Chapter 74-The Truth Hurts

Over the next several days the only thing that kept me from retreating back into a depression was the promise I made to the boys.  If they thought something was different about the triplets they never mentioned it.  Watching them interact should have warmed my heart but I had a constant knot in the pit of my stomach that prevented me from enjoying my children.  I wanted to love them; it should have been easy; a natural thing to do yet each time the looked at me with their innocent faces I wanted to cry.  There was no one I could talk to about this because I was too ashamed.  

  Not even in therapy did I breathe a word about my problem.  I was talking to her now and I knew her job wasn’t to pass judgment on me but it would be too hard to explain how I couldn’t remember cheating on my husband.  The fact that I was gone for three days with no memory of anything after leaving my house already had her questioning my mental state.  I truly believed if it wasn’t for great support system I have she would have called social services in order to have me investigated.  No, telling her was out of the option.  Instead I suffered my doubt in silence while trying my best to pretend everything was ok.  I kept my mind off of things by trying to keep busy.  I got a tutor for Dunham.  

 I spoke with all of his teachers at a conference as well as Dax’s just to make sure I wasn’t missing anything.  Trig was the only thing Dunham struggled with.  His grade never managed to get above a D in that class.  Dax’s only real struggle was keeping his mouth closed and his eyes open.  I couldn’t really fuss at him about the sleeping thing since I knew the cause of it but he promised to stay awake and talk less.  Overall they were both good students.  Dunham’s teacher gave me a list of possible tutors.  They were college students who were his previous star students.  After talking to a few of them we settled on Embry Weston.  

 She was working on her bachelor's degree in childhood education in hopes of becoming an elementary school teacher.  She was sweet and polite, her class schedule worked best with Dunham’s and they seemed to get along.  Shirley, the nanny, continued to come a few hours each day and I was grateful to have her.  She was a nice lady who was excited about the upcoming arrival of her first grandchild.  Although I was expecting it, the day she actually called out because her daughter was in labor I panicked.  It would be the first time I was completely alone with the triplets.

“You can do this, you can do this.”  I chanted to myself as I stood outside their nursery door.

“Ma-Ma.” Elphie said reaching out for me as soon as I entered the room.  I only hesitated a moment before picking her up.

“Hey pretty girl.  Did you sleep well?”

She giggled in response as I changed her then sat her down to get Elton.  Wash, rinse, repeat; after getting them and myself all dressed it was time for the fun task of carrying them down the stair for breakfast.  I placed Edson back in his crib, which he was not happy about, while I took the other two downstairs to put them in their high chairs. 

Once all three were fed, it was potty time.

Edson and Elphie were a breeze, but

Elton didn’t mind sitting in a soiled diaper so he would fight me.   Breakfast-check, potty-check, next outdoor play time.  Shirley had worked hard to get them on a schedule and I didn’t want to ruin it, plus I had no clue how to really interact with them so sticking with the schedule worked well for me.  Just as I was getting all the toys together to take outside the doorbell rang.

“Hey guys do you think it’s Uncle Carter or Uncle Jonas?”

They all followed behind me as I headed for the door.

“No, it’s daddy.” He said as I opened the door. 

“Mulo.” 

“Hello Love.”

“Why---what are you doing here?”  My heart was pounding and my hand gripped tightly onto the doorknob as I tried to keep my entire body from shaking.

“I came to see my kids and to see how you were doing.”

I stood frozen.  It had been a good few hours.  I hadn’t once had the chance to think about who their father might be; instead I simply had been a mother taking care of her children.  Then he shows up and ruins that.

“I would have come sooner, but your house was a beehive of activity with people constantly coming and going.  I thought it best to wait.” 

He walked into the house and I absentmindedly closed the door behind him.  Edson crawled over to him putting his hand up in the air signaling he wanted to be picked up.  Mulo bent down scooping him up as if it were a perfectly natural thing to do.

“I’ve missed you Love.” He said giving me a quick kiss on my cheek. 

Elton and Elphie had gone back to playing with their toys completely oblivious to what was going on around them.  I wandered into the living room not wanting to acknowledge his statement.  They weren’t his, they couldn’t be his.

“Come now my love.  Do you have any other explanation?”

“No, no, no no.” I muttered to myself.

“Look at them!” He ordered.  “You and your human couldn’t have done this.”

The truth was literally staring me in the face as I looked into the eyes of my son. 

“They are mine, ours Amari.  No amount of wishful thinking is going to change that.”

He was right.  There was no way they could have ended up like this unless I had cheated on my husband but something wasn’t right.  Something felt off. 

“Why don’t I remember?”

“You asked me to cloak them.  You had terrible guilt over what we had done and it pained me to see you so distraught so against my better judgment I agreed.”

His answers seemed plausible.  I would have been guilty, I am guilty over this.

“But you were in France.”

“The benefits of owning your own plane.  I come and go a lot.  I came back for you.  You needed me and wanted me to.”

I thought back to the phone calls we shared.  Although I never said anything directly, I did miss him early on and wished he wasn’t so far away.  Oh dear God he was right.  I could have done this.  How would I explain this to the boys?  What would they think of me?

“You don’t have to worry about that.  Your oldest children told them so story to explain the differences.”

Oddly I was not comforted by that fact.  Aric and Bynni had to lie to protect my reputation with my boys. 

“They did it freely.  They love you and wanted to spare both you and them any additional pain considering what you are going through.”

One small step forward, ten giant leaps back.  The triplets were starting to get fussy.

“It’s time for their nap so I think you should go now.  Please.”

I needed him gone so I could curl up and lock out the world for a few moments.  I didn’t want him near me serving as an even more painful reminder of yet another failure in my life.

“No.  Let me help you.  I’ll leave before your sons come home.”

I didn’t get a chance to object as he picked up Elphie and Edson then headed towards the stairs.  I could only follow behind carrying Elton.

“I missed out on this with Aric.  I won’t do that this time.” He commented as we walked into the nursery.

“You can’t expect to just step in and start playing daddy to them.  I can’t…I can’t deal with that.  With you.  Not now.”

“I’m their father and I have a right to be in their lives.”  Mulo kept his voice low but the anger still came through loud and clear.  Taking me by the arm he all but dragged me back down the stairs.

“Let go!” I said yanking my arm free.  “I am barely holding on as it is.  I don’t need you coming around adding additional complications to my life.”

“I’m not a complication, I’m their father!”

“You were more than happy to leave the parenting of Aric to me so why can’t you do the same now?”

Mulo stepped closer to me clearly very angry but stopped when he saw I was scared of him.

“I’m not unreasonable.  I know you don’t want to explain this to your sons.  If it makes it easier I will only come by when they aren’t home.”

Nothing about this was easy.  I had betrayed the one man who loved me in spite of all my faults.  Easy would be having a time machine that would allow me to erase all my mistakes.  I wasn’t fortunate enough to have that option.

“Mulo, I need some time.  Some space.  Looking at them daily is enough of a reminder of what I have done.  Having you here, I don’t know if I can handle that.”

He reached out for me but I recoiled away from him.  He clenched his jaw and curled his hands into fists at his side.“I’ve been patient giving you time to grieve.  They are my children and I will not lose anymore time with them.  You are thinking of yourself, but do you really think it’s in their best interest to not have their father around?”

Damn him for being right.  I couldn’t deprive them of the right to know their father because it was a harsher reminder of my mistakes. I learned that the hard way with Ceula and I know Bynni still wishes she had met her father.

“Only when the boys aren’t here.”  I conceded.

“You’ll see this will be good for everyone.”

Mulo looked as if he wanted to reach out for me again but he stopped himself.

“I’ll go now, but I’ll see you tomorrow.”  He let his fingers brush across my arm as he walked past me.

“Mom.”  Dax called out to me as he walked into the house.  I quickly wiped the tears from my cheeks as he entered the living room.

“Hey honey how was school?”  I asked hoping to sound a little cheerful.

“I stayed awake.”

“Well that makes for a great day."  I joked.  "Where’s your brother?”

“Oh he said he was meeting up with Embry.  Something about a test and needing to see her.”

“Um, he didn’t mention anything to me.”

“He said he texted you.”

“Ah, ok.  It’s been a busy day.  I’m not even sure where my phone is.”

Dunham was out past dinner.  Once Embry dropped him off he barely said hello before he ran upstairs.  He did make a reappearance to help Dax and I get the triplets bathed and ready for bed.  The house was quiet, too quiet as I lay there staring at the ceiling.  Sleep was eluding me tonight.  Every time I closed my eyes I got images of me with Mulo.  It was disturbing so after tossing and turning for a while I headed downstairs.

 I hated myself for thinking it, but for the first time since he went missing I was relieved Marcus wasn’t here.