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“I talked to Cheryl today, and you’ll never believe it. She has my dead husband’s mistress and love child living with her.”
“What?”
She doesn’t look at me as she speaks. “Yeah. Apparently, Stacy had nowhere else to stay since her ATM died in a car crash, so she let her and Mikey move in there.”
“And this bothers you?”
Now, she looks at me. No, now she glares at me. “Yes, it fucking bothers me. That woman is a home-wrecking whore. She knew about me. She knew Michael was married, and she chose to stay with him for years.”
This may not be the right thing to say, but I feel the need to say it anyway. “Are you sure that she knew?”
“What?”
“I mean, are you sure that she knew that he was married?”
She scoffs. “How could she not know?”
“You didn’t know he was cheating on you. You didn’t know he had a whole other life,” I say.
“What the hell are you trying to say, Jonas?” She snaps.
“I’m saying that you’re placing a whole lot of blame in all the places that maybe it doesn’t belong. Maybe he lied to Stacy just like he lied to you. Maybe she thought she was the only one. And you’re blaming Cheryl for wanting to get to know her grandson.”
“You sound just like she does.”
“So, why is this such a big deal? Think about it. Michael lied to his own mother for years about that little boy. I know if my momma found out she had a grandbaby she didn’t know about, she would want to spend every single second she could making up for lost time.” I try taking her hand, but she pulls away.
I continue. “There is one villain in this story, and it’s Michael, plain and simple. He manipulated everyone in his life to fit into the mold of all of his lies. Even now, he is still manipulating you. He’s making you believe you have to hate a woman you don’t even know. He’s making you scared to move on to something new, no matter how great it could be. You aren’t going to be able to live your life…truly live your life…until you can find some closure and put all of this behind you.”
I know that none of this is what she wants to hear, and her demeanor shows that. Her walls are all the way up, and I half expect her to kick me out any minute.
“You’re supposed to be on MY side,” she says.
“I am on your side. I’m onourside, and we are never going to be able to keep moving forward until you put the past behind you. And to do that, I think that you need some closure.”
“Like you have made peace with Jessie? You want to talk to me about holding onto things. Take a look in the mirror.”
I sigh. “You’re right. And I’m trying to move past my anger to have a relationship with him. Maybe it’s time to take your own advice and deal with the past instead of locking it away. You don’t even want to know anything about your parents, and I think that not knowing haunts you.”
“Don’t start with that bullshit. They abandoned me. I don’t want to know.”
I throw my hands up. “But look how angry you still are about it. What if they had a good reason, and you’ll never know? You’ll just hate them anyway.”
“And that’sMY choice if I want to hate them!” Tears are now streaking her cheeks, and I don’t know how we ended up here.
I was just trying to get her to find some closure, but clearly, it backfired. This whole thing has backfired on me.
“I’m just saying that it’s good to let go of some of that anger, or it will eat you up inside. And I know how special Cheryl is to you. Don’t add her to the list of people you hate. She just wants to get to know her grandkid. Put yourself in her shoes. Wouldn’t you want to get to know your grandkid? And if you were Stacy, wouldn’t you want your kid to get to know his grandma?”
There’s a look of utter and complete sadness in her eyes that I can’t explain.
“You think one day you’ll have grandkids?” She asks.
I don’t understand why she’s asking, but I’m just happy she stopped yelling at me for a minute. “Yeah, I guess. I’d like kids and grandkids one day.”
We are both quiet for a moment as if neither of us knows where to take the conversation to now.
Finally, she wipes the tears from her eyes and heads toward the door.
