Chapter Thirty-Four
Kristen
I woke up to the sound of gentle rain outside my window. I had left Jake’s place earlier than usual yesterday. I’d spent an hour cleaning up after I’d gotten home, and then I’d headed out for a late dinner with Melody. The whole time, however, I had thought about Jake. Melody had probably noticed, but she was a lot more forgiving with me because she was convinced I was madly in love with Jake.
Not that she was far off the mark with that one.
I was in love with Jake, and it was getting harder and harder to justify the secret I was keeping from him. He deserved the truth, and I desperately needed his trust. But how on earth was I supposed to secure it now? That was what was making me hesitate. I didn’t know how to tell him the truth without completely destroying his trust and faith in me. I kept hoping some magical solution would present itself, but so far, I was just going around in circles in my head.
I rolled out of bed, brushed my teeth, had a quick shower, and then walked to my kitchen. I had plans to meet Melody again today, but I was seriously thinking of canceling. I missed Jake and Noah, and as I looked out towards the gentle pitter-patter of the rain, I knew that Noah would enjoy baking cookies on a day like this. I noticed that there was a message on my answering machine that I hadn’t checked, so I walked over and pressed the playback button.
“Hi, Kristen,” Jake’s voice was clear and crisp, but he was talking a little fast like he was distracted with something. “I’m just calling to…to… Noah, don’t pull that, kid… The whole thing’s going to… Noah, seriously?”
I stifled a laugh as I listened to Jake trying to juggle the phone call with his son.
“Sorry… Noah’s trying to get to… Anyway, I just called to ask about your plans for today. There’s someone I’d like you to meet. She’s… For God’s sake, kid… Kristen, I’m sorry, I’ve got to go. Try and drop in today if you have the time.”
I walked to my fridge and opened the door. There were only a few fruits and a loaf of bread on the verge of going stale. I spent so much time at Jake’s that keeping a fully stocked pantry and fridge just seemed wasteful. I realized that I really wanted to see Jake and Noah today, and I wasn’t prepared to wait until the evening. Quickly, I called up Melody, praying that she would understand.
“Hi,” I said brightly, the moment she picked up.
“Hi, what’s up?”
“Um… I was just calling to ask whether you were still in the mood to go shopping?”
“I’m always in the mood to go shopping,” Melody said immediately. “And today’s the last day to find the right outfit because my date is tomorrow.”
“Ah, right… Seems to me that I’d just slow you down though,” I said, trying to be as diplomatic as possible.
“Kristen?”
“Yeah?”
“You’re trying to get out of shopping with me today, aren’t you?”
“Whatever gave you that idea?”
“Your high-pitched tone for one,” she replied bluntly.
I smiled guiltily. “Sorry… It’s just that… I think Jake’s aunt is in town, and he wants me to meet her. She’s the closest thing to a mother he’s had since his own mom died and so this is kind of a big deal for me.”
“Fuck… He wants you to meet his mother?”
“Well… She’s technically his aunt—”
“Yeah, I get it; she’s practically his mother.”
“Right.”
“Did he tell you she was in town?”
“No, he didn’t say a word,” I admitted. “She probably just dropped by unexpectedly to surprise Jake and Noah.”
“Well then, you have to go meet her,” Melody said.
“Aw bless you,” I said gratefully. “Thanks for understanding.”
“You owe me a shopping date.”
“Definitely,” I said. “And I will deliver.”
“You better.”
“Wait,” I said quickly before Melody could hang up.
“What?”
“I… I’ve never met a boyfriend’s family before,” I said. “How do I act?”
Melody laughed. “You act the way you always do,” she said. “Be yourself, and she’s going to love you.”
“Okay,” I said, gulping back my nerves. “Thanks.”
After I hung up, I headed towards my wardrobe and looked around for something to wear. I finally decided on jeans and a simple blouse. I kept my hair loose around my shoulders and added just the faintest touch of blush, mascara, and lip-gloss before heading over to Jake’s apartment.
I stopped by one of the city’s best bakeries on my way and picked up a tray of breakfast treats I knew Noah would love. When I got to the apartment, I took a deep breath and knocked twice. A few seconds later, the door swung open and Jake was standing there smiling at me.
“Hey, you’re here.”
“And I bring gifts,” I said, passing over the box of pastries.
“Hey, Noah and I love this place.”
“I’m glad,” I said, and then I looked around for his aunt. “So where’s Aunt Margo?”
“Aunt Margo?” Jake asked, in obvious confusion.
“Yes,” I nodded. “Your message this morning, you said there was someone you wanted me to meet.”
“Oh,” he said, understanding. “There is someone I want you to meet. But it’s not my aunt.”
“Oh,” I said, wrinkling my brows together. “Then who is it?”
Before Jake could answer, Noah came running through from his bedroom. “Krissy!” he yelled, sounding delighted. “You’re here!”
“Hi, buddy,” I said, bending down so that I could hug him. “Slept well?”
“Uh-huh,” he nodded. “Guess what?”
“What?”
“Grandma’s here.”
I frowned. “Grandma?” I repeated, recalling that Jake had told me his mother had passed away some years back.
“Yes,” Jake nodded. “My mother-in-law is here. Daphne’s mother.”
I felt my body grow cold as I realized what he was saying. Isabelle was here, and she knew exactly who I was. How could this have happened before I could tell Jake? How could I let this have happened?
“Grandma!” Noah called.
A few seconds later, I heard footsteps, and then Isabelle emerged. It had been years since I’d last seen her. She was still the same graceful woman I had met back then. Her hair was only just starting to gray at the edges, and her eyes were still as blue as ever. Her eyes landed on me, and she stopped short as her expression turned from oblivion to shock.
“Kristen?” she said, staring at me as though she had seen a ghost.
The smile on Jake’s face grew subdued as he looked between us. “Wait…do you two know each other?”
I tried to reply, but my throat had gone dry, and I couldn’t form the words. Realization slowly began to dawn on Isabelle’s face, and I saw her gain her composure back.
“This is all very strange,” she said.
“What is strange?” Jake asked, and I could sense he was getting a little on edge.
“When I heard the name Kristen, I did think it was a strange coincidence,” Isabelle said, looking towards me. “And there was the call, too… But I didn’t think about you at all, Kristen.”
“Grandma can we make cookies with Krissy?” he asked, pulling on her hand at the same time that he reached out for me.
Isabelle looked at him distractedly, but Jake stepped in. “Buddy, can you go to your room and organize your toys for a few minutes, please?”
Noah’s face fell immediately. “But… I wanna stay with Grandma and Krissy… I wanna make cookies.”
“Sort out your toys first,” Jake said, as he glanced at my guilt-stricken face. “And then we can start, okay?”
“Okay,” Noah said, sounding impatient.
He headed off to his room, and I stood there, silent and terrified, knowing that the house I had built was about to come tumbling down around me. The moment Noah was gone, Jake turned to me, and the smile had disappeared from his face.
“Why are you so pale?”
I gulped, but I couldn’t find it in me to say anything, so Jake turned to Isabelle, who was now looking supremely uncomfortable.
“Isabelle?”
She looked towards me for a second. “I… I met Kristen years ago,” she said shakily.
And I knew immediately that having realized that Jake didn’t know who I was, she didn’t want to sell me out. I knew this was the moment I needed to stop being a coward. I needed to come clean, no matter how hard it was for me.
“I knew Daphne,” I blurted out.
Jake turned to me slowly. “Excuse me?”
“I… I knew Daphne.”
“How?” Jake asked, as his eyes went wide with disbelief.
“Because we’re related… I’m her half-sister,” I said.
Jake just stared at me for a few moments. “I… I’m sorry… I don’t think I heard you correctly.”
“It’s true,” Isabelle said gently. “She is Daphne’s half-sister.”
Jake looked between the two of us, and I could see his mind process this information. Then he turned to face me, and I could barely look him in the eye for shame.
“So when you told me about your no good father who had another family—”
“Daphne was his first child… Isabelle was his wife,” I stammered. “And my mother was his…”
“Plaything?” Jake demanded angrily.
“I… yes,” I said, hanging my head.
“Now, Jake,” Isabelle said, coming forward. “This isn’t so bad.”
“I trusted you,” he said, ignoring Isabelle and staring daggers at me. “I… I fell for you. You had months to tell me this, and you didn’t.”
“I meant to tell you,” I said pleadingly.
“Then why didn’t you?”
“Because I was scared of how you would react,” I said, tripping over my words. “At first you were so different to what I’d imagined, and I didn’t feel comfortable telling you who I was, and then after I was comfortable enough to tell you… I just… I was scared of how you would take it.”
“So you just decided never to tell me?” he asked incredulously.
“No, of course, I was going to tell you—”
“When?” he demanded. “Before or after you’d trapped me?”
I deserved his venom, but it still stung nevertheless. I felt tears in my eyes instantly, and I forced myself to push them back. I didn’t want to cry in front of him. It was weak and pathetic, and it was asking for sympathy when really, truly I felt I deserved none.
“Jake,” I said, taking a step towards him. “I care about you so—”
“Don’t,” he interrupted, turning away from me. “Just go.”
“But—”
“I said go!” he said, in a voice that was harsh and cold and very similar to the man he had been before he had gotten involved with me.
“Jake,” Isabelle said, stepping in. “Maybe you should just hear her out.”
My heart swelled with gratitude for Isabelle, and I marveled at how incredibly gracious a woman she was, especially after all she had suffered at my mother’s hands. That she could stand there, knowing I had effectively stepped into the space her daughter had filled and not hate me was mind-boggling to me. I had never met a woman with that much grace and composure.
“I don’t think she meant to hurt anyone,” Isabelle said.
Jake just turned to her and glared until she backed down. Then he turned back to me. “Get out.”
I rushed towards the door just as I heard a little voice call out my name. “Krissy?” Noah called. “Where are you going?”
His little cherub face was slightly distressed, and I guessed that he had heard part of the exchange between his father and me.
I forced on a brave face and smiled at him. “I’m sorry, sweetheart,” I said, proud of the fact that my voice didn’t shake. “I have to go.”
“But…cookies?”
“Another time, okay?” I said, knowing that there would probably never be another time. “I’m sorry, but I have to go.”
“Hug first,” Noah said, stretching out to me.
I hugged him tightly, gave him a kiss on the cheek, and then headed straight towards the door without looking back. I was almost at the elevator when I heard Isabelle’s voice calling out my name. Feeling the tears slip from my eyes I turned.
“I’m sorry, Isabelle,” I said. “I never meant to cause any trouble—and I certainly didn’t mean to take Daphne’s place.”
“I never thought you did,” she replied.
“Can I ask you one question though, please?” I asked, rubbing the tears from my eyes.
“Yes.”
“You mentioned a call inside; what did you mean by that?”
“I got this call from another woman a few days ago,” Isabelle said. “She told me that I needed to visit my son-in-law and my grandson. There was a woman in their lives that I needed to meet. I suppose that’s what brought me here.”
I stared at her for a moment.
“Do you know who it might have been?” she asked.
“I know exactly who it was,” I said, trying to contain my hurt and anger. “It was my mother.”
Chapter Thirty-Five
Jake
I stared down at Noah, watching his eyelids flutter slightly in sleep. He had been a handful all day, mostly because he wanted to spend time with Kristen and I had to keep making excuses.
“I want to make cookies with Krissy,” he had insisted.
“You made cookies with Grandma yesterday,” I had pointed out, feeling a headache come on.
“Krissy makes them different,” Noah persisted. “They taste better.”
“No, they don’t.”
“Yes, they do.”
“No, they don’t,” I said, aware that I was having an argument with a four-year-old that I couldn’t possibly win. I had heard Noah keep this up for a steady fifteen minutes before, and I usually burned out after two minutes.
“Yes, they do.”
I had sighed tiredly and held my head for a moment. “Krissy is busy, kid,” I said. “She’s not going to be around for a while.”
At which point Noah had thrown a full-blown temper tantrum. I had tried everything to calm him down, but nothing worked. In the end, he had simply tired himself out. Then he had huffed into his room and stayed there until he had fallen asleep. Which is exactly how I’d found him when I’d walked in two minutes ago.
I sighed and kissed his forehead, wondering how on earth I was going to explain Kristen’s continuing absence. I was having a hard enough time explaining it to myself.
Right after Kristen had left, I had stormed off to my room, leaving Noah with Isabelle. When I’d finally emerged, Isabelle had insisted on talking to me, but I hadn’t been in the mood.
Now I wished I had. Now that my mind had had time to process the news, I had questions. I knew what Kristen had told me about her parents and the affair her father had continued with her mother for decades, but I knew very little else.
I remembered her mentioning a half-sister to me, but it hadn’t even crossed my mind that it might be Daphne. Those kinds of coincidences didn’t happen in real life. Except it wasn’t a coincidence at all… Kristen had planned this somehow. I didn’t know her purpose, but now I wanted to.
I couldn’t believe I had been so blind. She looked so much like Daphne that now I felt stupid for not having seen it sooner. I looked back on the past few months and thought about everything Kristen and I had shared. I couldn’t believe that she hadn’t told me. It was a pretty big secret to keep, and she hadn’t even given me a clue.
I walked out of Noah’s room and headed to mine. I was sitting on the edge of my bed as I dialed Isabelle’s number and waited for her to answer.
“Jake?” she answered almost immediately.
“Tell me what happened,” I said bluntly.
“Jake… I think perhaps you should talk to Kristen.”
“She’d probably just lie to me.”
Isabelle sighed. “You seem to care about her very much.”
“Not anymore.”
“That sounds like a lie you’re telling yourself in the moment.”
“Isabelle,” I said impatiently. “Please, just tell me what happened… Did Daphne even now about Kristen?”
“She did,” Isabelle told me. “In fact, they had a relationship for a short while.”
“They did?” I said, in disbelief.
“After we found out that Ted had another child and…a mistress…it took a while to process that, but once we did, Daphne was curious. So when Kristen contacted her—”
“Kristen contacted her?”
“Yes,” Isabelle replied. “She wanted to meet.”
“Daphne agreed?”
“She didn’t at first, but I think her curiosity won out,” Isabelle said. “Their first meeting was rocky. Daphne came home upset and angry, but she wasn’t angry with Kristen—just the situation and her father.”
“Why did Kristen want to meet Daphne?”
“That is a question you’ll have to ask Kristen, Jake,” Isabelle said gently. “I can’t answer that for you. I can tell you that Daphne liked Kristen very much and for a while there, she actually felt she had a sister.”
“But something changed,” I pointed out. “Because she never mentioned Kristen to me—ever.”
“No…” Isabelle sighed. “Discovering her father’s betrayal hurt her far more than it hurt me. She changed slightly with time, and she became…harder somehow. Her desire to join the military was a split-second decision that she made on a whim. I think for her it was a form of escapism. She just wanted to leave behind that part of her life and start anew somewhere else.”
I gulped back my hurt as I realized I had never asked her why she had enlisted, and she had never volunteered the story. Was it possible that my whole marriage had been a lie, too? If Daphne had not told me this huge chunk of her life, what else had she kept from me? Was I just another form of escapism? Was she just trying to replace the family she had lost with me?
“She loved you, Jake,” Isabelle said, as though she knew what I was thinking. “She loved you so much.”
“Just not enough to tell me the truth about her life.”
“You knew she had nothing more to do with her father.”
“But not that he had another woman and child secreted away somewhere… Why wouldn’t she tell me that?” I demanded.
“Because she wanted to put that behind her. She didn’t want to have to talk about it all the time,” Isabelle said. “That’s not an excuse, and I happen to believe it was the wrong decision. But it was her decision to make, and I had no choice but to go along with it. I was just happy she had found someone she wanted to spend the rest of her life with.”
“Only it turned out the rest of her life wasn’t going to be very long,” I snapped unnecessarily.
Isabelle fell silent, and I felt terrible instantly. “I’m sorry,” I said. “That was uncalled for.”
“You’re hurting right now,” she said gently. “I understand.”
“I wish I could say the same,” I said. “I’m just so…confused right now.”
“Talk to Kristen, Jake,” Isabelle advised me. “She’s the only one that can give you the closure you need.”
“She’s your husband’s love child,” I said. “How is it that you’re not pissed at her, too?”
Isabelle paused for a moment. “Because she was innocent in all this. It’s not fair to blame her for what her parents did. That was on them, not her. When she found out, she made it a point to track me down and tell me the truth.”
“She told you?” I asked incredulously.
“She did,” Isabelle said. “And, I appreciated that more than I can say. Because she told me the truth, I was finally able to end my marriage without ever looking back. In a way, she freed me. I met her once more after that with Daphne, and she was just a sad, lonely kid who had tried to do the right thing. She had a mother who had neglected her, a father who didn’t care about her, and no one else in her life. I felt her for…and I still do.”
I shook my head. “I just can’t get over what she did.”
“Ask her why she did it,” Isabelle suggested. “Because whether or not you get back together, you’ll want to know.”
“And you don’t care that I was with Daphne’s sister?”
“I want you to be happy,” Isabelle said. “I want Noah to be happy. And before you found out about all this, I saw that you and Noah were both in a good place. I had to believe that had something to do with Kristen.”
After I hung up with Isabelle, I scrolled down to Kristen’s name. With my finger poised over the call button, I wasn’t sure if I should hit it or not. In the end, my need for closure won out, and I waited for her to pick up.
“Jake?” Kristen’s voice sounded breathless.
“I have questions for you,” I managed to say.
“I’m so, so sorry—”
“I don’t want to hear your apologies,” I said harshly. “I just called because I want to know why you did what you did and what happened between you and Daphne.”
She paused for a moment, and I could hear her breathing slow. “Okay; ask me anything.”
“Why weren’t you at her funeral?”
“I didn’t find out she had died until after she’d been buried,” Kristen replied.
“Because you’d stopped talking to her at this point?”
“Well, it was more like she stopped talking to me.”
“Why?”
“Our relationship was fragile to begin with,” Kristen explained softly. “I was her father’s illegitimate child. More importantly, I was the direct result of the affair he had had with my mother. After Isabelle divorced him, he moved in with my mother and me. It caused problems between Daphne and me. She started lashing out at me because she couldn’t lash out at her father.
“And then it got worse, and I realized how unhappy and dissatisfied she was. When she told me she was thinking about enlisting, I got upset. I told her she was just running away from her problems, instead of facing them. I told her she needed to stand up to Ted so that she could move on. Enlisting was just the coward’s way out. It wasn’t my finest moment, and I regret a lot of what I said to her that day… But it was the final straw for her, I suppose.
“She said things to me and then stormed off. After that, I didn’t hear from her again…until the letter.”
“The letter?” I repeated. “What letter?”
“I received a letter from Daphne some time back,” Kristen replied. “It was only when I called the number she had left that I found out she had died. She had sent the letter from Afghanistan, you see, and it had been delayed in reaching me. By the time I got it, she had already been buried a month.”
“What did the letter say?” I asked with baited breath.
“I… It’s personal—”
Immediately, my temper flared up, and I bit back. “Personal?” I said. “I think we’re past that point now, don’t you, Kristen?”
“That’s not what I meant, Jake.”
“You know what?” I said. “I don’t care. I don’t want to see you ever again; do you hear me?”
“Jake—”
“I’m giving you a two-month severance package,” I interrupted. “So you don’t have to show up to work on Monday.”
“What?” she gasped. “You’re firing me?”
“Just take the severance package.”
“You can’t buy me off,” she said as her voice turned into a fighting tone. “You can’t just ignore the months we spent together.”
“I’ll certainly try.”
“Jake, you can’t keep doing this.”
“Doing what?” I demanded.
“Throwing tantrums when things don’t go your way.”
“Excuse me?” I said, livid at her tone and self-righteousness. “But I believe you’re the one in the wrong here. So any tantrums I might throw are completely justified.”
“I know what I did was wrong—”
“Obviously, you don’t,” I cut in. “Now I suggest you take the package and get out of my life. And if you want to sue me for wrongful termination, and then go ahead.”
With that, I hung up and threw my phone across the bed. When I heard it ring again a second later, I knew it was Kristen, but I was done talking. She had made a choice, and now I had made my decision.