Second Thoughts

by Clarke, Kristofer

  “Nothing that makes you uncomfortable.” She gave an immediate response. “Why don’t you start with the day your mother died?”

  I guess that was the reason my sister gave for me coming to see her; to deal with unresolved issues surrounding my mother’s death.

  I didn’t know this bitch from anywhere to trust her with my innermost feelings. I didn’t know the relationship this Dr. Reeves had with my sister so, in that moment, I’d decided to make it my business to find out just how close these two were.

  “How do you know my sister?” I asked without hesitation.

  I sat in a brown suede chair─the walls were painted just a shade lighter─with my legs folded beneath me. Dr. Reeves stood with her backside against her desk and her hands clasped in front of her. Her right foot swayed side-to-side on the heel of her burgundy peep-toe sling-back pumps.

  “Would you be more willing to talk if I didn’t know her?”

  “You didn’t answer my question,” I hurriedly retorted.

  “Fair enough.”

  She unclasped her hands and rested her palms on her desk. She looked first towards the floor and then looked up at me as she responded.

  “I counseled your sister Vanessa and Dillon.”

  “Were they having problems?”

  “I can’t tell you that.”

  “OK. Maybe you can tell me this. Did this counseling happen before or after they were married?”

  “I can’t tell you that, either, Ms. Duncan. Listen, why don’t we…”

  I interrupted, “I’m glad you said that.”

  I got up from the chair and walked over to where Dr. Reeves stood. I folded my arms and stared directly into her eyes.

  “How can I be certain our doctor-patient confidentiality isn’t trumped by your friendship with my sister?”

  “Trust me.”

  “That’s not an easy thing for me to do, Dr. Reeves.”

  I walked back to the chair and sat.

  “And please,” I added. “You can call me Taylor. I know you want to.”

  Dr. Reeves finally walked over and sat in the identical chair across from me. I was waiting for her to pull out her pen and notepad, but instead she removed a silver pocket mini-cassette recorder from a drawer under the coffee table.

  “I hope you don’t mind,” she said.

  She pressed the record button and placed the recorder on the table before I gave my consent. I stared at the small silver devise that sat ready to capture my confession. I didn’t know where my story was going to start or where it would end.

  “So, I guess you think I still cry for my mother.”

  “What I think doesn’t matter, Taylor,” she corrected. “Do you?”

  “My mother isn’t who I cry for. I cry for what she took from me.”

  I could feel the tears making their way to the corners of my eyes.

  Dr. Reeves sat back in her chair and crossed one leg over the other. She lengthened her dress to cover her exposed knee.

  “Continue,” she permitted.

  “The only thing that saddened me about Lydia’s death was that she carried the whereabouts of my son with her. She was the only one who knew where he was. She was wicked and selfish. Nothing she did for us─or at least for me─was done out of love. Everything she did to us and for us was only for her to look better in everyone’s eyes. Even now, I can’t forgive her for what she did,” I ranted as if I were reading a prepared speech.

  “What could your mother have done that was so unforgivable, even years after she’s gone?”

  “She took my son away from me!” I screamed. “He was mine, and she didn’t have that right. She was more concerned about what her pretentious elite friends would think about her daughter being knocked up at fifteen that she did everything she could to hide it. Little did she know those same women didn’t give two fucks about her or her children,” I paused to compose myself. “And you know what my mother did? Every morning she bandaged my stomach and my breasts to keep them from growing.”

  I closed my eyes and attempted to squeeze away the memory. I tried to stifle the tears that eventually fought their way through tight lids.

  “And when that no long worked―because I was unwrapping my belly every night before I went to sleep―she shipped me away to California that summer. I don’t know what her explanation to Vanessa about me leaving was, if she gave her any explanation at all.”

  “Have you told Vanessa?”

  Through my tears, I managed to laugh.

  “Are you kidding me? I didn’t tell her anything then, and I don’t plan on telling her.” I had to pick my poison, and so I decided dealing with my loss was best. “She already thinks she’s better than me. Both my mother and Vanessa took from me.”

  “What exactly did Vanessa take from you?”

  “Besides Dillon?”

  I waited for her reaction, but she remained stoic. I stopped myself from explaining my query. I stood and walked a few steps from Dr. Reeves, but not before taking a few pieces of tissue from the silver flat container she had handed to me. The same perplexed look appeared on her face again.

  “I saw him in my dreams this week.”

  Dr. Reeves looked at me with a quizzical expression and then quickly fixed her face when she realized her reaction.

  “He looked like I thought he would look now, everything for his father, with his wavy black hair dominating his small head. That was the only thing I saw as he was whisked him away from me. He looked healthy and happy. He always had his hands stretched towards me, waiting for me to pick him up. But just before my hands were secured under his arms, I would wake up.”

  “What about the child’s father? Does he even know this child exists?”

  “No. Patrick had his own issues he had to deal with, and as far as I know, he’s probably still dealing with them.” I smiled, thinking about my childhood friend. “Plus, I wasn’t going to tell him about something I couldn’t even prove. The scars were only memory deep.”

  I told Dr. Reeves that my mother forbade me to speak to Patrick. She succeeded, yet again, at taking another person from my life. This time she took my best friend from me. I had seen Patrick McKay about three years ago just before I became mixed up with DaMarcus. I still couldn’t bring myself to tell him about our son. He’d entered into the pavilion on this cold winter evening. He was the last person I expected to see. I wasn’t looking at him in a sexual manner, but I was admiring him in every other sense of the word. We had a few minutes to catch up before he had to get back to his client. Patrick Duval was now Patrick McKay, a very successful sports agent. Patrick was still tall and dark, and handsome, just like he had been when I last saw him when he was sixteen.

  “Well, Taylor,” Dr. Reeves said.

  I turned my head for a quick glimpse in her direction.

  “I take it my time is up?” I asked.

  Dr. Reeves had just glanced at her watch on the underside of her left hand.

  She walked closer to me, and though I had my back towards her, she talked as if she were talking to my face.

  “Unfortunately, yes,” she affirmed. She paused. “For this session. Listen, I know you came here on Vanessa’s suggestion, but she doesn’t have to know if you continue to see me. I have a few extra minutes if you want to continue.”

  “You know what I’ve learned, Dr. Reeves? A dead man tells no tale. I could fall asleep on your couch and I still wouldn’t know if my son is dead or alive. I do thank you for your offer though, but I’m good.”

  “Are you, Taylor?”

  Dr. Reeves extended her hand and rested it on my shoulder. I didn’t acknowledge her gesture.

  “Maybe you should consider talking to Patrick about this child you share with him. I know you have no evidence of your child’s existence, but it might bring you close to him―close to somebody―’cause it seems you haven’t allowed yourself to get close to anyone since him.”

  I allowed her suggestion to marinate in my head. I wasn’t sure
I was going to follow Dr. Reeves’ suggestion. It would be nice to reconnect with Patrick. We were so close when we were younger, even with him confiding in me about his sexuality. After that day, Patrick changed. He became a splinter of the outgoing man I fell in love with seemingly from the first day I met him.

  I left Dr. Reeves’ office with a cluster of emotions I didn’t feel like dealing with, thanks to Nessa’s persistence and my own damn fear. So what if she did find out about the past with Dillon? So what if she knew our occasional rendezvous never stopped even after their nuptials. He was mine first. I still had a right to him, especially if he felt he still had a right to me.

  Chapter 23

  DaMarcus…

  I Love This Feeling

  I liked the feeling that came over me. Thoughts of drowning Taylor like a tsunami left the kind of taste that only overly sweetened Kool Aid could. I tasted upside-down pineapple cake with a thick layer of brown sugar, all at the thought of giving Taylor her just dessert. I never thought my involvement with her would have come to this. The more I thought about how I treated her and what I got in return, the more I became aroused by the plot to destroy her. She made promises she didn’t keep. My fling with her had given me a son I was still trying hard to love, because he reminded me of everything: Taylor, the woman I now hated, and Belinda, the love I no longer had. He reminded me that lust didn’t cost a thing but could cost you everything─my everything was Belinda. I wondered if Taylor ever felt guilty and if so, how long had this guilt stayed with her. Apparently, not too long; she was already on to the next. That next happened to be her sister’s husband. She was a shrewd woman so I figured she was immune to emotions, if she had any emotions at all.

  My ally sat composed and watched me lose the woman I loved because she all of a sudden developed a conscience. Where was her goddamned conscience when she was telling me I was the only one she loved and I couldn’t change it, right before she told me she would never do anything to hurt me? Well, if she thought she was a little girl who could hide behind a tree during a childhood game of hide-and-seek and not be seen, she was about to find out she was now all grown up, and none of her bad deeds were going unpunished.

  I got out of bed, pushed my feet in my slippers, and wrapped my toes around the thong. I walked across my American black walnut hardwood floor and stood in front of the dresser. I opened a top drawer and removed a small passport-size picture of Taylor. I stood at the window, my face covered in cynicism. Nothing would please me more than to wipe that pretentious angelic smile from her scandalous face. Taylor belonged in a barge with the rest of the garbage because she’s nothing but trash. The plot to destroy her aroused me.

  For a moment I was bothered that Vanessa would be hurt in the setup. I felt sorry for her because I knew what Taylor was capable of. I felt nothing for Dillon. He was just like me. Taylor probably loved him beyond measure to the point where he’d swallowed her lies like he was being fed honey. I’m sure she was already plotting her next set of lies and would somehow convince Vanessa she was an innocent player in Dillon’s secret games.

  “You should have trusted me,” I said aloud, and I felt disappointed all over again.

  I was staring at the small photograph in my hand.

  “I said you would be taken care of, now taking care of you has a whole new meaning.”

  I had lain down with a dog named Taylor DeAngela Duncan. What happens when you lie down with dogs? I thought.

  Like Santa Clause at Christmas, I made my list and checked it twice. It had taken me all weekend and most of Monday to come up with what I hope was a perfect plan. I was lying in bed highlighting the people I had on standby; those who had developed a just disdain for Taylor. I commended them─myself even─for their momentary surrender. I fell asleep smiling at the thoughts that flooded my mind. I’ve thought about Taylor from time to time, usually dismissing them as they surfaced. Tonight, however, I welcomed the thoughts that infiltrated my mind space, surprised they had become my lullaby, my musical carousel, soothing me to sleep.

  • • • • •

  They say payback was a bitch, and this bitch was going to get the payback of a lifetime. It was my turn to watch her fall. Besides Quinton, her sister was the only other person she had in her life. I’ve tried to forget about Taylor and what she had done to me, but every time I thought about my walk of shame, my green mile after Belinda threw me out, her sleeping next to her new man, the crave to even the score came rushing back, leaving a syrupy taste in my mouth. I wasn’t going to need an alibi, just the perfect accomplice, and I had at least two to choose from.

  That’s right, I thought, with an evil smile on my face. I’m not the first one you’ve fucked over, and I’m sure I wasn’t the last.

  I sat in my cosmopolitan burnt red leather armchair that sat in the corner of my bedroom, eager to put my plan into action. This was definitely the day that the lord has made. I reached over the side of the chair and grabbed my cell phone I had set on the floor. I slid my finger down the screen, stopping at her name. I was hoping she would partake in my plan. I had asked her not to mention anything to Dillon or Taylor. Was she able to fight the urge?

  "Hello," she answered, sounding if as I were disturbing sleep that had finally come. "I told you I would call you when everything was ready."

  "Do you know what time is it?" she asked.

  "I do know what time it is. Are you ready for revenge? They say it is sweet, and I’m already salivating like Pavlov’s dogs. Taylor’s days of stepping on people without consequences are over.”

  “I’ve given it some thought since we last talk,” she began. “I’m not going to object to you exacting your revenge on her. Maybe she does deserve it…”

  “There’s no maybe about it, Vanessa,” I interrupted.

  “If you insist,” she continued. “But I want nothing to do with this. She is my sister.”

  “And how often have you wished she thought like you? I wonder how much it mattered to her that you were, indeed, sisters. Were you sisters when she had your husband inside her? She betrayed you. She betrayed your trust. Did she think she was hurting her sister, or were you just another bitch with the wrong skin tone and eyes that had what she wanted and thought she had the right to? The truth is, she didn’t give a damn about you then, she didn’t give a damn about you a week ago, and she doesn’t give a damn about you now.”

  “What exactly do you want to punish her for? How much of your plot of destruction has to do with you and Belinda. You can tell me now, DaMarcus.”

  “Huh?”

  “What? Did you think I wasn’t doing my research, too? What do you think was going to happen when Taylor realized she couldn’t have you to herself?” I asked. “She plays for keeps, and if she was going to lose, so were you.”

  “I was never going to leave my wife for Taylor. She was something to occupy my time; attend my games when Belinda couldn’t. This, losing Belinda, the divorce, and Quinton wasn’t a part of any plan.”

  “You should have made sure you and Taylor had the same plan. Maybe you should have taken some time to get to know the woman you were sharing the bed you shared with your wife. Before you or Chad, there was the investment banker whose wife spent more time overseas on business. Then there was the developer, and I can’t forget the executive chef. She knows how to pick them. As you can see, she ended up with none of them, and they ended up wifeless.”

  “Well, Vanessa, she’s about to lose again,” I assured her.

  “And will that bring Belinda back to you?”

  “It’s not about Belinda coming back.” I paused, ready to give in to Vanessa’s unwillingness. “Fine, I’ll light the fire. You can sit back and watch her burn.”

  “And so could you,” Vanessa shot back. “Where does this yearning come from? Sure she took from you. But didn’t she take from others?”

  “So let me make sure I’m hearing you right. Because I wasn’t her only victim, it makes what she has done, and continued to do, ok?�
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  “Accept the things you can’t change, DaMarcus,” Vanessa implored.

  “Oh, you mean like you have? And what are you going to do the next time she comes after something, make that someone, who belongs to you? What are you going to do the next time she comes after someone she thinks she’s entitled to?”

  “You don’t think she’s changed?” Vanessa asked.

  I paused and waited for her to substantiate her claim.

  “As much as you would like to convince yourself of such a farce,” I said, “the only thing changed about Taylor is her draws, and she probably has a hard time doing that. Believe me, Vanessa, there’s an inevitable encore as soon as she becomes bored with what she has. Didn’t you hear what I said? She has your man right where she wants him; between her legs.”

  “Just think about it.”

  “What’s there to think about?” I asked.

  “It’s been what, three years? Don’t you suppose she’s learned…?”

  “Learned what?” I interrupted. “Her lesson? What have you done to teach her she can’t just spit in peoples’ faces and expect them to wipe and carry on like nothing happened? What have I, anyone, done to give back to her what she has been dishing out for so many years?”

  I paused and waited for Vanessa to retort. When I was met with silence, I continued.

  “She’s having her alligator moment; laying just beneath the surface, her eyes skimming her surroundings for her next prey. Nothing has changed. The only change is that she’s not coming after me, or Chad. She’s coming after your husband. Dillon.”

  “Dillon has a lot to lose.”

  “Newsflash, Vanessa. Sometimes we don’t think about what we have to lose, or what we’re losing until we’ve lost it.”

  “You and Dillon aren’t the same.”

  “Tell you what. I’ll tell you the plan I came up with. If you want to be a part of it, listen closely. But if you think your sister is no longer after your husband’s dick, hang up your phone, roll over, and pretend that as if I never made this call.”