Color Me Blind (A Divine Love Story Book 1) (38 page)

Lisa and Vanessa came into the bathroom.  Vanessa saw her daughter sitting there looking despondent. 

“Baby is everything alright?” 

“Yes mama.
I’m okay just a little nauseous.” 

Lisa and Vanessa shared a look
then took a seat.  Lisa put the back of her hand on Jasmine’s forehead. 

She said, “You’re a little warm sweetie.” 

“I’m okay just been a rough day I guess.  An emotional roller coaster.” 

“Yeah it has been but are you sure that’s the reason you’re sick.” 

Not wanting to go into detail about their suspicions Jasmine nodded.

“Yeah I’m sure
.  It’s just a bug.”

Vanessa rolled her eyes, “Yeah the kind of bug that lasts for nine months.” 

Jasmine’s head popped up, “What, why would you say that?” 

“Uh perhaps because I have four children.” 

Lisa laughed, “How late is your cycle Jasmine.” 

Beyond embarrassed she blushed. 

Lisa said, “Do you really think that we don’t know you and Blake are consummating your nuptials every chance you get?” 

Vanessa laughed, “
We were newlyweds once upon a time too.” 

Jasmine smiled, “Guilty as charged and I’m f
ive days late.  Blake just went to get me a ginger ale and a test.”

Silence
enveloped them until Blake walked into the restroom ten minutes later carrying a plastic bag.  He stopped in his tracks when he saw his mom and Vanessa sitting with Jasmine. 

He
said, “Uh, hi.  What are you two doing in here?” 

Lisa said, “Oh we could ask you the same thing, this is
the women’s bathroom.” 

Jasmine said, “Baby we’re busted just give me the test so I can go and take it.  He handed her the test and she went into the stall.  Blake was beyond
mortified with both of them staring at him while his wife was peeing on a stick a few feet away.

Jasmine came out of the bathroom and said, “Well we gotta wait three
minutes.” 

Lisa looked at her watch, “That gives us just enough time to find out and then g
et back to our session.” 

Blake
set his phone timer for three minutes.  Jasmine walked into his arms. 

He put his forehead on hers. 
In a low murmur he asked, “Are you excited baby?” 

“Well I was until the puking reared
its ugly head.” 

He laughed, “Listen
, I know today isn’t the ideal day for this, but maybe in the end it will be the glue that keeps us all together as a family.  Remember how you told me to trust God?  Well you need to trust Him too.”

Vanessa looked at how in love her daughter was with this man and said, “Lisa
, why don’t we give them a minute.  I feel like we’re intruding on a private moment.” 

Lisa smiled at their kids, “I know what you mean.  We will know soon enough.” 
             

They slipped out and a minute later
the timer beeped.  Jasmine walked back into the stall and picked up the test she’d left sitting on a paper towel on the sink. 

Blake followed closely behind and asked, “Are we pregnant?” 

She turned with a huge smile on her face and nodded.  He picked her up and spun her around.  He put her down, grabbed her face and kissed her. 

She grinned, “Oh my goodness Blake we’re gonna have a baby!” 

“Jasmine I’m so excited about starting our family.” 

“Me too baby, b
ut we’re going to have to cut this party short.  We’re late!” 

The door opened and an older woman walked into the restroom
alarmed to see Blake.  Seeing the way they were hugged up her mind deduced what they must have been doing.  She gasped aloud and looked at the door again to make sure she had the right restroom. 

She said, “Now I know sometimes you just gotta have it but in a bathroom honey.  That’s just tacky.” 

They ran out of the bathroom laughing.

Everyone had returned to the session except for Jasmine and Blake. 

Sheridan checked her watch and said, “We will give them a few more minutes before we send out the search party.” 

Lisa and Vanessa shared a
look. They decided not to say anything to their spouses but to let the kids share the news.  They didn’t want to get any hopes up if they weren’t with child.  Frank wanted the kids to hurry up while he had the nerve to share his pain.  He had no idea how much longer he could keep this courage.

A minute later Blake and Jasmine walked in with smiles from ear to ear and apologizing for keeping everyone waiting.  Sheridan wanted to ask if they’d just had a quickie but she knew it wouldn’t be professional.
  Jasmine didn’t look sick anymore.  For some reason she felt strongly that she should let Frank tell his story before she addressed whatever Blake and Jasmine had going on.

She began before anyone else spoke, “Okay guys let’s keep this moving.
  In order to be mindful of the time we’re going to move right on over to Frank and after he’s done then we can have open discussions about everything that has taken place.  I will give my recommendations for how to move forward from today, okay.” 

Everyone said their agreement.

Lisa reached for Frank’s hand but he gently pulled away as he stood up.  He walked over to the window on the far side of the room.  He could feel every eye in the room on him just as he could feel the bile rising in his throat.  How was he supposed to do this? 

H
e knew he would keep his back to them until he finished because he couldn’t stomach watching their faces as he uttered the unspeakable events from his past.  Sheridan didn’t want him to feel rushed, but she had a feeling this was going to take some time. 

She said, “Frank, whenever you’re ready.  Remember this is your
family. They care a great deal about you.  This room is free of judgment.”

He let out a
cynical chuckle, “I’m not so sure that’s even possible.” 

Lisa had no idea what it was but she wanted desperately to know.  She knew this day had been weighing on her
husband because his sunny disposition as of late was now a distant memory.  She hoped this day would unburden his soul so they could live out the rest of their lives finally in peace.

With his back still to his family Frank took a deep breath and spoke, “What happened to me was a lifetime ago.  It was so horrible I honestly
convinced myself it wasn’t real. When I was a teenager some kind of way I was able to block it out.  I honestly forgot all about it.” 

He had everyone’s undivided attention.  Sheridan
sat up in her chair, intrigued.

She
asked, “What triggered this memory back into your life Frank.” 

He hung his head and said, “Blake’s friendship with Jasmine.” 

There were a few sharp breaths taken.  Jasmine inched a little closer to the edge of her seat.

Sheridan asked, “So what happen
ed to you happened when you were just a child.” 

He nodded and said, “
The nightmares started coming to me when the kids were around seven.  It’s when I realized that what they had was a true friendship that could last forever.  I started having flashbacks.  I thought it couldn’t be real but I knew it was.  I could hear the screams in my head.  So I started drinking to block out the nightmares and it helped for a while.  I never had nightmares but now that it had been brought back I couldn’t escape it.  Every time I saw the two of them together it would bring it right back.”

Sheridan could tell he was struggling for composure so she asked the question, “What was it about the time you beat them that pushed you over the edge?”
 

Frank took a deep breath, “I now know differently but through my alcohol induced
haze I thought they were kissing.  It triggered a moment from my childhood that I couldn’t stand to remember.  Jasmine was my pain.  She had to be the one to go.  When Blake stood in between me and her to protect her I lost it.” 

Sheridan asked, “Why Frank?
” 

“Because he stood up for her something I couldn’t do.” 

Frank began to weep. It wasn’t hysterical, it was quiet and dignified.  Lisa was so lost. She had no idea what he was talking about but she knew whatever it was, it was bad.  She stood next to him and held his hand.  She turned her back to him because it seemed like he needed to not look at them in order to release his truth.

Sheridan asked, “Frank who did you fail to protect?” 

It took several moments but he said, “When I was five years old I used to visit with my grandparents on their plantation in the summer.  My great-grandparents owned slaves.” 

He paused to let that marinate considering his
audience.  Jasmine gave a look at her parents. Their faces remained blank.  Lisa held Frank’s hand a little tighter as he began again.

“
The children of their slaves were of course freed but they still lived on my grandparents land and worked for them.  They had a daughter.  Her name was Beth.  We were inseparable that first summer.  We did everything together.  My grandparents never had a problem with it for whatever reason.  It was likely because my grandmother was so fond of Beth.  I taught her how to read and she taught me pretty much everything else,” he said with a smile in his voice. 

“
It almost broke my five-year-old heart to leave and go back home when the summer ended.”

He let his mind drift back to a time when his innocence was at
its most perfect. 

“The next year
when I came back we picked up right where we left off.  We were the best of friends playing together every day, getting in trouble for running through the house and what not.  We were only six but we shared our first kiss.  It wasn’t anything inappropriate though, just a friendship peck.  It was really innocent and it only happened once.  I guess she learned affection from her parents because mine certainly didn’t show any.  One thing you all need to know about Beth’s parents is that they were so in love with each other.  It was in every interaction they shared with each other.  Anyways, one day about halfway through that summer my grandmother would not let me play with Beth.  I didn’t know why.  I thought it was because she found out we kissed.  It was a big uproar going on but at the time I couldn’t comprehend.  Apparently Beth’s father Joe was said to have made a pass at my mother when they came for a visit.  It was hard for me to believe that because he was devoted to his wife but I believed what had been told to me. Late that night I heard screams and it startled me awake.  I knew for a fact one of the screams was Beth’s voice.”

Everyone in the room began to
fidget.  Lisa held on a little tighter as tears began to roll down her cheeks.  Sheridan began to doubt her ability to keep her professional composure.  This was brand new territory.  Jasmine felt the burn in her belly.  This was the kind of stuff you saw in movies.  She never thought she would know someone who actually experienced it. 

Blake was ashamed at what had transpired in his family and for some reason it made it hard for him to look at Jasmine at the moment.  Justin just hung his head not knowing exactly where this was going but knowing he wouldn’t like it.  Vanessa felt her resistance
against white men building back up.  It was going to be a task to separate them from Mr. Matthews.

Frank continued,
“A short while later my dad came and got me and we left in his truck.  I asked him where we were going.  He said to do what men do when one of their own is disrespected.  I had no idea what was going on but I remember being really afraid of my dad for the first time ever.  He had this look in his eye that even at a young age I correctly interpreted as dangerous.  We arrived at another plantation down the road.  There was this mob of men yelling and cussing and throwing their fists in the air.  My dad took me out of the truck and he maneuvered us to the front of the mob.  That’s when I saw the most horrific thing I had ever seen.” 

Frank began to weep, “It was Beth’s dad hanging from a tree. 
He had been beaten bloody and I knew he was almost dead.  I screamed. I asked my daddy why he was hanging like that.  He told me because he deserved it.  Someone handed my dad a torch.  He turned, handed it to me and said you finish him to do your part in honoring your mother.  I was shaking.  I cried and said no I didn’t want to.  My daddy backhanded me and said boy you will defend your mother.  I got up and picked up the torch that fell out of my hand.  My dad lit it.  Because I was too scared to do anything else I set it to his foot and was forced to stand there and watch him burn.  I was violently ill.  In my tiny mind I literally thought I was throwing up my insides.”

The silence that hit the room was deafening. 
It was so quiet they could hear a cockroach take a tinkle on a cotton ball.  Frank could not see the stunned expressions on the faces of his family or Sheridan.  There wasn’t a dry eye in the room. 

Frank managed to compose himself, “I can still hear his screams and smell his flesh burning in my nightmares.
  I fell to the ground until my dad dragged me to the truck and beat me because he said I was weak.  About a week later I saw Beth.  She told me that she didn’t have a daddy anymore and that she didn’t know why.  Beth was my best friend in the whole world. I’d had a hand in killing her father.  I didn’t want to see her and her mother kept her away from me after that anyway.” 

He felt his wife’s hand tremble in his.  When he managed the courage to look at her and only her she stared back with a blank expression and a
face ravaged with silent tears.  She was shaking uncontrollably.  He didn’t know if it was from fear, horror, anger, or disgust.  He wanted to hold her but he was afraid to touch her.

He found some courage deep in the recesses of his soul to look up and face everyone else in the room.  His eyes bore into Blake’s. 

“Son, I’m so sorry.  For a long time I thought if I hadn’t been so close to Beth then my father would have never made me do that.  I felt as though he wanted to sever my ties with her once and for all. I know now he was passing down his hatred to me, making sure it stuck.  He was a very mean and intolerable man.  You guys don’t know this because I kept him as far away from you as possible but he died when you were eight years old Blake.  I went to see him on his death bed and he confessed to me that he’d overheard my mom coming on to Beth’s father.  He’d beat her silly for it, but his pride couldn’t take it and Joe had to pay for it.  He said it wasn’t like killing a real man, he was an animal.  He wept.  It was the first time I had ever seen my father cry but I didn’t care because I still lived with the nightmares of what I’d done.  He was about to be free of his because death was knocking at his door.  I hated him even more.  I didn’t think that was possible.  I know you and Jasmine’s relationship was nothing like that but still the familiarity of it hit too close to home.  I was determined to do everything in my power to stop it.  The truth is Jasmine the reason I hated you so much is because you represented something I was conditioned to despise.  It was easier to hate you and see you as less than human than to hate myself.  It was easier to see you as the problem than see myself for who I truly was, a coward, a murderer and a racist.  As long as you were less than me then I could live with what I did.  The moment I saw you as equal is the moment I would have to face what I did so I always kept you and all other black people beneath me.  I can see that now.  For that I am truly sorry.”

Blake had no response.  H
e just stared at his father not even sure of what he was feeling.  Jasmine didn’t know how to comfort her husband. There was no instruction manual for this kind of emotional bomb when dropped at your feet.  She stared at Frank he looked so much like a broken man her heart bled for him and the six year old that was still in there screaming for understanding and forgiveness.

Jasmine stood up and walked over to Frank. 

She wrapped her arms around him and whispered, “I forgive you Frank.  You are not a coward.  It took great courage to tell your story.”

Frank
held Jasmine tight and said, “Thank you.”

A few moments later Jasmine released him and took her seat.

Sheridan took a tissue and wiped her face, “I apologize for my lack of professionalism but that one took me by surprise.  Frank, my heart breaks for that six year old you were and the burden you can’t help but carry with you now.” 

It pained her to be objective.
She wanted to lash out at him for that life that was carelessly disposed of. 

She cleared her throat, “You’re no different from any other abused child out there.  This
tragedy was not your fault.  Even though you knew right from wrong the people who were responsible for guiding your life distorted that sense of morality.” 

She had to wipe her eyes again.
 

“I cannot imagine what this has been like for you but you have to find a way to forgive yourself and embrace your family.” 

She paused again to wipe her face. 

“You must also find it in your heart to forgive your father.  You’ve been blinded by your hatred for so long that you can’t see you’ve turned into someone like him.  Even though he’s dead and gone you have to free yourself from the grip he has on you.
  That spirit of hatred was passed down to Blake as well but thankfully that issue has already been resolved between you two.  It’s very important that you all can recognize the pattern.”