Fiction Series About Family Secrets And Friendship
Perceptions Of Glass by James J. Cudney
Series Excerpt
Despite summer's early attempt to burst on to the scene, the weekend ushered in dark clouds and a cool, heavy rain. For Olivia, the tattered noise of drops pounding against the window were simply another item she added to the growing list of reasons why she couldn't sleep. Olivia opened her eyes and breathed in her surroundings. The vibrant sun rose above her backyard as though nothing bad had happened. Everyone around her would start another normal week. Except for her. The empty side of the bed sent pangs of grief to Olivia, but it was the bitter letter she wanted to incinerate that had pushed her over the edge. She'd already read it too many times since becoming aware of its existence, praying it would change each time the words passed her doubting lips.
When the letter was first mentioned, she thought Ben had pulled a trick to encourage her to laugh instead of cry over his death, a comfort she wanted to rely on, but she knew Ben would never use the boys in such a seedy manner. He might have jokingly confessed to hiding another wife or losing their money, but he would never fabricate a story about the boys. If he wrote the words, they must be true. He'd never lied to her before, except, he had.
Ira rang twice to speak with her, but she declined his calls, even after some of the boys pushed her hard to quell their fears over Ben's last letter. Olivia had been whirling not only from her husband's death, but the secret he revealed from the grave, bound to wreak havoc on an already burdened family bereft of their leader. Anger intensified over Ben's selfish decision. She'd lost a child, and no one allowed her any time to mourn. A baby who died without ever recognizing its mother's arms around him, treasuring any opportunity to know love before the world forgot he existed. Salty tears filled her eyes and painful questions plagued her head.
What happened to the baby? Was there a burial? How did no one realize it? Does anyone else know? Who grieved for my lost boy?
Olivia's parched throat screamed evolving into a loud and guttural wail. It echoed off the bedroom walls, sending her body into tormented convulsions of frustration and rage. Her hands shook and searched for something to throttle, finally settling on the closest object in her path.
Diane rushed into the bedroom. Olivia ripped apart Ben's pillow and cried in rampant distress. Diane hugged and cradled her sister in her arms. Their sticky, sweaty skin pressed against one another in the hopes two were more prepared to fight off misery's lecherous grip.
“He's gone, Liv. I know you're hurting. I'm here for you. Let it out.”
“I'm not crying because he's gone. I'm crying because of what that jerk did, what he took from me. How could he do it?”
“Oh, Liv. You don't mean it, honey. Ben was taken too soon from you. He didn't cause the accident. That's just your anger talking.”
Olivia kicked the pillow away and jumped off the bed thrashing and jostling Diane from her path. “I'm not talking about the accident. I need to get out of this house.”
Diane sat motionless on the bed watching as her sister released intrusive pain and pent-up emotion. “Talk to me. What's going through your head? Is it grief over something in the letter?”
Olivia paced the floor, pulling out locks of hair as she ripped a silver flower clip from her head and threw it across the room.
As it whizzed by Diane's face and slammed into the bedpost, three of its metallic petals splintered and cracked, each one disintegrating on its flight to the floor. A final crashing sound emanated against the foot of the nightstand, resulting in Olivia dropping to her knees with eyes full of fury and lips full of venom.
Olivia begged for a hug, and she crumbled into Diane's waiting arms. “I'm not ready to tell you everything Ben wrote in the letter. I need to figure out what it means and what I must do now. He lied to me.”
Diane rubbed her sister's back to calm her. She pulled Olivia's hair together in a bunch and away from her eyes. “Why don't we get breakfast, and you can tell me whatever you feel comfortable telling me right now. One mistake doesn't erase forty years of a good marriage.”
Olivia smirked. “Forty years of a good marriage? It may have been happy at one time, but it swarmed full of lies. You don't understand what he's done, Diane.”
Olivia slipped away from the embrace and walked to her bathroom kicking Ben's mangled pillow to the side. Feathers glided through the emotionally-charged air to the carpeted floor as she treaded on to wash away the tears. When she entered the bathroom, she could only find his terrycloth robe, still hanging on the back of the door, unused since the morning of the anniversary party. The musky scent soothed her as she searched for any memory to bring her relief.
Olivia sniffled and breathed in deeply recalling the day she'd met Ben forty-two years ago. After the New York law firm where they both worked had won a few high-profile cases that summer, they received an invitation to Puccini's Turandot performance at the Metropolitan Opera House. Once entering the ornate hall, Olivia stood in the foyer searching for someone she knew to watch the crowd with before the performance began. The room boasted wide and open spaces with endless gold-plated ceilings holding sweeping silk draperies against the thick white marble columns. Bowls of fresh purple and yellow freesias uncurled their soft petals against each of the pillars, and the peppery strawberry scent drove Olivia's senses dreamy and gleeful. She glided toward the West entrance, stepped up the glossy set of stairs and quickly lost her footing. As she leaned to the left narrowly missing a waitress carrying hors d'oeuvres, a man caught her arm, and she fell against him, jolting at the charge of electricity surging through her body. Although an office romance might damage her career, it didn't stop her from pursuing Ben. Olivia graciously thanked him for saving her from an embarrassing fall, and her eyes stared into his for a moment longer than she'd expected. It was that night at the opera when they'd shared their first kiss. It was brief, a goodbye kiss after the performance ended, and his masculine scent fashioned a chill down her back. She'd worn three-inch pumps and still had to stand on the tips of her toes to reach his lips. When they pulled away from hers, a wave of euphoric serenity chased out everything around her except for that moment with Ben. She would never forget the kiss, not even in his death.
Praesent id libero id metus varius consectetur ac eget diam. Nulla felis nunc, consequat laoreet lacus id.