shaking my head like this is a bad dream. “Alex must have told Sean and he probably told Kai, but it wasn’t me.”
“It doesn’t matter. It’s none of their business, it’s none of your …” He pauses.
“Excuse me!” I draw in a deep breath. “It’s none of my what? Business?”
Oliver closes his eyes and shakes his head.
“You have some nerve. I was in the freakin’ hospital! Broken in every sense of the word thanks to you keeping your past hidden from me. So excuse the hell out of me for confiding in Alex. But don’t you dare invite me into your bed and tell me you’ll do anything for me then turn around and say it’s none of my business.” I slam his door and start walking down the street because there’s no way I’m going back in the house with Kai and my parents.
“Vivian!”
I keep walking.
“Stop.” Oliver catches up and steps in front of me.
I stop. “You’d better knock me off my feet because right now anything less than that isn’t going to work. I’m so sick of everyone making me feel like the pain in my heart caused by other people is somehow my own fucking fault. It’s not my fault I have this embarrassing, mauled skin on my back that makes me look like a mutant. It’s not my fault you have a wife and didn’t tell me. And it’s not my fucking fault Kai told everyone tonight!”
There’s an echo of several dogs in the neighborhood barking. I’m sure my outburst has riled them up.
“You’re right.” Oliver sighs with downcast eyes and a sullen face.
I wait.
Nothing.
“No.” I shake my head and start to brush past him. “Not good enough.”
“Wait.” He steps in front of me again.
I stare at his chest, clenching my jaw.
“I’m trying so hard not to regret my past, as awful as it’s been. But when I’m with you it’s so hard to do. I let my mind imagine a world where you’ve always been mine … a world where you don’t see your imperfections through his eyes, but your divine beauty through mine. Then I think of the pain that won’t go away … my pain, Caroline’s pain … Melanie’s pain. And I wonder if time was worth it. Can I be that person who doesn’t believe in divine purpose and meaning? Can I call fate bullshit and wish my child never entered this world because the pain with which she left it … left me is too great? I don’t know what to do with the pain and anger.” His voice breaks and so does my heart. “You’re the very best thing that’s happened at the very worst time. I feel like I’m in the middle of the ocean and you’re my life raft, and sometimes I get so frustrated that we’re not making it to safety fast enough. I find myself blaming you for it, but it’s only because I fear my weight, the weight of my past, is going to take us both under.”
He cups my face with gentle, loving hands, and tilts my head up. “What if we’re sinking?”
I place my hands over his and close my eyes to the anguish etched in his face. “What if we’re not?”
*
I let him go back to Cambridge, not because I want to, just because I need time alone with my parents.
“Young lady, where have you—” My mom pauses as I close the front door and look at her with red swollen eyes.
“Can you just…” I wipe away my tears “…treat me like an adult for once. I need a friend more than a mom right now. So can you? Can you be both tonight?”
My dad hugs me and kisses the top of my head then does the same to my mom before going upstairs. She looks at me for a moment then nods and opens her arms. I fall into her embrace and weep. All of the emotions I can’t share with Oliver come pouring out—the fear that we could be sinking, the insecurity of knowing that he has a wife and it’s not me, the meaning of what I saw behind the locked door.
“You love him.”
I nod between sobs.
“Tell me about his wife.”
“I-I don’t know. They l-lost their b-baby and she went ins-sane or something.”
“Oh, Vivvy … he had a baby?”
I sniffle. “A daughter … Melanie.”
She leads me into the kitchen and I sit at the counter while she makes us tea. “He’s leaving his wife for you?”
I shake my head. “He filed for divorce before we met.”
“Why?”
I suck in a shaky breath. “That’s just it. I don’t know and I’m so afraid to ask.”
“Does he see her much?”
“She’s in Portland. That’s where they moved after he graduated from Harvard.”
She hands me a cup of tea and sits across from me. “What happened to Melanie? SIDS?”
I shrug. “I don’t know. I haven’t found the courage to ask him. But I have this very unsettling feeling it wasn’t SIDS.”
“What makes you say that?”
“I don’t know it’s just a … feeling.”
“Can I give you some advice as both your mother and a friend?”
I nod.
“Ask what you need to ask and decide sooner verses later if you can make the time and emotional investment in Oliver and his past. You have two years left of school and I’d hate to see anyone or anything derail your dreams.”
I grimace. “Yeah, about that …”
Chapter Twenty-Three
Ripped Open
Oliver
I offered to stay, but she told me to go. Leaving felt cowardly, like I was abandoning her in the middle of a huge mess. Kai has impeccable timing. Of course I know it’s not fair to blame him for the timing of his sister’s death, but nonetheless it dragged Vivian away on my birthday. His announcing my wife to her family on her birthday … unforgivable. He must like having my fist stamped on his face. Dear God I hope Vivian is too smart to give him another chance.
“What’d you think of her parents?” my dad asks as we row along the river just after sunrise.
I grunt as my oars grab the water. “I like them. They’re a little overprotective, but I suppose that’s to be expected since she’s an only child.”
“Yeah, that and I’m sure they feel responsible for her burn accident. Every parent feels responsible for what happens to their children even if they have no control over it.”
I nod but don’t respond.
“Shit! Oliver, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to—”
“No, it’s fine. I … I know what you mean.” I stop for a moment and sigh. “It’s probably about time for me to stop expecting everyone to act like my li
fe in Portland didn’t exist. Vivian knows part of it and when she gets home later I’m going to tell her the rest.”
“Oliver that’s … Have you talked to your mom about this?”
I shake my head. “I trust Vivian. I don’t need Mom to tell me if or how to tell her. This is something I have to do by myself.”
“What about Caroline?”
I shrug, trying to dismiss the tensing hatred that takes over my body every time her name is mentioned. “What about her?”
“You’re still married to her. Responsible for her.”
We pull the boat out of the water. “No, I’m not. She’s Doug and Lily’s problem, not mine.”
“Oliver—”
“The papers have been filed, and it’s just a matter of time before it’s official.”
“You loved her once.”
“Dad! I’m not doing this with you!” I slam my oars in the boat.
He rests his hand on my shoulder. “I just want you to be prepared for the unexpected. You’re a lawyer. I shouldn’t have to tell you that circumstances can change.”
Resting my hand on my hip, I look at my feet and nod with a sigh. “I know.”
*
From my dad’s lips to my life, what are the chances? There’s a message on my phone after I get out of the shower. Doug Welch, my soon-to-be ex-father-in-law wants to talk to me. He has a favor, but he wants to talk in person, as if I have time to fly across the country on a whim. Not happening. I delete the message.
Vivian will be back in a few hours. That gives me a small window in which to get my shit together. I promised her answers and that’s what she’s going to be expecting. The door upstairs has to be opened and I need to face my fears … face my reality. The problem is I can’t get the sound of Doug’s voice and his message out of my head. What’s his favor? Why does he think we have to talk in person?
It may only be nine in the morning, but I think this day calls for an exception so I grab a beer. Three beers later I pour a glass of Jack and head upstairs. Inverting the cobalt vase, I wait for the key to fall out. Nothing. Where the hell is the key? I try to turn the knob, but it’s locked so I bang on the door … The door that I’ve not wanted to open, until now. I step back and kick it, but it doesn’t budge. It’s possible the alcohol is robbing my strength or my common sense.
Pulling my phone out of my pocket, I call Chance.
“It’s nine-thirty on Sunday, dipshit, what do you want?”
“I need an ax.”
“Okay, Paul. Shall I bring my blue ox too? What the hell do you need an ax for?”
I lean back against the wall and slide down while laughing. “Funny, you’re real funny today.”
“Jesus! You’re drunk and it’s not even ten o’clock.”
“Yeah, well what’s that saying? It’s five o’clock somewhere.”
“She dump you again?”
I empty the last few drops of Jack into my mouth. “Who?”
“Viv.”
“No. Why?”
He chuckles. “Uh … no reason. I’ll be there in twenty minutes.”
After two trips back downstairs to refill my rocks glass, I come up with a brilliant idea. I bring the bottle upstairs with me. Genius … pure genius. My Harvard education is totally paying off.
“Yo, Bro … where are you?”
“In my house.”
Chance chuckles, coming up the stairs. “No shit.”
“Where is it?”
“What?”
I sigh. “The ox, stupid … I—jeez, I mean the ax.” I purse my lips together and squint at the door. “Although I bet an ox could take that door down too.”
“What’s behind the door? Dude! You have a fucking dead bolt on the door. What on Earth?”
I let my head thump back against the wall and close my eyes. “I know. I’m pretty messed up. Don’t tell Mom.” I laugh.
“Where’s the key?”
“It’s in my pocket. I just thought it’d be more fun to bust it down with an ax.” I think my speech slurs, or maybe it’s just my hearing making everything sound slow and muffled. My eyes are so … very … heavy.
“Oliver?”
I’m tired … too tired.
“Oliver?”
“Hmm?”
“What’s behind the door?”
The world’s fading … “Melanie.”
*
Vivian
A wispy, free feeling floats inside me on the train back to Boston. I had a transcendent moment with my parents yesterday. All my fears of how they would react to my lies and deception vanished. The words came to me without hesitation. I saw so much love and understanding in their eyes mixed with their own anguish and guilt. As much as I tried to convince myself that I was protecting them by lying about college, the truth is … I was protecting myself. I didn’t want to face their disappointment in themselves for not making enough money, or watch them continue to feel pity for me. The tears were plentiful, the moment was raw, but in the end everything was out, and I feel closer to my parents than I have ever felt before.
Now I’m dying to see Oliver. I miss him. All I can think about is leather work boots and his hot, naked body pressed against mine. His smile … I love his smile, especially when it gets so big both dimples appear. I’m sure if I could see past my complete infatuation with him, I’d see his flaws. Maybe he has some birthmark I haven’t discovered, or the veins in his hands are too prominent. It’s possible he walks pigeon-toed, but I haven’t noticed. Oliver can’t be perfect, I know that, but he’s perfect for me.
Chance’s truck is parked behind Oliver’s car on the street. Alex’s car is there too, so I decide to take my bags home since attacking my man in front of his brother might not be good etiquette.
“Hey, Flower! How was your weekend?”
I drop my bags on the floor by the stairs. “What are you doing?”
“What do you mean?” She glances over her shoulder at me.
“I mean, you’re cooking and…” I glance at the cooling racks filled with cookies. “…baking.”
“Yeah, so?”
I take one of the bite-sized sugar cookies and pop it in my mouth. “Are your parents coming or something?” I mumble over a mouthful.
“No. I’m just getting back into practice. I haven’t done much in the kitchen for a while.”
I raise a single brow at her. “You’re acting too weird, even for you. What’s going on?”
She turns and licks some cream sauce off her fingers, lingering when she gets to her left ring finger.
“Oh my God!” I grab her hand gawking at the huge princess-cut diamond.
“I’m getting married!”
I can’t peel my eyes off the mammoth rock. “Yeah you are. Holy crap, where did Sean get the money for this?”
“It was actually from a necklace that his grandfather gave his grandmother. Sean had it put into this platinum band. You like?”
I pull her in for a hug. “It’s incredible. I’m so happy for you.”
“Good, I hope you still feel that way when I tell you that you have six months to plan the best bachelorette party ever, Maid of Honor.”
“What, me?”
She rolls her eyes and turns back around to the stove. “Duh, of course you.”
“Why so soon? Are you pregnant? I knew that outfit-thingy he was wearing the other day would get you into trouble.”
“Yeah, Flower. I got pregnant on Friday. Saturday he drove to Jersey to get the diamond, had it mounted and sized on Sunday, and proposed right after I peed on the stick this morning.” She laughs. “No, I’m not pregnant. His older brother will be back from Africa for a week over Christmas. Remember I told you Dillon’s in the Peace Corps?”
“Yes, I remember.”
“Anyway, Sean decided he wanted to seize the rare opportunity of having his whole family here so he proposed.”
“So you’re not pregnant?”
She laughs again. “No, Flower, I’m not pregnant
. But you’d better make nice with neighbor boy because once I move in with Sean…” she turns and gives me a sly grin “…well, officially, then my parents are selling this place.”
“Speaking of neighbor boy. What the hell kind of birthday present was that supposed to be?”
“Ahh, it’s the deluxe version of the model I bought for you right after you moved in. I have one too. Isn’t it a-mazing?”
“Well, I wouldn’t know. Once it fell out of the sack and onto the floor in front of my parents and Oliver, I sort of lost the mood to try it out.”
“No way!”
“Way … as in way embarrassing. I’ve been having the best sex of my life so why did you think I would need that?”
Alex chuckles. “Flower, first, you’ve been having the only sex of your life, so technically it’s the best and the worst. Second, it can be used as an adjunct to all the kink you and neighbor boy have already been doing.”
I bite at the peeling skin on my lower lip. “That’s what Oli alluded to as well. So, how does that work. I use it in front of him? He uses it on me? I use it on him?”
“Yes, yes, and yes. You guys into anal?”
“What?” I gasp.
She shrugs while draining the pasta. “It was just a question.”
“Anal me or anal him … or … ugh, never mind! No to both anyway. How could you even ask me that?”
“Don’t knock it until you’ve tried it. Maybe you should watch a little guy-on-guy porn. It’s hot as in capital H.O.T. It might change your mind.”
“You are definitely Maggie’s niece. Are your parents into this stuff too?”
“Ooo, yuck, gross! Why did you say that? Now when I see them it’s all I’m going to think about.”
Yeah, like my images of her tied to her bed and Sean in chaps and a cowboy hat.
“Think about what? Your mom wearing a strap-on penis? ‘Spread ’em, Mark. You’ve been a naughty boy.’ ‘Harder, Annabelle!’”
“STOP!” Alex squeezes her eyes shut and sticks her fingers in her ears while stomping her feet.
I laugh. “That’s for not locking your door before the rodeo.” I steal another cookie. “I’m going to unpack then go see Oliver.”
