False Start: A Football Romance (33 page)

Looking up at the front porch now, I can honestly say I’m proud of our investment. Six bedrooms, two of which are master suites, five full baths, three half-baths, a living room, and the den, which we converted into the game room for the Playstation4 and Xbox one. It even has an in-ground pool in the back yard.

I toss my keys on the table by the front door in the entryway and kick off my shoes before heading down the hall to my room. Unbuttoning my shirt, I let it slip from my shoulders to the floor and then let my pants fall in a heap next to it. I’m not worried about them. I’ll pick them up in the morning before Clarisa comes by and yells at me for missing the laundry basket again.

Clarisa is our house cleaner who comes once a week when we are away and three times a week when we are home to maintain our perfect home. She also does most of the grocery shopping for us too, but don’t get me wrong, she’s a hard ass. Just because we pay her to clean, doesn’t mean she lets us walk all over her. She will be the first to chase me down the hall with a broom if I leave an unnecessary mess for her. In a lot of ways, she reminds me of my own mom.

Pulling back my comforter, I climb in between the silky softness of my 5000-count sheets. It feels so good to be back home and back in my own bed. Turning on my side, I reach my hand out, searching for my favorite pillow to rest beneath my head, but my hand gets tangled in something stringy, and then I’m being attacked from everywhere and nowhere.

“Get your filthy hands off me. RAPE,” a woman shrieks into the pitch-black room. I roll, trying to get away from her abusive swings and find a light to turn on, but instead, I manage to knock the lamp on the ground. It shatters, causing tiny glass fragments to splinter across the wooden floor.

“Stop. Who are you?” I try to catch her swinging hands, but just when I think I have her, I hear the soft wails of a baby coming from the corner of the room.

“Get out. I’m calling 911!”

“Just stop. Who are you? You’re in my room,” I yell back at her and flip on the light switch, casting a bright glow across the room.

“This is my brother’s house. Not yours,” she says, reaching for the squalling baby. I pick up my cellphone and hit speed dial, calling Aaron.

“What’s up man?”

“Did you forget to tell me something?” I have to yell over the screaming woman and baby in the background, but I think he manages to hear me.

“Oh fuck, Charlee.”

“Aaron?” she asks, and I pass the phone to her, sitting on the edge of the bed as she walks into the hall for privacy.

“You said the first door on the left was mine, Aaron, and then I had some strange man crawling in the fucking bed with me while I was dead asleep, giving me a heart attack.” She pauses while Aaron answers her. I already know what he’s going to say.

“I was in the first room on the . . . fuck. Ok. You’re right. Son of a bitch. You mean I was in his damn bed? Oh my God.” Another pause. “Yeah, I got it. Okay, I’ll see you then. Love you.”

She walks back in the room, holding my phone straight out for me, and for the first time, I get a good look at her. She and Aaron favor a lot, which I guess makes sense, considering they are twins. Long, kinky-curly, dark blonde hair hangs in her face, hiding her hollow brown eyes. She looks exhausted, and judging by the squirming newborn in her arms, I can imagine why. For a second, I feel like shit for waking her, and then I shake my head. All I did was come home to my bed. How was I supposed to know she was here when Aaron failed to tell me?

“So, I guess I owe you an apology,” she says, looking anywhere but toward me.

“Don’t worry about it. Shit happens.”

“Right, okay then, I’ll just get our stuff and go.” She takes another step in the room, and her foot catches on a piece of glass from the shattered lamp. “Oh, fuck.” She hops up and down on one foot, blood pouring from her heel. I can see the cut is deep.

“Here, sit down. Let me get you something.”

“No, I’ll be fine,” she says, turning back toward the door. The baby in her arms is crying again and squirming around, making it even harder for her to hobble on one foot. I try to sit and give her the space she asked for, but I just don’t have it in me.

“You’re really hard-headed, aren’t you?” I say, taking the baby from her arms and cradling her in mine. “Go on, clean up your wound. We will be right here when you come back.” She looks from her crying daughter back to me, weighing her options before hobbling off to the bathroom. I just shake my head and glance down at the squalling baby in my arms.

“Votre maman est si têtu bébé fille,” I murmur to the infant in my arms while I bounce lightly up and down. She stops her crying and instead gazes up at me questioningly. I think she finds me entertaining. That, or she agrees with my prior statement that her mother is very stubborn.

“Une jolie petite fille es-tu?” I murmur, nuzzling her soft cheeks. The sweet, intoxicating scent of a newborn baby takes me back to five years ago and the last time I held someone so tiny in my arms. I would do anything to be able to go back to those days.

“Oui, you’re a pretty little girl.” She smiles up at me and yawns widely before closing her eyes and drifting off to sleep.

Charlee walks back into the room just as I’m setting the baby on her bobby pillow in the center of my bed. She glances around the room frantically at first, and then, after spotting her daughter, she sighs and walks back out the door, returning moments later with the broom and dust pan. Together, we manage to clean up the broken glass and get all of her things moved into her room across the hall. Aaron had Clarisa buy a swing and a bouncer as well as a basinet that she had set up next to Charlee’s bed, anticipating the arrival of the baby.

I try to ignore the tears I see spring to the surface of her eyes when she sees it all, but I can’t. Seeing the raw appreciation and relief reminds me once again of the many things my own mother gave up for me when I was growing up and how much I truly owe her.

“I’m sorry about scaring you earlier. I didn’t know you guys were coming,” I say to her, trying to ease the tension in the room. Her shoulders tense, but she doesn’t turn to me or reply, so I walk out of her room and back to my own, where her sleeping daughter still lies on my bed.

“Come on, beauty, let’s get you to bed,” I whisper to her as I lift her beneath her head and bottom and carry her from the room.

Entering the room, I see that Charlee is sitting on the edge of the bed holding a stack of letters. I don’t think she notices me enter, and I don’t want to startle her again, so as quietly as possible, I ease the baby into the bassinet and then lean down and kiss her on the forehead. She’s so precious. I’ve always envied the young, especially at this age. They have nothing to worry about. Someone else takes care of their every need.

“Bonne nuit, belle fille,” I whisper to her and then walk from the room, closing the door quietly behind me. It’s been a long night, and I’m beyond ready to lie down and get some sleep.

Chapter Two

Charlee

As soon as the door shuts, I pull out my phone and Google what he said, typing in the best translation I can—Bonne nuit, belle fille
– Good night, beautiful girl
.

My heart aches when I read the touching words. Why can’t her father love her this way? Why doesn’t he see her as the beautiful blessing she is? A complete stranger has spent less than an hour with her, and he held her more in that time than her own dad has in the last six weeks. I wish I could blame it all on the drugs, but I know that’s not true.

He didn’t want a baby. He was pissed when we found out I was pregnant and demanded that I have an abortion, but I refused. In the end, he stayed and pretended to be happy until we found it was a little girl. Then everything changed.

I understood that he wanted a little boy if he was going to have a child, but that’s not the hand we were dealt. Why couldn’t he be happy that we were blessed with a healthy child? Instead, he found comfort at the end of a glass pipe with his buddies, and for the time, I stayed with him, at least until my beautiful Everly Grace was born. Then I’d had enough.

The final straw was when he showed up at the hospital, high as a kite, and then left me at eight centimeters dilated to go across the street to get a tall boy. My daughter was welcomed into this world by a team of doctors and nurses. She didn’t meet her father until she was one week old. He didn’t show back up at the hospital, not even to sign the birth certificate, so as far as the state of Arizona was concerned, her father was unknown.

Laying my head against the fluffy pillows, I close my eyes and try to dream of a future of happiness. A future where I no longer have to worry about how I’m going to afford my next can of formula and my next pack of diapers. I long for that security, for that stability. I want more than anything to give that life to my daughter—to give her the life I never had.

I hate being here and living off Aaron, even though I know he doesn’t mind. He loves having me here, and having his niece close by makes him even happier, but I feel like a moocher. He has worked his ass off every day on the field to make the money he makes, and he supports himself. He shouldn’t have to support me too.

Lying in the bed, I doze in and out of sleep. I try to shut my mind off and escape into the far Netherlands in the dream world, but after being woken earlier, my body just won’t allow it. At least Everly is sleeping soundly in her new basinet. Everything in my life has been flipped and turned upside down so suddenly that at times, I can’t figure out which way is up and which way is down. My mind stays actively buzzing, eating away at me every minute of every day, reminding me of every single misgiving and tricking me into believing I am less than I am.

My monster doesn't sleep under my bed. She sleeps inside my head, lurking in the far recesses, just waiting for the chance to pounce. She doesn't need to be provoked or invited. One minute I can be smiling, almost enjoying life, and the next, I’m falling on my knees, alone and afraid but unable to reach out for help.

How can I, when I can't find the words to explain what's happening in my own mind? The way my throat tightens, constricting the air I need to exhale, trapping it in my lungs, another unwilling passenger to the torture I am forced to endure. Pain embraces me, like the loving mother I never had, on my way through the kaleidoscope of emotions flowing through me.

Fear.

Regret.

Loneliness.

Shame.

I accept them all. I have no choice. I am . . .
broken
. This single word describes who I am better than any other in the Webster’s dictionary.

I hate myself.

Flipping on the bedside light, I sigh with relief as the darkness is pushed away, however briefly. My alarm clock reads 5:42. I have been lying here awake for at least two hours, trying to crawl back out of the hell my mind creates while I sleep. Most people dream. A lot of those people even have nightmares. The difference between them and me is that when I wake up, my nightmare doesn't disappear. It clings to me and follows me throughout my day, whispering sweet nothings in my ear like a sweet lover.

My nightmare has a name.

I call it
life.

I should have taken my damn sleeping pills last night
, I think silently,
but I hate the way they make me feel during the day
. Slow. Lethargic. I should have known better, but at least if I am bone tired today, I know it's from lack of sleep and not some pharmaceutical bullshit running rampant through my system.

Technically, I don't need to get up from the comfy confines of my bed yet, but falling back asleep right now is impossible, so I grab my journal from under my mattress and peel back the abused, creased cover in search of the next available blank page. I find one at the back. It's almost time for me to replace the pages in it again. Thank God I still have a case of the paper that goes between the leather covers. Unsnapping the pen from the tie around the top, I allow myself ten minutes of my own personal therapy. Writing down the words flowing through me is the only time I feel somewhat normal. I pour myself out into the page before me.

Once there was love,

Now there is pain

In the house of misery

Losers stand to gain.

The pain has now gone away,

Numbed by Life. Dead to me.

There's a new flame

Burning in my soul.

Not like her; she must stay.

God! I'm losing total control.

I lost one love,

But I gained two:

The power of the heart

And the never ending start.

                                   -CC

When I finish, I read back over it and wonder where these words come from, how they manage to just erupt from within the tiny confines of my blackened soul when I put pen to paper. I close the pages, letting the rough leather cover and my three-year-old hair tie hide the words from me, keeping me from having to dwell on them anymore. I lock them up, just like I lock myself away from anything else in this world that might make me hurt . . . even just a little bit.

Throwing back the covers, I climb from my personal heaven when all I really want to do is throw a pillow over my head and shut out the world for one more day, to just close my eyes and forget the promise I made to myself last night, but I can’t. Shit, it's only been eleven hours, and I already regret calling Aaron and admitting how much I screwed up. He was furious with me for letting things get as bad as they had and not calling sooner. I guess I should have.

“I’m your brother, Char . . . your fucking twin. Let me be there for you,” he said.

Not just for me, but for Everly too. He’s right. She deserves better than this shitty life I have been giving her for her first six weeks of her life, so I swallowed my pride and packed my bags. Our flight left at 11:40, due to arrive in Phoenix at 3:10 pm. I wish I could say I was excited, but in truth, I was just ready for this particular stage of my life to be over. I’m ready to relax and settle in, not worry every time I hear footfalls in the hallway, wondering if it’s the building manager here with another eviction notice, or worse, the power company here to shut off my lights.

No time like the present.

Padding across the room, I try to tap into some hidden reserve of energy buried deep inside on my way to the bathroom. I turn the shower on hot and wait as the steam fills the room.

Today will be a good day.

The mirror hanging above the bathroom sink mocks me, challenging me to look into its glassy depths. Normally, I try to avoid mirrors whenever possible. I hate to look into my own eyes and see the secrets and fear staring back at me, judging me. I'll never understand how the world doesn't see the real me. All they see is a pretty, dark skinned, blonde-haired, brown-eyed beauty with soft skin and big, full lips. They never see the scared, lonely little girl screaming for help inside, but I do. I see the shell of a woman who isn’t good enough, who will never be good enough.

My eyes float down my naked body, slowly perusing it. The steam is etching its way across the mirror now, slowly as hell. I start at my feet. I've always thought they were too big for the rest of my body. My second toe is slightly longer than my big toe, and it reminds me of a monkey or a sloth. I curl them in, hating the way they look, and then allow my eyes to travel higher. My knees bow backward slightly, and I remind myself to pull them forward, even if it hurts to ignore my natural stance.

“Stand straight. Don't stand like that, fucking whore!”
I can hear my dad’s voice echo through my mind, a long ago memory I wish I could forget.

My thighs are a little too rounded and run straight into my narrow waist. My hips jut out sharply and I poke them, trying and failing to shove them back. If only all my fat didn't go straight to my hips and thighs, then maybe I would be pretty. Then maybe
someone
would love me. Yeah, right. Fat chance of that happening. I inherited my Dad’s family’s build. Thin waist and hippy.

Maybe if I lost that last five pounds,
I think, pinching the fat of my thighs between my hands and leaving red splotches across my skin.
Nah, I can't lose any more weight. Then I would be too skinny, and no one loves a girl who is too skinny.
I am already cutting it close. At 5’ 9”, my 147 pounds leaves me rail thin, and I know losing five more pounds would leave me looking like
her.

My gaze passes over my arms and the numerous scars lining each of them, in a hurry to beat the race against the steam, to my face and the secrets hidden there. No need to revisit the proof of my failed attempt to cut the pain from my soul during one of my darkest days. I have plenty of opportunities to gaze at the puckered red and white scars throughout the day. I raise my head higher. Lifeless, shit-brown eyes stare back at me.

Who are you?

I don't recognize the woman standing before me. I never have.

Where are your scars? How do you hide them?
I silently question the reflection staring back at me. She really is beautiful, stunning even, I think, until I look into her eyes. In there, I see me and all the things I try to hide from the world. My thoughts spin in a vicious circle, taunting me, reminding me who I really am.

Miserable.                           

Frail.             

Unloved.

Sick.                                                       

Pathetic.

Beaten.

NO!
No, not today. Today, I will love me. Today, you will not win,
I tell the monsters in my head and then turn away from the hazy mirror, climb in the hot shower, and let my mind wander back to a time long ago. A time when I could smile, and it didn't take everything in me to do it. Like a projector, I see the clips pass by until finally it stops on the day everything changed. The first day I met
her—
my mother.

Thirteen years earlier…

I’m sitting at my desk, studying multiplication tables when the buzzer rings overhead in Mrs. Brooks’s third grade class.

“Mrs. Brooks, please send Charlee to the office to check out.”

“Thank you, Mrs. Smith. I'll send her now,” Mrs. Brooks answers before turning her chair my way and instructing me to gather my things.

I slide the chart sheet back inside my desk before closing the lid and then push my chair under before going to grab my backpack off the hook by the classroom door. I walk with hurried steps toward the office. I can’t believe I’m getting out school early today! My large lips are stretched so far across my face, I probably resemble the Joker from Batman, but I don't care. This is the best day EVER!

The door on the other side of the office, directly across from me, shuts noisily, drawing my attention away from my game of avoiding cracks in the black and white squares on the floor. Aaron, my brother, walks in. His cheeks are flushed, contrasting heavily with his pale skin and making the freckles across his nose stand out even more. He must have run from his class too. We hardly ever get checked out of school. Meeting in the center of the office, we both look around, searching for who checked us out.

The office is empty of visitors, except for a single woman standing at the counter. I don't recognize her. I'm about to ask Mrs. Smith where my dad is when the strange lady steps back, turning toward us. The side of her mouth rises slightly in what some would consider a grin. We stand there while she rakes her gaze over us, a bright glint in her eyes. After telling Mrs. Smith thank you, the strange lady strides pass us, gesturing for us to follow her. We both do, not knowing in that moment that our lives are about to be changed forever.

I like to believe that if either of us had known who she was before we left the security of the office, maybe we wouldn't have followed her so willingly, but that is a lie and I know it. We would still have followed her, because at the time, in the back of our minds, we had both always wondered curiously who our mother was. Not the stories we had been told over the years, but who she really was. What was she like? Why didn't she want us?