“Hello,” she said softly. Her eyes were red and swollen. The tears that had formed fell over and followed the path down her cheeks of the heartbreak she was obviously suffering.
“Hi,” I replied in a small voice.
Dominico introduced me to her in Greek and she nodded in understanding at the stranger in her son’s home. I moved forward and wrapped my arms around her. I couldn’t help myself; the suffering on her face was so heart wrenching that I didn’t want her to not have someone to lean on.
I felt two small pairs of arms wrap around our legs and smiled despite myself. It was Alexa and Markos and they wanted a hug too it seemed.
Gabrien’s mother pulled away from me and went back to her chair to resume her sky watching as the children climbed into her lap.
“How old are they?” I asked Dominico.
“Three years old. They were his pride and joy. He knew how desperately Marley wanted to become a mother and he was happy that he could do that for her,” he explained as we walked toward a man that was standing on the property line, hands in his pockets, staring into nothing.
“Papa? This is Olivia, Marley’s best friend,” he said gently putting his hand on the older man’s shoulder.
“Hello Olivia,” his father responded blandly, without turning to face me.
“Hello. I’m sorry for your loss,” I replied softly.
“Thank you,” was the stoic reply.
Dominico sighed and led me back to the house. He explained that the rest of the family would meet us at the funeral home tomorrow. I brushed away tears again as I watched him leave and ran up the staircase. I wanted to find Marley and the rest of the girls because being alone in the knowledge that her husband wanted to meet me and never did, destroyed me.
I bumped into her at the top of the staircase as they were coming down.
“What’s wrong?” Marley asked curiously.
“Oh you know. Just met your brother in law, found out that your husband wanted to meet me, and I was too wrapped up in my own relationship to ever reach out to know,” I rambled.
Marley smiled sadly and put an arm around my shoulder, as we went back down the stairs.
“Don’t feel bad. It just wasn’t meant to happen,” she replied bravely.
I sighed unhappily as we went into her kitchen and sat down around the large island in the center.
“So tell me what’s going on,” she said looking at me curiously. “Sofia and Cassidy told me some of it.”
“You remember Mitch obviously,” I started, nervously licking my lips. “Well things kind of went downhill out of nowhere. The sex stopped or was so far and few in between that I felt like I was a virgin each time he decided he wanted to get laid. His drinking got out of control and he started to pay more attention to his video games than to me. Which would’ve never bothered me since I always played with him, but he would sit in the other room and play alone. Um, I decided to go to Spain and Cassidy went with me and I met a guy in the airport. God he’s so much younger than me, but he’s such a good person and the sex was – is absolutely mind-blowing, Mars.”
“Then what’s the issue?” she asked with a laugh.
“I left with him last year and the plane crashed. I’ve spent the past year in the hospital learning to walk again and struggling to get my memory back. It’s almost all there; I was able to tell him how I met Mitch and stuff. He, Alejandro, loves me so much that it’s suffocating, but not in a bad way. I could drown in his love and never once wish it was different,” I explained truthfully.
Marley cradled her chin in the palm of her hand and looked thoughtful for a moment. The backdoor slid open and in ran Markos and Alexa with flowers for their Mama and I couldn’t help but smile. I watched her take the flowers and kiss them each in turn as they turned around and ran back outside. She placed the flowers on the island top and glanced at Sofia, then Cassidy, then me.
“Have you decided who you want to be with yet?”
“No. When I was with Alejo all I wanted was to be with him. But when I was with Mitch, I thought of all that we had already been through together and even though it’ll take a lot of work to fix things, we built a foundation already.”
“Who are you willing to give yourself completely to, Livie?” she asked.
“It could go either way. It’s not as easy as I thought it would be,” I replied dropping my face into my hands.
“Think about it this way; you’re holding your almost death against Alejandro even though you willingly went. You’re holding your somewhat crumbled relationship against Mitchell, when you did nothing to fix it. That’s not fair to anyone involved, you included,” she said wisely.
I sighed as I heard the front door open. I turned my face to look out into the backyard when Mars got up from her chair and disappeared from the kitchen.
Sofia didn’t say anything and neither did Cassidy. I wasn’t sure if they were silent for my sake or because they just had nothing to say.