The Adulterer's Unofficial Guide to Family Vacations, A Novel (23 page)

I lay back down, snuggling into the hollow between Alan’s shoulders.
And he didn’t snore!
Score!

Over breakfast the next morning, Alan reminded the kids that the vacation was almost over.
We were deafened by the collective groan that followed.

“I know, I know,” he began as if leading peace negotiations in the Middle East, “but we’ve extended this vacation longer than we should.”

“Then we hafta go home?” Jack mumbled through a mouthful of cornflakes.

“I don’t wanna go home!”
Ben wailed.

Alice and Jenny threw their arms around each other and burst into tears.
Pretty soon people from the other tables began to look at us like they would alert security.

“Calm down, guys!
We’re still here!” That’s me, always looking for the silver lining – even if the silver lining had a quickly approaching expiration date.

Alice bit her bottom lip, “Can Jenny come live with us?”
She turned those big, chocolate eyes on her father.

“We could trade!
Alice can have Jenny and we get Jack!” Ben suggested, rather unhelpfully.

Before they had a chance to sign their siblings over, I interrupted, “Well, it looks like you guys could get your wish.”

Alan nodded, “That’s right.
How would you like it if we all lived together?”

Four pair of eyes grew wide to the point of cartoon proportions.
I looked desperately at Alan, hoping he knew if this was a good sign or not.
The silence was palpable.
For one, heart-wrenching moment, I wondered if we had made the biggest mistake of our lives.

“Aiiiiiiiieeeeeeeeeee!”
A united squeal broke the sound barrier in the food court.
If the cups weren’t made of paper, I’d bet they would have shattered.
Apparently, the kids were happy.

Alan raised his hands, “Enough!
Quiet!
Calm down or we won’t do it!”

To my shock and awe, that worked.
The kids became quiet, but their bursting smiles were unmistakable.

“We’ll explain more later,” I said slowly, “but it looks like you get new brothers and sisters.”

The shrieks were slightly softer this time.
But we beat a hasty retreat before anyone could throw us out.
Needless to say, we raised a few eyebrows on the bus trip as the kids announced to anyone who would listen that they were getting a new family.
I suppose we were lucky that the kids didn’t think it out beyond getting new siblings.

“And my mommy and daddy, and her mommy and daddy, are all moving in together!”
Alice was all smiles, explaining our situation to a very confused grandmother sitting across from us.
Shit. I guess we weren’t that lucky after all
.

“Alice, honey,” Alan called his daughter over to him gently.
“Let’s sit down and not bother the other people on the bus, okay?”
He looked at me and I just shrugged.

“You know, there are worse things…” Alan began, whispering in my ear.

I looked around, giving a weak smile to those who narrowed their eyes at me in disdain, “You mean worse than spending twenty minutes trapped on a bus full of people who think we are starting a swingers commune?”
I whispered back.

“Sure,” he responded easily, “they could find the severed heads of our spouses mounted on our hotel room door knobs.”

All I could do was agree.
He had a point, after all, and who was I to argue with such logic?

“So, when do we tell the kids that one mommy and one daddy won’t be part of the picture?”
I mumbled in his ear.

“Someplace public, where they can’t rise up against us,” he responded, his hand closing over mine.

“Hey, they came up with the wife-swapping commune idea.
Do you really think they will be too embarrassed to scream in public?”
My fingers slipped around his index finger and slowly began stroking.
What was my message here?
Let’s come up with a brilliant plan, and oh, by the way, I’m simulating sex with your finger?

“Good point,” Alan pulled his hand from mine before we got into any more trouble with the people on the bus.

An hour later, we were watching the parade.
The kids sat on the curb in front of us, arms locked around each other, while we stood behind them, reasoning out various plans to tell them the truth.
Dropping the bomb on them back at the hotel wouldn’t work, since the walls weren’t soundproof and our neighbors had already had a front row seat to our affair and spousal showdown.
A restaurant for lunch was also ruled out.

By the time the parade was over, we had a plan.
Well, a pretty pathetic one actually, but a plan nonetheless.
One hour later, we were sprawled on the grass with a picnic.
Alan had worked pretty hard to find the right level of isolation, while I juggled the huge, family-style lunch from the concession area.

Jenny and Alice were deep in discussion of what their joint bedroom would look like.
Basically, it would be pink, with pink furniture, matching pink beds and even pink clothes in the closet.
I tried to be supportive, but come on.
All pink?

Alan and I listened, not really finding the perfect spot to jump in with our news.
I was thrilled that the kids were happy, and didn’t relish the thought that we were about to introduce some unhappiness into the mood.

“That went well,” Alan said as he picked up the paper plates.
The kids were off at the playground.

“Considering that we didn’t break the news to them, how else could it have gone?”
I tossed a pile of napkins and cups into the trash can, and sat down next to him.

He nodded, “I know, I know.
But the timing wasn’t right.”

“I don’t know that we should wait for the right time.
I mean,” I pushed my bangs out of my eyes, “I could justify not telling them until we get home.”

Alan shook his head, “No, we should talk about it before we get home.
I don’t want Susan surprising them with the news.
Alice and Jack will think she doesn’t want them anymore.”

“Okay.”
I hadn’t thought about that.
As angry as our soon-to-be-ex-spouses were, things could get ugly.
“Let’s agree to be completely professional about this.”

His eyebrows arched, “Professional?
That’s an interesting word to apply to divorce.”

I made a face, “I mean, let’s agree not to badmouth Mike and Susan or make them look like villains in this.
Besides being the right thing to do, it can only make our attorneys a little happier.”

“Fine,” he said, “we’ll keep everything above-board.”

I leaned over and kissed him, my tongue darting quickly into his mouth to tickle the roof of it.
Alan responded by pulling me onto his lap and we proceeded to make out.
His strong hands with those nimble fingers entangled in my hair as his lips slid over mine.
I could feel the longing in his touch and I surrendered to it.

“Mommy!”
Ben’s wail jolted me back to the present, “Why are you kissing Alan?”

All four kids stood before us, eyes wide, mouths open as I scrambled out of Alan’s lap.

“Daddy?” Alice asked.

Well, this was what we wanted, right?
Maybe just not the way we planned to tell them, but you can’t have it all.
I pulled Jenny and Ben down onto the grass across from me, holding their little hands in mine.
Alice and her brother climbed into Alan’s lap.

“Remember when we said that all four of you were going to live together?” Alan began, shooting me a look that I translated to mean
I’m making this up as I go, so feel free to jump in anytime.
He waited for the kids to nod before continuing, “Well, we are going to do this because Laura and I are going to get married.
You four will be brothers and sisters.”

“But what about Daddy?” Jenny looked at me, her lower lip quivering, “Where will he live?”
The other three nodded.

I took a deep breath, “Mommy and Daddy are getting a divorce.
Do you know what that means?”
My children nodded as Alan said the same thing to his kids.

Tears streamed down Jenny’s face, “He doesn’t want to be with us anymore?”

“No!
Daddy loves you.
It’s just that Mommy and Daddy don’t want to be together anymore.”
Alright, so that was half true, but they’re five, for Christ sake!

Alice rubbed her eyes, “Will we get to see Mommy again?”

A hard lump formed in my throat.
This was terrible.
I looked at Alan and he seemed to be at a loss for words.

“You will see her a lot, actually,” I said, afraid I was speaking out of turn.
“And you two will see Daddy.
But from now on, we will be your parents too.”
I was starting to wonder if I should have made up a flow chart, since this was getting confusing.

“Jimmy’s mom and dad got divorced,” Jack spoke up, “and they yell all the time.
Is that what will happen?”
For some reason, he looked directly at me.
Great.
I am now the evil stepmother.
What did I expect?
This theme park was literally full of them.

I shook my head, “No.
We will all be nice to each other.”

“Whose house will we live in?” Ben asked Alan.
      

Alan smiled, “We thought we would move to a new house, in a new city.
We thought you could help us pick it out.
What do you think?”

The four children looked at each other.
In all honesty, we were dropping a neutron bomb on their little lives.
I found myself holding my breath, afraid of their response.

“Let’s go play,” Jenny said.
And with that, the four of them ran off to the playground, leaving Alan and I a little shell-shocked.

“What just happened here?” Alan said, watching them run.

“I think they’ve gone into brain-lock.” I murmured.

He turned to me, “Brain-lock?”

“Um, yeah.
When iguanas have too much information to process, they go into a kind of brain-lock where they shut down to figure out how to deal with it.”

“You can’t be serious.”

“It’s true.”

“I don’t even want to know how you know that.”
Alan took my hand in his, stroking my palm with his thumb.

“I once had an iguana.”
I shook my head, “It doesn’t matter anyway,” I started, “apparently, we told them too much.
They’ve chosen to ignore it rather than deal with it.”

“Considering the circumstances, can you blame them?
I want to go into brain-lock.”
Alan grinned.

“As long as you don’t do it in bed, I think we’ll be alright.”

We watched them play in the distance, as the kids acted like we’d never told them about the divorces.
Maybe Alan was thinking the same thing.
Neither one of us spoke for a while.

Chapter 26

To our complete surprise, the kids didn’t mention the divorces again.
Mental note – remember that two marriages are involved.
Of course, that didn’t make me feel better.

Alan and I decided not to bring it up again.
Maybe that was a cowardly thing to do, but our children obviously either forgot about it, or wanted to forget about it.
Either way, our chickenshit approach to parenting seemed like a good idea.

By mid-afternoon, it was very hot.
The munchkins didn’t have to work very hard to convince us to spend the rest of the day back at the hotel pool.
And the idea of seeing Alan in his swimsuit really appealed to me.
And so, by 3:30, the kids were splashing around in the pool and I was ogling my lover.
Life could be so sweet sometimes.

After spending an hour in the pool, playing with the kids, I slid out of the water and onto one of the chaise lounges.
For half an hour I watched Alan play with all four giggling and squealing kids.
I suppose it was possible to die of happiness at that point.
They were no longer my kids and his kids, but our children.
Ours
.

A kind of weariness invaded my brain as I realized that soon, Jenny, Ben and I would return to Ohio.
For a moment, I felt a twinge of loneliness.
Seeing Mike would be hard.
But our marriage was over.
Of that I was certain.
Just pinpointing the exact time and place of the demise was difficult.

I wondered if I was being fair by moving halfway across the country.
It seemed like a good idea at the time.
Making an adventure out of it by going somewhere I’d never been before and putting down roots seemed exciting.
But wasn’t I being a lousy parent by taking the twins away from their father?
Instead of Cinderella finding her Prince Charming and happy ending, I felt like the evil queen in Snow White, offering Mike the poisoned apple.
“I’m leaving you and taking your children with me to a place far, far away…”
Damn, I’m evil.

Was Alan thinking the same thing?
Did he feel guilty about moving out West with Alice and Jack?
My stomach clenched and a cold sweat broke out on my forehead.
By pursuing our happiness, were we hurting our kids?

Jenny squealed with delight as Alan tossed her through the air.
She landed with a big splash between Jack and Ben and a chorus of “Me too, me too!” exploded.
Alan laughed, shooting me a beautiful smile.
After a few more moments of teasing the kids, he got out and joined me.

I watched with lust in my heart as he approached.
His skin was bronzed by the sun, dark hair damp, light eyes lit with amusement.
It was then I realized my jaw was hanging open.
I supposed I should get used to acting like a drooling monkey whenever he was around.
Especially when he was half naked and wet.

As he leaned down to kiss me, little drops of water landed on my skin, giving me goosebumps.
Alan laughed as he sat down.
Taking my hand, he looked at the kids playing together in the pool.

“You’d never know they haven’t known each other their whole lives, would you?”
He asked softly.

“Alan, are we doing the right thing by moving to New Mexico?”
That’s me, Laura break-a-great-mood Smith.
Or at least, that would be my name if I was Navajo.

“Is that why you’ve been scowling?” He asked, giving my hand a squeeze.
“I thought something was bothering you.”

I nodded, “Yeah.
I wonder if it isn’t totally cruel to take the kids away from their mom and dad.”

Alan considered this, “Well, Ohio and New York aren’t exactly neighbors.
One of them would be without kids if we moved to your town or mine.”