California Dreaming: Four Contemporary Romances

by Casey Dawes

  “I don’t think it has to be that way. I know lots of independent women at work who have husbands, kids, and career and still find time to take a spa vacation with their girlfriends.”

  “Sounds exhausting.”

  “They seem to manage.” Annie hesitated. “I have to ask something. Are you in love with Bobby?”

  “Of course I am. At least I think so. After five years together I ought to be.” Elizabeth looked across at her friend. “Shouldn’t I?”

  “I’m not sure ‘should’ and ‘love’ go together very well.”

  “Do you suppose I won’t marry him because I simply don’t love him? Have I been using him all these years? Maybe I should talk to someone.”

  Annie stood and fetched her purse. Pulling a small square out of her bag, she handed it to Elizabeth. “I have just the person.”

  Elizabeth glanced at the card. “Carol Eos, Life Coach.” She chuckled. “How’s that going for you?”

  “It’s going well, I think. There’s so much going on — the coaching, the body work, John, and now Beverly. I feel like the pieces of my life are churning in a kaleidoscope, but I haven’t turned it the right way to make a picture.”

  “I’m not sure I’d want go through all that confusion.” Elizabeth put Carol’s card on the sideboard. “Was your aunt helpful? What was she like?”

  “Very different from my dad. She’s tall and willowy — exactly what you think of when you think of a dancer. She feels so alive, and, I don’t know, ‘light,’ I guess. My dad always felt dark and angry.”

  “From everything you’ve told me, he was.”

  “It gets worse.” Annie took a deep breath. Elizabeth listened in obvious horror as she told her Beverly’s tale of sexual abuse.

  “And your dad stood there and watched your grandfather rape her?” Elizabeth looked utterly disgusted. “Did he — did he ever try anything with you?” Elizabeth watched her friend carefully.

  Annie shook her head. “No, nothing ever happened.” But even she could hear the false note in her voice as she said it.

  • • •

  John flipped through the Good Times as he stood by the cash register. There had to be something interesting to do on a Friday night. He wanted to make the night special for Annie. He heard footsteps and set the paper down to wait on a customer, but looked up to see Sunshine.

  “I thought you might be interested in this.” She handed him a printed e-mail with the subject line: Ellis Paul, April 19th. “One of the times Annie was in here we got to talking about folk music. We like the same people. Rumor has it you’re taking her out tomorrow.”

  “What’s this?” John asked, gesturing with the paper.

  “It’s a house concert. Well, they used to be house concerts. Now they’re winery concerts.” She must have seen John’s total look of confusion. “You’ve never been to a house concert?”

  He shook his head.

  She sighed. “You really did live in the sticks. Singer-songwriters, like Ellis Paul, perform in houses across the country. The homeowner has a large room and a mailing list of people interested in hearing them. My friend, Jasper, has been doing them for years. I’ve seen some great people — Cozy Sheridan, Vance Gilbert, Dave Mallett … ”

  “Who are they?”

  “Musicians. Like the ones Annie likes to listen to.”

  “Oh.”

  “Anyway,” Sunshine continued. “Jasper also owns a winery by Swift Street. He switched the house concerts down there since it’s more convenient than his house in the mountains.”

  “Thanks for educating me, Sunshine. I feel less like a country hick now.” John smiled fondly at Sunshine. She was a good employee, and, in some ways, a good friend.

  “I’m trying to take care of you here. If you really want to impress Annie, this would do it!”

  John raised his eyebrows and waited for her to continue.

  “See, I signed up for my mom and me to go, but she wound up having emergency surgery and I need to take care of her. The concert’s sold out, but you could use my tickets. You could take Annie.” Sunshine emphasized the last word and smiled as if she’d given him a huge present.

  Which she had.

  “I hope your mother will be okay. Do you think she’d like him?”

  “My mother? It’s routine surgery and there shouldn’t be complications. And, yes, she likes Ellis Paul — but it’s Annie I was talking about. Ellis Paul is borderline famous. I can’t believe they can still snag him for a house concert. You’d make points — mega-points.”

  “Thanks, Sunshine. You’re a life saver.”

  “Remember that the next time you’re handing out bonuses,” she said. “Tell Jasper you’re taking my seats. Enjoy!”

  John couldn’t wait for the lunchtime employee to come back to take over the register. He wanted call Annie right away.

  • • •

  Annie paced the living room as she waited for two o’clock, the time of her appointed call with Carol. She’d managed to avoid the story with Elizabeth, but she had a feeling it wouldn’t be as easy with the coach.

  The conversation started off casually enough with comments on the weather of the respective coasts. But Carol never spent too much time in idle talk. “Are you ready to dig deeper?” she asked.

  “What do you mean?”

  “From what you’ve told me, you’ve spent much of your life trying to appease the men in your life, keeping them calm so you’d stay safe. That’s understandable given your father’s suicide and Fred’s alcoholism. But I can’t help thinking there’s something more, something you’re afraid to tell anyone. Am I right?”

  “I met my aunt this week.”

  “And … ”

  Annie told her Beverly’s story, hoping the horror of the tale would deflect any further questions about her own life.

  “Your aunt certainly had a rough time of it. Did she say why she told you that story?”

  “She wanted to explain why she’d never met me before.”

  “Anything else?” The coach probed further.

  “Not really.”

  “Nice try, Annie, but if this is going to work for you, if you’re really going to change your life, you need to admit the truth.”

  “Funny,” Annie said. “Aunt Bev said something similar.”

  The silence lingered. There really wasn’t going to be any way out of this.

  “Right after I had my first period, my parents had their worst fight ever,” Annie began. “I locked myself in my room, but I could hear shouting and the sound of breaking glass. My father kept yelling, ‘It’s my right! It’s the only thing girls are good for! She’s got to be taught her place.’ Eventually he left the house … I could hear the door slam. I waited a while and then came out of the room.”

  Annie had always kept the horror at bay by sticking to the facts. She took a deep breath. “Mom was in the kitchen. Her eye was swollen and her lip was bleeding.”

  As Carol kept quiet, Annie began to shudder. The shudders turned into sobs.

  “It was so horrible. It was my fault she looked like that. She … she was protecting me.”

  Carol waited until her sobs diminished. “Tell me the rest,” she said.

  “Mom said I had to be careful,” Annie whispered. “She could barely talk. She said never be alone with my father. Always keep my door locked. I remember her looking at me … she was very fierce … she said, ‘If he tries anything, you tell me.’ I promised her. She told me to go back to my room. I did. We never talked about it again.”

  “What did your dad do?”

  “He came home later that night and tried my door. He banged on it for a while, demanding to be let in. I … I was afraid he might push it down, but he went away. I locked my door every night. And I listened to my
mother. I never went anywhere with him alone. If he was home and my mom wasn’t, I went to a friend’s house.”

  Annie paused. “He tried every night for a long time. Then it was only once in a while — I think he was trying to catch me unaware.” Her breath caught. “Eventually, he gave up and left me alone.” Until he died.

  Annie heard Carol’s intake of air over the phone. “So you escaped the rape that your aunt experienced. But you didn’t really escape. You know that, don’t you?”

  “I suppose.”

  “How do you feel?”

  “I don’t know. Exhausted, I think. Drained.”

  “Is there something else you think you should have done?”

  “I should have given in. Then he would have stopped hurting my mother. I was a coward. I should have let him do what he wanted and gotten it over with. Maybe if I’d done that, my mother would be more normal now.”

  “No, Annie. You did the right thing. Your mother wanted to protect you. Unfortunately, she wasn’t strong enough to leave, but she did the best she could. She’s probably buried the truth, not wanting to face it. Your father was the one who was wrong — not you or your mother. Can you believe that?”

  “I’ve tried all my life to believe that.”

  “What stops you?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “That’s what we need to figure out. When’s your next body work appointment?”

  “Tomorrow afternoon.”

  “Good. I want you to ask your healer to work on the root chakra. It’s at the base of your spine — she’ll know what it is. While she does that, I want you to think about what you’ve told me.”

  “What good will that do?” Annie asked.

  “We carry our memories in our cells. The root chakra is all about survival — your right to exist. Your memories are locked in your body, including the story that you’ve told yourself — that the abuse was your fault. Somehow you need to release that lie. We’ll have to try every method we have to help you let it go. When you do, I think your choices will become clearer. Are you still journaling?”

  Annie groaned. “Yes. I suppose I need to continue that, too.”

  “Yes, dear.” Carol chuckled.

  They finished up the conversation and scheduled the next appointment.

  She’d barely hung up when the phone rang again.

  “How are you?” John asked when she answered.

  Chapter 21

  “I’m okay,” Annie said. Her heart surged.

  “That’s good,” John said. “Remember I said to save Friday night for me?”

  “Yes.”

  “I lucked into a couple of tickets for something I hope you’ll enjoy. I didn’t recognize the name, but maybe you will — Ellis Paul?”

  “Really? You’ve never heard of Ellis Paul? And you have tickets?”

  “I looked him up online — he doesn’t appear to get to Montana much, so I’ve never heard of him. And, yes, I have tickets for a concert in a winery by … ” Annie could hear papers rustling. “Swift Street. Will you come with me?”

  “Oh, yes. Thank you! This is fantastic!”

  “I’ll pick you up around six and we can get a quick bite to eat at the Cellar Door Café. Does that sound good?”

  “I’ll be ready.”

  “Got to go,” he said. “See you tomorrow.”

  She hung up the phone and wandered to the kitchen to make tea, a silly grin on her face. She felt like a schoolgirl going out on her first date. She had it bad.

  The sharp aroma of lemon tea wafted around her as she went back to her home office. Beverly had been right. Telling the story about her father to Carol had made it better, not worse. Annie felt hopeful for the first time in a while. Maybe some of her childhood dreams were possible. If she could find a job where she didn’t have to invest so much of herself, maybe she could save some of her time and energy for her music.

  With a sense of purpose, she began to look at the job banks online. While full-time jobs could be found in places like Cleveland, Ohio, they were scarce around San Jose. And the salary range of the Ohio jobs would never let her keep her house in Costanoa and she’d still have to move. Perhaps a consultant job was the best choice for now.

  She found a few jobs that she might be a match for — temporarily managing projects at smaller firms. The pay was close to what she’d been making at JCN, but there weren’t any benefits. She’d cross that bridge when she came to it. Maybe it was time to ask Fred to cover David’s insurance.

  She pulled up her resume and began to work on it, stopping only to have dinner with her son.

  That night, she dreamt of her father pounding on her door, yelling to be let in. She forced herself awake, threw off her covers and went to the kitchen to brew some tea. Grabbing a pen and pad, she began to make notes about restarting her music career. The ideas came easily — songs to rememorize, venues to check out. Maybe she should build a website.

  An hour later, she returned to bed and fell into a dreamless sleep. The next morning she sent off her resume to the two jobs she’d identified. A quick check of her work e-mail revealed only one new note — from her boss, Randy.

  “I need you to come in on Monday. I’ve heard from Jim and there’re a few things we need to discuss about the job in New Jersey.”

  Drat! The job was still a possibility. She needed to make a decision soon.

  Annie sent a quick reply telling Randy that she’d be there Monday morning.

  Before she left for her body work appointment, Annie recycled the box from the printer cartridges she’d ordered, cutting the tape that held it together with her jackknife before tossing the box in the blue recycling can. She thrust the knife in her jeans pocket, locked the door, and took off.

  Sukesha was waiting for her when she arrived. Soothing music began to still the chatter in her brain.

  “How are you today?” Sukesha asked.

  “It’s good to be here — a lot going on.”

  “Yes?”

  Annie hesitated. “Things are changing. I’m not sure how exactly, or what’s going to happen, but it feels different.”

  “Yes.” Sukesha was a woman of few words.

  “My coach asked if you could work on my root chakra. I’m not sure what she expects, but I figured I’d ask. Is it something you do?”

  “Yes.”

  Sukesha led Annie back into the massage room. As she disrobed, Annie felt vulnerable, like she was a newborn experiencing life for the first time, not sure what was out there for her. She lay down on the massage table and covered up before Sukesha entered. Although she couldn’t see her, Annie heard the soft swish of the woman’s feet on the rattan mat.

  “It’s good that you’re here,” Sukesha said as she splayed her hands on Annie’s back. “The work we’ll do today is deep work. Let it be whatever it wants to be.” She placed a tissue box on the floor where Annie could reach them as she lay face down on the table. That’s not a good sign, Annie thought.

  “You’re safe,” Sukesha murmured. She pulled back the covers and began to massage the sides of Annie’s spine.

  Annie let herself drift with the soft pressure of the woman’s hands. Sukesha was soothing — in fact the whole environment — pale yellow walls, melodic new age music and the soft scent of lavender — lulled her to that sweet place between awareness and sleep. Eyes closed, she could feel the energy move lower in her body, awakening the core of her sexuality.

  With that energy, memories crept into her mind, recent ones first. She stirred thinking about the kiss she’d shared with John the last time they met. What would tonight bring? Was she ready to move beyond a kiss?

  Absorbing the energy of the massage without awareness of the person giving it, Annie forgot Sukesha was in the room. There’d been a long dry spe
ll before John. The few men she’d dated didn’t turn her on. She skipped over the misery that marked the end of her marriage with Fred, but recalled the tenderness and passion of the beginning.

  He’d been tender with her, courting her with flowers, candles and romantic music. She was aware of his desire for her, his hands roving over her body, lighting her on fire.

  She stirred on the table as memories of the early years of her relationship flooded her body. Energy swirled around her, feelings of joy and sorrow blending like the colors of light through a prism. Annie was unaware of the soft tears and her body’s deepening relaxation under Sukesha’s fingers.

  All of a sudden, he was there in her mind. Her father’s eyes following her around, making her feel unclean. She’d shower two or three times a day, trying to rub off dirt she couldn’t even see. He’d remind her to keep her legs closed like a lady should, at the same time he stared at her growing breasts. She shuddered as she remembered her doorknob turning when he checked to see if she’d forgotten to lock him out.

  Her tears turned to sobs. Sukesha continued to massage her, whispering, “It’s okay. Let it go. Release it.”

  Annie cried until there was nothing left. Sukesha’s massage turned to comforting touches. The body worker covered her with warm blankets and stroked her hair, until Annie’s breathing returned to normal.

  “Are you all right to be alone to get dressed?” Sukesha asked.

  Unsure of her voice, Annie nodded. After the woman left the room, Annie lay there for a long while, tuning in to the sound of her own breathing. She was exhausted, but for the first time in her life, the anxiety that had always been with her was gone. It was as if someone had turned off a low frequency motor that she didn’t even know was annoying her.

  She sat up, keeping the blanket wrapped around her. The feeling of freedom persisted as she sat there, gathering the strength to get up.

  Once dressed, she sat with Sukesha in the anteroom. “That was a powerful release,” the woman said. “You’ll need to take good care of yourself. Drink lots of water and walk outside. The beach would be good.” She smiled. “We’re lucky to live in such a beautiful place.”