March 15
"Who is she?" cried Barbara hysterically. A picture of Monica and John sitting mid-kiss in the library at Brown was crumpled up on the table in front of him. He was crying too.
Barbara fell to her knees. John dropped his head in his hands.
"Why are you doing this to me? To us? To your son?" she asked, her voice thick with sobs. Luke's wails grew sharper – he'd been crying since the yelling had started ten minutes earlier.
"Why, John? Why?" She looked up at him, the pain on her face so clear. "God dammit! Say something!"
"She's someone from my past."
"Your past? Since when do you have a past that didn't involve me?"
"We've known each other for years."
"Years? Look at her! She can't be a day over 15!"
"She's 18." His voice was hollow.
"What is this? What is going on? How far back into your past does this go? Do you have a predilection for teenage girls?" She jumped to her feet. "I'll fucking report you, John! I'm calling the station right now." She grabbed for the phone, but John beat her to it, placing his hand over it.
"Sit down," he said coldly.
"Don't you tell me what to do. I'm not the one screwing around. I'm not the adulterer! I'm not the pedophile!"
"Dammit, Barbara!" He swallowed and concentrated on calming himself down. "She…she's just a friend." Barbara opened her mouth to debate that, but John quickly continued. "Yes, I know we kissed. But that was the first time. It never went past that. And it will never happen again."
"You're damned right it won't, because if it does, I'm going to divorce you so fast your head will spin." She stood up and looked him dead in the eye. "And you can be assured that I will take Luke away from you and you will never see him again. Never. Do you hear me, John? Never."
She left him to his tears and tended to Luke. He heard her slamming drawers, and running about from Luke's room to the bathroom to their room. And when she came back in, a bag slung over her shoulder, and a red-faced Luke, still upset, settled on her hip, he barely had the energy to protest her decision to stay with her mother for a while.
He didn't know how long he sat unmoving at the table, but it was dark when he finally reached for the phone.
"What's wrong, John?" asked Monica, who knew from the tears in his voice that this had something to do with Barbara.
"She knows. She knows about you."
"How? Did you tell her?"
"She had one of my buddies from the station follow me yesterday. That person in the library, that was a cop, not a student. He took pictures of us. She knows."
Monica was silent. She could feel the inevitable coming before John finally spoke.
"She says she'll take Luke away from me. I think she can do it too. Her father's a lawyer. He never did like me. Always said I was worthless. Never there for her. And now this. Monica, I can't lose him." John began to sob. Monica closed her eyes. She couldn't breathe.
"This is it, isn't it?" she asked quietly.
John didn't – couldn't – speak, but she knew he had nodded.
"You're staying with Luke. You're staying here in '87."
"I can't give him up, Monica. I have another chance with him. Please understand."
"I do."
"I want you both. But he's my son."
"I know. I can't… I can't talk about this anymore." Monica too could no longer hold back her own tears. "Goodbye, John. I… I love you," she said to him, for the first time ever. And with that she hung up the phone and walked away.