Tainted Love: contemporary womens fiction love story and family saga (Behind Closed Doors Book 1) (6 page)

He’s always been adventurous and raring to go. I think if the school would have let him, he’d have started a semester or two earlier. He couldn’t wait to get in the classroom. He was dragging me along by my hand. I’ve never known anyone so excited about school before. I had great hopes for the rocket scientist he showed promise to be. Hmm… well… thank God for divine intervention.

Without Cal at home this time, the house was suddenly so still. There was no television playing in the background, no footfalls running up or down the stairs. I’d completed my whole day’s chores within a few hours of being home. God! How was I going to fill my days?

I nearly leapt from my skin with the telephone rang. My heart was still pounding as I picked up the handset.

“It’s me,” Cal said in a distracted voice. “I can’t talk long, between meetings, but I wanted to know how Caleb got on this morning?”

Aww, how sweet. My heart went gooey. “He was fine.”

“No, he wasn’t. I can hear it in your voice.” Cal must have sat up because his voice was definitely stronger. “Don’t lie to me, Faith.”

“He’s fine, I promise.” He blew out a long breath into my ear as I sighed. “I guess I understand why housewives have affairs with milkmen and window cleaners.” I took a drink of my tea.

“You’re having an affair with the milkman and the window cleaner?” I spluttered the tea over the counter at Cal’s tone. He was deadly serious! “Couldn’t you have at least waited to tell me to my face? Tell me at home?” His voice had gone up an octave and his breathing was heavier. “How could you do this to me? When did you find time to have an affair? No, not one affair, but two,” he shrieked.

“Cal, we don’t have a window cleaner or a milkman.” I sighed, trying not to laugh. “You weren’t listening. I’m so bored! It’s only eleven o’clock.”

“I very nearly came home and locked you up for safe keeping, you know that, right?” I laughed. He wasn’t serious about that, but at least I knew how he felt about the idea of me running off with another man. “So… you’re not the very first mom to stay at home, do what the other moms do,” Cal said.

“I don’t know what they do. I guess they have hobbies, maybe. They go shopping, or play squash, or tend to the roses.”

“There you go. Stop fantasizing about milkmen and window cleaners, because I’m not into role playing. Take up knitting or something.”

Knitting’s not that easy. I tried to learn once before and squash is a lethal game! I ended up with a black eye and Cal wouldn’t let me play again, so I had to try something else. He started getting fussy over the money I was spending, so I curtailed my shopping habits pretty quickly.

I suggested that maybe I could go back into nursing, but he didn’t like the idea I wouldn’t be at home for the children if anything happened. He used the same excuse for any other part time jobs I suggested. The practice was doing well. Cal was in talks with the other psychiatrists and opening a second McKenzie Medical Center. The reasons he had before when I was going back to work no longer applied. He wanted me to stay at home and take care of our children.

So I was still at a loss as to what to do when I found Mom’s old gardening books in the study. I’d run out of things to read, and yes, I was so bored I’d read just about everything, but they were fascinating. Mom made handwritten notes where she’d learned something new. I leafed through the book and saw sketches and plans she’d drawn up. The entire corner plot was all Mom’s work. I felt terrible we’d neglected it for so many years. So I studied the plans and the books and set about restoring Mom’s garden.

I was in the garden the day Georgia fell in her roller skates and I saw the whole thing. I knew the moment she went down that her arm was broken. The noise she made pierced through every cell within my skin. At eight years old, she hadn’t cried like that in years. But she sobbed and she sobbed for Cal. I tried to comfort her. At fourteen, you tried your best to make her laugh, too. But when that didn’t work you took it on yourself to take care of Caleb, who was heartbroken that Georgia was hurt and we had to take her to the hospital to have an x-ray. I thought her arm might be broken.

“But Daddy is a doctor,” she sniffled. “He can fix my arm.”

“Dad isn’t that kind of doctor, Georgia.” I smiled. “He fixes peoples’ minds.”

“You’re not a doctor.” She started crying again. “You don’t know anything.”

“I was a nurse before I met Dad.” Georgia looked at me with suspicion. “We met at the hospital. Baby girl, I’m telling you. You need to have your arm x-rayed.”

I called Cal before we left the house. He was at the emergency room before we were. The second we saw him, Georgia started to sob again. He swept her into his arms. “Why weren’t you watching her?”

“I — I was…”

“Was too busy pruning roses.”

“No, I told her to be —”

“Take the boys home, Faith. This is an ER.” You know, I could have left Caleb with you that night, but nothing like this had ever happened to us. I was barely keeping it together for Georgia’s sake. So I knew exactly where Cal’s mind was at that moment. “It’s not a day care.”

Of course, he apologized after he’d put her to bed, said he’d freaked out, that seeing her so upset had only made things worse. But he was at the hospital for hours and I’d been prowling the house the entire time. By the time he’d come to face me, I was too wound up to be forgiving.

“I was there! I was in the garden. She was being overzealous and I shouted to her, not two seconds before to be careful and then she fell. I saw it happen. And there were no pruning shears in sight! How dare you accuse me of being an unfit mother?”

I went to walk out of the room and something stopped me. The blasted promise I made on that goddamn beach nine years ago. “What do you want me to do, Cal?” I asked as I turned to face him. “Should I turn to drink? Or drugs maybe? I’m going stir crazy, and everything I try, you find a reason why I can’t do it. Why don’t
you
try staying in this house all day every day and see if you can manage it?”

The following day, he came home with flowers, chocolates, and a membership and coaching sessions at the local tennis club. “Make friends, have a hobby, get out of the house, drink at social events. No drugs permitted, though.” He smiled at me. “They say it looks bad for the sport.”

Chapter Twelve

Spring 1989

You and Cal spent so much time in the garden playing football when you were little. I'm not surprised you were one of the star quarterbacks from the moment you went to high school. I even had Coach Brown telling me we needed to get you focused academically, to get your grades up high right from the outset. He could see your name in stadium lights but you weren't interested in college. You just wanted to play ball.

It didn't quite sink in for you just how good you were until the college scouts came around that first year and talked to me about you. We sat down with the school guidance counselor, and I asked you if there was anything you could be in the world, what would it be? You said you'd be a doctor like Cal. But what was the point thinking about it when Cal had already told you we didn't have the money for you to go to college?

We didn't? Why didn't I know about this? What happened to the money Mom and Dad had put aside for your education? What about the money they'd left to me? I was sure we hadn't gone through that in ten years. We couldn't have. What about the practice? Wasn’t it doing as well as Cal claimed?

The guidance counselor told you not to worry about the money. These colleges offered students with exceptional talent like yours full scholarships if they can also prove themselves academically. As I said, D, you're incredibly intelligent. All you had to do was apply yourself. The guidance counselor told you what you had to do to become the perfect candidate for medical school, and I set about asking Cal about our money troubles.

Of course he denied it. He told me you were lying and he'd never said anything of the sort…but you'd never lied to me. Why would you lie to me now? He started calling you names, saying you were a delinquent, not interested in your education, and you would live off of us for the rest of your life.

I defended you. Of course, I defended you. You did your chores, you remembered your manners. We'd brought you up to be a fine young man.

He grabbed me by the fleshy part of my upper arm and pulled me into your room. "Tell me, Faith." He opened your bottom drawer and took out the box with your “comic book” collection and asked, "Is this the fine young man you're talking about?" His grip tightened as he tipped the box upside down on the floor. Now... you're wondering why I never cancelled your subscription, aren't you?

So there I was, wondering how on earth a boy who’d just turned sixteen would get such interesting reading material with such fascinating
photography
. I was trying one, not to blush, and two, to get out of Cal's death grip to pick them up, so you wouldn't know we'd been in your room. This was not a conversation I wanted to deal with. You're my brother. As your guardian, I was supposed to deal with this properly. As your sister, part of me just wanted to make fun and never let you forget it. The other, the proper girl who didn’t lose her virginity until she was engaged, wanted to forget I knew you had such magazines.

So I tried to be a modern woman of the nineties and say, "Come on Cal, are you saying you never had anything like this when you were his age?"

He lit up like the sky on the Fourth of July. "What kind of man do you take me for?" His temper exploded with the effect of a pyrotechnical spider. "It may be acceptable in your family, but it most certainly is not in mine."

Suddenly I was on the floor. The force of being shoved down vibrated from my knees, through my hips and into my ribcage. My heartbeat thundered in my chest. My left arm throbbed at the sudden release of his intense hold. What the hell?

"Cal?" I craned my neck and forced my eyes to meet his. Something had seriously gone wrong here. He'd overreacted over a few dirty magazines. Something wasn't right with my husband. "What is it?"

"I want them gone!" He slammed the door on his way out.

Chapter Thirteen

As you're aware, those magazines were still in your drawer the next time you went to look at them. I didn't lie to him. I'd never lie to him. By the time he asked about them, I was fairly sure he'd calmed down enough to say it just wasn't a conversation I could have with you. Cal said he'd handled it. He figured out where you got the idea there wasn't the money for college from, too. He said you were talking about attending some of the best colleges for pre-med and then the number one med-school, they don't come cheap. You misunderstood him when he told you not to set your goals too high.

That night when I showered before bed I noticed them. The big oval marks on my left arm that wouldn’t wash away. As I inspected the dark shadows closer they were tinged with a purplish hue. Bruises? Did he know he'd held me so hard he'd bruised me? My mind went back to the moments his hand squeezed just that little bit more and forced my eyes to his. Instinct said he knew.

No, I was overreacting. Yes, it hurt, a lot. But by no means was it deliberate. We'd been married ten years. I'd know if my husband had abusive tendencies. Besides, he promised never to hurt me again.

We spent the following day at the beach and we left to come home in time for your game. I think by then you were getting too old for play time at the beach, all of you. You'd found an excuse not to come with us, and at nine and seven, neither Georgia nor Caleb wanted to be on the sand that particular day, nor did I. As Cal pulled into a truck stop, they jumped out of the car quickly and dashed towards the restrooms.

"I should —" I made to go after them.

"What's wrong?" He twisted in his seat as the kids scampered to the bathrooms. We could see both entrances from where we sat. "Faith?"

I was going nowhere. "It's nothing." I managed a weak smile. "I'm not feeling too well."

"Oh Gawd." He groaned, rolled his eyes, and grinned, "Are you going to tell me you're pregnant again?"

Oh, how insanely inappropriate! But I laughed. Hard.

"Thank God." Cal's head tilted to the side as he looked at me. "We've been trying all day to make you smile." I let my head flop back against the head rest and just enjoyed the look in his eyes. The one which told me I was the rarest and most precious of gems and he'd never let me go. "I'd be okay with it, you know, if you were."

"What are you saying, Cal? You want more children?"

"Oh good God, no," he cried. "I'm just saying if an accident happened, I want you to know it's all right, you can tell me, and we'll get through it because it's not gonna end my world like it used to."

"I'm not pregnant, Cal." I smiled at him. "It's just... I'm just feeling a little off-color."

"Really?" Cal leaned forward, the back of his hand reached across to my face. "Jeez, Fay, you're red hot." He wound the window down. "Take that jacket off."

"Cal, please don't fuss," I whispered, closing my eyes. "I just... will you just... watch for the..." I felt his hand on my left shoulder. My eyes flew open as he pulled at the sleeve. "No."

"Fay? Come on. You're burning up and you need to cool down.” His hand tugged at the sleeve again.

"Cal, please... Don't."

Too late. "What the fucking hell is that?"

"I'm sorry!" I cried. "I wasn't going to tell you. I know you didn't —"

"I did that?”

I nodded.

"No." His head shook as he stared at the purple handprint on my arm. The orange in his eyes was almost all black with disbelief as he turned them to me. "No, I couldn't have."

"I know you didn't mean to, we were arguing, we were angry, you took me into Darryl's room that was all. I didn't realize how hard you held me, either."

"No." He gasped as he shook his head again. "I am not this man. I am not my father!" He climbed out of the car. It shook as he slammed the door. Now I was confused, as well as worried. I thought his parents had a happy, loving marriage? I thought he said his father died of a broken heart?