Storm in a d cup, p.19
Storm in a D Cup, page 19
‘Honey, have some faith. Julian is not that kind of man.’
‘None of them ever are, until they are.’
He sighed. ‘Princess, until he’s ready to talk, I suggest you don’t force anything out of him. You don’t want to pull a Marcy on him. She badgers everyone until she gets what she wants.’
‘How is she, by the way? Still driving you nuts?’
‘Absolutely. Still drinking, too. And she won’t even consider AA.’
‘You are obviously not happy, either, Dad. How long are you going to keep living like this?’
‘Are you suggesting I get a divorce?’
‘I’m simply asking you whether it’s fair on you to do all the putting up with.’
‘Marcy would be lost without me. Not because she loves me—’
‘Oh, she loves you, Dad. Maybe in her own sick, twisted way, but she has eyes only for you, rest assured.’
‘I know. But if I died, she wouldn’t know where to start. The bills, the insurance… hell, even the grocery list would be too much for her to tackle.’
We both sighed simultaneously, then chuckled.
‘What a pickle we’re both in,’ I said. ‘You in one way; me in another.’
‘Love is always a pickle, in one way or another, sweetheart. Love is always complicated. Until it ends. But if it ends, it was never love in the first place.’
‘So if Julian and I end, does that mean that it was all pretend?’
‘You and Julian will never end, honey,’ he reassured me.
I snorted. ‘That’s what Julian used to say.’
‘Then have some faith in him.’
I sighed again. Have faith in Julian, when he was avoiding me, pushing me away? Hard to do so, especially when we have never felt this distant ever before.
*
As the days dragged by, I worked on my novel and continued to answer the most serious Erica Can Tell U questions:
Q: Dear Erica,
My husband doesn’t want to have a baby because he says all my attention will go to it rather than to him. What can I do?
A: Buy your husband a pacifier and stick him in a playpen and post pictures of him on Facebook. That ought to do it. Let us know how you get on.
*
Q: Dear Erica,
My husband is really good-looking and when we go out, sometimes he walks ahead of me, like he doesn’t know me. I sometimes get the feeling he’s ashamed of me. What can I do?
A: Don’t go out with him.
*
Q: Dear Erica,
My husband complains my career has supplanted my family time and that he sees our housekeeper more than he sees me. As a matter of fact he’s bonking her. What should I do?
A: Hire a cleaning boy and bonk him.
Sometimes it was very difficult to know how to approach certain topics, but of one thing I was convinced. A good dose of humor always helped, at least for the minor issues. But other things simply couldn’t be helped.
*
No one was ever allowed behind Julian’s office door. We all knew that. Yet, there he was with Genie Stacie.
I could hear her high-pitched voice even if she was making an effort to talk furtively. ‘Jules… she can be perfectly happy with another man… you’ve always told me I’m the love of your life.’
I swallowed and almost grabbed the door to keep myself from swooning. What…? I didn’t know that!
Julian was silent, and I could feel him debating through the two-inch oak wood door. Oh God, had he really said that to her? Had she really been the love of his life? And most importantly, could it ever happen again? Certainly she wouldn’t even go there if she didn’t think she had a chance with him. And Julian? Was he going to leave me after all these years now that his lifetime love had reappeared like an H-bomb in our home?
That’s jealousy for you – instead of taking the high road and pulling away from his door, I stayed glued to it. I couldn’t help it, but I somehow seemed entranced more by the silences between their words rather than the spoken words I could barely grasp.
There came another sigh, almost a hushed moan and I buried my head in my hands. I dare anybody to stay calm and collected while listening to a woman throwing herself at your husband in your own home. Was Julian in Genie Stacie’s arms, letting her kiss his doubts away? I wanted to barge in on them and shriek a long-pent-up, ‘Aha! I knew you were up to no good!’ like in the old movies, but my stomach gave such a violent lurch I thought I’d be sick in the corridor. Which would not earn me any brownie points in case he was still debating, teetering over the brink between Genie-Stacie, love of my life since I can remember and… what’s her name again? Oh yeah – Erica, the neurotic, unstable and manic wife of seven years whom I constantly have to reassure and who, by the way, hasn’t given me a child yet.
No contest. No matter what Julian promised me.
Silence again. Then, a soft moan. My heart lurched. ‘Let’s go home, Jules… I’ll produce your movie for you – star in it for free – anything you want. I miss you…’
I strained my ears as he softly murmured something back. It was practically a done deal. No man would turn down the chance to live in a Hollywood mansion while his movie was being funded by his lover. The movie was what Julian desired more than life itself. And Genie Stacie’s presence would make sure it raked in the big bucks.
Another long silence ensued, followed by more soft moans. What the hell…?
And then just like that, the door opened and Genie Stacie sashayed out, sending me a satisfied smirk. I watched her go up to the next floor as Julian appeared on the threshold, a grim expression on his face.
‘I need to talk to you, Erica,’ was all he said.
Talk…? Oh God. This was it, the end. The definitive ending to us. This was how he was going to get rid of me to marry Genie Stacie once and for all. The engagement party, the secrecy. It had all been just a matter of time! And now, here it was, the talk I’d dreaded since he told me he loved me eight years ago. He wanted to leave me for greener (or blonder) pastures, and I was weighing him down. He wanted to pursue his career as an author because he believed in it – a career that he couldn’t pursue exclusively from an old Tuscan farmhouse. We’d fared pretty well, if you considered all we’d been through.
Gulping, I nodded and followed him inside, every part of me shaking.
He sat at his desk, like a doctor about to give me a horrible diagnosis. So I braced myself, huffed and looked him straight in the eye. Maybe if he saw how much I loved him he’d change his mind?
He was rubbing his hands, the way he always did before facing a problem. Correction – before getting rid of a problem. I squared my shoulders, ignoring the pricks at the backs of my eyeballs. This was it. The end of an era.
‘Erica…’
Erica. He hardly ever called me Erica. Mostly it was sweetie or honey. Babe in our best moments. And now we were back to Erica.
Look me in the eye when you kill me, I silently willed him.
Julian looked up from his hands on his desk as if he’d heard me and for a moment I thought I’d actually said it out loud. He plowed a hand through his thick hair, his eyes searching mine. ‘I have to tell you something…’
I could only nod to indicate for him to go on, because my throat was too tight.
He looked at me for a moment longer before he huffed. ‘I’m so sorry, Erica, but… Genie Stacie and I…’
I closed my eyes and swallowed. Here it came. The end of our marriage.
‘Joey is my daughter.’
17
Family Strangers
There was a loud woosh in the room. My breath, rushing out of my lungs like a raging river emptying itself into the sea. I waited for my lungs to refill, but nothing was happening. My body had literally stalled, as had my mind. Joey, Genie Stacie’s daughter, was also… Julian’s…? No. It couldn’t be. Despite the similarities that had kept creeping into my unconscious when I lay quietly in bed, I’d ignored them. Pushed them deep down into one of my darkest corners so that I would never have to consciously deal with it. Because this utter proof that he didn’t need me anymore, if not even to make him a baby, just couldn’t be true. But Julian’s face was saying otherwise.
‘Your… daughter…?’ I heard myself rasp, while most of me was still clinging to endless possibilities.
His lips tightened and he nodded. ‘I’ll have to take a paternity test, but Joey’s birthdate matches the time I was seeing Genie Stacie.’
But I didn’t need a paternity test to know the truth. In the cold light of day, where there was nowhere to hide the facts, the rock-hard evidence was Joey’s face minus the make-up, a lovely female version of Julian’s features. Joey had his eyes, hair, even his teeth. How had I not had the courage to face this before? To see it with my eyes as well as my instinct? How had Julian never seen it before? And more so, how had all the showbiz rags missed it?
The thought kept roiling around and around in my brain, looking for a place to rest and settle. Julian has a daughter of his own. From another woman. And I, his wife, couldn’t give him what he’d wanted after months of trying.
And now I wondered why my rival had stayed away all these years. If she wanted him as much as she appeared to, why was she only staking her claim on him now, after almost eighteen years?
As far as Joey was concerned, and with my maternal instincts, I knew that she was extremely vulnerable under that Who gives a shit? exterior. And a part of me, on some level, was relieved for her. Relieved that Julian could have a say in changing that poor girl’s life and offer her his unconditional love. But the other part of me wondered, what about his family? What about Maddy, Warren and me, our family? What would all this mean for us? How would Warren and Maddy take it? And what about Julian and I? What about us?
And then it all came to me in a rush, adding up and slotting into place, piece by painful piece. The engagement, the secret groom and all the hush hush about everything. Every mysterious, wandering piece finally fit to shape the most grotesque picture for me. He was slowly, secretly replanning his new life. Which indicated only one thing.
‘You knew about Joey…’
He stopped and looked me straight in the eye. ‘Yes,’ he finally whispered.
Something at the bottom of my stomach flopped, like a dying fish. Or maybe it was merely me, slowly starting to die inside. ‘For how long?’
‘Genie Stacie called me when I was in hospital.’
The fish flopped again. Once, twice. ‘You’ve known for weeks…?’
‘Yes. I’ve been tormenting myself, thinking of how to tell you, and now that you know, it’s like this huge weight has been lifted off my shoulders. And now all I want to do is win my kid back and build a relationship with her.’
Forget that you’re dying inside, Erica. You need to make some sense out of all this. I cleared my throat, but I only managed to croak out my question. ‘W-why is she telling you now?’
‘She told me that she’s always loved me, even when she married Tom Jackson.’
So much for trying to understand. I didn’t want to hear any of this.
But Julian was an ebullient fountain of information. ‘Genie Stacie said that if I’d died in that hospital, I would have never known the truth about my daughter…’
My daughter. Up until this very moment, every time I’d heard him proudly say that, he’d always been referring to Maddy. His daughter, whom he’d lovingly adopted. Our daughter. And now, in the space of an instant, these two wonderful words, my daughter, meant something completely different. A kid. His own, biological kid!
We’d moved to Tuscany eight years ago as a family, with a million visions of happiness in our heads – our dream home, our dream businesses, our dream life that we had truly earned. We deserved to finally be here, together as a family. We were a family. But if our dreams had finally come true, they hadn’t lasted all that long.
Because now Genie Stacie, the seemingly dumb Hollywood bimbo, had outdone me. She had used all she had, daughter included, to try and get Julian back. They had history. Chemistry. And they even shared biology now as Joey’s parents. That was one thing that Julian and I did not have. And, judging by the way our sex lives and IVF had been going, it was looking pretty clear that we had reached the end of the line. Was this what life had turned out to be, while we were busy creating dreams of our perfect future? Had this been fate’s plan all along? To give us the illusion of happiness, only to whisk it away from beneath our feet, just as we were about to get there?
I turned away from him, trying to stifle the sobs that were now shaking me from head to foot. Awh, hell.
‘Come on, Erica. Try to understand. What am I supposed to do, turn my back on my own blood?’
Funny life, wasn’t it? First my mother turned out not to be my mother at all. Then she had a child from another relationship. Then my first husband Ira produced a child from another relationship. And now it was Julian’s turn – the only person in the world who I thought would never ever do anything like that to me. The one man I had entrusted my whole life and family to, had in fact been the one to deal me The Blow of Blows, finally putting me out of my misery and annihilating me once and for all.
Because the one thing Julian had wanted from me I couldn’t give him, and life had found a way to award him for all his kindness to the world. And punish me for trying to be happy. The moment I’d most feared had arrived. Julian Foxham didn’t need me anymore. Now he had a child of his own.
To think I had cried maybe once in seven years, so happy we were. Happy times are up, girl – you’ve had your share, now make way for the Bad Times.
No longer able to stifle my sobs, I slapped my hand over my mouth and fled his office. There was nothing I could say, and if there had been, I was unable to say it.
*
‘Oh my God, Erica, I’m so, so sorry,’ Renata offered as she hugged me.
‘Yuh, thanks,’ I managed as I tried to blow my nose, but I was still far from even being able to breathe. Renata’s was the first place I ran to. My go-to person, who was always around for me.
‘Julian and Genie Stacie, I can’t believe it…’ she repeated for the tenth time since I’d got there. ‘Here, let me get you something stiffer to drink. How about a Bloody Mary?’
‘How about a Bloody Genie Stacie instead?’ I quipped and laughed at my own pathetic little joke. God, not even in times of duress could I refrain from making a joke?
‘Here,’ she said, shaking her head as she pulled a pitcher out of the fridge. ‘I just made this. I had a feeling you would show up sooner or later and that we’d need it.’
What she didn’t mention was our little unspoken diatribe about Leonardo Cortini, but that was another story. Right now, out of the two marriages, mine was in clearer and more present danger than hers.
‘So what are you going to do now?’ she asked.
Suddenly the fish was back in my stomach, flopping like mad again. ‘Apart from sleeping in the guest room, what can I do? I’m still reeling here – I have no idea what to do. All these years I thought Julian and I were solid, and instead…’ I broke down into such violent sobs that my chair began to creak.
Renata let me sob for a while, just to get it all out. After a long, long moment, she groaned: ‘I still can’t believe it… Is there any way at all you might be wrong?’
I stopped sobbing and sat up to look at her inquisitively as I rolodexed through the possibilities. There were none whatsoever, and I began to bawl all over again.
‘Come, here, lie down on the sofa for a bit,’ Renata suggested, guiding me off her chair. She was probably worried I’d shake it apart. ‘Where are the kids?’
‘Warren’s in Siena as usual and Maddy’s with Angelica…’
‘Again? Those two are inseparable lately, don’t you think?’
‘Yuh,’ I agreed miserably. ‘I’m supposed to go pick her up in ten minutes.’
‘I’ll go,’ Renata volunteered. ‘You stay put, OK?’
‘Will you bring her back to my house and tell her I’ve gone grocery shopping or something?’ I whimpered. ‘I don’t want her to see me like this.’
‘Of course. You just try to calm down and get some rest. I’ll be back in twenty minutes. OK?’
‘’kay,’ I obeyed, hunkering down deep into her amazingly miso-friendly sofa. ‘Thanks, Renata.’
Her gentle hand ruffled the top of my head and I closed my eyes, comforted by the knowledge that I was loved, if not by Julian anymore. Renata would stick by my side. Which was what I was going to do for her if and when she decided to tell me what was going on with Leonardo. If there was indeed nothing between them, was he making their business difficult as he’d done to others? And if so, she should tell Marco. Marriages. They took forever to build and a second to tear them down.
When I got home later and all cried out, the house was absolutely still.
I tiptoed up to Maddy’s room. She was lying in bed, bopping her head to inaudible music in her earphones, a half-eaten focaccia on her bedside table. I pitied her instantly, so happy in her own carefree little world. It would not last long. Sooner or later we would have to tell her and Warren about Genie Stacie and Joey and us being no longer.
I checked the other rooms. No sign of Julian and/or Genie Stacie or Joey. Had Julian moved out? I checked his closet and found a half-filled suitcase.
I gulped to suppress another sob. No. I couldn’t let Maddy see me like this. I was her tower of strength, whether she knew it or not. How I behaved in consequence would imprint on her forever. I actually wanted to punch a hole in the stone wall, but what did I do instead?
I went back downstairs to the kitchen and began to peel onions. Lots of them, and soon my face was bathed in tears due to the fumes. That was what I told myself. But my onions and I knew far too well how this went. We all knew the drill, even if it had been a while. Hello, my old friends. My, there are so many of you! And you are particularly strong tonight! Let your fumes fly into my eyes like they did yesteryear, and hide my real tears like you always have!
