Chapter 9: Beware of Pot Holes

With Mom and Dad gone, I was left alone with Beth and Carrissa, but no one said anything for a moment. Instead, we all looked at each other in wonder and I’m not sure about the others, but I was feeling somewhat shaken by the morning’s happenings.

“Oh, by the way, Beth, George said he’d like to talk to you sometime today,” I broke the silence.

“He called,” Beth grinned. “From Tom’s house. He didn’t even wait to get home after doing our chores.”

“You’re not mad at me for telling him not to come in?”

“No, from what he said about his timing, he’d have gotten told off for disturbing me right then,” she grinned. “You did good to warn him off - that time.”

“Whew,” I mocked wiping my brow.

“But, he said he was going to watch for the pickup truck to go by and then he’s going to come over,” she grinned.

“Umm, so Carissa and I are chaperoning you two, I guess.”

“I guess,” Beth winked at Carissa. “But then he and I can return the favour, in spades.”

“So what are we going to do?”

“Well, first Carissa and I are going to cook you and George brunch, after that we’ll see what happens,” Beth grinned and hopped to her feet. “Come on, Princess, we need to cook for our princes.”

“First things first,” Carissa laughed and suddenly she was crawling into my lap.

While we were kissing and cuddling, George came to the door. When Beth let him in, he wrapped Beth in his arms after calling a good morning to Carissa. I think perhaps she waved hello, but she certainly didn’t speak, we were too busy. I soon decided that kissing was almost as good an idea as brunch, maybe better.

When I realised in a few minutes just how much my body was enjoying the idea of necking and petting Carissa, I came to my senses somewhat and pulled back.

“Sorry everyone, but I think we’d better take a break,” I announced. “Besides, I’m starving, how about you George? Could you eat something?”

“Mmmmph,” he mumbled first, then managed to break away from my little sister.

“I could eat a horse,” he announced.

“George, you couldn’t even ride one,” I laughed. “And if you want to eat anything that Beth cooks, you’d better forget about eating her horses.”

“He sure had,” she snorted. “What a guy I pick for a fellow, he can’t even ride a darn horse.”

“That’s why they made cars, right Carissa?” he laughed.

“Oh, they both have their good points,” Carissa already knew better than to get into that argument.

“So Beth, are you and Carissa cooking, or are Chris and I burning something?” George demanded.

“Oh God, I don’t want to die of ptomaine poisoning, that means Chris isn’t touching the food,” Beth declared, heading for the fridge.

“Is he that bad?” Carissa asked as she slipped off of my lap after giving me one final peck on the lips.

“Worse,” Beth declared. “He can burn water, without the pot ever touching the stove.”

Carissa giggled as she moved to join Beth. About then George nodded his head toward the porch, so I grabbed my crutches and joined him out there.

“Damn it, Chris, what’s going on with you and Carissa? Or is it Corinna?” he asked quietly.

“It’s Carissa and without Corinna, she’s neat,” I smiled.

“But are you and Sandy kaput? Already? Or are you...”

“Long story, which I thought I explained earlier,” I sighed. “The short version is that we fought and I don’t see us going out any more. I guess you haven’t heard about Corinna and Wil either then?”

“No! Are they together too?” his eyes were the size of saucers.

“Yeah, that’s where Mom and Dad went. Wil swiped my car this morning without asking me. It seems that he and Corinna decided they liked watching sunrises together.”

“Huh? What do you mean?”

“They want to get hitched. So they rushed to town to ask Mr. Coulter if they could get married and they were in a rush, since they wanted to catch him before his Sunday morning golf game,” I grinned.

“Holy Shit! Married?” he gasped.

“Yeah, I came home last night after the fight with Sandy to find Wil and the twins sitting here on the porch. They’d been drinking Grampa Bender’s hooch for a while. So, since I’d just fought with Sandy, I was in the mood to get a bit drunk and I joined the party. Corinna and Wil had paired off and Carissa decided that I had to be cheered up after breaking up with Sandy. After a while, she and I called it off. Well, at least we stopped before we got too carried away. The two of us went our separate ways and got some sleep, but Wil and Corinna stayed up all night.”

“Oh wow. So are you and Carissa a couple or what?”

“I don’t know,” I laughed softly. “All I can say for sure is that I’m learning to like her more and more.”

“Wow. And you’re the guy that we all figured was going to live his life as a bachelor.”

“Yeah? Well, how about you and my little sister?” I grinned.

“Unh, you know she asked me out, don’t you?” George asked quietly.

“Yes George,” I chuckled. “I’m not about to kick your butt.”

“Even if I tell you that I’ve wanted to take her out for the past year?”

“Even then, George. I do trust you enough to believe you wouldn’t hurt her intentionally and you do know her quite well, so you know what would hurt her.”

“You know I’d never do that,” George sighed. “When she got upset last night she almost had me crying. I didn’t know what to do, not at first anyway.”

I didn’t know what he meant, so I just waited.

“On the way home, I remembered that I’ve got an aunt who lives in the town that the other team came from. I told my folks about what happened and how Beth was so upset, then I asked Dad if he knew any of the people from there. Dad called my aunt and she had somebody call him back. I guess they called Beth because when I phoned Beth from Tom’s, she said the coach of the other team had called her this morning.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah, he asked her if she’d play for their team since she wasn’t one of the regulars here,” he grinned. “None of the girls on the other team were badly upset, but they do think our team snuck a ringer in on them and that the game shouldn’t count.”

“I’ll bet Beth would like that,” I laughed.

“Unh unh. Instead, she suggested that the next game they play here, they come with one player short and she’d play one game for them,” he chuckled. “You’ve gotta admit, she’s fair.”

“Huh, wait until she plays against you in a game sometime,” I snorted.

“Well I...”

“Hey, did you guys want to eat, or do we have to throw this stuff to the pigs?” Beth interrupted as she stuck her head outside.

“We want to eat,” George laughed as he ran toward her, but she broke into a giggle and ran inside.

By the time I hobbled to the table, George had two of the waffles that the girls had cooked on his plate and was slathering them with butter and maple syrup. Carissa was still cooking though and by the time I’d sat down, she’d dropped two fresh ones on my plate in return for a quick kiss.

Those two girls could cook. Both George and I ate our fill of waffles for once and both Beth and Carissa had as many as they wanted. There were still a few left on a plate in the warming oven when the door opened and Mom walked in.

Wil was right behind her and he looked like he hadn’t slept in a week. He was carrying my clothes in his hand and he looked sheepish as he held them out toward me.

“Look, Chris, I wasn’t thinking too clearly this morning...” his voice trailed off as he saw my face twist into a frown.

My mood had changed instantly. I really hadn’t thought about what I wanted to say to him, but I waited for a moment to see if he was going to say anything more. I suppose the pause was almost like the one Dad took when he was really going to rake you over the coals. Instead of speaking loudly, I almost whispered when I finally spoke and I made sure that I looked him right in the eyes.

“I don’t mind so much that you took the car, other than that it annoys me that you didn’t ask my permission. But, I am pissed off that you took my clothes without asking me first, particularly since my wallet, with my ID in it, was still in the pocket of my shorts. On top of that, I’m absolutely furious that you drove my car, or any car for that matter, after you’d been awake all night and had been drinking. That was just plain stupid.”

Then I shut up. I didn’t say another word. He looked like he wanted to apologise, but I wasn’t going to help him. Everyone in the room was staring at me and I swear Wil looked as if he was about to break into tears.

“But we didn’t drink any more after you left,” Wil’s voice was almost a whimper. “Really, I wasn’t drunk.”

I decided that if that was his idea of an apology, he needed to think about things a bit more. I managed to get to my feet and onto my crutches, then grabbed my clothes from his hand and hobbled away, close to tears myself. I expected someone to say something, but no one did. Instead the only sound in the house was the clumping of my crutches as I struggled up the stairs then down the hall to my room.

By the time I got inside my room, I was more angry with myself than I was with Wil. I slammed the door behind me, tossing the clothes Will had returned to one side and my crutches to another, then flopped down on my bed. Grabbing a history book, I lay there, trying to study for my final exam, but I found that I wasn’t able to concentrate, instead I was in a blue funk. Too many things had happened to me and my family in too short a time period. I knew that my emotions were stretched far enough that I’d reached my limit.

At other times when I’d felt like this, I’d simply gotten on a horse that hadn’t been ridden in a several days and let my emotions get washed away as I’d fought to stay in the saddle. Then usually after the horse had worn himself down, I’d gone for a ride and hadn’t come back until I felt in control of both the horse and myself. This time, with a cast on one leg and another on my hand, I wasn’t going to be able to take my frustrations out by forcing my will on a horse.

Someone knocked, then opened my door and came in, but I ignored whoever it was, trying to pretend I was reading my book until I felt the weight of someone sitting beside me on the bed. I just knew it was going to be Mom and I really didn’t want to try to explain my outburst to her.

“Chris, Wil is really upset,” Dad’s voice surprised me, since I was sure it would be Mom who would come to make peace in the family. “He didn’t expect you to be so angry with him and I think it’s the first time you’ve ever walked away from him without letting him explain why he did something.”

“Dad, I’m sorry, but I’m just about stressed out and my emotions are going through the roof. I’ve had a week or so that’s ranged from heaven to hell and so have the rest of you. Just look at everything that’s happened to us,” I exploded. “I got kicked out of school for a week. I even got all of us saddled with two girls invading our home and that’s throwing the family into still more turmoil. They aren’t acting like the same two girls that I’ve known for years. Then I fall off a stupid horse and end up in the hospital with a broken leg and a screwed up hand. I damn near die because I’m allergic to a bloody pain killer. My life is saved by another girl who turns out to be a nutcase and her father is even worse. My sister goes bananas over one of my best friends, then turns into a weirdo over a stupid baseball game. At the same time Wil reappears and adds about a ton more crap on the top of the pile. How do you expect me to be calm?”

“Oh, I know Chris,” he chuckled. “Your mother and I have had to deal with all of that and more.”

“I know dad, but you have years of experience to fall back on,” I sighed. “You two have already dealt with all the crap of growing up and the crud that goes with it. It’s the first time around for me and for the Wil and Beth too.”

“Oh, you kids are going through a lot of different things than your mother and I did. All of you are years ahead in experiences compared to where we were at your age,” he said emphatically. “Look at Wil. He and Corinna want to get married for cripes sake and they’re only eighteen years old.”

“Dad, how old were you when you got married the first time?”

“I was twenty-two, but that’s different. First off, I’d already taken over the farm and secondly ... well, we pretty well had to get married. We thought Wil was already on the way.”

“Do you want to run that by me again? I know you and Mama Kate were married for at least a year before Wil as born,” I frowned at him. “How could you think that you had to get married?”

“Well, Kate missed two periods in a row, so we planned a quick wedding and we managed to keep a secret about Kate being late. The only people who knew were our folks. We had a small wedding, then drove to Banff that night. After two nights there, we went on to Jasper for a couple of days and then around by way of Edmonton for our honeymoon. In all it only took a week, but it was wonderful, except for the last night.”

“We were in Edmonton and we were planning to do some shopping the next day. We’d made love that night, then we’d both fallen asleep. However, Kate woke me up in the middle of the night. At two in the morning she sent me out to see if I could find somewhere to get sanitary napkins since her periods had restarted,” he smiled sadly. “You can imagine what I felt like, embarrassed to be asking at a little store for something like that and at the same time feeling upset because I’d really been looking forward to having a kid.”

“Were you annoyed that you’d married Kate and then found out she wasn’t pregnant?” I asked quietly.

“Oh no, never!” he shook his head emphatically. “Actually, we thought she had aborted. In fact we drove straight home from Edmonton so she could go to the doctor the next day. The doctor felt that she had been so worried about being pregnant that she’d had a false pregnancy. I told her that her body had collaborated with my desires to make sure she married me. Of course inside of a few months she was really pregnant and later she had Wil.”

He sighed deeply. “That’s when we found out that she should never have gotten pregnant at all. Her body simply couldn’t take the strain.”

“But Mom’s first pregnancy was a surprise too, wasn’t it?” I asked and then wished I’d kept my mouth shut because I remembered what Mom had told me about it.

“Yeah, it sure was,” he gave a rueful chuckle and he got a far away look in his eyes. “I’ve been a very lucky man. I’ve been married to two wonderful women and to this day, I think that Kate arranged for your mother and I to fall in love with each other.”

“Mom said something about that,” I sighed, then rolled onto my side and looked up at him. “Did Kate really say something about you and Mom being a family when she was lying in a hospital bed?”

“Not just your mother and me, but Wil too,” Dad sighed and I could see the tears in his eyes. “I don’t know how long your mother and I would have fought off our love for each other if Kate hadn’t said anything.”

I didn’t know what to say, so I just waited quietly, wondering if he’d say anything more. Finally he sighed and grinned at me.

“You’re a very rare person, you know.”

“What?” I squawked in surprise.

“You’re the only person I know of whose parents know exactly what day he was conceived, almost down to the minute,” he laughed softly. “Your mother and I only made love that one time on that one night, then we both pulled back until weeks after Kate died. We didn’t really plan on getting married, not that I didn’t consider it, but it turned out that your Mom was carrying you and I wasn’t about to let an unmarried woman carry my child and bear that stigma.”

“You mean that you didn’t want any bastard sons walking around,” I said.

Then I realised that what I’d said sounded quite brutal and was almost condemning him. I opened my mouth to apologise, but he held up a hand to stop me.

“Now that sounds bitter and while I know it’s not what you meant, it still hurts,” he said very quietly, almost a whisper. “Your mother and I love each other very much and we did then, but because of what others would have said about our rushing into marriage so soon after Kate’s passing, we tried to deny our love for each other.”

He paused for a second, then sighed. “There are people who still condemn us for marrying so soon after Kate died, but most people have forgiven us for that, even if it does tramp all over a lot of society’s taboos. Liz and I have simply ignored the suggestion that she came here and jumped into our bed with Kate and me, but that’s what some of them seem to think, even after all these years.”

“You know that’s not what I think, Dad. I am sorry for making it sound like I did,” I apologised. “I know you and Mom love each other a lot. Actually, I hope I can end up with a woman who I can get along with half as well as you get along with Mom and if I do I’ll be very happy. If I can find someone that I love as much as you obviously love Mom, I’ll be ecstatic and if I can find one who loves me as much as Mom loves you, I’ll be delirious.”

“Oh, my, and here I thought George was the politician in your group of friends,” Dad looked at me and grinned, then sobered. “However, this isn’t helping any with the problem between you and Wil. I know you’re annoyed with him, but I think you’ve left him feeling like a complete heel right now and I’m not sure he deserves that.”

“I suppose not,” I sighed. “I just wish people would think ahead a little bit. I get tired of seeing people get themselves into trouble for no real reason.”

He chuckled softly. “That’s another difference between the two of you, Wil reacts to situations far too quickly and you may think a bit more than most people, so you seem slow. Yet put the two of you on horses and while Wil seems to wait and reacts too late to save himself from being bucked off, you seem to anticipate what the horse will do, which is exactly the opposite of what anyone would expect to happen. It just isn’t reasonable. There are times when it seems to me that the two of you must have swapped some nerve cells somewhere along the line.”

I just looked at him and finally managed a weak smile, not sure what either he or I wanted right then. I think he was in about the same state.

“Do you want to be alone for a while or would you like some company? I think Carissa would love to spend some time with you. I think she wants to talk about what’s happened and to try to explain why Corinna and Wil thought it was so important to talk to Corinna’s father so early in the morning.”

“Does she really understand? I wish I did. It doesn’t make sense to me.”

“If anyone does, I’d say she would,” Dad smiled at me. “After all, she and Corinna are twins and they probably react much the same way in any situation. At least that’s what I’d expect.”

I sighed, then just nodded my head, thinking that at least I could have someone to listen to instead of having the same thoughts running around and around in my mind. Dad opened the door, then paused, looking back at me as if he wanted to say something else. He didn’t, instead he sighed, shook his head, and closed the door quietly behind him.

When the door opened again, Carissa slipped inside, but she wasn’t alone, both Corinna and Beth followed behind her. Corinna walked over to me and hung her head as if in shame for what she had done.

“It’s really my fault, you know. Wil wanted to wait, but I insisted,” she held out her hand hesitantly. “I really wanted to tell someone how I felt about Wil and Daddy seemed to me to be the natural person to know first. I insisted that Daddy had to know right away, but then I’ve always told Daddy about things first, even before talking to Mom. I don’t know why, but that’s the way I am. And this was so important.”

She lifted her head and looked me in the eyes. “I’m sorry I rushed him so much that we reacted like we did, but at the time I was just so excited. I don’t think that I really thought things through, in fact, I guess I didn’t think much at all. I just reacted and I’m not really proud of what I did.”

“Oh, I think Wil might have been a little excited too. What worried me is the fact that both of you had been drinking and then he drove my car. On top of that you were carrying my ID with you. The idea that a bad accident could have happened so easily and then to have Wil’s and my ID found on the scene gives me the shivers.”

“Oh, I never even thought of that,” Corinna whispered.

“That’s where Chris and Wil differ,” Beth spoke firmly.

Carissa had moved over and sat on the edge of my bed, almost instantly grasping one of my hands in hers, then she looked up at the other two and frowned. “I thought you two agreed that you were going to let me talk to Chris first?”

Her voice was quiet, but there was an edge to it that sounded almost dangerous. When I started to open my mouth, she lifted a hand as if telling me to be quiet.

“But we thought...” Beth said quietly.

“Think again,” Carissa barked. “I want to talk to Chris for a few moments. Alone!”

Corinna stared at her for a second, then grabbed Beth’s hand and they went out, closing the door behind them. Carissa sighed deeply and slowly turned to face me.

“I’m sorry about that,” she whispered. “I really got taken by surprise when they came in with me.”

“Oh, I wasn’t, not really,” I sighed. “Everyone’s emotions are all screwed up.”

She looked at me and smiled, shaking her head. “How do you do that?”

“What did I do now?”

“I’m the one who is supposed to be calming you down,” she sighed.

“Oh, I’ve been calm all along,” I shrugged. “I’m angry at myself for losing my temper and I’m pissed off at my brother for driving when he’d been drinking. On top of that, he’s probably gone without any sleep for who knows how long. Both things mean his judgement is shot all to hell, but I’m completely calm. I hate to be judgmental, but what they did was stupid.”

I slid over in the bed and patted the pillow beside me.

“Snuggle?” I whispered. “I need a hug and someone to talk to, please.”

Almost instantly she was stretched out at my side and her head was on my shoulder, her eyes scant inches from mine.