Accidentally On Purpose Part 39

"Well, I didn't exactly make you feel secure in our relations.h.i.+p."

"If I'm insecure, it's my own fault. I trust you, one hundred percent. Listen, I have to go. I have a client waiting for me. I'll call you tonight."

"Okay. I love you," I said and held my breath.

"I love you, too, babe."

My heart flopped around happily in my chest.

Later that night, after Lucas was already in bed, Luke called. I told him about the bar, how I had the remains leveled and then cleaned up and put the property up for sale.

"You did all of that in a week?"

"The right amount of money can almost move mountains in a week."

"What's the rush? I thought you were going to think about it for a while."

"I had to let it go in order to move forward. My life isn't in Jersey anymore. My life is in Chicago."

"You sound sad about it."

"It's a little sad," I admitted. "But I don't fit there anymore, not even with my friends and my family. I felt like an outsider in Belmar. Truth be told, I feel like an outsider almost anywhere." I didn't mean to get so deep, the words just tumbled out, and now I had a lump in my throat. Sometimes I can be so lame.

"You're crazy. Everyone loves you. My mom loves you like a daughter and my sisters love you like a sister. Your own family..." He hesitated, because he knew he couldn't begin to fudge that one. Emmet and I had grown close since his move to Chicago, but my other siblings remained emotionally and personally distant. Even my relations.h.i.+p with my father wasn't like it was when I was a kid. I don't even need to elaborate on my mother.

"I have you and I have Lucas," I said. "But...I don't know. It's not that you two aren't enough..."

"We're not, but I understand. You need to talk to your mom. Talk to to her, not her, not at at her. Speak, don't yell." her. Speak, don't yell."

"Blah," I said.

The next morning I pulled my mom outside again. I was so calm and cool when I told her about Kyle, but when I started telling her about how I felt about her and our relations.h.i.+p, I felt my blood boiling beneath my layers of skin. When I was done with my spiel (after many interruptions), she sighed and slumped back in her seat.

"You're my favorite, you know," she said.

"Let's not tell lies, mother."

"I'm not lying. You're everything I wished I could have been when I was young."

"A weak, cheating, man-stealing, heart-breaking, under achieving, single mom?"

"No. A strong, independent, beautiful, resourceful, successful, wonderful mother."

"What are you talking about, mom? You got everything you've ever wanted, right? A husband, children, a nice home, and a great figure."

"Those are all very nice things," she said with a small shrug. "But I sometimes wish that I would have waited a little while before doing all of that. Long before Lucas was even a thought, you had traveled the world, climbed mountains, swam in distant seas, had a successful career, and experienced love and s.e.x in ways a woman who gets married at nineteen will never experience."

Yuck!

"I thought you were happy," I said, suddenly concerned she was going to go through a mid-life crisis twenty years too late and divorce my dad and date someone a little older than Lucas.

"I am am happy. I'm very happy, but that doesn't mean I don't have my regrets." happy. I'm very happy, but that doesn't mean I don't have my regrets."

"If I'm everything you wish you were, then why do you ha.s.sle me so much? I have daydreams about shoving you off of cliffs or drowning you in gelatin."

Her eyes turned to the lake. The slight wrinkle in her forehead told me she was trying to find the right words to use. At least she was thinking before speaking.

"Sometimes I think you're not being the best you can be," she started, turning her attention back to me. "Sometimes it seems like you want to blend in with everyone else and be ordinary, but you're not ordinary. You stand out in a crowd, you always have. It's not that you don't fit, honey. You're just too dumb sometimes to see that you're the center piece, and the rest of us are trying to fit around you. you.

"So, maybe I do ha.s.sle you sometimes. Some of it is typical mom stuff, you'll understand when Lucas is older, but sometimes I know you are better than the things you sometimes do. And I'm just a little crazy, so I suppose I'll always annoy the h.e.l.l outta ya."

Chapter Forty-Seven

"Guess what, Lucas?" I cooed, as we walked down the hallway to our apartment. "We're home!"

I slipped the key in and opened the door. Lucas ran in ahead of me while I struggled with our luggage.

"Daddy!" I heard him screech.

"Hey, buddy! I'm so surprised to see you!" Luke exclaimed and I heard the "Muah" of a kiss being planted somewhere on our son. A second later, Luke appeared in the hallway, carrying Lucas. They were both grinning ear to ear.

"Surprise," I said, trying to drag in a suitcase.

"I am am surprised. I wasn't expecting you guys for a few more days." He stepped over a couple of bags to give me a quick kiss on the lips. surprised. I wasn't expecting you guys for a few more days." He stepped over a couple of bags to give me a quick kiss on the lips.

"We were homesick, weren't we Lucas?"

"Homethicks," he agreed.

Lucas and I piled into the rental we had picked up in Jersey, and started back to Chicago a few days after my talk with my mom. I really was homesick, missing the sounds and sights of Chicago, the craziness of Lorraine's house during family functions, and of course Grace's apple pie.

And I missed Luke. Since our "make-up" phone call, I felt like a teenager again, sending love notes during the work day, but spending hours on the phone at night. I had a perpetual smile on my face and when we weren't talking, I often found myself recalling our latest conversations and reawakening the b.u.t.terflies in my stomach.

Unlike being a teenager, there was nothing stopping me from rejoining Luke in Chicago. No interference from parents or jealous friends and money wasn't an issue. So, one night after another long, heart palpitating phone call, I packed up the rental and we left the next morning.

"I'm really glad you're home," Luke said later that night after Lucas was in bed.

We were in the living room, trying to organize the mess I brought from the east coast and the gulf, but after a half hour we gave up and collapsed on the couch.

"I'm glad to be home," I smiled at him.

"Did you ever talk to your mom?"

"Yes, and it went surprisingly well."

I told him about the conversation, including the drowning her in gelatin part.

"Why gelatin?" Luke asked.

"Why not not gelatin?" gelatin?"

"Gelatin is tasty."

"Gelatin is scary."

"What? You don't like gelatin?" He looked at me as if I had grown a third eye.

"Not even when it has vodka in it."

"Oh. My. G.o.d. I'm in love with a gelatin hater. Not even strawberry gelatin?"

"Nope."

"Grape?"

"No."

"Cherry?"

"Are you deaf? I don't like the stuff."

"I'm insulted," he said, shaking his head. "I can't marry you now. I can't marry someone who doesn't share my love of gelatin."

"d.a.m.n. I guess I'll have to marry Tom Cruise instead."

"He's crazy. He won't let you take an aspirin if you get a headache, and he's married to Joey from Dawson's Creek Dawson's Creek."

"She has a real name. It's not Joey Potter."

"Whatever. You can't marry Tom Cruise."

"I think this is simultaneously the most ridiculous and most serious conversation we've ever had," I said. "I don't like Jell-O and you wear stripes, and I think that is far more offensive, but I'll still marry you despite the stripes."

I pushed myself off of the couch and went to bed. As I lay there, listening to Luke moving around the kitchen, I had to cover my mouth to keep from giggling. We just had a conversation about marriage using stripes and gelatin as a cover up for the fact that we were talking about marriage. Luke proposed through Jell-O and I accepted through stripes. The idiocy of it all had me shaking with excited, silent laughter.

When the bedroom door opened, I covered my head with a pillow to hide the stupid grin on my face and took deep breaths to quell my laughter. After a moment, the pillow was ripped away from me and I could see Luke's face over mine clearly thanks to moonlight s.h.i.+ning through the s.p.a.ces in the blinds.

"What's so funny?" He whispered.

"We are," I said and then pulled him into a kiss.

Again, I felt young, as we made love with giggling, laughter, and absolute delight. And when it was over and Luke was nearly asleep, I whispered a secret into his ear that I had been holding onto for days.

Epilogue

A year has pa.s.sed, and life is good, most of the time. My father had a heart attack, but is recovering well. My mom spends most of her time in Louisiana now, happily caring for the love of her life. She still invokes my most violent tendencies when I have the pleasure of her company, or when I'm stupid enough to answer her phone calls.

Lucas is giving us the true meaning of Terrible Twos, with tantrums, disobedient behavior and his inability to sit still for even two minutes. I never knew that I had so much patience. My mother tells me that I was horrible at Lucas's age, and on a really crazy day, I can almost forgive her for being the person she is today. Almost.

We bought a house in a Chicago suburb, a few weeks after I returned. It has five bedrooms, two and a half baths, a family room, a formal dining room, a huge back yard, and all of the other normal parts of a house. The travel time to the firm isn't horrible and we're near Lorraine, Lena, Emmet, and Grace. Now our home is used just as much as Lorraine's. It's often full of family and friends, children and good food and drink.

I've made new friends, and though none of them can replace my old friends, they are good, reliable, and fun women. Donya, Mayson, and Tabitha keep in touch regular, with the occasional visit, and I've accepted that they're all able to be good friends without me.

After three months on the market, the property my bar was on was sold. Kyle bought it. He didn't contact me directly, but contacted Luke. Apparently, he ran into my old barmaid, Lilly. After several conversations, they decided to go into business together and open a sports bar.

By the time Kyle called, Luke had already known about what had happened that New Year's night. I imagine that it took an unfathomable amount of self-control for Luke to remain professional and civilized. He dealt with his anger alone, because I wasn't made aware about any of their meetings until the deal was about to close. The way Luke handled the situation made me love him that much more. Even Kyle's actions were admirable. He apologized to Luke for his treatment of me and insisted on keeping their meetings quiet so not to add any unnecessary stress on me.

I was curious about a lot of things, like if Kyle was going to quit Sterling Corp, if he was still clean, and especially if he and Lilly were dating. Maybe later, I'll make a phone call and find out. Then again, maybe not. In the grand scheme of things, it doesn't really matter.

For the record, the money that I took from Jessb.i.t.c.h and Walter Sterling was donated to shelters across the country that catered to women and children that are victims of domestic violence. Luke said the money was dirty, and using it for our own personal needs and entertainment would be equally dirty. I, personally, have no problem getting dirty. I feel that I deserve the money, but I really didn't need it, and I didn't want to fight about it.

Only less than two weeks after the gelatin and stripes proposal, the proposal became real, with a diamond ring. Of course I said yes. We were married four months later, in front of all of our family and friends. We skipped a honeymoon for the time being. Luke was very busy at the firm and we were still trying to get settled into our new home.

The secret I had whispered into Luke's ear that long ago night bloomed into a beautiful baby girl named Kaitlyn. She, too looked exactly like Luke. Lucas is in love with his baby sister, calling her Kaywen, the best he could do for a two year old. He watched her sleep, he watched her eat, but he ran away screaming whenever there was a p.o.o.py diaper.

Like I said, life is good, most of the time. I argue with my husband, and I am daily tempted to tie my two year old boy to a chair. My house gets out of control with toys and baby items, and I sometimes realize I haven't showered in a couple of days. Sleep eludes me and tequila is out of the question with a breast feeding baby, but I am finally completely happy. My life makes sense and my many mistakes have been left in the past. G.o.d knows I'll make a thousand more before I die at an old, ripe age.

Every day I am thankful for Luke, the real love of my life, my Prince Charming, my rescuer. He saved me from my biggest enemy: myself. Parts of me are still broken and cracked, but my children and Luke keep me grounded, and heal me with their constant love and affection.

And let's face it. I am my mother's daughter. I supposed I will always be a bit cracked...