This chapter is for Char who told me it was okay to end it. It's better to end it when I'm still completely in love with it than to end it when I hate it and loathe it. I need the love so I can make it better. So I can re-do those first god-awful chapters. So, yes my friends, we've reached the end. [April 24, 2002]
I actually wrote this chapter in April and at the time I thought it was horrible. I re-read it a few days ago and realized that it was the perfect ending. I wish I had realized that in April. But later better than never I suppose.
I suck at saying good-bye, I really do. So, thank you for hanging in with me the last two years. Your e-mails and things have been wonderful, thank you so much.
The song used in this chapter is called "After All These Years" from the new Silverchair album entitled Diorama. Go buy it!
The website : http://www.snowroses.net My e-mail : quillfairy4@hotmail.com
And remember..
Don't forget to Smile, Secret Dreamer/Bernadette Secret
Chapter 22 "After All These Years"
playing like a scared, enthusiastic pawn
Dawn was crying. I was exhausted. I wasn't sure what to do. I felt empty. The house looked so different now. The curtains were fluttering in the wind that came in from the ocean. The rich smell of saltwater and sand had long ago sunk into every fiber of the carpet.
Bruno came bounding up, eager to go outside. He was three times as big as he'd been. Almost 30 pounds now. James opened the glass door and took him outside.
Peaches was perched on the staircase, she blinked at us and turned the other way. She was too tired to give a proper greeting. We were all too tired.
I set Dawn down on a chair in the kitchen and began making tea.
"I can't believe it," she choked out, dabbing at her eyes with a handkerchief. "All those weeks of agonizing torture."
I could only nod. It was still too overwhelming. The sound of the kettle hitting the stove seemed dulled. The cabinet clicking shut after I'd taken down two mugs. The sound of the glass door closing as Bruno and James came back inside. Bruno barked and wagged his tail at me. I tossed him a treat and went back to my own numbness. The tea bags landed in the mugs with a soft plunk, seething once the water hit them and their herbal flavor poured from the packets and seeped through to the scalding water. But it was tasteless to me. I couldn't figure out why.
Dawn and I sat in silence.
in silver a golden son
I sat at my computer, the curser blinking evilly at me. Daring me to write down what I was feeling. Challenging me. Nothing made it from my brain to my fingers. It barely made it to my brain. I just kept biting my finger nail and staring out the window. I was so god damned tired. But it was still early. I still needed to get dinner ready. Or order out for Chinese. That was looking better and better as the minutes ticked by.
James came into the room and crawled into my lap. He wrapped his arms around my neck. He was too big to sit on my lap but I let him anyway. I think it was more for my comfort than his own.
"Everything is going to be okay, Mama," he said to me and leaned against my shoulder.
I wrapped my arms around him. I knew he was right but it didn't register. I couldn't figure out why I felt like this. Maybe I was so sure the verdict would be different. That I'd convinced myself to be glad with what the judge would eventually decide upon. But now, now it was different. I knew the verdict now. His words kept echoing in my head, over and over again and my reaction was less than appropriate. When he'd said those words I cried. Dawn and I had cried in each others arms and James couldn't figure out why. The Montgomery's were so shocked. They thought the same thing I did. And the opposite happened to both of us. But then I stopped and everything came rushing back. The reality of that verdict. That that one man had just decided the rest of our lives and how we'd live them.
"I've rewarded custody to the defendant," he'd smiled so brightly at us and winked at James. And suddenly, thinking about it again, it was different. It was so god damn different. And I felt the happiness slowly creeping back and more tears pricking the corner of my eyes and the sheer joy and still the apprehension. I was going to be raising a baby again. I would be up at 3 a.m. to give feedings and changing diapers and getting 3 hours of sleep in a week and taking her in the car at night so she'd go to sleep. Carrying around a helpless creature in my arms. But it wasn't just me. And that's what had scared me. It was a 'we' now. I'd never raised a baby as a 'we'. Donny and James had left so quickly and then Hazel had died. Even though there was a 7 year old child sitting in my lap, he hadn't been raised by me. He had been raised by Donny, Sylvia, and Frank. I'd never actually raised him but I was reaping the benefits.
I had been so sure it would work out the same way. The Montgomery's would get Abby and we would be a three-person family forever and I would never know the actual joy of 3 a.m. feedings and taking her in the car because the hum of the engine would make her fall asleep. This time I would, though. And with Dawn.
waking on a summer day
So I told her. I swept her up in my arms and told her everything we'd get to do with Abby. What we'd get to teach her. And she smiled. She smiled that gorgeous smile that made me weak in the knees and dizzy in the head and happy to be alive. She kissed me with those lips that made my heart bounce to my throat. And we were happy again.
you'll be home again
I think about Donny sometimes. I remember how much fun we had together and how in love we were. I don't think I ever stopped loving him. There's so much of him in James and it's comforting to know that all I have to do is look at him and I'll see Donny smiling back at me. I miss him.
I look at Dawn and I wonder if Abby will look like her. I remember that Jared looked a lot like me. I've always imagined that Abby would have blonde curls, big bouncing ones and soft gray eyes like Bob's. Will she be able to sing better than Dawn? As much as I love her, she can't carry a tune in a bucket. But that's what love is, even the things that annoy you to pieces are lovely when done by the one you love.
Maybe Abby will be a writer - like me. No, I don't want her to be like me. I want her to be like her. She'll have the most beautiful laugh, though. It will ring like Christmas bells through light snow. Perhaps she will be a great painter. But we'll know in time as the three of us help her grow up to be the most amazing woman possible. She'll be the first Moon-Reed.
Dawn is sitting on the counter now, eating strawberries like they're the only food left on the planet. A little bit of juice runs down her chin and I lick it off.
She smiles, God I love that smile, and she kisses me and she tastes like strawberries and sunshine. I can't believe she's mine forever. I'm finally realizing how wonderful the people in my life are.
James is grooming Bruno on the kitchen floor. They're both growing like bean poles. James will need new clothes by spring, maybe sooner. I don't worry though.
and I'll be home soon
Dawn stares at me for a long time as I massage her feet. Abby is due any day now and she is a wreck. I can only tell her what I know - that she'll never regret it. She smiles at me like I'm the most beautiful thing in the world and I feel like it. I wish we could stay this happy forever.
brings young naivety
They say everything happens for a reason and I'm inclined to believe it. If I hadn't met Donny, I never would've had James and Hazel. If Hazel hadn't died, I never would've gone to Penn State and met Gretchen. If I hadn't met Gretchen I never would've saved Dawn's live in the middle of the Garden Strip. If I hadn't moved to New York to be with Dawn I wouldn't be sitting in this rocking chair holding Abby for the first time.
James is peering over my shoulder begging to hold her. Dawn is exhausted but keeps grinning at me.
"Can I hold her?" he finally asks and I show him how to hold his baby sister.
Her eyes open and she stares at James. She blinks but reaches up her hand and clings onto his shirt. She knows we belong to her.
I lie next to Dawn on the bed and put her head against my chest. "How do you feel?" my arms are wrapped securely around her.
She looks up at me and smiles and I feel beautiful. She doesn't need to say anything, we both know what she's feeling.
James sits down in the rocking chair, still holding Abby as he rocks back and forth. They belong together.
Dawn and Abby yawn at the same time and drift off to sleep. James and I watch them like the lovers we are and will forever be.
mend in my sleep
Abby cries in the middle of the night and I send Dawn back to sleep. She is nestled in between us so I lift her tiny body into my arms and hold her against my chest, singing softly in her ear until she calms down. She clings to my hair and grasps at my breast, hoping for food.
I'd almost forgotten what that was like and for a few minutes I wish I could just let her suckle on my nipple and feel those tiny gums against me, giving her nourishment. Helping her live.
Dawn sits up and pulls off her shirt. I lay Abby in her arms and in the dark a tiny mouth finds its target. Abby coos as she drinks. All three of us fall asleep once she's finished.
bring again the day
Bruno always lies where Abby is. He won't let her out of his sight. He's frightfully large now but Abby adores him.
I am sitting on the floor with her as she naps on a blanket. Bruno is lying on my other side, his head on my ankles so he can keep an eye on her. I scratch him behind the ear but he already knows that I appreciate what he's doing. He knows that its his duty to watch out for his family. I'm glad he found us.
Abby whimpers in her sleep and he crawls around and licks her hand. Her tiny fingers grasp a mat of hair and he lies back down. She smiles and coos. He sighs and I know that he's fallen in love with her too.
munificent, artless and ascetic
She and Dawn are lying on the couch sleeping. Abby is lying on her stomach, mouth open and tiny hands in tiny fists. Dawn has a protective hand on her back. I run upstairs and grab my camera. They're perfect subjects, my muses, they inspire me. James will squeal when he sees the pictures.
and I'll be whole again
I don't think I'll ever be able to keep my eyes from her. They're just automatically drawn to her when she enters the room. Except usually I don't even have to see her to know she's there. A tingling sensation starts at my toes and works its way up to the tips of my fingers before she's made a sound. I like it that way. I feel connected to her. It scares her a little bit when I start talking to her and she doesn't even know I'm in the room. One day she'll get used to it, maybe.
forget about all the troubled times
Sometimes I even think about Gretchen. What she's doing or who. Maybe she got her big break but I doubt it - she was never really that good at acting.
I wonder if she thinks about me at all. Does she regret breaking up with me? Does she ever wonder where I am? I used to miss her sometimes but it was the old her. Maybe I should send her a card and thank her, I never would've met Dawn without her. But then I laugh because I don't know how to get in contact with her and that's comforting. But I almost wish she would try to get in contact with me. Just so I knew if I meant anything to her. I don't think she ever realized how much she meant me to . Maybe that's a good thing.
Would I recognize her if I saw her walking down the street? Would she recognize me?
Would we keep walking, pretending nothing happened or pretend to be old friends and cordially ask how the other is doing? I almost want to see the look on her face when I talk about Dawn, Abby, and James. But she never wanted children. When I think about it now, that should've tipped me off. But, everything happens for a reason.
The End.
and every father's pain casts a shadow over a broken son. you'll be whole again. and I'll be whole again. all those years I was hurting to feel something more than life.