“How exciting,” Emily said, leaning forward. “So you’re really going to do it?”
“I’ll give it my best shot,” Mark said, nodding. “My friend said he thought it would fly…big-time.” He winked at Trevor. “I told him I’d already gotten a promise from a customer to buy a copy.”
“Yep,” Trevor said, then reached for another hamburger from the platter. “Good burgers, Mark. Finally.”
“The best things are worth waiting for,” Mark said, then looked at Emily, who immediately blushed a pretty pink and directed her attention to her plate.
They ate in silence for several minutes.
“I have news,” Emily said finally, feeling a chill course through her. “We’re all invited to the MacAllister July birthday party, Sunday at one o’clock. Jessica signed up for this month’s bash, but it’s being held at Grandma and Grandpa’s house.
“Jessica said everyone will be delighted to see you again, Mark, after all these years. You know, the MacAllisters who knew you when you looked…very…different than you do now?” She stared at Mark intently.
Mark frowned and nodded slowly. “Yes, I understand what you’re saying, but…”
“I can’t go to that party, Mom. I’m spending Saturday night at Jacob’s. It’s his thirteenth birthday and his folks are taking us to dinner and a movie, then on Sunday to a picnic at Water World. We bought Jacob’s present a couple of weeks ago, remember? I still have to wrap it, but you and Mark can go to the MacAllister party together so everything is cool.”
“Very cool,” Mark said. “Some things are worth waiting for, other things definitely shouldn’t, and won’t, be rushed.”
“Huh?” Trevor said.
“Yes, now I recall that you have plans for the weekend, Trevor,” Emily said. “I did forget, but that’s fine. The family will understand.”
And she understood, she thought, what Mark had just alluded to. He’d gotten her message. Well, she could view this as a temporary reprieve, she supposed. It was just that ever since she’d decided to tell Mark the real reason she’d broken things off with him after he went to Boston, the lie was suddenly so heavy, it seemed to be crushing her with its weight.
Even though Mark would never know how she felt, the old lie didn’t belong in what they were sharing in the present.
Saturday night, Emily thought. Trevor would be at Jacob’s house. She and Mark could be alone. On Saturday night, she would tell Mark the truth about the letter of lies she written to him over a dozen years ago.
Nine
On Saturday, Emily cleaned the house, shopped for groceries, then later in the afternoon went to a stationery store with list in hand and bought cards for everyone in the family who had a July birthday. As she selected the last one she needed, she stared into space.
How should they sign the cards? she mused. Would Mark feel uncomfortable about not having any to pass out to the birthday people if she didn’t include his name on the cards from her and Trevor? Or would it be presumptuous on her part to add his name? Well, phooey, she didn’t know. So, she’d just ask Mark what he wanted to do.
As Emily reached the door to leave the store, a man entered and immediately smiled at her.
“Hello, Emily,” he said.
“Oh, hello, Mr. Anderson,” Emily said. “I haven’t seen you in ages.”
“It has been a long time,” he said, nodding. “I’ve stopped in here to buy my wife an anniversary card. We’ve been married thirty-five years. I can’t believe it’s been that long.”
“How lovely. Congratulations.”
“Time has a way of flying by, doesn’t it?” Mr. Anderson said. “It’s seems like only yesterday that I was teaching English to you and your sisters, and this fall I’ll have your son in my class.”
“Really?” Emily said, smiling.
“Yep. I’ve seen the class lists for the new school year.” Mr. Anderson paused. “I was at the community pool the other day taking a dip, and I saw Trevor swimming. The boy is good, has real potential. That shouldn’t surprise me, I suppose, considering what a great swimmer his father was way back when. Mark Maxwell is the reason there are so many swimming trophies on display at the high school.”
He chuckled. “Trevor is the spitting image of Mark at the same age, too. Even if I hadn’t known all along that Mark is Trevor’s father, I sure would figure it out now by comparing the two in my mind.”
Emily felt the color drain from her face. “You’ve always known that Trevor’s father is… I didn’t realize that it was common knowledge that Mark…” Her voice trailed off, as her mind raced.
“Oh, I don’t know that it’s common knowledge, as you put it,” Mr. Anderson said. “Goodness, Emily, I hope I’m not speaking out of turn here, but you might recall that I was an assistant swim coach in those days. I had to earn extra money to feed our brood and took on that job. I knew you and Mark were going together, and you were always at the swim meets cheering him on. Mark left for Boston after graduation, you have Trevor months later and…”
He shrugged. “Seeing Trevor in the pool the other day was like a flashback. I can remember being sorry at the time that things didn’t work out for you and Mark. You two seemed so suited for each other, appeared to be so happy but… Well, you’re to be commended on doing a marvelous job of raising your boy alone, Emily. He’s a great kid and I’m looking forward to having him in my class.”
“Thank you,” she mumbled. “I must go. I’m running late. Happy anniversary. Bye.”
Emily managed to make it to her car on trembling legs that were threatening to give way beneath her. She slid behind the wheel and leaned her head back, taking several deep breaths.
During all those years that she’d hidden in her house getting fatter by the day, she thought frantically, the humanity beyond her front door had known that Mark Maxwell was Trevor MacAllister’s father.
She’d been so dumb, so naive to think that the people who knew her and Mark wouldn’t put two and two together. Heaven only knew how many people were aware of the true facts. There was no doubt in her mind that someone was going to spill the beans to Trevor. Somehow she had to convince Mark that Trevor had to be told by them that Mark was his father before someone else did.
When Mark had suggested that he and Emily go out to dinner since Trevor would be at Jacob’s birthday celebration, she had declined the invitation. Saying she had too much to catch up on around the house, she suggested that he come over about seven o’clock, and she’d watch him eat a dish of ice cream.
She really did have a lot to catch up on, Emily thought, as she heard Mark’s knock at the door that evening, none of which she wanted to discuss in a restaurant. Good heavens, she wished it was already tomorrow and the heavy-duty discussion was over, the chips having fallen where they may.
She opened the door and produced what she hoped was a passable smile as she greeted Mark. He entered the house, then turned to face her.
“What’s wrong?”
“Wrong?” Emily said, raising her eyebrows as she pushed the door closed.
“Hey, this is me…Mark,” he said. “I know you very well, remember? That was one of the phoniest smiles I’ve ever seen.”
Emily sighed. “You’re right. It was. I have a lot on my mind, Mark. Let’s go into the kitchen and I’ll serve up the ice cream I promised, then we’ll talk. We really do have to talk.”
“Forget the ice cream,” Mark said, frowning. “What’s going on?”
“Okay. Fine. Have a seat.”
Mark settled onto the sofa and spread his arms across the top as Emily sat down across the room in an easy chair. She drew a deep breath, let it out slowly, then related what had taken place with Mr. Anderson at the stationery store that afternoon.
“Don’t you see, Mark?” she said. “Someone is going to say something to Trevor that will make him take a closer look at you. If he figures out on his own that you’re his father the situation will be worse than it already is, which seems impossible
but it’s true. Trevor must be told the truth now.”
“Yes, I understand,” Mark said slowly, a frown knitting his brows. “I was so centered on when I wanted to tell Trevor that I’m his father that I didn’t think about anything else.”
“We’ve got to sit him down as soon as possible and tell him together. If you do it without me, Mark, Trevor will surely ask you why you didn’t marry me and take on the role of his father from the minute he was born.”
“And I’d tell him that it wasn’t possible because you no longer loved me,” Mark said, his voice rising. “Plus the bulletin that I didn’t even know he existed until I came back to Ventura for this visit. You don’t need to be there when I talk to him, father to son.”
“That’s not fair,” Emily said, her volume matching Mark’s. “Then Trevor will come to me demanding to know why I lied to him all of his life.”
“Which will be a legitimate question, don’t you think?” Mark shifted his arms to prop his elbows on his knees and make a steeple of his fingers. “I’d like the answer to that one myself. Just because you no longer loved me is no excuse for keeping the existence of my son a secret, not letting me know I had a child.”
“You don’t understand, Mark,” Emily said, shaking her head.
“You bet I don’t.”
“I…” Emily started, then stopped speaking as a chill coursed through her.
This was it, she thought. Truth time. Oh, God, she was so terrified.
“Mark,” she said, hearing and hating the quiver in her voice, “there’s something you need to know.”
“I’m listening,” he said, still frowning. “What is it that I need to know?”
“When…when I found out that I was pregnant, my first instinct was to contact you in Boston and tell you. I was so scared, felt so alone and… I must have picked up the receiver to the telephone ten times to call you, but I kept putting it back down.”
“Why?” Mark said, nearly shouting. “Why in the hell didn’t you tell me you were carrying my baby?”
“Because I loved you too much to do that to you,” Emily yelled, then drew a shuddering breath.
“What?” Mark said, his voice a harsh whisper.
“I loved… I loved you so much,” Emily said, her eyes filling with unwelcomed tears, “and I needed you here, with me, standing by my side as my husband, the father of our baby. But…” Two tears spilled onto her pale cheeks and she swept them away. “But I knew if I told you I was pregnant, you’d leave Boston and come right back to Ventura to marry me.”
“Damn straight I would have.”
“Oh, can’t you see?” Emily said. “I loved you beyond measure, Mark. If I had told you about the baby, you would have sacrificed everything you’d worked so hard for to be here with us. I couldn’t do that to you because I loved you too much to destroy what was then yours, what you’d earned the right to have.
“The letter was a lie. I told my family the same lie so my father wouldn’t go to Boston and bring you back here to marry me.”
“I don’t believe this,” Mark said, staring at Emily with an incredulous expression on his face.
“It’s true,” she said, fresh tears tracking her cheeks. “I kept our baby a secret from you out of love, Mark. Then the years went by and there was never a good time to tell you about Trevor because you were working so hard, making a name for yourself. What I did was done out of the deepest love for you, Mark, I swear it was. That’s what we can tell Trevor…together and…”
Mark lunged to his feet, and Emily jerked back in the chair at his sudden motion. He strode across the room, planted his hands on the arms of the chair and leaned down close to her to speak as she stared at him with wide, tear-filled eyes.
“How dare you have made that decision on your own,” he said, a muscle ticking in his jaw. “How dare you treat me like a child not capable of making my own choices. How dare you keep my son from me all these years based on what you call love.”
“I do love… I did love you,” Emily said, nearly choking on a sob. “That’s why I didn’t tell you about our baby, Mark. It was because I loved you so much that I kept silent and—”
Mark straightened and sliced one hand through the air. “Cut. Don’t say it again. It’s insulting my intelligence, and I don’t want to hear it repeated. You loved me? So you wrote me a letter saying you didn’t? You kept the existence of my son, my son, from me based on the fact that you loved me?
“Emily, you don’t know the meaning of love. Love doesn’t lie. Love doesn’t keep a father from his son.
“No, you don’t know how to love, never have and probably never will.”
“Mark…” Emily said, crying openly.
“I had the right to know about our baby from the very beginning, before he was even born, damn it,” Mark hollered. “I…am…Trevor’s…father, Emily.”
“But I…”
The front door burst open, and Trevor entered the house. He slammed the door closed behind him and curled his hands into tight fists at his sides. Mark spun around to look at him and Emily got to her feet, brushing past Mark.
“Trevor, what are you doing here?” Emily said. “You’re supposed to be at Jacob’s.”
“Jacob got the stomach flu,” Trevor said, his eyes darting back and forth between his mother and Mark. “His mom brought me home and said we’d try again next weekend and… I heard you yelling as I came to the door, Mark. I heard… I heard you say that you’re my father.”
“Trevor, honey, listen to me,” Emily said, taking a step toward him.
“Don’t you come near me,” Trevor said, his bottom lip trembling as he took a step backward. “You’re a liar, Mom. You told me my father was dead. You told me he was an angel in heaven. You told me I should never, ever lie to you about anything and now I find out that you…” He burst into tears. “I hate you, Mother. I hate you, I hate you, I hate you. I could have had a dad…a real dad…just like all the other kids, like Jacob, and…I’ll hate you for as long as I live!”
“Trevor, wait a minute,” Mark said. “Let’s talk this through and…”
“I hate you, too, Mark,” Trevor yelled. “You’re a liar, too, just like my mom. You came to town and spent time with me, did the swimming junk, and buddied up to me and…
“What were you doing, Mark? Looking me over, sizing me up, deciding if I was good enough for you to claim me as your son? Did I pass your tests, Mark? Well, you don’t pass mine. I don’t want you for a father and I don’t want you for my mother, Mom, not for another second of my life. I hate both of you.”
Trevor turned and ran out the door, leaving it open behind him.
“Oh, God, no,” Emily said, running to the doorway. “Trevor! Wait! Please, sweetheart. Let me explain why I…”
“Emily,” Mark said quietly, “let him go.”
She turned and looked at him, a stricken expression on her face.
“How can you say that?” she said. “He’s a little boy, a baby, who has just had his world as he’s known it his entire life destroyed. He’s hurt and angry and confused. We’ve got to go after him, bring him home, sit him down and—”
“He won’t listen,” Mark said, dragging one hand through his hair. “Not now. Not yet. Give him some space, some time alone to settle down, think about what he has just learned.
“I think all he heard was me saying that I’m his father. He’s going to have questions when he calms down and we’ll need to be here with the answers for him.”
“But…” Emily said, staring out the open door. “He’s out there somewhere crying and…”
“Close the door, Emily. Come on. Leave him alone for now.”
“No,” she said, shaking her head. “I’m going after him and tell him—”
“Tell him what?” Mark crossed the room and closed the door. “That you lied to me and then lied to him out of love? Whoa. Won’t that sound great? That you rewrote that line from the old movie and that love means you get to tell as many lies
as you want to? Yeah, right, the kid will really go for that malarkey…about as much as I do, which is not at all.”
“Damn you, Mark Maxwell,” Emily said, planting her hands on her hips. “You’ve made up your mind that I never loved you and now you won’t budge on the subject. Would you stop and think a minute? About what we had together back then, what we shared? Do you really believe that I was the kind of girl then, or woman now, who would make love with a man she wasn’t deeply in love with?
“I won’t stand here and remain silent,” she raged on, “while you insinuate that I was some cheap little floozy, who… No. I’ve struggled to get a sense of self, to nurture my self-esteem and, by God, you’re not going to destroy it by casting negative shadows over me, attempting to turn me into something that is less than who I am. No, no, no. Have you got that, buster?” Emily drew a much-needed breath. “Goodbye. I am going to go look for our…my son.”
“You love me, are in love with me…now?” Mark said, narrowing his eyes.
“What?” Emily said. “Weren’t you listening to a word I said? I was trying to get across to you that I loved you so much back when I discovered that I was pregnant that I made the decision…”
“Hold it,” Mark interrupted, raising one hand. “You said that you were not the type of girl then, or woman now, who would make love with someone unless she was deeply in love with him.”
“Don’t be absurd,” Emily said, with a cluck of disgust. “I did not say that. I said…” She stopped speaking, her eyes widened, and a heated flush stained her cheeks. “Oh. Well. I’m upset, terribly, terribly upset, and I didn’t intend to say that I… What I mean is…
“Oh, for Pete’s sake, what difference does it make? Yes. Yes, Dr. Maxwell, okay fine. Yes. I loved you then and…and…I love you now. I didn’t know that I did, but then I did know that I did. Satisfied? It won’t mean a tinker’s damn to you because you don’t believe that I’ve ever been, nor will ever be, capable of loving anyone.”
“Emily…”
“Just…just shut the hell up,” she yelled, tears threatening once again. “I’m going out there and find Trevor. But let me tell you something, Mr. Know-it-all. You don’t think I ever really loved you? Well, guess what? Our son’s name is Trevor Mark MacAllister.” A sob caught in her throat. “I named my baby after his father. The man I loved with my whole heart. It’s a wonder Trevor hasn’t zeroed in on the fact that his middle name is Mark, but he will now and… Oh, oh, oh, I’m just done with you, finished. I’m ending this conversation and—”
Plain Jane MacAllister Page 10
