Chapter 57 The Future
THE FUTURE
MAGGIE
“And we even went to a penis park!” I giggled to Celeste. “I swear to you, I have the pictures, there is an honest to God park you can visit there that has these penis statues everywhere!”
My best friend’s jaw fell open as my husband snorted into his coffee mug beside me.
We sat at the counter of The Comfy Cushion, regaling Celeste with more tales of our brief time overseas.
Celeste had never traveled further than Atlanta and found our stories as wild as dragon fantasies.
She kept wiping down the same forks as she hung onto our every word.
I may have embellished a bit in response to such a captive audience.
“Yeah, it’s all for a fertility god or something, like we have to worship the penis to get lots of babies!”
“Babies, huh?” Celeste prompted with a grin. “And when are we gonna talk about babies for the Hayes family?”
Her jest may have been playful, but a wave of distress washed over me.
I still couldn’t bring myself to come clean about my eating disorder with her.
She was my best friend, and I knew she wouldn’t judge me, yet somehow telling her about what I had been doing all these years made me too ashamed to admit the truth.
Barb always encouraged me to take the time I needed.
She said it was up to me to decide when I was ready to come clean.
“Actually, Maggie and I decided we aren’t going to have kids,” Zeke supplied. “And at the end of the day, that’s a choice only the two of us can make, so it’s really no one’s business but ours.”
Gratitude surged through me. Zeke didn’t want me to disclose my body dysmorphia if I wasn’t ready. He gave me an out while politely reminding Celeste that our family making decisions weren’t up for debate.
God, I loved this man.
Celeste appeared momentarily stunned before nodding. “Of course. Being a parent is a serious job. No one should do it if they don’t want to.”
I could tell that she wanted to pry more, though.
We never actually talked about our futures since Celeste’s had sort of been decided for her and I was too chicken shit to actually think about mine.
Most people in River’s Run just assumed women wanted to be mothers.
It was more of an expectation than an outright desire.
Not a lot of critical thinking involved.
“I love being Iris’ godmother and if you ever bless me with any more honorary nieces and nephews, I promise to spoil the shit out of them,” I vowed. “Motherhood just isn’t something I want for myself. I don’t think I could handle a pregnancy.”
Her signature small smile made an appearance, then vanished. “Iris might be all I have.”
Should I tell her about Wes reaching out to me?
Guilt swirled in my gut as a mental war raged between the two sides of my conscience. If telling Celeste about Wesley’s message did more harm than good, what would be the point of saying anything?
Yet she deserved to know. I would want her to speak up if Zeke tried to reach out. Not that I would let him go after this.
As if he could read my thoughts, Zeke smiled and placed a comforting hand on my thigh. He leaned in close to my ear to whisper, “I’m so proud of you.”
“For what?”
I glanced down at my plate, assuming it had something to do with how much I managed to eat. Half a slice of wheat toast and most of the fruit on the plate were gone, which didn’t seem like much to some people, but Zeke knew my eating habits better than I did by now.
“For admitting something so hard to Celeste. That takes guts.” Zeke placed a gentle kiss to my temple and I warmed at his praise.
“Ugh, get a room, you two!” Celeste griped. She stuck her fingers in my water glass and flicked the droplets at us, making all of us laugh.
The temperature of the room fell by several degrees as Desiree, Celeste’s stepmother, entered the diner behind us.
My best friend’s joy instantly evaporated and Zeke immediately threw a couple twenty dollar bills down on the counter when he sensed me bristling with rage.
I had already told off one parental figure that morning. Why not continue down the list?
Zeke wrapped a firm arm around my shoulders to steer me towards the exit, nodding to Desiree as we swept past. I waited until we crossed the street before shaking him off.
“I had a right to tell her where to shove it!” I argued.
“Always getting in to trouble,” he teased. “I have no doubt you could’ve insulted that woman from here to Doomsday, but Celeste didn’t look like she needed that right then.”
My shoulders slumped as I accepted the truth of that statement. Desiree still pulled all the strings when it came to Celeste.
Zeke took my hand in his, trying to distract the depressing thoughts. “I love you, Mrs. Hayes.”
It worked, damn him.
“I love you more, Mr. Hayes.”
Since Zeke still didn’t have an assigned unit to report to after the disastrous meeting with General Leggett, we had nothing but time until someone from his new chain of command notified him.
We continued down the street, hand in hand, while I pointed out all the local businesses and their corresponding town gossip.
“That over there is Mike Greenwald’s sporting goods store. He actually played football for Georgia State, and if you give him enough of your time, he’ll recount every single play he ever made while on the team. Some of the hunters in the area are still trapped inside, waiting for him to shut up!
“And that little boutique up ahead? Sandra McCleary owns it.
She makes her daughter, Willa Jo, model all the clothing, even though none of it fits right.
Willa Jo hates it so much that she threatened to burn the whole shop down!
All the kids at school made fun of her because her clothes were so damn ugly.
“Now, across the street you can see—”
“My word, Maggie, what happened to you?” Diana’s voice cut me off, and I instantly felt as if I was sinking into a pit of quicksand.
Her calculating eyes assessed me, starting with my feet in what I realized were scuffed up flats all the way up to my sheared hair.
A hand came to her chest as if Diana was so stricken with the changes in my appearance that she had to catch her breath.
Everything might have changed in my world over the past several months, but time stood still for Diana Eaton.
Her long brown hair still hung in stringy curls along the side of her face, and I could tell just from sight that she had to use way too much hairspray to get them to hold.
Thick makeup coated her face that either she didn’t know how to blend in at her neck or did not match well to her skin tone.
I recognized one of my old dresses, one that I discarded for being too tight and itchy, on her lanky frame.
For once, she was without a male presence of any kind, and I couldn’t help but wonder if she was just leaving a man’s house or on her way to one.
Rather than say anything, I merely nodded, and pulled Zeke around her. I had no desire to engage in conversation with this woman.
“You really don’t have anything to say to me?” There was a hint of surprise and intrigue to Diana’s voice that I’ve never heard her use with me before.
Sighing, I turned to face her so she could see the honesty in my expression. “No, I don’t.”
“But I’m your mother!” Her harsh whisper was followed by a quick glance up and down the street. Couldn’t have a potential boyfriend know her real age.
“Don’t even use that excuse with her!” Zeke balled up his fists as he stepped towards her, ready to defend me like I did for him earlier in Leggett’s office.
I reached out to grab his wrist, minutely shaking my head. No, this was something I needed to do. In fact, I had needed to do it for a long time.
As I cautiously approached her, Diana’s cold assessment began again.
“Not sure what possessed you to cut off all your hair like that, but then again, looking like a man is all the rage these days. Good luck keeping that man’s attention when he can’t separate you from all the soldiers around him!
” She giggled like she just made a witty joke.
“I don’t care about your opinion,” I said simply. And as the words slipped out, I could practically feel the shackles freeing from my wrists. “I love my new haircut. I love the way it makes me feel. Make whatever comments you want, but they don’t matter to me anymore.”
“Honey, I’m only trying to help you! What is a good looking man like that gonna want with a girl who doesn’t take care of herself?
You look like you’ve gained weight since I saw you, too.
Honestly, Maggie, what has gotten into you?
I taught you better than this!” Diana gestured to Zeke behind me before sadly shaking her head with another perusal of my body.
In the past, comments like these would have led me on a self-hatred spiral.
I would have immediately gone to the bathroom to perform my ritual, marking up all the areas in the mirror that she pointed out to me before forcing myself to purge everything I just ate down at The Comfy Cushion.
I would have cried in the shower as I washed myself, letting her criticisms drown out all the other noise as I repeatedly told myself that I was ugly.
For the rest of the day, I would’ve refused to eat, probably even foregoing water in case it led to any bloating.
I would have jumped on the scale at least a dozen times until I saw the numbers drop.
The allure of that spiral hung in the air like a phantom. It beckoned me to follow, to return to my old patterns. To fix all the things that made me such an ugly duckling. I didn’t deserve a gorgeous husband like Zeke Hayes. Not when every word she said was true.
Except…none of it was true. Having short hair didn’t make me look like a man, and even if it did, why did that mean I was any less worthy of love? Love had no sight, no scales of judgement, no sense of merit. Zeke showed me time and time again that he loved every single thing about me.
You’re not a burden, you’re a gift.
And in that moment, I didn’t really care about Zeke’s love for me as much as I cared about my love for myself.
I had such a long road ahead of me. I still couldn’t eat a full meal.
Desserts sent me into a panic attack. Mirrors made it too easy for me to fall back into old patterns.
But I wanted to get better more than I wanted to keep letting Diana’s comments control me.
“I hope that someday you find out what love truly is. Maybe then you’ll be lucky enough to meet a man like Zeke, who sees everything on the inside, beauty and ugly alike, and loves you anyway. Until then, I want nothing to do with you. Good-bye…Mom.”
Somewhere in my heart of hearts, the little girl desperate for love smiled, taking the phantom and shackles with her as she disappeared. Barb would be so happy with my progress.
Grabbing Zeke’s hand again, I led him down the street toward Marla’s bakery, leaving Diana sputtering in confusion behind me. He didn’t say anything, but the resulting squeeze and gleam in his eye let me know that my declaration meant the world to him.
Marla herself stood outside in the middle of the road, shouting out instructions to two men on a forklift installing the new sign on the outside of the building. Shielding her eyes from the sun with one hand, she ordered the guy on the left to raise the sign a quarter of an inch.
“No, a quarter! A QUARTER! I swear, don’t they teach fractions at school anymore!” lamented Marla.
Zeke and I exchanged a grin as we walk up to stand beside her.
“It looks real good!” I smiled at the cute sign that she had custom made for her bakery.
“It’ll look better when these two nimrods figure out how to make things level!” Something about our appearance caught her eye enough for her to drop her hand and look at us dead on. “Y’all look like you’re about to head out on an adventure. What’s going on?”
“Oh, we’ll find some kind of trouble,” I agreed cheerfully. I shot Zeke a conspiratorial wink.
Marla’s attention shot back to the sign. “C’mon, did they send a couple of idiots to do this?! Newborn babies have better eyesight than that, fellas!” Without another word, she stormed towards the lift.
Zeke pulled me flush against his chest, one hand sneaking up to cup my cheek while the other held me in place at the hip. Instinctively, my own hands followed, pinning him to me, a slap-happy grin on my face.
“See, Trouble, even Marla knows what to expect from you!” he teased.
“Um, I believe she said we look like we’re going on an adventure!”
There was no doubt about the love that flooded his eyes as he gazed at me. “Then what do you say, Mrs. Hayes? Care to go on an adventure with me, every day, for the rest of our lives?”
I pursed my lips as I pretended to contemplate the question. He grinned in response, his mouth drawing closer to mine.
“Alright,” I agreed. “You can count me in.”