The Blake Soul

by I C Camilleri

  She burst into tears and started mumbling. “I’m sorry, it’s my fault. I’m so sorry....”

  “I don’t get you. What are you so sorry about?” His heart was hammering inside his chest. He was dead scared that she might be seriously ill. She looked so fragile and thin. He did not know how he could possibly fight destiny against an illness. He’ll hire the best doctors but even they would not be able to do any miracles.

  She pushed his hands away from her shoulders and walked back to the lounge. She leaned against the wall and folded her arms across her chest, bracing herself. “I’m pregnant and I want to keep the babies. I know that this must be a great shock to you. I don’t expect anything from you....”

  “Babies? But you’ve lost weight.”

  “I haven’t been keeping food down. And it’s twins.”

  He was speechless. He moved towards her, but she stepped back, shrinking against the wall as she burst out sobbing again.

  “I’m sorry Josh, I’m sorry I forgot the contraceptives. I promise I didn’t do it on purpose. But now that it happened I want to have the babies, they are mine and I love them. No one needs to know that they are yours. I can bring them up on my own and I don’t need your help.”

  “Don’t be silly, they are my babies too. Hey, don’t cry please.” She was as lost as she had been on the first day he had seen her in that park. His honesty trait was nagging at his conscience. “Maria, stop crying, it’s not your fault...you never forgot your pills. I took them out of your bag. So there, now you know that I want this pregnancy too.”

  The tears stopped, her eyes widened and her face burned with anger. “What? Did you actually plan the whole thing? Oh, I hate you so much. How could you do this to me?”

  “I can’t understand women. Just a minute ago you said that you wanted the babies and your only concern was that I wouldn’t want them. Anyway, I don’t recall you actually begging me to stop back there in Yellowstone, you knew that you hadn’t taken your pills and you decided to take the risk. I just threw the pills away, I did not rape you and I would have stopped if you had insisted. It takes two to tango you know,” he retorted angrily.

  She suddenly covered her mouth and ran into the bathroom, retching. He rushed in after her.

  “Go away,” she said. But she leaned heavily against him and lost consciousness. He panicked. He lay her down on her side and tried to feel her pulse. It was very faint and irregular. He had to act fast. He grabbed her phone and found Rob’s number. He hated asking for his help but he had no choice.

  Rob arrived within three minutes. “She has been throwing up constantly, hyperemesis gravidarum. Vomiting is normal in the first fourteen weeks of pregnancy but in Maria’s case it is more severe and it is compounded by the fact that she has twins. This excess vomiting causes the potassium levels to fall which in turn lowers the blood pressure and causes heart arrhythmias. I had advised hospital admission, just to keep an eye on it but she refused. She was still coming to terms with the pregnancy and she didn’t want those damned reporters who are constantly following you around to sniff this out. And her hesitation nearly killed her. But she’ll be fine once we adjust her potassium levels.”

  Rob was explaining all this to a bewildered Josh as he loaded her onto an ambulance. Maria had regained consciousness but was only half aware of what was going on. Josh could see that she was very scared as she looked at Rob hovering over her. But she seemed to trust his confident expertise.

  Josh sat beside her bed throughout the whole two weeks she stayed in hospital. She seemed to alternate between periods of lethargic weeping and bouts of blazing anger. Rob was often there too, conversing amiably with her for hours. He was this proper English gentleman, very proficient in what he did and not bad looking either, and Josh had to endure seeing them together, knowing that his children’s and Maria’s lives were completely in her ex’s hands.

  Josh cried with joy when he saw his twins on the ultrasound screen, those tiny bodies with little arms and legs. It was a totally new heart-warming experience for him, but when he reached out to take her hand, she just heartlessly pushed him away. She wasn’t going to forgive him that easily. She refused to talk to him civilly and their conversations only ended up in heated arguments. Nevertheless, he stayed in her room all the time and none of her stinging verbal insults managed to drive him away.

  The only person who spoke kindly to him was Anna who seemed to see past his deception and often comforted him, “Women are emotional during pregnancy, just give her time, she will get over this. Here are some more books, my, you are really depleting my library. How do you manage to get through them so fast?”

  Josh had taken to reading all sorts of texts about pregnancy and Anna was the source of his information. He read constantly since he had nothing better to do than seeing Maria and Rob together.

  Eventually Maria managed to keep her food down and she was discharged home.

  “I really can’t get my head around the fact that you only slept with me to manipulate me into marriage. What kind of sick person would father children just to get his own way? The whole week in Yellowstone was only a stage, another of your acting parts, carefully studied and planned. Whereas for me it was such a special week, oh, how could I have been so foolish?” she told him after going back home.

  Josh sighed. They had been having this same discussion over and over again and they always ended up going round in circles, achieving nothing but pain and frustration on both sides.

  “Maria, just forgive me and move on. The bottom line is that you want the babies and I want the babies. We are meant to be together, so why do you keep fighting it?” Josh said for the millionth time.

  “All I needed was more time.”

  “A thousand years would never have been enough, and you know that. Can’t you understand why I did this? I wanted to be with you all the time and not just for weekends and whenever you felt like a break from your precious work and your even more precious Rob. Gosh, I hate that man. He was all over you these past two weeks. The only thing that stopped him was the fact that you are carrying my children.”

  “Josh, face it, this pregnancy will never bind us together. It’s over between us. Go back to your acting, that’s all you’re good for. Just leave now. I can’t bear to have you hovering beside me anymore. You must have realised that you are no longer wanted. I can see why even your mother hates you.” She smiled with spite as she saw him hang his head down in diffidence. She had managed to tease out those inner childhood insecurities again. Mentioning his mother never failed. That should keep him in check.

  He was deeply wounded but he was no newcomer to cruel rejections. His heart ached. He rubbed his taut neck muscles. Her speech was brutal and final and Josh knew that the only thing he could do was to go along with her wishes for the time being. She might soften up after a while. He cleared the lump in his throat.

  “You will eventually have to come to terms with the idea of having me around. Nothing will separate me from my kids, I want to be part of their lives and give them that support I never had. My children will not grow up without a father. We can do it together as husband and wife, it’s your choice, I have already proposed countless of times, and I won’t do it again. Next time you will have to ask. I have to leave for Africa now but I plan to be back way before their birth, I promise.” He kissed her on her forehead. “I love you Maria, I always have and I always will, but you surely know that by now. I hope that you can find it in your heart to forgive me, even if it is for the sake of our children.”

  He went to see Anna who lived on the opposite side of the road. Luckily she was in. He returned the books he had borrowed and told her what had happened. He asked her to keep an eye on things and to phone him if anything changed. He also asked if he could contact her from time to time.

  “Certainly, Josh. And I’ll do my best to knock some sense into her too, but I can’t promise anything. She is as tenacious and hard-headed as her father. I knew him well, and he never wav
ered from any of his decisions.”

  Josh nodded. That tall dark-haired man had repeatedly haunted him with that contraceptive pill dream. He desperately wanted a pregnant daughter. He was so tenacious that Josh finally gave in to that stupid deception. And look at the mess he was in now. He sighed sadly.

  “Is there anything I can do to thank you for your help?” he asked, grateful for her kindness.

  “You can always mention me the next time you win an Oscar.”

  “I will,” he said as he ruffled up her son’s crop of fair hair. The three-year-old boy had dumped all his toys at his feet and Josh had sunk down on one knee and played with him for a while. The boy must miss having a father. He knew that feeling. He slowly stood up and his eyes swept the room and landed on a pile of envelopes on the hallway table. He smiled and left.

  The next day Anna received a phone call from her bank. All her debts had been settled by an anonymous benefactor. She had been struggling with mortgage repayments ever since her husband died three years previously and her house was on the brink of being repossessed. She could just imagine who the benefactor was. She called Josh but he categorically denied any involvement. But he could not fool her. When Anna told Maria what he had done she merely shrugged, “Oh that is so Josh, buying his way into people’s affection. He bought a cottage and a whole forest just to sleep with me.”

  Anna thought that the comment was very harsh indeed, after all Josh had denied paying off her loans. And in any case she hadn’t expected him to do anything and she would have helped him anyway. She looked at Maria and thought of the herculean task ahead of her.

  ****

  Despite his previous resolutions to abandon the surveillance camera, Josh found himself spying again. He tried calling her every day for the first two months and he left several pleading messages but she never answered the phone when she recognised his number. And if he used another phone she just angrily switched it off after hearing his voice. Surprisingly, Max seemed to take his side of the argument, after all she had been aware of the missing pills and she had chosen to take the risk. But not even her brother was able to sway her. She had a big row with him and she stopped answering his calls too.

  Eventually Josh just gave up on phoning.

  That was when she passed from a period of severe anger to a period of downright fear and depression. He often saw her crying. Anna was always by her side, trying to reason with her.

  “Maria, you have to shake yourself out of this. You have to get things ready for the babies; cots, prams, clothes; you can’t go through this alone. He only stopped phoning because you never answered his calls and you were downright vicious. You should phone him and apologise. You are being unfair. Anyone can see that he really loves you. He still calls me every week to ask about you.”

  “That’s probably for the babies’ sake and not mine. He must have moved on by now. I know him well. He won’t refrain from having sex for more than a couple of weeks. I just can’t bear the thought of seeing him with someone else. I’d rather not see him at all.”

  He was half tempted to prove her right but the thought of being with another woman made him cringe and he knew that it was not an option. Though, his pride had been severely wounded, and after two months of grovelling he wanted her to pick up the phone. She was almost seven months pregnant and he knew that he will eventually have to swallow that pride and go crawling back to her. He was not going to let her give birth to the twins on her own; his splintered pride will have to be boxed and shelved. But he badly wanted her to reach out to him and somehow repair his shattered self-esteem. So he was going to wait for a little longer until the very end.

  He was gloomily staring at the computer screen, watching her mope about on a late Friday night. She had returned from work and changed into her baggy unflattering indoor clothes. She just sat there eating her way through her tenth apple. She seemed to have developed this intense craving for that fruit. The twins must love the taste. She suddenly received a text message on her phone. She panicked and sprang to life. Within the next half an hour she was all dolled up in an attractive blue halter neck dress. He saw her adjusting the straps and lowering the neckline, drawing all the attention to her voluptuous breasts and away from her huge bump. She brought her rich curls over her bare shoulders and she smiled as she twirled round in front of the mirror. She obviously wanted to impress and she had made it with only seconds to spare. The doorbell rang.

  Freddie kissed her on both cheeks and generously complimented her on her appearance. He had dressed for the kill too, making him irresistible to any female on the planet. They settled down on the sofa and he brought forward some documentation about his mother’s trial of the new drug. The cancer cells were responding miraculously well and Maria was excited with the news.

  Freddie then moved on to lighter and funnier topics. Josh continued to observe their subtle reactions to each other’s presence. Maria looked relaxed and at ease. She kept flicking back her hair and tilting her head back as she heartily laughed at his jokes; Josh wasn’t the only one she was physically attracted to. Freddie was slowly inching his way closer. He took one of her curls and started to twirl it round his finger. She never stopped that intimate gesture.

  Encouraged, Freddie approached the topic that was the main reason behind his visit. “So, Josh has left you in this mess.”

  Josh could see a degree of anxiety in his cousin’s deep blue eyes as he moved towards that delicate subject.

  “Not exactly, he only left because I pushed him away.” Maria was quick to defend him. “How is he? Has he...err...has he ...err...has he moved on?”

  Josh heard the tremor, the anxiety, the fear in that simple question.

  “I don’t know. I haven’t seen him in ages. I only heard about this because of that article in the paper. They are assuming that he is responsible for your condition and that he shrunk back from his responsibilities. They are certainly assuming that he has moved on...and I think that they are right. I’ve known Josh for a very long time and he has been sleeping around ever since he turned fourteen or fifteen. I don’t think you being pregnant would stop his activities elsewhere. You must have had a taste of his insatiable appetite, so you must know what he is like.”

  Now that was meant to maim...and it did. She winced with pain. She tried to hide her tears but Freddie was counting on them. He put his arms around her shoulders and drew her close to him as he continued with his carefully prepared speech.

  “Don’t cry. He doesn’t deserve your tears. He was always this heartless with women. You never had much in common with him anyway and he would have bored you to death eventually... Maria, there is something I want you to know. I did fall in love with you a long time ago but I never said anything out of respect for that good-for-nothing cousin of mine. You don’t have to go through raising kids on your own. Marry me, Maria, and I will love his children because they are yours. Please think about it.” He bent down and slowly kissed her lips.

  So Freddie had gone after the one girl who had refused him. It would never do for the unwanted charity boy to have someone he himself hadn’t previously enjoyed. Josh should only have had his generous handouts. Freddie wanted to make sure that he sat in the driving seat again. He would abuse and desecrate the body carrying his cousin’s children, make her crave for him and then he would discard her when he eventually got bored. Josh had often heard those false declarations of love and empty promises coming from his cousin’s mouth before he had sex.

  “The promise of a ring always gets their juices flowing like a waterfall,” Freddie had often told him as they bed-hopped. “You should try it rather than silently going into a cold dry cave.”

  But perhaps this time he really meant what he said. Perhaps he had really fallen in love with her.

  In any case, Maria seemed to believe his promise for commitment and drank his long passionate kiss thirstily. Josh just stood there and watched as she wrapped her arms around Freddie’s neck, encouraging him on. She didn’t
stop him when he undid the strap around her neck and buried his face in her chest. She just slid her fingers through his hair and pulled him towards her, enjoying his pure worship. She only recovered from her deep trance when his hands moved up her dress and tore her lacy underwear off. Her big brown eyes flew wide open in panic. She didn’t want to go any further and she tried to push him away. But he persisted, drawing her painfully closer to him, crushing her bulging pregnant belly beneath him.

  Josh went mad with rage. He wouldn’t intervene if Maria had wanted to go on. But she was obviously getting distressed. He phoned Anna, “Anna, please phone Maria now, this very second. Don’t hang up until she answers. Ask her if she wants you to go over. I know that it’s late but I would appreciate it if you would go out and see her if she asks you to. Just don’t let her know I called. I’m coming home now.”

  Freddie let her go after the tenth ring.

  “Oh yes please. Thank you Anna.” Maria was shaking violently as she put the phone down. She looked at him, sitting too close to her, cornering her. He had kicked off his trousers and it was obvious that he was still under the impression that things would resume after that rude interruption. He had not read through her panic because he would never have thought that anyone would want to stop once he got started on them.

  He smiled and pulled her hand towards his groin. “Don’t be shy, it’s all yours. Give it a little pat.”

  “Freddie, I’m sorry. I was feeling depressed, bloated and unattractive and I....” She tried to snatch her hand away. “Freddie, my friend is coming over in a second or two; she lives just across the road. Please Freddie.” He let her go and she quickly pulled up her dress and did the strap around her neck.

  “I’m sorry,” she continued. “I was just miserable thinking of what Josh must be doing out there. I still love him and I’m sure that the last thing you want to do this evening is to sleep with a heavily pregnant unattractive woman. So we both don’t want this to go any further. I know that whatever you said about love and marriage was made out of kindness and perhaps gratitude towards me for helping your mother. Freddie, you don’t have to feel responsible for what your cousin did.”