Chapter 13

In spite of her dubiosity, she had seemed to relax at my willingness to talk and visit her place in order to see the children.

“Good, I’ll call first, okay?” she said, “let you know that I’m coming.”

“Uh-I don’t have a phone,” I said. She reached into her purse which she had been holding and pulled out a cell phone.

“I didn’t know if you had one or not, so I got this one for you to use,” she said.

It was one of those new cell phone things that I’d seen around at the VFW.

“Okay?” she said. “My number is already programmed into it under contacts.” I gave her a look. It was clear to her that her assuming I couldn’t afford a phone was kinda insulting. She didn’t mean it that way, I knew, she was just making things more convenient for herself and for me too as an afterthought.

“Okay,” I said. “I guess I’ll have to use it for now until I can get one of my own. But I’ll get it back to you as soon as I can get one.” She gave me a sour look. I guess she thought that I was being petty. I wasn’t actually; I just didn’t want to be owing them anything, not anything.

“Okay,” she said.

We talked a little longer, and then we were joined by her husband and the kids, all of whom had been entertained by the seniors while she corralled me.

“Well, I guess we’re all ready to go,” said Owen. “Uh-Sam, I hope we’ll be seeing more of you down the line. I know that this meet up tonight must’ve felt a little strange. To be totally honest it did for me. But, well, anyway, I hope we can get to know each other a little bit better.”

“Yeah, sure,” I said, as disingenuously as I ever said anything. I know my look had to have been seen as very cold toward the man, and in truth it was meant to be. I couldn’t help it. I wanted nothing so much as to see the man dead. But, all in all the day had gone okay, better than I might have imagined it would. And I had gotten out of it what I wanted at least ostensibly. Would it all turn out to be a chimera? Well, we’d be seeing. Yes we would.

The seniors had been standing back letting things play out, but now our hosts came forward and saw the family Cord to the door. The kids were staring back at me as they were ushered out.

The door closed behind them. I had a look on my face that even I wouldn’t have been able to describe. But, Mister Williams seemed to be able to.

“You look pensive,” he said.

“Pensive? Yeah I guess. Like the man said it was strange me being here with them, especially him. It felt really strange.

“I would have liked it better if the children would have at least said goodbye to me, but I guess I understand why they didn’t,” I said.

“It was a first step, Sam. Don’t read anything into the kids not saying goodbye. It’s going to need some getting used to. I mean you being around them and they you.

“At any rate, this meet up needed to be done because you will be around them off and on in the future. I mean when you go to see them or they bring them down to see you,” he said. I nodded, he was right. I knew he was right, but the kids getting used to me paled by the prospect of my needing to get used to being around the man who’d helped my wife make me a cuckold, and followed that up by taking her away from me. I just wasn’t sure I was ever going to be at a place where I could do that, get used to being around him, at least not comfortably.

“Yeah I guess,” I said, “maybe.”

“Well whaddya think,” she said.

“Abigail, I just don’t know. I feel so sorry for the guy. I mean his face! It’s awful. But...” he said.

“But?” she said.

“Abby, I do not want to give up my position, whatever it is, with the girls. Sam being around from time to time is fine. I’ve got no problem with that. But to officially and meaningfully give up being their father, really their only father, well, I just don’t know,” he said. “I know what you promised your dad, but...”

“Oh boy, that is going to be a problem, Owen. The man came to the barbecue because I assured Dad that we would be willing to give the honor of chief fatherhood to the man. If he thought that we’d played him, well, I don’t want to think about the fallout from that,” she said.

“I know. And, I do wish you’d talked to me first before you said anything to your dad. But, I guess we’ll just have to go forward and hope that things will work out for the best, and that includes for me, not just Sam,” he said.

“It will. I’m sure of it,” she said. “We just have to be—something.”

“You’re the eternal optimist,” he said. “How are you going to broach the fact that I’ve adopted the twins? Just meeting with him so briefly, I got the feeling that he is not the kind of guy to just take something like that in stride.

“Abbs, I’m the twin’s daddy, their real daddy. Okay, I’m not the sperm donor, but in every other respect I am the man who fills that role, the fatherly role,” said Owen Cord.

“Yes, you are, and you will have your place with those girls no matter what happens or how much the other guy’s around. But, at least for now, and at least in name, he’s got to be allowed to believe that he’s the main daddy. The man’s sacrificed a lot. And we stole his life. He’s got nothing else but those girls. And worse, he may never have anything that means anything to him ever again apart from those girls. Letting him have a little of his own is little enough,” she said. The man nodded.

“I guess you’re right. And, we do owe the guy. So, okay, I’ll play along. Okay?” he said.

“Thank you my husband. I love you,” she said.

The big do had been over the Labor Day weekend. That had been almost a month gone. I’d not gotten any calls or messages or visits in all of the time since. I wondered at that. Abigail had seemed very interested in meeting with me for some reason; hell, she’d given me a phone so she could contact me. But, apparently I’d misread her intentions in that regard. Well, that’s what I’d thought until two hours ago. Because two and a half hours ago I’d hung up the phone, her fancy phone; she was on her way here, to Tucson, and that without either the children or her husband.

I was tilting back an IPA. I’d discovered that I preferred it to regular lagers. It was stronger for sure, but also less bloating. One had to love the ingenuity of today’s brewers.

I heard her pull up outside. Right on time; well, I’d judged the time since the call and I was off by exactly four minutes.