Love Series (Complete Series)

by Natasha Madison

  Samantha

  Samantha

  Standing in front of the full-length mirror in my room, I smooth down my black skirt. My blond hair is tied up in a ponytail, my cheeks are sunken in more than normal, and the blackness around my eyes indicates I haven’t slept well since this whole thing happened. Since I found out that not only did my husband die, but that he also married someone else.

  I sit on the made bed and look down at my wedding band. My thumb of my right hand touches it, and the lone tear that falls out of my eye lands straight on it. “Mommy.” I look back at Lizzie, who is standing in the doorway wearing a black one-piece dress similar to mine with ballerina flats.

  My mother-in-law went shopping yesterday and bought us all new outfits for today. “We need to put our best foot forward,” she said as I watched her walk in with the six bags. “We can’t let people talk.”

  I turned around and walked out of the room, going upstairs. Shutting myself in my bathroom with my back against the door, I cried quietly, trying to hide my sobs. “We can’t let people talk,” I whispered to myself. The hatred I had begun feeling when I remembered my husband.

  Lizzie walks to the side of my bed and sits next to me. “I hate this dress,” she says when I put my hand around her shoulder and bring her to me, kissing her head.

  “I know, baby,” I whisper, “but after today, it’s going to be all over.”

  “That’s what Grandpa A said.” She mentions the name she calls my father-in-law. Grandpa A because you can’t get better than an A.

  “Is everyone ready?” I hear Ethan yell from downstairs. “The limo is picking us up in twenty.”

  “Let’s go, baby,” I tell her, getting up and holding her hand while we walk downstairs. My in-laws are both sitting in the kitchen. My mother-in-law in a black skirt and top while my father-in-law has on a black suit. “Where is Daisy?” I ask them.

  “Elliot is upstairs changing her. She spilled milk on her dress,” Judy tells me, looking at Lizzie. “You look like such a big girl.” She blinks her tears away.

  Elliot comes down the stairs with Daisy on his hip, smiling at me when he walks in. “Okay, you girls go sit in the living room while us grown-ups talk,” my father-in-law says, and the girls both know to leave the room. When he knows they are both out of earshot, he starts. “Today is going to be tough, tough for us all, but we have to stand together. We have to be the family that we are.” I lean against the counter while he talks. “The situation with the other one has been taken care of, and she has been served papers.” I look at him and then at Elliot and Ethan, both of them looking down when our eyes meet. It’s almost as if they feel guilty for meeting this woman. My father-in-law continues, “After all this is done today, we are meeting with the lawyers in person, so we can go over the will, start the paperwork for the insurance, and make sure she doesn’t touch a thing that belongs to him.” I stop listening at this point, turning to look out the window at the backyard.

  The swing set that he built in one day to make sure the kids could use it when he left the next day. The patio set he had delivered to us, so I could have somewhere to sit while I watched the girls while he was living with another woman. I shake my head, walking out of the room. I sit on the couch, and the girls come to sit next to me, one on each side. “Today is going to be really hard,” I whisper to them, “but we have to be strong for Daddy.” They both look at me, their eyes exactly like their father’s. “But, if at any time, you need to leave or you need me… I don’t care who is talking to me or who is around; you come and get me.”

  “Grandpa A said we had to sit and wait,” Daisy whispers just as Elliot comes into the room and kneels in front of us.

  “What is this meeting about?” he asks, smiling at us. The circles around his eyes are just as black as ours. He hasn’t left our house since this happened.

  “Mommy said if we need her that we can go to her,” Daisy says, looking at him and then me, “even if Grandpa A said no.”

  He leans in, whispering, “You can come to me too, and I’ll make sure that you get Mommy.”

  “Okay,” Lizzie and Daisy both whisper at the same time, and then the doorbell rings.

  We get up, put our jackets on, and one by one file into the black limo that has come to take us to the funeral home. We arrive before everyone else. “We get an hour with him, and then they will open the door,” Adrian says as Judy grabs her tissue and dabs her eyes.

  I look around the funeral home. I’m not sure what I’m looking for, not sure where he is. I haven’t seen him since he kissed me goodbye four days earlier. His last words to me were, “Call you when I can.” That phone call never came.

  I follow my in-laws to the big brown door that is closed. “I want to go in before the girls.” Everyone turns to look at me.

  “We can keep them in the lobby,” says the lady who greeted us at the door. She told me her name, but I just didn’t listen.

  I nod at her as she turns to ask the girls if they want hot chocolate. Daisy’s eyes get big as Lizzie turns to look at me. I nod my head, giving her permission, so she can go with the woman.

  The doors open, and I don’t even know what to expect. I’ve never been to a funeral. Never known anyone well enough to pay my last respects. Judy and Adrian walk in first, followed by Ethan, and Elliot waits with me. I step foot into the room, and it’s so cold that I shiver. The smell of flowers hits me right away, making me turn my head. The number of flowers and wreaths shocks me; the whole room is almost full. Some wreaths blocking others. Rows and rows of brown chairs line the room, all facing toward the front of the room. My eyes land on the brown wooden casket at the front of the room. The open half showing you the white satin inside. I walk down the aisle toward him, and then my eyes land on him. Eric. I can’t take another step forward because my knees give out, and I fall. Elliot isn’t fast enough to hold me up, and my knee lands with a thud. But the pain doesn’t matter because nothing could take the place of the pain in my heart. The sound of wailing fills the room as I look up at my dead husband.

  I feel arms around me; I feel myself lifted; I feel myself almost floating. He isn’t the Eric who kissed me goodbye; he isn’t the Eric who I made promises to; he isn’t the Eric who made all my dreams come true. This isn’t him.

  The man with makeup caked on his face isn’t my Eric. My sobs overtake my body as I look at him, expecting him to open his eyes. Expecting something, anything but this. “I want the casket closed,” I say, my voice soft. “I want it closed.”

  “Samantha,” my father-in-law starts, “it’s—”

  I shake my head. “I don’t want the kids to see him like that,” I say softly. I know that for me they wouldn’t even consider it, but for the girls, they would move heaven and earth. “They need to remember him alive and smiling, not like that,” I say, pointing at the casket.

  “Dad,” Ethan says after me, “I agree.”

  “Me too,” Elliot says from beside me. “Close it.”

  He just nods at us, then walks to the man standing in the corner. The man looks at him as they have a hushed conversation and then just nods his head. “Do you need some water?” Ethan says to me, and I nod. I don’t bother listening to what else he says; instead, I get up and go to the casket. Standing before the brown box, I look at him, really look at him. You see some bruising under the makeup, and his nose is a little swollen. His hands are folded over his stomach, resting on his black suit. The suit he wore when we got married. Why? I ask him in my own head. Why did you do it? I ask him, hoping I can hear him whisper something to me, whisper anything back. To answer my questions, to give me something; anything to make me understand why he did what he did. Why he left me with so many fucking questions and not one answer.

  The man comes over to close the casket. Eric’s face disappears slowly, the shadow filling his face till the casket finally shuts. “I’m sorry for your loss,” the man says, nodding at me. “If at any time you want it open, we can open it back up.” I tu
rn around now, looking at the chairs that will fill up as soon as the people start coming in. Ethan consoles my mother-in-law, and Elliot stands where we were just sitting, his hands in his pockets.

  “I’m getting the girls,” I tell them and then walk out with my head held high but my shoulders slumped. Defeated is a word that you use so many times not really understanding what can actually defeat you. I know now, my husband dying, him cheating on me, my kids without a father, my dreams of growing old with him gone. Beaten straight down to my core, straight down to my bones.

  I walk over to them as they look up. “Let’s go, girls,” I tell them as they both get up and walk to me. Lizzie takes one hand, Daisy takes the other, and we walk back into the room that holds a piece of our hearts. The room where their father lies, with no answers and no tomorrow.

  We stand in that room for four hours while people come up to me and give me their condolences. I nod my head and play the part of the grieving wife. I am the grieving wife, but I’m also the wife whose husband didn’t love her enough to just be with her. The wife who knew her husband was slipping away but couldn’t catch it in time. The wife he said he would love and protect. The wife who stands here between his girls wishing that for one second he suffered horribly. The wife who has to pick up the fucking pieces and lie to her girls about what a great guy he was. The wife who, at the end of the day, just wasn’t good enough.

  We listen as people tell us how amazing he was, how much he loved his family, and how much he loved his girls. The whole time, I’m yelling on the inside, ready to stand in the middle of the room, throw my head back, and yell at the top of my lungs. But I don’t do what I want. I don’t tell them what a fraud my husband was. I don’t tell them that it was almost all lies. I don’t tell them that the day he died, they called his other wife and not me. I don’t tell them that I wasn’t the one with him when he died.

  I stand here thinking about this other person—his other wife—and wonder how she would handle this. How she would be with my in-laws. Would she just let them control her and do everything for her? Would she want it to be open and weep for him beside the casket instead of standing next to it?

  I look around the room at all the people who came to pay their respects, and my eyes find someone I’ve never met before. Someone I’ve never seen before, and our eyes connect. His green eyes stare into mine as I watch him nod to me and turn to walk out. As he walks out of the crowded room, I strain my neck to watch his back. I don’t have long to think because Elliot comes up and whispers, “It’s time.”

  Blake

  Blake

  I walk out of the funeral home with my head down. I make sure not to make eye contact with anyone in case I actually know them. Coming here today was something I know I shouldn’t have done, but I did it anyway.

  Three days ago, I had to sit my sister down on the couch and tell her that her husband really wasn’t her husband. That he had another family. I had to do the dirty work of a coward. I had to take the brunt of her hatred when his two brothers showed up on her doorstep to claim his body. I had to be there while she slowly died right in front of me. And then if that wasn’t enough, the fucking cease and desist letter along with the restraining order were served. I wanted to get into my car that minute and find his family, but the last thing my family needed was for me to end up behind bars. So I stood in the corner and developed a plan.

  Then I left quietly in the middle of the night, just as the sun was rising, and made my way toward the place where my brother-in-law would be.

  I walked into the room, looking around. My eyes landed on the woman I assumed was his wife. I took in her blond ponytail and no makeup on her face. Her brown eyes, red and puffy from the tears that she kept wiping away. Two beautiful little girls stood beside her, and I was okay till she looked my way. When her eyes settled on mine, I saw the anguish she was going through, I saw the pain of losing her husband, and I saw the pain of having to be there, but I also saw something else, something I didn’t expect to see. After watching long enough, I saw the anger, and as more and more people approached her, the more her eyes changed from sadness to all-out anger. I looked in her eyes for one second and then left. I couldn’t take it; I couldn’t breathe. The tie around my neck got tighter and tighter. I pushed out through the door, loosening the tie, then unbuttoned the first button. I opened my door and got in, finally breathing normally for the first time since I walked into that room. The video montage of Eric played on the wall with all the memories from when he was born till he died. Nothing, not one thing would make you think he was a lying piece of shit. Not one mention of the other woman he left behind. Nothing about the woman who has to be carried up to her bed every single night, the one who cries in her sleep, and the one who wakes up every single day with one question on her lips—why?

  I sat here in the car, not realizing that the people were now walking out of the funeral home. As the hearse pulled up in front of the home, and the casket was carried out by his brothers, who I believe was his father, and three other men. Samantha and his two girls walked out hand in hand with a woman next to them. The two girls looked ahead—the older one with tears in her eyes, and the younger one, leaning on her mother looking like she needed a nap.

  They placed the body in the hearse, and the family got into the limo, waiting for them. I watched them pull out of the parking lot, the limo following the casket. I waited till I was one of the last cars left in the parking lot before I finally pulled out and made my way home.

  For the next three weeks, I watch my sister fall deeper and deeper into an abyss. I watch her die a little bit more, and I’m powerless to help her. I’m finally off shift from the fire station when my phone rings.

  “Hey there.” I hear Crystal’s voice low and almost in a whisper.

  “Hey, yourself,” I breathe out. “What’s up?”

  “I’m going to see her,” she says as I hear a car door close.

  “Going to see who?” I ask, not sure who she is talking about.

  “The wife,” she says. “I have to go see her.”

  “I don’t think that is such a great idea. Honestly, what good can come of that?” I ask her, thinking about how she can possibly answer this.

  “I have to know what she’s like. I have to know for Hailey,” she says, and I know that I have to take her. I don’t think she will be able to hold back. I pick her up and then follow the address she gives me, pulling up to the quiet little house.

  “You sure about this?” I ask Crystal when I finally turn off the car. She looks around, not saying anything but nodding her head.

  It’s been three weeks since Eric has died, two weeks since his brothers came to the house and ‘claimed’ all his belongings. Two weeks since Hailey was served with papers demanding she cease and desist using Eric’s name.

  I get out of the car, looking at the little gray house with flowers lining the walkway. The brown door with the hanging welcome sign. Crystal looks down at her feet, takes a deep breath, and then starts to walk toward the house with me following right behind. When we get to the door, Crystal reaches out to ring the doorbell, and we hear the sound from the open window upstairs.

  We hear footsteps approaching the door. “Here we go,” Crystal says, and I hold my breath as the door creaks open.

  The door swings open, and there standing in the middle is the woman who has haunted my dreams since the funeral. The woman who in my dream is lost and turns to me for help, but each time I’m about to reach out to her and help her, she vanishes right through my fingertips. The woman with blond hair that is straight and long, coming over her thin shoulder. Her big brown eyes, too big for her face, her cheeks more sunken in than before. Her clothes look like they are five sizes too big for her. “Can I help you?” Her voice comes out soft as she looks from Crystal to me. Her eyes stop on me, but she doesn’t say anything more.

  “I’m Crystal.” Samantha’s eyes go big when she recognizes the name.

  “We are sorry to just
barge in on you,” I start saying when she looks at me again. It’s the same look she gave me at the funeral, except now there is more, there’s so much more, and I can’t put my finger on it. “We were wondering ...”

  Samantha moves out of the way. “Please come in,” she says as we walk in. “Don’t take off your shoes,” she says to us as she turns and walks into her house. The entrance is closed in, and when we walk into the home, we both stop in our tracks. Pictures of Eric are all over the walls; pictures of his family fill the whole wall in the living room. Pictures of him and the girls littered the room.

  Samantha turns around and watches us look at all her pictures. “That was taken the day we found out we were expecting our third child. Two weeks later, I miscarried.” She points at the big portrait of the four of them. “Would you like to sit here or in the kitchen?”

  “I can’t sit in this room,” Crystal says, but at that moment as I’m looking at Eric in the picture, I know that if he was still alive, I wouldn’t be able to stop myself from destroying him. “It’s just too much.” Samantha nods her head as if she understands.

  “Would you like something to drink?” she asks, going into the kitchen.

  “Water,” Crystal says. Samantha goes to the fridge, opening the door, and we see the drawings on the fridge. “I can’t fucking ...” she mumbles as I place my head down and count to ten. I count to ten and curse him all the way to hell.

  She comes back, handing us each a bottle. “I don’t know what the protocol is for any of this, so I don’t want to be rude in any way.” She crosses her hands over her chest, and there it is, the anger that was in her eyes.

  “We just want to talk,” I finally say. She nods at me and walks to the table.