Chapter 24
C
HARLENE
C
harlene stretched her arms and yawned as she slowly opened her eyes. She felt tired, from the top of her head to the bottom of her feet, and even though she'd slept the better part of the day away, she still didn't feel rested.
Charlene shook her head as she thought about the events that had shaped her day to this point. She'd started her morning by listening to Leslie Sachs's live interview, which had left her with even more questions about what Leslie and Vivana were really up to. Then she'd followed that headache by having a big blowout with her daughter this afternoon over Lauren's decision to drop out of medical school. And if that hadn't been enough, she'd topped things off with a nerve-bending conversation with her son, who'd brought Johnny Mayfield's name into the mix.
Charlene had felt so defeated that all she'd wanted to do was sleep and forget about the troubles facing her. She'd gone to her bedroom, reached into her nightstand drawer, and pulled out a bottle of Lunesta that her doctor had prescribed for her several months ago when she'd been battling insomnia. The sleep aid was fast-acting and powerful, so she'd known that she had to be careful. She'd used a pill splitter to cut it before taking only half of a dose. The medicine had done its job, giving her the rest she'd needed to calm her anxiety, if only for a few stolen hours.
Charlene stood up, stretched again, and tied her bathrobe around her waist. She rubbed her stomach, realizing she hadn't eaten since lunchtime yesterday. “I'm starving. I need to eat something before I get sick.”
She slipped her feet into her bright red velveteen bedroom shoes and shuffled down the hall. But she came to an abrupt stop at the sight she saw when she reached the edge of her kitchen. Although it was beginning to get dark outside, she could see that snow was falling. She moved faster as she walked to the door leading out to her back deck and was shocked to see what looked like over a half foot of snow covering her deck chairs and table. “Lauren, Phillip!” she called out in an excited voice. “Get down here, it's snowing!” She turned and walked to the end of the hall that led to the stairs and called out to them again.
Charlene didn't wait for her children to come downstairs; instead she rushed into the family room and opened the blinds so she could see the beautiful snow falling outside. “This is unbelievable!” she said as she watched the fluffy white flakes descend from the sky. She turned on the TV and took a seat on the couch, sitting in rapt attention as she listened to the announcer give updates about the unexpected snowstorm that had roared through most of the southern states that afternoon, bringing travel and holiday activities to a halt. It was an emergency situation because none of the weather models had forecasted the storm, which was supposed to dump close to a foot of snow in some areas by early morning. As it stood, Amber would get at least nine inches of the white stuff, if not more.
Charlene looked up when she saw Lauren enter the room. “Can you believe this?” she asked her daughter. “I knew it was cloudy outside when I lay down for my nap earlier this afternoon, but I had no idea we'd get snow. Amber hardly ever gets snow, and certainly not this early in the season.”
“I know,” Lauren replied. “If I'd known I'd get snowed in and stuck in the house, I would've stayed in Baltimore.”
Charlene stared into her daughter's eyes, which were laced with unmistakable frustration and disappointment at the fact that she was being forced to stay home. The exhilaration Charlene had felt just moments ago was snuffed out by Lauren's comment.
What have I done to make her resent me so much?
she wondered.
There had been a time, not too long ago, when Lauren had considered Charlene her best friend. But now Charlene barely recognized her baby girl, either physically or emotionally. The neatly dressed, levelheaded, respectful, high-achieving daughter she'd raised had been replaced by a disheveled, irrational, rude, dropout with an enormous chip on her shoulder. And despite Lauren's claims of being fine, Charlene knew there was something very wrong with her, and she planned to get to the bottom of it.
“Lauren, you've made it clear that you don't want to be here, yet a few hours ago you said you wanted to move back here because you'd dropped out of school. Which is it?”
“I didn't drop out, I withdrew,” Lauren snapped.
“Same thing,” Charlene snapped back at her. “If you wanted to move back here, then why are you saying that you wish you'd stayed in Baltimore?”
Lauren was silent, and her lack of a sarcastic comeback let Charlene know that she'd struck a nerve in her rebellious daughter. “Nothing you've said has made any sense to me. I want to understand you, really I do. But it's hard to talk to you because you have your guard up, as if you have to protect yourself from me. Baby, I'm your mother, and all I want to do is help you.”
Suddenly, Lauren broke into tears. “I'm pregnant.”
Charlene tilted her head in confusion. She thought she just heard her daughter say she was pregnant, but Lauren was sobbing so hard that Charlene wasn't sure. “What did you say?”
“I'm pregnant, Mom. That's why I withdrew from my classes and why I wanted to come home. I lied when I said Hakeem wanted me to stay in Baltimore with him, and honestly, he's the one who suggested I come back home because he made it clear that he doesn't want me or our baby in his life.”
Lauren stood in the middle of the family room and cried as if she'd fallen off her bike and skinned her knee. Charlene's heart ached for her, and she wished she could make everything better with a kiss and freshly baked cookies the way she used to when Lauren was a little girl. But those days were long gone, and Charlene knew she had to stand in the reality that was right in front of her. Lauren was a grown woman who was about to walk down a rocky road, and she needed a mother's strength, love, and guidance to help her along the path.
“How far along are you?” Charlene asked.
“Three months.”
Although Lauren was no longer a small child, she would always be Charlene's baby girl. Charlene rose from where was sitting and walked over to her daughter, wrapped her in her arms, and rocked her back and forth. “It's gonna be all right, baby. Everything's gonna be all right.”
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Charlene sat across from Lauren at the breakfast table as they sipped from their second cups of double hot chocolate that Charlene had made from a recipe her mother had handed down to her. She glanced out the window, noticing that the wind had picked up, causing the heavy snow that was falling to completely blanket everything in sight. For a brief moment, the picturesque scene made her forget about all her troubles because everything seemed so perfect. She was sitting inside her beautiful home, safe and warm, sharing quality time with her daughter during the holidays. But unfortunately, that surface portrait belied the complications bubbling underneath.
Charlene had spent the last hour listening to her daughter tell her the truth about what had been the real cause for her steady decline over the last two years. And just as Charlene had suspected, all roads led back to the terrible revelation when Lauren discovered she'd been dating her half brother. But the part that Charlene had been in the dark about and was shocked to learn was the truth behind why Lauren had brought the boy home in the first place. She'd been pregnant then, too.
When she'd met Jeffery, a handsome young man in one of her premed classes, he'd been her first real boyfriend and eventually, her first sexual experience. She'd been in love and so had he. One night they slipped up, losing themselves in the heat of passion, and two months later she learned she was pregnant.
Lauren and Jeffery had every intention of keeping the baby, getting married, and both continuing on with medical school while they juggled raising their child. But their youthful, idealistic dreams were vanquished when she'd brought him home to meet her family. After the “who are your people?” quiz, the truth was revealed, a young love was shattered, a decades-old marriage was destroyed, and Lauren's downward spiral had begun.
“After we returned to school, Jeffery and I talked and decided it was best that I had an abortion,” Lauren said in a solemn voice. “He told me he would be by my side, but on the morning of the procedure he was nowhere to be found. A friend of mine ended up driving me to the clinic and then took me back to my dorm. I tried calling Jeffery but he wouldn't pick up his phone, and two weeks later I found out that he'd transferred to Auburn. I haven't heard from him since.”
“Lauren, I wish you had come to me,” Charlene said as she reached for her daughter's hand. “You shouldn't have gone through that alone. I would've helped you, baby.”
A tear fell from Lauren's eye. “I was so embarrassed and ashamed, and I didn't know what to do. It's one thing to fall for the wrong guy, but to fall for your own brother, and then get pregnant by him?”
“Baby, nothing that happened was your fault. There's no way you could've known . . . that's on your father.”
Lauren nodded. “I know, and I'll never forgive Dad for that. But what was my fault was the fact that I was careless and ended up pregnant.” She paused and took another sip of her hot chocolate. She looked at her mother as her voice began to tremble. “You'd think I would've learned about how to pick the right guy and protect myself. But I fell for a loser, and now I'm pregnantâagain. I know you're disappointed in me, and so am I.”
Charlene wanted to break down and cry because she hated hearing the pain in Lauren's voice, but she knew that Lauren needed a steady hand to guide her fragile heart. “I'll always be proud of you,” Charlene said. “I'm proud of you right now, in this moment, because even though you've made some mistakesâwhich we all doâyou're going to move forward and do great things. You're still young and you have your whole life in front of you. Living here with me will cut your expenses, and once you have the baby, next fall you can enroll in med school at the University of Alabama, and life will keep on moving right along.”
“You make it sound so easy.”
Charlene shook her head. “Baby, don't mistake my optimism for fantasy. It won't be a walk in the park, but it also won't be as bad as you think. You've got support, a roof over your head, and people who love you. You and my grandchild are going to be just fine.”
A long moment passed between them. They both looked out the window, each thinking about a future that was full of uncertainty. Finally, Lauren spoke.
“I love you, Mom.”
Charlene smiled. “I love you, too, baby.”
“And I'm really loving this double hot chocolate,” Lauren said as she took another sip. “If I'm not careful, I'll be working on my third cup.”
“There's more on the stove, so help yourself. I made a huge pot because I thought your brother would be down here by now. He loves my hot chocolate almost as much as you do.”
Lauren shook her head. “Phillip's not here.”
“What?”
“He's not here.”
“Where is he?”
“He left a couple of hours ago while you were still asleep. I told him not to go out in the middle of a snowstorm, but he was determined.”
“Where did he go?”
Lauren pursed her lips. “Where do you think?”
“I don't know, that's why I'm asking you.” But in all truth, Charlene knew exactly where her hot-blooded, woman-chasing son was. “He went to see a woman, didn't he?”
“You know it.”
Charlene looked out the window, picked up her phone, and dialed Phillip's number.
“His cell is dead. He didn't have his charger, and because he has an iPhone he couldn't use your charger or mine.”
Charlene shook her head. “I can't believe that boy got behind the wheel in the middle of the worst snowstorm the Southeast has seen in over fifty years.”
“Some men have done a lot worse.”
“But he has no means of communication,” Charlene said with frustration. “It's dark outside, what if his car gets stuck and he's stranded . . . risking his life just to see a woman?”
“Like I told him, she must be one bad chick.”
Charlene looked out the window and prayed that her son was all right.