“Maybe you should have thought about that before you let me spend a year planning a wedding with a lying, cheating bastard!”
Suddenly, out of nowhere, Luke spoke up, “I think that both of you need to get everything out in the open, but here’s not the place because it’s too easy to start screaming and yelling. I’m taking the both of you out to lunch to a restaurant, where you will do nothing but embarrass yourselves if you raise your voice. That way you can talk calmly.”
“Thank you, Luke,” my mother said.
“If you think for one second I’m going anywhere with that woman, then you’re delusional!” I yelled.
“Come on, babe, we need to talk,” he said as he lightly took hold of my arm and led me to the bedroom. “We’ll be right back, Mary,” he said.
As we walked into the bedroom, Luke pulled me into an embrace. “Listen to me, if you ever want her to leave you alone, then you need to talk things out with her. Just listen to her; ask her questions, get your answers, and then be done with it. If you still want nothing to do with her after you talk, then you can walk away with no regrets.”
“I can’t, Luke. You don’t understand,” I said as I began to tremble.
Instantly, he broke our embrace and placed his hands on each side of my face. “Close your eyes, and take in a deep breath, babe.”
I did what he said; then I slowly opened my eyes. “Feeling better?” he asked.
I nodded my head, and he kissed me on the lips. “I’ll be there with you. I’ll be there for you, and I’ll be there to catch you if you fall. You’ve suffered enough, and you need to do this. Ok?”
“Fine, I’ll go. Just let me get myself together,” I said.
“That’s my girl.” He smiled, kissed me on the head, and walked out of the room.
***
Luke pulled into the parking lot of a restaurant called The Garden Bistro. I was still unsure about this, but I had Luke there to help through it if things got rough. We walked into the restaurant and were promptly seated at a table. I stopped to see which seat my mother was taking because I didn’t want to sit next to her; then I took the seat across. As the waitress greeted us and handed us our menus, she asked us for our drink orders.
“I’ll have a melon ball, please.” I smiled.
Luke looked at me with knitted eyebrows and then looked at the waitress. “Doesn’t that have vodka in it?” he asked her.
“Yes, it does,” the waitress replied.
“No melon ball for her. She’ll have a glass of red wine.”
I looked at him, cocked my head, and then looked up at the waitress. “Just bring the bottle, please,” I said as I sighed.
I looked across the table at my mother as our eyes met and she took that opportunity to begin her sad attempts at changing my mind about her. “I miss you, Lily. You have no idea how hard this has been for me since you left.”
I felt the fire starting to rev up in my body. “This has been hard on you?” I asked as I raised my voice, and Luke grabbed my hand. I took in a deep breath because I wasn’t going to embarrass myself or him. I made a promise to him, and I was going to keep that promise. Just as I was getting ready to speak, the waitress set the glass and bottle of wine down on the table. Luke grabbed the bottle, pouring some into my glass. I took a sip and asked my mother the question that I’ve wanted the answer to, “Ok, mother. Why? Why didn’t you tell me about Brynn and Hunter?”
She looked down at her glass that held her gin and tonic. “They both promised me they’d end it, and I thought that they had. You already had trust issues with men, and I didn’t want to hurt you.”
“Once a cheater, always a cheater. You of all people should know that!” I spat.
I could see the tears beginning to form in her eyes. Luke looked over at me. “Lily,” he said.
“What? It’s the truth. Dad promised you that he wouldn’t see other women, but he did anyway, and he did it until the day he died. I remember walking past your bedroom almost every night and hearing you cry yourself to sleep. How could you live like that? How could you want that life for me, your own daughter?”
Mary took in a sharp breath. “You put up with certain things when someone is your life and consumes you. I know Hunter loved you, and that’s why I didn’t tell you. You deserved to have a good man love you after what your father put you through.”
As I couldn’t comprehend where she was coming from, I blankly stared at her. “I have a question for you mother, and I want you to be honest with me… Are you on drugs?”
“Lillian Grace Gilmore! How dare you speak to me like that!” she spat in a loud enough voice that managed to turn a couple of heads.
“Lillian?” Luke smiled as he asked.
“I was named after my grandmother. Be warned that you are never to call me that!” I said sternly as I held up a finger to him.
The waitress walked over with our food and sat our plates down in front of us as I got ready to spit fire back at my mother.
“Brynn misses you; she’s torn up over everything that has happened,” she said calmly.
I finished the last of my wine, grabbed the bottle, and poured more into my glass. “She’s broken up? What about me? Don’t you even care how this has affected me? Why is everything about you and Brynn? What about my feelings and what happened to me? Jesus Christ, Mother, sometimes I think we aren’t even cut from the same cloth.”
She looked at me, and a single tear fell from her eye as she quietly spoke, “We aren’t.”
In that instant, every part of me froze. My pulse starting racing, and I felt my throat constricting.
“What the hell, Mary!” Luke said as he looked at her.
As I glanced at Luke, I got up from my seat. “I need to get out of here,” I said as I grabbed my purse and ran out of the restaurant.
I had only made it to the parking lot when I needed to stop to try and catch my breath. My legs felt like lead, and they didn’t want to move anymore. My stomach was tied in knots, and I wanted to vomit. Luke came up behind me, placing his arms around me, but I broke away from him.
“Don’t, because if you do, I’ll lose it, Luke, and I can’t lose it!” I started raising my voice.
Suddenly, I heard my mother’s voice in the distance. “She was only seventeen years old and a baby herself.”
As I started to take a few steps forward, I stopped and turned around. With sarcasm I responded, “Let me guess…you swooped in and saved the day!”—raising my voice—“Or better yet, her life!
“The two of you aren’t going to do this in the middle of the parking lot,” Luke snapped. “Get in the Jeep, and we’ll go back to the apartment where you two can talk about this.”
As much as I hated her at this moment, I needed to hear everything she had to say. I couldn’t spend the rest of my life wondering about the truth Mary had kept hidden all these years. As hard and painful as it was going to be, I needed some answers.
“Luke’s right. Let’s go back to my apartment; I want to hear about what a lie my life has been.”
The three of us climbed into the Jeep, and Luke drove us back to my apartment.
29
We walked into my apartment, and I immediately took out a bottle of wine. As I was taking a glass from the cupboard, my mother looked at me and said, “You seem to drink a lot. Do you have a drinking problem?”
I gasped as I set the glass on the counter. “Considering everything I’ve been through in my life, I should have one.”
She shook her head and sat down at the table. Luke sat down across from her, and I stayed at the kitchen counter.
“So, go ahead and tell me how my whole life’s been a lie,” I said.
She cleared her throat as she began to speak. “I had some problems, and the doctors told me that I would never be able to conceive a child. You have no idea how much that devastated me, because the only thing I wanted was a child with Johnny. I started drinking a lot, I stayed in bed all day, and I isolated myself from the world. One night, Johnny came home with this seventeen- year-old girl, Allison. He told me she was pregnant with his child, and that she’d agreed to give us the baby. Her mother was a prostitute and a drug addict, and her father had run off after she was born. She could barely take care of herself, let alone a child. So, Johnny paid for her medical care and after you were born, he gave her money to start a new life.”
Her eyes filled with tears as she continued. “I know you’re probably to going ask me why I stayed after that. It was because of you, Lily. I may not have given birth to you, but you were my baby, my daughter, and you were a part of Johnny, which made you even more special.”
I gulped before throwing back my glass of wine. I closed my eyes and Luke got up from the table and walked over to me.
“Lily, are you alright?” he asked as he put his hand on top of mine.
“I raised you, Lily. You’re my daughter, and you cannot say otherwise! I loved you and nurtured you. I took care of you when you were sick, and I was there for you when you cried, while your father was out playing his shows and hav**g s*x with any woman that looked his way.”
Luke tightened the grip on my hand. “Mary, I think Lily’s heard enough.”
As I removed my hand from his, I looked at him. “It’s ok, Luke. Let’s go sit down.”
I walked over to the table and sat across from my mother as I actually had a moment where I felt incredibly sorry for her. “Mom, please just tell me why you were going to let me marry Hunter if you knew about him and Brynn. All I want is an honest answer.”
Mary looked at me with pursed lips as she tilted her head. I could see the pain in her eyes as she spoke to me. “You seemed happy with Hunter, and I couldn’t ruin that for you. All I wanted was for you to be happy. I know I was wrong, and I should have told you when I first found out,” she said as she shook her head.
“When did you find out?” I asked.
“Does it really matter at this point, Lily?”
“Yes, Mother, it does. It matters to me.”
She took in a deep breath before spilling the words I didn’t want to hear. “I found out the day we went shopping for your wedding dress.”
My stomach instantly felt sick as I put my shaking hand over my mouth and my eyes swelled with tears. “But, Brynn was with us that day and she was trying on maid of honor dresses. How did you find out?”
“I received a text message from Mrs. Kendall with a picture of Hunter and Brynn going into a hotel room together. She said she saw them, and she thought I should know. Why do you think I broke down and cried when you came out in your dress? Part of it was because you were so beautiful, and I couldn’t believe you were getting married, and the other part was because I knew it would destroy you, and I couldn’t let that happen. So, one day, not too long after that, I confronted the two of them and warned them that they were to end it immediately.”
Luke walked over to me and clasped my shoulders with his hands, rubbing them gently. I took in a deep breath, and I buried my face in my hands. As I thought of something, I lifted my head and looked at my mother.