Tears Fall at Night - smashwords (3 page)

“I’m a grown woman," Jasmine said, "and Nelson and I are happy, despite our age difference.”

Joy turned her back to Jasmine and held up her hand. “Don’t speak to me ever again. I am not interested in anything you have to say.” With that, Joy headed for the door.

“Don’t go like this, baby-girl," her father said. "I really want to help you understand why I decided to leave your mother.”

Joy opened the door and then shot back at her father, “Oh, I know exactly what was on your mind.” She walked through the door and slammed it behind her. Joy was so angry that she wanted to hit something. She had looked up to her father almost to the point of worship for as long as she could remember. Nelson Marshall had been a man of integrity… someone she, her brother and her mother could count on.

Tears rolled down Joy’s face as she walked away from her father’s new home. She heard the door open behind her, but didn’t stop or turn around to see who was coming after her. She wanted nothing to do with her so-called best friend or her dishonorable father.

“Baby-girl, wait! Jasmine said that you need a ride home. Don’t walk off like this.”

She kept walking.

Nelson caught up with his daughter and grabbed her arm. “Let me explain.”

“Get away from me.”

“Don’t act like a child, Joy. You know how life works.”

Joy wiped the tears from her eyes as she swung around to face her father. “I sure do know how life works. Men who claim to love their wives turn around and cheat on them every day. But I never expected you to be one of those men.” She was disgusted by her father. At that moment she was ashamed to call this man her father and the tears flowed again.

“Don’t cry, baby-girl. Come on, let me take you home.”

Joy backed away from her father. “No, I don’t need you to take me home. You need to go home to your wife.”

“I can’t do that.”

“Then leave me alone.”

“I can’t just leave you out here like this, Joy. I’m your father. It’s my job to protect you.”

She laughed at that. The man standing in front of her had just destroyed her belief in humanity, but he was talking about protecting her. “I’ll call Troy. He can come get me.”

She pulled her cell phone out of her purse and dialed her fiancé. When he answered, she explained that she needed a ride, and Troy promised to come and pick her up. She hung up the phone and turned back to her father. “There, I don’t need you, so you can go back to your little girlfriend and continue tearing our family apart.”

3

In the kitchen with her radio tuned to 92.7, her praise station, Carmella was busy baking cakes for her neighbors. Her way of saying thanks for the things they’d done for her in the past month: like mowing the law, trimming the bushes, coming by to check on her and just being kind to her. Dontae was still away at football camp, but would be home in two days. So, this was Carmella’s way of letting her neighbors know that she appreciated them.

Cooking was a love of Carmella’s; she could get in her kitchen and lose herself amongst the pots and pans and flour and sugar. She also loved listening to her praise music while she cooked or baked. Smokie Norful was lifting her spirit by telling her that God saw what was going on in her life and He understood when she felt like giving up. Then Smokie began encouraging her to keep moving forward, one more day, one more step.

Carmella was feeling it and was about to break out into a praise dance right in her kitchen, but then Joy walked in and killed the mood.

“Mama, why didn’t you tell me that Daddy left you?”

Carmella had hoped not to have that discussion at all. She had prayed that Nelson would come to his senses and move back home where he belonged, before the children found out about his mid-life crisis. She’d thought he’d get the message when she didn’t sign the divorce papers, but mailed the shredded document back to him. But Nelson had just sent her the document again. “Joy, this doesn’t mean anything. Your Dad is just going through a mid-life crisis. He’ll be back home soon enough.”

Joy’s eyebrow went up and she sat down at one of the counter seats. “You’d take him back after he moved Jasmine into his new house?”

Carmella took two lemon pound cakes out of the oven, closed the oven door with her foot and placed the cakes on her prep table. “What did you say, dear?”

Joy got up, walked further into the kitchen and stood next to her mother as she looked her in the face and said, “Daddy is living with my best friend, Jasmine.”

She dumped the cakes out of the baking pans. “Don’t say things like that, Joy. Where in the world would you get an idea like that?”

Joy put her hand on her mother’s shoulder. “Listen to me, Mother. It’s true. I saw it with my own eyes.”

“Your father wouldn’t do anything like that to us. He’s a God-fearing man and he loves us.” Carmella hadn’t been feeling much love from her husband lately, but she didn’t want to discuss any of that with Joy. Her daughter was a daddy’s girl through and through. She hadn’t even wanted Carmella to tuck her in at night when she was a child. Joy always asked for Nelson, to the point of hurting Carmella’s feelings at times.

“Mom, come sit down with me in the family room.” They walked out of the kitchen and made their way to the family room. Joy waited until her mother sat down on the sectional. Joy sat next to her and took her mom’s hand in hers. “I helped Jasmine move today. She told me that her boyfriend had gotten a place for them. By the time we finished with moving things around in the house, Daddy showed up. I thought you had sent him to get me because I was taking too long, since I had called and told you that I would be coming over for dinner. But that wasn’t why he was there.”

Carmella was silent as she listened to her daughter. This doesn’t seem like my life, she thought. Certainly doesn’t sound like my husband, the man I married and promised to spend the rest of my life with. Nelson had been so sure that he would become a success in life and Carmella had just been grateful that he’d wanted her to be a part of what he was destined to create. They had spent a lot of nights praying for Nelson’s career, his judgment and their finances. And just as Nelson had expected, their life had turned out great, with all the trimmings: a beautiful home, exotic vacations, college and mutual funds, the works.

“Dad admitted it to me, Mom. He said that you two were getting a divorce and that he was now with Jasmine.”

“But that doesn’t sound like Nelson,” was all Carmella could fix her mouth to say. And then she thought, maybe it wasn’t Nelson. Maybe some demon had come out of the pits of hell and climbed into her husband’s body and was doing the slimy things that Nelson Marshall never would have dreamed of doing, if he wasn’t under demonic possession.

“Mom… Mom. Where did you go?”

Joy was waving her hands in Carmella’s face. “I’m still with you, Joy. I was just wondering if we should find a priest to perform an exorcism on your father or something.” She then lowered her head and laughed hysterically.

“Mom, this isn’t funny. Stop laughing.”

But Carmella couldn’t stop. Her husband had left her for a twenty-three-year-old recent college graduate, whom she’d fed numerous times in her own kitchen. If she didn’t laugh, she’d cry until she drowned in her tears.

“I’m going to call Aunt Rose,” Joy said as she jumped up and ran for the phone.

Rose had been Carmella’s best friend since they roomed together in college. The two women had both married the year after graduating college. Their kids were born around the same time. They celebrated holidays and vacationed together. But even with all that, Carmella still hadn’t called Rose to tell her that Nelson just up and walked out the door.

Rose made it to the house within fifteen minutes. The three women went into the kitchen. Carmella turned off the praise music and Joy and Rose helped her put icing on the cakes. “I need to get these to my neighbors. They have been so wonderful this past month and I want to show my appreciation.”

“Hon, why didn’t you call me? Why are you going through this alone?” Rose asked as she put the cream cheese frosting on one of the cakes. “And when did you have time to bake all of these cakes? There has to be at least twenty on the table.”

“I have nothing but time,” Carmella told her friend. “My husband no longer comes home and Dontae is still away at camp.” She pointed towards Joy with a butter cream filled knife. “Joy has been staying in an apartment with Nelson’s girlfriend down by the college.”

After saying that, Carmella put her knife down and then punched a hole in the cake she just frosted. “Can you believe such a thing? My husband has a girlfriend.”

Rose came around the table and pulled Carmella into a hug. As they pulled apart, Rose said, “Why don’t we just go kill him?”

“Hey, I may not like him very much, but he is still my father,” Joy said as she objected to where the conversation was going.

“You just put frosting on that cake and let me talk to Rose.” Carmella threw a warning look in her oldest child’s direction and then turned back to Rose. “Since Nelson is the father of my children, do you think we could just put him in the hospital?”

“Mom!”

“Hey, she wanted to kill him.” Carmella pointed at Rose.

Rose pointed towards the cakes, giggling so hard, she could barely get a word out. When she finally collected herself she said, “Remember that movie, The Help?” she asked and then doubled over with laughter.

“Yeah, I remember The Help. You and I went to see it together. I’m still mad about that outhouse mess.”

“Speaking of mess…” Rose said as she came up for air.

“Aunt Rose, I know you aren’t suggesting that my saint of a mother bake a cake full of poo for my dad?”

Carmella put her hand over her mouth and her eyes widened as she began to understand what her friend was trying to tell her. “Rose, you are crazy, girl.”

“What? You said you wanted to put him in the hospital. Don’t you think eating a dung filled cake would do it?”

“Girl, I have too much respect for cakes to treat one so harshly.”

“Well you’re the one who wanted to put him in the hospital,” Rose reminded her.

“By running him over or something like that, not by ruining one of my beautiful cakes.”

Joy stepped away from the prep table. “I’m going to my room.” As she walked out of the kitchen, she threw back, “And I hope I won’t be testifying against my mother any time soon.”

Carmella and Rose laughed, then Carmella got serious and said, “She’s right. The man is my husband. I’ve been married to him for twenty-five years. I shouldn’t be talking like this.”

“He asked you for a divorce, Carmella. It’s time to fight, girl. Do something,” Rose told her as she bounced around the kitchen as if she were getting ready for a boxing match.

“I don’t know how to fight,” Carmella confessed. “All I’ve ever done is be Nelson’s obedient pup, run his errands and take care of his house. I haven’t even put the degree I worked so hard to get to use in over twenty years.”

Carmella sat down on one of the stools in the kitchen, laid her head on the counter and cried like tears were rain and she was doing her part to end an all consuming drought.

***

Another day, another problem. Two days ago she’d cried on Rose’s shoulder and then went door to door passing out pound cakes to her neighbors. This morning she was awakened out of her fitful sleep by the ringing of the phone. Carmella had tried to ignore it and sleep on, but it seemed as if it would stop ringing for a moment and then start back up again. Somebody wanted to speak with her, and they weren’t going to give up until she answered the phone.

With her head still on the pillow, Carmella reached over to her night stand and took the phone off the hook. She put the receiver against her ear and mumbled, “Hello.”

“Hi, may I speak with Mr. or Mrs. Marshall.”

Her voice was groggy as she responded, “This is Mrs. Marshall. Who’s calling?”

“This is Rita from Wells Fargo. We’re just giving you a friendly reminder call concerning your mortgage.”

That woke Carmella. She popped up in bed and asked, “What about my mortgage? What’s wrong?” She’d never received a call from her mortgage company before; why on earth were they calling her so early in the morning?

“We haven’t received the payment this month and we just wanted to remind you that it was due on the first.”

The first was two weeks ago. They were almost halfway through August. Had Nelson been so busy playing with his girl-child that he’d forgotten his responsibilities? “I’ll check into this and get back with you.” Carmella hung up the phone.

A hot flash was overtaking her body, reminding her that she was forty-seven and pre-menopausal. She fanned herself with her hand, but that didn’t help, so she opened the window and then realized it was August and hot as Hades outside. So she put the window down and turned the ceiling fan on. Just as she was cooling off, the phone rang again.

Carmella picked it up, but didn’t say anything. A recording asked her to wait for a very important message. The message was about the payment on her Lexus SRX 400 being past due. “Oh, I know he done fell and bumped his head now.”

She dialed Nelson’s office, not caring that he would need to be on the bench within fifteen minutes and was probably handling some last minute judgeship stuff. She needed to speak with her husband and nobody was going to stop her. So when Laura, his long time secretary answered the phone, Carmella said, “Good morning, Laura, I hope your morning is going well.”

“It is, Mrs. Marshall.”

She noticed that Laura didn’t ask how her morning was going. No doubt Laura already knew about Nelson’s mistress. So she was probably worried that Carmella would break down on her and tell her all sorts of horrid things about her boss. “Listen Laura, I need to speak with my husband. I know he’s probably busy, but I don’t care about his schedule right now. I’m having a crisis and I need him on the phone ASAP.”

“I’ll put you through this instant, Mrs. Marshall.” Just before transferring the call, Laura mumbled, “I’m sorry.”

Carmella heard her and appreciated that she would let her feelings be known in the slightest way. But when Nelson picked up, she had no time to dwell on that kindness. “Why haven’t you paid the mortgage or my car note?” she screamed at him.