Mended Hearts

by Sarah Markel

  After speaking to the Bergen Family and pronouncing Mr. Bergen as deceased, Kelly headed to her office to gather her things. After making sure she had everything, something told her to look out her window. As she stood in front of the window and looked out over the staff parking lot, she noticed Lilly sitting on the hood of her charger, which was parked just to the left of her office window. Angry, Kelly opened her window and yelled, “Lilly! You get out of here now! I am calling the police.” Lilly just shrugged and smiled at Kelly, “You do what you have to do, baby. I meant what I said.” With that, Lilly got off the car and headed away from the building. Shaken, Kelly quickly walked to Alex's office and knocked on the door. After a moment, she heard Alex tell her to come in. “Hey, Alex. I was wondering. Umm... could I ride to Angie's house with you? I can't really explain it, but I would feel safer riding with you.” Kelly finished quickly. Alex looked at her with curiosity before responding. She's just scared and wants to feel safe. Angie isn't exactly a forbidding figure. She isn't even interested in you like that. Just give her the ride, idiot. You know you want to. Alex stood and gathered her things, “Sure. Not a problem, but we have to stop by the school and pick up Zane and Dej first. I hope you don't mind.” Kelly smiled and nodded. “That’s perfect."

  After letting Angie in on the new travel arrangements, Kelly and Alex headed to the parking lot side by side. After unlocking the doors of her silver Ford Expedition, Alex opened the passenger door for Kelly. Kelly stopped just before getting in and looked from Alex to the passenger seat and back again, hesitation evident on her face. She is just being nice, no need to act like she offended you. Kelly thought to herself. “What's wrong?” Alex asked, looking at the seat to see if one of her kids might have left something on it. Smiling, Kelly shrugged, “Just not used to someone opening the car door for me. Very chivalrous, thank you, Alex.” Kelly slid into the seat and chastised herself for being so rude after Alex agreed to let her tag along. Alex got in behind the wheel and started the car. As the radio came on, Kelly laughed out loud when she heard Born This Way blasting out of the speakers. Blushing scarlet, Alex jabbed the power button for the radio. “That was great!” Kelly exclaimed with a smile, “I never pegged you for a Gaga fan.” "I'm not, really, this is one of Dej's mix CD's. She loves Born This Way, and it was her turn to pick the morning music.” Alex avoided eye contact and focused on backing out of her designated parking spot.

  Kelly watched Alex's face as they drove. She is really very beautiful, Kelly thought, I wonder if she is embarrassed easily, or was just caught off guard by the music. The drive to Willow brook Academy, the private school that both Alex and Angie's children attended, was quiet and companionable. During the thirty minute trip, Alex and Kelly talked some about themselves. Alex learned, to her surprise, that Kelly was not as reserved as her demeanor implied. Kelly learned that Alex had been spending the last several weeks attempting to execute the plans for the perfect birthday party for Zane and Dej, who just happen to be exactly 4 years apart.

  “I have everything set as far as the venue goes. It's going to be at Turner Park, I have the whole south end of the park reserved, and between the two kids we invited fifty guests. I just hope I can get the caterer and the bakery on the same page! Because of Dej's diet restrictions, I am having her food made separately, which is causing communication issues between Johnson's Bakery and Finesse Catering. If Wes Johnson would get his chauvinist head out of his ass and listen to Marie from Finesse there wouldn’t be any problems.” Alex explained. Kelly smiled to herself, enjoying the excitement in Alex's voice as she continued to vent her concerns. When Alex stopped talking suddenly, Kelly looked at her. Alex had turned bright red and looked slightly embarrassed. “Sorry about that. I didn’t realize I needed to vent. I shouldn’t have done that to you.” Kelly smiled and patted Alex on the arm, “No, don't worry about it, honest. I was enjoying it. You seem very determined to throw the best birthday bash ever and it is quite refreshing.” Alex's demeanor softened a bit and they spent the rest of the trip in comfortable silence.

  Chapter 8

  Oh my word, I love this shower! Kelly thought to herself as she stepped out onto the shower mat to dry herself. She had just spent the last two hours teamed up with Alex, Angie, and Steve in an epic battle against the kids, in a "Winner chooses the bed-time" water fight. She never thought that playing with water guns would make such a mess. Steve had mixed washable craft paint and water to make the game more fun, and by the time it was over, she and everyone else looked like they had lost a fight with a box of crayons. Laughing like she never had before, Kelly helped the other adults bathe the children to wash off the rainbow of paint that covered them. With the four of them working together, they got all six kids bathed and into bed within an hour of the adults pulling out a very close win. If Kelly hadn't spotted Raider hiding behind that bush, the kids would have won. Chuckling to herself as she dressed in a pair of borrowed sleep pants and a tank top, Kelly remembered the look of utter betrayal on the boy’s face when she soaked him with the bright pink water in her water blaster. He hadn't even seen her hiding under the deck.

  Picking up her colorful wet clothes, she headed out of the bathroom and called into the kitchen to let Steve know it was his turn. High-fiving him as he passed her, she made her way to the family room to sit with Angie and Alex. “Just toss those into kitchen, Kelly, I will get them in the morning.” Angie said as she offered Kelly a beer. After doing as instructed, Kelly took the offered beer and sat on the arm of the sofa next to Alex. She wanted to let Steve have the spot next to Angie. As if reading her mind, Steve strolled in, wearing clean lounge pants with a towel around his neck, and took his spot. Raising his beer, he said “To victory, my dear ladies. May all future battles involve Kelly ruthlessly ambushing a sneaky child.” Laughing, the three women joined the toast. “Alright, my Love” Steve said, leaning in to kiss his wife, “You stay here and enjoy some girl time, and I am going to hit the hay. Gotta be at the station early to look into that restraining order.” After kissing Alex and Kelly on the cheek, Steve headed up the stairs to his room and closed the door.

  “I didn't know Steve was a cop.” Kelly said looking at Angie. Taking a swallow of her beer, Angie replied, “Mmhmm. He's a homicide detective. He's been on the force for, gosh, twenty years. That's actually how I met him. He questioned me during a canvas after one of my neighbors was killed. I know, very romantic.” She quipped. Chuckling, Kelly set down her beer and took the seat between Alex and Angie that she had left open for Steve. Kelly felt silly asking, but she turned to Alex, “Are you staying the night too?” Angie snorted, causing Kelly to blush. Was that rude? She thought to herself, thinking she had missed something. “Yeah, I'm not going to wake the kids up to go home. They were out before their heads hit the pillows in there.” Alex replied, gesturing towards the living room, where six sleeping heads were visible on the king sized air mattress. Smiling to herself, Kelly asked Alex, “If you don't mind my asking, where is Callie? I've heard you mention her a few times before, and Steve said she was his sister. Did you two break up?” As soon as she finished her questions, Kelly immediately regretted them. Alex's demeanor had changed. Her posture stiffened and her eyes took on a stony look. Looking down at her hands, Alex pulled away into herself. Shit! Look what you did! The woman obviously dislikes talking about herself and is very careful with what she tells people. Maybe she hasn't told you because it's none of your damn business! Kelly chastised herself. “I'm sorry Alex. I didn’t mean to pry. You don't have to tell me.” She said, looking at the floor and willing the scarlet blush of embarrassment to disappear.

  “Alex, you have to talk about it. It's not good to hold things in like you do.” Angie said. Alex pulled her knees up to her chest and stared at the fireplace, rocking back and forth gently. Kelly looked at her and saw, for just a moment, the woman in the picture on Alex's desk. Sadness and what looked like fear had replaced the happiness and love so readily evident on the young woman's face. Just when
it seemed that she wouldn't answer, Alex spoke in a soft voice filled with emotion as she visibly fought against the tears in her eyes. “No, we didn't break up.” Alex jumped and shivered a bit as thunder chose just that moment to crash. Kelly looked to Alex and said, “Alex, it's really alright if you don't want to tell me. I'm practically a stranger and it wasn't my place to ask.” Wiping at the tears in her eyes, Alex shook her head. “No, Angie is right. I need to talk about it.” Letting out a sigh, Alex finished her beer and turned on the sofa to face Kelly and Angie. Taking a deep breath, she began. “First, in order for things to make sense, I have to start at the beginning. And Ange,” she said looking at her sister, “if I can't finish, you do it for me. It’s not fair to leave someone hanging like that.” After getting an agreement from Angie, Alex began her story.

  “Up until a few years ago, I went by Lexie and I was all femme. When I was 19, I met a woman whom I fell instantly in love with. She was bartending at this little dive bar, a few blocks from campus. I was so shy back then and I could barely open my mouth to order my drink. So I just sat there at the bar and watched as she poured drinks and shouted food orders to the kitchen in back. She was beautiful. I remember thinking that there was no way in hell I would be able to get her off my mind. She had short hair, the same color as Steve's, and the bluest eyes I had ever seen. I sat there at that bar, staring at this woman who had tattoos all over her arms and the parts of her chest that were visible. She was obviously a lesbian, as I had seen her flirting with every woman who came up to the bar, but it all seemed to be playful.

  After a while, she noticed me sitting there, and she came over to me, leaned close enough so I could hear her, and said "They're just tits, beautiful, you don’t have to stare. You have a pretty good pair of them yourself.” I was so embarrassed that she had caught me staring. I turned bright red and tried to think of something to say, but my mind was blank. She noticed I was flustered and she just laughed. She introduced herself and asked if I was actually going to drink anything or if I was just going to sit there and stare. I was flustered, I didn’t know what to say, so I just got up and left. I went straight back to my apartment and spent the rest of the night pissed off at myself for being so shy. I stayed away from the bar, afraid I might run into her again and humiliate myself further.

  A few days later, while I was working on a paper, someone knocked on my door. When I answered it, I thought I was dreaming. Standing at my door was Callie, wearing tight black jeans and a leather jacket with her motorcycle helmet under one arm and my purse in her other hand. She stood there, smirking, and told me that when I had rushed out of the bar, I had left my purse on the seat next to me. She had grabbed it and tried to catch me, but I was already out of sight by the time she got outside. I was so relieved that she had gotten to it before someone else had, I wrapped my arms around her and hugged her tightly. I hadn't even thought about what I was doing. After I let her go, she smiled at me and asked me out to dinner. I accepted, and we started seeing each other.

  We were together for a long time before we even talked about having kids. By the time we decided to have Zane, Angie had moved back, married Steve, and had Jaxon. When Steve agreed to donate so we could have a baby, I thought life couldn’t get any better. The day we found out that I was pregnant, Callie did the sweetest thing anyone could ever do. We called our families and got everyone together at Turner Park for an impromptu picnic and told them all at the same time that we were expecting. Before everyone went home, Callie got down on one knee and proposed. I was so happy I practically tackled her when I said yes.” Alex stopped and smiled sadly at the memory. After a few moments, she wiped her tears and continued.

  “We got married the day after we found out that Zane was a boy. She wore a deep blue pantsuit, and I wore a white gown with deep blue accents. It was a wonderful ceremony and I still remember our first dance. We danced to the song Marry Me by Mélange Lavonne. It was funny, because we slow danced to a rap song. Our families thought it was the greatest thing, and Steve and Angie decided to jump in and dance with us. We were really happy together. We bought a house, had Zane, and then had Dej. I honestly thought we would be together forever. Callie loved to take pictures. She took all the photos in my office, except the one with the posters, and all the ones on the walls here. She usually only did it for fun, but after she took some family pictures for a friend of hers, she agreed to do it as a profession. She started a small studio at home in our extra bedroom and did pretty well for herself.

  One day she did a sitting for this lady who wanted pictures of her with her kids while they were all together. One of the kids was a woman who, from the second she walked into that room for the sitting, started hitting on Callie hard. After they were done and the lady picked up her photos, Callie thought that was the end of it. It wasn’t. For months the daughter came to our house every day and begged Callie to go out with her. Callie told her she was married and was not even close to interested, but the woman refused to take no for an answer. Callie finally got tired of it and threatened to have the woman arrested if she came to the house again. The woman left, but a few days later she started calling the house. When Callie answered, she would immediately hang up. When I answered, she would say nasty things, like how I didn’t deserve Callie, and they belonged together. When she started threatening to kill me so she could be with Callie, Callie got so mad. We changed our phone number and left it unlisted. Callie stopped taking clients so no one would have the number, and for a while things were good again. Those pictures of me and the kids that are in my office were the last set of photos she took.

  Two weeks after they were taken, Angie, Steve, Callie, and I were at the boys’ soccer game. Zane, Jax, and Raider were all on the same team and they were playing their final game of the season. After the game was over, we were all on our way back to the cars, and Callie went ahead of us to bring the car up. We had parked at the back of the lot, and it was unusually hot out so she wanted me to wait with the kids in the shade while she brought the car to us. As she headed away from us and into the lot proper, a car came flying through and hit her.” Alex stopped as her tears came in waves and sobbed uncontrollably. Kelly couldn’t help herself, she leaned over and wrapped Alex in a hug. She sat there holding her boss, her friend, and silently hoped that the driver had gotten their just desserts.

  After a few minutes, Angie finished the story. “Callie was hit so hard, she was thrown almost thirty feet and landed on the pavement. She died on impact with the ground. Steve, the kids, and I were only a few feet ahead of her when she was hit, and Steve went over to make sure the driver didn’t leave. Alex and I ran to Callie and even though we knew she was gone, we called nine-one-one. Alex sat on the ground next to her, holding the kids, and screamed at her to wake up.

  At the hospital, after the doctor pronounced Callie, and we were waiting for Steve to come pick us up, we noticed some officers that we knew standing outside another room. One of them saw us and came over to give her condolences to Alex. I asked her if they knew anything, and even though I knew she wasn't supposed to, she told us to come with her. Her partner went to grab a coffee and while he was gone, she showed us through a gap in the curtain the woman they were guarding. Alex recognized her as the woman who had stalked Callie. The officer told us that she was the driver of the car. The woman was charged with premeditated murder, because she had evidence at her home that she had been continuing to stalk Callie and had gone as far as to have a soccer schedule on hand, and found guilty. She was sentenced to death and is currently sitting on death row. About six months later, Alex stopped using the name Lexie, and decided that she couldn’t bear the thought of going on as the same person she was with Callie. She keeps that person locked away in her heart so that in that sense, she will always remain faithful.

  She cut her hair, butched out, and became a completely different person in public. She's not going to stay alone forever, but she hasn’t been with anyone since Callie died. She's afraid to be happy.” Sigh
ing deeply, Angie finished her beer. Alex had stopped crying, but stayed where she was, right there in Kelly's arms, as Angie gathered the empty beer bottles and tossed them in the trash. After saying goodnight and heading upstairs, Angie left her sister and her best friend alone to get to know each other. She had seen the way Kelly looked at Alex, ever since that first day in her back yard. She had also seen what Alex had tried so hard to hide, and she was sure that Alex was denying it even to herself. Alex looked at Kelly the same way she had looked at Callie.

  Chapter 9

  Drifting slowly to awareness, Alex opened her eyes and blinked away the lingering fog of sleep. She was still in a bit of a daze, when she realize she was not alone on the couch. She looked down and saw a mess of dark hair resting on her chest. Assuming that one of the kids had crawled in to sleep with her, as they did quite often when she slept on the couch, she pulled the person closer and whispered, “Good morning, sleepy head.” Kelly's eyes snapped open at the sound of Alex's voice, and she sat up quickly with a look of panic in her eyes. “Holy shit!” Alex exclaimed, staring at Kelly with a look of disbelief and embarrassment, and quickly wiggled her way off the couch. Kelly struggled to gather herself after being so suddenly pulled from her slumber, and looked around in confusion. The last thing she remembered was holding Alex after Angie had gone up to bed. Feeling herself blush, Kelly stared at the floor.