Authors: Virginia Duke
"Sounds like you're feeling depressed," he hummed
in his condescending shrink-speak, "When things in our lives become too
heavy to manage, sometimes our bodies go haywire trying to shuffle the emotions
and find the strength to organize and make sense of it all. How are you
sleeping?"
"I'm not. That's why I'm here."
"Alright then, I'll have a prescription faxed over to
Crane's, it's a non-addictive sleeping agent. Half a pill about an hour before
bed every night. Give me a call if anything else comes up, let me know how it
works and we'll schedule a real appointment in a few weeks. I know how you feel
about the anti-depressants, but we might need to consider that route if things
don't start to change, got it?"
***
He hadn't meant to approach her the way he did in her
office that morning, but after they'd learned Michael wouldn't make it, Rachel
was all Dylan could see.
Before today, he thought he could wait to talk to her.
Michael needed him. And he’d waited sixteen years to talk to her, he could wait
until the gala drew nearer. But then he’d seen her in the pharmacy that morning,
and now every waking moment was eclipsed by his unearthed obsession with
Rachel.
Michael was gone, and he'd waited long enough.
Dylan needed something pure to distract him, something
explosive and raw, something big enough to help him keep his head above water.
Losing Rachel had been like learning to live with a terrible sickness that
could never be cured, it took him years to come to terms with it. But he'd
never forgotten how she made him feel, how he'd loved her. How he never loved
anyone the way he'd loved her, and he’d never forgive her for it.
And then he’d left her office without saying what he’d
wanted to say, she still hadn’t given him an explanation. So he went back, and
she was crying, he lost control, he wanted to scream that she wasn’t the
fucking victim. He hadn’t meant to kiss her, but once he’d done it, it was like
a supernova, in a flash, she'd consumed him all over again, destroyed him.
She felt it, too, he knew as soon as he’d kissed her.
But when he confronted her, instead of making excuses or
explaining, she said he left her. Adamantly, she’d pulled away from him and in
one breath she’d placed the blame on him. What did she blame him for? Leaving
her? For leaving to work that summer?
Then she'd told him to get out over and over. And he
couldn’t trust himself, his rage was unpredictable. So he’d left.
Had he really expected an apology? An explanation?
He thought he'd given up understanding what was lost
between them, where he went wrong, but now he lay in his apartment with her
face looking down at him, her thoaty song in his ear, her hands exploring his
body, and he couldn't walk away.
Was she happy in her marriage? Had she thought of him as
he'd always thought of her?
He was losing Michael, over and over every day, and the pain
he'd felt when he'd first lost Rachel was fresh again. She’d been the first
person he loved to leave him without saying goodbye, but Michael would be the
last.
Rachel would give him an explanation, no matter how long it
took, he would demand it.
***
Back at her desk, comforted by the sleeping pill
prescription tucked safely in her purse, Rachel opened her laptop to try and
get some work done. Her phone rang and she glanced over at the caller ID, it
was Lana. She reached for the receiver.
"Hey Lana."
"Hey Dollface," Lana said loudly, "Good
news! Megan is ready to leave, but she's only got a few hundred dollars. She's
gonna need some help with a deposit on an apartment and the first month's rent
until she gets a job."
"That's exciting," Rachel said unenthusiastically,
"Can she get us a copy of the lease so we know how much it'll be? And when
does she need it?"
"I've got the lease right here with me and she needs
it today."
Rachel sat silently for a moment, she knew they didn't have
the money in the bank to spend on a client's apartment when she was trying to
put the gala together.
"You there, Rachel?" Lana asked.
"Yes, I'm here," she breathed, "Okay, bring
the lease by the office or fax it to me, I'll have a check ready for her by the
end of the day."
She reached into her purse for the bottle of courage she
needed to endorse Dylan's check. She took the Valium, signed the check and put
it in an envelope with the deposit slip, then walked out to the mailbox on the
corner before she lost her nerve.
Her computer made the familiar noise indicating an incoming
email.
From: Dylan Easton
To: Rachel Daniels
Subject: I'm sorry.
Rachel,
There is no excuse for my behavior this morning.
I wasn't myself.
I'd appreciate an opportunity to explain. In person.
Coffee tomorrow morning.
She read the email again. And then a third time.
He'd been a ghost in her life for sixteen years, why show
up now and start digging up demons? Was he going to apologize? Did she even
want an apology? She'd gone too long asking herself why he'd left, why she
hadn't been good enough, why she'd been so stupid. And it took her too many
years to find any peace in accepting that she would never know.
Screw it. He owed her an explanation. She deserved to know
why, but she needed time to pull herself together so she could say everything
she needed to say. Rachel gulped down the rest of her soda and typed out a
response.
From: Rachel Daniels
To: Dylan Easton
Subject: Re: I'm sorry.
Dylan,
I'll be happy to meet with you for coffee.
But I'm terribly busy.
I'll be in touch once things slow down.
Rachel took the time to make herself feel presentable, and
she and the kids filed out to the car singing, "I want to scream and
shout, and let it all out, scream and shout, and let it all out!"
She knew she was screwing up her kids in a million other
ways, but she'd never apologize for letting them listen to crap pop music. Not
after being made to listen to her mother's collection of French jazz growing
up, while her peers listened to Madonna and Prince.
"Now, dumplin'," she'd say, "That garbage
will just make you stupid, if you're ever going to attract a man of
circumstance, you need to be well versed in more cultured, more sophisticated
music."
Dylan gave her an old stereo soon after they'd met, and she
took the tapes he made for her up into her studio, where she knew her mother
wouldn't overhear. She spent hours listening quietly to his carefully chosen
songs, playing them over and over while she painted or read the old romance books
she’d snuck home and hidden in her attic, the only place in the house she could
go without being disturbed, where she could read or listen to music without
being lectured on all of the inappropriate things her peers exposed her to.
She'd sworn never to limit or criticize Hunter or Lauren's
creative interests. And no matter how terrible the music or how vulgar the
book, Rachel would do her best to indulge her children in exploring the worldly
things she'd never had the freedom to explore herself.
She pulled into Adam’s Elementary school to drop Hunter
off, and tussled the shaggy blond hair he'd managed to get sticky with cereal.
"I love you, bud," she said as he climbed out.
She wanted a kiss, but he'd already reached the age where
little boys wouldn't be caught dead kissing their mothers in public. She
watched him for a moment, thinking she never kissed him enough when she had the
chance. She didn't hold him enough when he was a baby. What if something
terrible happened at the school today? One of those shootings like they'd been
covering on the news the last few weeks? How terrified would her baby be if
somebody raced into his classroom with a gun, started shooting people? Would
she be able to keep it together for Lauren?
Gross, Rachel. Stop it.
She pulled away from the curb and turned up the radio, some
atrocious rap song, anything to drown out the morbid fears playing out in her
head.
She pulled into Steps Beyond Childcare and whipped into the
director's space. She was in a hurry. She flung Lauren out of the car, still
singing, and they pretended to hopscotch their way inside, a challenging feat
with her stiletto heels. Maybe when Lauren was her age she'd remember her
mother wasn't always so serious, or neurotic.
A sloppy kiss and a wave of her hand, she hopscotched
towards her classroom, brown curls bouncing side to side carelessly. Miss
Independent. Nothing like her mother.
***
Rachel met her at the Galleria, Savannah had a tennis date
after lunch. She hadn't wanted to ride with her mother anyway, two or three
hours was more than enough to get some shopping done. Anything longer than that
and they'd both have to get drunk at lunch.
"Hello dumplin'," Savannah cooed, "I'm so
glad you called. Come with me, I can't wait to show you these new Valentino pumps."
"Hello Mother," she smiled pleasantly, sticking
her hand inside her purse to double check for the Valium bottle.
"Rachel, do you have time for a facial?" Savannah
asked quietly, their hells clicking in unison against the marble flooring,
"You really could use one, did you run out of moisturizer? Do you need me
to buy you some? We'll run by cosmetics on our way downstairs."
Rachel followed, nodding in agreement while Savannah
chattered on about the importance of exfoliation and sunscreen, her perfectly
manicured nails, bitch red, pointing at the various articles Rachel needed to
incorporate into her repertoire if she were going to maintain her youthful
appeal. Savannah was an expert on the subject.
At fifty-four she didn't look a day over forty. Her blond
coiffure, always styled precisely the way she'd wanted, make-up suited for a
movie set. She'd never had any plastic surgery, but they all knew the day would
come when Savannah no longer felt young or attractive and she'd sneak into some
medical spa in Arizona, swearing to her friends that she'd only gone to get
some rest.
Rachel understood, she'd stopped judging her for it years
before. Savannah may not have been an educated woman, but she was a smart one.
Her looks had been what saved her from the poverty stricken dirt road she grew
up on. Her looks, and a lonely old man.
Frank Beauchamp had driven into Bomeade, Texas looking for
a place to rest on his way to Lubbock. Some oil tycoon was charged with killing
his partner and he'd paid Frank a fortune to come in and defend him. Savannah,
barely eighteen, sat perched on a bar stool at the local diner, tiny, dusty
slippers on her feet and a yellow dress that had seen its last mending. A thin
blue ribbon held her hair back from her face, she was reading a 16 Magazine,
celebrity news and gossip, lost in the lives of people she'd wanted to be.
"Let me tell you something," Rachel’s father
said, "Your mother was the most elegant thing I'd ever seen, like she
stepped right out off big screen. I loved her the moment I saw her."
Rachel never asked what an eighteen year old beauty had
seen in an almost fifty year old man, even as a child she'd understood.
At she and Kenneth’s wedding, Frank had too much scotch and
pulled Rachel aside, and pointing in Savannah's direction with his half empty
highball, he'd slurred, "She stepped out of that raggedy town still stuck
in the 1930’s and stepped into my brand new 1976 Lincoln Continental. She never
even told her parents she was leaving, you know, just left. Fucked my brains
out on that vinyl bench seat and asked me to take her to Lubbock."
She’d smiled at him sadly when he paused to drain his
glass, then he'd winked at her, "You know, that vinyl bench seat cost me a
fortune. You're the only thing in my life I ever did right, Rachel. And you're
beautiful today. I'm sorry I never told you that before. And this boy,"
he'd said, aiming the empty glass at Kenneth, "That boy is a keeper. He
might not be a lawyer or a doctor, but he's got a good heart. He'll take care of
you. If he doesn't, I'm sure your mother will have his balls cut off."
Then he'd staggered away, laughing. The alcohol took him
from her not long after that.
***
She picked at her sandwich and stirred her tomato basil,
listening to Savannah go on about her ideas for the gala. Maybe Rachel would
ask her to help take over some of the planning this year, she'd been so
distracted she could use the help. She waited for Savannah to take a breath and
jumped in.
"Mother, I want to tell you something, and I need you
to stay calm. It doesn't have to be a big deal."
Savannah's hand rose to her throat dramatically,
"What? What is it? Are the children well? Are you depressed again?"
She half-whispered, half-spit the last words, she'd always despised what she
called Rachel's weakness of spirit.
"No, Mother, everyone is fine. But listen, the boy who
was injured at the football game a few weeks ago? The one Kenneth ran down to
help?"
"Yes? What about him? Is it his mother? Did she file
the lawsuit?" she asked, and reaching for her purse, she went on, "I
have to call Jameson. He knows somebody who- "
"No, Mother, listen. She hasn't filed a lawsuit,"
Rachel interrupted, "I'm not sure if she will or not. We have no idea
what's going to happen. I assure you, if she does, you and Jameson will be the
first people we call."
"Well, don't scare me like that. What in the world is
it then?"
"It’s his father," she hesitated, knowing her
mother would panic.
She'd never forgiven Dylan. What mother would? Rachel would
kill any man who dared hurt Lauren in the same way. She’d never understood
Savannah’s hatred for him until she’d had a daughter of her own, and knowing
how angry she’d be made it that much more difficult to tell her.