Beautifully Broken: If I Break #3

by Portia Moore

  “Lauren. I’m so glad you called,” he says hopefully. It’s funny how much he’s changed.

  “Mr. Scott. Do you know anything about Cal’s birth parents?” I ask him desperately.

  “What. Why are you asking that?” he stutters.

  “Collin told me that Cal wants to kill his dad named Clay because he thinks he killed his mother, and we ended up meeting Mr. Crestfield and Collin asked for a third of his company and somehow he knew how to trigger Cal and I think he gave Cal this Clayton guy's address and I’m pretty sure he’s on his way there to kill him.”

  “Wait, what? And who is Collin?”

  chapter 18

  Cal

  I’ve been waiting on this day for a long time. Dex never came through. I feel stupid that I never went directly to the real source. Dexter Sr.

  When Chris pissed all over himself after finding out his daddy was screwing his so called best friend I knew my time was coming to take over, but when she told him she had a kid that was his sister, even I couldn't believe that shit, and good ol’ boy Chris just couldn’t take that blow. Unfortunately other greedy pussies stepped in, trying to keep me from claiming what’s mine.

  I thought Collin was smarter than that. Asking for a third of Dexter Crestfield’s company. Fucking greedy dumbass. Chris’ weakness is his feelings, Collin's is he thinks he’s so much smarter than everyone else. My weakness is this mother fucker’s existence sitting tied up in front of me which I’m about to eliminate very soon. I like watching him squirm. I’m enjoying it a whole lot actually.

  All of the time I spent looking for him and he was right under my nose. He lived just a few blocks from the house in Venitan. I knew I was close, I just didn’t know how close, and I really want to ring those fucking PI’s necks. I’m waiting for him to wake from the blow to the back of the head I gave him. When I saw him I couldn’t believe it. The man who causes the same fucking nightmare for me again and again. It’s all going to be over soon though. He’ll be dead, the little boy in my dream can have peace and the fucker that shot his mother right in front of him will be wiped off the earth.

  Then I can live in peace with Lauren and Caylen and all will be well with the world.

  After a long ass hour the bitch finally starts to stir. I pull off the bag on his head and his eyes widen, and the small thread of uncertainty that I grabbed the wrong guy is gone. I’ll never forget his eyes, I see them in my dream every night.

  “What’s up, Pops? Remember me?” I laugh at him. I still have the tape on his mouth so he can’t speak but he shakes his head, as if the more he shakes it the better his chances are to make it out of here alive. Too bad for him, I don’t give a shit how he answers my questions—the only way he’s leaving this house is post mortem.

  “I know you had a thousand little bastards running around but see me, I’m special. You remember my mother, Isabella?” I ask him sarcastically. The expression on his face now is priceless. He looks at me more closely and I can see the horror on his face as he recognizes he’s met his undertaker.

  “Yeah. I think you do,” I nod.

  “I bet you never expected to see me again did you?” I ask him.

  “Then I was a helpless little boy, left crying in the pool of blood after you shot his fucking mother right in front of his face,” I growl at him. He shakes his head again and I can hear him straining to talk.

  “Oh, oh it didn’t happen like that? You’re not the right guy?” I ask laughing and I hit him right on the mouth with the back of my 9 mm.

  “Fucking liar. I re-live what happened every night. Every single night. I will never forget your face,” I growl at him, disgusted as I see tears pouring out his eyes. I stick the gun right between them.

  “Don’t you fucking let one more tear come out or I will start by blowing off your fucking dick,”

  “Cal!” I turn around and look back to see Lauren and fucking William Scott coming down the stairs. Stupid Chris and Dex, I forgot he was having me followed, traitor.

  I point the gun at William. Lauren gasps.

  “Cal what are you doing?”

  “You know as much as I can’t stand Chris. I really do owe the guy. Maybe I should just do him a favor and kill your ass too,” I joke, but neither of them are laughing.

  “Cal, put the gun down,” she pleads, silent tears rolling down her cheeks.

  “Why the hell are you crying, Lauren? This is going to fix everything!”

  “He’s not going to shoot me, Lauren,” William says, way too calmly.

  “Oh I won’t?” I laugh, aiming at his knee.

  “No!” Lauren screams. Ugh. She’s ruining everything.

  “Both of you get the fuck out!”

  “You’re not going to shoot me or that guy in the chair because if you do your wife, the woman that you love, will never look at you the same.” Oh cue the violins.

  “If anyone knows that it’s me, son. Gwen will never ever look at me the way she did before this happened,” he pleads. I glance over at Lauren who's crying and is looking at me like I’m the worst person in the world. I go over to Clay and smack him with the gun again.

  “This is all your fault!”

  “Cal! What do you remember from that night?” William yells.

  “I don’t have to explain anything to you!” I shout at him.

  “Don’t explain it to me. Explain it to Lauren,” he says. “Get her to understand why you have to do this.” I wonder what type of two bit reverse psychology he thinks he’s using. I really should shoot him in the fucking knee.

  “Think Cal. What do you really remember?” she asks, sobbing. I let out a groan.

  “He shot my mother, Lauren. Right in front of me, he left me there until someone found me,” I tell her.

  “Who found you?” she asks. I start to answer her but, I-I can’t. I don’t remember.

  “Does it matter who found me?” I ask, frustrated with all of this.

  “How clearly do you remember that day Cal? You were five,” she pleads.

  “When your mother gets shot in the fucking face in front of you, that’s not something you forget!” I shout back.

  “Is that really what happened?” she asks quietly. Her voice has a way of calming my anger down and I hate it.

  “I talked to Helen while we were on our way here,” she says, slowly approaching me.

  “Lauren, stay over there,” I tell her but she continues approaching me.

  “That is not how Chris or any of the other alters remember it,” she says.

  “Why don’t you like to drink?” she says.

  “What does that have to do with anything?” I tell her.

  “You, the one who lives on the edge, and indulges in all of life’s pleasure doesn’t like to drink?” she says, and I feel myself growing impatient.

  “Your mother used to drink. A lot,” she continues.

  “What are you talking about Lauren?”

  I look back at the son of a bitch Clay.

  “What the hell is she talking about?” I snatch the tape off of his mouth and he gasps for air.

  “Talk and talk fast,” I growl at him, the gun still at his face.

  “She didn’t used to drink. Before you were born your mom was a CNA. She got a job through the welfare programs at this big hospital in the city. She was the happiest I had ever seen her. Our family was actually doing okay…”

  “You’re on a time clock,” I say impatiently.

  “A-after a few months there she started having a lot of extra money. She started having these fancy clothes and jewelry. I’m not the smartest man in the world but I knew that wasn’t coming out of her check. I knew something was going on but I never said anything. She was happy, we were happy. Then she got pregnant. She lost her job but she kept saying everything was going to be okay. That we would be taken care of. After you were born whatever she was waiting on never came through. She got real depressed, started drinking a whole lot, she was only sober half the time,”

&nb
sp; “You’re lying,” I growl at him, releasing the safety on the gun

  “Listen to him Cal!” Lauren screams at me, and poor Clayton starts to cry.

  “Do you want to know how we adopted you?” William shouts.

  “We had wanted a baby for so long. Everyone knew it, even my estranged stepfather! Dexter Crestfield Sr. brought you to our door. He told us that you were his illegitimate son whose mother killed herself.”

  “You’re lying!” I shout.

  “I’m not. Call Gwen. She’ll confirm it,” he says, ushering out his phone. I look over at Lauren.

  “That’s why Collin asked for a third of his company. He remembers what you don’t. He knows you’re his son,” Lauren pleads.

  No. No, fuck, no!

  “Okay let's say you’re right. I’m Dexter Crestfield’s fucking son. This asshole found out and he shot her for it,” I yell at them.

  “No. That’s not what happened,” Clayton says crying like a little girl.

  “No Cal,” Lauren pleads. Think. Please try to think. I feel dizzy, my thoughts crash together and my vision blurs.

  Instantly I’m back at the house, this time she’s alive. She’s drunk. My mom... I’m on the floor watching television. She’s yelling at someone on the phone.

  ‘You lied to me. You ruined my life. You promised you’d take care of us. I see your little ugly fucking kid whenever they show you on the news. How could you not love ours…you don’t love him, if you did you’d get me out of this hell hole….I don’t give a shit about a trust fund for him, we have to live now I won’t keep living like this!

  I rub my temples, I feel my heart pounding.

  She’s drinking more and more. She goes into her room. The two other kids and I are in front of the TV. I get up and open the door to her room. She’s sitting on the bed bawling.

  I ask her what’s wrong.

  “Nothing. I have a toy, you want to play with it?” she asks me. Her voice is so sweet and nice. It hardly ever is. I nod my head and she goes in a drawer and pulls out a gun. She kneels down on the floor in front of me. It’s heavy but she helps me hold it.

  “We’re going to play a game. When I count to three, you’re going to pull this, okay,” she says showing me the trigger. She then aims it at her chest.

  “One, two…”

  I drop the gun out of my hand. “I killed her. I killed my mom,” my chest feels tight. I can’t breathe.

  “Babe, it’s okay,” Lauren says, running over to me and hugging me. I’m crying so hard I’m shaking.

  “It’s okay, babe. You were only a baby,” Lauren says rocking me like I’m a baby now. I killed my mother. I almost killed an innocent man because I was wrong. I killed her. I’m a murderer.

  “I found you, in the bedroom. She called me right before it happened and told me everything. How she had an affair with Dexter Crestfield, that he promised to marry her and take care of her the rest of her life and he didn’t and that you were his son. She said she couldn’t live in squalor anymore. That you and your brothers and sisters were better off with her dead. I tried to get home as fast as I could. When I did it was too late. I figured out what had happened.” Clayton's voice explains but it doesn’t matter.

  Everything I believed, that I held on to was a lie…

  Except her.

  She’s my truth.

  Chris

  It sucks when you have to be filled in on things that happen in your own life. When the transition finished Lauren and Dr. Lyce filled everything in for me. How it turns out I’m actually a Crestfield. It still makes me cringe to think about it.

  How my birth mother was so sick she used me to kill her. Clayton, her husband, eventually told them she grew up Catholic and believed if she killed herself she’d go to hell. I wonder how much better off she thought she’d be having her five year old do it for her. Clayton also told us Isabella left a note with Dexter Sr. the day she killed herself. Clay called Dexter Sr. and told him what had happened. Dexter Sr. came and had everything, right down to the last detail, swept under the rug. Clayton says he told him family had always been important to him and he had to know his son was taken care of. Can you believe that? Dexter also gave him a pretty nice chunk of change as an incentive for him to disappear with my half brothers and sisters. Dexter had to keep everything quiet since at the time he was re-married and the pre-nup would be void if infidelity could be proved.

  It made perfect sense for him to give me to my parents since my mom couldn’t have children, she couldn't care less what led to the mysterious circumstances of Dexter bringing a child to their door. My dad wanted to make her happy and Dexter purchased the land that they lived on, which they wouldn’t have been able to buy for years.

  Collin, the other guy inside my head, it turns out had been popping up on occasions long before he made his presence known to Lauren. He was the one who told the Crestfields about Cal and how he needed their help when Cal surfaced and took over. The Scotts thought all along it was Cal who reached out to the Crestfields but it was actually Collin who was the one who took over after Cal’s break and started talking to Helen in these sessions I’ve had to take over for.

  We’ve been in therapy the past few weeks. After everything happened with Cal trying to kill Clayton Rice I guess he needed a break because I woke up and Lauren had to explain everything that had happened. To think how many lies were hidden from both of us, and the fact that I have a whole other alter that not even my parents or Helen knew about. Therapy has been going okay. I still feel numb a lot, like a part of me is missing. Lauren is great, always there, supporting me each step of the way. My mom has been staying with us the past two weeks too. I’ve even talked to my dad one or two times. I’ll have to slowly try to build that relationship back, if it can be rebuilt. Helen’s recommended that I try to avoid anything that brings stress or anxiety to me and to try not to think about it until our sessions. I’ve started to have more memories of Lauren and me when Cal was in control. They’re not as frequent as they were but they’ve been coming back slowly but surely. Lauren comes to these sessions sometimes but Helen asked that today it just be me.

  “Okay Christopher, before we begin I want to show you something,” Dr. Lyce says turning on the big television in her office.

  “Are we watching another testimonial?” I ask her, trying to sound more interested than I am. At first it was interesting watching videos of other people with DID share what their experience has been like. The hardest part was listening to how their family members cope with it. So much sacrifice everyone has to make, it makes you feel guilty.

  “Not today,” she says. And I look up and see myself on the screen.

  “So, we on?” The moment I hear the voice I know it’s not me. It’s him. He lets out a deep sigh and sort of leans over his knees.

  “It’s me. The guy you think made your life a living hell, right?” he laughs.

  “Well if you think that you’re fucking delusional because without me, Caylen or Lauren wouldn’t be in your life. You’d probably be married to that stuck up bitch Jenna.”

  “Cal, come on, you said you’d be nice,” I hear Helen’s voice in the background. He rolls his eyes and huffs.

  “Okay, let me get straight to the point. I want to do right by Lauren. I-I left her once because I thought I was doing the right thing. I wanted her to have someone better than me,” he says solemnly.

  “Well not better, because let’s be honest it doesn’t get any better than this, but more responsible, reliable who didn’t have the shitload of baggage we do,” he shrugs.

  “I never wanted for Lauren to know you. It always seemed like everything in life came so easy for you. I thought you’d be easier for her to love than me,” he continues. It’s one thing for you to hear a recording of yourself and not recognize your voice or remember saying the words but to see it, to watch yourself, it hits you that this is real.

  “Since I met her. Before I officially met her, I’ve been trying to fix things fo
r her. Make things right, give her everything she deserves,” he sighs.

  “She doesn’t deserve us fighting against each other. Telling her to pick and choose all the time. Confusing the hell out of Caylen when she gets older,” he shrugs.

  “You are the responsible one. The selfless one. You could be a good dad. But God, sometimes you’re a fucking pussy man,” he says with a groan.

  He’s such an asshole.

  “I mean you are, and I can’t leave my girls with someone who acts like a pussy.”

  “I want to give her something she always wanted. I sure as hell can’t do it by myself. But maybe both of us together, we can give her her Prince Charming,” he says.

  “Helen and I have been talking and I’m starting to think maybe this integration thing won’t suck ass completely. So what do you say, Chris? You in, or you going to pussy out?” he asks cockily.

  I don’t care what he says. I’m not a pussy.

  Lauren

  Six Months Later…

  A new start.

  That’s what he asked for. I told him no, because I don’t think we need one. Our history wasn’t the best but it’s made us who we are. Each step of the way, though bumpy, has made us who we are today.

  When he got on one knee and asked me to marry him again—that I agreed to.

  We thought there was no better way to start it than renewing our vows on a beautiful July day on my Aunt Raven’s property. I glance over and smile at Aidan and Hillary who, as it turns out, had been secretly dating since they met at the disaster of a dinner party, at the Scotts. Raven sits proudly next to the man she’s been seeing, who may be walking down this same aisle next. Angela is next to her holding Caylen, whose hand is intertwined with Stephen's. It turns out that I was never his perfect girl but Angela seems to be. I look back at Mr. Scott who did the honor of walking me down the aisle.

  It’s funny how time and life changing events can heal wounds. Well, some of them. He and Mrs. Scott are separated, they are working on their friendship even though Gwen plans on proceeding with a divorce. Mr. Scott is hoping she changes her mind. However, I can’t imagine how Gwen can since he’s actively involved in his daughter Willa’s life. I tried to get Lisa to come to the wedding but she respectfully declined. My husband still hasn’t forgiven her so it's probably for the best, even though he has warmed up quite a lot to Willa, who is our flower girl.