Bitter Rose

by Melody Carlson

  Ned and I continue to chat, and I can tell we are getting closer. Okay, it might be “just as friends,” but that’s okay. He makes a good friend, and he’s easy to look at too. Who knows what might develop on down the line. It’s not like I’m in any hurry to run off and elope with him, although I do imagine it at times. Not to make it seem that I’ve changed my opinion on marriage—the jury is still out on that—but sometimes (in my daydreams) I imagine Ned and myself living happily together (as man and wife) and how our home would look and what it would feel like to be loved and protected by him. And I have to say, it’s not bad.

  When it’s time to meet Dad on Sunday, I wonder if I made a mistake. Am I really ready to talk to him? I feel slightly sick as I park in front of Java Hut. My dad’s Explorer is already here, parked on the other side of the street. I brace myself as I go through the door, spying my dad over by the window, the same table we sat at last time—last time, when I was vowing my allegiance and support of him, so certain that my mom was the witch, the evil cause behind their breakup. Oh, how the tables can turn. I warn myself to be fair—I haven’t heard the whole story yet.

  Dad has already ordered for me—a mocha like I usually have— but it irritates me and makes me want to say that I’d really prefer an espresso, although I’ve never even tasted an espresso. Claire says they’re like coffee on steroids. I sit down and just look at him.

  “How are you doing, Magpie?”

  I shrug. “I’ve been better.”

  “Yeah, I know.” He nods to the coffee. “I got your favorite.”

  “Thanks,” I say in a flat voice without touching the mug.

  “We need to talk.”

  I nod without speaking and still don’t touch the mug.

  “I know that you must have some questions, about Stephanie, I mean.”

  So it actually was Stephanie—not that there was really any question. Mom seemed pretty certain.

  “I’m sure you were shocked to see, well, a woman in my apartment. But I can explain.”

  I look evenly at him. I want to say, “Fine, why don’t you?” But I just sit there. To my surprise, it doesn’t bother me in the least to see him uncomfortable like that. I want to make him squirm.

  “Stephanie works with me.” He waits, like I’m going to say something, which I am not. “We’ve been friends, well, for some time.”

  “Friends?” I repeat the word, making my tone suggest that perhaps they are more than just friends.

  “Yes. She’s a nice person, Maggie. I think you’d like her.”

  I can feel my eyes now. It’s like there is fire behind them, and I have a feeling they look a lot like Mom’s when she’s starting to fume. But I remain calm.

  “I never meant for this to happen,” he says with a sad expression. “Some things are hard to understand, I mean, how they happen. But I want you to know that I never planned it, never actually thought to myself that I would really do something, you know?”

  I shake my head. “No, I don’t know. Why don’t you explain?”

  “Well, it’s not like I got out of bed one morning and said to myself, ‘I think I’ll get involved with someone.’ It just wasn’t like that, premeditated, you know.”

  “So what was it, Dad? Did she sneak up on you in the copy room, jump you from behind, and then just take you?”

  Dad looks slightly amused, although I didn’t mean to be funny. “No, it wasn’t like that either.”

  “What was it like?”

  “We fell in love.”

  Okay, gag me! Seriously, this makes me sick, but I try to keep my face composed. I really do want to get to the bottom of this. Even if it does remind me of the time our dog Shaniko ate a battery from one of my toys (my fault, since I think I fed it to him) and I had to go out in the backyard and wait for him to do his “job” and then I had to use a stick to dig through the pile in order to see if the battery was in there. Fortunately, it was or we would’ve had to take him to the vet. That dog is long gone now, but getting to the bottom of my dad’s story feels sickeningly similar to that whole fiasco.

  “I know you’re probably thinking that it’s wrong, that I should love only your mother. And I can understand that, honey. Like I said, I didn’t exactly plan this. But being with Stephanie, well …” He looks over my shoulder, as if he sees something there besides the wall. “She makes me feel alive again and like I want to get up in the morning, and she really understands me, and we’re just in love. How else can I explain it?”

  “Are you having an affair?”

  He puts his hand over his mouth, partially covering what I now think is a very ugly goatee. In fact, I think it makes him look like the devil. Maybe he is.

  “Are you, Dad?” I glare at him. “Are you sleeping with her?” My voice has grown louder, and the couple at the nearest table looks our way. But I don’t care.

  Now he looks away, but judging by his expression, I have my answer.

  “So you have been cheating on Mom.” I say the ugly words for him. “How long has it been going on, Dad? How long have you been cheating on Mom?”

  His cheeks are getting flushed, and he looks slightly alarmed now, like this conversation is going too far, too fast, and it’s ready to derail him any moment. He looks at me in that way—the way that asks me if I’ll just let this go, just understand, just be his gullible little Magpie, the daughter who totally adores him and accepts him and believes whatever he wants her to believe. Well, those days are gone, Dad!

  “How long has this been going on?” I repeat my question since he seems to have forgotten it.

  He clears his throat. “Well, Stephanie and I have been seeing each other for a few months now.”

  “A few months?” My voice is really loud. “You’ve been having an affair with this woman for a few months? When did Mom find out anyway?”

  “Can you keep it down?” He glances around. “There are other people here, you know.”

  “Fine.” I lower my voice, but the damage is done. I think everyone in here knows that my dad’s been cheating on my mom, and I don’t care. I don’t care that this is his favorite coffee shop and he may not want to show his face in here again. Or maybe he’s already brought Stephanie here. Maybe they know.

  “Your mom found out in September.”

  I nod knowingly. “About the same time she started losing it? The same time she started getting grumpy, getting on your case, acting like she was living in a state of continual hormonal meltdown? Well, doesn’t that figure.”

  “Of course, she was upset. You can’t blame her.”

  “Blame her?” I challenge him. “You saw me blaming her. You saw me making her out to be the demon woman, the one who drove you from our home. And you just let me. You never admitted—”

  “There are two sides to this, Magdela,” he says in a firm tone. “You haven’t heard everything yet.”

  “Yeah, right. Mom falls apart when she learns you’re cheating on her, and she’s to blame. You bet.” I just shake my head in disgust. “But I want to know something. Why didn’t she make you leave in September when she found out? Why did she let you stay?”

  “We thought we could work it out.”

  Now I soften just a little. “Why can’t you, Dad?” I plead with him. “Why can’t you work it out?” As I wait for him to answer, it occurs to me that the reason my mom let him stay, the reason she thought they could work this out, was probably because she still loved him. She probably still does. “I’ll bet she would forgive you, Dad. Did you ask her?”

  He still doesn’t answer, but I persist.

  “Did you give her that chance, Dad? Did you ask her to forgive you? Did you ask her to go for counseling with you?”

  He just shakes his head.

  “Why not?”

  Now he looks evenly at me, and more than ever, he seems like a stranger to me. It’s like something in his eyes is different, like I don’t know this man anymore. But I ask him again. “Why not, Dad?”

  “Because
I don’t want to. Because it’s over, Maggie.”

  I look down at my untouched mocha, thankful that I didn’t drink a drop of this man’s poison, and then I stand up. “I don’t want to have anything to do with you, Dad,” I tell him evenly. “As far as I’m concerned, you are dead.” Then I walk out, get in my car, and drive away.

  thirteen

  DESPITE MY TOUGH TALK, MY HEART IS BROKEN. AND AS MUCH AS I HATE him, I still don’t know what to do about certain things—things like memories, like when he taught me to ride a bike and wouldn’t give up until I got it, or the time he bought me the exact dress I wanted (the one Mom had told me was too expensive) for my first formal dance. How do you wipe those memories away? How do you delete entire portions of your life?

  I end up following my mom’s example, the very thing that had me undone just a month ago, and I remove all traces of my dad from my room, including team photos taken during the years when Dad coached our soccer team. I even place the formal dress in a box and shove it to the back of my closet. I just don’t want to be reminded of him anymore.

  Mom knows that something is wrong with me. I can see it in her eyes when we meet on the stairs or in the kitchen, coming and going our separate ways. And I can tell by the way she talks to me, like there’s this question in her voice. Of course, she has no idea that I met with Dad or that I know about the affair. But she eventually corners me and makes her inquiry.

  I’m barely through the door after a busy night at work, and all I want to do is kick off my shoes and veg out in front of the boob tube to block it all out, maybe watch the latest reality show that Claire was telling me about today. I’m grabbing a soda from the fridge when Mom comes into the kitchen.

  “Are you okay, Maggie?”

  “What do you mean?” I pop open the can and take a swig.

  “You’ve just seemed pretty quiet the past couple of days, and I thought we’d made some progress. We were starting to talk again, and it felt good. Have I done something to offend you?” Her expression is so sweet and sincere just now that it makes me want to cry.

  “No, Mom,” I say quickly. “It’s not you. Not at all. The furthest thing from it.”

  She sits down on the stool by the counter as if this is going to take more than just a minute or two. “Well, what then, Maggie? Anything you can tell me about? Boy trouble?”

  I kind of laugh. “Not exactly.” Then I study her for a moment, wondering if she’s ready to hear this. In a way, she seems stronger than she was a few weeks ago, like maybe she’s moving on now. “It’s more like man trouble,” I tell her, pulling out a stool for myself. I sit down, preparing myself for what will probably be an uncomfortable conversation and hoping it will be brief.

  Her brows lift. “You mean Ned? Are you and Ned getting involved?”

  “No, Mom.” Now this kind of irritates me. What if Ned and I were involved? Would it really be that bad? I realize he’s older, out of high school, in college. But it won’t be long until I’m in the same place. Can’t she see that? I’m not exactly a baby anymore.

  “Well, what kind of man trouble are you having, Magdela? You know, that’s not exactly the kind of thing a mother wants to hear from her daughter.”

  “It’s your man,” I tell her, showing my exasperation.

  She nods a bit stiffly. “Oh.”

  “I talked to him on Sunday.”

  She puts her elbows on the countertop, resting her chin on her folded hands, almost as if she’s bracing herself. “And?”

  “And he admitted to having an affair with Stephanie.”

  Mom presses her lips together, trying to appear, I’m sure, as if this isn’t any big surprise. And yet she looks hurt too. And I almost get the feeling that she’s hearing this news for the first time, although I know that’s not really the case.

  “And I asked him if he’d asked you to forgive him, if he’d considered getting help and patching things up.”

  Now Mom sits up straighter, looking slightly hopeful. “And?”

  “He doesn’t want to.”

  “Oh.” Her chin quivers, ever so slightly, and it reminds me of a little girl, and suddenly I just want to hug her.

  “I’m sorry, Mom.”

  She shakes her head. “No, it’s okay, Maggie. I suspected that might be the situation.”

  “You mean with Stephanie?”

  “Yes. So that’s it then? He plans to stay with—with her then?”

  “Yeah, it looks that way.”

  Her face looks very pale now, but she just slowly nods and then stands up, placing her hands on the counter as if to steady herself. “Well, I can’t say I’m not a little surprised. He told me this was just a phase, like a midlife crisis, you know. He thought it would end soon.”

  “He didn’t sound like that to me.”

  Now she studies me very closely. “Are you certain of this, Magdela? Are you absolutely sure? Please don’t spare my feelings. I need to know. This will help me make some decisions and move on with my life. I do not want to be stuck in limbo, stupidly thinking that if I wait long enough he’ll come around. Do you understand what I’m saying? I need to know.”

  “He said he’s in love with her, Mom.”

  “Thank you, Maggie. Thank you for your honesty.” She takes in a deep breath. “I think I’ll go to bed now. I have a closing in the morning.”

  “Are you okay, Mom?” I ask as she goes toward the stairs.

  “I’m fine, Maggie.” But her voice sounds thin and frail and anything but fine. “Good night.”

  And when I go to my room, after watching the last twenty minutes of what turns out to be a totally lame reality show, I hear my mom. She is quietly crying in her room. I stand by her door for a couple of minutes, unsure as to whether I should go in. Then I think about what I would want in a similar situation, if my heart were breaking like hers is, and I suspect I’d want to be alone—at least for a while. So I don’t knock on the door like I want to. I just go to my room and cry too.

  For the next two weeks, it doesn’t seem the least bit like December in our house. Normally, my mom would have decorated every square inch of the place on the inside, and Dad would’ve hung lights on the outside. Our tree would be up in the living room, Mom’s favorite Latino Christmas music would be playing, and she would have a good start on her Christmas baking, starting with Mexican wedding cakes that she would wrap and store in the freezer. But not this year.

  I try to pretend I don’t mind. Since I spend most of my evenings working and the others trying to stay caught up on homework, it’s not that big of a deal. But I do warn Elisa and Marc about the Scrooge state of our home. “Don’t expect much. It looks like it’s going to be a bleak Christmas,” I tell them in an e-mail. They’re both aware of our dad’s affair by now. Marc, of course, says he knew it all along. Elisa, like me, is a little surprised. “It seems out of character,” she wrote back to me. “Does this mean he’s not a Christian anymore?” Well, I didn’t know how to answer that, but I told her she might want to ask him. I also told her that I’ve completely written him off, that I no longer consider him my dad. “You can’t do that,” she wrote back. “Just because they’re splitting up doesn’t mean he’s not your dad.” I didn’t even respond to that in my next e-mail. I simply told her that Mom was in pain and that she needed our support more than ever right now.

  Finally, it’s the beginning of Christmas break, and our gloomy house is seriously bugging me, so I get an idea. I call Claire and ask her if she wants to help me cheer up my mom.

  “What do you have in mind? A trip to Nevada for a quickie divorce?”

  I sort of laugh. “No. I thought we could decorate my house for Christmas. It’s so depressing around here. And Marc will be home on Saturday, and then Elisa a few days after that.”

  “That’s a great idea, Maggie!”

  So the next day, Claire and I make several trips to the attic, hauling down carton after carton of Mom’s carefully organized Christmas stuff. I try to remember where
she likes things, and then Claire and I go to work. It’s actually pretty fun, and by the end of the day, it looks way better. I even put on Mom’s favorite Christmas CDs.

  “Too bad we didn’t have time to make cookies,” Claire says as she gets ready to leave.

  “Well, maybe this will inspire my mom,” I say. “Thanks so much for the help.”

  “Let me know what she thinks.”

  When Mom comes home, she seems pretty surprised. She walks through the house and checks out our handiwork. Okay, it sort of hurts my feelings when she changes a couple of the decorations around, like we didn’t get it quite right, but I don’t say anything—after all, this is her territory, not mine. But then she sits down on the couch directly across from the fireplace, which I happen to think we did a pretty good decorating job on, and she begins to cry.

  I don’t know what to do. Finally, I tell her I’m sorry. “I guess we shouldn’t have done this,” I say, feeling defensive and ready to speak my mind.

  “No, honey,” she says, looking at me with wet eyes. “It’s wonderful. It’s sweet. But it just makes me sad.” She starts crying again. “This will be our first Christmas, you know …”

  Then I put my arms around her and hug her. “Yeah, I know. But we can’t just skip it, can we? I mean, it’s still Christmas whether Dad is around or not. And Elisa and Marc will be here, and …” I begin crying too.

  “I’m sorry, Maggie,” she says when she sees my tears. “I really do appreciate this. And you’re right. We can’t skip Christmas just because your father is a jerk.”

  I nod. “That’s right. And you know what? I hope he feels bad, you know, when he realizes we’re all over here having a good time and he doesn’t even have us anymore. That would serve him right.”

  She smiles. “Yes, it would. A friend at work was just telling me that very same thing. She said the best revenge is to live well. And maybe that’s just what we’ll do, Maggie.” She stands up now, pulling me to my feet. “And tonight we’ll bake cookies!”