Uncorked (27 page)

“Chella, I want you in my life,”
Mitch said, feeling a little puzzled by her attitude.

“I want you in my life, too.
Maybe we need to give this situation some time. I’m new to all this, and I
don’t know how to fix it.”

“You’ve distanced yourself. I
feel like you’re building a wall around yourself again.”

“That’s not my intention,” she
replied.

“What are your intentions?”

“To be able to take care of
myself, to be independent, and to stop running.”

“So you don’t need me in your
life?”

“Evidently you don’t need me
either, so I guess we’re even.”

“Am I that disposable to you?”

“Don’t turn this around on me. At
a time in your life when you were hurting and I should have been there, you
shut me out. Everyone else was allowed to be there to visit you and love you
and care for you and you took that away from me. And don’t even think about
telling me this was for my safety. There were armed police there around the
clock. I would have been just as safe there as at the penthouse, if not safer.”

“I did what I thought was best.”

“How would you have felt after
the explosion if I didn’t want to see you? You know how helpless I felt? You
don’t need me in your life. You made that abundantly clear, and it’s all rooted
in the fact that you don’t trust me.”

“That’s not true. I wasn’t
looking at it from that perspective.”

“Mitch, you were almost killed,
in a manner that was very similar to the way my parents died, I might add. You
were unconscious for hours. Do you have any idea how scary that was? And within
an hour of regaining consciousness, you ask me to leave. You made me feel just
as helpless as the day my parents died. Caught up in a pile of metal knowing
I’m alive and not being able to do a damn thing to save a loved one.” A tear slid
down her cheek then another and another.

“I’m so sorry,” he said walking
over to her. He tried to embrace her, but she pushed him away.

“I can’t be around you right now.
I’m sorry. I want to be alone.”

“Chella, please don’t. Let’s talk
about this.”

“I don’t want to talk. Please
go.”

He kissed her lightly on the
cheek and left.

Earlier in the
day when Mitch had spoken to
Chella, he thought she might have been overreacting. He realized now this went
much deeper. Five days ago in the hospital, he had wanted to protect her.
Instead, he had opened up old wounds of hers that never healed. She was more
scared than angry and the distance she wanted between them was her way of
protecting herself.

Whether he wanted to admit it or
not, she was right about so many things. He wasn’t ready to talk about family
issues of the past, but if he wanted to keep her in his life, he would have no
choice but to tell her everything. For now, though, she needed space. She had
left him with no choice. He had to stay away.

He returned home later that night
to find that his mother had left. He was disappointed, but she had made her
choice.

The following Friday,
Chella thought she and Mitch
needed to talk. She missed him. They spoke every day since he last visited her
at her new place, but they hadn’t seen each other in four days. She went to the
office that day to oversee photo shoots for her promotion. She planned to stop
by and surprise him once she had wrapped up for the day.

The taxi driver followed her
ridiculous instructions around the city to ensure she wasn’t being followed.
She was a little nervous on the elevator ride to the penthouse, unsure of what
their meeting would be like.

As the elevator door opened to
the foyer, the entry door was slightly ajar. Inside, she heard voices. A
woman’s voice.

“What makes you think you have
the right to come into my life after all these years and make that kind or
request?” Mitch shouted.

Chella pushed open the door and
walked in.

Mitch stood wearing a suit with
his back to her and a woman stood opposite him. They appeared to be in a heated
argument.

“Mitch, what’s going on?” Chella
asked calmly.

He turned and froze in place for
a second. His piercing eyes expanded at the sight of her. “Chella.”

“I thought we could talk,” she
replied. “It looks like now’s not a good time.”

He took her hand, led her to the
foyer and shut the door behind him. “Chella, I’m sorry. You have really bad
timing.”

“I can see that.”

“That woman is my sister.”

“Your what? You never told me you
had a sister.”

“I met them today.”

“Them?”

“The other one is in the
bathroom. They’re twins. Chell, I have to deal with this. I’ll tell you
everything later.”

“What’s wrong?”

“I’ll be fine. Pissed off, but
I’ll be fine.”

“Are you sure?” she asked with
great concern.

“Yes. Don’t worry. I’ll be okay.”

“I’ll be home if you need me.”

“You can wait in my room if you
like.”

“No. I’ll give you your privacy.
You know where to find me when you’re ready.”

“Let me call you a cab to come
pick you up.”

“I can handle it,” she said with
a slight smile then kissed him on the cheek. “We’ll talk later.”

When Mitch returned
inside, both sisters awaited
him. Simone was the more aggressive of the two; she managed to forget
everything her father did to his mother. Olivia was more compassionate and quiet.
She allowed her sister to do most of the talking.

“As I was saying, you two don’t
get to show up in my life and make these requests.”

“But he’s your father,” Simone
replied, glaring at him with the same hazel-green eyes.

“I don’t have a father.”

“How could you say that?” she
asked, as if surprised by his comment.

“That man you’re so eager to call
my father ruined my mother’s life. All he is to me is a sperm donor.”

“You can call him that if you
want but if it weren’t for him you wouldn’t be alive.”

“Are you kidding me? You want me
to be thankful to the man who violently raped my mother? The two of you have a
helluva lot of gall.”

“He’s really sorry for that,”
Olivia said softly, unable to look Mitch in the eye.

“Right. Sorry. You know what’s
worse? The two of you have known about me for seven years. Not once did you try
to contact me, and now that you want something from me, you conveniently know
how to find me.”

“My dad didn’t want us to disrupt
your life,” Simone shouted.

“Your father has been one big disruption
my whole life.”

“He’s been a wonderful father to
us.” Olivia said, looking into Mitch’s eyes.

“Congratulations. Good for you.
At least some of us were fortunate.”

“I know you’re angry with us, but
you’re our last hope,” Olivia stared at him with pleading eyes.

“If you two expect me to hop in a
car and go to the hospital with you and say ‘Here, take my bone marrow, have as
much as you want’ you all are completely out of your mind.”

“Yes or no?” Simone gestured her
hands in front of him.

“Give him some time,” Olivia said
to her sister, physically pulling her away from Mitch.

“Get the hell out, and don’t come
back again, or I’ll have you both arrested for trespassing,” he said coldly,
pointing them to the door.

“Please help us,” Olivia said
softly, tears in her eyes. “You’re our only hope.”

“I’m sorry, Olivia. I can’t do
this right now. Please leave.”

“We’ll leave our numbers in case
you change your mind,” Simone replied, flipping her long, jet-black hair over
her shoulder. She placed two cards on the island and headed out the door.

Hours later, Mitch
sat with Chella on her patio.

“So these two girls are my
father’s daughters with his wife.”

“You never wanted to talk about
your dad. What’s going on?”

“He’s not my dad. He’s my
father,” Mitch replied angrily. “And I really didn’t want to talk about this or
have him in my life, but they won’t let me forget he exists.”

“Mitch, you’re going to have to
tell me what’s going on. There’s no way I can understand if you continue to
alienate me from your life. How can I give you the support you need if you
continue to push me away?”

“I’m sorry I made you feel that
way. It wasn’t my intention. Things were really dicey between us. I thought it
would complicate things.”

“I’m sorry, too.”

He embraced her, apologizing repeatedly.
He was so disappointed with himself, but now he had to go through the long
arduous task of telling her something about his past, something so personal
only he and his mom knew.

“Chella, my mom was raped. I am
the result of that rape.”

Her eyes closed as she listened
to his words. “I’m so sorry. I don’t know what to say.”

“That’s pretty much how I felt my
whole life. I love my mother dearly, and I’m thankful to her for bringing me
into this world, but the violent way I was conceived is something so difficult
to deal with.”

“Do you know your father?”

“I met him once. It wasn’t
pretty.”

“What about your mom? How does
she feel about him? Did she know him?”

“He was her best friend—or so she
thought. She felt hurt, betrayed, lost, angry, thankful. She says I’m the best
thing that ever happened to her. She has all the normal feelings you’d expect
someone to have in that situation, but she has feelings of gratefulness, as
well.”

“Oh my God. Did she tell you
about him growing up?”

“No. I was always curious about
my father, but she never wanted to talk about him. So when I was sixteen,
unbeknownst to her, I started digging around myself. I got a private
investigator involved. That was when I found out she had been raped in college.
I found her yearbook, dug through some of her personal stuff, and connected the
dots.”

“Did you confront her about it?”

“Not at first. I didn’t want to
remind her of such a painful experience. But then it started eating me up
inside, and after a few years of getting into fights at high school then
college—serious fights—I told her I knew.”

“I’m so sorry.” Chella’s chest
ached. She heard the pain in his voice as he relayed the details to her.

“One day I came home from school,
and I heard voices as I entered the house. When I saw the man talking to her, I
recognized him as my father from the pictures that the P.I. provided me. I
thought he was there to hurt my mother, so I beat him, badly. So badly my mom
couldn’t get me off him. She called the police, and they pried me off him. He was
badly injured. He never pressed charges against me. Later, my mom told me he
came to apologize. He didn’t know my mom had gotten pregnant. She transferred
to another university after the rape. He tried to reach out to me, but I told
him I didn’t want him in my life and to stay away from my mother.”

“How did your mom feel about the
whole situation?’

“She forgave him.”

Chella gasped.

“She used to love him. It might
have been as best friends, but, nevertheless, love.”

“This is unreal.” Chella replied
in utter shock.

“I wish I could get to a place of
forgiveness, but it’s been hard. I don’t know where or how to start.”

“So how do your sisters fit into
this?”

“A few weeks before my car
accident, I started getting phone calls from them. They left messages at the
office with Greta. Their names are Olivia and Simone. They’re
twenty-one-year-old twins. They told Greta they were my sisters and they wanted
to meet with me, but I wasn’t ready. I was still getting over the situation
with Aaron. It reminded me of how angry I got that day with my father. I also
wasn’t sure I wanted to meet them or have them involved in my life. Despite the
fact that I didn’t respond or take their calls, they continued to send me
emails, letters and voice messages. This afternoon, they ambushed me in the
elevator when I was coming in from the office.”

“Does Liz know?”

“No. Earlier this week I realized
I let this situation interfere with our relationship by not confiding in you.
I’m sorry.”

“I’m sorry, too, but I appreciate
you telling me now,” she replied, cracking a slight smile.

“So this is my dilemma. My father
is really sick, he might even die, and he wants my forgiveness. He wants to
make things right with me. How, I’m not sure, but my sisters are begging me to
get tested to see if I’m a match for the bone marrow transplant he needs to
survive.”