by Jordan Marie
“What’s the point?”
“If you don’t know the answer to that, you’re a bigger horse’s ass than I gave you credit for,” she mutters, walking off to my kitchen.
“Where are you going?” I ask, but I don’t really care. She left and that’s good enough. I lean back against the couch, my head spinning, and close my eyes. The next moment, they jerk awake with shock as cold water pours over me with the force of a hurricane. Hurricane Ida. “What the fuck did you do that for?” I growl, drenched because she poured a huge kettle of cold water over me, soaking me and my couch.
“You need to wake up. If you want my daughter, then do what you need to do to make her happy. Do it for her, yourself, but most importantly, for my grandson!”
“Fuck you. Why can’t Petal be the one to give in this time? Why must it always be me? I’m sick of being the only one who bends for this relationship, and if this is your show of motherly concern, you’re a little late.”
“I’m not your mother, Luka. I’d die before I would ever be your mother,” she answers. Her voice is quiet now, her face turning so stiff it’s almost stone. I get the feeling I missed part of this conversation, but it doesn’t matter. Nothing matters anymore.
“Get the fuck out of my house. I’m done with you, and I’m done with Petal. I’m done with it all.”
“Luka, are you alright out there?”
“Is there a woman in your fucking bedroom?” Ida Sue screams at me which pisses me off. She doesn’t have the right to know what’s going on. She never did, and Petal sure as hell doesn’t anymore. I bite down the urge to explain.
“So what if there is?” I shrug, feeling sicker and sicker by the moment, and somehow that’s Ida Sue’s fault, too.
“Then I was right all along, and your father’s blood runs too deep in your veins.”
“What the fuck does that mean?” I growl, wishing she would just leave.
“The apple doesn’t fall far from the fucking tree, and this tree is fucking riddled with worms,” she mutters, turning to the door.
“Don’t let the door hit you on the way out,” I grumble, closing my eyes again.
“Drop dead, Luka,” she growls back, jerking the door open.
“That doesn’t sound like a worthy Ida Sue comeback. You’re losing your touch!”
“You aren’t worth the effort,” she answers, slamming the door.
“What’s going on?” Mom asks, coming out of the bedroom where she’s been trying to clean it up, proclaiming that her son isn’t about to live in filth. If only she knew that I don’t even want to live. “Good lord, Luka! You’re all wet!” she exclaims.
I don’t answer. I just close my eyes and pray the world stops moving soon.
Present:
“Luka, your father hates me.” That’s never going to change.
“Do you still think the only way we can make this thing work between us is to move away from here?”
“It’d be simpler. We had so much between us when we got married, Luka. That would have been hard enough to overcome, but I think we had the past between us, too.”
“The past?” I ask, not quite understanding what Petal is saying.
“The horrible history my mother and your father have. You can’t be blind to it,” she exclaims, and I pull her into my arms, letting her head rest against my chest. I kick my legs out on the coffee table and send up a silent prayer that we can just stay like this and the outside world would just disappear. I don’t need anything other than Petal and River. I never did; I was just too stubborn to admit it.
“I’m not blind to it. I don’t know what it is, but I can admit they hate each other and that hate has managed to hurt us both. Still, that’s on them, Lo’. We can’t let their past ruin what we have—not anymore. We let that happen once. We let everything get between us, but there’s only one thing that really mattered: how we felt about each other.” I link our hands together and thread our fingers. My hand is rougher and larger than hers, but it never feels stronger than when it’s holding hers.
“Some pasts are so painful… so huge. Nothing overcomes them, Luka,” she says, and for some reason, it feels like she’s warning me. I pull her onto my lap, deciding she’s not close enough. “Luka, stop. You’re sick,” she halfheartedly argues, but once I get her settled against me, she doesn’t move.
“Holding you makes it all better.”
“Liar,” she laughs.
“Just let me hold you, Lo’. I don’t need anything else tonight. Just let me hold you.”
“All night?”
“All fucking night.”
“Your father and my mother will find out…”
“I don’t give a fuck.”
“When you hold me like this, I’m not sure I do either.”
“Then stay and let’s worry about everything else tomorrow.”
“Sounds good,” she whispers, and she raises her head to kiss under my chin. “Better than good.” For once, Petal and I are in complete agreement.
32
Petal
Present:
I can’t lie. I feel like I’m living on borrowed time. Eventually everything is going to explode, and when it does, I’m not sure who or what will be left standing in the aftermath. I need to prepare Luka. I need to express to him exactly the hate his father keeps directing towards me, but I keep chickening out. The worst part is that I know why I’m doing it, and yet can’t store up enough courage to face it.
Luka never believed me when it came to his father—not while we were married. I have no guarantee he would listen to me now, and if he didn’t, there would be no coming back from it. So I’ve been stupid. I’m the chick sitting on a powder keg holding a match and wondering when it’s all going to blow.
It’s been a week since his father cornered me at the school. A week in which I’m practically living with Luka. My mother thinks I’m being a whore with the man Black set me up on a date with, and I’ve done nothing to make her think otherwise.
Which essentially means I’m lying to my mother.
God. You would think after all this time, I would have found a way to grow up and grow some lady-balls and just live my life. I’m disgusted with myself. I admit it. But let me tell you, there isn’t a greeting card around that says, “I’m sleeping with the offspring of the slime-secreting, fly-sucking, pond-scum-dwelling tree frog who raped you. P.S. Were you raped?” I’ve looked for a card, too, not because I thought there might actually be one, but because I was hiding out at the local Walmart card aisle to avoid talking to Luka’s mother when I saw her standing at the checkout lane. When I told Luka moving would be an easier option, I wasn’t lying.
“What are you thinking?” Luka asks, looking up from the table where he’s helping River with his homework.
“Just that our parents are going to catch on to what we’re doing soon.”
“Yeah, I think my father might have already,” Luka confesses before turning around to laugh at something River said about his writing homework.
He has no idea the cold fist that wrapped around my heart at his words. “What do you mean?”
“He’s come by the office a few times and made some snide remarks. Nothing concrete, but…” He shrugs.
“This is not good, Luka.”
“Lo’, quit worrying. There’s not a damned thing he can do about it,” Luka laughs. He laughs. I swear, for a man who is so smart, when it comes to how truly evil his father can be, Luka can be downright stupid. Maybe it’s because Luka tries to deal with people being straightforward and honest. He can’t understand how his own father can be as dark and evil as the Devil himself. “River is sleeping over at Green’s tomorrow night with Allen, right?” Luka asks, changing the subject.
As much as I worry, I let it go. I might as well be like an ostrich with its head buried in the sand and ignore all potential threats… and Luka’s father is definitely a threat.
“Yeah, it’s Allen’s birthday. Green promised him a sleepover
with all his buddies… though I doubt he planned on Allen inviting fifteen boys over,” I add with a laugh.
“Jesus. I don’t even think our house could hold fifteen kids.” Luka ruffles up River’s hair.
My heart literally flips over in my chest. Does Luka even realize he called this place our house? He’s been calling me Lo’ more and more lately, whereas before, it was only during sex.
I’m noticing other things, too, and Luka probably doesn’t have any idea he’s doing them, but he is. It’s like I’m finally touching the dream I always had of the two of us being together. In the evenings when I am here and it’s just me, him, and River, we feel like a family—a family that is together and strong—and I’m right where I’m supposed to be.
I don’t want to lose it. I can’t.
“I don’t think Green realizes just how bad it’s going to be yet,” I say with a grin. “We may have to do some investigating and film it… for research purposes.”
“Research purposes?” he questions with a laugh.
“You know, in case River ever wants to have a sleepover.”
“I do!” River pipes up. Luka looks at me with terror in his eyes, and I probably shouldn’t, but I can’t help laughing.
“I’ll have to visit Mary that night,” I mumble.
“No way, woman. You will be right here where you belong,” he says, his voice quiet and whisper-soft and his dark eyes so warm, they make me melt.
I love Luka Parish… more every day.
33
Petal
Present:
“Luka? What are you doing here?”
“You got a problem with me being here?” he asks, and a look passes over his face I don’t necessarily like. I understand why it’s there; we didn’t get to spy on Green’s party. We haven’t had many nights together at all since then. In fact, I haven’t even seen Luka in two days. It’s also kind of my fault. I couldn’t get what he said about his father out of my head, and I’ve been cautious—maybe even extra cautious.
It might be completely irrational, but Luka’s dad is like the proverbial monster under my bed, and no matter how I try to ignore it, no matter how hard I try to stand up to him, he scares me. Not because of what he can do to me, but what he can do to the people I love. He’s used that threat often enough, and I am almost positive his follow-through would be worse than the threat. I also think that Roger Parish is so evil that he wouldn’t even blink at destroying his own son if it meant getting even with people who crossed him.
“Of course not,” I answer, but I can tell from the look in Luka’s eyes that I didn’t answer quick enough. I glance around the shop. It’s empty except for one of my coworkers. We’re set to close in another hour, but having Luka here without River makes me nervous. I’ve been practically living with Luka, and now I’m scared because he’s at my shop. No wonder Luka is frustrated… and he is. I see it written all over him.
“Alright, that’s enough. Let’s go.”
“Go?” I ask, confused.
“We’re getting out of here, and we’re talking. Really talking, Petal,” he warns me.
“I’m working, Luka! I can’t just leave!” I argue.
“Sure you can. I’ll close up,” Melissa pipes up helpfully—the bitch.
“Then it’s settled. Let’s go,” Luka demands, crossing his arms against his chest, daring me to argue.
“Luka—”
Before I can continue, he steps toward me, wraps his arms around me, and throws me over his shoulder.
“There we go,” he says, taking us out of the shop.
“What are you doing? Let me down!”
“I can’t hear you,” he sings. “Later, Melissa!”
“See ya, Luka!” Melissa happily yells after us as we leave.
“I can’t believe you did that! You know how much Melissa loves to gossip. It’s going to be all over town by morning.”
“Who gives a shit?”
“Then you know what will happen—Wait. What did you just say?”
“I said: Who. Gives. A. Shit.”
“Luka! Your dad will—”
“I don’t think you understand, Petal. I don’t give a fuck,” Luka mutters. He takes me to his squad car and opens the door to the back. He stands me up, and before I can give him hell, he kisses me. It’s not a gentle kiss, either; it’s a forceful one with his tongue pushing into my mouth and laying claim to me. For a minute, I’m too stunned to react. Then, I get lost in the kiss. Our tongues war with one another, his hands moving down to my ass and pulling me close. My hands dive into his hair and my fingers curl as I give myself over to him. “That’s better,” he growls, pulling away from me. I’m still in a Luka-kissed-me-and-made-me-melt phase, so I don’t even offer up resistance when he moves my hands behind my back. I don’t come through the kiss-fog until I feel the cold metal of handcuffs encircle my wrists.
“Luka?” I ask questioningly, and I still must be in some kind of haze because I’m not really resisting even as he maneuvers me inside the car. I don’t come out of it until I hear the door slam, signaling I’m closed in… in the back of a squad car… with handcuffs on… like I’ve been arrested. “What are you doing?” I ask, and that’s when I know there’s no haze left in my mind, only anger, because I literally screech the question out.
“I’m arresting my wife,” he answers calmly as he climbs in the driver’s side and starts up the car. There’s a black metal guard between the backseat and the front. I look through it in disbelief.
“We’re not married!”
“It’s funny that out of that sentence, that’s the part you want to argue with.”
“We’re not!” I argue again, my heart beating a hundred miles per hour. In response, he turns on the radio. “Luka! You cannot arrest me!”
“But I can,” he says calmly.
“What on Earth for?”
“Alienation of affection.”
“Alienation… Will you please use English!?”
“It’s a law that enables a spouse to pursue a third party for the destruction of their marriage.”
“A third party? You’re talking insane, and I’d just like to point out yet again that we are not married!”
“Usually a marriage ends because of cheating. In this case, you’re the cause, and instead of standing by and watching you destroy everything again, I’ve decided to take action.”
“Watching me… I’m the cause… You have completely lost your marbles!”
“If I have, Lotus Petal Parish, you have driven me to it!” he growls back, showing his first real sign of emotion other than the kiss since he picked me up.
“Luka, be reasonable! You’re not making any sense here!”
“That happens when a man’s woman ignores him for days!”
“I’ve been busy!”
“Do you really expect me to believe that shit?”
“I have! You can’t get all bent out of shape just because I haven’t been around to—”
“Petal, I’m only going to warn you once to not finish that sentence,” he threatens, his voice dropping down low in a tone that would chill a smarter woman—a woman who wasn’t upset.
“You just blamed me for our marriage ending, you jackass. You are threatening to have me arrested on a stupid law—which I don’t even think applies to the state of Texas, by the way!”
“I’m the sheriff, and I say it does!”
“You’re a fucking asshole who is acting pissy because I haven’t touched his dick for two days.”
“And that’s it! I warned you!” he growls.
“Oh gee, Luka! What are you going to do to me? Have me arrested?”
He pulls his car over to the edge of road. I look outside and I can tell we’re on Hickory Road, which is an old pasture road that connects to my brother Blue’s farm. I guess I should just be thankful that it is not his father’s driveway at this point.
“You are the single most stubborn, pig-headed—”
“I cou
ldn’t even begin to hold a candle to you!”
“You wish,” he growls, getting out of the car. He walks over to my door and opens it. He looks down at me with so much anger on his face that I’m not sure what to do—so I do nothing. It seems the wisest thing to do right now. “You and I are going to have a come-to-Jesus moment, Lotus Petal!”
“Stop calling me that! And stop sounding like my mother!”
“Then stop acting like a spoiled brat! Fuck! Why does it always feel like I’m the only one fighting to save this marriage?”
“We’re not married! I’ve been busy, Luka! That’s all! I don’t know why we’re fighting!”
“Stop lying! Something has freaked you out and you’ve been avoiding me! We’ve come too far to turn back now, Petal. I’m warning you, if you do this, there will be no more chances. It will finally be over. I don’t have the energy to go through it again. Is that what you want?”
His words sober me like nothing else could. In this moment, I can clearly see two paths, and both of them terrify me.
34
Luka
Present:
“Well?” I prod, demanding Petal answer me. I’m at the end of my rope. This woman has me going in circles, and I can’t take it anymore. I refuse to let her withdraw again. She’ll either fight and hold on or it’s done.
Enough is enough.
“Okay, fine. I have been avoiding you,” she whispers.
You would think her answer would make me feel better, but instead, it does the opposite.
“What the fuck for?” I growl, shoving my hand in my hair to keep from reaching out and wringing her neck.
“People are going to find out!”
“You have to be fucking kidding me right now. Christ, Petal, we’re not kids here, not anymore. We’ve got a son together. I doubt people will bat an eye over the fact that we’re back together.”