A Cry For Hope (7 page)

The smell of my mother’s homemade meatballs and sauce immediately hit me in the face as I walked through the door.

“There you are,” she said as I walked into the kitchen. “I was just about to call you.”

“Oh, I stopped off at the new diner on Beach Street and ran into Nick Abate.”

My mother smiled. “Yes, and thank you so much for sending his dad my way. He’s going to keep me very busy with his dessert orders.”

“Well, I told him you were the best around,” I said.

“Your brother, Patty, and Alexa are coming for dinner?”

“Oh, okay,” I said, sounding a little indifferent.

“What’s the matter?”

“I just don’t want everyone feeling sorry for me again. You know, I’ve gone from ‘Poor Hope, she lost her child’ to ‘Poor, Hope, she lost her husband’.”

“Oh, Hope, you know we don’t think that way. They just want to see you and spend time with you.” She rubbed my arm, trying to comfort me.

“Well, did you need help with anything?” I asked.

“Nope. The sauce and meatballs are cooking. So the only other thing to do is sit down and have a glass of wine.”

“Sounds good.”

She poured us each a glass of white zinfandel, and took the cheese and cracker tray that she had made out into the living room. We sat down on the couch and sipped our wine.

“Today is Jamie’s birthday,” I blurted.

She gave me a sympathetic smile. “I know. First time in twelve years that I actually remembered to get his card out on time.”

“I miss him so much, Mom.”

“I know you do, Hope, and I’m sure he’s feeling the same way…even if that’s not the way he’s acting. Just give it time. That’s all you can do.”

I looked out the sliding glass door into the back yard and smiled when I saw the beautiful red cardinal on the railing of my mother’s deck, braving the torrential downpour that had started on my drive home and hadn’t let up since. I got up and walked to the door to get a closer look. He was just as beautiful as the one that I had seen on my patio the other day, and part of me foolishly wondered if he was the same one. “What are you looking at?” my mother asked.

“The beautiful cardinal on your deck,” I answered, never taking my eyes off of him, until he spread his wings and flew up into the huge oak tree. I finally turned around once he was out of sight.

“Oh, yeah, I saw him out there this morning. I’m wondering if there’s a nest up in that tree.”

My attention was drawn to the front door as my brother, his wife, and my niece entered.  My brother and sister-in-law were doing their familiar bickering that all of us were so used to from them. “Hopie!” my sister-in-law, Patty, said in her thick Brooklyn accent. She walked into the living room and threw her arms around me. “How are ya’, baby doll?” she asked.

“I’m okay,” I said, being overpowered by the strong scent of her perfume. I loved my sister-in-law; we got along great. Patty was my brother’s “Italian princess”, as he referred to her.  She and my brother met when she was down here vacationing with her family twenty-two years ago. They kept their long distance romance going for three long years before they finally got engaged and then married. She was the perfect big sister that I never had, and even though she could be a little overbearing sometimes, I knew that she meant well and I loved her for that.

My brother pushed my hair from my face and looked me over. “You need to eat, Hope. You’re too thin.” He hugged me tightly and kissed me on the forehead. “Are you okay?” he whispered in my ear.

I nodded, fighting back the tears. My brother and I were really close. He had always been overprotective of me. He looked at me sympathetically and shook his head.

“I’m gonna be fine…really,” I said, trying to reassure him. I gave my best forced smile when I saw my niece, Alexa. “Hey, beautiful girl!” I said, giving her a huge hug.

“Hey, Aunt Hopie! Where’s Uncle Jamie?” she asked.

My brother looked at me apologetically. “Oh, he’s working,” I said, without skipping a beat.

“Alexa, come here and show Grandma your teeth now that you got the braces off,” Patty called from the kitchen.

As Alexa went running into the kitchen, my brother motioned for me to sit down on the couch. “So how’s business been?” I asked while taking a seat next to him. I was trying to talk about anything but the disaster that was known as my life. 

“Good,” my brother quickly said, brushing off my question. Normally, he would talk forever when you got him on the subject of his construction company. “Hope, what’s going on?”

I sighed. “Nothing. Jamie and I just need some time apart.”

“You don’t look good.”

“Well, thank you!” I laughed.

“No, I didn’t mean it that way. I’m just worried about you.”

“Well, Bobby, what do you want me to say? My son is gone. My husband had an affair because he blames me for it. I don’t know how I’m supposed look, but I
can
tell you how I feel.”

“He had an affair?”

I nodded. “But, please, don’t say anything to Mom about it. I don’t want her holding a grudge. I need to work through this myself and I don’t want anyone else’s opinion to cloud my judgment.”

“I won’t say anything. I promise,” he said.

“Thanks, Bobby.”

He pulled me close and hugged me. “If you need to talk, I’m here.”

“I know. Thanks.”

“Dinners ready!” my mom called from the kitchen.

My brother stood up and took my hand, pulling me from the couch.

We sat down and the crazy conversation began. You never knew what you would be in store for when you had dinner with my family. We would talk about the oddest things. Patty began to tell us all about her co-worker who had to just go back in for breast reduction surgery because they had messed up the first time and her boobs were now lopsided. I actually found myself laughing a genuine laugh, not the forced laughter that I typically displayed just to be polite when someone would say something funny. I thoroughly enjoyed myself, listening to my niece telling me about all of the boys that had asked her to her freshman social. I let some more laughter escape when I saw the look on my brother’s face. She was a beauty and my brother was going to have his hands full when it came to her and the boys.

After everyone had left, my mother and I sat down and watched some television. We both decided to call it an early night when neither of us could keep our eyes open. I lay down in my bed, listening to the rain beating on the roof. I tossed and turned, suddenly feeling wide awake. I grabbed my phone from the nightstand, checking my messages - nothing. I flipped over and began to laugh out loud when I heard my bed squeak loudly. Funny how something so insignificant could trigger such happy memories, causing me to grab my phone and text those three little words that I had been dying to say all day:

Happy Birthday, Jamie.

Jamie held me tightly in his arms as we swayed back and forth to Eric Clapton’s
Wonderful Tonight
.  He looked over at the bride, my friend Sheree, and looked back at me with a smile.

“What?” I asked. He just shook his head and kissed me on the cheek. “What’s going on in that handsome little head of yours? I asked.

“I was just thinking that she doesn’t look even one-tenth as beautiful as you did on our wedding day.”

“Oh, stop. She looks amazing!”

“Not as amazing as you.”

“Mr. McAdams, if I didn’t know better, I would think that you are trying to butter me up to get me to do some wild and crazy things with you tonight.”

A huge smile spread across his face, revealing the deep dimple in his left cheek. “Actually, I was being sincere, but now that you mention it…”

I caressed his face with the back of my hand and whispered in his ear, “There’s just one little thing.”

“What’s that?” he asked.

“Did you forget that we’re staying at my mother’s tonight?” The wedding that we were attending was only five minutes from my mom’s house. Since she was babysitting Charlie and it wasn’t getting over until late, we had decided to just spend the night at her house.

“Well, it’s not like it would be the first time that we had to sneak around in your bedroom,” Jamie said, reminding me of the night before our wedding when I snuck him into my room, long after my parents were asleep, to get a jump start on our wedding night.

I smiled just thinking about that and how I felt the next morning, waking up wrapped in the arms of the man that would be my husband in just a few short hours:

I was lying in bed, trying my best to fall asleep. I panicked when I looked at the clock and saw that it was almost 2 am. I needed to look fresh and rested in just a few hours. How on earth was I going to pull that off with just a few hours of sleep? I had just texted Jamie, asking him if he was still awake. I smiled at his response:

Yes, I’m thinking about my beautiful fiancé and tonight.

Tonight? Don’t you mean tomorrow night?

No, it’s 2am so, technically, it
is
tomorrow so I’m looking forward to tonight.

I decided to stop the texting and called him. “Hey, beautiful girl,” he answered.

“So, I was thinking since it’s
technically
our wedding day and we both can’t sleep, why don’t we put some of the excess energy to good use?”

“I can be there in five minutes. I’ll text you when I get there.” I could almost hear him smiling through the phone.

Jamie was spending the night at his best friend Alex’s, who happened to be married to my cousin. They lived two minutes from my mother’s house so I knew that he would be here in no time. I tiptoed down the steps so that I wouldn’t wake my parents.
 
My phone vibrated in my hand, letting me know he was here. I opened the door and wrapped my arms around his neck, kissing him deeply.

We quietly went up the steps and into my bedroom. I locked the door behind me and immediately lifted my nightgown over my head. He leaned down and cupped my breast in his mouth, circling my nipple with his tongue. He ran his hands down my body and slowly removed my underwear. He laid me down on my bed and continued to tease my breasts with his tongue, trailing his fingers downward and placing them inside of me. “I want to be inside of you so badly,” he whispered in my ear.

“Well, what are you waiting for?”

“I want to taste you first.” He traced his tongue down my stomach and along my inner thigh, finally reaching his destination. My body quivered from the pleasure that it was receiving. I turned my head into my pillow, trying to stifle my screams. I was breathless, needing to feel him inside of me.

“Jamie, please baby. I need you now.” He looked up at me and smiled as he quickly took off his pants and boxers. I smiled when I looked down and saw that he was more than ready to go. I screamed a little louder than I probably should have when I felt that fullness inside of me.
 

“Shhh…remember? Quiet.” He placed his finger over my lips.

“I can’t help it. You make me feel so good,” I whispered.

“I promise to make you feel this way for the rest of your life.” His movements became quicker and my bed let out a squeak that was loud enough to wake the dead. He stopped and looked up at my headboard as we both began to laugh.

I grabbed onto one of the wrought iron poles, hoping that would dull the noise as Jamie began to move once again, but the bed squeaked just as loudly. I gasped when I heard my parent’s bedroom door open. “Shit,” I whispered. I could tell from the sound of the footsteps in the hallway that it was my dad. I breathed a sigh of relief when I heard the bathroom door shut. “My dad is in the bathroom,” I whispered to Jamie. He pulled himself out of me and turned on his side. “What are you doing?” I asked, not trying to disguise my disappointment.

He pulled me to him and hugged me. “In just a few more hours, we will have the rest of our life to make love wherever we want and whenever we want. For now, I just want to fall asleep in the arms of the woman that I love more than anything in this world, knowing that this is what I have to look forward to every night for the rest of my life.”