Across The Pond Read online

  Across the Pond

  By Faith Wolf

  Copyright © 2013 Blue Ribbon Books

  All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead is purely coincidental.

  For questions and comments about this book, please contact us at [email protected]

  CHAPTER 1

  ~ Daniela

  “I really advise against this, Daniela!” hisses my lawyer and best friend, Angharad, looking about ready to blow up.

  The fact that she hasn’t yet is a testament to her professionalism, for Angie is not one to hold her temper outside her job as a barrister. Then again, she has been known to explode in court every once in a while, and has even been cited for it on occasion.

  Not that it has hurt her reputation and business any, since the “McGuire” in MacGilvy, Xavier, and McGuire is hers. One of the toughest, most expensive, and most sought-after esquires in the business – specializing in family law, in Angie’s case.

  But I had been through this long enough, and want no more of it. All I want is out, while I still have my self-respect, my dignity, and my sanity intact, more or less. Or should that be the other way around?

  Looking across the table at Damien, I know that no price is too high to get out of this marriage. Six years was more than enough, and if I walk out of here with just the clothes on my back, then so be it.

  Not that it has to come to that, thank goodness. The sad thing is that I still love him, actually. I remember the first time I saw him back in college and thinking to myself: this is the man I am to wed.

  I’m serious.! Those were the exact words I actually used.! It’s a Amazing to think that I was once that young, idealistic, and romantic. Well, it came true, obviously, but whoever believes that first love can never die? Especially the young?

  Not that it has died with me. At least, not entirely. But while I knew that marrying him meant marrying into his family, I never realized that it also meant they would be moving into our lives and would playing an active part in it.

  “Marrying beneath your station”, was how his mother put it to him, as I recall. In front of me! It’s hard to believe that such things can still exist in the 21st 21st century, huh? But it does. It most certainly still does.

  Everyone said I was so lucky to be marrying into the Collingsworth family, though none more so than the Collingsworths themselves. It’s funny, really, because the only one who stood beside me at the altar facing the priest on our wedding day was Damien Collingsworth. It was only to him that I said my “I dos” to, not to the whole Collingsworth clan. And certainly not to his mother.

  I don’t know when it all started, really. The first time I met his parents, his father was fine, but his mother, I knew, had a problem. HShe had a problem with me, too. That was eight years ago, two years before we finally tied the knot.

  That’s her over there, my mother-in-law, trying to imitate Queen Victoria. Ever since her husband died three years ago, all she ever wears is black. Look at her: black jacket, black pants, black hat, and black gloves, an ensemble completed with black shoes. The queen managed to mourn for the remaining forty years of her life. I wonder how long this harridan will?will.

  Ever since we walked into this room, her (black) gloved hand has never left her son’s left arm. After all, her place is wherever her baby-poo needs her to be, isn’t it?

  I never called my husband that, by the way. Baby-poo. That’s her special name for him, bequeathed bestowed from the very moment he popped out from between her legs, I guess.

  I suppose that the first time I ever heard her use that word with him (at our very first meeting, as a matter of fact), should have been sufficient warning to me that I was in for trouble. In retrospect, I should have run the other way as soon as I had the chance., though t To be fair, though, it wasn’t always bad with Damien – at least not during the first half of our marriage.

  In fact, he often stood up to his mother for me, which I found rather heroic of him. But with his father’s death, she at last had the penultimate weapon against me, for how could he possibly abandon her in her hour of greatest need? Surely, I understood?

  A mama’s boy will always be that, unfortunately, and while I firmly believe that Freud was an idiot, I think that in my husband’s case, that (pseudo) psychologist’s theories apply. I am not saying that Damien ever thought of killing his father and marrying his mother out of some deep-seated Oedipus Rex complex, mind you.!

  But I have to admit that after my father-in-law died of a heart- attack three years ago, well… that’s when our marital problems began, come to think of it. In retrospect, that’s when my husband became the poster- child for the Freudian school of thought.

  Had I not experienced it over the last three years myself, I would not have believed it could have happenhappened or was even possible. But it happened. So, clearly, even the most asinine theories about human behavior and motives are truly possible.

  The price to walk away from my weak husband and his strong mother, lay here before me: a stack of papers, dictionary- thick, waiting for my signatures. I find it amazing that his mother still thinks that I married her son for their money, especially since they don’t have a lot of it left.

  But I suppose that when you’ve descended from noble blood (as the Collingsworths certainly have), then denial in the face of hard times becomes a face-saving and pride-maintaining survival mechanism.

  Still, two wonderful years of courtship, followed by three years of marital bliss and great sex, h. How do you put a price tag to that? You don’t, do you? But then you pay for all of that with the fighting, the mother-in-law and the rest of the Collingsworth clan, the long periods of silence, followed by ear-shrieking splitting bouts of screaming matches… well…!

  Can you ask for your life back? At least the last three years of it? Can you ask for compensation for all the years of insults (both veiled and outright) from your in-laws, and the heartbreak as you watch your husband’s eyes turn from ones of love to ones of defeat? -- Ccontempt, even?

  Can you ask for a refund for all the years you’ve put into a relationship that never stood a chance in the face of a man who was still a boy in his mother’s eyes, and who, therefore, is – though he may deny it to death?

  Thank God we never had children! Yet another problem that his mother and family had with me. Of course, it had never occurred to them that the problem could have been with Damien.

  To walk away, I am being asked, no, (no, ordered!) to give up a house that was never really in my name, the old-fashioned hand-made furniture that dates back to the start of the last century (and smelled of it), the ever-dwindling artifacts that are quietly sold off to pay the bills, and the Collingsworth name that I had appended to mine for the last six years.

  “It’s a cheap price to pay to get out of this, Angie,” I finally reply, bending over to sign the papers before me.

  Across the table, I hear Damien gasp. I don’t have to look up to know that his mother is gawking like a fish at my (perceived) presumption. But I mean it. I still love Damien (and hate myself for it)., I probably always will, but what can I say? I am so fed up with their crap.

  Another woman had come between us. His mother. Then again, she was always there, and I was tired of playing second fiddle to my mother-in-law.

  As I sign paper after paper, I can feel Angie’s rage flow across to me. As my best friend, she understood that I wanted, , no,, needed, to get out of this prison. But the barrister in her is outraged at how easily I am giving in. Angie loves to fight, sometimes out of habit alone, but I've really had enough.

  But tThis had been going on for way too long: - this back and forth bargaining and bickering over ridiculous bits and odds and ends. I had put money into that house! And I bought the Lexus with my own money! Let him continue the payments on it, then! I wonder what else he’ll have to sell off in order to do so.

  They let me keep my clothes and some stuff I had bought for myself, at least. But there is to be no alimony, not that I want or need any. All I want is out.

  “Everything seems to be in order,” Damien’s barrister (whose name I can’t seem to recall) harrumphs in a posh accent. “MISS Sorensen, you have ‘till the end of the week to collect your things.”

  Miss Sorensen. I actually flinch. It has been years since anyone called me by my maiden name. And now, with just a few signatures, I am a divorced woman. But I am also out of a home.

  It feels good, save for the bit where he called me by my surname. Took me by surprise, it did. I’m sStill not sure how I feel about that.

  Damien and his mother leave wordlessly, and to my surprise, no sooner do the glass doors shut behind them than I find myself in tears. I dDidn’t even realize it ‘till Angie handeds me some tissues. I look at it puzzled, thenand then see my face reflected in the wall-to-ceiling mirror behind her.

  “Oh my Ggod! Am I actually crying!?”

  “Danny, you can be such an idiot,” Angie replies, pulling me to her.

  It is a good half hour before I managed to break away from her. The greater pain hit later this evening as I lay in bed in Angie’s guest bedroom, my home for the last two months. I spent the first month in a hotel after getting out of my former house.

  Imagine that.? I walked out of Damien’s hou
se that long ago and felt immense relief when I did. There was no pain at the time,time and no tears ‘till after my divorce papers were signed earlier today. Yet only now do both cramp my gut.

  The problem is, I am not entirely sure what it is I am crying about.

  Silly, isn’t it?

  ***

  ~ Catalina

  “So how’d your date go last night, dad?”

  “Ha ha. Finish your breakfast or you’ll be late for the bus.”

  “Don’t change the subject, dad! How was your date!?”

  “Catalina, how many times do I have to tell you that I didn’t go out on a date last night!? It was simply business!”

  “Dad,” I sigh for the umpteenth time. “Mrs. Saavedra’s a beautiful woman! And her daughter, Margie, is a good friend of mine! What’s the matter with you!?”

  “Catalina, I love you, baby. But if you miss the school bus, I’m gonna whoop your ass, now move it!”

  “So did you hit third base?”

  “Mija! I had dinner with those people who run that hospice. The entire board, ok? And your Mrs. Saavedra happens to be its finance officer. You could say I had a groupie date last night, so how cool is that? Now finish your breakfast and get dressed. If you miss your bus, you’re gonna have to walk to school, ‘cuz there ain’t no way I’m gonna be able to take you if you miss it again. I have to be in New York in half an hour!”

  “Dad! ‘Ain’t’ isn’t a word!”

  “Mijaaaaaa?”

  “Finishing my breakfast… so just to be clear, you’re saying that Mrs. Saavedra is not your type?”

  I duck to avoid the nerf ball he throws at my head, but the point is well taken. So,. Mrs. Saavedra is a no-go. What a shame. It would have been nice if she and Margie were to move in.

  Mrs. Saavedra makes some of the best beef burritos I’ve ever tasted. She makes some great beef burgers, too. And she’s really nice. I really, really like her. The fact that Margie and I have been the bestest (you heard it right, there’s an extra “est” there) friends for so long that we’re practically sisters now, well… that makes it even better. Or should’ve.

  More importantly, Mrs. Saavedra’s been a widow like my dad has been, since… since like forever. And just like him, she seems determined to remain that way ‘till… ‘till like forever. Damn!

  [ddnt wrk. least we tryd. ttyl]

  Knowing Margie, it’ll take her forever to respond to my text message. By the time she does, we’ll be sitting right next to each other in class, so it’ll be pointless. Oh well. Keep trying, then.

  I go through the list of women I know, those at school and those at church, but my mind keeps coming up with a blank. I don’t want my dad to marry one of my teachers. That would be so weird!

  “Penny for your thoughts, mija?” my dad asks as he walks with me out the door – no doubt, to embarrass me before all the kids in the bus.

  “Dad, haven’t you ever heard of devaluation? The hell’s a penny gonna get me in this economy, huh?”

  “Smarty-pants!”

  “What can I say? I take after my dad.”

  I always get a thrill being near my dad, and getting hugged feels even better. Still, you can’t beat timing, ‘cuz we were still hugging when the bus comes chugging down the street. Man! I’m gonna get some serious heat for this as soon as I get on.

  “Love you, dad,” I say as I break away from the hug. “But I got me places to go and peoples to see. Ciao! Sorry the date didn’t work out!”

  And I high tail it to the bus as he mock- chases me to it. The sound of his laughter bursts through the open windows, filling the bus, making it worth the ribbing that’ll eventually come. No one in my school bus would be dumb enough to tease me while my dad is still in sight.

  [{I have a plan b]}

  Wow. For Margie, that was fast. But I am my dad’s kid, and as far as I’m concerned, if he doesn’t want Mrs. Saavedra, then maybe she just isn’t good enough for him. If so, then I have to move on, and maybe Margie’s plan B isn’t gonna square with my idea of what a good plan B for my dad should be.

  I really don’t get it, though. She’s a pretty good-looking lady, and a lot of men keep going after her. Considering the fact that she’s still widowed, then she’s either as picky as my dad is, or she’s a carpet-muncher… Nnow that’s an interesting thought… scary, too.

  If Mrs. Saavedra’s a lesbo, then does that mean my dad’s gay? Eeuww!!! Oh, wait a minute. That’s not fair. If my dad’s… alright,! gGay! There! I said it! G-A-Y… (sigh) Ffine. If my dad’s gay, he’s still my dad. And I’ll still love him, no matter what.!

  But could that be why he’s still single? Could I have had this entire thing wrong from the start? Maybe he’s an in-the-closet gay, afraid to come out to me because he’s afraid I’ll reject him! Oh. My. God. That must be it!

  Hmpf! I am Catalina Aguillar! At 12 years of age, I’m an adult already! A young woman! I am a child of the new millennia! I am not burdened by the primitivistic prejudices of my ancestors, nor by the stupidity of superstitious, racist Republicans!

  Gay people are people, too! And if my dad’s gay, then I will be just as happy with two dads as I would be with one mom and one dad.! I will! So long as my dad’s happy, I’ll be happy!

  Hmmm… this is a lot of new information to digest. Let’s see… my dad’s a pretty fit, buff guy. And judging by the many women who keep throwing themselves at him, he’s also hot.

  That means he’d probably prefer guys like him. And since he owns his own construction and renovation firm, he’d probably want someone self-employed, just like he is. Or at least some go-getter, not some loser who still lives in his mom’s basement, huh? Gosh. I wouldn’t want someone like that for a second dad, uh-uh!

  Hmmm… Mr. Audusson seems to fit the bill. He’s my coach. He’s buff, blond, blue-eyed, and gorgeous, and all the girls (and some of the guys) I know, go ga-ga over him. He’s hot! Ok. So I have a crush on him. Still, as a young woman, I must put my father’s happiness over before my own.! But he is my coach!