Page 61 of Save You
Pru waits for Leo to close the door before crouching down to where Leo had just perched, looking very much as sad for me as he did. I thought she hated me, that she was someone who was a staunch Mayfield traditionalist, yet here she is looking beside herself with worry over me. I frown in confusion and when she sees my puzzled face, she takes my hands inside of her cold ones and squeezes them tightly.
“I’m sorry, Beth,” she says a little sheepishly, “I had no idea this is what Oliver had become; I thought he was different. He told me he had finally found the girl he had been pining for since he was twenty. Of course, when I saw you, I immediately had my suspicions. You looked so young, but I thought maybe you were just lucky…had good genes!” She laughs a little over her mistake. “But when I tracked down a photograph of your grandmother, Rosalie, I knew straight away who you were. Still, he seemed besotted with you, so who was I to question it? I thought that he was telling me the truth when he said he wanted to change things, to bring down the man who, over the decades, has been accused of the most wicked of crimes.”
“Like what? What has he been accused of, Pru?” I ask as I try to lift my head but end up dropping down again when my body complains with an aching all over it.
“Many things, Beth,” she says with a sad smile before starting to apply fresh compresses to my welts. “The first of which, was destroying one of your grandmother’s school friends, long before he had even made his intentions toward Rosalie known.”
“I don’t understand.” My family history keeps twisting and turning; it’s no wonder I’m in a constant state of vertigo. “What happened to her?”
“Her name was Lucy,” she explains, now focusing on her task rather than looking at me, “she was very quiet, very shy, and very beautiful. Her family wasn’t particularly high up in Mayfield, so someone like Carl Steele would never have considered her anything more than someone to take for his immediate gratification.”
“Oh,” I reply and begin playing with the sheet again, squeezing it tightly between my fingers while feeling deeply uncomfortable over being related to such a monster.
“She was fifteen when he attacked her. He raped her and pulled chunks of her hair from her scalp; he must have been like an animal,” she says with a sneer as she talks. “Of course, her parents lodged a complaint with the police. This soon got back to Carl and his parents; consequently, she vanished, as did the formal complaint. Her family became even lower in the pecking order, not that they cared about that, they just wanted their little girl back.”
“You said shewas,like she’s no more? What happened to her?” I ask nervously because I think I already know.
“She was locked away, for years,” she says as she turns to look at me, like her words are a warning, “in a psychiatric facility. Probably to endure the same fate she had faced on the night she was attacked, over and over again. Ten years after she managed to get out, she hung herself, in the woods near to where her parents lived.”
“Oh, God!” I gasp in shocked horror. “How do you know all of this?”
“My mother was Rosalie’s maid, a companion of sorts, only a few years older than her. Rosalie confided everything in her and my mother used to tell me Lucy’s story as a warning to not get too mixed up with those in power. To never trust the police and to never speak out. I married Edward, a clerk to one of the founding fathers, but thankfully, doesn’t treat people like they do. The man has never laid a finger on me or our children, so I consider myself lucky. I thought all of this was outdated, but after today, I shall be watching my own daughter more closely!”
“You know my story, don’t you?” I ask her quietly.
“I do now that I know who you really are,Beth, and I’m sorry. I also know your grandmother’s story. Well, up until she left, anyway.”
“Will you tell it to me?” Pru seems surprised by my question, as though she thinks I should already know it.
“One day,” she smiles after a few moments of thought, and I know she means it. “But let’s get you cleaned up and feeling a bit better again.”
Xander
Monday, possibly the most depressing day of the week, even when you don’t have any school or work to go to. For some reason, it’s just that day that makes you sigh for no other reason than because it’s Monday. However, today is the day I asked everyone to give Rosie and I some space, to let us bond without the usual crowd of grandparents, aunts, and uncles. No one dared to argue because, secretly, they think I need to be on suicide watch. However, today I had given them a hopeful smile and sounded almost positive about having some daddy, daughter time.
It’s not that I don’t appreciate my clan, but I finally feel like I need some semblance of normal; to get my girl and me into some sort of routine, or so Mom keeps telling me. Christ knows what I’m doing, I’ll be the first to admit I’m learning on the job. As far as I can tell, having a baby pretty much equals a shit night’s sleep, shit emotions, and generally feeling like you’re doing a shit job of it all. Who knew someone so small could completely take over your life, your soul, as well as make you feel inadequate on a daily basis? Suffice to say, I have a newfound respect for all parents, especially single parents like me. And as for those who don’t have anyone but themselves, my heart truly goes out to them. I may not have Beth, but I have a pretty awesome village supporting me at the moment.
After breakfast, and about an hour of dressing her, changing her, then redressing her because we had an epic back poo that meant everything needed washing, even her hair, we eventually began walking into town. It should be nice, simple, and ordinary; something I could do as part of a daily routine. We even wandered in and out of a few shops, ignoring the strange glances I got from people I was at school with only a few months ago. I get it, I’m a single dad who is halfway between eighteen and nineteen, and who never even showed a hint of having a girlfriend. Yet here I am pushing a buggy around, beaming over the fact that Rosie has finally drifted off to sleep.
“Xander?!” a familiar voice cries out in shock. To my horror, I’ve walked directly into the path of Kyle Holmes, who currently has his arm draped over a senior and a cigarette hanging from his limp, left hand. “What the hell, dude?!”
Before I can pretend like I didn’t hear him and about-turn, he’s rounding the buggy to poke his big, obnoxious head inside of Rosie’s pram, peering at her like she’s an alien creature. I pull back on the bar, not wanting his smoker’s breath anywhere near my daughter. Most people would feel insulted, but he just looks back up at me with a ridiculing grin across his face.
“Oh, how the mighty have fallen!” he laughs, being completely at ease with his own insult. “Who did you knock up, Fenton?”
The old Xander who isn’t sleep-deprived and who is trying his very best not to risk waking up a one-month-old, would have had him up against the wall, slowly squeezing his throat with an urge to keep going until he could no longer breathe. However, I no longer give a flying shit what idiot features thinks of me, so, instead, I huff loudly and direct my attention toward his girlfriend. She’s grinning at the sleeping babe inside of the pram. Besides, I don’t want to risk Rosie having to see Kyle’s ugly face, who knows how long it would take to stop her crying over that ordeal.
“She’s so cute,” Kelly cuts in with a much more pleasing attitude. I don’t know her all that well, but she’s always seemed nice, and far too good for the likes of Kyle. “How old is she?”
“Four weeks,” I smile proudly, “she’s a handful but already has me wrapped around her little finger.”
“What’s her name?”
“Rosalie, Beth, Fenton,” I reply, taking in a large gulp of air because I haven’t actually said her full name out loud before. It sounds good to hear. “We all call her Rosie, though.”
“Beth? I take it that’s her mom?” Kelly looks like she’s trying hard to picture Beth, seeing as she wasn’t at our school for too long. “You’re such a good daddy taking her out. I bet Beth is exhausted!”
Kelly smiles softly as she continues to gush over my sleeping little bundle. Meanwhile, my heart feels as though a knife has just been run through it.