Then There Were Three

by Jeanie London

  For a moment, she was struck by an image of a foyer very similar to this one, filled with antiques rather than baseball gear, baby accoutrements like a double-wide umbrella stroller and push-pedal sports cars in hot-pink and boy’s blue. A foyer that was a showcase to be admired with the sun slanting through the windows illuminating dust motes rather than a place where a family passed through on their way to living.

  She hadn’t experienced this kind of acceptance with her own parents. Whom she had to call soon. She really couldn’t stall much longer. Not only was guilt eating away at her, but she was setting a terrible example for Violet. Very much like the poor example she was setting by avoiding the overdue conversation they needed to have.

  “We can’t put off talking any longer,” she said when Violet appeared in the kitchen doorway, ready to bolt for the stairs, to where there was a computer. No doubt she wanted to check Facebook for her friends’ reactions to a nose ring and a new last name.

  Eventful few days, no question.

  Keeping her voice casual, she said, “We’ve got time until your grandmother gets home from work.”

  Violet bristled and looked at her through the eyes of a stranger. “What’s there to talk about? How you lied? How mad you are that I ran away?”

  Megan swallowed a sigh. There would be no dragging Violet from this mood, no way to engage her in constructive conversation. The best she could hope for was to glean some idea of the underlying issues and come up with a way to address them. She hadn’t wanted to have a one-sided conversation, to deliver a soliloquy as it were, but things needed to be said.

  “I wasn’t so much mad that you ran away as I was worried, and surprised and disappointed,” Megan admitted. “I expected more caution from you. You know better than most how dangerous traveling internationally can be.”

  “I’m alive.”

  “And I’m relieved about that.” Megan forced a smile and tried distraction. “So is Marie. She wanted me to send you a kiss, by the way.”

  Violet only nodded, not mellowing one bit. She’d rather be anywhere in the world right now. That much was obvious.

  Leaning back against the counter, she faced her daughter.

  “So you read my email and thought I’d turned down the New Orleans project.”

  “That’s what the email said.”

  “Declining to make a decision,” Megan clarified. “That’s what I told them. I didn’t have to commit to the project until Helping Hands had a confirmation on their headquarters’ location. It was simply a way for me to buy time so I could figure out what would be best for all of us in a very difficult situation. Your father included.”

  “Telling the truth might have worked.”

  Megan inclined her head, conceding the point. “Yes, it might have. And if I had the situation to do all over again, I would certainly handle it differently. I’m not making excuses for my behavior, Violet, but I want you to understand why I made the choices I did.”

  “Who cares about why?” she snapped. “It doesn’t change that I had to find my own dad. That I didn’t get to meet him until I’m all grown-up.”

  Megan let that one pass. Violet was talking, which was a good thing. She was a beautiful young girl on the brink of adulthood, testing the limits of her relationships and forming her own opinions and beliefs.

  She had every right to feel angry, and Megan braced herself, telling herself they would weather this storm the way they’d weathered everything else in life. Together. The anger would only be temporary.

  But deep down she also knew that once she’d loved her parents with the same youthful trust, had felt solid and secure in their love. Until she’d started testing her own limits. They hadn’t accepted her independence, and she’d felt betrayed. That betrayal had dictated their lives ever since.

  Violet felt betrayed now.

  “I’m afraid my choices did mean you didn’t get to meet your dad,” Megan acknowledged. “And I’m sorry about that. I wanted to make the best of a bad situation. I didn’t talk with my parents the way you and I talk, Violet. My upbringing was different.”

  “What, did Grandpa and Grandma Bell tape your mouth shut or something?”

  In any other circumstance, Megan would have tabled the conversation right there. Violet’s sarcasm was degenerating to nastiness, and that wasn’t acceptable—for either of them.

  But there was never going to be a good time for Violet to learn her mother was human, so Megan forced a calm into her voice that she didn’t feel and said, “No. They did not tape my mouth shut. They were just…different than we are. That’s not right or wrong. That’s not a judgment. They believed the way they did things was the only way to do things.”

  Violet didn’t say a word, which was the only invitation Megan was going to get. She knew it, and ran with it.

  “I wasn’t much older than you are now. I met your father and…my whole world changed. I couldn’t think about anything else except spending time with him, doing things young people that age do. We were seniors so he asked me to the prom. I shopped with my friends to find the perfect dress and spent hours imagining how wonderful the night was going to be. I was seventeen and the whole world revolved around how I felt.”

  Those days had been filled with naive magic. She’d been head over heels in love and so blissfully unaware of anything else. She chose her next words carefully.

  “Turns out that when I told your grandparents they weren’t all that thrilled. They were strict, very protective and very involved in my life. I was only allowed to date boys from our circle of friends, so they knew the parents. They didn’t know anything about your father.”

  Violet leaned against the table, not sitting because she didn’t want give the impression that she was interested when she was actually hanging on to Megan’s every word.

  “Your grandparents loved me and wanted the best for me. They tried to make that happen the only way they knew how. I should have let them know how much going to the prom with your father meant to me, but I never gave them the chance to help me figure things out. I don’t know if they would have. That’s something we’ll never know. I just made up my mind to handle things my way and did.”

  Very much in the same way that Violet had when she’d learned about Nic.

  “I made a lot of choices that felt right at the time, but I was young and so was your father. We were making adult choices and got in over our heads.”

  “None of that explains why you didn’t tell Dad about me.” An accusation.

  “No, it doesn’t. But I hope you’ll understand that I was trying to make the best choices I could for all of us. I was a pregnant teenager, Violet. I couldn’t go off to college with a baby to care for. I didn’t have a career to support us. Your father was in a similar position, only he was working all kinds of odd jobs to help out your grandmother. I didn’t want us to be a burden to anyone—not your dad or his family or my family, either. I loved you too much.”

  Megan inhaled deeply, braced herself for the most difficult truth of all.

  “It wasn’t a good choice. It wasn’t even my choice to make. Your father had every right to know about you. Just like you had the right to know about him. Unfortunately, by the time I realized that, I’d done a lot of damage. It wasn’t as easy as calling your father and saying, ‘Oh, and by the way, we have a beautiful daughter.’ We’ve talked about this before, about how difficult it can be to fix the consequences of poor choices.”

  About how, sometimes, the damage wasn’t fixable at all.

  “I honestly did the best I could with what I had to work with, pup. I hope you’ll believe that. That’s why I’ve always been such a fanatic about giving you the skills you needed to make better choices. I didn’t have them and a lot of people are suffering because it took me so long to learn. There are no excuses. What I did was wrong and I’m so sorry.”

  The urge to wrap her arms around her daughter almost overwhelmed her, to reach out and soothe away the anger, the confusion, the bet
rayal that seemed to roll off her daughter in a physical wave.

  Megan wanted to explain that forgiveness was a one-step process, an essential one. That Violet would be the only person who would suffer if she didn’t forgive, that she would feel her anger and betrayal bleeding into everything she felt, every word she spoke, every thought she thought.

  It didn’t matter about the effect on the person being forgiven, whether they were sorry or not sorry, whether they cared or didn’t care, whether they remained involved or vanished forever. Forgiveness most mattered to the person doing the forgiving, the rest was only a bonus.

  Megan knew because she’d been grappling with forgiving herself for so, so long.

  But now wasn’t the time for that explanation. Not yet.

  Not while Violet was in the heat of anger and righteousness because she felt so hurt and betrayed. She would need time to process, to sort through all these truths.

  Megan knew it the instant she met her daughter’s gaze.

  “I’m not going home,” she announced, making sure she got her time. “I don’t have to. I’m old enough to choose where I want to live, and I want to live with my family.”

  For an instant, Megan could only stare into that beautiful face, masked by such passionate emotions.

  A part of her recoiled, braced to defend herself against words that felt like a physical blow, to remind Violet that her father would have to agree to the arrangement and she shouldn’t be so certain a single man would want the full-time responsibility of a teenager. But the impulse died as quickly. Megan knew her daughter, knew Violet only lashed out to gain some control over the hurt.

  Hurt that she’d caused.

  Megan also knew enough about Nic to know that he’d assume the responsibility without batting an eye if that’s what the situation called for.

  And Megan’s family would go on without her.

  It took every ounce of strength she possessed to keep her expression from collapsing when every muscle in her face tugged in the wrong direction. It took every ounce of self-control not to give heartache an upper hand.

  The only thing that mattered right now was Violet, how upset she was. Megan had earned her hurt and would bear it like the responsible adult she was.

  It took every shred of energy she had to face her daughter and say, “I’m so, so sorry.”

  An apology. So worthless in the face of so much pain.

  The words hung in the air between them, heavy and useless, before they sank in and had an effect.

  Violet recoiled, physically pulled back. She exhaled sharply and took off without another word, without even glancing back before she disappeared from the kitchen.

  Her footsteps resounded as she flew up the stairs. A door slammed. Then…nothing.

  Megan stood there, a few frozen minutes, a lifetime, she didn’t know. She couldn’t seem to move or to think. Just felt as if she was being crushed beneath the weight of Violet’s hurt, beneath the emotions colliding inside her, tugging at her.

  She’d always known this moment would come.

  And it was finally here.

  Tears were swelling inside, trying to win this battle of wills, and Megan spun around, gripping the counter as if she might still push them back by sheer strength. But she could see through the kitchen window over the sink, saw through to the backyard, to the garage apartment outside.

  The breath seemed to seize in her chest, the memories crashing in on her, stolen moments with Nic, a time when she’d been so naively happy, the last place where she could claim to have known a sense of peace because once she’d left New Orleans she hadn’t known peace since. She couldn’t sort through the frantic jumble in her head except for one blinding thought that was like a lighthouse through the fog.

  She had to get out of here.

  If she didn’t get out of here, she would literally crawl out of her skin.

  Before Megan recognized what was happening, she found herself in that foyer again, but the sight of the stairs jolted her into some awareness.

  She couldn’t leave Violet alone.

  Nic. The investigation. The whole point of staying here so someone could keep an eye on her.

  Megan stood rooted to the spot, awareness blasting through her, leaving her no choice but to remain paralyzed by the need to run as reason and impulse collided.

  A sound broke into her awareness. She couldn’t make sense of it at first, not until the door opened and a woman stepped through, a dark-haired woman, juggling keys and kids.

  For a blind instant, Megan stared…

  Tess. Anthony’s wife.

  “Oh, hi—” Tess broke off suddenly in the process of letting the twins slide from her hips, their little feet stretching toward the floor. “Megan, are you all right?”

  “Are you going to be here for a bit?”

  The twins hit the floor ready to run, but were stopped short by the death grip Tess had on each of their hands. “Until Mama gets home.”

  “Do you mind if I go? Nic’s on his way. I don’t want to leave Violet alone until he gets here. She’s upstairs.”

  Tess smiled, a kind smile. A knowing smile. “Go. I’m here. She’ll be fine.”

  The tears were pushing hard, swelling against Megan’s throat so all she could do was mouth the words, “Thank you.”

  She thought about calling upstairs, but couldn’t force any words out. Violet didn’t want to hear her voice right now anyway. Maybe not ever again.

  Bolting through the door, she sailed down the stairs and onto the sidewalk, feet carrying her instinctively when her mind wasn’t clear on what she was doing or where she was going, when she could only give in to the need to move, to get away, to run.

  She thought about calling Marie, knew she’d talk Megan down from this place, where every thought in her head jumbled with the emotions coiling inside. But she had no words, couldn’t imagine trying to find any. She knew Marie’s voice would be like a cooling summer rain on the turmoil blazing inside her, but she couldn’t even summon the energy to reach for her cell phone.

  She needed to walk, just walk.

  She barely noticed when lived-in houses of the residential neighborhood yielded to the stretched-out lawns with pristine fences and impeccably kept homes along St. Charles Avenue. She quickly crossed the street to avoid the streetcar rattling in her direction then kept moving, the sidewalk unfolding before her, dictating her path.

  She barely noticed when the poise of this ageless neighborhood yielded to the stillness of the streets surrounding the university campus. Megan kept her head slightly bowed and forged ahead, awareness limited to her periphery.

  And kept walking.

  She was home. It didn’t matter that she hadn’t been here in fifteen years. It didn’t matter that Hurricane Katrina had nearly blown the city off the map. The years of different locales and cultures and new people didn’t change the fact that she knew New Orleans by heart.

  When she finally slowed, the heat of the late afternoon wilting some of the urgency, Megan was on a familiar street.

  She blinked to focus on Mrs. Bryson’s butterfly bushes in full bloom, a crazy array of blue and violet and white reaching almost to the roof of her double gallery house.

  Slowing her pace, Megan looked up and actually took in her surroundings… And the wrought-iron fence was still painted black beneath the climbing roses. The cora-bells still crept rebelliously beneath the fence line onto the sidewalk.

  Another few steps and she could see the big rose-colored blooms of the dogwood tree in the front yard, the tree outside her bedroom window… Her own house with the side-gabled roof and gallery running the entire front of the house. Set back from the street, the bungalow-style house was still butter-yellow. The lacy Victorian ornamentation bright white.

  Megan remembered the last time she’d seen the home she’d grown up in, in the darkness of predawn while hurrying from the house to catch a crack-of-dawn flight, the night concealing her shameful departure from the prying eyes of
neighbors.

  She’d left in such a rush, in such a state of emotional turmoil that it had never even dawned on her she wouldn’t return, that her life as she’d known it had been over.

  The gate was shut tight. There were no cars in the driveway. Given the time of day, her parents could easily have been teaching classes at the university a block away.

  She looked at the empty driveway and suddenly remembered the red Toyota Camry they had bought her at the beginning of her senior year. Back then all three of their cars had lined up like little soldiers. Very inconvenient when one of them wanted out. Her dad had threatened to take away half of Mom’s garden to have a circular driveway put in.

  But he hadn’t. There had been no need. Megan had left and hadn’t come back. She wondered what they’d done with the Camry, had never occurred to her to ask.

  She glanced at the smaller gate that led to the walkway, noticed more rust than she’d remembered being acceptable to her father, who’d been a naval jelly and steel wool fanatic.

  “It’s our home, Meggie. Our special place in the world. How we care for it reflects how we feel about ourselves, and how others see us.”

  She’d taken that lesson into adulthood. She and Violet always devoted a solid week after relocating to pulling their new home together.

  They never shipped anything but personal items—far too costly for things like furniture. So they took that first week in their new home to find everything they needed. Made an adventure out of long days spent searching for exactly the right pieces, eating at the local eateries, meeting people and getting to know their new town.

  Long nights spent endlessly arranging and rearranging, hanging curtains, sometimes even painting walls. Whatever it took to get their new home started. Each home reflected a new mood, and they often joked that by the time they finally got a place perfect, it was time to leave.

  “I’m not going home.” Violet’s voice echoed in memory.