“Lauren, forget it, it’s over. You’re right, I’m in love with Jenny, and if you choose to believe that happened while you were still here, then there’s nothing I can do to change that, and what’s more, I don’t care to.” Damn, how fucked up have I been? I was married to this woman for years, had planned to spend the rest of my life with her. So why don’t I feel a damn thing but pity for her now?
“You can’t throw our lives away because of one stupid mistake, what about the girls? What about all the plans we had?” She walked towards me with her arms outstretched, and I took three steps back and out of her way.
“Don’t touch me. Once was more than enough. Did you really think I’d touch you again? How are we supposed to stay married when the very sight of you makes me sick to my stomach?” I just stopped short of spewing the words I hate you and was shocked at myself to realize that it was true.
Not because she’d cheated on me, not because of the many lies she’d told throughout the years, but for what this is going to do to my kids. What having a mother like her is going to do to them in the long run. I was suddenly very tired like all the steam had run out of me, and I just wanted to be done with this whole mess once and for all.
“You shouldn’t be here; you’re not welcomed here. And you’re not allowed around my children until they’re old enough to protect themselves. If you come here again, I won’t think twice about having you arrested for trespassing or worst.”
I was surprised at my level of calm. Maybe because I no longer felt like my life was spinning out of control the way I had just a few short weeks ago, I was able to keep a level head while dealing with her. She looked terrible like she’d been through hell in the last few days.
She was wearing a hospital gown, two it looked like, had a bandage on her forehead, and no shoes on her feet. I couldn’t drum up enough sympathy to care; I just wanted her gone. “You can’t keep me away from my children, and I never signed for any divorce.”
“Didn’t they teach you about no-fault divorce in law school?” Oh, boy, the scientist is back.
“Baby, I don’t think you should be here, why don’t you go back upstairs with the girls?”
“I don’t think so.” She walked into the room, pushing up the sleeves of my sweater that was way too big on her.
I’m not sure which pushed Lauren over the edge, the sight of my woman wearing my sweater or the rock on her hand that glinted in the lights coming from the tree.
Whichever it was her crazy amped the hell up, and she made a grab for Jenny. I jumped in between the two of them and pushed her back. “Don’t fucking touch her, or then I’ll really break your neck. I’m doing my best not to lay hands on you right now, but trust me, you don’t want to touch her.”
I guess that was the wrong thing to say because she changed direction and came at me, claws bared, and reaching for my face and eyes. I just knocked her out of the way, but the way she screamed, you’d think I was killing her. “I’ll kill that bitch before I let her have my children.”
“What children? The ones you tried to kill?”
The screaming and wailing really started in then, and I had a moment of clarity in which I wondered just how the hell I’d screwed up my life so much that it had reached this point. It wasn’t lost on me, the fact that the two women were so vastly different, that I too was a different man with each of them.
Outside I heard sirens approaching. Lauren got this wild look in her eyes like a cornered animal, and I was finally able to see the sickness in her eyes. Jenny was right after all; it wasn’t an act. Lauren really is crazy.
“I hate you both this isn’t over.” There was such venom in those few words that I think if she’d been armed, we’d both be dead. It was at that moment that I realized I needed to cauterize her existence from our lives.
There was such hate in her eyes when she looked at Jenny that I automatically went to stand in front of her, blocking her from her view. Someone rang the doorbell. “Go, let the cops in Jenny.”
Derrick
It was absolute chaos. My phone rang just as the first set of cops walked through the door behind Jenny. It was the arresting officers from the day before alerting me to the fact that Lauren had escaped from the hospital, and they had a crew on the way. I just hung up without telling them how late they were.