SCARS (11 page)

              He smiled and gave me a lingering kiss. “Yes.”

              “Do you mind if we decorate the whole trailer?”

              “I think there’s a larger question on your mind, yes?”

              “There are always larger questions on my mind. But the biggest one is how do we include Ellen in our world?”

              “In any fashion that you like. But by purchasing a tree and decorating my house you’re actually making my trailer house into our home.”

              “Are you asking me to move in?”

              If I did move in it would be a fast move. One, which Ellen would not approve of. It would leave her alone in a house we had been through everything in. I couldn’t, as much as I wanted to be with James, do that to her. There had to be a better way.

              I looked into his eyes. He recognized the hesitation. I watched him deflate somewhat. “Oh. I thought--,”.

              I interrupted him “It’s not that I don’t want to. I just…I just can’t abandon Ellen like that. She would be forced to move back in with her family. Not that her relationship isn’t good with them, it’s just it’s been us against the world for so long.”

              “Your loyalty is part of what makes me love you. So if you need to straddle the line between Ellen and me well then, I can accept that.”

              The image of him was heartbreaking. He would never ask me to choose. He knew what that would do to me. The truth was, I needed to have a conversation with Ellen. A real heart to heart about that house. I knew James would never move into it. And with Georgia’s arrival on the scene there was no telling what would become of it now. This relationship might be the very thing that got me out from underneath my mother’s invisible thumb.

              Speaking of my mother. She was dying. Asking for me. For what reason I wasn’t sure. Did she know that terrible, awful secret I was trying to hide? She had to. How could she not? Now Georgia was back in the picture ready to expose me at any moment.

              “What would you think of moving into the house with me and Ellen?”

              I saw the hesitation and fear on his face and in his eyes. That was a big fat no. I knew on this issue, as least, I would have to give. On a very base level I wanted to throw myself into his arms and in a visceral way I wanted him to know just how badly I wanted to live with him. I just needed to hash things out with Ellen. I needed for her to know the dynamic would be changing. She needed to know she wouldn’t be losing me. She would need to know she was as important as ever to me.

              “I wish I could, Rayna. One person is hard enough. But two? I’m just not ready for that.”

              In that moment I knew I was moving in with him. That whatever hardship would come our way we would not break under the weight of it. And there was hardship coming our way.

              “Just let me talk to Ellen. But be prepared. I’m no cake walk.”

              “You’re my everything, Rayna. You’re worth every last bit of trouble or pain I have to walk through to get to you and keep you by my side.”

              My heart melted. I wanted to be with him as soon as possible. I wanted the tree. I wanted the decorations. I wanted the home and life with him. But first there was Ellen and my mother. Then the life I had thought was beyond my grasp.

              “Yes. James. I’ll move in. Be my everything and I’ll move in.”

              He grasped me tightly by the arms and branded me with his kiss. I was his. He was mine. And woe be to anyone who tried to come between us.

***

              Ellen sat on the loveseat. She was silent. For the longest time I held my breath. She looked…sad. As if she were losing, me, really. When her gaze met mine I saw resignation and it broke my heart in a way that only a best friend’s can.

              “You understand I’ll have to take another job. That I won’t be able to see you as much. My family doesn’t approve of James. They judge him. They think he’s hiding something. Hell they think you’re hiding something, only they think you’re harmless. But in James they see danger. They see a threat. And if I move in with them they will stipulate I am not to go over there.”

              My memories crowded in on me.

              James pulling me out of the car.

              The fire.

              The shower.

              The bridge with my father.

              The bridge with James.

              So many memories. So many saviors. I felt like Ellen was forcing me to choose. I felt like Ellen was, in her own way saying goodbye and that was the
last
thing I wanted.

              “How old are you Ellen? I know you don’t like James but I…I…I love him and when you love someone you want to be close to them. Moving in with James doesn’t mean we have to say goodbye to our friendship. If anything it’s a joyful thing to--,” she cut me off.

              “When it comes to you Rayna, I’ve come to realize this part of you has been asleep for a long time. This man, even though I don’t see in him what you do, he awakens a part of you that you’ve effectively put to bed for ten years. Afraid to interact with a man because you’re afraid of getting burned. Because you’re afraid of infecting him with this horrible disease that Kevin has given you. He makes you feel. Desire. Comfort. Protected. He makes you feel loved. Romantically loved. And you haven’t felt that in a very long time. As much as I want to throw a blockade up and stop this from happening, I can’t. More than that I won’t.”

              She fell silent.

              I was terrified. She had given me what I wanted but she hadn’t vocalized what I wanted to hear most. That no matter what we would still be friends. I was desperate to know that would always be the case. In my life I was short on friends, and family was non-existent.

              “I love you, Ellen,” I said starting to cry.

              “I know.”

              “Are you saying goodbye to me?”

              Her eyes welled up with tears. “Never. But you have to know things are going to change.”

              “You’re not playing fair.”

              “Neither are you. James is the worst kind of man to ask for my blessing on. He’s reckless, a chronic alcoholic and he nearly cost you your life.”

              “He saved my life!” I blurted out. “The night of the car wreck, remember how I told you I didn’t know how I got out of the car or how I got home. It was him. It was James. He was the one who saved me. He’s a good man. You just don’t see what I see when you look at him. Please you’re my only family. Don’t pull away. It will break me.”

              I had dissolved into racking sobs.

              And then, as if the world had been righted Ellen joined me on the couch and looked at me. She put her arm around me and whispered, “Any man who saved you from your father is a man worthy not just of my approval, but of your love as well. You won’t lose me. This is not goodbye. I am not just your friend, but I am always your sister.”

              I leaned into her and freely wept in relief. There weren’t many people in my life that I loved and cared for and even fewer that I trusted. One day I would tell her the awful terrible I had done, but for now this had to be enough. I didn’t want her to judge me. I didn’t want her to be scared of me. More than anything I couldn’t bear to lose her. She was my backbone. James was my heart. I was the keeper of my soul and not a very good one at that.

              “I’m so lucky,” I told her. “I have you and James.”

              “Yes you are. Remind me to thank him and apologize for my bitchy behavior towards him.”

              “You both love me. It just took a minute for you two to understand you could both fit into my life.”

              “I’m pretty sure we both always will love you. But I promise you, if he hurts you I’ll break his face.”

              I laughed and the fear and the pain ebbed away. For now things were good. Things were okay. Between Ellen and James they would remain so. But where Georgia and my mother were concerned, that would never be the case.

Chapter Sixteen

              The nursing home was the last place I wanted to be. But, like a good daughter, or at least one desperate for her mother’s validation and love, I was there. Both Ellen and James had offered to come with me and wait outside to offer support. But I knew this first meeting with my mother had to be done without them. This was ultimately my burden to bear. If I was ever to truly exorcise this demon in my head, I would have to face one of my biggest flesh and bone ones in my present.

              Though to be honest, she had become one of my living ghosts. Facing her I wasn’t quite sure what to expect. Would Georgia be there? I certainly hoped not. Confessing my sins wasn’t something I was ready to do. But mom was a drunk in the time I lived with her. The night in question wasn’t something she’d ever really ever been that clear on to begin with.

              Ironically it was in the time I recovered from those wounds, the ones self-inflicted and those from the car wreck and the resulting fire that Georgia and I were at our closest. It was sad to remember it as a flicker of a passing ray of light-- Something that was rare, and upon closer examination perhaps meant more to me than it had ever meant to her.

              Now, the woman who had made it that way was summoning me. I had been the bastard who had cost her the love of her life. Twice. The first of which, I had nothing to do with. The second well, I may have called him father but in reality he was torturer. Only when I was in James’ arms did I feel safe enough to talk about the marks this family tree had made on me when I tried to break free of it.

              No. This first confrontation had to come with me facing Emily Havarc alone. My mother may have looked pale and feeble. However, only one acquainted with her closely would truly understand just how devastating her acid tongue and fiery tip of cigarette could be.

              As I walked through those nursing home doors, the smells themselves left me feeling like a child going to see a sick grandparent who I wanted to leave there and never see again.

              Lysol. Urine. Bad food. Mixed with the flowery scents of the nurses who worked there. The cologne and aftershave of some of the orderlies hung in the air too. The white walls and fluorescent lighting all combined to give me one huge headache.

              I headed for my mother’s room. Even though I had never stepped foot in there I knew exactly where it was. I heard the beeps of monitors. The sounds of life and death. A nurse stopped me.

              Her mouth moved but I couldn’t quite hear her words. I made out the words ‘stroke’. And ‘unable to speak or move’. It was impossible to process this as I had always felt my mother and I had words left unspoken between us. Maybe unkind ones, but words nonetheless.

              Instead as I walked into her room she lay there. Her body as still as stone. But when I looked in her eyes the same hateful spirit was there. In that look I knew exactly what I needed to see.

              She knew.

              She hated me for it.

              She always would.

              And if she had her way I wouldn’t just pay for it in this life. I would pay for it into eternity and every life I lived after this one.

              A wave of nausea hit me like a thunderclap and I vomited into the wastebasket.

              “I’m sorry I can’t do this,” was all I could manage and I bolted to the truck. I got in, slammed the door shut and rested my forehead to the steering wheel trying like hell to get my bearing straight. I loved my mother. I always would. Having it confirmed she would never love me back, well, that was hard. Impossible to process. I needed my family. My real family. I needed James and Ellen.

              I turned the ignition and left the nursing home. I would be back. But not without ammunition. And not like a lamb being led to the slaughter by my manipulative, cold hearted bitch of a sister.

***

              I was drained.

              There was truly nothing left to give.

              As I walked through the trailer house door I felt as if my legs would give out. I shut the door behind me and a huge sob erupted from me. Where it had come from I didn’t know. My insides shook so violently at the image of my mother laying there in the nursing home bed staring at me with such cold damnation. Slamming the door on any hope of me ever having a loving relationship with her.

              It wasn’t as if I didn’t know there was a wall between us. But she had blamed me for my biological father’s abandonment of her and now she damned me for my stepfather’s death.  In a way the fantasy had always been kept alive for me that one day I would be close to my mom. However it was never to be. Georgia had seen to that.

              Never knowing the warmth of any of my parents’ love was a bitter pill to swallow. Knowing I would never know it was even harder. I began to slide down the door towards the floor. And then, like a knight charging in on his white horse James appeared and caught me before I fell to the floor and walked me over to the couch.