The Little Lies We Hide, page 2
TWO
Cassandra Knighton watched her husband David back his Audi Q5 out of the driveway—an extravagance he’d told her he deserved after busting his ass building a successful career for nearly twenty years—and waited until she could no longer see the taillights through the spaces in the branches of their neighbour’s gigantic maple tree on the front lawn before she let the curtain fall back. It wasn’t even six in the morning, the dawn sky just starting to pink, and her husband was already heading to the office.
Or somewhere else.
That was more likely. She wasn’t stupid. She knew what was going on. What had been going on for the better part of their marriage.
Why would he need to go into the office, a real estate office, this bloody early? Some agents barely ever went into the office, doing most of their work from home using their cell phone and a laptop. Spending time with their family.
But not David. David was all about David.
She touched the necklace around her neck, a simple C-shaped golden pendant. Life had seemed so full of possibilities and hope when she had seen that future through the eyes of a naive teenager. David had intoxicated her with his charm, made a young girl believe that she was special because he had picked her over all the others. Everyone would have traded places with her to be David Knighton’s girlfriend.
Cassandra doubted any of them would want her life now.
She wasn’t oblivious. Oh, she pretended that everything was fine. She had mastered the art of pretend. But she noticed things, like how his once passionate kisses were now barely a peck on the cheek, and the way he could barely look her in the eye when he was lying, and of course, she’d become quite good at detecting the unmistakeable scent of another woman on him.
She let herself drop on the edge of the king-size bed they shared and although she could feel her eyes burning, she didn’t dare shed a tear. Tears were for weak women. She had never been weak. Angry? Yes. Pissed off? Definitely. But not weak. Still, as she sat there contemplating the rest of her life—at some point she would need to decide what was best for her—she cursed herself for all the wrong decisions she’d made.
What a stupid fool she had been to fall for all of his lies and promises. She had been so sure that he was the better choice, that he would be good to her and for her, that he’d been sincere when he’d told her that his straying had been an expected young man’s mistake that would never happen again. She had believed him when he’d vowed he would spend a lifetime making it up to her.
Lies, lies, lies.
Fool, fool, fool.
What would her life have been like if she had followed not just her heart, but her gut? And of course, by the time she’d found out what she would be forced to keep a secret forever, it had been just too late to change anything.
As she’d heard her mother say time and time again, I made my bed and I must sleep in it no matter what. Cassandra had never understood what her mother was talking about, until her father had walked out on them the day before her tenth birthday. On that day, she had understood that her dad wasn’t a nice man. Neither of them had really been sorry to see him go. He had been a selfish man who’d gambled away their money—what little he hadn’t spent on liquor and other women.
How ironic that she had fallen into the same trap.
Ironically sad.
If only she could go back to the summer of 1999. Would she really change anything, take that chance?
Cassandra noticed that the left side of the bed hadn’t been slept in. He’d probably slept on the couch again in the room he used as a den, but since she had gone to bed long before he’d come home, she had no idea what time that might have been. Long gone were the days she stayed up for him, waiting so they could reconnect, both eager and hungry for physical release.
Maybe that had been a lie too, or she’d simply been a convenience. Either way, she’d been used.
Cassandra stood and walked to the ensuite that was probably twice the size of their old apartment, and brushed her teeth. She could still taste last night’s bottle of wine pasted to the back of her mouth.
At least his money was good for something.
But she hated that it had become her crutch, her way of burying the grief and regret that consumed her. That’s what falling in love with the wrong man had done to her. She had once been an independent and determined young woman full of energy and dreams, but as she wiped her mouth with the back of her hand after spitting in the sink, she didn’t like the heartbroken and shattered stranger who stared back at her from the mirror.
* * *
Cassandra Blackburn was seventeen, a senior, when she hooked up with David Knighton at a party. It was a bit of a surprise, considering all the years she’d been hanging out with his brother Bradley, and not once had David showed any interest in her until that night.
Everyone had gone to this party to celebrate the Forest Creek Cavaliers winning the Carleton-Goulbourn Hockey League finals in four straight games over the Carleton High Leafs. David, for the fourth straight year, was named MVP on the strength of his dominating performance: twelve goals and nine assists.
All the girls at Forest Creek High, from freshman to OAC—the Ontario Academic Credit formerly called Grade 13—dreamed of being his girlfriend. He was tall, gorgeous, had a smile to melt hearts and the lines to hook them, which had landed him a string of girlfriends during his high school years. Some lasted a month or two, others a day, but that was enough to give these girls bragging rights.
Cassandra felt sorry for these poor souls, especially knowing how David really was when there was no audience. Bradley had spilled the goods on his brother as often as he could, so much so that she’d once had to tell him that David didn’t interest her in any way so he could stop worrying about her.
And here she was at this party unable to resist David Knighton’s dimpled smile and charismatic charm.
What an embarrassment.
But David didn’t seem to be the jerk Bradley had painted him as. In fact, he was attentive, witty, and truth be told—and she hated herself for thinking that—much better-looking. It wasn’t just the hair colour and eyes that were totally different; there were features David had that were just simply more refined, almost feminine, yet he was the one bashing guys into the boards, while Bradley looked more rugged, was quiet and didn’t care for the attention, and preferred to read books and work on his studies.
The two brothers couldn’t be more different.
Bradley was going to kill her. They’d been friends since she and her mom moved to Forest Creek after her father left, and as she was sitting on the edge of the hearth beside David, who’d taken her hand into his—how warm and soft his hands felt—all she could think was how in the world she was going to convince Bradley to forgive her.
She was going to have to beg big time.
The smart thing to do would be to pull her hand away and tell David that she was flattered, but that she wasn’t interested in being part of his long string of girlfriends. But those eyes . . . nothing really as striking as Bradley’s blue eyes, just plain hazel eyes, but the depth and intensity they radiated, the pull she felt, like no matter how badly she wanted to go, she just couldn’t look away.
Maybe that was how those others girls had all felt? Cassandra had heard all the rumours of how dreamy David was, and she was starting to believe it.
What was it that made Bradley dislike his brother so much?
She would have to ask—
The thought was interrupted by David leaning into her and meeting her lips with his, a soft, gentle pressing of flesh on flesh that made her want more.
A lot more.
Which made her face feel warm, and her mind quickly filled with shame. Bradley was going to be so mad.
“Stay here,” David said.
Cassandra looked around and noticed that everyone was looking at her. This would be the perfect time to disappear. Nothing good could come from this. Whatever this was. If Bradley had come tonight, she wouldn’t be sitting here getting seduced by David. She could simply get up and leave.
So much of her wanted to stay.
“Here,” David said and handed her a beer.
She frowned. “Kind of underaged.”
David laughed softly. “You’re legal in Québec.”
“Not until July twenty-fourth,” she said. “And this is Ontario.”
“Technicalities,” he said. “Cheers!”
He tapped his bottle against hers and she raised the bottle to her mouth and had her first taste of beer. A grimace chased the bitterness across her face.
“You’ll get used to it,” he said.
“Probably not.”
“Feisty,” he said. “I like that.”
She didn’t know what to say so she took another swallow of beer. The bitterness didn’t seem to crunch her face as much.
“Want to get out of here?” he said.
She should have said no.
* * *
There was no point trying to fall back to sleep. Her mind was reeling, full of anxiety and fury, and the best remedy for that kind of turmoil was a strong cup of coffee and a generous shot of Baileys. Oh, she had come a long way from never having had a drink before that end-of-season hockey party; that young and naïve girl was just a memory that seemed more fictitious than real.
Cassandra headed down the stairs toward the kitchen at the back of their three-thousand-square-foot home—much too big for just the three of them—and made a pot of coffee. As she waited standing in front of the garden doors that looked out into the vast back yard lined by a forest at the very far end, she recalled a conversation with her mother the morning of her wedding.
“You sure you don’t want to wait?”
“A little late for that.”
“You look beautiful.”
“Thanks, Mom.” A pause. “Am I making a mistake?”
“We all make mistakes, honey.”
In the mirror, Cassandra shot a look at her mother, eyes rounded and full of desperation.
“Not exactly a vote of confidence.”
“I’m sorry.”
“David isn’t Dad.”
“Didn’t say he was.”
“You don’t like him?”
“I’m not the one marrying him.”
“But?”
Her mother took her time to find her words. “I married too young. I was pregnant, and back in those days, even in the carefree 1970s, girls like me didn’t have many options. So I married your father. I knew in my heart that I didn’t love him, that a careless night of too many drinks and too much smoking up had landed me in the trouble I was in, but I also knew that I didn’t want to give you up. Marrying your father was the compromise that I made so that I could keep you.”
Tears stung Cassandra’s eyes.
“Don’t you go wrecking your makeup now, Cassie girl. You put those tears right back where they belong. I never shed a tear for my choice, and neither will you. I don’t have much in my life, but I got you and you’ve always been more than I needed. Maybe your David will be everything your father wasn’t.”
“And if he’s not?”
Her mother put a hand on her belly. “She’ll be all you need.”
“She?”
“I have a feeling.”
Cassandra pulled a mug from the cupboard and filled it with coffee. She dropped about an ounce of Baileys into it and took a long sip. “Looks like we both failed at choosing the right man,” she said to the empty room and took another sip. “Oh Mom, what should I do now? Angel is almost all grown up. She starts college Tuesday and soon she’ll be moving out and I’ll have nothing but this empty house and a cheating husband.”
She moved back to the garden doors and saw a fading reflection of herself as the sun was slowly rising, a mirror of her faded life. At times like these, her mother’s absence dug deeply into her core. They hadn’t always gotten along, especially when her mom had pushed and pushed and pushed for her to work harder, get better grades, be the best at all the sports, as if somehow that could set her free, but even in those moments of friction, they’d had a special bond, them against the world.
You can be anyone you want to be, honey. Be better than me. Be someone.
Cassandra snorted.
Some someone I am. I’m Mrs. David Knighton, housewife, alcoholic, and all-round useless human being.
Except when it came to Angel.
For her daughter, she had settled for a life full of regrets.
* * *
Cassandra always loved September, especially the way the morning freshness whispered promises of renewed hope, a chance to revisit the shortcomings of the last two months while also keeping the upcoming cold dread of winter as distant as possible. Days were still long and warm, even hot at times, and the evenings were perfect for that favourite sweater that hadn’t been worn since the spring. Fall had a way of making all of life’s follies fade away.
The summer of 1999 had been like that: full of turmoil, lies, and promises colliding and severing hearts. What she had yearned for and what her common sense had told her were as opposite as winter and summer, and looking back, she knew she had thrown away a hint of love as if it were a disposable inconvenience. She had not trusted her intuition, instead believing that it couldn’t last, wasn’t real, that it was a mistake. Going back to David had been the only right thing to do.
But then she had convinced herself that no, she wasn’t going back to him, that he didn’t deserve her after all. He’d cheated on her one too many times.
But David, master persuader, knew how to say the right things.
Cassandra refilled her coffee mug, eyeballed about an ounce of Baileys, and went out back. She stood on the two-tier composite deck that had cost more than Angel’s entire college tuition was going to be, and walked towards the glass railing. She rested her forearms against the top, stared at the inground pool—she sighed at the thought of needing to close it soon, once the weather turned too cool to enjoy a dip—and breathed in the scent of Labour Day weekend.
The doorway to autumn.
Just like she remembered, the air smelled sweet and promising, but also deceitful. What waited after autumn were months of bitter cold, long dark days, and never-ending loneliness.
Cassandra raised the cup to her mouth and took a sip of coffee. She let out a sad breath. If only she had read her mother better on her wedding day, truly listened to what she was telling her.
You didn’t really want to hear it.
That was true. It was too late to change her mind. Almost two hundred people had come to see her, her, walk down that aisle and marry whom everyone thought was the love of her life.
Even at the cost of her friendship with Bradley, she had fallen in love with David at that party. And, for a while, they were the couple. For most of her OAC year, their relationship was solid. But then rumours started to circulate as summer of ’99 approached.
Josée Dubois.
Cassandra and Josée had been number one and two on the volleyball team since their sophomore year, and when her friendship with Bradley cooled, Cassandra began hanging out more and more with Josée.
Her best friend.
How could Josée have done that to her? She simply hadn’t been paying attention, the way Josée seemed to laugh too hard and too long when David was around, the way Josée never took her eyes off of him, the way she was always asking Cassandra how her dates went. She caught none of that because Cassandra was head over heels in love with David Knighton then and nothing could have changed that. Not even when he came grovelling back to her and promised that his thing with Josée had been a mistake, that he would never cheat on her ever again because he loved her, and he couldn’t bear to lose her.
So, she took him back for the first time just before the end of her OAC year. But then a month later on her birthday, he was a no show. How she wished now that she could have seen into her future! What a foolish and gullible girl she had been. As smart as her mom had told her she was—as far as academics went—she hadn’t been that smart with her heart. Guys like David Knighton weren’t the guys you married.
Cassandra touched the pendant around her neck again. She hadn’t worn it in years, had sort of forgotten it until she’d gone looking into her old jewelry box two weeks ago, the one that was lodged at the back of a shelf in the walk-in closet. It had just caught her attention as she was looking for something to wear. Her heart had seemed to shrink even more when she first saw it, but then, as if on autopilot, she’d put it around her neck and hadn’t taken it off since. Angel had noticed and asked her if it was new.
“No,” she’d said. “I just haven’t worn it in a long time.”
Cassandra took a big sip of coffee and felt a warm trail of Baileys slide down her throat. Sad that this was the highlight of her day; even sadder that she hadn’t done anything about it for years. Her excuse had always been Angel: her daughter needing her, her daughter needing her father, her daughter needing the illusory perfect family that Cassandra had fabricated. She felt horrible for being so deceitful, but she’d convinced herself long ago that living the lie was better than the pain the truth would bring.
Lately, though, she wondered whether that had been the right decision. She figured if she was still debating it today, that it must mean it had been wrong. There was no must. She knew, not just in her heart but in her soul, that she had messed up her life, and probably Angel’s too.
A robin landed about four feet from her on the railing, chirped away without a care in the world, and took off. Cassandra followed it until it veered sharply and flew over the house.
She was still young enough to salvage the years that lay ahead without compromising the lie. She could divorce David. God knew he had committed enough adultery to warrant her demands. Angel wasn’t a baby anymore, and yes, she would be hurt to see her parents split up, but Cassandra had lived long enough for her daughter. Wasn’t she allowed a little happiness?
* * *
