All for Maddie (7 page)

There were more. Maddie
standing on top of the counter with no one around in the dining room. Maddie
laying in the parking lot, screaming and throwing a fit because I wouldn’t let
her ride her bike around the cars. There were too many cars coming and going.
Maddie asleep in her car seat alone in the truck. I was carrying in groceries.
Me dancing pretty provocative with Naomi, holding a beer. It was bad. I knew it
was bad.

This was suddenly real. I was
scared and afraid of the unknown. I had to tell my dad now. There was no other
way around it.

“Mr. Wesson feels that you
are unfit and thinks that his daughter would be better off with him.”

“She wouldn’t be, he can’t
take her,” I demanded, unable to control the tears that streamed down my face.
He couldn’t take Maddie from me. He just couldn’t. I would die without her. She
couldn’t live without me.

“Ms. Bradshaw, do you want my
honest opinion about all of this?”

I sniffed and wiped my nose
with the back of my hand and nodded.

“I really think the best
thing that you could do, would be to talk to Mr. Wesson and work this out
between the two of you. You don’t want this to go to court.”

I drove home in a fog. How could
this be happening? How could he do this? Was he really that callous? Did he not
care what this would do to Maddie? I wanted to call him, but I couldn’t. I
couldn’t stop crying long enough to breathe, let alone talk.

I should have wanted Maddie
with me. I did want her. I just didn’t want her to witness the state of my
emotions. I called my dad and told him that I didn’t feel well and was going to
lie down for a while; of course he was fine with it. He loved her. This was
going to kill him. What have I done?

Most of the day, I laid
around in a daze.  By four o’clock I thought that I had finally cried the last
of my tears. There just couldn’t be any more. It was impossible. I had already
thought that many times over the past few hours, but the tears just kept
coming.

I finally picked up my phone
and dialed the dreaded number.

“Hello, this is Whitley
Bradshaw. Could I please talk to Mr. Wesson?” I took a deep breath waiting for
Alex to pick up.

“Good afternoon, Whitley. I
told you that the temperature would change in hell. I have a way of making
things happen.”

“What do you want, Alex?” I
asked, sounding defeated. I didn’t want to sound that way. I didn’t want him to
think he had the upper hand. Truth was, he did. He was a slime ball, but was no
doubt holding the control.

“I want my daughter. The one
that you chose to keep from me for three years.”

“What does that mean, Alex?
You want to take her from me?”

“Yup, I want you to see how
that feels. Let you see how it feels to be kept from your own child.”

“Alex, you raped me.”

“Yes, yes, Whitley. I think
we have established that. I apologized for that.”

“You apologized?” I asked.
Really? He apologized for raping me?

“Yes, now let’s move past
that. The paternity test is the same no matter how you look at it.”

I shook my head. This guy was
unbelievable. “I don’t want to go to court.”

“I was hoping you would see
it that way. I want Madelyn this weekend. Here at my house. I can come and pick
her up or you can bring her to me. It’s your choice.”

“Alex, please don’t do this.
She doesn’t even know you, I can’t just drop her off to you.”

“She doesn’t know me, because
you chose that. Not me, not her,
you
are the one that did that. Have her
here by two on Friday,” he ordered and hung up.

“I’m not a bad mom, I’m not,”
I said to the silent phone.

My tears were replenished. I
couldn’t breathe as I heaved in sobbing breaths. How was I supposed to just
take her there and drop her off? I couldn’t do it. I would run with her. I
would go to Mexico or some place that he couldn’t find me. I would change our
names and dye our hair. He was never taking her. Over my dead body, would I let
this happen.

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I should have told my dad. I
guess I was just hoping that after Alex realized what a handful Maddie was, he
wouldn’t want her anymore. Maybe it would all be over after this weekend.

Maddie jabbered from her car
seat beside me as we drove to Lincoln. I tried to pay attention to her and
answer her silly questions. I was just having a hard time staying focused. I
was taking her to her dad, whom she didn’t know from Adam. It was messed up.
This whole thing was messed up. I tried to talk to her about it and tell her
that she was going to spend the night with a man named Alex. She didn’t
understand. She wouldn’t understand until I left her. Oh, God. I couldn’t do
it.

Thank God for Kylie. I knew I
couldn’t go to a hotel and keep my sanity without her. Kylie knew now. Kylie
knew that Alex Wesson was her dad. She, however, didn’t know that he raped me.
She thought that he and I went out a few times after she moved. I told her that
lie.

“Why that light turn green?”
Maddie asked.

“Because, it means we can go
now,” I answered.

“Where we go?”

“Remember, you’re going to
spend the night with a very nice man that loves you. He wants to play with
you.”

“What him name?”

“Alex,” I answered the same
question for the tenth time.

“Where that truck go?” she
asked, on to the next three-year-old question.

My heart couldn’t have been
heavier as I listened to the GPS letting me know that we would arrive at our
destination in ten more miles. Ten more miles and Maddie was going to spend an
entire weekend with a man, I despised. I had never been away from her. Not for
one day. Yeah, she stayed with my dad and Dana some, but I saw her all day and
first thing the next morning. I trusted my dad. He loved her. I had no idea
what this guy’s motives even were.

I held my breath as we pulled
into the drive of the most elaborate house I’d ever seen, right next to the
white sports car. The garage alone looked to be bigger than my house. The lawn
was flawlessly kept with fresh straight lines. It was early, not even noon yet.
I didn’t want to bring her at Alex’s required two o’clock time. I didn’t want
her to fall asleep and wake up crabby, which she was known to do.

“I here?” she asked, leaning
up.

“Yeah baby, you’re here,” I
smiled with a broken heart.

Alex walked out to the
concrete landing in front of his house. His girlfriend stood beside him. She
didn’t look extremely happy about the situation. I never thought about her. I
wasn’t sure how I felt about her being around my daughter. Yes, I was; I didn’t
like it. I lifted Maddie from her car seat and sat her on the blacktop, while I
reached for her backpack. I held onto it, not about to hand it over yet, giving
Alex a hateful glare as he squatted to Maddie.

“Hi,” he said taking her
hand.

This was when I hated the
people that Maddie was exposed to. I swear the girl would talk to Bigfoot. She
wasn’t shy a bit. I wanted her to hide behind me and scream, throw herself to
the ground, and refuse to talk to him. She didn’t.

“What that?” she asked,
touching the fancy gold tie clip.

“That’s my tie pin. Do you
want to wear it?” he asked, taking it from his tie and pinning it to her pink
floral shirt. She giggled and looked up to me. I smiled a sad smile down at
her. Please don’t like him.

“I’m sure you would like to
check out where she will be staying,” Alex assumed. Was he really being nice to
me?

“Yes, that would be nice.”

Maddie let him hold her hand
as he led us inside his home. Goddamnit, Madelyn Rae, don’t hold his hand.

“Hi, I’m Madelyn’s mom.” I
introduced myself to the same blonde that I had seen him with the past two times.

“Kendall,” she smiled a fake
smile with her perfect too white teeth. I didn’t like her.

“What dis?” Maddie asked,
touching the nose of some ugly, skinny dog statue with shiny gold eyes.

“That’s a dog,” Alex replied.

“What him name?”

“He doesn’t have a name.”

Yes, that was my look. My
daughter looked up to him, giving him that stupid look that my dad hated.

“Him don’t have a name?”
Maddie asked, cocking her hip. I was sad, but I couldn’t help but smile.

I squatted to her and the
dog. “How about you give him a name,” I offered. She smiled.

“Um….him name can be Nemo,”
she decided. Everyone’s name was Nemo: her fish, her dolls, her stuffed animals,
and even the rubber ducky that swam in her bathwater.

“I’d like to see her room,” I
requested, looking at Alex. I’m not sure where Barbie went. She walked off with
her cellphone.

I held Maddie’s hand as Alex
led us down a long hall. He opened the door to a spare room, I presumed.

“She’s sleeping here? You do
realize she is three, right?”

“Yeah, what’s wrong with it?”

I rolled my eyes and gave him
a disgusted look. Un-fucking-believable! And I was being forced to leave her
with him. “How do you expect her to get into that bed? How do you expect her to
get out without breaking her neck? What if she needs to go pee during the
night?”

“Oh, you think it’s too
tall?”

“Uh, yeah, Alex. She’s thirty-six
inches tall. That bed is what, four feet?”

“I’m sure she will be fine
for a couple of days. I plan to turn this room into hers anyway. I’ll buy her
new furniture.”

“And where do you sleep?”

“Upstairs.”

“I can’t leave her here,” I
assured him, picking her up.

“I don’t think you have a
choice. What is your problem?”

“How many kids have you been
around, Alex? You can’t sleep upstairs and leave her down here by herself. This
house is huge. Do you really think you’re going to hear her when she wakes up
screaming?”

“Does she do that?”

“Yeah, sometimes she does.
She’s a little girl. She has bad dreams.”

“A gemin get under da bed,”
Maddie explained.

“A what?” Alex asked, looking
at me. I wasn’t about to tell him that Jaron let her watch the Gremlins.

“A monster,” I used instead.

He smiled at Maddie. “Daddy
won’t let any monsters come in here,” he assured her.

“Are you kidding me, Alex?”

“Now what? Why don’t you just
leave, and let my daughter and I get acquainted?”

I wanted to punch him in the
face. I might have done it, had Maddie not been in my arms. I didn’t even
reply. I had no words. He was ignorant, plain and simply ignorant. She had
never seen the guy in her life and he was calling himself daddy.
Idiot!
!

I sat Maddie down, holding
her close to me. “Mommy’s going to go visit Kylie, and you’re going to stay
here with
Alex
,” I said, looking up to him. “Your princess movie is in
your bag with your jammies. Maybe Alex will read you a story before you go to
bed. Mommy brought you some books too, and your elephant is in your bag. I’ll
call you later, okay?” Oh my God, I couldn’t cry. I couldn’t let Maddie see me
cry, let alone that asshole.

“What’s your number? I want
to call and check on her later,” I asked, holding my cellphone to input his
number.

“I have yours. We’ll call
you.”

This guy was on some sort of
power trip. I didn’t give a shit about his supremacy. He had my daughter and I
wanted a number.

“What’s your number?” I asked
again, trying to be stern. He reluctantly gave it to me.

I hugged Maddie tight. “I
love you, baby girl.”

“I come wif you, k?” she
asked, sensing that I was about to leave her with this stranger. What kind of
mother does this? What kind of father does this?

“Hey Maddie, do you want to
go see the pond?”

“A fish in a pond?” she
asked, forgetting me.

“You have a pond, lovely. One
more thing for me to worry about.”

“She’s going to be fine.
We’ll call you later,” he said, taking Maddie’s hand. “There is a bunch of fish
in it,” he assured her. “See yourself out,” Alex said, giving me the same
disgusted look that I had given him ten times in the last ten minutes.

I made it to the truck and
broke. I was leaving her here with him. The tears once again returned. Where
the hell were they coming from? This would be the longest day of my life.

I sat in a fog most of the
day by Kylie’s pool, declining the multiple drinks that she thought I needed to
get through this. I didn’t want to be drinking if Maddie needed me and I had to
go to her. I already didn’t like the fact that Kylie lived twenty minutes from
him. That was so far away.

I couldn’t believe it when he
hadn’t called by seven. Did she have lunch? Supper? Did she get a bath? I
forgot to tell him how she doesn’t like soap in her eyes. Surely he would know
what the pull-up was for. I forgot to explain that too.

Eight o’clock. That was
enough. I walked into my room and dialed his number.

“We were going to call you,”
Alex answered.

“Well, you didn’t. How is
she?”

“She’s fine. We just had a
bath, and now we’re going to watch a princess movie. Never did I think I would
be doing that,” he joked.

Really? He thought it was
okay to joke with me about her? I hated him. “I will gladly watch a princess movie
with her. Can I talk to her?”

“Maddie, your mother is on
the phone.”

“I come home now, K?”

“Hi sweetie, Alex wants to
watch your movie with you.”

“Him da daddy,” she informed
me.

“Him is your daddy?” I needed
clarification.

“Uh-huh.”

Great, I was going to have
fun explaining that one to my dad.

“What have you been doing?
Did you see the fish?”

“No, dem wasn’t hungry. I
swim in a big pool,” she excitedly told me.

Great, a pool too. “You did!”
I asked, trying to sound cheerful for her.

“Uh-huh, and I go real fast
down a slide.”

I was going to have a heart
attack sure as shit. “Was it fun?”

“Uh-huh, me was faster than
daddy too. You come get me now?”

Son of a bitch.

“Hey, you ready to watch a
movie and eat some popcorn?” I heard Alex in the background.

“Yeah!” she yelled,
forgetting about me…again. I was so easily replaced.

Alex didn’t even get back on
the phone. I didn’t get to tell her goodnight or that I loved her. He just hung
up. I wanted him dead. I wondered how much a hit man would cost. Where did you
find those guys?

“Now will you have a drink?
She’s fine?” Kylie tried.

“No Kylie, I can’t drink,
knowing that my daughter is being forced to stay with that monster.”

“You didn’t think he was a
monster when you were doing him behind my back. I still can’t believe you never
told me you were having sex with Alex Wesson. I would have had a heart attack.”

“It didn’t last that long.”

“But, I’m still your best
friend. We’re supposed to tell each other everything.”

“Can we not discuss that
right now? I did have sex with him, and I got pregnant. I’m too distraught
about my daughter being there to care about teenage secrets.”

“You shouldn’t have kept her
from him.”