Marriage and Family
Chapter Six
Sam settled into her seat on the plane, waiting for it to take off from the runaway and staring aimlessly out the window. She took a deep breath, closing her eyes and letting her mind wander. Her thoughts zeroed in on the reunion of Claire with Nikolas.
"There's my beautiful wife." Nikolas exclaimed happily as he approached where Claire and Sam were standing. He barely had the time to get those words out before Claire threw her arms around him and started kissing him.
Sam stood back, looking down at the floor so as not to stare at her daughter and son-in-law. But she did manage to steal a few glances and smiled at the scene in front of her. She remembered how happy she was when they picked Martin up at the airport after he moved down here.
A few moments later, Claire and Nikolas separated, but not after whispering words of love and how much they missed each other. "Hello mom." Nikolas greeted, giving her a hug.
Sam still thought it was nice that Nikolas felt comfortable calling her mom. But why shouldn't he? He was a permanent fixture around their house for many years before he started dating Claire. "Hello Nikolas. It's good to see you."
"Likewise." Nikolas smiled, pulling away and wrapping his arm around Claire's waist. "I see that you've been taking excellent care of Claire. She looks wonderful."
"Mom's been a great help." Claire smiled, elated to have her husband home with her. "But unfortunately, she has a flight to catch soon. Don't you?"
"Yep." Sam smiled.
"Going home?" Nikolas asked.
"No, I'm making a detour to New York first. I have some old friends I'd like to see." Sam explained.
"Oh." Nikolas flashed Claire a questioning look asking why she wasn't going home and was met with one of her looks that meant she would tell him later. "Well I hope you have a safe flight."
"Thank you." Sam replied.
Claire broke away from Nikolas to give her mother a hug. "Thank you mom, for everything."
"You're welcome sweetie." Sam replied. "I love you."
"Love you too." Claire replied with a smile.
"I'll talk to you both later." Sam called as she headed for the ticket counter.
The plane was getting ready to take off and Sam looked down to make sure that her seat belt was fastened tightly. It was but she pulled it tighter just for good measure.
As the plane started to increase its' altitude Sam started thinking about what she had told Claire. She told her daughter that the problems she was having with Martin weren't as bad as the ones they had eighteen years ago. In some ways that was true, but for the most part that was a lie.
Things were really bad for them right now. She wasn't sure how long they could keep this up without breaking. She chastised herself for allowing it to get this bad. After the last time, they both should have realized not to let their problems get this worse. But they didn't and now they were in the exact same position they were all those years ago.
Leslie would not be proud of them. She'd be really disappointed if she knew what was going on. But Sam was hoping that she'd have some ideas of exactly how to make things right. That's the main reason why Sam decided to stop over in New York.
Sure she wanted to see Danny, Michelle and the rest of the old gang. It had been way too long since she'd been able to visit with them. But the main stop was going to be to see Leslie.
Although Leslie had retired from her private practice a few months ago, Sam was more than confident that Leslie wouldn't mind giving her some advice and lending an ear to hear about their problems. She'd know what to do.
Sam laughed as she realized that Leslie's first suggestion would probably be to work on their communication. But that was always their biggest problem. It always had been and probably always would be.
"Excuse me," the woman sitting next to Sam spoke, "do you mind if I turn on the light?" She gestured to the light above them. "I was going to read my book but I also don't want to disturb you if you were wanting to get some sleep."
"That's very nice of you." Sam replied, looking over at the older woman. "But I'm not going to sleep. Feel free to turn the light on."
"Is everything ok dear?" The woman asked. "You look…distracted."
Sam usually didn't tell perfect strangers things about herself, but this woman made her want to talk. Maybe it was the fact that the woman was old enough to be her mother. "I'm just having some problems with my husband. That's all."
"Oh." The woman chuckled. "Man troubles. Those are the worst."
"Yeah." Sam chuckled with her. "They are."
"My name is Isobel." The woman held out her hand for Sam to shake.
"I'm Samantha." Sam replied, shaking the woman's hand.
"Nice to meet you Samantha." Isobel smiled. "So these man troubles…did he cheat?"
"No."
"Did you cheat?" Isobel asked.
"No." Sam shook her head.
"Well if you don't mind me asking, then what exactly is the problem?" Isobel was confused. Most of the problems with men she had encountered were because of cheating.
"We constantly fight about everything. Ever since our kids moved out, we've been having problems talking to each other. It's like we've completely run out of things to talk about. Then when we do talk, we fight. So we just quit talking." Sam explained.
"I see." Isobel nodded her head as she absorbed what Samantha was saying. "Sounds normal to me. Everyone has problems when their children first move out. My husband and I did."
"How did you fix it?" Sam was curious now. Maybe this stranger could help.
"We took a nice, long vacation together."
"Well that may work with getting us to talk more but it still won't solve all of our problems." Sam pointed out.
"You have other problems?" Isobel inquired.
"Yeah, and the main one is centered around my husband's father." Sam explained. "We let him move in with us because his health was getting bad and he couldn't take care of himself anymore. He lived with us for about four years before he died."
"That must have been hard, taking care of him." Isobel observed.
"It was. Of course it didn't help any that his father hated me. He was always yelling at me or accusing me of doing something just to spite him. My husband never saw that side of his father though so he always shrugged off any attempt I made of trying to talk to him about it." She paused, remembering one of the conversations she had with Martin about Victor.
"Martin, we need to talk about your father." Sam told him as she climbed into bed and claimed her usual spot in his arms.
"Is something wrong with him?" Martin asked, kissing her forehead.
"He's fine except for the fact that he finds something wrong with everything I do for him." Sam explained.
"No he doesn't." Martin shook his head.
"Yes, he does!" Sam exclaimed.
"Well he's probably just having trouble adjusting to living here. He's used to being alone so now living with four other people has got to be hard for him." Martin reasoned.
"He's been living here for three months." Sam pointed out. "He should be adjusted by now."
"Well maybe you should try to be a little nicer to him." Martin suggested.
"I am nice to him." Sam could feel the anger start to boil and decided to stop this before they ended up fighting. "Never mind." She sighed, turning out the light. "Goodnight. Love you."
"Love you too." Martin told her, kissing the top of her head again and pulling her close to him.
"Eventually I quit trying to talk to him about it."
She couldn't help but be a little angry with Martin for not seeing what was going on in his own family and for being so wrapped up with his father that he didn't see the repercussions that Victor's presence had on the family. "But I could deal with his father's insults and accusations. It was when he died that things really started getting bad. My husband started blaming me for his father's death."
"He blamed you?" Isobel asked, shocked by this twist. "Why? How?"
"It's a long story that I don't want to bore you with." Sam replied. "But the short summary is that I had convinced my husband to take me out to dinner without his father and when we came home, his father was dead from a heart attack."
"But he shouldn't have blamed you for that." Isobel pointed out. "It's not like you knew he was going to die."
"I know that and you know that. Most rational people know that, but he doesn't." She sighed. "He apologized for saying it, but things haven't been the same since then."
"You know, this isn't our first break. We had one about twenty years ago. We'd been having a lot of problems and even saw a marriage counselor for a while. And everything was going well until my father-in-law moved in. Sometimes I wonder if things will ever be good again and if we'll ever be able to make it work or if we're just wasting our time."
"There's an old quote that I've always tried to be true to. In my old age I have forgotten where I heard it, but this is how it goes. 'When two people love each other, really love each other, but they just can't get it together; when do you get to that point when enough is enough? The answer is never. You never give up as long as the love is there.'"
Isobel sighed. "I have tried to live by that my whole life and it's part of what has kept me and my husband together for so long."
"How long have you and your husband been married?" Sam asked.
"Almost forty-eight years." Isobel smiled proudly. "This is kind of a personal question, but do you love your husband?"
Sam was quiet for a moment, thinking about Martin and everything they had been through together. "Yeah, I do."
"And does he love you too?"
"I don't know anymore." Sam admitted sadly. "Sometimes I don't think he likes me very much, but…"
"Maybe you should ask him." Isobel suggested. "I'd wager a guess and say that he loves you too. And if there's love there, you can't give up."
Sam and Isobel spent the rest of the flight talking about their husbands and families. Sam told her about her children, and Isobel informed Sam about her five children and seven grandchildren. The time flew by so fast that Sam could hardly believe it when the pilot announced that they were making their final dissent and they would be landing in five minutes.
"It was really nice talking to you Isobel." Sam smiled at the woman after they got off the plane.
"And it was nice to meet you Samantha. I hope everything works out for you." Isobel smiled back.
"Thanks." Sam called after the woman as she headed to go claim her baggage. After she got her bag, she looked around but didn't see Danny. He was supposed to be there to pick her up, but, looking at her watch she noticed that he was already twenty minutes late. With a sigh, she rolled her bag over to a nearby chair and sat down.
As she waited for Danny to get there, she started thinking about Martin. He was pretty much all she ever thought about though. While she was with Claire, she tried really hard not to let any sadness or any signs of missing Martin show because she didn't want to worry her daughter.
Besides, Claire was missing Nikolas so much that she didn't want to add to that. So she'd pushed Martin to the back of her mind in hopes of avoiding the problems and the sadness, only acknowledging thoughts of him when she cried into her pillow at night.
But now that she wasn't around Claire, she embraced her feelings. She really missed Martin. She missed everything about him. Even though there were moments where she disliked everything about him, she still missed him.
She's been apart from him for three months now and that was a record. They weren't even apart from each other that long when they were on their break all those years ago. The more she thought about the situation they were in, the more depressed she got.
Danny entered the airport and looked around frantically for any sign of Sam. When he saw her sitting down, he heaved a sigh of relief and headed over to her.
"Hey. I am so sorry that I'm late, but there was this accident on the highway that you wouldn't believe. There were cops and ambulances all over the place…" His explanation was cut off when she looked up and he saw that she was crying.
"I didn't make you cry, did I?" Danny felt really bad because he started thinking that he was responsible for her tears. "Ah Sam I'm sorry. I really didn't mean to…"
She shook her head. "It's not you. I don't care that you're late." She sobbed.
He sat down next to her and wrapped his arm around her shoulder. "Then what's wrong? Why are you crying?"
She proceeded to tell him about all of the reasons why she was crying and Danny, being the good friend that he was, listened and let her cry until she had exhausted all tears.