Helping Sis Pick A Dress
by Lubrican
Chapters : 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8
Chapter Eight
Since our father was a foreign national at the time he died,
the Ontario Provincial Police notified the State Department, which then
notified two families of the tragedy.
Why two?
It turned out our father was a bigamist, with two wives and
two families. He had two phones on him when he died, one for each family, and
nobody knew which was the "right" one to notify. So they notified
both of them and let us work it out. Suddenly we knew why he had been "too
far away" to come home on a number of holidays in the past.
Mom was devastated, of course, by both his death and the
knowledge that came with it. A side effect of his criminal behavior was that he
had married the other woman first, which meant she had legal claim to being his
wife, his life insurance, everything. She saw my mother as being the
home-wrecker in the story, even though Mom didn't know about any of it. She
probably thought of Cathy and me as bastard children, too, but I never met her.
Cathy's and my reactions were different from Mom's. I think
we felt betrayed, too, but on more than one occasion I thought that, under
other circumstances, my father might have made a good Taliban. His political
beliefs were rabid. He felt like women were inferior creatures and should be
controlled by a man. He certainly acted like he owned Mom and Cathy. The fact
that he based this on the Bible rather than the Koran didn't make any difference, really.
The way he had treated Cathy was a little like an honor killing, without the
actual killing part. Sure, I had some good memories, but the Taliban make some
good memories, too.
I was furious with him for hurting Mom, though, and that's
why I didn't miss him. His other wife claimed the body and buried him. We
didn't even go to the funeral. The "system" is pretty heartless in
situations like this. To the law, it's all black and white, and the shades of
gray that are "the other family" are ignored completely.
The exception was our university family. Granted, they
didn't know all the details, but they gave us both time off to go to
what they thought of as our "home". Michael drove us there in his car
so we wouldn’t have to endure the bus trip.
Mom was torn up, listless, her spirit broken when we got
there. All we could do was hold her while she cried. Michelle picked up on the
atmosphere and started crying, too, which was the first time Mom actually
realized she was there. Mom had never seen her granddaughter, and I think
Michelle might have saved Mom's sanity, because she went into Grandma mode and
got a grip.
We knew we had to be there for Mom at Christmas, and planned
to stay until after the new year.
Oddly, there was nothing to do, concerning his death. As I
said, wife number one claimed the body. We weren't invited to the funeral,
which was in Oregon anyway, clear across the country. I imagine it's a little like when a soldier dies in a foreign land, going missing in battle and is never found. There's no body for his people to bury and no real closure. Dad's belongings at our
house suddenly seemed sparse, consisting of some clothes, his 2004 Mustang, and
the tools he used to work on the Mustang. That's what he drove when he was
home. He didn't let me use it very often and he never let Cathy take it out. I
used it to take all his clothes to the Goodwill store.
Being home was bittersweet for Cathy and me. Mom had loved
Dad, and that didn't magically go away just because she found out he had
cheated on her ever since they met. I realize he was really cheating on his
real wife, not on Mom, but that's how she saw it. They met at her work, of
course. He stopped for lunch one day and flirted and since he wasn't wearing a
wedding ring, and was handsome, she flirted back. The rest, as they say, is
history. I have to hand it to him, he was good at compartmentalizing his married
life.
For Cathy and me, though, the sooner all traces of him were
gone, the better. True, he was our biological father, but for those first few
years after he died, that was all we saw him as. Later, the good times would
surface and mitigate our disgust for him, but once the bandage was ripped off,
we saw him for the scar he was. Maybe that sounds heartless, but you reap what
you sow, and he was pretty heartless, too. And not just to our family.
Eventually it was time to head back to school. Mom decided that,
since we had Michelle and all, we should take her van and that she'd drive the
Mustang. That was a real windfall for us. I packed most of the tools, too,
since the van was eight years old and would need some maintenance. At least my
old man had taught me how to do that kind of thing.
It was different, having a car. I think Cathy and I felt more
married, somehow. It was obvious to both of us that, barring some love miracle,
neither of us was going to go out and find some normal person to fall in love
with. Michelle made it seem like we could be almost married, and that
was fine with us, so nothing much changed that next semester. Michelle started
pulling herself up on furniture, and then walking. She spoke five or six words.
"Mama" was her favorite. When she wanted me to pick her up or play
with her or whatever, she reached for me and said "Mama." Michael and
Tiffany thought this was hilarious, and they started calling me "Mom"
around the house. Incidentally, Michelle called both of them "Bo" for
reasons nobody could ever figure out. They were like her aunt and uncle.
Cathy hadn't had a period since giving birth, but all the
experts said that was normal, seeing as how she was breastfeeding not only
Michelle, but also donating breast milk to the experimental folks. Later on
she'd actually suckle babies whose mothers were breastfeeding but who couldn't
be at the day care center at all feeding times. Some pumped, of course, but if
they wanted to be in the experimental group, they could also opt in for donated
milk, too.
She planned on weaning Michelle at one year, but eight
months in she started gaining weight. This was picked up because all the women
who were either breastfeeding or donating milk to the program got weekly
checkups and all their vital data was recorded. So they cared if a woman gained
or lost ounces, much less pounds. She kept gaining weight and it was one
of the researchers, in fact, who suggested it might not be dietary. Her doctor
didn't think the theory would hold water, but he took urine and sent it to the
lab.
Once again, Cathy and I were involved in an unplanned
pregnancy. So much for breastfeeding preventing pregnancy.
Mom's response was, "I didn't know you had a
boyfriend," and Cathy said, "I don't, Mom," and Mom said,
"Bobby was supposed to take care of you!" and Cathy said,
"Don't turn into Dad, Mom," before she thought about it. The ensuing
silence upset Cathy and she decided to drive back home and smooth ruffled
feathers. I had to work, so I took care of Michelle while Cathy drove the 200
miles by herself.
I never got the whole story. It was a mother/daughter
moment. What I do know happened, was that Mom was upset and went on and on
about how Cathy was ruining her life and how no decent man would want her and
she'd never get married and what kind of man fathered a child and then
abandoned it. Anyway, at some point Cathy couldn't take it anymore and just
yelled, "Bobby is Michelle's father. He's the father of this one,
too!" Cathy said she cupped her stomach, which wasn't really pooching yet.
It's a time-honored gesture, though, and it brought home to Mom that her
daughter was with child again, and she was going to be a grandmother two times
over.
Naturally, Mom was aghast, especially when Cathy blamed it
all on Dad. That was ridiculous, of course, but her story about how after the
birth control thing happened Dad had been so controlling and so
dictatorial was plausible. Mom knew Cathy had never been allowed to have a
boyfriend, and Cathy's anguished, "I needed some-body to
love!" got traction in the moment. Mom didn't think about why Cathy might
have wanted to be on birth control to begin with. Not then anyway. And if she
thought about that later, she never said anything.
A truce was struck when Cathy started crying about losing
both her parents. That's all I was ever told. I'm sure there was a lot more
said, but in the end, Mom decided that, since Michelle was undamaged by the
ravages of incest, maybe the new baby would be okay, too.
And all this is just an example of how society, being the
ultimate do-gooder it is, feels like it can and should "do good" for
its members. And I get that. To be civilized, we can't have things like murder,
rape, theft, and chaos running rampant. So there have to be some rules. At the
same time, history is full of examples of humans starting with a good idea, and
making a law about it, and then taking things way farther than they need to
actually go. The ten commandments are a good example, though of course their
origin isn't reported as being human. Still, they're ten pretty good ideas on
how to run a mostly calm, good to live in society. But humans didn't think the
original author was specific enough, so they added to it until instead of ten
rules, we now have ten million.
One of those is that a brother and sister are not allowed to
love each other like a husband and wife are.
Cathy and I ignored that, and we ended up happy.
So was our mother.
In fact, we let her name our third child.
The End
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