Beautifully Torn E-Book

Crystal Dawn Bickford

• Herausgeber: BookRix
• Kategorie: Poesie und Drama
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2020

Beschreibung

Cathy was a lovely girl with a wonderful life. She had a beautiful family and a loving husband. There were many ups and downs in their relationship, but to any onlookers, they were picture perfect. Things are perfect when she wasn’t thinking about her past. She dreams of what she really wants to do with her life but always feels she’ll be judged if the truth comes out. Cathy becomes complacent with the repetitious cycle of chores and continues with what is needed of her.

The day comes that she perceives to be a wonderful change in their life. She has a new career opportunity. She is perfect for the job and she loves it. Then Jeff emails her. He lifts the fog and her ambitions become clear again. She becomes torn between the family she has built and the feelings for Jeff that never ended.

Leseprobe

Crystal Dawn Bickford

Beautifully Torn

To my children Be true to yourselves, alwaysBookRix GmbH & Co. KG81371 Munich

Chapter One

Life for her was about to change. However, she wasn’t expecting the unspoken change about to come. Cathy was in her late twenties, a beauty of a sight. She had green mysterious eyes that seduced you with one glance. Her hair was a sassy short blond cut, to match her short sassy body, fun-sized and voluptuous. She was happily married to her high school sweetheart, or at least the longest relationship she had during high school even though it was the on again, off again type. They had a daughter and son together. A beautiful, modern family. Dave, her husband, had a career in retail management. Not the best job but a job nonetheless. He was a hard worker and put up with all the bullshit that came with retail. The area they lived in had low employment opportunities so when Cathy saw the ad in the paper, she jumped on it. She worked nearby at the local Coney Island as a waitress. It was not much money, just enough for gas and milk throughout the week.

The ad she spotted was to be a flight attendant for a local airline. She went to the open house, nailed both interviews and left her family in Michigan for five weeks of training in Florida. Sure, it was tough. She had never been away from them for such a long period of time. She knew and they understood the need and the chance for them to have a better life. The weeks of her training started slowly but started to speed by rather fast. She met wonderful, lifelong friends and knew this was just the change in her life that she needed. She worked hard at her studies so she would do well on her tests to make everyone at home proud.

Today she found herself lying around the hotel. She had nothing on her plate but to get prepared to receive her wings the following morning. She aced all of her exams and was finally going home tomorrow. The weather was borderline hurricane; it was the season after all, and that ruined her plans to stay by the pool. Instead, she decided to play on her laptop. Surely there were emails she needed to reply to. She had tons of junk mail she quickly checked for deletion. She browsed the email addresses to uncheck messages from friends. Something caught her eye. She didn’t believe it at first. How could this be? An email from an ex-lover, someone she once felt was her soul mate. She moved on from him but reading his message sent a surge of dormant feelings to life again. His message was the basic, “Hey, I think I know you, if this is you, please reply. If not I’m sorry and please disregard.”

She knew who he was as soon as she saw his email address with his name, Jeff Connor. She never forgot him, his name, or their love. What do I do? she thought. She had to know how he was and hear his voice again. After all, during the last seven years of her marriage she always wondered what became of him, secretly searching for him online, not wanting to admit to anyone but herself that she would be with him again one day. She imagined them finding each other when the time was right. This time wasn’t right for her. Even so she emailed him back, giving him her phone number to reach her personally. She knew her husband would be furious. The history of their relationship always hurt him. She just had to speak to him one more time. That couldn’t hurt.

She found herself remembering their past for the rest of the evening, constantly checking her phone for his call. She dreamt not about her accomplishment in her career or the return to her family but about Jeff, his eyes, his lips and his laugh. When she woke, she almost felt ashamed of herself? Snap out of it, she told herself as she dressed for her final day in Florida. This was wrong to do. She was a married woman. She kept contradicting herself with rationalizations that it was just an email or possibly a phone call.

She went to her ceremony trying to focus on the world around her and the new opportunities she had. In the meeting room, minutes before the ceremony, her phone rang. Everyone looked at her as she answered. She had to; it was him! She took note of the glare from the instructor and said she would have to call him right back. He sounded exactly as she remembered. She counted the minutes until she had her chance to call him back. Finally, forty-three minutes after she hung up with him, she had a break to call him back. He answered, sounding as scared and excited as she was. They chatted for her entire break.

He was married and had three children. He briefly stated that he was thinking of her lately and just wanted to catch up. She was glad to hear he was doing well and was alive. Her biggest fear was she would find him too late. She felt a tremendous ease off her heart knowing he was still of this earth. She told him of her family. He was surprised to hear she was with Dave. Jeff then realized what happened in their past and why she stopped talking to him. She couldn’t talk much more; she had to start her journey back to her family. She told him she would email him and definitely keep in touch.

Once she arrived at the airport, she discovered she had hours before her flight. She figured she would send Jeff an email; she had to find out more, or tell him more. He responded almost immediately. She was pleased to hear from him again so soon. They chatted back and forth for hours, until he had to leave work, not that it seemed as if he had accomplished any work today. He told her that he was heartbroken when she cut him out of her life. He also said that he learned to accept it but always knew in his heart that they were meant to be together one day, just not that day. She wanted to see his children so he emailed her pictures of them. She always dreamt of them having children together one day and what they would look like. Seeing his sons put her vision right in front of her.

He asked her if her son was his child. She contemplated on what to say next. She had a secret that he may have the right to know. Email was not the way to explain this to him. Cathy then realized the length of time it was taking her to respond. She had to squash that bug before he began to worry. No, her son, Steven, was not his child. She could understand how he could think that with the time line. Her own in-laws questioned if Steven was Dave’s child while she was pregnant. Cathy knew Dave was his father, no doubt about it. Then once Steven was born it was never questioned again until now. Steven was picked right out of his daddy’s ass, as they say in the South.

With that out of the way Jeff expressed how happy he was to hear from her and to be able to stay in touch. He also told her that he was in a failing marriage. She figured so with all of the talk of his feelings for her. She told him that she did think of him often. The next paragraph of words that he sent tugged at her heartstrings. She felt flutters as she read the words, “I know we are going to be together one day; I want to grow old with you. I know right now is not the right time for us both but it will happen. I will wait two, five, ten or more years if I have to.”

Chapter Two

Cathy was only eleven when her mom moved her to the suburbs. She was born a city girl on the outskirts of downtown Detroit, a well-rounded, fun girl. Her parents were never married and she faintly remembers the times the two were ever together. She grew up with four parents and a ton of siblings and loved them all. Her father had married and moved here a few years ago. Her mother moved the day she got married, literally. So here she was, just getting to this city in the summer, not an easy way to meet friends. That didn’t stop her from walking the neighborhood to scope it out.

She asked her mother to drive her to school that day. She was nervous and excited. She wore her best outfit as she always did for the first day of school. This was her last year of elementary and her innocence began to fade. Her body was developing and it was hard for her to come to terms or get comfortable with her filling cups. She walked through the back of the school yard, wandering through the stares and glares. Her mother by her side she looked over at her and asked, “What’s going on?” She may have been developed body-wise but these kids were beyond her physical formation.

She soon would be mixed in the crowd wearing makeup and learning about drugs. There were some nice friends she met in her classes. Some even lived in her neighborhood. There was this one guy, Dave. He was nice. He grew up in this town and his family was proudly from the South. There was always innocent flirting between the two. He always tried to flatter her by completing her homework or other silly tactics. She never felt he could be her type, plus she was too involved with the new friends and places to throw relationship drama in the mix. They moved on through junior high but separated when it was time for high school.

She always liked school and when high school started, she fell in love with it. She loved it all. She attempted almost every sport they offered just for the experience and to meet more people. She enjoyed cheerleading and dance the most. That was definitely for her, she adored it. She was a junior in high school and had to cheer at home game against the city’s other football team. Those were always the fun ones and made her super excited. There were some old friends she always wanted to run into again.

The night was cold but the place was alive. She was walking through the crowd and happened to see Dave again. He was hot! She hadn’t seen him in a few years and he had changed. He had long curly black hair, no more glasses and a leaner muscular form. She had to talk to him and was glad that he recognized her. He came over and they embraced in a nice, familiar hug, exchanging greetings and stories. She had to step away and focus. She asked him to definitely find her again before he left the school.

She accomplished her dancing duties and was chatting with her friends on the stands. They had already made plans to stay the night at Amy’s house. Amy’s house was always fun to stay, whether they were just chilling and watching scary movies or running around the neighborhood egging cars while hiding in the bushes. They had some stupid, innocent fun those days.

He spotted her in the stand. Their eyes met, she was dying to talk to him again and definitely get his number. He climbed up to her level; his friend was right behind him. They chatted for a bit about what was new and what the plans were for the night. He asked her to call him sometime; little did he know she would call only a few hours later.

Her friends were winding down and she asked if she could use Amy’s phone. It was late but she had to speak with him. For hours, they talked. Dave almost fell asleep on her. She took notion of his tiredness and told him to get some rest and call her tomorrow. She felt some connection with him and was excited to know more. Her friends had made fun of her, teasing about having the phone glued to her head. She felt this could be the person she was searching for.

Cathy’s love life started off with a few special relationships. At this point in time she was in and out of a relationship with an older boy. Dave, knowing her dilemma with this, tried all he could to distract her from that guy. He would show up at her house just to say hi and get a hug. It worked to the point where all she wanted to do was be with him. She moved on from her past boys and wanted to be stuck in time with Dave. Cathy realized this the night of their first kiss.

He came over as she was getting ready to go out with her friends. She could see in his eyes he wished he was going as well but she had made these plans and it was a girls’ night. He was getting ready to leave her to her fun times. As they stood in the doorway of her front room to say their goodbyes and goodnights, he softly put both hands on the side of her face, pulling her into him and kissing with such passion she felt weak. She had never felt a kiss like that. Her stomach ached with butterflies. Wow, what a feeling. She almost didn’t want to leave this moment.

Over the next few weeks, he would drive her to school and pick her up, even though it meant getting up earlier so he made it to his classes at his school. They wrote each other letters all day long. They spent every moment together. After a few months went by, they made it official that they were a couple. They were so consumed with each other that he even switched schools to be with her. It was almost sickening. The only time they were apart was when she had to attend her after school activities.

There were even nights they stayed at each other’s house. He introduced her to a new world of drugs and parties. She had tried to push away the people that were into that entire scene but with him she gave in. She loved the new experiences with him. She got lost with him on acid and became that girl that smoked weed every day. She had already been doing the club scene with her fake ID but only got involved with drinking. Now she was falling off the edge with him and she liked it.

They talked of getting married and having kids together. She was so intertwined with him and lost in his world. Cathy begged her mother to take them to get their first tattoo before she even had a driver’s license. They both picked out a different design but the tats were the same size and positioned on the same spot on their bodies. He would join her to meet her family on the holidays. They went to the movies all the time. She saved every ticket stub and they even took the cheesy pictures in photo booths. Junior year was almost at a close and they had enjoyed every dance together.

Amazingly they didn’t argue much. She got her way mostly. If there was ever a disagreement it was quashed rather quickly. She went on vacation with him in the spring to visit more backwoods members of his family name. She loved his family and enjoyed their company. They were the “tell it like it is” kind but she enjoyed their gossip the most.

She loved the fact that Dave’s parents were married, even though she had a full family life she always thought it would have been nice to know that unity with her own parents. Senior year approached and whatever she did, Dave had to do too. Cathy loved being with him but there were times she just wanted to hang out with her girlfriends. It got to the point where she was almost annoyed and wanted some freedom back. He had dropped out of her school to pursue on a job offer. He attended another school and had his GED before she even graduated. They still had a blast together; she was just starting to forget what it was like to be her own person. They broke up then got back together. The yo-yo effect of their relationship became normal to her.