Chapter 5 #2
“Maybe, and maybe I just don’t know what I want.”
“Of course you don’t know what you want,” Kelly stated, her eyes squinting. “Yet you were pretty quick to ditch him when he got home, weren’t you?”
She stared at her sister. “That’s not fair.”
“Sure, it’s fair,” she argued, with a shrug. “I’m sitting here, watching you go to pieces, trying to help you make all the right decisions, and yet … you see him once, and there you are, all over him again.”
“No, that’s not true,” Keisha countered, staring at Kelly. “I don’t remember how that divorce decision came about in the first place. I just remember thinking that he was a completely different person and that I didn’t know him anymore.”
“That’s exactly how you get to those kinds of decisions,” Kelly noted, frowning at her. “You realize that the person you married isn’t the same person anymore.”
“Maybe not,” Keisha muttered. “Anyway, it doesn’t matter, and he was looking fine today.”
“Looking fine,” Kelly repeated, then shook her head. “Jesus Christ, if you turn around and go backward again on this whole thing …”
“I’m not going backward. There is no backward to even go.” She stared at Kelly, shook her head, and muttered, “Jesus Christ.”
“What?”
“Never mind.” Keisha quickly served dinner, giving her sister a plate and then sat down to eat herself.
Kelly stared at the food on the plate and immediately said, “I’m not hungry.” And she wheeled herself away.
Realizing that Kelly’s issue was all because of the talk about Jaxon, Keisha called out, “I’m not going back on my word.”
“Not yet but you will. He’ll snap his fingers, and, just like that, you’ll be gone again,” Kelly spat, tears in her eyes as she stopped at the doorway.
“But that’s okay too. You go off and do your thing.
” With that, she turned and wheeled as fast as she could wheel herself down the hallway to her bedroom.
Keisha shook her head. It always ended up this way. Conversations about her and Jaxon ended with Kelly in tears that would take days to calm her down. And, in that moment, Keisha realized that one of the biggest reasons why she had started the whole separation with her husband was because of Kelly.
It wasn’t even so much … Then she stopped and whispered to herself, “Now stop it. You can’t blame your sister for this. You’re the one going through the whole you don’t know who he is anymore issue.”
In all fairness, Kelly had been pretty big on making Keisha see who and what she was, what she was looking for now. So, she couldn’t blame her sister for putting herself in this spot. Still, Keisha also didn’t understand why seeing him today had changed something in her, and yet it had.
Confused, frustrated, and angry, Keisha went out for a walk, taking Harley and Homer.
Both Heinz fifty-seven mixes of medium build somewhat resembling black labs.
But they were company for each other. She should have taken them to The Haven today.
They’d have loved it, but she’d left from the clinic early to collect the llamas and deliver them so hadn’t thought far enough ahead to take the dogs.
She needed to do more trips like that with them.
They were pets that she didn’t get much of a chance to be with because she was always at the clinic, always working, always doing something, and of course, the always doing something part was that she was trying to redo the mess her life was in.
She’d married quickly, and Kelly had disapproved horribly.
Jaxon and Kelly did not have a great relationship between them.
He’d never had a whole lot of patience for Kelly, and Kelly had left no doubt about her intolerance for him.
Then he’d been deployed, and he was gone.
The timing had been good because Keisha couldn’t handle the bickering between Jaxon and Kelly anymore.
So, with him on assignment, Keisha and Kelly had settled into a more pleasant routine.
Then, all of a sudden, he returned, but he was damaged, injured, and Keisha just hadn’t known how to handle it.
They’d been apart just long enough that she felt single again and had loved the peace and quiet of being home with one less person to consider.
Although she had missed him terribly, she hadn’t missed the problems with Jaxon and her sister, to the point that Keisha wondered if she had made the wrong choice in marrying Jaxon.
Kelly had been quick to point out all the things that were wrong with him, and Keisha had listened. Whether that was right or wrong, she didn’t know, and now she wondered how much she had just wanted that peace and quiet and how unfair that was to him.
Tears in her eyes, she headed back home. When her cell phone rang, she answered it almost absentmindedly.
“So, did you go see him?” asked the computerized voice on the other end, followed by mocking laughter.
Not knowing who was calling her, Keisha disconnected.
But she recognized this cruel taunting nonetheless because Keisha had been tormented online to the point that she had stopped using any social media accounts—all because this one person kept bugging her about her partner, about what a waste of space he was.
Broken, useless, somebody this particular person didn’t want to be seen with.
So, Keisha had deactivated every online SM account she had, not knowing how this person had even gotten a hold of her, and yet they had.
Then, out of the blue, they got her phone number.
It had driven Keisha batty, but she hadn’t told anybody, and it shouldn’t have played any part in her decision to divorce Jaxon.
Yet always lingering on the edge of her subconscious was the idea that all these problems would go away if she divorced him.
Again, not fair to him and not fair to the ache in her heart either. Yet somehow, somewhere along the line, life had seemed so much easier before.
With a heavy sigh, she walked back up to the house and realized her sister had locked the door while she was out, so Keisha was forced to call her.
When Kelly finally opened the door, she glared at her. “Like I need more exercise in a day,” she snapped.
“I’m sorry, but I didn’t realize you were locking up.”
“I didn’t lock up,” she declared, staring at her. “That was you.” And, with that, she turned in a huff and headed back to her bedroom.
Keisha wasn’t sure whether she had or hadn’t, but had been tired enough that maybe she had made such a mistake.
She felt foolish and worn out and quickly headed to bed.
As soon as she got there, she couldn’t sleep.
Every thought, every deed, every act, every insecurity she had just piled on to the point that she didn’t even know what she was doing anymore.
Then, just when she was almost asleep, the phone call came again.
Private Number.
These crank calls never came with a number. She immediately answered and asked, “How did you get this number?”
The mechanical voice laughed, and then it disconnected.
Shaky, worried, sad, and confused, Keisha finally fell into a deep but fitful sleep.
She woke up the next morning, exhausted and worn out, wondering what the hell she was doing with her life. Confused and tired, she collapsed back again, this time finding a way to sleep a little bit longer and, to a certain extent, a little bit better.