Time's Forbidden Flower (28 page)

“You’re wasting your time,” Christopher sings a little indignantly. “You want the ones like me mum always made.”

“You mean like the cook always dumped out of a can,” I state. “I love Grace, but I can’t see her using a can opener for fear of splattering juice on her hand.”

“Too true,” Christopher agrees. “Still, I don’t understand the kerfuffle over your beans.”

I pretend to keep my focus on Christopher's ranting, as Eric tastes the imported beans and shakes his head in memory. “Yep, those are British.”

His wording forces my snicker, which prompts Christopher to wave his fork at me and warn, “No comments from the Yank Scouser.”

Eric tastes my beans before making a face of disgust. “These are the ones Christopher doesn’t like?”

“Yep,” I sigh.

Christopher crosses his arms with a smug look, which Eric quickly wipes off of his face. “Seriously, Christopher, you’re off your head. I’m calling Grace and giving her a serious verbal lashing regarding your taste buds.”

Christopher's mouth goes agape in horror of the betrayal right as the doorbell chimes. “I was raised on these,” he claims aghast, as I flee to answer the front door.

Eric continues his chastising. “As was I, but I grew up poor. I’m going to ask Grace what her excuse is.”

My smile drops when my hand touches the doorknob. Donovan stands before me holding Sunshine, whose head is nestled into her daddy’s neck. “Hey, what brings you two by?” I ask, my hand caressing Sunshine’s curls as I attempt to sound cheerful.

Donovan pulls his head back to smile at his daughter. “I thought Sunshine could use a night out. Mind if she plays with the kids?”

“Not at all. Hungry? There’s quite the comedy act going on inside.”

Donovan sets the girl down and points to the dining room. “Go on, sweetie. Go enjoy some of Auntie Lily’s amazing cooking.”

We watch the girl run off with a big smile. When I turn back to Donovan, all pretense is gone as he embraces me. “She didn’t see anything bad, did she?” I ask, gripping tightly and fearing the worst. My only consolation is that I don’t see any new marks on him.

“No, but Anna’s in the car, and I’m taking her to rehab for the next thirty days. Can Sunshine stay here tonight?”

“Of course,” I tell Donovan. “Why isn’t she staying with you?”

“It’s bad enough her mom is freaking out. The last thing she needs is a mental case dad who is struggling to hold it together. My nightmares tonight should be epic.”

Lord, how I wish his life wasn’t this way. I’d give anything to change it.

Wait. Did I mean that?

“Okay, but can you come back for breakfast? Eric’s test results will be back and things could get interesting. We made need a shrink, albeit a broken one.”

“Sure, Lil. Thanks.”

As Donovan heads down the walkway, I call out, “Hey, call if you need me.” With a little nod he continues on, driving Anna into the night.

Drinking coffee on a stress-filled day is only wise if you use Valium instead of sugar. Sadly, I didn’t have this thought two cups ago.

Donovan and I sit on the porch steps, sipping coffee as the courier van arrives. Inside, Christopher sleeps, completely in the dark regarding the battles going on under his nose. Only one set of answers arrives today. The delay of the hair strand test leaves Donovan and I stressed for another week.

Eric is already on a quest to prepare breakfast when we approach. Tapping his shoulder, I raise the envelope to him. “What’s this?” Eric asks.

“Your test results,” I say, gently. “Ours will take a few more days.”

Eric’s eyes drop to the envelope—reminding me of a frightened house cat who’s trying to stare down a pit bull. “I suppose you figured it out then.”

“Truthfully, I don’t know if you’re his father or his uncle.”
 

With a shrug and shake of his head, he resigns himself to whatever lies inside. “Will you both be there with us? I’ve a feeling we’re going to need all of the family we can get.”

The adults gather in the library, behind closed doors, sitting in reading chairs with a table pushed in the center. Eric sits before me, repeatedly clearing his throat and looking heavenward. Christopher eyes the envelope on the table; concerned that it holds my answers. With swift movements Eric opens it, then hands the contents to Christopher. “I wanted to tell you yonks ago, but I had to respect Grace’s wishes. Please forgive me for not telling you sooner.”

Christopher looks as if he is being given bad news. “What is this?” he asks.

“Our part of the DNA results.”

“Our part?” Christopher scans the document, his face going slack. He looks to Eric whose eyes plead for acceptance. “You’re—you’re my father?” Christopher lays a hand over his mouth as he drops back in his chair. My heart tightens for him.

Eric presses his arm onto that of the chair, as if trying to control jitters. “When your parents had their first huge fight, all looked bleak. Grace escaped by coming to see us lads on tour. My wife and I had an agreement that I could have company while on the road, but there were rules. I broke them by getting involved with someone I had attachment to—and I did it without protection. Not only did Grace get pregnant, it opened me up to all kinds of health issues, thus endangering my wife as well. She saw it as the ultimate betrayal and left me even though she too was pregnant. My daughter was eighteen before I got to spend any real time with her. By then she was so jaded against me that—”

“Oh my God, Ellen.” Christopher gulps his breath as if it’s a boulder. “You were just getting to know her when I returned home and ruined everything.”

 
Eric looks to the ground, his breath weighty. “I suppose that’s a whole other can of worms. Grace never wanted anyone to know out of respect for Paul, who eventually learned anyway. Constantly I’ve asked Grace if I could tell you; when you moved, when you returned, after Paul died, when you married, and countless other times. A few days ago I informed her I was doing it whether she approved or not.”

“Dad—Paul knew?”

“Yes. Paul knew my family well. When you were little you looked just like me, and the older you got, the more you looked like Mick. It was too obvious.”

Christopher wanders to the window, his eyes lacking focus. “This explains so much. I always wondered not only why I looked so different, but also why I was treated differently. It’s because I wasn’t his son.”

I go to him in support. Sadly I am of as much comfort as Eric’s words. “Christopher, Paul did the best he could, given the circumstances. Most men would have left. Paul at least tried.”

Futilely, my eyes try to grab Christopher’s. His pain radiates, making my body ache for him. “He treated me so differently,” Christopher says to the grass outside. “Now I know why he set me up to fail in school.”

“No, Christopher,” Eric corrects. “He wanted you to grow in ways he couldn’t. He never meant for you to have such a hard time.”

“Funny, I don’t see it that way.” Christopher storms from the room, leaving the rest of us to stare at each other.
 

Eric turns to Donovan and me, as if requesting forgiveness. “I should have told him when Paul died, but I didn’t feel I had the right.”

Donovan places a reassuring hand on Eric’s arm. “You did the right thing. You tried to be a good father and put your son’s needs first. That’s more than I ever experienced with my own.”

Christopher returns with his open laptop in hand, screaming at Grace over video chat like a rabid dog. “You shameless whore! You let Dad set me up to fail just so you had an excuse to come home! You knew I never should have been accepted to that school. I left someone I loved because I thought I was helping to put my family back together, but actually I was the excuse for Dad—Paul—whoever the hell he was—to march you back! And you didn’t even have the decency to tell me he wasn’t me dad nor that I was returning home to the man who was.”

“Christopher,” Grace pleads. “That’s not what happened.”

Christopher storms the room, twitchy and ranting. His face is contorted into a growl as he berates Grace. “It sure as hell is in my eyes! You saw how brokenhearted I was when we left, but what mattered to you was returning home. The least you could have done was tell me what I was returning home to. It would have given me perspective and hope. Instead I got into a world of trouble. All the drugs I did, all the girls I used—all because there was nothing in my life worth caring about! I became worse than you when we were in America! Sure, bringing you home saved you, but it was at my expense, not to mention April and Clara. Clara never spoke to me again after you paid her off to have an abortion. Not a night goes by when I don’t pray for forgiveness for your actions. I would have done the honorable thing, but you stuck your nose in and went against my beliefs!”

My throat constricts around the gasp I try to withhold for Christopher’s sake. That beautiful man can’t possibly be talking about himself.

Christopher has always been embarrassed by his mistakes during those two horrible years apart. We all do foolish things—but what I am hearing is so unlike him that it’s no wonder why he didn’t want me to know. Grace was a shameless tramp that he drug home and sobered up night after night. He was so humiliated by her that I can’t imagine him doing anything similar. Dear God, if he was worse… and how the hell did Eric’s daughter, Ellen, come into play? Who are these other girls I have never heard of? No wonder why he’s wanted silence.

“I only did it for your future,” Grace begs through the monitor. “You know I never gave up hope for—”

Christopher smacks the laptop onto the desk, us all cringing at the force. “If you wanted Lilyanna and I together so badly why didn’t you insist I stay with her and stand up to Paul, the perfect man who dumped you time and time again? My real father and his friends came to the rescue even when I hurt them. I was a huge disappointment with the way I acted like some big shot, throwing around money, getting into trouble, and hurting poor Ellen. She was actually getting me to shape up when I got shoved away like rotten garbage with not so much as a goodbye. It ripped her and Eric apart, and I thought it was that everyone was disappointed to the point where they had given up on me. Lord knows I was disappointed in meself! Now the real reason is bloody well clear.”

Eric’s reluctance in approaching Christopher makes me unsure if he is standing behind the laptop to back Grace or if he’s afraid to get near the fuming beast. “You really have it all wrong. Grace wanted you to have a solid family, not be an outcast who didn’t know where he belonged.”

“Bloody bad job she did! I was always the outcast. I had a right to know the truth just as much as you had a right to tell me.”

“Christopher, please. Just let me explain,” Grace begs.

“We are done here!” With a
smack
he slams the lid on his laptop, ending the call and leaving the rest of us in shock.

Eric stares out the window, as if an answer as to why he didn’t tell Christopher sooner is written in the sky. Donovan sits with his head nearly in his lap, remembering his own parental betrayal, knowing that more looms around the corner, no matter what we learn.

Christopher doesn’t deserve this pain. Never in the thirteen years I have known him has he ever lost his temper in such a wild fashion. This level of fire is uncharacteristic, and I worry for him. He sits shrunken in a reading chair, the red in his downturned face slowly subsiding, yet his anger still smolders. Is the hiding of his face caused by shame for his actions or embarrassment that the truth has surfaced?

If I had moved to England none of Christopher’s problems would exist. Eric would still have his relationship with Ellen, and Mom may have left Donovan alone. A pressure simmers in my head as years of betrayal and loss are finally absorbed. Although my thought is irrational, it also makes perfect sense. “This is all my fault,” I mutter. “Every bit of pain in this room is either my fault or amplified by my actions. I’m the problem.”

“Darling, don’t be ridiculous.” A calmer Christopher puts a hand on my shoulder. I feel like his anger transfers to me.

“No!” I snap at him. “It’s all my fault, beginning with Donovan and ending with Eric’s problems with Ellen. I could have prevented them all.”

“Lily!” Donovan jumps out of his seat before regaining his composure. “You know that isn’t true,” he calmly reasons. “Let’s get you some air.” He walks me out of the house, his heart pounding and his demeanor cool. Inside the driveway we hide between two cars. “Lily, you know what you feel isn’t true.”

“I know,” I say calmly and resigned to frustration. “I’m totally overreacting. A satanic inner voice says I’m a horrible person who causes suffering, and a big part of me feels you should just leave and have a normal, healthy life for once.”

“I’m not leaving you,” he says, insistently. “You know that. Especially now that we don’t know what we’re up against. I swear, every day something happens to rub my face into the fact that us breaking up was the biggest mistake ever.”

“Donovan, that doesn’t make any sense. How would staying together have stopped any of this?”

“Neither you or I would be swimming in a mess of everyone else’s problems. I know it’s selfish, but is it so wrong to want you back? To desire the level of happiness that I only get when you’re in my arms? What I’m trying to say is, you are not someone who causes suffering. I made the biggest mistake of my life when I thought that way about myself. Don’t let it happen to you.”

The last thing I need is a dose of Donovan remorse, but he’s right. “I’m just locked in a cell of my own guilt, and I have to get out. Obviously Christopher is in the same boat. We should become fitness junkies to burn off frustration.” I pick a rock up and chuck it across the street. The act actually helps. “Didn’t playing football used to help you?”

“Like that will ever happen,” Donovan snorts. “Though I bet Christopher would be an entertaining disaster with tackle gear.”

“Or maybe I could do—”

“Hmm…a runner. That would work for you.”

“A runner? Yeah, I could do that. Damn it! This is all such a huge disaster. It’s like everybody is on love drugs, and I can’t stand it anymore. I need to tell Christopher the truth about us and Chuck Cunningham’s room. Somehow I have to escape the bullshit.”