In Too Deep, page 10
“Where are you going, Alex?” the receptionist calls out as I head towards the door. “Alex?”
“I’m leaving!” I yell back loudly, loosening my tie as I do. “I can’t be here anymore.”
I’m sure word of my mental break down will spread through the office like wild fire, it’ll be gossip all day long, but I really don’t care. They can all say whatever they want about me, as long as I don’t ever have to go back there then I won’t know what they say anyway. It really doesn’t matter.
I suck in the outside air, feeling a tiny bit better as freedom hits me, but that will only last so long. I’m going to have to head back home to face my parents eventually which sucks. I know it’ll be awful there. The atmosphere alone is dreadful. It’s almost as crushing as in there.
What am I going to do now? I think as I slide into my car. With everything? How can I move past this? I still don’t know what I want to do and everything else is at a standstill too. I guess, for now, I just need to be a rock for everyone. A support system, someone to rely on.
I don’t know if I have the inner strength to be a support system, I don’t know if I can be everything that everyone needs of me, but I suppose I have to try. It isn’t like I have any other role anyway and I can’t just do nothing. I fire the car into gear and try to prepare myself to keep being strong.
* * *
I wait in the car for a while before I make the brave step of getting out. I know it’s going to cause a kick up that I’m home in the middle of the day, but I’ve already driven around aimlessly for far too long. I thought that speeding along the road with the windows down and the music blaring would help, but instead it’s left me with nothing more than an intense, unshakable headache.
I look up towards the house, knowing that in one of those many rooms, Marcus will be sobbing, Mom will be screaming, Dad will be on the phone yelling at someone. The massive expanse of emptiness is finally full for the first time I can recall it being so, and it’s horrible. It makes me miss Sephy’s little apartment even more. That house is always warm and inviting. I miss having everything so nearby and always feeling a little bit cramped. With Sephy, I never minded.
I grab out my cell phone and send her another text. I’ve fired off at least one a day and although she hasn’t replied, I can’t seem to stop. I need her to know that she’s in my thoughts. ‘Sephy, I’m thinking of you. I hope you’re okay. I’ll be here if you want to keep in touch, I hope you know that. Alex xxx’
I wait for a couple more seconds but I don’t get anything back. I didn’t expect to really, there isn’t any reason I should, but still I want it. I want to know that she’s thinking of me too.
I push myself out of the car and I walk pointedly towards the front door. I have that awful feeling in my chest again. I mean it isn’t as strong as the day that we found Liza in the hospital, but it’s unpleasant all the same. This time, though, I know what’s on the other side of that door.
“Hello?” I call out quietly once I get inside, peeking my head around the door. “Is anyone home?”
For one glorious moment I think there isn’t and I’m going to be greeted with the pleasure of a brief moment to myself but of course that doesn’t happen. Mom whizzes around the corner with that pinched, stressed expression on her face again. I swear, that’s just how she looks now.
“Oh, Alex, you’re here.” She hasn’t yet seemed to realize that I shouldn’t be here yet. I guess she doesn’t care so much about the office. “Good, your dad is on the phone with the lawyer again.”
“Lawyer?” I slam the door closed behind me. “Why is he talking to a lawyer? What’s happened?”
Mom gives me a look like she cannot believe I just asked that. “He wants to know how we can get the baby back off that wretched woman before he forgets about his father.”
“Mom, are you crazy? This isn’t the sort of situation where we need a lawyer.” My heart leaps up into my throat at the thought of Sephy being faced with a lawyer when she’s trying to do her best. “Have you tried just speaking to the Smithers family? Maybe we can smooth things over…”
“There is no speaking to them right now, and of course Marcus is no help. He’s crumbled into such a mess that he doesn’t even want to help right now. He’s happy for the baby to stay where he is.”
“You can call him by his name, Mom, even Marcus has come around to the idea of calling him Benji because that was Liza’s last request. Or one of her last requests anyway…”
We all know what her last request was and it’s the very thing that’s caused all the tension now. She wanted Sephy to be very heavily involved in her son’s life, probably because she knew that Sephy is way more capable than anything else. I need Mom to remember that, it’s very important.
“The baby can’t stay with them forever, it is not a long term solution, Marcus is the baby’s father. I don’t know if everyone has completely forgotten that. He’s the dad of the baby and he needs to be in his life. The baby would give him purpose, it would help him get out of bed, he needs that.”
I strongly disagree. I really don’t think Marcus is even slightly in that frame of mind but what I can I do? I really need to do something before this gets out of hand because it’s about to. Dad can afford the best lawyers in the world, they will annihilate Sephy and her mom. This is a mess.
“Why don’t we arrange a meet up for all of us?” I offer with a helpless shrug. “Don’t you think we should at least try to do this in a civil way? For the baby, I mean. Surely it’ll be better that way.”
Mom averts her eyes away from me, almost as if she doesn’t yet want to accept that there might be another way. I’m sure she’s been manipulated by my father all week long. It’s going to take me a while to convince her but I really think it’s necessary. I think I need to do this for everyone. For Marcus, but mostly for Sephy. She doesn’t deserve whatever my dad has coming her way.
“Mom, I think we really need to do something about this to make it easier. Don’t you? If we don’t, we might end up losing… the baby…” I hate saying that, but I’m trying to win her around. “Forever.”
17
Persephone
Oh my God, what am I doing? I think desperately as I tug my hands through my greasy, knotted hair. I haven’t slept in forever and Benji cries all the time, probably missing his mom, and I feel out of my depth. I’m drowning under the weight of the pressure, I feel totally out of control. I’m like a zombie, I don’t know if I’m coming or going. My whole body aches, and I can hardly stand it. But still I’m doing my best. I’m trying for him and I’m doing this for Liza. Will this feeling ever end?
“Have you got that bottle yet?” Mom yells through the apartment. “Benji’s getting fussy.”
“Almost.” I grab the bottle as I remember what I’m doing. “I just need to heat it up.”
I wait for the milk to get to the right temperature with my back against the ice cold kitchen wall. My eyes fall closed and I remember that sensation of sleep for just a moment. This is helpless, it’s so hard, I really could use some help. I mean, I’m glad I have Mom here, she’s been amazing and I couldn’t have done it without her, but we need more. Benji needs his father for sure.
I grab my phone, wishing I could just call Marcus but I can’t. For one, I never got his number so that’s awkward, but for another his parents have been so terrible to Mom through this horrible time that she’s digging her heels in. It’s almost as if they’ve forgotten that she’s grieving her daughter.
My eyes find Alex’s messages and the guilt crushes through my system. All I want to do is respond to them, but I know I can’t. Not while everything is so messy and complicated. I don’t even know where to begin when I think about us again, I can’t even think about anything like that, it’s madness. I’m too tired to even think about myself right now, never mind anyone else. We’ll have to wait.
‘Oh my goodness, Sephy, I’m sorry about all the mess at the hospital. I hope you’re okay xxx’
His touching words, his sweet lovely kind sentences that are full of caring. He’s been so lovely this while time and I’m too confused to respond at all. I scroll down to see some more.
‘I miss you., Sephy. I can’t stop thinking about you. I hope everything is alright xxx’
And then of course there is the most recent one, the one that I really want to reply to: ‘Sephy, I’m thinking of you. I hope you’re okay. I’ll be here if you want to keep in touch, I hope you know that. Alex xxx’ but what will I say? Things are so strained between our parents, it’s awful. I don’t know what will happen next. The baby that was supposed to bring us all together, has torn us all apart.
Once the bottle is made I race back to my mother’s side, taking her stairs two at a time. Luckily we have here to stay because my apartment is much too small. Babies might be tiny but they create such a mess and they need so much stuff as well. Diapers, wet wipes, clothes… endless clothes. Plus a crib, changing mats, milk, bottles, dummies… oh God, I don’t even know what else. I couldn’t fit Benji and everything else couldn’t fit in that small space for sure. There’s no chance.
“Sorry, Mom, sorry, Benji, here’s the bottle.” I take a seat and Mom places Benji in my lap. I place the teat of the bottle between his lips and watch as he sucks down hard. When I’m with Benji in a moment such as this one, I feel like Liza might be staring down at me, watching me, checking on the both of us. It’s the only time that I can still feel her and there’s a closeness between us. It makes me miss her even more. She should be here with Benji, loving him as much as I do. “You like that?” I ask him just to try and stop the tears from falling apart. “Is that milk nice, sweetheart?”
Sometimes it looks like he’s smiling at me, but other times I’m sure he just looks sad. The more he grows, and he has grown a lot in the last couple of weeks, the more his face turns into Liza’s. He’s just like her, everything about him is the same. She lives on in a way through him. I can imagine her here now smirking with pride as her son becomes more of a person every single day.
Ring, ring… ring, ring… ring, ring…
My eyes snap towards Mom with horror as the phone rings again. Recently it’s only ever been one person and it’s never good. I see her eyes glaze over and her emotions shut down as she prepares herself to talk to him. The man who seems determined to see us all fall apart. Marcus’s father, the man who’s become the devil recently. I want to stop her from answering, but he never stops calling.
“Fucking hell,” she mutters under her breath with a redness tainting her cheeks. “Hello?”
I can’t hear what’s happening on the other end of the line, but I can tell from Mom’s tightened expression that it isn’t good. I feel helpless, all I want to do is end this, but I can’t. I can’t seem to find a way to make this all okay again. There has to be an answer somewhere.
“Yes,” Mom continues stiffly. “Yes, I understand. Mhmm, I see. Right, yes.”
As she hangs up the phone she gives me a bit of a desperate look. “That was Alex,” she says in a strange voice. “Marcus’s brother, I don’t know if you remember him at all?” That comment is so laughable it almost makes me chuckle. “Well, he wants to arrange a meeting between the families to try and sort this out. He says that his dad is hiring lawyers and stuff which he wants to avoid.”
“Lawyers? That’s a bit too much, isn’t it?” I ask in shock. “Seriously? Has it got that bad?”
Mom nods slowly, while staring at Benji in my arms. “He doesn’t seem to get that we’re only trying to do what’s best for Benji, you know? Marcus isn’t in the right place to raise a child, and much as I love him, I don’t know if he’ll ever be in the right place. He’s the workaholic type, isn’t he?”
I agree with Mom, I know exactly what she means. Marcus isn’t the guy who’ll be in the trenches, changing diapers and waking up at three AM, but that doesn’t mean we should keep the hell away. Somehow I think we need to rally together and all get involved in raising Benji together.
“Well, I mean, maybe Alex is right. Maybe we should all meet up together and try and sort this out in the right way. There has to be something we can do.” I half shrug as I speak. “I don’t know.”
“But that man is horrible.” Mom throws her hands in the air in dismay. “He’s absolutely unreasonable, he’s a control freak. I don’t see any conversation with him going well. And she isn’t much better. I know she looks down on us, I’m sure she didn’t think Liza was good enough for her precious little boy. She said some very untoward things on the run up to the wedding.”
Okay, I cannot get into the whole pre-nup thing again. I get it, it was a bit shitty, but I suppose from their point of view they have to try and protect what’s there’s. We don’t have to agree with them but we do need to work with them. The fact that Alex is setting this whole thing up gives me much more confidence in it. I’m sure it’s not some trap to make things go a certain way.
“I know, but what else can we do? We need to at least try. If we don’t it’ll just get worse. Especially if there are about to be lawyers involved. They will have some amazing legal support on their side. There’s no way we can compete with that, and we don’t want to lose Benji completely.”
Mom glances up towards a picture of Liza up on the wall, probably thinking the same thing as me. She’s already lost too much, she doesn’t need to lose more. Raising Benji might not be easy, but we don’t ever want to lose custardy entirely. Then, the heart break will really set in.
“I know you’re right,” she whispers eventually. “I mean, I did say yes, I know this is something that’ll hopefully make things better. I’m just scared that it’ll make it so much worse. It’s tomorrow anyway, tomorrow night at their home, so… make of that as you will.”
My heart hammers in my throat as I consider this. I haven’t seen Alex for a very long time, for what feels like forever actually, and the idea of seeing him again under these circumstances is just horrible. I wish I could see him just me and him first, to talk things through. I suppose I could if I replied to any one of his text messages, but it feels weird now. It’s been too long. If I reply now it’ll look like it’s just because he called. I suppose it is, but I don’t want Alex to think it’s like that. He’s too important to me. Even now, even after everything that we’ve been through and all the time apart, he still is.
“I’m sure it will be fine,” I try to reassure her. “We just need to ensure that it stays calm.”
I push myself into a standing position, with Benji still in my arms, and I take him towards the bedroom. He’s fallen asleep during his feed and since he doesn’t sleep much I need to take this moment to myself. Motherhood is more demanding than I ever could have expected!
“He’s asleep now so I’m going to take a shower. Probably the first one in weeks,” I chuckle as if it’s funny, even though it isn’t and I really need to get clean. “Is that okay, Mom? You don’t mind?”
She nods and lolls her head back, sliding her eyes closed as she does. She needs some shut eye too, neither of us have slept much, so I creep out the room to leave her to it. I tiptoe all the way to the crib and I lay Benji’s sleeping form down in it. Instead of racing to the shower like I thought I would do, I lean in and kiss him gently on the forehead. He’s so adorable, so innocent in all of this, he doesn’t deserve this intense war going on around him, it isn’t fair, it isn’t right. Liza would hate it.
“I will do whatever I can to make this alright for you,” I murmur quietly to him. “I know this isn’t easy at the moment but it will be. I’ll do whatever I can, whatever it takes.”
He gurgles, not understanding me at all, but that doesn’t matter. I’ll still tell him because I want him to know that he will always have someone on his side.
“Liza, I promise this to you as well if you’re out there listening to me somewhere. I don’t know if you are, or if I’ve ever believed into the after life or whatever. But yeah, if you’re there, I’ll do whatever I need to. Building these bridges between these families isn’t easy, but somehow I’ll try.” I start backing out the room. “But right now, I really need to wash. Like, desperately so.”
I scurry towards the bathroom growing excited as the dream of washing gets nearer and nearer. It feels like it’s been forever…
But before I even make it through the door, Benji bursts into sobbing tears and the dream slips away. He needs me again.
18
Alex
I feel oddly nervous when the moment I’ve been planning for the last couple of days comes to a head. Any minute now, Sephy and her mother will be here, probably with baby Benji and we’ll have to finally come to some sort of arrangement with what we’re going to do next. This is so damn important, and the tension is flooding the house. I can tell that everyone is really feeling it.
Dad keeps walking around the house as if he has somewhere to go, muttering curse words under his breath as he goes. Every time he passes me I brace myself, waiting expectantly for the moment he turns and screams at me for the mess I must have left behind at work, but to be perfectly honest I don’t think that he’s noticed yet. He’s had too much else to think about. But when he’s going to explode he will really go. He’s like a pressure cooker, and he’s getting ever closer to his boiling point.
Then there’s Mom. God, she might be even worse. She’s fussing around, trying to make everything absolutely perfect as if she’s hosting a dinner party or something. She’s really done up, wearing her nicest dress and best shoes. Pearl earring dot in her ears to really tie the whole outfit together. It’s ridiculous, I want to shake her, especially when she keeps racing around the house and dusting things like that’s something she does every single day of her life. She might be house proud, but it isn’t ever her who makes the place sparkle. It must just be for something to do to recover from her nerves.
