by Jamie Berris
Marissa is totally stuck on the cheating thing. When she asks him about it, it turns into a nasty fight, so now she feels like the dumb wife who lets her husband get away with adultery.
She suggested a vacation to Marcus, and he said he’d think about it. Marissa asked if Kurt and I would want to go along and be a buffer. She thinks it will help them to both be on good behavior and could possibly help for Marcus to see how good Kurt is to me. I didn’t bring it up to Kurt tonight. I guess I’ll have to think about this one carefully. I’m not so sure I want to deal with the tension.
Kurt always tells me I get too involved in Marissa’s marriage. What he doesn’t understand is that Marissa is like another sister to me. Nothing between us is off limits. When she hurts, I hurt. I guess that’s his point.
Nope! He wasn’t ready, not yet. He would get to that time period eventually. He was still too raw emotionally to read anything from 2009 to 2010.
Kurt put the diaries from those critical months in his nightstand and went back to the basement and dug out one dated back to 1996, the year they were married. He read entries that put him back to their wedding night, their honeymoon in Jamaica.
Settling into the diary, Kurt took a swig from his beer and decided this was a good place to start. The early years brought back such good memories. Life was so simple; with only the two of them to think about, their lives were carefree. The most stressful it got was deciding what to eat for dinner or where to take the boat for the weekend. He would read about the rocky time of their marriage . . . eventually.
October 6, 1996
Jamaica is awesome and so is my husband. Married life is bliss. Today we climbed the Dunn’s River Falls. The water was freezing! It was also very beautiful and romantic. The guides made us kiss a thousand times and never stopped snapping Polaroid pictures. We lay lazily by the pool with cocktails and talked about our next vacation; we’re thinking St. Thomas. Ah, married life is good.
Kurt just turned off the shower. Room service delivered champagne and chocolate-covered strawberries. Tonight’s lingerie is pink satin.
Kurt closed his eyes and remembered the day, crystal clear. He’d held Lydia’s waist as they tumbled backward, lips locked, into the “plunge pool” at the falls. The guide had taken a Polaroid picture, and it was one of Kurt’s favorites to this day. It was stuck in the scrapbook Lydia had made with their wedding and honeymoon photos and memorabilia.
Lydia had at least twenty different pieces of lingerie that her girlfriends had given her for the honeymoon, but that pink one was her favorite. She was ecstatic the week after she gave birth to Sadie that she could fit into it again. Kurt didn’t have the heart to tell her it was busting at the seams.
Two weeks after Jayna was born Lydia fit into it once again. A small hole developed in the side stitching, and Lydia had tried to sew it back up. She wasn’t much of a seamstress, and it ended up lopsided, not to mention she used orange thread.
Kurt wondered what happened to the pink lingerie. The last time he remembered seeing it on Lydia was just before Lydia got pregnant with Nicholas.
At 12:30 a.m., Kurt put the diary away and went to check on his sleeping children. Tonight Sadie was sleeping with Nicholas in his bed, and Jayna was sleeping by herself in Sadie’s bed. He watched them all sleep and prayed he could at least be an average dad. He knew he wasn’t in the running for any gold medals, but he also knew he never fell short when it came to loving them. And he did love them, all three of them.
Chapter 6
Sadie
On April 10, 2014, Sadie’s sixteenth birthday, “Teenage Dream,” by Katy Perry, was playing on her alarm. Opening her eyes, Sadie was happy to see the sun peeking through the blinds.
“Sweet sixteen,” she murmured to herself, ecstatic about getting her driver’s license after school.
Before Lydia died, she’d told Sadie she could have her black Infiniti QX80 for her sixteenth birthday. Having driven it with her permit, Sadie felt like an old pro, but to have it officially be hers, and to drive anywhere at any time, alone, gave Sadie goose bumps.
She knew if her mom were alive she would be driving a used something or other at a fraction of the cost and style of the Infiniti. Her dad hadn’t argued that night at the dinner table when Lydia declared that Sadie would become the proud owner.
Sadie knew it was a flashy and expensive car for a teenager with a brand new license, but given the circumstances in which she received it, well, she wasn’t going to put up with anyone criticizing her for being spoiled.
In the kitchen, Kurt sat with a cup of coffee, staring out the window. The Today Show was on the TV mounted to the wall, but the volume was turned down low. Sadie poured herself a cup of coffee—she’d been hooked since she was twelve—and sat down next to her dad at the table.
“It’s my birthday, Dad.”
A smile crept across his face. “How could I forget, Sadie? Happy sweet sixteen, sweetheart,” he said as he looked at the Bon Appétit chalkboard propped on a stand in the corner of the kitchen. Sadie had been counting down the days to her birthday since January. Every morning she erased and rewrote a lesser number. Today Sadie wiped the board clean and wrote HAPPY SWEET SIXTEEN, SADIE in giant bubble letters.
Kurt handed his daughter a small box wrapped in lilac paper with a tiny iridescent bow. “From Mom and me,” he said in a voice with more sadness than Sadie needed on her birthday.
She hadn’t wanted to cry today, but Sadie could already feel the tears welling up in her eyes and choking her throat.
“Did Mom wrap it?”
Kurt nodded. “When have you known me to wrap a present, sweetheart?”
“Are you going to call me ‘sweetheart’ all day?”
Kurt smiled wide and the corners of his eyes creased. “I’m sure you’ll give me a reason not to at some point.”
“Funny, Dad.” Sadie unwrapped the box and discovered Lydia’s princess-cut diamond earrings sparkling up at her. She was ten when her dad gave them to her mom on their anniversary.
Sadie put them in her ears and turned towards her dad. “May I wear them to school?”
“Take them out at tennis.”
Sadie knew he’d let her. Ever since her mom died, he was all about living in the present and not waiting until tomorrow to do what you could today. She wiped a tear that had crept down her cheek and gave her dad a hug, thanking him. He knuckled the back of her head, as he had since she was little, and told her he loved her.
“She also left you this,” he said, handing her a card. “Maybe you want to wait until after school to open it.”
Nodding, Sadie grabbed the box and card and took the stairs two at a time to wake up Jayna and Nicholas; she still had to get on with the morning routine.
~*~
Dylan came up from behind Sadie and rested his chin on her shoulder as she was reaching into her locker.
“Could I make your life any sweeter, birthday girl?” he asked.
Sadie whipped around, nearly eye to eye with Dylan, thanks to the wedges she wore today. He grabbed her chin and kissed her lips. A flutter of emotion washed through her, and she hoped no teachers were near.
Even though Dylan and Sadie had been together for a year and a half now, she was still shy about kissing in public, especially terrified of a teacher witnessing.
Dylan could have had any girl in the entire high school, and Sadie still wondered, Why her? She considered herself pretty, but definitely not the prettiest girl in school, or even in the sophomore class. Sadie wasn’t a cheerleader or on the girls’ rugby, volleyball, or soccer teams with the ultra-popular girls.
She knew what she was doing on the tennis court and had as many friends as she needed, but she wasn’t the most popular and certainly not the life of the party. Guys like Dylan were supposed to date those kinds of girls, so she really didn’t get it, and neither did those girls.
Sadie pushed Dylan’s sideswept dark blond hair out of his eyes to reveal the light green hue hidden b
ehind. “That depends,” she whispered close to his mouth, thankful she just popped a mint.
“Depends on what?” he asked with a flirtatious grin.
“Depends on whether you let me take you for a spin in my new wheels.”
“Where to?”
“Anywhere or nowhere.”
Dylan pressed against Sadie, pushing her back into the locker. Over Dylan’s shoulder, Sadie saw Allison walking by, darts shooting from her eyes. Once she caught Sadie’s glance, she quickly said something to her friend Sami and they both laughed.
“Bitch,” Sadie mumbled.
“What?” asked Dylan.
“Nothing.” Sadie gave Dylan’s chin a peck to show Allison that he was hers.
Sadie had asked Dylan countless times why he dumped Allison to date her. “She’s not you” was always his response.
~*~
Sadie so wanted to blow off tennis practice and go straight to the Secretary of State after school to get her license, but her dad gave her some lame lecture about having to be responsible, saying only responsible people were given the privilege to drive.
She knew this was bull because her dad couldn’t wait for her to get her license so she could help with picking up Nicholas from preschool and carting Jayna to and from dance. Not to mention getting groceries and picking up his dry cleaning.
Kurt managed to make it to the last half of Sadie’s tennis practice. Unfortunately, he spent most of the time chatting with Marissa. Sadie felt she was being loyal to her mother by still considering her the enemy.
Marissa’s daughter Paige and Sadie were still friends, but they didn’t hang out as they did when they were younger. It was sort of an unspoken rule to never talk about Marissa and Paige around their house.
Most of the time Kurt rushed to tennis to pick Sadie up just as it ended. Lately, he somehow managed to get out of work early to be there for the last half, and he never missed a match, no matter if it was an away game. Every time Sadie looked his way, he and Marissa were talking and laughing. It was rubbing her the wrong way, but she had yet to bring the topic up to her dad.
Sadie wasn’t the only one who noticed her dad and Marissa being overly friendly to each other. The other moms were whispering about the two of them sitting together, spending more time gazing into each other’s eyes than watching their daughters play tennis.
The fact that she knew people were gossiping only angered Sadie more. What a disgrace her father was! In Sadie’s eyes, he was being unfaithful to both their mother and his children.
Sadie wondered if the entire posse of mothers knew what despicable thing Marissa did to Lydia to break apart a twenty-year friendship. With the sight before her, Sadie was more determined than ever to find out.
Dear Sadie,
Happy Sweet Sixteen!!! My first born baby, sixteen years old, wow! Take a moment today to stop and feel me kiss and hug you sixteen times. I am with you, Sadie, always, and so is God. Talk to Him. Talk to me. We are listening. God hears your prayers. Go to Him with all your dreams, worries, wishes, fears, hopes, anxieties, and sorrows, and most of all, thank Him for all that He has given you.
Okay, I won’t preach anymore today. I know you hate it when I do that, but come on, Sadie. As you get older, you have to admit that Mom occasionally knows what she is talking about and has some so-so advice. ☺
So, take care of my Infiniti and have fun cruising around town. Do me a favor and go get us an ice cream sundae to split. How about Hudsonville’s triple peanut butter cup, smothered in caramel, whipped cream, and a maraschino cherry? (Still don’t know how you can eat those fake cherries, yuck.) Think of me with each bite, knowing I’m right beside you celebrating your special day. Oh, you can have the last bite. I eat it day and night up here in Heaven!
I remember the day I got my license. I didn’t have any particular place to go, so I decided to get my dad a Father’s Day card, a month ahead of time, and I stopped by a friend’s house to say hi. It wasn’t anything important, but I remember feeling such freedom to be truly out on my own, alone, without a family member or another adult.
I realized that I could drive clear across the country to California if I wanted. I could take myself to the mountains, the ocean, or just shopping if I felt like it. It was an amazing feeling.
The point is, Sadie, you are embarking on a new adventure in life, giving you freedom and independence. Be wise in your decisions, be responsible, and be cautious, but also courageous. Have fun with your new set of wheels and your newfound freedom.
Happy Birthday, Sadie. I love you,
Mom
P.S. Take good care of my earrings. Dad was very nervous about giving them to you this young. He wanted to wait until you were eighteen or until you graduated from college, but I didn’t see the point in having them sit in my drawer. Enjoy!
Chapter 7
Kurt
Kurt was oblivious to the drinking going on right before his eyes. Or that was what he kept telling himself. Every half hour or so he would check on the growing number of kids in his garage to make sure there were no visible signs of alcohol or drugs. At this point, he figured if he didn’t outright see it then he was going to assume it wasn’t there.
He never imagined his stress level would creep so high with all these kids under his roof. Why did he allow this party? He knew there was probably more going on than he could imagine.
When Marissa pulled in the driveway, Kurt’s heart fluttered—heck everything did. It had been so long since he had been touched, needed. Marissa seemed to feel the same way about Kurt, but they were treading on thin ice when it came to exposing their feelings. Kurt knew his kids would have a hard time with him dating, especially since in a few weeks it would be the first anniversary of Lydia’s passing. Sadie, he knew, would be furious.
Kurt took Marissa into the house and mixed her a vodka tonic. He had already put Nicholas to bed, and Jayna was staying at Chrissie’s house. He didn’t want his thirteen-year-old sneaking into the garage and some high school horn dog hitting on her. Worrying about one daughter was enough tonight.
~*~
Sadie
When Sadie and her two best friends barged through the door and saw Kurt and Marissa sitting together in the screened porch, she glared at the two of them and tugged Myla and Kyla upstairs without saying a word. Sadie was seething as she and her friend’s smoothed their hair and applied lip gloss. What the heck was that woman doing in her house? Was her father trying to ruin her birthday party? Or did Marissa show up uninvited? Was she seriously trying to move in on her dad? Sadie’s mind was swirling with accusations.
When the girls came back downstairs, Myla and Kyla were both laughing at the way Noah kept doing the sprinkler, oblivious to Sadie’s angst. Sadie once again snubbed Marissa with a nasty look and an added humph as she trailed behind her friends.
She wasn’t two steps out the door when she heard her dad apologize to Marissa on Sadie’s behalf.
Sadie flew back in the garage and headed straight for her can of Sprite, which she had mixed with vodka. She cringed as she swallowed and felt the alcohol burn as it slid down her throat and into the pit of her stomach. She was on the verge of tears when Dylan spun her around.
His lips pressed to hers as he began to dance with her. She couldn’t tell if the alcohol she tasted was on her tongue or his. Dylan placed his hands on her hips and she sank into him.
“Sadie,” she heard her dad’s voice call out over the thumping of the song, “Bang, Bang.”
Normally, Sadie would have escaped out of Dylan’s embrace if her father was in eyesight, but this time she slowly peeled her lips away and turned to face her father. Marissa was standing next to him but peering around the garage with disbelief across her face—probably scanning for her own daughter. Paige was most likely somewhere in the crowd with the rest of the high school.
“Sadie, can I talk to you outside for a second.”
She turned away from Dylan and brushed shoulders with her dad as sh
e walked past him and Marissa and out the garage door. Sadie folded her arms in front of herself, partly because the night was cold and partly because she was already on the defense and ready for a lecture on how disrespectful she was.
“There isn’t anything going on in there that I should know about, is there? I feel like this party is getting a little out of control.”
Kurt was trying to look Sadie in the eyes, and she was doing everything to avoid eye contact, even though Sadie knew that was a dead giveaway to lying. “No, nothing you should know about,” she said, looking past him.
“Don’t get snotty with me, Sadie. I’ll end this party now. Every single person in there is technically my responsibility, and if anything were to happen to one of them, I would be held liable.”
“Everything is cool, Dad. I promise.” It was, right? No one was puking drunk, and there were no serious drugs that she knew of.
“Okay, let’s just keep things cool.”
Sadie shook her head. “Is that it?”
“Two more things.”
Shit, here we go.
“I ordered pizzas, and they should be here any minute. It’s probably a good idea for you kids to eat,” Kurt said with a nasty smirk.
Sadie panicked, wondering if he could smell the alcohol on her breath. She remembered the piece of gum in her pocket and wished she’d remembered to pop it in her mouth.
“Also, Marissa came by to help me chaperone. I’d appreciate it if you could be polite to all the guests here. A simple hello would do.”
Hearing Marissa’s name on her dad’s lips made Sadie’s gut churn. Call it woman’s intuition or whatever, but Sadie could see the writing on the wall—this was the beginning of the end. Her intuition was right—something was going on between her dad and her mom’s ex-best friend.
Chapter 8
Sadie