All for Maddie (9 page)

Maddie was up at eight the
following morning. I could have sworn I had just fallen asleep. My eyes felt
like sandpaper.

“Mommy!” she exclaimed,
surprised that I was with her.

“Good morning, are you ready
to go home?”

“I have a potty,” she stated,
sliding off the bed. Where was the bathroom? Great, I hoped Alex was up. I
hated the thought of snooping around his house.

I should have known smarty
pants, Maddie, already had that figured out. She was sharper than a shiny new
penny. She pulled me by my hand to the bathroom off from the dining room.

I stood in the door checking
out the elaborate bathroom while she removed the dry pull-up and tossed it to
the trash.

“Mommy is going to go get
your clothes. I’ll be right back.” I turned and ran right into Alex.

“Good morning,” He smiled
down at me, grasping my arms to steady me. Jesus, did he always look like a
million bucks? It was eight o’clock in the morning. He had already showered,
shaved, and dressed to kill, and he smelled
—
No, no. I didn’t give a shit how heavenly he smelled. I darted
around him and back to Maddie’s room.

She was standing on some sort
of fancy scale in the corner, naked butt and all. Alex watched her amused. I
slipped around him with her clothes and sat on the edge of the tub bigger than
my kitchen.

“How much me cost?” Maddie
asked, looking down at the numbers.

I laughed and looked up to
Alex who also laughed. “You cost more money than the world could hold, but,” I
said, looking down at the scale, “you weigh twenty-eight pounds. Here put your
foot in,” I coaxed, holding her panties out.

“I’ll go start breakfast,”
Alex smiled our way.

“You don’t have to do that.
We’ll just grab something on the way,” I countered.

He gave me that stern look,
like my father would, and repeated himself. “I’ll go start breakfast.”

Maddie helped with the
awkwardness as we ate scrambled eggs, sitting at Alex’s table.
Unfathomable….She busily talked about the zoo animals, the pond outside, the
swimming pool slide that I hadn’t seen yet, and her papaw. She was ready to go
see her papaw and so was I.

Alex put her in her car seat
and kissed her. “I love you. Daddy will call you later, okay?”

“I come back, K?” she told
him as though she sensed that he was sad that she was leaving him.

“Okay, sweetie, you come
back.”

I got in and started the
truck. Damnit. Why couldn’t he just walk away? I rolled down the window.

“I don’t like you driving her
around in this thing,” he admitted.

“What thing? My truck? This
thing’s a tank. I’d drive it to Florida.”

He snorted. “Not with my
daughter, you wouldn’t. From what year is this thing anyway?”

“94, it has been very faithful.”

“I’ll buy the next one.”

“Yeah okay, I’ll see you
later,” I said, cranking the handle to raise the window.

“Bye, Maddie,” he waved,
blowing her a kiss.

Ahh, Maddie, don’t blow it
back.

It felt amazing to be home. I
loved the cozy feel of home: my home, Maddie’s home. This was where we belonged,
right here at the resort.  Right here with our secret little beach and with
friends and family who loved us both, more than Alex could ever think about.

We hadn’t been home five
minutes before my dad was pulling up in his golf cart.

“There’s my girl. You come
down here and give papaw a big hug,” he demanded, catching her as she leaped
from the top step into his arms. He hugged and kissed her all over.

“Don’t you ever leave me for
two whole days. I missed you too much.”

“I feed a fish, Papaw.”

I could only shake my head.
That kid would never forget about those damn fish.

“You do what you need to do.
I’m taking my baby for the day. We have to go feed the fish,” my dad, explained.

“I drive?”

“Yes, you can drive,” he
assured her.

I watched them drive out the
dirt road feeling a sense of defeat. What the hell was I supposed to do? What
choice did I have?

I started a load of laundry,
jumped in the shower, and dumped the spoiled milk down the drain. I needed to
go to the grocery store. I wasn’t doing it. I would snatch some milk from the
dining room. I didn’t want to do anything, but enjoy my home. I wasn’t sure how
much longer I had to do that. Oh Lord, was I thinking about this so-called
proposition? Of course I was, Alex was leaving me with one option,
his
.
I prayed Maddie kept her mouth shut and didn’t say the D-word around my dad.
She wouldn’t. She would spill, and that would be how I explained Alex Wesson to
my dad. He would kill Alex. How was I supposed to explain anything?

So far so good. My dad brought
Maddie home when she started getting whiny, needing a nap. Mommy needed a nap
too. That sounded wonderful. I’m not sure who was asleep first, her or me, but
it was just what I needed. A nice sound sleep without any thoughts.

I woke startled by my new
ring tone, ‘I fucking hate you’ by Godsmack. I downloaded it while I waited for
hours at Kylie’s to talk to my daughter. I sat up and searched around me, finding
my phone between the cushions. Oh no, where’s Maddie? I instantly wondered,
seeing the empty loveseat.

I walked toward the clank in
the kitchen, answering my phone.

“Hello,” I answered, with my
hand on my hip, sternly looking down to my daughter, spreading peanut butter up
her legs with a spatula.

“I not find a bread,” she
said looking up with that oh-shit-I’m-in-trouble look.

“Hi, you made it home okay, I
presume,” Alex said.

“Yeah, we’re home.”

“Good, can I speak to my
daughter?”

“Not at the moment, she’s in
the tub. Call back in a little bit.” I hung up, not because I was being rude
like when he did it. What else was I going to say? No, you can’t talk to her
because she’s covered in peanut butter. I was proving myself unfit, I didn’t
need his help.

“What on earth are you
doing?”

“I not find a bread,” she
said again.

“That’s because we need to go
to the store. Were you planning on eating your legs?”

“I not like dis,” she said,
holding up a stale onion bagel, also covered in peanut butter.

I took a spatula out of the
crock that was setting on the dishwasher and scraped her legs, trying to get
the majority off before moving her. She giggled. I didn’t find it funny at all.
She had peanut butter all up and down the cabinet, the floor, and I have no
idea how it got on the handle of the freezer. She wasn’t tall enough to even
reach it. I picked her up and stripped her clothes. Standing her in the bathtub
while washing her legs, arms, and fingers before starting the bath water.

“Why do you always do that?”
I asked as she sat down.

“I did cook.”

“You did make a mess. Stop
doing that. You wake mommy up.”

“But me hungry.”

“Mommy will cook. You’re too
little.”

“I free. I have a birfday a
marrow.”

I groaned and picked up the
soiled clothes, turned the water off, and walked out. “What do you want to
eat?” I asked after depositing her clothes into the washer and walking to the
kitchen to clean her mess.

“I eat wobber,” she called.

I looked toward her, dumping
water from a cup with a confused look. What the hell was wobber? “You want
wobber?”

“Uh-huh.”

I ignored her. I wasn’t even
going to try. She was getting hot dogs and French fries.

“My daddy make me wobber,”
she explained.

Stop saying that. “Alex gave
you wobber?”

“Uh-huh.”

My phone started singing the
hate song just as I finished scrubbing the floor on my hands and knees.

“I told you to call back
later,” I answered.

“It is later,” he replied.

“She’s still in the tub.
She’ll call you. What the hell is wobber?”

“Excuse me?”

“Maddie wants wobber for
supper. She said you made her wobber.”

He laughed. “I think she is
trying to say lobster.”

“Oh.” Maddie wasn’t getting
wobber. Maddie was getting a hot dog. “She’ll call you back.” And again I hung
up. I did do it to be rude that time.

I had just cleaned up our
supper dishes when my new favorite song went off again. Maddie mumbled the
words, I had to change it. I didn’t have the explicit version, thank God. Jesus
he was persistent.

“You’re ridiculous,” I
answered.

“I want to talk to my daughter.”

“MOMMY!” Maddie called from
the living room. I walked over to her kneeling down looking attentively at
something on the area rug.

“A t-wex in da house,” she
claimed.

“That’s not a t-rex. It’s a
grasshopper. Here, Alex wants to talk to you,” I said handing her the phone and
scooping up the bug in my hand. I heard him laugh as I handed over the phone.

Maddie talked for maybe two
minutes and then was on to something else. I hung up.

I declined the invite to eat
supper with my family. Maddie hadn’t spilled the beans yet, and I wasn’t ready
for that. We stayed home, walked to the river, and were in our pajamas by
eight. I was still feeling the effects of no sleep from the night before and
didn’t foresee it being any better tonight. How could it? I still didn’t have
an answer to my problem.

Maddie fell asleep on the
couch, watching the Lion King. I slid from beneath her and pulled her legs to a
laying position. I took a beer, walked out to my front porch and sunk to the
first step. I wanted to call someone. I needed to tell someone what I was being
forced to do. Who? There was no one to call. I honestly believed that my dad
would have been the only one to believe my story. I couldn’t tell him. This was
going to happen. Alex was going to force me to live with him or take my
daughter. My dad would end up in prison and Alex would live far, far under the
earth’s surface.

I rolled my eyes and hit the
end button as I sang, “I fucking hate you,” with Alex’s ring tone, not omitting
the word that was blanked out. I wasn’t talking to him. I had nothing to say to
him. He wasn’t going to dictate what I did. I chugged my beer and went in to
get another one. I finally answered my stupid baby daddy on the fourth ring.

“Oh my God, Alex. What do you
want?”

“Why are you ignoring my
calls?”

“Because, I don’t want to
talk to you.” I hung up. I hadn’t planned on doing that. I just did it.

“Yes……” I answered again.

“We can do this all night.”

“What do you want?” I asked,
rubbing my eyes.

“I wanted to tell Maddie
goodnight.”

“Too late, she’s already
asleep,” I had my finger on the end button when I heard him.

“Don’t you dare hang up on
me.”

“Is there something that I
can do for you?” I smartly asked.

“Yes, you can bring my
daughter and get back here. I miss her.”

“You don’t even know her.”

“I know her well enough to
know that she is mine.”

“She’s mine. You shouldn’t
have any rights to her at all.”

“I guess you should have
thought about that before you decided not to press charges when you were twenty-one.”

“I wasn’t fucking twenty-one,
Alex. I am twenty-one now. I was seventeen. You raped me when I was seventeen.”

Dead silence.

“Alex?”

“Are you serious, Whitley?”

“Yes, I am dead serious. I
was a senior in high school.”

“You lied to me.”

“Yeah, and you fucking raped
me.”

“Will you stop throwing that
word around? I hate hearing you talk like that. You told me you were twenty-one
and that you went to NC State.”

“I lied.”

“Why didn’t you report it?”

“Why did you do it?”

“I don’t know. It was stupid.
One of the guys had some shit that he said was sure to get us laid that night.
I took it. I guess, because you made it so easy. You didn’t fight me at all.”

“I couldn’t fight you, Alex.
I wanted to. I did try.”

“For whatever its worth, I’m
sorry.”

“It’s not worth anything.
You’re ruining my life. I don’t want to move to Lincoln with you. I don’t want
my daughter to know you. Why can’t you just leave us alone?”

“I’m not going to do that.
Regardless of the circumstances, she’s still my daughter. I’ve missed three
years of her life. I don’t want to miss another day. You should have told me.
You have no idea how infuriated it makes me to know that you hid her from me.”

“Alex,” I said exasperated.
“Maddie is a product of you raping me. If I would have told you then, it would
have been because you were arrested and registered as a sex offender. I wish I
would have told someone that night. I wish you did go to jail; at least I
wouldn’t be going through this right now. I wouldn’t even have her right now
had I done that. I would have had the morning after pill.”

“I’m glad you have her.”

“So am I. But I’m not glad
you are doing this. I don’t understand you. I don’t know why you think you have
any right to stake your claim.”

“When are you coming?”

“Did you hear anything that I
just said?”

“Yeah, I heard. I’m not
listening. How about two weeks?”

“I never said I was moving in
with you. My dad is going to freak out. What the hell am I supposed to tell
him?”

“Tell him that you’re in love
with me and that you want us to be a family.”

“I can’t live with you.”

“Why?”

“You’re a psychopath.”

“I am not. What else are you
going to tell him? Tell him that you ran into me at that wedding. Tell him you
told me about Maddie and that we’ve been together ever since. I’m coming there
this weekend.”

“For what?”

“I want to spend the weekend
with Maddie.”

“My dad will shoot you
between the eyes.”

“Not if you tell him you’re
in love with me.”

“I am not telling my dad that
I am in love with you. I don’t even like you. You can’t come here.”

“I’ll be there Friday after
work.”

“No you won’t, we’re fully
booked for the next month.” Ha, that’ll teach him.

“That’s okay. I’ll either
stay with you or get a room and take Maddie for the weekend. I’ll talk to you
later.”

“You’re not doing either,
Alex! Alex!” Oh my God, I hate that man. I hate, hate, hate him. Somebody
needed to put him in his place. Knock him the hell off his high horse.

<><><> 

Alex continued to call every
day, not once but three times. I never talked to him again. I wouldn’t even
answer it. If Maddie wasn’t with me, I would ignore his call and send him a
text telling him she wasn’t with me.  If she was with me, I let her answer and
hung up as soon as she was done.

It was already Thursday,
Maddie hadn’t let the cat out of the bag yet and I was hoping that Alex
wouldn’t show up the next day. I thought for sure Maddie would have blabbed by
now, not that I was complaining. I knew I had to work up the nerve when I got
the text message from Alex later in the afternoon, kindly letting me know that
he would arrive around five. I responded:
You’re not taking Maddie.

That’s fine. I’ll stay
with you. See you around five.

Of course he wouldn’t answer
when I texted back, telling him to stay away. He would be there. There was no
question in my mind. I learned pretty quickly that Alex Wesson did what he
wanted.

“You’re partying with us
tomorrow night, right?” Jaron asked, pulling me from the empty screen on my
cellphone, waiting for asshole baby daddy to text back.

Brilliant…..

“You know what? Yeah, I think
I am,” I decided.

Gaining a weird look from
Jaron, he said, “Um, okay. Good, I’ll see you later.”

Alex wants Maddie. Okay, Alex
can have Maddie. He wanted to come and spend the weekend with her. Fine mommy
was going to have fun. She would be right there on the resort and in her own
bed. I’d show Mr. Big Shot Alex.

I walked up to my dad’s to
get Maddie after waiting tables for a while so that Naomi could be late, again.
I wracked my brain, trying to come up with something to tell him. I was taking
his baby girl away from him. How in the hell was I supposed to justify that?

Hey Dad, by the way, I’m
being forced to take Maddie and live with a rapist. You can come and visit.
Grrrrr. I honestly did hope that Alex Wesson died a slow painful death. I
wished he was on his death bed right that moment.

“Papaw read a book,” Maddie
informed, sitting on the deck with my dad. She was on his lap, and he just
opened the book and began to read. She wasn’t leaving yet.

“Johnny was excited. Johnny
was going to the zoo,” my dad began.

“I go to the zoo,” Maddie
educated him.

“Papaw will take you to the
zoo before summer is over,” he promised.