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by CELENE CAREY

  “I’m so glad to see you.”

  She hugged me again and again.

  “Do you want some iced tea? Some pink lemonade?”

  “Iced tea, please.”

  No matter how miserable I got, I could not disrespect my mother; she’d carried me in her womb for approximately two hundred and seventy-three days, which was something no one else could ever do for me. I smiled. She loved me and right now I needed love I was sure of. I’d worry about my father later, when he got home.

  Jonathan

  Saturday evening, mom refused to let me convince her that she needed rest. Her fragile almost sixty year old frame slowly got ready to go to choir practice. She wore a pink flared shirt with a white polo-like striped top, pink and white, with a white knitted head piece over her platted hair, her sandals, and her small handbag, which only held her bible, an umbrella, and a blue ink pen for her jottings. I walked her down the stairs, gave her cell phone to her, and reminded her how to call me, so I could come meet her and walk her home when she was finished. In the meantime, I got some cleaning done and did some thinking. I did the things I knew mom couldn’t do for herself anymore, like move the furniture and sweep behind it, clean under the cupboards, and so on. I would start paying a woman to clean every Monday. Not a Sunday, I knew mom wouldn’t want anyone to be here when she wasn’t home. She went to morning and evening service every Sunday.

  I took a walk into the town, went to the pharmacy, and bought her some vitamins I knew she wouldn’t want to take. “I’m not sick,” I’m sure she’ll say; I could hear her voice in my head scoffing at the idea that prevention was better than cure. I looked at the difference between the streets she was used to and the streets I’d now gotten used to. The more homeless people I saw, the more I thought about Veronica’s soft heart. Maybe it was just the American in her talking, but she sometimes wished aloud that she had the money to donate some to a place where these people could get something warm to eat and clean clothes for free. She spent most of her adult life here in Australia; I think she was sincere. I saw the way she looked at them and the way she’d refused to look anymore when she realised it was only a wish and there were some things you couldn’t do in real life. She wasn’t a bitch; she was a good girl.

  It was a fact of life: good people can do incredibly stupid things. Cheating was one of them, though I could not convince myself that Veronica was capable of doing something this stupid, and over and over again, because I was sure that it couldn’t have happened just one time. Cheating is like picking a flesh wound, it’ll hurt but you’ll like it too much to not go back. You could either pick at it until it bled again or let it heal, whichever one would still leave a scar eventually. How could she cheat when we were supposed to be in love? In a love that was supposed to be like hearing your favourite song for the very first time over and over again. How could she do this to me? To us? To herself? I wanted to curl myself into a fist and not hate a man I’ve never even met. A man who had pleasured her, who she had pleasured. I tried not to get upset. After all, she’d still been calling back. I couldn’t get myself to answer her, couldn’t hear her voice. She’d been my weakness and addiction for so long that I knew giving her a chance to explain would only give her a chance to steal my heart again, what was left of it. There was nothing to explain. What was she going to tell me? What he did and didn’t do? What she liked and didn’t like? At least, she still knew me well, even if she was now but a stranger to me. She saved me the trouble and didn’t offer an explanation. An apology wouldn’t serve me well either, his head on a platter, however, sounded like Christmas to me. I knew Veronica was never strong enough to apologise. She’d accept she was wrong, try to fix it, but for her “I’m sorry” was one of the hardest things she’s ever had to say to anyone. I learned that the first year of our relationship.

  Had he known? Had he known he was trespassing in and on what should’ve been my secret hiding place? My forever and always? Had he been a victim like me? Had she really done this to me? How had she broken a man who had believed he’d seen the worst of what life had to offer? Life was definitely like a box of chocolates, and I’d just bitten into a flavour I was allergic to. If I ever heard his voice again, I’d probably break out in hives. I would call her sometime soon. As soon as my soul caved and the wall I was trying to build cracked like it was in an earthquake.

  Mark and Lucinda Blair

  Veronica

  When dad came home he asked a millions questions about my sudden arrival; the strangest question he asked was, “Do you need money?” Was I a charity case?

  “What would I have done if I’d shown up and they were gone? My phone didn’t work and I was raised better than to talk to strangers.” They were mostly simple questions that I didn’t even bother answering. I would’ve checked into the Inn down the street. He knew it existed. I was again grateful for my mother’s affection, though a part of me struggled to hope it wasn’t fake.

  It seemed as if he never really missed me. It wasn’t a shocker. I kept my anger to myself, too many emotions were bubbling and boiling inside me. If I didn’t release them, I’d burst, and that was never good. I always did something that was either very uncalled for or ridiculously drastic for me. He was in the garage, by himself, digging through his toolboxes. I stood in the door frame and watched him. I finally spoke, “Am I not your child?”

  He turned his ear towards me, but didn’t look at me. I continued, “Did mom have me out of wedlock? Did you just change my last name and give me yours to save face?”

  “Don’t ask stupid questions like that, Veronica. You are flesh of your mother’s flesh and my DNA; you have my eyes for Christ’s sake.”

  I didn’t remember his eyes; he didn’t look at me long enough as a child for that detail to be etched upon my mind.

  “You don’t love me like I belong to you at all, though.”

  I walked away, went to my room. It had been redecorated when I turned eighteen, as though I’d never come back to sleep in it. I buried my face in my pillow, not crying physical tears, but crying on the inside: for a father’s love I never had, for the love I had lost, for losing myself. I wanted to still be standing in the aftermath.

  Like clockwork, Lucinda came walking in; her five foot frame resting on the edge of my bed, she silently rubbed my back, and the tears came. I looked up at her, tears welling up in her eyes as well and spoke from my heart to my mother for the very first time.

  “Mom, I’m so confused, there’s so much happening, losing Jonathan has made me realise there is so much wrong with me,” I said with tears in my voice.

  “Hush, Hun, there’s nothing wrong with you,” she cooed; she was a mother.

  “Yes, mom! Something’s wrong, I’ve done things I can’t tell you or anyone but, I didn’t leave Jonny. He left me. I lost him, mom, all because I’m selfish and stupid!”

  “You’re not selfish, baby. People do stupid things all the time. It doesn’t mean they are, in fact, stupid.”

  I was getting angry, here she was pretending she really knew me and knew things would actually be alright. They weren’t alright and they weren’t getting easier.

  “Stop acting as if you know me. Stop lying to me! Stop lying to yourself! You and daddy tolerated me, that’s what you did. You tried to buy me, he ignored me. I was a child! I just wanted to be hugged... A child who just wanted to be loved! And now you come in here rubbing my back like you were doing this when I was thirteen or even when I turned seven!”

  Her tears were falling now, the first one the calm before the storm. I regretted lashing out at her the very moment I did. I pulled her into my arms and held her; we cried together and through her muffled tears, her face pressed up against my chest, she whispered, “We’re sorry, Veronica. We did the best we could.”

  Those are the words I had needed to hear my entire life. I needed her to stop pretending everything was okay for just one second, long enough to see that I was hurting. That I hadn’t moved on completely from a ruffle
d childhood as a fat girl who believed she’d end up with no friends; if your parents weren’t your friends who else would want to be?

  My mother was so in love with the man she’d married she was blinded by all the things he’d done wrong, all the things he still gets wrong.

  “How do I know he loves me?” I asked her.

  My mother, in a voice I didn’t know so well, looked me in the eyes and told me, “I know, because your father is the man I married. I know because he loves me. I know because I know he loves you just as much as he loves me. Veronica, your father looks at you the way he looked at me the night we’d first met. Did I ever tell you that story?”

  I shook my head. Did you tell me any story? I guess I should give mother the benefit of the doubt and actually listen to her too-little-too-late story. It was time to make things right in my life.

  “How’d you meet?” I encouraged her. She smiled like a shy school girl, the youth present in her eyes.

  “It was back in Australia. I don’t know if you know this but I wasn’t a very fortunate girl. I grew up in Rae Town, a place you prolly don’t know down there. Back in my day it wasn’t the worst place to grow up once you knew the right people and acted the right way. I was serious; I wasn’t going to be no young and pregnant at sixteen like most of the girls. Anyway, that’s a lecture you sure don’t need. It was popular for us to go the parties held not too far from the dock, and it was even more popular to go when the ships docked. Those parties were ‘fabulous,’ as you kids say nowadays.” Nobody says fabulous. I tried not to laugh. I let her talk, watched the sincere happiness in her face. “Those were the best parties! My first time there, I remember clearly, I wore shorts that my mother thought were way too short and tight, but I didn’t look cheap since I was so small and a baby-pink polka dot belly blouse.”

  She rubbed her even-now flat belly through her house dress.

  “I was so excited. I was seventeen and I was following my cousin Chunnie that lived up the lane from me. She wore a mesh looking thingy that didn’t look as sweet as mine. She was older. When we walked in, all eyes were on us. We had asked for a drive from a trucker, and asked him to drop us down the road. We walked our way up, he lived in the neighbourhood too, so we wouldn’t be leaving ‘til late. I was surprised mom had let me go. Anyways, the vibes was nice, a little older than my years, but nice all the same. The music was just right, the sea breeze had me cold but I was dancing so hard I didn’t feel it much. All the men were watching me and Chunnie, her big romp swinging to the beat and me looking petite and neat. Soon a guy was dancing behind me, He didn’t look three bad, so I was dancing on him and Chunnie was dancing on another man.”

  “They bought us some drinks. Chunnie had hers, but I couldn’t stand the smell of mine. You know I don’t drink, well it’s not since old age that I don’t drink. He was upset and said I “insulted’ him. I laughed and tried to walk away, when I was walking off he grabbed my hand! So I asked him nicely, in my sweetest voice, to let go of my arm because it belonged to me.”

  “He was cursing about girls who love to play games with men, but I wasn’t the one who had asked him for a dance. Then I saw this strange guy walked up and say something to him. I didn’t hear what he had said, but the upset man let go of my arm and walked off quickly...”

  “So I was trying to thank this man, one real roughneck-looking man, so I said to myself don’t judge a book by the cover. Before I could finish, this man held my hand and tapped my cousin on the shoulder, who wasn’t even seeing what was happening, and said, ‘the boss calling you.’ Which boss? I thought. I almost pissed my sexy shorts. I went from one level of afraid to completely terrified.”

  “Those parties were frequented by anyone and everyone, since it was open space no one could be denied entry. The man started to take me to the bar. When I was finally there I saw that it was the ‘don’ of the district. ‘You’ve grown,’ he said and pinched my belly. I almost pissed myself that time for real. Now, Ver, this was a big fat man with a lot of earrings and chain around his neck. He was really ugly too. I didn’t know what to do. I could see Chunnie in the distance looking at me in either fear or envy. I wasn’t sure which one.”

  “What happened next, mom?”

  “Just listen… He had me standing beside him for an hour, ‘til I told him I wanted to pee. Instead of him telling me to go, this man made the same man he had sent for me follow me. When we were at a good distance, I took off. Literally. I ran and ran and ran. When I looked behind me, he was coming on my heels. I ran up the road we came down...I ditched him and went back towards the crowd. A man was seeing it all, from when I was being carried away. He just ran up to me, uniform and all, as if he we were old friends and said, ‘Hey! How’ve you been?’

  “I was confused, thought he had the wrong person, then he winked at me. I looked into his eyes, eyes just like yours, and I was in love for the first time, as cliché as it sounds. I hadn’t known I was until long after though. He held my hand and said, ‘Come, let’s go for a walk.’”

  “I’d never heard anyone with that accent before, and his deep voice was just so sexy. We spent the night holding hands, he actually didn’t let go much. He didn’t talk much, just listened to me, and by the end of the night he knew my name, my family story, and where I wanted to be in life. He’d said ‘A pretty young lady like you shouldn’t have that much worry in her life.’”

  “He promised to come back for me. I didn’t believe him. Three months later I was married and moving out, at seventeen years old. Your father was twenty-two. All this is to say, Veronica, your father is a good man. A man of his word. Yes, he might have not been the most compassionate father towards you, but have you ever considered that he may just not know how?”

  “But, mom, he never reached out to me.”

  “He has, in his own little ways. Mark isn’t the sweetest person, but he never lies. He was never a man of much words, I told you how I did most of the talking the night we met. But I’m sure- I would swear on my mother’s grave- that your dad loves you. And you know I don’t believe in swearing for anyone but yourself. Think about it, give it time, and reach out to him.”

  She kissed my forehead and went out the door. How much time did my father need? I am twenty-three years old, he’s known me all my life, there was nothing left. I’d had too much emotional trouble today; that conversation could wait for another day. I considered using the house phone to call Jonathan, but it wouldn’t make sense.

  Part Four

  “Love sustains all Things”

  The Real World

  Claire Bell

  What have I done to myself? Who have I become? I was so confused. I didn’t know if I should’ve felt the way I felt, I knew Bill wasn’t mine; I knew I was his and no more, no reversal of power, no reversal of belonging. I guess this is what it feels like to be a side-bitch. Why were women like this? Why was I like this? I’d been hiding, chasing, dying to be a side-bitch when I was already a wife at home. I guess men are right. Women don’t really know what they want. I think we are sometimes confused as to what it is that we need. I know I want Bill, I know I want to be treated like I belong to him, to feel like, for once, I didn’t had a care in the world because he would control and worry about everything for me. Well, this is the real world. I had no choice but to embrace that I was folding out of this arrangement. I was leaving shorthanded, the exact same way I walked into it; maybe worse off. Alex was sitting in his playpen, so sweet, so innocent; he is my all, I live and breathe for him. I stayed with his father because of him. Okay, maybe Alexander became an excuse. His birthday was coming up soon, I made a mental note to talk to Adam about making plans, if we could stand each other long enough to have a decent conversation, if I could keep my shit together long enough. I sighed. I was just lost, it shouldn’t take me alone to try and fix this broken relationship and I didn’t want a broken home.

  Where had the communication gone? Where had the late night conversation that usually turned into p
assionate love-making gone? I was bordering depression, depressed by my relationship, depressed by my wrong choices, depressed that what had been my source of release had just ended. I wasn’t going to kill myself; this was Australia, and that shit only happened to crazy people. What was I saying? It happened to everyday people, anyone. I didn’t consider myself just anyone, though; I was Claire Bell, beautiful, independent, head strong, and stubborn. But had Bill stripped me of all those things? I’d been dependent on him, had not voiced an opinion, was too conforming, and was never stubborn with him. I’d saved all those traits for making Adam feel bad, talking down to him. I was a mess. I sighed, ran my fingers through my hair.

  It was time for Alex’s bath.

  “Come on sweetie,” I said, looking down on his innocent face. I would raise him to respect women. I would start by respecting myself and teaching him to respect me as well. Already at one year old, almost two, he was so much like his father.

  I climbed into the tub with Alexander off to one side playing with some toy that didn’t float; I needed to wash my hair. I liked long showers, but getting into the tub with baby Alex was just as good. I watched him playing with the toy. I’d give him five or ten minutes, then it would be time to get out. He was so sweet, he was a fast learner, and he would be a bright boy like his father and mother. I watched the way his smile formed, a mouth that reflected my own. He would be drop-dead gorgeous; yes, I’d raise a handsome son who respected women. He giggled and it was like music to my ears, in his sweet little baby voice he squealed, “Mam vook, bite!” which loosely translated into, “mom, look! Bike.” His toy bike. Where was the action figure that came on it? I searched the water, found it, and put it beside my leg, all the time keeping my hand beneath the water.

  “Oh no! What’s this? Alex, what’s that in the water? Shark!”