Chapter 6 #2
“Well, I’m still in bed and hardly had a wink of sleep,” she told her, “so, no, I guess I’m not really okay. If I’d had some sleep maybe that would help, but today is starting to look a whole lot like more of yesterday.”
Her sister sighed. “I thought a lot about what you found out, and I don’t even know how to make it up to Riley. That it should never have happened is obvious, but that is on me because I put it all in motion. But,” she added, “I don’t really know what happened between the two of you.”
She laughed. “You,” she declared. “You happened.”
Her sister groaned. “I know, but I, … I guess I felt that, if you guys were good together, you wouldn’t have judged him for that.”
“Really, Debbie? After you told everybody that you were carrying his child? After you told everybody that you were engaged, after you told everybody that he had cheated on me with you?” she asked.
“After all those lies, Mom and Dad both did all they could to blackball Riley immediately without a thought,” she reminded Debbie.
“All I heard was He’s bad news, so he’s out of the picture.
I can’t even imagine what all they did to him. ”
“Well, let’s hope they didn’t do anything else,” Debbie wailed, then her voice failed. “But you and I both know they did. He probably had to pay for at least some of his medical expenses that the military didn’t cover, plus he lost his career.”
“Yeah, I know,” Gail acknowledged. “But Riley said something that I need to run by you, again in total confidence.”
“Yes, please,” Debbie replied. “I’ve learned my lesson. Let me help in any way I can.”
“Okay,” Gail began. “Can you tell me what you did for the company when you were there?”
Debbie snorted. “You already know that I answered phones and did filing.”
Gail nodded, even though Debbie couldn’t see that. “What did you file?”
“Gail, that was years ago. I was fired from the family company, remember?”
Gail sighed loudly. “Try to remember. This is important.”
“I don’t understand,” Debbie admitted, “but I filed invoices and contracts and shipping manifests and other boring stuff.”
“Would you remember any of the client names?”
Debbie groaned. “You are really taxing me here, as I just told you how boring my work was.”
“Try, Debbie,” Gail coaxed her.
“I remember some business was in China. Maybe one in Mexico. Don’t even ask me if I remember the company names because I wasn’t interested in all that back then. So I have no memory of that useless stuff. Why are you asking me now?”
“Because Riley made the comment that Dad acted more like a mob boss than some legit businessman.”
After a long pause, Debbie muttered, “Oh … my … God.”
“It’s just a theory,” Gail began, “and you can never tell Mom nor Dad because they would literally kill Riley this time around.”
“But,” Debbie whispered, “it makes so much sense.”
“Doesn’t it?” Gail replied.
Debbie wailed, “Now I’m more scared of our father than I ever was before.”
“Good,” Gail stated. “It might keep you safe. Plus, if I were you, tell Simon that you and Sissy and he all need to move somewhere far, far away. Don’t even tell me where you are. Call me with a different burner phone. I’m not kidding, Debbie.”
“Jesus, I agree with you. I don’t even know what to say, to think. I didn’t sleep much either, and Simon is, well, … let’s just say that he’s pissed.”
“Ya think?” she muttered. “Wait. Why is he pissed?”
Debbie then went into detail, sharing how she finally told her husband everything because it was all bound to come out now, maybe all too soon. He’d only ever known half of the truth about what happened right after they married.
“But is he pissed at you, pissed at me, or pissed at our parents?”
“All of us, I think,” she replied. “He actually left and went to his mom’s house last night after I told him. I begged him not to leave, but he just shook his head and told me, Actions have consequences. I stayed awake most of the night hoping he would come home, but he hasn’t.”
“Jesus,” Gail whispered. “I didn’t mean to blow up your relationship now.”
“Well, it took a long time for us to deal with the reality of what I did in the first place. He knows why I did it though, and that had been my saving grace, at least it has been, but now he’s pretty upset.”
“Did he ever do any time in the service?”
“No, but he lost his father to the military, and his brother is still recovering from his service.”
“Right, I should have remembered that.”
“Well, I didn’t. I mean, it seems to have been an excuse I used at the time, that I just didn’t even think things through,” she muttered. “So, yay me, I’ve screwed up yet again.”
“You didn’t have to tell Simon,” Gail noted generously.
“No, but we try not to keep secrets from each other after what I did do, and this isn’t something new that’s erupted. It’s just something else I didn’t know about that came about because of my actions from before,” she wailed, but the tears were choking her at the same time. “God, we’re a mess.”
“Yeah, we are, and you know what Mom would say. Buck up and smarten up. Life goes on,” she quipped. “Have you talked to her today?”
“I haven’t talked to her in probably a week,” Debbie replied. “Even at that, it’s hard for me to look her in the eye anymore. It’s always that look of how I failed her.”
“Yeah, well, you should be prepared for an earful. You haven’t heard the latest.”
“What’s that?”
Then she told her sister how she’d essentially thrown both parents from her apartment, with some help from the neighbor calling the cops.
Debbie was stunned. “Oh my God.” She kept repeating it over and over.
“Yeah, I know,” Gail stated. “I’ve really disturbed the wasp nest, but there are times when you just have to draw the line. If only I’d figured that out years ago.”
“There absolutely are times that push us to draw those lines,” Debbie agreed, “but you also know that the fallout from that will be massive. You should move too.”
“I do understand that all too well. I saw what they did to you,” she said.
“I’m sitting here in my apartment, refused to go for my wedding dress fitting, refusing to go shmooze with some clients.
So Dad will just have to deal with it. I just don’t even know what to do anymore.
” She groaned. “I feel like I’ve blown up my own life, but instead of feeling upset about it, a part of me is absolutely thrilled. ”
“What about your fiancé?” Debbie asked, puzzled.
“You mean, the man who didn’t even contact me yesterday?”
After a moment of silence, Debbie asked, “What do you mean? Peter didn’t check up on you?”
“Yeah, you heard me. But can’t you just hear Mom in the background saying, Give her space. It’s probably that time of the month, I’m sure she’ll be fine in the morning—or in a week.”
“Oh God, that would so be her, wouldn’t it?”
“Yeah, it would,” Gail agreed bitterly. “And just so you know, I’ve not heard from him at all, not so much as a text.”
“Hang on a minute.” She waited while her sister worked through it. “Wouldn’t he normally text you?”
“Yeah, he absolutely would. There would be a dozen texts a day, a couple email messages, phone calls,” she shared. “There’s been nothing.”
“So, what does that tell you?”
“It tells me that he knows. Yeah, he knows, and he’s been primed to give me space, to give me time.”
“Right, and then you know what’ll happen.”
She groaned because she definitely had some idea. “Yeah, Mom’s probably on her way here. If she’s not already on her way, she will be very quickly. So, imagine how that’ll go over, in this new mood I am currently in.”
“Well, right now, you also know that she won’t give a crap what Dad did, and she would say that you were happy to have it happen.”
“Oh, she already has,” Gail told her immediately. “Happy to have it happen, happy to get rid of a really bad influence in my life,” she repeated, and then she burst into tears.
Her sister groaned and offered, “I can come over there.”
“No, I’m not good company for anybody right now. Something has turned my world upside down, and I just don’t even know how to handle it,” she said. “So, no, do not come.” She looked down at her vibrating phone and grumbled, “Oh, and there’s Mom calling me now.”
“What will you do?” Debbie asked immediately.
“I’m not answering it,” she said. “I need some me-time. Beyond that, maybe I need to talk to Riley.”
“You said you spoke with him already?” she asked hesitantly.
“Yes, we went to the coffee shop. I happened to see that he was in town when I was driving by his mom’s place.”
“What do you mean, driving by? That is not on a main road.”
She hesitated and added, “I know that.”
“Oh God,” she murmured. “You’re not over him, are you?”
Gail stared at her phone and noted the truth that she had been trying to avoid the entire time. “I don’t know what I am,” she murmured.
“Oh, I can tell,” Debbie replied. “You’re still a woman in love, and, after all this time and all the shit everyone has been put through, that will not be an easy path forward.”
“Do you think I don’t already know that?” she asked.
“I can also tell you something else. Riley’s not one to back down.”
“And that’s the problem. I don’t know that he cares about me anymore,” Gail admitted, “because I think that boat has probably sailed, along with all the other betrayals that we shot into his world. But he’s here, he had coffee with me, and, yeah, he’s got some physical issues now, compliments of our family,” she shared bitterly.
“Yet I’ve got to tell you, he still looked to be the very same man I knew. ”
“The same man,” her sister added, “who took absolutely everything we dished out and just knew at some point we would get back on track.”
“Yeah, you were friends with him before me,” Gail remembered. “I forgot that.”
“And then,” Debbie added, “look what we did to him.” With that, Debbie was crying again and ended the call.
Before Gail got lost in her mind of rambling thoughts, she quickly wrote down the company names she had entertained over the years. She also took a photo of it. Not sure who to send it to.