Unlike Any Other (Unexpected #1)

by Claudia Burgoa

  “What were we for you?”

  He doesn’t respond or move, and now I wonder if he’s even breathing.

  “Did we mean nothing to you?”

  I place my hands behind my back and cross my fingers hoping we meant something at some point or another. My therapist will have fun when I tell him about this.

  When I told him that my parents didn’t love me, he explained that perception is different from reality. This is the fucking reality of my life. I want at least two hundred and fifty dollars back for that useless hour.

  “You said you had this great love for your family. We were what gave meaning to your life.” I swallow a few times and ask the obvious question, “Another bunch of lies?”

  Darn, I seem to always put myself through these kind of situations. If I could only learn from my past and let the lies roll forever, I wouldn’t be in the middle of this situation, or… the Ryker incident, or… damn, one tear makes it through the barrier and slowly rolls down my cheek.

  Gabriel runs a hand through his blond hair, his sapphire eyes never leaving mine.

  “AJ, you’re real,” he uses his soft but firm voice. “You and your brothers are my entire world, baby girl. I love you—the three of you with all my heart. You were never a lie and yes, my family is what gave meaning to my life. Things change, love changes and just as I protected the four of you for years, now it’s time to look after me.”

  He makes it sound as if he put his life on hold for us and now that we’re older, it’s time to get it back in gear.

  Protect… because putting his family in the middle of nowhere Washington is as powerful as a special shield? A dome?

  As the internet widened and social media progressed, we had more access to those sites that like to dig the dirt out of celebrities. Sites that revealed to my brothers and me that my parents pretended to live a different life in order to keep us ‘safe’. Perhaps while we grew up it made sense, but now… now I don’t get it.

  “So that’s it; bye, bye to the old, hello Twinkie wife?”

  His gaze drops and I take it as a yes.

  “Where is the big love, the one that happens once in a lifetime? What happened to it? If you lost it like that, then there’s no hope for the rest of us, Dad.”

  No wonder my relationship fell apart like it did. The dreamer in me thought back to my sixteen-year-old self when I thought I had found the great love that could withstand everything. I claimed to have what my parents had… almost three years later reality slapped me, no, reality crushed me.

  Gabriel doesn’t speak. He has no comeback or comment to what I say. He makes a one-eighty degree turn and stares out at the blue sea.

  I don’t count how long he’s immobilized in front of the window, nor do I move. However, after what feels like hours, he extends his hand and curls his fingers toward me. The moment I’m next to him, he puts his arm around my shoulder and hugs me tight, kissing the top of my head.

  I hug my dad for the first time in years and my back relaxes.

  I’m home.

  “You can stay together in the name of love just for so long, AJ,” his voice has lost all the strength, the shield is down.

  My body and soul identify with his, we’re defeated, sad and with only so much energy left to continue.

  This is one of the traits we share, putting on a brave front while withering inside.

  “Lately, I wonder if what we had justified being together for so long.” I hate those words as he lets them out. “Was it real or a fantasy we built and once reality hit we couldn’t keep it together. It hurts, being apart is painful—I won’t lie.”

  Really, it hurts? Because there’s a woman outside—pregnant. I want to yell at him, my teeth grind, but I don’t let my anger get the best of me.

  Not yet.

  “It was mutual, we came to the conclusion that we wanted different things, our lives were going in different directions, and now I’m trying to build something—a new life?”

  The uncertainty in his voice is a gift, a speckle of light that gives me hope. The words… well, they sound like a speech they—my parents agreed on giving us. That’s the way they were while growing up, one parental front. I don’t want to jump to conclusions, but my money is on him. Gabriel called it off.

  This is unfair. My parents drove me insane with their rules. Their crazy ideas and lies to the outside world. However, they are a match made in heaven. They are like milk and cookies, one can’t go without the other.

  “This is wrong.” I shake my head. “You can’t finish a once in a lifetime love story like that,” I weakly claim. “Each time you told the story, it didn’t sound as if you made some sacrifices for us. It sounded as if you did it out of love. Am I wrong? Would you like to revise your story?”

  He shakes his head.

  “You should. Let’s do a play-by-play,” I suggest. “Maybe you can come clean and clear up all the lies you added to it when you told it as we grew up.”

  “They weren’t lies,” he defends himself. “Maybe we skipped a few details… not many. We couldn’t disclose everything to our small children.”

  “Once upon a time I thought I found what you did, Dad,” my bottom lip quivers, but I continue, “but everything crumbled, and… now I’m a cynic who doesn’t want to feel or believe. You’re proving me right, love is a shitty thing.”

  “It isn’t, I can prove you wrong.”

  “I’m all ears, Dad.”

  2015

  For a nonbeliever, her eyes are telling me that this is a trick and she’s hoping for a miracle. If I know my little girl, she’s thinking that by retelling this story I’ll change my mind. There’s no doubt she’s blaming me for the split. No matter how many times I recount the tale, there’s no going back. It wasn’t me; it takes two to create a family. It takes two to break it.

  Those beautiful emerald eyes fill with moisture and stare at me as if I’m going to scare away the monster under her bed. Or I’ll find a cure for what’s eating her.

  What is eating her?

  Who the hell hurt my baby?

  I squeeze her again, trying to… I don’t know, it’s been a long time since I could protect my little girl from the real world. I want to laugh as I think about my own parents. If I had listened to them and stayed in Albany to take over the insurance business, none of this would’ve happened. Then again, that’d include my triplets, and well, I can’t imagine life without our trio.

  “Can you tell me what happened to you?” I dare to ask.

  Her body stiffens and starts trembling.

  “You can, Dad, but I won’t answer.”

  I scan her again from head to toe. Her brown, wavy hair was only shoulder length instead of all the way down to her waist. There’s a different light to her. It had been longer than two years since I’d seen her.

  My little girl is a grown woman.

  “AJ, we lost you along the road too.” Those aren’t my words, but I bring them up trying to salvage our relationship. “Maybe you can help me find the debris of our family by telling me where we went wrong.”

  She shakes her head.

  “Please?”

  “I’ll give you a few snips, but not many.” She takes a deep breath. “Just don’t push my limits, I can’t crumble again, Dad. I hate that depressing girl.”

  I assume she is referring to the girl who stormed into the house like a hurricane lashing out at her parents—an unlike behavior from our sweet girl—and leaving with an agonizing threat: she’d never come back.

  It didn’t help that I forced her to apologize, that if she didn’t, I wouldn’t want to see her again. I should’ve known better. She’s as stubborn as her father and once she makes up her mind, you have to work hard to change it.

  “We’ll take turns.” I kiss the top her head again. “Do we have a deal?”

 
She gives me a careless shrug and I take whatever she may give.

  “It all began when everyone dressed to emulate Madonna, Cyndi Lauper, Duran Duran or wore a white glove and moonwalked. Oh, and we wanted to be gagged with a spoon.” I open with a terrible joke to lighten the atmosphere, but it doesn’t work. “Either you laugh or I’ll take the philosophic way and begin to tell you about my lifetime path and how destiny played—”

  “Har, har, har, Madonna. Gag me with a spoon…” AJ shakes her head. “Dad, it appears you can’t grasp the magnitude of what’s happening. My parents are no longer together, I can’t laugh at jokes. Then you want me to open up… that’s going to hurt and no one will pick me up—again. So for now, I want a love story. Romcom style. Meg Ryan meets Tom Hanks on the top of the Empire State.”

  “Impossible. That never happened with us,” I warn her. “Now can I continue?”

  “… It was the eighties.” AJ rests her head on my chest and listens like she’s always done since she was a baby.

  I love my boys, but this tiny thing is the one who steals my heart every time.

  Why did we let her go?

  Ah, yes, I said, “Let her be accountable for once.”

  I was an idiot.

  1984

  …In New York City, I was fresh meat out of college, from a small town, Albany. My plan: to find a job at one of the big financial institutions and be a stock broker for a while. Then work my way up and become a big shot CEO.

  No such luck, by the fourth week and with my savings disappearing slowly, I took the first job I came across, modeling.

  As I walked through Central Park, a man stopped me. “Hey, we’re shooting for our clothing catalog; you can’t walk through here.”

  “Sorry, I didn’t notice,” I said to the tall, bulky man.

  “Wait.” Another guy with a smaller frame and gray hair with a goatee holding a camera called after me. “What’s your name, kid?”

  “Gabriel Colhurst.” I scratched my head and looked around.

  I finally took in the scene; the cameras, the big lights, the industrial size fans and the couple sitting on a bench with a hard stare directed toward me. I had interrupted their photo shoot.

  “Robin Snyder,” the man who had stopped me introduced himself, then lifted my shirt slightly, touched my biceps, and nodded. “You’re about six-three, six-four, right?” I tilted my head and crossed my arms. If he tried to touch me again, I’d kill him. “Your tall frame, wide shoulders, blond hair and blue eyes are perfect.”

  “Perfect?” His gaze remained fixed on me. I whistled and shook my head because the man sounded delusional.

  “Yes, I’ve been looking for someone like you.” He handed me his card. “Call me this evening so we can set something up. Modeling isn’t easy, but I think you can pull it.”

  Pull it? He had the wrong guy. I was a financial major about to break through and become the next big shot.

  But big shots are curious and I called that evening.

  His offer enraged me.

  Underwear model.

  I refused to accept the job after he finished explaining that I’d only be wearing a bright smile and a pair of boxers. I didn’t go to school to end up working naked for money.

  However, I went to school and learned to do math in my head faster than the average person. Robin Snyder mentioned the amount they’d pay for only one sitting.

  The pay covered three months of rent, utilities, and food. One shoot bought me more time to find a better-suited job. I would’ve been stupid not to accept it.

  Two days later, I wore a pair of plaid boxers and my brightest smile. They shot several pictures in different poses and when it ended, they handed me a check. In retrospective, it wasn’t as bad as I feared, and when he asked me if I’d be available for other jobs, I made sure to write down my number for him.

  Underwear model and financial broker were night and day but for the immediate future, I held tight to modeling until I found a good job. I wasn’t in such a hurry anymore.

  About six months later—and several photoshoots after, one of the models I worked with handed out a flyer. An audition for an action movie where they needed tall, well-built, good looking men to work as extras.

  Five hundred dollars a day to work as an extra in the background for a minimum of four days. That’s the easiest two thousand dollars I would make for a week of work, I thought.

  The next day, I headed to the audition, handed over my picture and resume, then waited with the rest of the models. One of the casting members called my name and handed me a script.

  “Read the first three lines,” she ordered.

  Back in high school and college I had taken small parts in a few plays. Nothing important, but as we created my resume, my agent advised me to add those, making myself stand out from the rest of the crowd.

  After a couple of silent reads, I did it out loud. The bearded man wearing thick glasses and a white t-shirt said, “Thank you, we will call you tonight if you got the part.”

  “Part?” I asked. “I’m here for the extra gig, not to land a role in your movie.”

  He snapped his fingers requesting my picture and scanned my resume. “You have acting experience.” He pointed at it. “You did well. Are you telling us you won’t take the part if we call you?”

  “What I fear is that you’re considering me for a part that I won’t get because I’m not an actor, and I won’t be considered for one of your extras.”

  “He’s more than a pretty face.” A woman with red hair and flouncy clothing rose from her chair. “Tara Mullins-Bradley, casting director.” She extended her hand. “Stick around kid, I see great things happening for you in the future.”

  I headed home with a knot in my stomach. That position at Merrill Lynch looked like a thing of the past, and what with the underwear pictures all over billboards and magazines, I could only imagine how the interviews would go:

  “Gabriel James Colthurst, aren’t you the guy whose half-naked picture is on the side of the bus that runs down Fifth Avenue?”

  Or better yet, my half-naked picture on the billboard across the street and the interviewer suddenly connecting the dots, “Is that you?”

  That same night the director called me back. The part was mine. I played an airplane pilot, said a few lines and kicked a few asses. Destiny pointed me in a different direction, the one that said: keep climbing your way to stardom and forget your roots.

  When I talked to my parents about the continuous shifting of my life, they supported me.

  “If things don’t work out, Gabe,” Mom said over the phone. “You can always come back home, dear. Just don’t forget your values and the importance of family. For now have fun. It’s all about the journey, enjoy it.”

  That was Mom, she pushed all her children to be the best and to find their own way. Except, she really wanted me to take over the insurance business from Dad and marry a nice girl.

  2015

  Dad stops, he isn’t kidding about exchanging stories.

  “I don’t understand what this exercise will accomplish,” I try the logical route. “This is about you, not me.”

  “It’s about us,” he retorts. “The family. Fun fact, AJ, you were the first one who abandoned the family, sweetie.”

  There wasn’t anything fun about it. They pushed me and I had to leave.

  “It’s complicated.”

  I chuckle because those were JC’s words earlier today.

  “I wouldn’t even know where to start, Dad. Yes, I left at the worst time. I needed you guys to catch me… no, I had already fallen. I needed you to pull me out and that day you only accomplished pushing me further down.” There’s an orange-sized bulge stuck in my throat, knots inside the pit of my stomach, and my legs aren’t strong enough to carry me out of this room to a safe place where I don’t have to re
member.

  “Let’s start from the beginning,” he suggests. “You look older, nothing like that two-year-old with piggy tails who believed I could conquer the world for her.”

  “Well, yeah, I grew up.” I touch my curly hair and smile at those uneven piggy tails I wore. “Life is good. Let’s get back to you.”

  “Three, six years?” I don’t understand what he’s trying to guess.

  “You drifted away in small doses until one day our little girl was completely erased from our lives.”

  Yes, doses. I created my own veil of protection, the one that became a big brick wall by the time I was twenty-one. It took ten years for me to build and only days to seal it, isolating myself from everyone.

  “Where did we go wrong?”

  “It wasn’t only you, Dad…”

  I was the quiet one of the three. Well, not exactly the quiet one, but my parents didn’t have to worry about me setting the barn on fire. I might have come up with the ideas, but my brothers were the ones who executed those silly things without my help.

  Like, one day I wondered what would happen if we released the chickens into the wild. It had only been a thought, but MJ and JC wanted to know. A month without video games, that’s what happens when the chickens are released.

  As my parents made up a few stories about themselves—Gabe mostly—I suggested that warming up aluminum in a microwave was just a lie; it wouldn’t set on fire.

  It actually does.

  They set the microwave on fire. Thank goodness by then, my parents had fire extinguishers handy.

  The ideas came from everywhere, not only me. Television, newspapers… anything they saw and thought was interesting, they experimented with. Those two were a handful. I can’t blame my parents for watching them twenty-four-seven. However, they forgot to watch me most of the time.

  Their watchful eye turned to me when things happened. Like fainting in the middle of a hike, and finding out I had juvenile diabetes. Then the attention was all on me until I learned to take care of myself, and they didn’t have to monitor me closely.