Chapter Fifty-Two
"Denny, I'm sorry… You know I'm sorry, don't you?" I only shook my head even while knowing that she couldn't see me through the bedroom door. My hand was still holding on tight to the knob, but I wasn't sure if I was ready to open it just yet. What I was sure of, though, was that this was exactly why Vaughn put the lock in backwards. "Denny, please let me out."
"I… I can't," I replied quietly. "I won't let you out until you calm down." It was then that she started beating on the wall. "Chelsea!" The pounding stopped. "Please… you need to calm down."
"But I am calm!" Hearing her voice, I couldn't help but wince, but it wasn't because of the sound of her voice that I did. It was because I was hurt. I had no way to help her as long as I didn't know what was really wrong. "It's your fault! You're the reason I can't go to sleep at night! It's all your fault!"
"Chelsea, I-"
"Mr. Denny?" Everything went silent when I heard Alisa speak. She was standing just behind me, holding on tightly to the doll from her father, and although she didn't say as much, her wide eyes told me she was scared. Not that I could blame her since- even as grown man- I was feeling more or less the exact same way. "Is Mama mad at you again?" she asked. "You're not gonna leave, are you?"
"No, I'm not going to leave," I assured her. Sure, things were getting hard, but… that wasn't all that surprising. Not really. "I'm staying right here with you and-"
"Stop lying to her!" The girl and I both jumped to hear her mother begin pounding on the bedroom door and rattling the knob. "You don't mean it! You can't promise her something like that!"
"Yes, I can." Turning back to the small child behind me, I knelt down and put my hands on her tiny shoulders and tried my best to smile. I couldn't imagine what it must have been like for her to take in all of what was happening. "I'm not going to go anywhere," I whispered, "but right now… I need you to go back to bed. Okay?" She nodded. "Okay. I'm going to shut your door, so don't come out until I come and tuck you in."
It was only after I had put Alisa back to bed that I returned to talk to the woman still beating on the wall. She'd been screaming the whole time, but I heard only half of what was actually said. Most of which had already been said before. She was repeating herself… over and over and over again... telling me that I was a liar. Among other things.
"Chelsea… I'm going to unlock the door," I told her. Even when I did, though, she still continued to slam her fists. That was until I opened it for her. "Chelsea, please-"
It was too late. As soon as I went to walk into the room to try and calm her down, one of her fists slammed into my head- just above my left eye. I knew it was an accident on my part, but when it happened, she immediately started to apologize. "Denny… are you alright? Did I hit you? What'd I do? I'm sorry… I'm so sorry!"
"Don't worry about it," I assured her despite feeling the blood trickling down the side of my face. It was a rather small nick, but I knew it was most likely her wedding ring that did it. A fact that I knew would only make things worse if she found out about it. "I'm sorry I locked you in there," I began once more. "I shouldn't have done it."
But I didn't know what else to do.
"No… no, it's alright," she insisted. She sighed then, her breath shaking while she did so, but soon enough she was trying to smile. For whatever reason, it was the last thing I wanted her to do. "I'm sorry. I'm-"
"It's okay if you want to cry." She just gazed up at me at first, but while she was trying to dry her face, I could still see the stains that were left on her cheeks from her tears. And when she realized that there was no way for her to hide them, her eyes started to well up again. "It's okay… Really, it's okay." Wrapping my arms around her, I held her tightly against me, but it wasn't long before she pushed me away. "What is it?"
"I- You need to go to bed." I didn't know what else to do, and so I let her go. That was apparently the wrong thing to do, though, because soon enough she seemed ready to rage yet again. "What's wrong with you? Can't you even talk to me?"
"I am talking to you, Chelsea." She just shook her head, and I knew there'd be no reasoning with her. At least not that night. "You go on ahead… I'm going to make sure Alisa's asleep. I'll… I'll be there in a minute."
Stepping bad into the little girl's room, I knew I'd never be able to sleep in that bed until I figured out just what was going on in my wife's head. However, that really didn't matter when I had her daughter to worry about, and seeing her laying in her own bed with her eyes still open that feeling only grew. I just wished I could do more for her.
"Are you and Mama still fighting?" she asked. Her voice cracked while she spoke, but just like her mother, she refused to let me see her cry. "You can sleep here… if you want to."
"I think I'd like that," I agreed with a soft sigh and a smile. "Thank you, Alisa…"
"You look even worse today, man." Although I tried my best to glare at him, Kai just shook his head and sighed. "You can't go to work looking like that, or everyone's going to want to know what happened. And you're not that great at lying, you know."
"I don't think they'd care," I muttered as I ripped open the door to his car. "I don't even know what happened last night."
"Easy there," he reminded me. "We're still in front of the school… and I'm pretty sure you don't want those people thinking you did that to yourself." I knew he was right, but I still thought it was better than them thinking it was done by the girl's mother. "That Alisa is really something, though."
"She really is." After all, most kids wouldn't want to share their bed with their stepfather to protect him… and from her own mother no less. "I can't believe she even wanted to go to go to school. I told her she could stay home if she wanted to, but-"
"Probably didn't want to wuss out in front of you," my friend chuckled, pulling out onto the street. "Anyway, do you know where our little bridezilla ran off to? She wasn't at the house this morning, right?"
"No, she wasn't." I had a good idea of where to look, of course, but the real question was if I should go after her knowing how upset she must've been. "I really wish I knew what happened with her, but she just blew up on me all of a sudden."
"Well… what'd you say to her?" Kai asked while glancing back towards me and raising an eyebrow. "I mean… most women wouldn't go off the deep end for no reason, right? She isn't that kind of woman… or is she?" I wasn't even sure, but I just kept quiet. "Denny? Are you listening to me?"
"I heard you," I assured him, still staring out the window the same as always. It was relaxing, really, the way I could just watch the world pass by, but I knew it couldn't last for long. "I asked her," I explained. "I asked her about… well, I asked her if maybe she was pregnant."
"Ouch."
"How was I supposed to know she'd start yelling at me like that?" After all, it seemed like an innocent enough question at the time, and if I'd known how wrong I was beforehand, I never would've bothered asking in the first place. Now I was left with an even more serious problem. "She didn't even tell me anything about it…"
"Wait. So is she or isn't she?" It would figure that Kai would have a one-track mind only when it came to these kind of things. It was just too bad I didn't have the patience for him that morning. "Well?"
"I don't know!" I snapped back, feeling my face start to warm. "Alright? I don't know."
"Hey. Relax, will you? I'm not trying to pick a fight with you, but you've gotta admit, it sure sounds like something's going on." I sighed again before taking another deep breath. "I'm not saying there's anything wrong with her, but… you guys really can't hold it together for long if you're already like this two months into this thing. I mean, I don't care if we have to go to work early to get Alisa to school or whatever, but-"
"Just take me to the docks," I muttered. Closing my eyes, I could see her just like I did back when I didn't know what her name was or even why she was there in the first place. Knowing what little I did about her now, I almost had to smile to think that there was a good chance she was wearing the same dress that she always did. The one that she wore just because it happened to be on the top of the laundry pile. "Can you tell Grace I'm taking a sick day? I was just going to come in late, but-"
"Don't worry about it," Kai said with a grin. "I'll take care of it. You have enough on your mind without worrying about her." I hadn't been all that surprised when he agreed to do it, but what did surprise me was the way he patted me on the back. "You'll be alright… but don't take her home until you find out what's going on in that head of hers. I don't want Aja telling me her boyfriend had to come to your place because of some domestic dispute."
Really, I was fine with talking to her. After all, even if we didn't always say very much, we still talked. The only problem was what we needed to talk about, and knowing that, I wasn't so sure how I was supposed to handle what was going on. Not that I had any idea to begin with.
"Chelsea?" She looked back at me, but she didn't seem to be any different than she already was. Other than how she wasn't wearing any make-up. Something that I didn't even know she was before I woke up with her every morning. "You didn't have to leave the house, you know."
"I just didn't want to make Alisa upset," she explained. "It's bad enough that I made Vaughn leave know without making you sleep in her room."
"Leaving the house isn't going to make her feel any better," I reminded her. The woman just bowed her head when she heard me say it, and I didn't hesitate to put my arms around her. "You forget your coat, too… You know it's winter, right?"
"Do you want mine?" She shook her head, but I could still feel her shaking. When I went to take off my coat for her, though, she pulled it right back onto me. "You've been out here for a long time. You're going to get sick if we don't get you warmed up soon."
"What about you?" I just bit back a sigh and chuckled, kissing the top of her head before taking off my coat and wrapping it around her shoulders. Then she looked up. "I really got you, didn't I? I'm so sorry. I should've known better."
"About what exactly?" It was hardly subtle, but that wasn't saying much when it came to me. Unfortunately for the both of us, there didn't seem to be much of an option. "If you're worried about me getting mad… I'm not going anywhere. I just want to know what's wrong."
"Would you believe me if I said I don't know?"
"Maybe… I hate to say it, but I think you know what's wrong…" She just didn't want to tell me what it was. "I don't like fighting. You know that…" Chelsea nodded weakly, and for it me, it was almost a relief. Almost, but not quite. "That's why I want to know because I don't want to have to fight about it later, and you know that's what's going to happen if we don't take care of this."
"There's something wrong with me," she murmured. "Vaughn always told me there was a problem, but I wouldn't go to the doctor because I didn't want them to tell me there was something wrong. I don't want Alisa to have to go through any of that. I could never forgive myself if-"
"Then why don't you go?" After all, by the sounds of it, she had every reason to see someone. At least as far as I could tell… but maybe that was just my own sense of self-preservation finally settling in. When I thought it over, though, I still felt that maybe it wasn't a bad way to think about the whole thing. "Things will just get worse if we don't take care of whatever it is now."
"Can you go with me?" she asked, pulling my coat tighter around herself. "I don't want to go by myself. I always get so nervous when it comes to these things…" So did that mean she had to go before? "Can we go home now, Denny? Please?"
But the questions would have to wait.
