And here it is, what you've been waiting for! Anyways, I HAVE A SURPRISE! I CREATED A FAN VIDEO FOR BENSLER, HERE IS A LINK AND ON MY PROFILE!
To get to this link, paste this after typing in you(tube) ...it won't let me type the entire thing correctly btw.
watch?v=MUB2h485weo
tell me what you think in the reviews or comment section on youtube!
The features of the woman impressed themselves upon Olivia's consciousness, like acid eating away at a photographic plate. The bright blue eyes, the thick, dark lashes. The narrow jeans, long legged. The ivory flats, well worn, like slippers. The pink shirt, sleeves rolled. A thousand questions competed for Olivia's attention. When? For how long? How was it done? Why?
The baby in the woman's arms was a boy. A boy with green eyes. The hues were slightly different, though the difference was not as pronounced at it had been in his father's eyes.
The envelope of time ripped open, and Olivia dropped in. She struggled not to have to lean against the door with the shock of the woman, of the boy's face.
"Come in."
The invitation broke the long note of silence that had passed between the two women. Although it was not a invitation at all, not in the way such offers are normally made, with a smile or a step backward into a hallway to allow entry. It was, rather, a statement, simple and without inflection, as though the woman had said instead, neither of us have a choice now.
And the instinct was, or course, to enter the house, to get out the wet. To sit down.
Olivia lowered the umbrella and collapsed it as she stepped over the doorsill. The woman inside the house held the door with one hand, the baby in the other arm. The baby, perhaps having noted the silence, looked at the stranger with intense curiosity. A child in the hallway had stopped her playing to play attention.
Olivia allowed the umbrella to drip onto the polished floor. In the several seconds the two women stood in the entryway, Olivia noticed the way the woman's hair swayed along her collarbones. Expertly cut, as Olivia's was not. Her's was unevenly curly, but her twist that held her hair hid that from the woman in front of her. She touched her own hair and regretted doing so.
It was hot in the hallway, excessively hot and airless. Olivia could feel the perspiration trickling inside her blouse, which was under her wool coat, making her more hot.
"You're Muire O'Brien," Olivia said
The baby in Muire O'Brien's arms, despite the different sex, despite the slightly lighter hair color, was precisely the baby that Julia had been at that age, five months old, Olivia guessed. The realization created dissonance, a screeching in her ears, as though this woman she had never met were holding Olivia's child.
James had had a son.
The dark haired woman turned and left the hallway for a sitting room, leaving Olivia to follow. The child in the hallway, a beautiful girl with enlarged pupils and a cupid mouth, picked up a handful of construction blocks, pressed them to her chest, and, eyeing Olivia the entire time, edged along the wall and entered the sitting room, moving closer to her mother's legs. The girl looked like her mother, whereas the boy, the son, resembled the father.
Olivia put down the umbrella in a corner and walked from the entry way to the sitting room. Muire O'Brien stood with her back to the fireplace, waiting for her, although there had been no invitation to sit down, wouldn't be.
The room had high ceilings and had been painted a lemon yellow. Ornately carved moldings were shiny with glossy white paint. At the front, the curved windows had long gauzy curtains on French rods. Several low chairs of wrought iron, cushioned with oversized white pillows, had been placed around a carved wooden cocktail table, reminding Olivia of Arab rooms. Over the mantle, behind the woman's head, was a massive gold mirror, which reflected Olivia's image in the doorway, so that, in essence, Olivia and Muire O'Brien stood in the same frame. On the mantle was a photograph in marquetry, a pinkish gold case, a bronze figure. On either side of the bow window were tall bookcases. A carpet of muted grays and greens lay underfoot. The effect was of light and air, despite the grand architecture of the house, despite the dark of the weather.
Olivia had to sit. She put a hand on a wooden chair just inside the doorway. She sat heavily, as though her legs would suddenly give out. She felt old, older than the woman in front of her, who was nearly her own age. It was the baby, Olivia thought, that somehow testified to the newness of love, certainly to the relative proximity of sex. Or the jeans in contrast to Olivia's dark outfit. Or the way Olivia found herself sitting.
Beneath her coat, her right leg spasmed, as though she had just climbed a mountain. The baby began to fret, utter small impatient cries. Muire O'Brien bent to pick up a rubber pacifier from the cocktail table, put the nipple end in her own mouth, suck it several times, and then put it in the baby's mouth. The boy wore navy corduroy overalls and a striped t-shirt. The dark haired woman had full, even lips and wore no lipstick.
Moving her eyes away from the woman with the baby, Olivia caught sight of the photograph on the mantle. When the picture came into focus, she started, nearly rose from her seat. The photograph was of James, she could see that even across the room. Unmistakably now from where she sat. Cradling an infant, a newborn. His other hand ruffling the deep curls of another child, the girl was in the room with them. In the picture, the girl had a solemn face. The trio appeared to on a beach. James was smiling broadly.
Visceral evidence of another life. Although Olivia had no proof.
"You're wearing a ring." Olivia said almost involuntarily
Muire fingered the gold bang with her thumb.
"You're married?" Olivia asked, disbelieving.
"I was"
Olivia was confused for a moment, until she understood the meaning of past tense.
Muire shifted the baby to her other hip.
"When?"
"Four and a half year's ago."
The woman hardly moved her mouth when she spoke. The consonants and vowels rolled from her tongue with a distinctive melodic lilt. Irish, then.
"We were married in the Catholic Church." Muire volunteered.
Olivia felt herself backing away from this information, as if from a blow.
"And you knew?..." she asked
"About you? Yes of course."
As though that were understood. That the dark haired woman had known everything. Whereas Olivia did not.
Olivia shook her arms free of her coat. The flat was overheated, and Olivia was sweating profusely. She could feel the perspiration under her hair, at the back of her neck.
"What's his name?" Olivia asked, meaning the baby. She was astonished at her own politeness even as she asked the question.
"Aedan." Muire said "For my brother."
The woman bent her head suddenly, and kissed the baby's head.
"How old is he?" Olivia asked
"Five months. Today."
And Olivia thought at once, as who would not, that James might have been there, in that flat, to share the small milestone.
The baby, pacified, appeared now to be falling asleep. Despite the revelations of the last several minutes, despite the unnatural relationship between herself and the baby, despite the very fact of the child's existence at all, Olivia felt an urge, akin to sexual, to hold the infant to her breast, to that hallow space that wants always to embrace a small child. The resemblance to Julia at five months is uncanny. It might actually be Julia. Olivia closed her eyes.
"Are you alright?" Muire asked from across the room
Olivia opened her eyes, wiped her forehead with the back of her palm.
"I have thought" Muire began again "I have wondered if you would come. When you called, I was sure that you knew. I was sure when he died it would come out."
"I didn't know," Olivia said "Not really. Not until I saw the baby. Just now."
Or had she known? she wondered. Had she known from the moment she'd heard the transatlantic silence?
There were shallow wrinkles about the eyes of the dark haired woman, the suggestion of parentheses that would one day form at either side of he mouth. The baby woke suddenly and began to wail in an uninhibited, lust way that had once been familiar to Olivia. Muire tried to comfort the child, bringing him to her shoulder, patting his back. But nothing seemed to work.
"Let me put him down" Muire said over the cries
When she left the room, the girl trailed after her, not willing to be left alone with a stranger.
James had been married in a Catholic church. The dark haired woman had known that he was already married.
Muire had known, had imagined this day, and Olivia had not. Muire returned and paced her way back to the cocktail table, and opened a wooden box on the table. She took out a cigarette, which she lit with a old time metal lighter next to the box.
James wouldn't tolerate being in the same room with a smoker, he had said.
"You want to know how it happened." Muire said, guessing Olivia's thoughts.
There is way more, and Bensler will come soon, I really am glad you have been patient! Thoughts and reviews would be great!
DONT forget to check out my fan video and tell me your thoughts in the reviews or comment section on youtube!
To get to this link, paste this after typing in you(tube) ...it won't let me type the entire thing correctly btw.
watch?v=MUB2h485weo