Maude, standing only a few yards away, paled with fright and looked ready to change her underwear when I mentioned ‘accomplices’; obviously she knew exactly who I was talking about.
“I will be pressing charges, Bella,” I stated. “With those charges, and all the others the police will be bringing, you can look forward to a nice long spell in the lockup; who knows, while you’re there, maybe you can write autobiographies of daddy the shit-shoveller, and your beloved uncle, you know the one I mean, the pimp and profiteer?”
The old woman had gone from purple fury to the color of old yogurt as I unreeled the list of things she’d done to piss the family off.
“One last thing, Bella: this is not your family, you have no place among civilized people, you’ve proved that again and again, and if you ever come within five hundred meters of my family, my home, me, David, or anyone else I choose to put in the restraining order, I think they call it a ‘court order’ here, or attempt to contact, intimidate, harass, or interfere in any way with anyone connected with me and mine, I will make it my business to make sure you go to jail, go directly to jail, do not pass go, and do not collect $200; do I make myself clear? Rosie…?”
Rosie had been champing at the bit the whole time, obviously raring to go Ground-Zero on the miserable old bat, and Bella actually shrank back as Rosie let rip on her.
“How dare you set yourself up as though you have any say in this family, Bella? David was perfectly prepared to make your life comfortable for you, not because he had to, but because he wanted to, because he’s civilized and compassionate, but you, you’re such a venomous, greedy old rat-bag you tried to grab it all, when you’re entitled to nothing from the Denham estates, nothing at all. Uncle David inherited everything, and he passed it on to his son; that David chose to share with you should tell you what kind of man he is. Now you get nothing, and you get to explain to the police the string of frauds you’ve perpetrated to squeeze money from funds and an inheritance that don’t have your name on them, from a family you’re not even a member of! Fine example of a grandmother you are! I hope they chuck you in gaol, you’re a bloody disgrace!”
She paused for breath, glimpsed Maude cowering a ways back, and the battle-light in her eyes flared up again.
“And you, Maude, don’t think you’re getting away with anything! Aunt Jane left a detailed record of all the snide little tricks you and this disgusting, grasping old snob tried to use; David’s trustees have all the lying letters and forged documents the pair of you concocted, and they make really interesting reading; when they pass those to the police, and trust me, they will, they’re on tenterhooks just waiting for the word that will get you tossed in gaol, you’re going to be sitting in the cell right next to Bella’s! The two of you are a pair of disgusting, greedy, work-shy, lying, thieving criminals, and I hope they throw the book at the pair of you. Let’s go, Lori, it stinks around here!”
‘Nuff said.
*
A blast from the past and the cat’s out of the bag (again)…
Josie and Sara’s arrival finally cleared all the unpleasantness of the confrontation out of my head; my two best friends in the world were here, and soon I’d be marrying David in a beautiful, historic church. Life didn’t get much better for me. They were both suitably impressed when I arrived in Jimmy’s limo, and Jimmy stowed their luggage and bowed them into the car in the grand chauffeur style (winking slyly at me as he did so, while I struggled to keep a straight face).
The girls were agog to meet David, the mystery man I was marrying, but all I would tell them was that he was still at work and wouldn’t be home until that evening; I’d managed to keep it from them that my David was also their David, but I think they were starting to put two and two together, or at least Josie was, and Sara was giving me some very odd looks. They’d already asked several times where Davey was (note how I was careful to keep ‘David’ and ‘Davey’ separate), and my slightly panicky, evasive, non-committal answers were beginning to make their antennae twitch.
I got the girls settled in, called Sophie to let her know they were here so Operation Bridesmaid could swing into action, and gnawed my fingernails down to the elbows waiting for Davey to call and tell me he was on the way; to be honest, I was unsure how to spring it on them that Davey was David; they’d known him since they were out of diapers, he was their almost-big-brother, and I had no idea which way they were going to jump when they found out. Just as my worrying reached fever-pitch, Jimmy called to say they were about 30 minutes out, and that’s when full-scale panic-mode really set in; it actually took me a while to realize the clacking sound I could hear were my teeth chattering…
As soon as Davey walked in the door he was almost bowled over by the girls flinging themselves on him, hugging him, kissing him frenziedly, and chattering, laughing and crying all at the same time. Poor Davey looked a little startled by it all; I don’t think he ever really believed that Josie and Sara had missed him so much, despite what I’d told him, so he was caught a little off-balance when they’d leaped on him like that, but it made me smile a little; obviously, their feelings for him hadn’t dimmed with the passage of time and maybe, just maybe, it would make it easier to tell them what they needed to know.
Sara was the first to quit mauling Davey and stop for a breather, although that didn’t mean she let go of him. Josie ditto, so the two of them were hugged onto him, his arms around them, big smiles all round, and then Sara asked the $64, 000 question:
“So Lori, where’s the mystery man? When’s this ‘David Denham’ going to show up? Talk, Keene; where’s the groom-to-be, shouldn’t he be here too?”
This was it: showtime…
Davey gently unhooked the girls’ arms from round his waist and came to stand next to me, knowing how difficult this was for me, and giving me his support. Sara had ‘that look’ on her face again, so I just plunged in.
“Sara, Jose, David Denham, the man I’m going to marry, is… right here; Davey IS David Denham, not Davey Keene; his real name is David Denham, it always has been…”
Sara’s eyes widened, then narrowed, while Josie slowly nodded; obviously, something had just become clear to her. Sara, though, was a little more direct…
“Are you fucking kidding me right now?” she yelled, “He’s your fucking brother! What kind of fucked-up retards are you, the pair of you? You can’t marry your brother, Lori, it’s fucking illegal!”
I tried to step in, calm her down, something, anything, but she backed away, her eyes blazing.
“How in the name of all fuckery did you two manage to get to this? What were you thinking? Chrissake, Lori, he’s your brother! Are you insane? Are both of you fucking crazy?”
Davey moved. Maybe he thought he could reason with her, but all he did was draw her attention.
“YOU!” she bawled, and in two quick steps was right in front of him. Before I could move, she’d slapped him across the face, the slap echoing like a gunshot in the sudden silence. Davey rocked back; she’d really put her shoulder into it, and it must have hurt him, but he made no move to push her away or retaliate.
“She’s your little sister, you moron, you’re supposed to protect her, not… be… with her like that, that’s just sick! What the fuck were you thinking? You’re both supposed to be grown-ups, what the fuck is wrong with the pair of you…?”
I tried to speak, to reason with her, but Josie held her hand up to silence me.
“Sara, calm down, there’s more to this, Sara, listen to me!”
Sara paused in mid-tirade as Josie grabbed her arm.
“What, whaddya mean, what’s going on, more what?”
Josie stepped between Sara and me, and motioned me back behind her back.
“Listen Sara, just shut up! Lori’s been in love with Davey since she was a little girl; so have you, and so have I. Don’t you remember how hurt she was, how angry, when Davey left? Only someone in love can be that hurt. Davey’s only her half-brother, I worked that out a long time ago, maybe that counts for something, but right now Lori’s alone, she needs you and me, we’re all she has, so are you going to shut the hell up for five minutes and just listen?”
Sara glared balefully at Davey, then stabbed her finger forcefully at me.
“Five minutes, that’s all, then I’m gonna knock your fuckin’ heads together! Of all the stupid, hillbilly, shit-for-brains, fucked-up…!”
“Sara, enough!” barked Josie, grabbing her hand. “And you,” she pointed at me, “start talking!”
Davey took my hand and squeezed it reassuringly. Sara’s eyes narrowed dangerously at that, but she didn’t say anything, so I started to explain, even rationalize, what really was so weird, but so wonderful, too.
“I guess the place to start is the day Davey left; you both remember how mad I was, how I felt; didn’t we talk enough about it? All I wanted was Davey home, but the way I saw it, he didn’t think my home was his home. He thought his home was here, and he wanted to come back here. So I decided to hate him, and I kept-on hating him; I kept that up for years; you remember that, both of you do, you were there with me, missing him as much as I did; I saw what you both did, how you were when you didn’t know I was watching….”
Josie was nodding, obviously remembering how it had been with me, and her own silent pain that Davey had gone from our lives; Sara, however was flinty-eyed, her expression neither understanding nor compassionate. I plowed on regardless; I’d come this far, now I had to tell it to the end, and see what happened next.
“Then I found something, something that changed everything. I was thirteen and one evening daddy asked me to go get something from the bureau in the study, and a picture just fell out and landed in front of me. It was a picture of Davey, in school, almost eighteen, the first one I’d seen in over two years, but all I could see was his smile, that smile I hadn’t seen in so long; he looked so beautiful, so different, yet still the same, still my Davey, and it twisted me up inside; I wanted to hate him, but I couldn’t; I couldn’t, he was there, and he was smiling at me, and it had been so long, too long…”