The View from Alameda Island - Robyn Carr Page 0,38

this your problem—this isn’t about you. This is our marriage that’s ending and we’re the only people responsible. And don’t let Lacey try to get you involved. I know in the end it will be difficult and painful for you girls, but I’ll do my best to reassure you, then we just have to move on.” She took a deep breath. “I’m sorry for the inconvenience.”

Hah. What tripe! she thought.

Then she called Lacey, who was every bit as unpleasant as she had been the evening before. “Have you come to your senses yet?” Lacey said.

“I’m afraid you’re going to have to get used to the idea that I’m not going to be married to your father any longer. It will take a while to sort out, but this doesn’t have to be about you, Lacey. This is about your father and me.”

“Oh really? And who’s going to take care of him in his old age?”

A rush of protests were on her lips, the most obvious being, You can’t treat a person like an irrelevant servant for years and then expect them to be your faithful caretaker in old age! Instead she said, “And who’s going to take care of me in my old age, Lacey? You? Because we both know it wouldn’t be your father.”

She heard her daughter suck in her breath, but nothing more.

“Never mind,” Lauren said. “I’ll pick out my extended care facility before I need it. I’ve given your father twenty-four years and I’ve given you most of that, too. Since no one seems particularly concerned that I be happy or cared for, I’ll do it for myself. Call me when you’re done blaming me.”

“How can you? How can you destroy our family like this?”

“Me?” Lauren asked. “Stop it, Lacey! There are no more excuses! Your father has been, at the very least, horrible to me. Cruel! Mean! I’m done. That. Is. All.” And she hung up.

She had a million things on her to-do list, but she chucked the cardboard cup and took a brisk walk down the main street. She needed to uncoil that tight knot in her gut. She’d awakened so fresh and rested, but Lacey could tax anyone’s patience.

She was familiar with the area, of course, but she saw it this morning through fresh eyes. The grocer was putting out his fresh fruits and vegetables and wished her a good morning. The café across the street had people lining up for breakfast. The bookstore was just opening its doors, as was the real estate office and bank. The bank was now her new bank and one of the tellers who was walking in gave her a wave.

Lauren walked for about a mile, then walked back to Starbucks to fetch her car. By the time she got home she was feeling better. Lacey was another reality she was going to have to accept. Despite the fact that Lacey knew only too well how hard Brad was to please, to get along with, she had managed to wrap him around her little finger. Cassie was right, Lacey was his favorite. He bought her spur-of-the-moment gifts he didn’t get Cassie. Not small gifts—a four-hundred-dollar purse, designer shoes they saw in a window and he said, “What the hell, huh?” Anything Lacey wanted, Brad would give her. It was entirely possible that the future belonged to Lacey and Brad as a family. Lauren excluded. Cassie excluded.

It stung. But it was a reality she’d been aware of for a long time.

Cassie, on the other hand, probably wouldn’t trade anything to keep a relationship with her father. She had already been clear, she wouldn’t throw her mother under the bus. Cassie’s eyes had been wide open since she was about seven.

So, this was where she’d failed. She shouldn’t have stayed with Brad so long. The first time the backs of her upper arms were shocked with small bruises from his nasty little pinches, she should have left him. In her naive attempts to fix her marriage or keep the meanness invisible for her daughters, she’d failed and in the end may have lost one of them. In fact she’d let one of them become spoiled and self-absorbed, while the other was all too aware of the abuse in their family. She worried that she’d failed all around. She hoped it wasn’t too late for them to heal.

She hurried to Beth’s to load up the things she had left at their house. Despite the darkness of her troubles, she felt a