Dare To Love Again

Before my mind could start wondering as to why that is and taking me down a long and winding road that leads to nowhere, I cut my thoughts off and tried to focus on what Rebecca was saying. I was still nervous in her presence, still expecting some kind of strong backlash for my actions, but for the half an hour we were there, she never once said anything derogatory or hurtful to me.

In fact, she acted as though we’d just seen each other the day before. The conversation sounded no different to many we’d had in the past, except for questions about the baby and his likes and dislikes and, of course, when she was going to be allowed to have him overnight once she set up a nursery at her home.

Her excitement and easy acceptance almost made me cry tears of shame, but as always, she seemed to recognize this and set about putting me at ease, much like she had the first time we met. It would’ve been so easy to fall back into the same old routine, like slipping my foot into an old comfortable shoe, but the fact that Calen had disappeared with our son kept me from being too relaxed.

That, and the thought of spending the night here. It’s funny, but I hadn’t looked this far ahead, haven’t had time to truth be known since Calen rushed back into my life. I haven’t even thought of my mother and how she will react to this turn of events.

I’m sure she won’t stay away once word gets back to her though I was hoping that her minions hadn’t seen Calen coming and going from my house. The thought put such fear in me that my extremities started to tingle, and I started to feel panic rising in my chest, so I had to take deep breaths to calm down.

This is going to be a mess all over again if I don’t do something, but I’m afraid there will be no running away this time. Not unless I want to leave my son behind. “Giselle, won’t you tell me what it is that’s bothering you?” The touch of Rebecca’s comforting hand rubbing my back soothingly was almost my undoing, but I dared not share the dark, ugly truth. Neither could I risk looking at her as I felt the heat of her gaze on the side of my face. One thing I remember very keenly about my ex-mother-in-law is that she was always very good at reading me.

“It’s nothing I’m fine, really.”

“It’s okay; when you’re ready to talk, I’m ready to listen. Just know that I’m in your corner; you’re not alone. And I’m sure if you tell my son the truth that he’d be there to protect you no matter what.” Oh, how I wish that were true. But she doesn’t know her son as well as she thinks she does if she thinks that’s true.

She carried on offering words of comfort, but there was no pushing on her part, and I wondered how it was that she could see so much when her son was so blind. I know it’s not fair to blame Calen, but so many nights since I left here, I’d dreamt of him coming to the rescue. I’d imagined him learning the truth somehow and facing down my mother and her threats, not caring about what she could do to him and his loved ones if it meant saving me.

I gave up on that dream within the first few weeks of being back when the new fear of how to protect my unborn child took over every aspect of my life. Part of me, the sane, rational part, wish I could go to Calen and tell him the truth, beg for his forgiveness, and plead with him to protect us any way he can.

But that other side, the side that still holds deep fear of the woman who’d tormented me since childhood, knew that it was no use. I’ve seen mother destroy everything good in my life. When daddy was still alive, things had been different, at least in the beginning. But she’d tried tearing us apart as well, hadn’t she?

I was too young when he died to remember it all, but I know that that’s when it had all started. When her seeming intense hatred of me had begun to grow and fester, I can still hear her words of accusation, still, feel the sting of the whip the day of the funeral as soon as we returned home. It’s the first time she’d ever been physical with me.

I’d lived believing that I’d killed my own father for years because of her words, until I was old enough to realize that I had no part in killing him, no part in him taking his own life like she’d said. I still don’t and will probably never know why he’d chosen to take his own life. But the therapist I’d finally got myself after years of being denied because mother didn’t agree with me having one, had worked hard at convincing me that my six-year-old self wasn’t the one responsible for daddy’s death.