by GM Scherbert
Shaking those thoughts out of my mind, I look once again to Margaret and see again how lost and hurt she is. I fucked her baby boy. I didn’t know it was him, but none the less, I fucked him and even talked to her about it, about how I was falling for him, about the way he felt buried deep inside me.
As the tears start to fall, all I can think is I fucked her son and that is something that I can never take back.
Why wouldn’t he tell me? He had to have known, but he didn’t think that telling me who he really was, might be something that I was entitled to. As I sink back into my thoughts, I hear a knock on the door and know that the shit that just hit the fan, is only about to get a hell of a lot deeper.
Standing absentmindedly, I make my way to the door as the tears keep streaming down my face. Looking over my shoulder, I see that Margaret has made her way back into the living room. Opening the door before he can knock again I look up and hear, “Alexandra, what is it baby? Why are you crying? What happened to have you this way?”
I am at a loss for words as I hear Margaret’s voice from behind me. Looking around me, I see the recognition in his eyes as he sees her. Then I hear her begin, “Nick, you should go. She doesn’t need you to explain anything to her. She just needs to leave you alone.”
“Alexandra, I can explain.” Reaching out for me, I slap his hand away as he begs, “Please baby let me explain.”
“How could you? You knew the whole time, didn’t you? That’s why you knew those things about me, about us, about my family? Why you knew-”
“Baby, you gotta believe me, I was going to tell you. I didn’t lie to you ever, I just needed for you to feel the same way about me that I have always felt about you.” Taking a step towards me he reaches for me while adding “I love you, Alexandra. I always have.” Hearing those words for the first time from him, do not have me feeling at all how I would have thought they would. The pain that rips through me at the words, and his betrayal is more than I can bear. All I can do is turn away from him and make my way upstairs. I’m sure that Missy and Ivette are the two I can hear quick on my heels, but I just can’t. Not now. Maybe not ever.
I slam my door shut and lock it quickly before tucking myself into my bed and losing myself to the tears that overtake me. Thankful that it is Saturday and I won’t have to drag my ass outta bed until Monday morning- for school. I lose myself to the grief that I have not felt since I lost Shannon, the only other love of my life.
I crumbled in that moment. Missy and Ivette helped me that day and the next, but soon, they had to get back to their lives. Margaret left shortly after Nicholas did, and we haven’t spoken since. I don’t know what to say to her and it is killing me that my friend of twenty years is so fucking mad at me.
My life fucking fell to shit and I didn’t have anyone for these past weeks to talk about it with. I found myself going to Shannon’s grave and talking with him. I know that it is weird and that most people wouldn’t understand, but when you feel that connection with someone, you just do. I was lucky enough to find it twice. The first time lasted almost twenty years, while the second time lasted little more than a few months.
Returning to school and everyday life was getting better slowly for me. The girls noticed that something was wrong and had no problem asking questions about it.
There is one day, about six weeks after that day that I feel joy and hope for a short time. The day that I miss my period. My heart soars with the thought that I am pregnant again, and I know that the feelings I have, no had for Nicholas are not going away. The feelings are short lived when I make an appointment for a few days from then, with my OBGYN. She quickly dismisses my hopes.
“Ms. Huber, your pregnancy test came back negative. The blood work that we ran indicates that you’re going through menopause, so that is why your menstrual cycle might be off. So don’t worry, I can’t think that a pregnancy at this stage would be a planned or wanted thing,” with that comment my mind floats away.
The last three days I have hoped for nothing more than to be pregnant with his baby. Hearing only bits and pieces of the doctors next words, I think again of the man that has done little to leave my mind in the six weeks that he has actually been gone. I hear the doctor say something about how my menstrual cycles will not be regular during menopause and that my hormones and emotions will be all over the place as well. If I need to talk to someone about them, or medication she could recommend someone. With that, I get up throw on my coat, and head back home. Knowing that my self-depreciation needs to end sooner or later. Right?
I find it hard to get up and keep on especially after the doctors appointment, but know that Aubrey, Andrea, and Annabelle don’t need to have their momma fall apart again. What the fuck kind of strong example am I showing them? I am not showing them the woman that I would like for them to see. Hell the one that I would want them to see. No fuck that the one I want them to be when they get older. I know that the girls have been struggling with watching me crumble. More than two months after that day, and only a few short weeks after the doctor, they don’t hold back any longer.
“Mom, why have you been so sad lately?” Annabelle asks from across the table.
Andrea stops herself sort of shoveling more pancakes into her mouth before looking up at me and adding, “Mom, who do I gotta fuck up?”
Shaking my head at her bluntness, I can’t answer before the only other person at the table speaks. “Does it have something to do with Nicholas not being around? He calls all the time, you know that we know that something happened between you two right? We might be kids, but we are far from stupid. Just tell us what’s going on.” Aubrey demands only a week after that fateful day.
“Girls it is no worry of yours what is happening in my life. Yes, Nicholas and I are not seeing each other anymore, but it is fine. People come and go from your life. There is little to nothing that you can do to make people stay.” Leaning across the table and touching each daughter lightly on the hand, I make eye contact with each before going on. “I will say that there have only been two people in my life that I could see myself building a future with. One, of course, was your father. The other was Nicholas, and it just didn’t work out between us. I will feel better in time, but as with everything, time is all that can heal.”
Aubrey looks to me with her daddy’s eyes and I see the fight in her as she thinks about not saying what is about to come out. “Just say it my darling girl, I see the struggle that you are having, and I know that of all the things my girls are, afraid to speak the truth is not one of them.”
“Mom we have noticed that Margaret has not been coming around either. Is that because Nicholas was her son and she didn’t think it was right that you were with him?”
“Wait, you knew that Nicholas was her son?”
“Of course Mom, we grew up with him. He doesn’t look all that different from when he was little, well the beard threw me for a little, but once I heard him talk with you, it was like those years ago when he would always be around you.”
“What do you mean Aubrey? How was he around me?”
Andrea answers with a full mouth, “Mom, he loved you then, for fucks sake dad knew about it. He would follow you around, help with things that even dad didn’t want to do. As soon as we saw that devotion and dedication we knew who he was.”
“Why wouldn’t you tell me, or mention it to me?”
Aubrey answers first, “so you didn’t know who he was? You didn’t ask him his last name, and you were,” looking from Annabelle to Andrea and back to me, “intimate, weren’t you?”
Standing quickly, I ignore the question before making sure that each girl understands, “That is really none of your business.”
I stand and clear the dishes off of the table before turning back to them. “Now, up and at em’ ladies, we have lots to do today before we take Andrea to her basketball game tonight. Go get some sweats on and meet me in the yard, so we can get to cleaning it up before the snow starts to fly.” Clapping my hands toget
her I add, “chop, chop” to try and encourage them.
Seeing each in turn get up, come hug me and make their way upstairs, makes me so proud to be their mom. They each care so deeply and each have their own way to offer help to me. They shouldn’t have to, nothing in my life should affect them like this obviously has. I make a note to keep my spirits higher around them and to not let them see me so sad anymore, they are not here to support me.
Before I have the last of the dishes in the dishwasher, Aubrey returns. “Mom”
I turn towards her and see again the wheels turning. “What honey?”
“Just so you know, we all liked Nicholas, and didn’t care how young he was, or who he was. He made you so happy for the short time that you were together, and that is something that I don’t even think that dad would have a problem with.”
“Aubrey, please. Let’s not talk about this anymore. He is not in my life any longer, and the more you dwell on the past, the more you don’t move forward.” Hearing the other girls coming down the stairs, I wrap my arms around her before pulling back and kissing her on the forehead. “Honey, don’t worry about me, please. I’ll be fine. Now let’s get outside and get this lawn in order.”
I see his truck when we are outside, but I don’t think anything of it. I know that he has tried reaching out each and every day since that day. I know that at some point we will need to sit down and talk like adults, but it can’t be yet. I am still too vulnerable, too wrapped up in all the emotions that I wish would just stop.
He stays in his truck almost the entire time that we are out there raking, mowing, and getting the yard ready for winter. I know that I will not be able to ignore him much longer, even though the last weeks have gone by in the blink of an eye. As we finish up the yard work and the girls head inside to clean up and get lunch started, I decide now is as good of a time as any and head towards his truck.
He gets out of the driver’s seat before I can reach the truck, making short work of the distance between us.
“Alexandra” is out of his lips and before I know what happens, I am in his arms and crying.
I guess I am not nearly ready for this, for the feelings that are still raging between us.
FUCK!
Blubbering, I can barely get out the next words. “Nnnicholas, I can’t. I, I’m just not ready yet. We will talk, I promise, but I am not ready yet.”
“I’ll be here whenever you are, and Alexandra,” lifting my chin slowly, so our eyes meet, “I am nowhere near giving up on this.” Kissing me lightly on the forehead, I have to stop myself from melting into him.
Pulling back, I know that he is right. This thing between us is nowhere near done.
The next few months pass in a blur that was only rivaled once before in my life.
With that realization, six months to the day after I found out who Nicholas really was, five months after I found out I was not pregnant, and four months after the last time I saw him, I make a call that is long overdue. A call to the one friend, ugh if we are still that, that hasn’t talked to me since the day she found out who my Nicholas was. I, for one, don’t know if I can blame her.
Margaret agrees to meet me and we set up a meeting for later in the day. Throwing together an outfit and trying to do my hair and makeup so that it doesn’t look as if I haven’t been living just to get through the day, trying not to think, yet again, of the man that I can’t have.
I walk into the local coffee shop, I see her sitting at a table, looking her usual well put together self. As I reach the table she stands and throws her arms around me in a hug that I was not expecting.
“Fuck Alex. You look like you have been going through a rough patch these last few months. How much weight have you lost? I am just guessing that you haven’t made some big life changing routine differences and this is all over him. I’m sorry that you were so hung up on him.”
With a grimace at the mention of Nicholas, Margaret knows her mistake in an instant and apologizes.
I cut her off abruptly. “Margaret, please don’t. You should not be the one who is apologizing. I am the one that crossed the line, and that’s why I wanted to meet with you today.” Shaking my head slightly I correct myself, “No, that’s not right, this should have happened months ago, but it isn’t something that I was ready for yet.” Trailing off I add, “not sure if I am ready for it now.”
Looking down I see that she has already gotten coffee for the both of us. Sitting down, my nerves get the best of me and I cannot control myself from twisting my hands together on the table. Margaret reaches out catching one of my hands in hers, stilling them in an instant.
“Alex, come on you can talk to me. I should have reached out to you sooner, I just didn’t think that this would affect you in this way. You were so strong through everything with Shannon, I couldn’t believe that a brief time spent with someone would affect you the same way as when you lost your husband of almost two decades.”
Smiling I glance down at our joined hands, and squeeze it before beginning.
“It isn’t as simple as you would think, Margaret.” Thinking of him again, I shake him outta my thoughts before continuing. “That’s not why I wanted to meet with you though. Well, not really at least. I know that this all started that day, and I should have just came over to deal with it then. It has festered since then and that is where I went wrong.”
“Being with Nicholas, is not something that I would ever have thought is something that I would need to apologize for. I knew that being with someone that young was a stigma, although the fact that men can do it really fucking gets me. I just never realized that he was your son. If I would have, Margaret, please believe me I would have ended it. It never occurred to me who he was, well until I thought back on everything.”
“What do you mean, Alex? When you thought back on everything?”
“Little things really. How he knew which door we used to get into the house. The way he seemed to know about my favorite flowers, food, candies, everything really. I thought that he was just a really good listener, or I don’t know that he really was meant to be in my life because he just seemed to know things that most guys wouldn’t know, show me how much he cared, how much he showed me his feelings for me. That kind of stuff.”
“You mean that Nicholas and you were actually serious?”
“Yeah, well I was, I thought he was as well. I don’t know how he could have been if he was lying to me about something so big though. I guess I was wrong and he wasn’t as serious about us as I thought.”
We continue to talk and as the hours pass, we catch up on each other. After another month of weekly coffee dates, we find an understanding, talk of him has to be put aside, because me moving on, ha, is more difficult each time I hear mention of him.
Chapter 16
Nick
When I get the repeated calls from my father the evening after the day she finds out, I ignore them. I ignore them for the next few weeks as well, both his and my mothers. In my drunken stupor, thankfully, I have only tried to take one-woman home from the bar, and it didn’t go to fucking well, it probably didn’t help that I was completely shitfaced. When she was on her knees in front of me, all I could think about was Alexandra and that this was a poor fucking substitute. I got her up and out of my house before I could make a bigger mistake. I need to talk with Alexandra and try to get her to see how good we are together, how much I love her, and how much she loves me.
After two months, nothing stops my dad from coming to my door. I am in for the reaming of my life when he walks in and finds me halfway through yet another good bottle of whiskey. Whiskey that I have been working my way through a little too quickly for my liking, but it is the only way to get the thoughts of her and how bad I have fucked up to subside.
Only registering some of what my father says, I groan at his bombardment of questions. “What have you done, Nick? Mom, seems to think that Alex did something to you, but I remember the way that you used to follow her about.” Picking up
one of the many empty whiskey bottles in the trash, he slams it back down shattering it if not one of the other bottles before going on, “You loved her then, and I am sure that you love her now, looking at the amount of drowning in whiskey you seem to be doing.”
“Dad, I fucked up.”
“What did you fuck up so bad? Your mother and Alex haven’t talked in the two months since whatever the fuck happened! Your mom won’t even talk to me about it. She seems to think that I don’t understand what the fuck happened. And believe me son, I don’t fucking understand. Did you treat her like nothing more than a cheap fucking one-night stand? That seems the only thing that I can think of that would have them so fucking pissed. Why would you treat her like that? Didn’t we raise you-“
“Dad” comes out sharply as I think yet again of my time with Alexandra. “I am fucking in love with her. I didn’t tell her who I was and that is what she is punishing me for.”
“Why wouldn’t you tell her who you are? I’m sure you knew her in an instant, Alex has not changed much in the years since you have saw her last. You were always glued to her when you would go over there, I am sure she made quite the impressions on your younger years. She probably tattooed herself in your brain, if I had to guess”
“She sure as fuck did dad.” Pulling my shirt off and over my head, I turn and show him the ink that was added just a month ago. Two words that mean everything to me, fate and Alexandra. The words are unbroken, intertwined in an arc across my shoulders. I have to admit even in my stupor these last weeks, Gun did a fabulous fucking job on them, even though he hesitated tattooing her name on me.
Thinking back to when I got the tattoo, I remember telling him what I wanted and was glad he didn’t want to fucking talk about it. Well, other than to rib me about getting a fucking name tattooed on me, but I did the same for him when Sara left, so he owed me that at least.
