You Got It Wrong - Part Forty One (incomplete)

Chapter Forty One

A/N So so so so sorry at the delay. Had a ridiculous January on so many levels. Finally started to get this story sorted and I had a forced absence. Sorry that it's not to everyone's cup of tea, I know how I want this story to go, but it's not getting there as I'd hoped. I will complete it, but my next story is already taking over, and it's a difficult time when I'm trying to formulate the rest of this story as another one is fighting for attention in my small mind!

I hope that you can stick with this, I will edit it, maybe rewrite parts, but I literally post as I write the chapters, so it's hard to go back and change things. Anyway. Sorry to you loyal readers once again. Promise regular updates. And then the next story very soon!

MZ

Lilah was sat in the kitchen on Amelia’s Notting hill house looking pale. Nina stood there staring at her trying desperately to gauge how her friend was felling. She’d been happy when she’d flown off to Cyprus, but then she was never happier than when was modelling. That was her prime love. She hadn’t done it for a long time, and she’d been looking forward to the trip. But something had changed.

                “You ok?”

Lilah looked up her face a mask, “I didn’t hear you come in.”

Nina stepped towards her, “I wasn’t quiet, you know me.” She sat in front of her, “what’s wrong? How was Cyprus?”

She leaned back in her chair, looking at her friend through dark expressionless eyes.

                “Warm...”

She nodded, “and the shoot?”

Lilah nodded, “I delivered...”

                “And you caught up with some old friends?”

Lilah bit her bottom lip, then nodded, “yes.”

At no point did Lilah make eye contact with Nina, so she shuffled to sit in front of her, “Lilah...what is it? What’s happened?”

She watched as Lilah shook her head, then reached for the cold cup of tea in front of is, drinking it without the flinch it probably deserved. And had replaced the mug on the table before she lifted her eyes, “I did it. Four days in the heat...and it was fine.”

                “And?” Nina was on pins.

                “Two nights ago, we wrapped it up, and Leonora, do you remember her?” When Nina nodded, vaguely able to remember the woman she’d modelled with in the past. “Well, she asked me to stay on for a couple of nights...a little winter sun, and of course sample the nightlife; I mean Ayia Napa is quite the place she assured me.” 

Nina smiled, “so I hear.”

                “We were in this nightclub, it was really busy, I mean considering it’s so late in the year. I didn’t drink much...I’m not in the mood these days.”

                “You’ll get your groove back. You were so much stronger when you left...”

                “I collapsed...in the toilets. I was waiting for Leonora to finish up...thank god...”

Nina grabbed her hand, “collapsed? Jesus Lilah what the hell is going on?”

                “I’m pregnant.”

Theo watched Sadie playing with Melody through the one way window of the room in the contact centre. The liaison officer linked to them felt that Sadie was trustworthy and that she should increase her role, see Melody more often and for longer...maybe in another location. He couldn’t think about that. He knew that he’d struggle to cope without the control over his daughter, Sadie could do anything and he couldn’t begin to imagine what it would be like if she disappeared with Melody to somewhere unknown. The night he’d found her with Sadie unconscious still haunted his dreams, and he couldn’t believe that people in authority honestly thought she was ready for more contact. Were they all mad?”

He turned to their liaison, a woman in her fifties called Cheryl, “I can’t agree to it. I want random drug tests first. If she passes a few then, and only then will I think about it. After all she’s a manipulator, and being a woman, the mother you all think she deserves specialist treatment. I mean what man would be treated the same way?”

Cheryl pursed her lips, “Mr Peterson, that isn’t the case, I assure you.”

                “Four months ago that woman...” he nodded in the direction of Sadie, “passed out due to drugs whilst caring for my daughter. She has not had any rehabilitation or detox, and YOU all want her to have MORE involvement with a vulnerable child she’s already proved she is too selfish to look after.”

                “But...”

He held up a hand, “there is NOTHING you can say to change things.” He nodded to the glass, to the tableau playing out in from of them, “so she can spend forty minutes reading stories to Melody, so she can play doctors and nurses. When she leaves here and jacks up on cocaine she’ll forget she was even here. I KNOW her, you forget that. I need detox and negative drug tests. Or I’ll pull even this bit of contact.”

His scowl silenced the woman, he didn’t care that he seemed unreasonable; no one seemed to be looking at the big picture, just Sadie and her doe eyes gaining pity wherever she went. He was getting more and more angry, he needed some fresh air.

“I’m going to wait outside.” The woman almost looked relieved to see him leave, and he gasped at the air as he emerged into the morning as though his life depended on it.

Sadie, he clenched his hands into fists wanting to punch a wall. All her life, all their married life she’d fluttered eyelashes and got what she wanted from Daddy Dearest, from teachers, employers...and him. Now she was using the same tactics to manipulate their daughter’s welfare. Well THIS time he was in a position of power, and she wouldn’t win.

He glanced at his phone and groaned, still no message from Nina, he knew that was part of why he was so angry. She’d disappeared four days ago from his home with no explanation, and other than an “I’ll call you soon” text, he’d heard nothing from her. And he was getting desperate. He had no idea how important she was to him until she disappeared. And it was painful. Especially when everything else was a disaster.

His phone rang and he glanced at the number, then let out a sigh at the fact it wasn’t Nina, instead it was one of his contractors from the new site he was managing in Harlow. He wasn’t calling for fun, there were problems and apparently only he could deal with it. He was waiting on a carer starting work looking after Mansell, and a little part of Melody’s day. They were still working out a schedule where the carers linked in with both him and Daniel so that Mansell was rarely alone. But it relied on nothing going wrong like this. Storming back into the contact centre, he had no choice but to wait the twenty minutes that were left of the visit.

Ninety minutes later, Melody was asleep in her car seat, curled under a blanket and Theo had solved the latest conundrum and the work was back on target. As he climbed into the driver’s seat of his truck he sighed, this was no life for Melody. And it was no life for him. Not really.

Picking up his phone he called Nina, he’d promised her space, time. But he needed to hear her voice.

But it cut to answer phone.

                “Nina. I’m sorry, I must sound like a stalker...but I miss you. I wanted to hear your voice.” He paused, “I hope things are ok. I...call me?”

He hung up the call and tossed the phone onto the seat beside him with a groan. When did things deteriorate so badly?

Nina looked at Lilah. She was finally asleep. But even in slumber she looked troubled. They’d had a tough few days, but hopefully they had turned the corner. Lilah had been silent for a long time, not answering Nina’s questions, but now, three days and a trip to the South of France later, she was talking. In a small chalet just off the Med coast, they’d spent two days not doing anything. But earlier that day she’d cornered her friend.

                “This is happening. You have to deal with it. You have to decide what you want to do.”

Lilah had rolled her head from her resting position comatose on the sofa to stare at Nina, “really?”

Nina squatted beside her, “Lilah, you are almost ten weeks pregnant. In thirty weeks, just over half a year...it’ll be here in your arms. You HAVE to wake up to this darling, as much as I don’t want to hurt you; you have got to be realistic. Do you want to have it? You’ve always wanted kids.”

And it was then that she started to cry, loud racking sobs that broke Nina’s heart, “I wanted them with someone who loved me, I wanted family, love...future. How can I love a baby whose father...” she shook her head. “I can’t even think about it. I can’t even verbalise it. How can I look this child in the eye, knowing what I know? Knowing how it came to exist.” She sighed, “I hate him, that man, I hate what happened. How can I treat a baby resulting from that well? I’ll blame it, resent it.”

Nina sat back on her heels, just relieved to know that Lilah had been thinking about things. Silence in this case was because she was trying to work through what was happening in her head. That was a positive. Definitely a move forward.

                “Will you go talk to someone? A counsellor? Someone?”

She shook her head, “not a stranger. I can’t do that.”

Nina had groaned at that, but then took her hand, “if we go away, somewhere away from here, somewhere different. And talk to me. We have to work out what you’re going to do.”

Lilah looked concerned so she added, “you can’t pretend it isn’t happening. You know that darling?”

And it was then the tear started to fall. It was what she needed, Nina held her, knowing that as each tear fell they were taking another step in the right direction.

Within a few days they were away, on the edge of the French Riviera in a small beach front chalet, filling their days with walks on the beach, good food, and copious amounts of herbal tea. Each day saw Lilah’s mood change. One day she wanted the baby, it was everything she wanted, everything she’d ever wanted. The next it was hell, her idea of permanent torture and torment, a real life reminder of what happened. Nina could understand both sides and she knew she’d be no better trying to make a decision over that.  But with every day, they were talking more, Lilah was opening up, and Nina knew that was all they could hope for.

                “I’ll speak to a counsellor. You’re right Nina; I can’t keep putting you through this.”

Nina opened her eyes, she’d fallen asleep in the sun kissed lounge, with the windows closed against the cold winter wind, but the heating on, it was more than warm sat there. She looked across at her friend who had been asleep directly opposite her. Lilah was so beautiful, her long lithe body curled up with the elegance of a cat, and her long blonde hair wafting around her shoulders, so serene in her repose.

                “Really? What brought that on?”

Lilah smiled, “you’ve got a life, a fit man waiting patiently for you. I’m compromising everything, being a selfish bitch.”

Nina stretched, “you’re never that. We’re sisters really, you know that.”

Lilah grinned, “well it’s my turn to go get dinner, I was fancying some pizza from that shack down the road?”

Nina nodded, “could get some more vino at the same time?”

                “Amazing idea. Maybe you want to...I don’t know...make a couple of calls, catch up on life whilst I’m gone?”

As Lilah pulled on her jacket and woolly hat, reached for her purse, Nina looked at her phone; she’d barely contacted Theo since leaving abruptly ten days ago. She had text him, but not much. But then she figured he was a big boy, he had to learn to cope without her, as she was a loyal friend.

As Lilah left, giving a wave, Nina reached for the phone and dialled the man who’d not been far from her thoughts the whole time they’d been away.

Margaret, Mansell’s carer was driving Theo mad, she literally changed everything, and suddenly the world revolved around their plans. Not that Mansell was complaining, and not that he himself was grossly unhappy with it all. But when he asked for things to be done, or when there were important appointments, things that Mansell had to do, Margaret took him to the park, or to the shops...anywhere and anything bar what they were meant to be doing. He wondered if it was the woman pushing the boundaries, staking her place in the whole picture, or whether this was Mansell himself causing chaos. That would be about right, the man was starting to get the sparkle back in his eyes, and that had to be a good sign.

Today he was stuck across town, late for picking up his daughter, and looking likely to miss the pharmacy where Mansell’s prescription was waiting to be picked up...in the next forty minutes.

Melody was most important, but his grandfather needed the meds. And he’d called Margaret fourteen times in the last hour to see if she could collect the prescription. But she hadn’t answered. As he grunted and kicked his truck into gear to do as much as he could in the time he had, the phone finally started to ring.

Connecting it through his hands free kit, he barked, “where the hell have you been? I’ve been calling you ALL afternoon!”

Bracing himself for the reaction of Margaret that he’d already come to expect, he half flinched, and nothing prepared him for the voice that offered, “really? I hadn’t noticed, and I’m in the South of France if you must know.” Then she laughed.

Theo almost stopped the vehicle to check that the voice was real. “Nina, is that you? Where the bloody hell have YOU been too?”