11. Joy

Joy

M ara

Sunday morning, I woke much like I had the day before, Zale’s big, warm body curled around my back, the front of his long thighs pressed against the backs of mine, my bum nestled in his groin, only this time his lips were busy at the back of my neck, his hand lightly molded my breast under my camisole, and his hips gently rocked against my ass.

There was no time for coherent thought, just a sweeping away of all thought, leaving only sensation and instinct, leaving me feeling safe, warm, and seen. We ended in much the same position as we began, Zale tight against my back, his mouth pressed against my shoulder, his arm tight around my waist. We stayed that way until we heard Olivia begin to stir.

She was raring to go again today, this time to visit Moony and Lilliput, Bex’s chihuahuas, also adopted from the shelter. This was not typical for Olivia, in fact, I’d thought after the double visit yesterday we might have to cancel today, but she was determined to deliver her cards. She had two left. She was bringing Willa’s in hopes that she might be there too.

I loved Sunday mornings. Zale was always rested, and we lazed over our coffee while Olivia puttered. Sitting at the kitchen table with him, both of us smiling as we watched her chat away to her cat who was meowing back at regular intervals, was the best kind of sweet. Olivia lay on her back on the couch, her hand contorted to make a hand dragon, a dragon that was flying around Sirius who lounged drowsily on Olivia’s chest.

Wings and flight had always fascinated her. She knew the bone structure of a bird’s wing, and could draw the joints, without ever having seen a diagram of a bird skeleton. She figured this out based on her own observations.

She noticed details that other people missed, and she opened our world as much as we hoped to open hers. While it was true that we worried over Olivia, at that moment, all seemed right in my world. She gave us incredible happiness. We had named her aptly when we named her Olivia Joy .

She packed her bag of happiness, and we took our time getting ready, ate lunch, then left for Rhys and Bex’s place. Only Rhys greeted us at the door. The whole family used to come to the door when we got there, but the routine had changed over the past few visits. This marked the second or third time that it was only Rhys who answered the door. It was to him that Olivia gave her card and he immediately smacked it onto the fridge, nestled amongst Amelie’s many creations.

Once we were in and settled, I remembered to ask Bex about it.

“Why does Rhys answer the door by himself all the time and you hang back?”

“Oh, Barrett mentioned that when we all gather at the door, it makes Olivia tense. We did an experiment to see if he was right. He was. Rhys won.”

“What do you mean, Rhys won?”

“We took turns answering the door. First I answered, and there was an improvement, then the kids answered, there was no improvement, then Rhys answered, and she came in relaxed. It didn’t take her any time at all to acclimate herself. Rhys won.”

She pursed her lips.

“You’re disgruntled about it.”

“Well, yeah… ”

I laughed. “It’s probably the combination of your energy and mine colliding at the door that is the problem.”

“Yes,” she nodded, smirking. “Let’s blame you.”

“I thought it was some weird alpha male thing.”

Bex stared at me for a minute, her eyes wide and laughing. “I can’t wait to tell him you said that!”

“Don’t! He’s going to get a complex. He already knows we talk too much.”

She sighed. “We do,” then looked at me sideways, searching, “how are things with Zale?”

“Good!”

They were good. We’d made love that morning, we’d bonded over coffee and our love for our daughter, he had held my hand in the car, and he’d smiled at me across the room twice since we arrived. I felt connected to him. I wondered at my angst from just a few days ago, the pain of it. It seemed far away and almost incomprehensible at that moment.

“That’s good. You’ve seemed off lately.”

My heart galloped in my chest. “What?”

“Off. You’ve seemed off. I’ve been worried.”

I nodded, looking down to gather my thoughts. “I have been struggling a bit more than usual, with things with my mom, some emotional stuff. ”

“What’s going on with the emotional stuff?”

“I think I must have a hormonal deficiency, maybe I’m going through early menopause. I don’t know. I had a psychiatric assessment this week,” I spun my bracelet around my wrist, “just to rule out any kind of mental health issue.”

She nodded, her face serious. “That’s good. What did they say?”

“Nothing yet,” I lied.

She studied me with concern. “You’ll let me know what they say?”

“Of course!” I shrugged, feeling worse. I couldn’t tell her. I had to at least tell Zale first. I wasn’t even sure I believed it yet. There was no point telling her something that was not true. Maybe my feelings were normal, maybe everybody felt like this sometimes.

She continued. “Because if there is something, I want to be there for you. Okay?”

My fearful heart picked up its pace, afraid she detected something wrong in me. “You think there is something?”

She shook her head. “I’m not saying that. What I’m saying is that it wouldn’t be a huge surprise if you were struggling with something because you have a lot going on. And I’d want to be there for you if there was a way I could help. That’s all.”

I studied her face. She looked like she was telling the truth. If anyone knew me, she did. If something seemed wrong, she would have told me. Well, I guess she just did, she said I seemed off. But that was because of Zale. And my mother. And just the everyday pressures.

Amelie and Cole came downstairs with the dogs, Cole delivered Lilliput into Olivia’s lap, then trucked over to me. Amelie came straight over with Moony in her arms.

Cole was the spokesperson that day.

“Hi, Auntie Mara.”

I wasn’t his aunt, really, and he knew that, but because Bex and I were so close, Olivia had always called her aunt. Amelie automatically started calling me aunt, and Cole had followed suit, albeit a bit more slowly and cautiously, but it came easily to him now.

“Hey, big man. On a scale of one to five, how was your week?”

He cocked his head to the side, his mannerisms mimicking his dad. “It was a solid three and a half. It would have been higher, but Jenny Abbott tried to kiss me again.”

Amelie scowled.

I tried not to laugh. “I see. That would bring the overall score down. Did you tell her you didn’t want to kiss her?”

“I’ve already had the consonant discussion,” he replied in a bored voice. “I’ll tell her tomorrow people are not allowed to kiss without consonant. She’s my girlfriend so she’ll listen.”

“Good, that’s really good. Consent is important. ”

“Right.” His little face flushed. “Consent is important.”

“Tell me the good stuff, the stuff that made it a three and a half even with Jenny Abbott trying to kiss you.”

He beamed at Bex. “My mom bought me the The Lego Minecraft Crafting Box and we built all the different combinations this week.”

“That does sound like a good week. Is Minecraft your favorite Lego? Do you play the video game, too?”

“I’m asking for it for my birthday. It’s coming in five months. Dad says I can have it when I’m seven.”

“That sounds awesome. I’ll have to get it for Olivia and me so we can play with you.”

His eyes lit up. He whispered, “That would be awesome.”

I laughed, “You want to see what I brought for us to do today?”

“Yep!”

I pulled three sizes of marshmallows, a box of toothpicks and a package of wooden skewers out of my bag.

“We’re going to build the highest marshmallow tower known to man.”

“And then we can eat it!” he grinned.

I grimaced and he laughed. “Better wash our hands first.”

Bex wandered over to sit with Rhys and Zale while I played with the kids for half an hour. Our tower was not a raging success, but we laughed a lot while trying to get it upright. Olivia ran out of patience quickly and dropped back. She sat eating a bowl of minis, picking each one up with a toothpick, and watched while Amelie, Cole and I struggled.

We eventually managed to get it upright with Rhys giving us some structural support advice, and he snapped a pic with his phone before it collapsed. Cole asked if he could keep the leftovers to try again tomorrow. I looked forward to what he would do now that he had some idea of what did and didn’t work.

I curled up beside Zale, facing Bex and Rhys.

“Is Willa coming?”

“Nope,” Bex stated, her eyebrows raised, her mouth twisted to the side.

I caught on. “Barrett?”

“Nope!” She grinned.

“You think?” I asked.

Her smile fell. “No,” she scowled. “Barrett’s gone on one of his drive-outs, but I live in hope!”

“Yeah, me too.” I paused. “What’s a drive-out?”

She shrugged. “He gets in his truck and drives. When he’s gone far enough, he comes back. That’s what he says.”

“I wonder where he goes? ”

Bex pursed her lips. “Me too!” We snickered together at our nosiness.

Bex looked cute today. She always looked cute. Shopping was the one thing she hadn’t let fall by the wayside. Her style had changed a lot. After getting diagnosed with Fibromyalgia, she bought a whole new wardrobe. She had to; her skin was so sensitive that most fabrics chafed. Now she wore a lot of leggings all year long, skirts, dresses and shorts in the summer, tights and dresses in the winter. Today she wore leggings with a boat neck sweater the same color as her eyes, a bright pink camisole underneath, its straps visible on her exposed shoulders.

I looked down at myself, my drab jeans, my so-called good ones, had seen better days. They were probably at least five years old, and while Zale could pull off a pair of worn jeans like nobody’s business, I could not. My sweater was cute when I bought it, but it was older than Amelie and Cole now, and it had pilled in all the spots prone to wear. This was one of my better outfits. How could I expect Zale to look at me when I looked like an aging, overweight housewife who no longer cared how she looked?

“I need to go shopping,” I muttered out loud. I blushed to the roots of my hair at the thought of drawing attention to my outfit.

“Saturday,” Bex promptly replied.

“Yeah?” I asked.

“Yes,” Zale confirmed .

My head whipped around to look at him.

“You need a girls’ day out. I can’t even remember the last time you went shopping.”

I pulled at my sweater, pulling it away from my stomach, not loving being the focus of everyone’s eyes. Rhys got up suddenly.

“You want a beer, Zale?”

I breathed out a sigh of relief.

Bex continued, softly this time, “Let’s go Saturday. We’ll call Willa, and see if she’s available, too. We can get our dresses for the wedding. You want to go to Bayview or Milltown?”

I lit up. This was exciting, new jeans could wait.

“Bayview, I think, it has more stores for our age.”

Bex scowled. “We’re not that old.”

“We’re not,” I agreed, “but we are old enough to buy the quality stuff, not the trendy stuff, and there’s more quality stuff at Bayview.”

Bex sat back, appeased.

We ordered pizza for dinner. Rhys suggested Greek food, but all three kids voted him down. He took the loss but elicited a promise from all three that they would at least try Greek food sometime within the next couple of months .

We left shortly after dinner. I felt wildly content with our weekend. It had been a long time since we’d been able to go out with any kind of regularity. It felt good to be with our people again.

Bex and Rhys

“I think something is going on with Mara,” she whispered across the pillow to Rhys.

He was lying on his back, one muscled arm bent behind his head, watching tv. He turned to look at Rebecca, sighed, and then rolled to his side to meet her concerned gaze.

“I told you what I think.”

“You think she’s like Amy.”

Rhys's first wife, who passed away suddenly after giving birth to the twins, had borderline personality disorder.

“I do.”

“I don’t,” she snapped.

He ran his finger down her face, from temple to chin. “I know you don’t.”

“I just can’t imagine her being in that much pain and not telling me. I’ve known her for more than twenty years. How could she hide that for so long? ”

“There’s a powerful amount of shame, sweetness, and it probably feels normal to her.”

“I think she’s just depressed and anxious,” she snorted, “not that that’s not enough, I don’t mean to downplay it by saying ‘just,’ it’s just, from what you’ve told me, I’d hate that for her.”

“Yes.” His gaze was steady. “I hope I’m wrong, but I don’t think I am. The important thing is that we are there for her.” His eyes got the faraway look they sometimes got when he thought about the past. “For her and for Zale.”

“Yes, handsome,” she whispered, placing her hand against his face, feeling his pain from the past. “We’ll be there.”