The New Ever After (The New Ever After Series) (10 page)

After three long flights with lots of time to think, Heather walked into the house and hugged the twins. As much as she had enjoyed her time away, she had missed them. And apparently Peter had as well. He ran in, grabbed George and tossed him in the air. He failed to realize George had just finished his bottle. He proceeded to throw up all over Peter.

"Welcome home!" said Heather.

Heather kissed her mom, whose bags were packed and sitting at the front door. Obviously, she was ready to go. Heather couldn't imagine how much this week had exhausted her.

"I want to hear all about your trip, but I really can't wait to sleep in my bed. Ok if I come by tomorrow or the next day?"

"No problem. We can't tell you how much this meant to us," said Heather.

"Well, you both deserved it, and I was happy to do it."

Peter kissed Diane good-bye and off she went.

"Hey, would you mind if I went over to Jenny's?"

"Nope. Go ahead. I'll put these two in the tub. Take your time."

"I love you and can never thank you for this week...and for everything." She kissed him before she took off.

Peter took the twins up to the tub and got them ready for their bath. He had missed them and was happy to let Heather go see Jenny. The big kids wouldn't be back till tomorrow. Ten minutes later, Peter was washing the shampoo out of the twins' hair, and Heather walked into the bathroom.

"No luck?" asked Peter.

"Nope. No one was home. Everything looked really closed up. Neither car was there. I wonder if she went to her mom's?"

"Why don't you call Janie and ask her? She might know."

"Good idea."

She went downstairs leaving Peter to tend to the twins and called Janie.
She answered right away.

"Welcome back
. How was it?"

"It was amazing. But, that's not why I'm calling
. Where's Jenny?"

"She went to her parents' house. She needed some time to think."

"Did she tell you I knew?"

"Yes."

"I planned to tell her. I didn't think Matt would tell her before I got home. I didn't want to open up this can of worms and then skip the country.”

"She's pretty mad. I get it
. It was all bad timing. She just can't understand why you wouldn't have told her right away."

"In hindsight, I should have
told her immediately. What can I do?"

"Give her some space
. Let her know you're thinking about her though too."

"I will. I texted her this morning before we left
. Peter messed with my phone when we arrived, so I didn't see all of her texts until this morning."

"Blame him! He deserves it!"

"Spoken like a true sister. Thanks for helping with the twins."

"No prob
. Can't wait to hear about your trip. I'll pop in tomorrow."

"Sounds great."

Heather went upstairs to help Peter put the twins to bed. As soon as they made it back downstairs to unwind, the doorbell rang.

"Who in the hell c
ould that be?" asked Peter.

"No idea. Maybe it's Jenny." Heather walked to the door saddened to find it was Victoria
. She stormed in passed Heather and set her keys and her phone on the counter.

"How could you do this?" asked Victoria.

"Do what?"

"Force Matt to tell Jenny. Everything's a mess, and it's your fault."

"Hold on," said Peter. "You’re the one who was screwing around with Matt, not Heather. You did this as soon as you cheated on your husband with your friend's husband. Heather has no blame in any of this."

"But she saw us!" Victoria started crying, and Heather almost felt bad for her for a split second until she remembered what Victoria had done.

“You saw us and it forced Matt to tell Jenny. If you had just kept going and not stopped and stared at us on the sidewalk everything would be the same.”

"What the hell are you talking about? You were sitting there jamming your tongue down Matt’s throat in broad daylight at a busy restaurant. Jenny's my best friend. I cannot believe what you did to her. You ruined her life
. You ruined your own. What the hell were you thinking?"

"I don't know
. Matt paid attention to me and listened to me, and I got a little thrill from it all."

“A little thrill? You have six kids between you
, and you did it for a thrill?”

“You’d never understand
. You have Mr. Wonderful over there.”

Peter stood at the island kind of afraid to move.

“I don’t understand because it was wrong. You are married and you had an affair with a married man. It’s pretty black and white.”

“No, there’s a lot of gray, Heather. I don’t expect someone like you to understand
. Jenny’s not the perfect wife either. She’s not blameless in this.”

Heather took a deep breath. There was never any rationalizing with Victoria
, and she didn’t want to hear anything else she had to say.

"Actually, Victoria, I don't really want to hear it. We just got home
. It's time for you to go," said Heather.

Peter smiled and walked her to the door.

"I'm proud of you," Peter said after he closed the door. "She's a pain in the ass."

"She stuck her tongue down Matt's throat and who knows what else and she blames me? I couldn't look at her after that."

"I think you should text Matt and find out if he knows when Jenny is coming home."

"Good idea
. Maybe I can corner her somehow."

8:45 Heather: Do you know when Jenny is getting back?

8:46 Matt: Tomorrow morning. I'm taking the kids out.

8:47 Heather: Do you know what time?

8:48 Matt: I'm taking them out at 9.

8:49 Heather: k

8:50 Matt: I'm sorry this is hurting your friendship too. I didn't mean for all of this to happen.

8:51 Heather: thx

Heather didn't want to correspond with Matt any more. She put her phone down and sat next to Peter on the couch.

"It's so much fun being back," said Heather.

"Not quite as relaxing as our little spot on the beach."

"I hate coming back from vacation. It’s my least favorite day
. Kind of like the day after Christmas."

"And you have the Jenny thing hanging over your head. Why don't you go up and take a bath. I'm going to do some stuff down here."

Heather got in the tub and tried to recapture the feeling of relaxation she had felt a short twenty-four hours ago.

Heather woke up determined to see Jenny before the kids arrived home around two. She wanted to put this behind them as soon as she could. Peter agreed to watch the twins, so she got Jenny's key and went over to her house. Jenny's car was in the driveway. Heather pulled in, walked up to the garage, unlocked the door and walked straight in through the laundry room and found Jenny meditating on the screened porch. Jenny jumped when she looked up and saw Heather standing there.

"Don't
. Don't come near me," said Jenny slowly standing up.

Heather didn't listen
. She walked right to Jenny and wrapped her arms around her and refused to let go. Jenny resisted at first and then Heather thought she might reciprocate. But she didn't. Instead, she pulled away.

"Listen
. I planned to tell you. I came right over last night to tell you. I didn't even think that Matt would confess before I got home. I just couldn't bear to tell you and then flee the country. I wanted to be here for you. I was beyond selfish. I'm so sorry," explained Heather.

"If I had known and could have confronted him
, I would have had the power. I could have taken the information and done what I wanted with it. But instead he caught me off guard, and I didn't even see it coming. You could have given me that power,” said Jenny wiping away the tears as she spoke.

"And I intended to
, but I was stupid and thought it could wait just a little longer. Jenny, I am so sorry and will do anything to make it up to you. I want to make this right."

Jenny sighed. Heather felt like their friendship hung in the balance of the next few words.

"You can't make anything right at this moment. I just need some space from him and from you."

With tears in her eyes, Heather walked out the door as fast as she could. She left completely dejected. She drove home and plopped down on the couch
.

"Didn't go so well?" asked Peter.

"Nope. She doesn't want to talk to me or see me."

"Just give her some space. She'll make her way back to you." Peter sat down and rubbed Heather's shoulders. "You’re as tense as before we left."

"Yep,” she said in a daze.

“We've got to keep going forward though
. The kids will be back soon. We have the twins’ birthday next weekend and then Maine."

"I know." Heather sighed and put her head back just as Emily climbed onto her lap.

Donna and Phil arrived with the kids as planned at two. Heather hugged them so tight that Henry complained of not being able to breathe. They exchanged stories of their trips and slowly unpacked. Henry regaled them with tales about the hermit crab he lost in the beach house that poor Phil stepped on in the middle of the night. And the shark that he saw when they were paddleboarding that turned out to be a dolphin and finally the seagull that pooped all over Hayes' sandwich one afternoon at the beach. Gracie had a couple of canvases that she had painted and Peter promised to hang them in her room for her. Hayes asked Peter if he would go paddleboarding with him tomorrow on the river since he had so much fun on the Sound. The twins were thrilled to see the bigger kids. George kept trying to headbutt them. Heather smiled looking at all the happy and refreshed faces that surrounded her.

After the kids went to bed, Heather jumped on Facebook
. She was curious about what Victoria had been up to
.
When Heather logged on to Victoria's page, it looked like all of her photo albums had been placed on Facebook. She had wedding pictures, honeymoon pictures and all kinds of recent photos of the two of them at events. Her page was like a flashing neon sign reminding everyone she was married to Ken. Heather clicked over to Jenny's page and couldn't find it. She searched for her name in her list of friends and realized she wasn't there anymore. Jenny must have been blocking Heather out of Facebook as well as the rest of her life.

Heather started the week with a to-do list a mile long and a black cloud hanging over her head. She missed Jenny's presence in her everyday life. It hurt to know she had done something to make her
friend so mad. Friends took a role of honor in her life. Hank had told her ever since they were in high school that she relied on her friends too much. But over the last three years her dependence on Jenny had grown even more. And maybe there was a piece of Heather that hadn't wanted to tell her about the affair because she didn't want their relationship to change.

She had no choice but to put the fretting aside and focus on the twins' first birthday and their trip to Maine. Janie had set up a Pinterest board for her with the best ideas for twin birthday parties. Janie had pinned no short
of three dozen ideas. She wanted her to do a Dr. Seuss Thing One/Thing Two theme. She thought everything should be red and white and had even purchased little outfits for the twins that matched the theme. In an act of desperation because she missed her right hand, Jenny, so much, she called Janie to ask for some ideas and a little bit of help.

“Hey! How are you this morning?” asked Janie.

“I’m fine. I’m planning the twins’ party and I need some direction. I’ve been on your Pinterest board, and I need your creative vision to help me create the Dr. Seuss wonderland you’ve been pinning.”

“I’d love to help.
Want me to send you a list of things to go get?”

“Yes! That sounds like a perfect idea! I’m not quite as creative as you are.”

“I love birthday parties and can’t wait to celebrate their big day. I’ll text you a list of some items to purchase and we can talk later to figure out the cake and all that.”

“Thanks!”

Janie must have been working quickly because 29 minutes later, Heather had a list.

9:39 Janie: Buy red and white tablecloths-sky blue plates, red napkins, white silverware-red and white paper straws-cups the same color as the plates
.

9:45 Heather: K. Thx. Luv u!! xo

Saturday rolled around and as much as she tried to put on a happy face for the kids, her heart was still heavy with the Jenny episode hanging over her head. Janie arrived at 8:30 to help and put Peter to work setting up tables around the pool. Michael and Hayes were in charge of decorating with balloons. The girls set out the paper goods. Heather had run a million errands all week trying to execute the overall theme for the party. Janie thought there should be a dessert bar filled with red and white lollipops, marshmallows dipped in chocolate, a Truffula tree fruit salad, pepperoni pizza rolls and of course a cake. The cake was the centerpiece. It was a three-tiered cake with Thing 1 and Thing 2 running all around it. Heather stood back and looked at all that Janie had envisioned and was amazed, and thankful. She knew it would end up on Pinterest the next day.

After all their
work, Heather felt guilty that it was going to be such a small party. She wished more people, especially Jenny, could celebrate with them. Diane, Donna and Phil and Janie and Chris gathered to celebrate the twins' special day. Lauren, Hank's sister, and one of Lauren’s girls came down from Northern Virginia to party with them as well. Her husband and oldest daughter stayed back because she had to work.

"Where's Jenny?" asked Diane.

"She had to go up to her parents’ house for awhile," said Peter.

"Hope everything's ok
. It was strange that she ended up not coming over to help at the end of the week while you were gone."

Heather, Peter and Janie exchanged looks.

"She's fine. Just trying to get away from the 2-3-1-1-3. You know how she is when she's not feeling very Zen," said Janie.

They all chuckled at Jenny’s reputation for needing calm and quiet.
Heather wanted to ask Janie for some more Jenny details. She was dying to know what she was thinking and what her plans for the future were. She just didn’t want to ask in a big crowd.

"Are you excited to head to Maine? I can't wait for you to see where we grew up," said Janie in an attempt to change the subject.

"Not looking forward to the monstrous car ride with five kids, but other than that, it should be great."

"What time are you leaving?" asked Chris.

"We're on the road by 4. I'm getting everyone up in their pajamas. Even this one," said Peter as he slapped Heather's ass.

"The idea is that they should still be tired from this big birthday party and will sleep most of the way," said Heather
.

"Good theory
. Let me know how it works," said Chris.

Lauren and Heather sat and talked at the pool
. Lauren had adeptly figured out something was wrong.

"What's with the doom and gloom attitude you're carrying on your shoulders?"

She filled Lauren in, and Lauren wasn't that sympathetic.

"You broke the cardinal rule of friendship, you know that right?"

"Yes, but I was overwhelmed and leaving on the trip and wanted to be here to help her."

"Stop playing the overwhelmed card. You're too smart and accomplished for any of us to believe that. I get that your plate is full - very full. You have five kids and a career and a new marriage and a ton of baggage
. But buck up, little camper. You're wasting your life and your time playing the ‘overwhelmed mama’."

Heather didn't move she just listened to someone who had known her for almost her whole life.

"You should have told Jenny right away. You shouldn't have gone on a tropical vacation and enjoyed yourself while you knew your best friend was going to be destroyed. Own it and move on."

"I did own it
. I told her I made a mistake."

"Then wait for her to come back to you
, and in the meantime, enjoy what you have around you. Look at these beautiful kids and that fucking hot as hell husband. You have too much good in your life, and I've known you for too long to let you do this to yourself."

Peter must have seen the look of surprise on Heather's face
. He walked over and interrupted the rest of the conversation.

"What's up girls? We've missed you
, Lauren."

"I'm just giving your wife some straight talk to shake her out of her head. But, I can do that since I have also had the luxury of wiping her ass." Lauren did help her in the bathroom on her wedding day because she couldn't wipe under her huge tulle skirt.

Lauren gave her a big kiss, and Peter decided it was time for cake. For the finale, George grabbed a tier of Janie’s gorgeous cake and smeared frosting all over Emily. Everyone went to bed early in preparation for their big trip.