This was an ongoing paranoia at the best of times. Michelle clearly suspected something, given the number of times I’ve tripped or hesitated over Ben’s name. And it was only getting worse over the last few weeks when I’ve been living with him full time. I’d catch myself way too much getting ready to say ‘Daddy’. It was only a fraction of a second each time, but it felt like hours.
I was going to slip up at some point. I knew it. And with my luck it would be in front of his parents. Still, a quick look around and no one seemed to notice my hesitation, so crisis averted for the moment.
I was jostled out of thoughts by Helen giving me some tips on how to best use the device. The others cleared out for a moment to get the luggage and to be spared the intricacies of sewing machine use. I was nodding and smiling politely. It might be an old machine, but I’d been using it since I was a kid. I could make that thing stand up and do a jig if I needed to.
“It’s just nice to have someone talk to about sewing and crafting things. I’m glad you’ll be able to take care of Ben when he needs something hemmed or made. Poor Beth was never really much good at that sort of thing,” Helen said.
I mean, seriously, how do you respond to that? I suspected this was her way of trying to bond with me, but God, I didn’t want to do that by throwing a dead woman I didn’t know under the bus. Daddy would never forgive me.
Fortunately I was saved when Mike brought their luggage into the room, and I gave them some time to get squared away. I tried to bury the incident just because I didn’t want either Daddy or Meg to ask what was wrong because that was not a conversation I wanted to have with either of them.
But it kept cropping up during the rest of the day. Just little mentions when no one else was in earshot. Helen said how lovely I looked, which was nice because Beth was very…. relaxed about her appearance. And when I was trying to give her a hand prepping supper while Daddy was outside barbecuing, She was making a pie while I put together a salad and some mashed potatoes. Bare bones stuff, but I got a reference that Beth didn’t like to cook much and her and Ben used to eat too much take-out for her liking.
I was trying to figure out a way to delicately say that perhaps she might want to dial it back a bit in case Ben or Meg heard when she hit me with the big one.
“I know how much he loves you. It’s so each to tell, which is good because we were so worried about him after Beth passed. And I know it’s early yet, but hopefully the two of you will have kids. I mean, not just because Mike and I would love to spoil some grandchildren, but I know how crushed Ben was when he found out Beth couldn’t have kids. He always wanted them, but by the time he found out, they were married, and what could he do then?” she said.
That was, in no way, anything resembling what Daddy told me had happened. I was about to ramble out something about we hadn’t really talked about children yet, when I looked up from the cutting board and saw Meg.
Over the last six or seven months Meg has humiliated me, infuriated me, made me laugh, been a good sounding board and, gradually, she was becoming a friend. Never in all that time did I feel sorry for her.
Right until that second. She just looked…. ashen.
I was going to say something, but she waved me off.
“Helen, the boys have just about finished the steaks. You’ve got your five minute warning,” she said, and forced a smile.
“Thank you, dear. We are just about ready for them.”
Meg forced the smile again and walked back towards the front deck. Ok, waved off or not, I had to say something or it was going to be four days of uncomfortable criticisms of Beth. And Daddy was going to hear it at some point and it would break his heart.
“Helen,” I said, tentatively, somewhat aware she was holding a knife.
“Yes, dear?”
“I really am appreciative of how welcoming you’ve been. We sometimes get looks because Ben has a few years on me, so it’s really great how ok you are with this,” I said.
She came over and chopped up some more veggies and threw them in a bowl. Apparently my salad was deficient. “You make him happy. That’s all that matters to me.”
“I’m glad,” I said. I hesitated for a second and then took the plunge. “You know, he still talks about Beth to me fairly regularly.”
She looked at me, surprised and with a look indicating she was puzzled why her son would talk about his dead wife with his current girlfriend.
I continued. “And I’m glad he does. I want to know about her because he’s so important to me and she was so important to him. She helped shape who he is now. And I think talking about her helps when he gets sad. Which still happens sometimes.”
She shook her head. “It’s been almost three years. He should be over that accident by now. I hoped he was now that he’s with you.”
“I’m not sure he will ever be 100% over it. It was traumatic. And… and I think he would be really hurt if he overheard you talking about Beth like that, or comparing her to me. So maybe while visiting you could perhaps take it easy on that. Please. I’d hate for him to get upset.”
It was a wussy way of going about it, but I couldn’t exactly tell my potential future mother-in-law to fuck off comparing me to my boyfriend’s dead wife because it’s really tacky, but it was as delicate as I could muster. I hoped she would take it ok.
I saw the look on her face. Hope away, Kitten because she’s not happy.
“I see,” she said. “Well, I’ll try and be more careful of what I say in the future.”
Oh boy. Fortunately, Daddy and Mike came in with a plate of steaks, mercifully ending the awkwardness. Still, I’d probably just made the next three days incredibly awkward because I felt sorry for someone that still drove me nuts half the time.
Supper was slightly weird, but Daddy and Mike seemed too distracted to pick up the weird vibe coming from the women at the table. After supper, Daddy offered to do the dishes and, to his surprise, his mom said that would be lovely. She was feeling tired and was going to lie down for a bit. Mike said he’d join her. Meg said she was going to go for a walk and, spur of the moment, I asked if she wanted some company.
“Actually, yeah,” she said.
“Great, so I’m stuck with doing all the dishes,” Daddy complained.
“I’ll make it up to you later,” I said, getting on my toes and kissing him on the cheek.
“Promises, promises,” he grumbled.
“I always keep my promises, Daddy,” I whispered.
Now all he had to do was let me keep my promise. I hadn’t been fucked in days and I was getting antsy.
It was still plenty warm enough when we got outside and the sun wasn’t going to set for another hour or so. Meg was waiting outside by her car and looked a little sheepish.
“I was actually just going to go up behind the sauna and sneak a cigarette, but now I guess I have to exercise or something. Where do we go?” she asked.
“Actually, if you think you can handle a short walk, I know the perfect place,” I said. She gestured for me to take the lead and I began marching up the hill, past the sauna and jacuzzi and followed a path into the woods.
I had never been much interested in exploring the rest of the land Daddy owned. The house was on a couple of acres of land. I viewed it more as a buffer from neighbors than something to be explored. But once I moved here at the end of April, Daddy insisted on doing some hiking. And it turns out there’s some nice trails and spots. I was taking Meg to one of them now.
She didn’t say much during the hike. I figured she was just being contemplative, but she also might have been just trying to save her breath. The trail sloped upwards most of the way. After about 15 minutes the climb stopped and we came to the edge of a rise. Below was a stream which had about a 20 foot waterfall, and then a small pool before continuing on its way down to the lake.
I’d hinted to Daddy that might be a good spot to do some clothing optional swimming, but he hadn’t taken me up on it…. yet.
I could hear Meg trying to catch her breath a bit. I pointed out some rocks where she could sit down. She trudged over and sat down.
“I was beginning to think this was a particularly masochistic way of trying to kill me,” she said.
“Please, you walk everywhere in Toronto,” I said, sitting down next to her. She pulled out a pack of cigarettes from a pocket in her shorts and shook one out. She was waiting to catch her breath before lighting it.
“Yes, but everywhere is flat. I take elevators if I have to climb more than two flights of stairs,” she said. I shook my head, and then the two of us lapsed into silence, just enjoying the waterfalls and the view. I knew she wanted to talk, so I figured I’d let her make the first move.
After about five minutes of sitting and fussing with the cigarette, she pulled out a lighter, lit it, and took a deep pull. She exhaled the smoke away from me.
“They keep forgetting, you know,” she said.
“Forgetting what?”
“That Beth wasn’t just Ben’s wife, she was my best friend,” she said, her voice getting uncharacteristically soft. “She moved onto my street in Grade 3 and we were inseparable. We slept over at each other’s house. We talked about who we had a crush on. Our first periods started the same week, for Christ’s sake. She was the first person I told that I might like girls….”
“I didn’t know you were gay,” I said. “Ben never mentioned it.”
“Bi,” she explained. “My first marriage was to a guy, and it was a disaster so I thought I should just go back to chasing after girls. Got married again, this time to a woman. Another disaster. I’m just not the marrying kind, apparently.
“Anyway, we did everything together. When Ben wanted to marry her, he didn’t ask her father for permission, he asked me. And I said yes, but that he always had to protect her because she was the most important person in the world to me,” she said, and now she choked back a sob.
There have been times when I would have cheerfully strangled Meg, but I wasn’t so big a bitch that my heart wasn’t breaking a bit listening to her. I leaned over and put my arm around her and squeezed. She didn’t object and for a few moments we were quiet.