Post by rsafan on Mar 28, 2007 8:26:02 GMT -5
Chapter 63
It seemed news travelled real fast in Salem, barely hours after Mimi had told Victoria that she was filing for divorce, Hope was broaching the subject. Mimi had been interrupted at work, once again, by her mother-in-law, “Don’t you think he deserves to know exactly why you walked out? If you’re serious about filing for divorce Mimi, you should let him at least know why.”
“He knows why.” Mimi said curtly, and immediately regretted her tone. This wasn’t Hope’s fault, the disaster that was her life right now was no one’s fault but her own.
“No, I don’t think he does. And I’m not too sure I do either. You don’t just walk out on a relationship, a marriage because you feel your husband should be with someone else. There has to be something that made you think that and right now, my son doesn’t know what that something is.”
“Oh, believe me he does, he just doesn’t know that I do.”
Hope picked up the phone and handed it to Mimi, “Call him. Call them. Talk to them, tell them what you know and what you feel. It might not change anything for you, you may still want to go through with this divorce, but at least you can get rid of the bitterness you feel towards them.”
“I don’t think that’ll ever happen.”
“Just call them Mimi, find out. Do it tonight, I know for a fact Victoria isn’t doing anything, she can babysit Zach if you want.” Hope offered.
Mimi took the phone from Hope and dialled Shawn’s number, “Hi Shawn, it’s Mimi, we need to talk…No, not now, is tonight okay with you?... At the loft, eight o’clock…oh and could you ask Belle to be there too, this kind of involves her too…Thank you. I’ll see you tonight.” Mimi hung up and handed the phone back to Hope, “There it’s done.”
“Now all we have to do is inform Victoria that she’s babysitting tonight.”
“Not until you’ve heard all I have to say. All of it!” he pulled her towards him, till their noses almost touched, for the first time in her life, she was truly afraid.
“If you don’t let me go, I’ll scream.” She warned.
“Go ahead!” he offered, “But no one is going to here you, you know that as well as I do.”
He was right of course, the room was soundproof, which was exactly why he’d chosen to sneak up on her there, “Luc,” she tried to twist her arm out of his grasp again but stopped when a sharp pain raced down her arm, “you’re hurting me.”
“You’re hurting yourself. If you’d just listen and stop struggling-”
Her arm was almost numb now and tears had sprung to her eyes, “It really hurts.” She whispered and was surprised when his grip slackened. He’d been right though, because it hadn’t been that tight to begin with, her twisting was what had injured her and not him.
“I simply came here to tell you to stop.”
“Stop what?”
“Don’t play dumb with me, I don’t want you looking into any more of my business arrangements, is that clear?”
“What makes you think I even care? About you or you ‘business arrangements’?” she shot at him.
“When you ask questions, you make waves. Make waves big enough and you’ll be in a lot of trouble Victoria, trouble you’ll find it impossible to get out of so take my advice and back off.” He warned her. Letting her arm go and walking out of the room.
But before he could leave, she asked softly, “Why’d you do it?”
He stopped, briefly. If she hadn’t been watching him so intently, she wouldn’t have noticed it, but she did. The hesitation, he’d wanted to turn around, to give her an answer, but instead he simply said, “Just heed my warning, before you get hurt.”
“It’s too late for that, I’ve already been hurt.” But he was already out of the room. As she raced to the entrance, hugging her arm to herself, she only spotted hope coming down the corridor.
“Did you see where he went?” she asked her mother.
Hope gave her a quizzical glance, “See where who went?”
“Luc, he was here, he was just here. He couldn’t have just disappeared.”
“Wait a minute are you saying he was in this building?” Hope asked her, then noticed Victoria holding onto her arm, rubbing it, “Are you okay, he didn’t hurt you did he?” The look Victoria gave her, made Hope ache right down to her soul. The pain he’d caused her just by showing up was ten times worse than anything he could’ve done to her physically. Hope opened her arms to her daughter and Victoria didn’t hesitate to walk into them. “It’s okay honey.” Hope crooned, “Everything is going to be okay.” But they both knew it wouldn’t, as far as Hope could tell, Lucien Dimera had no business seeing Tory and the fact that he had chosen to do so scared her. Tory started shaking, thinking of the warning Luc had delivered, that cool look in his eyes when he’d threatened her. “What did he say to you?” Hope asked when she felt the trembling, “did he threaten you?”
“I want to go home.” Tory said, where it’s warm, someplace Lucien Dimera hasn’t been, “Can you take me home?”
She nodded, “This is all to appease mom, you’d think I had the flu with the way she’s been babying me.”
“Give her a break.” Shawn said as he sat down on the bed next to her, “she’s never been able to do this for you; she’ll go overboard the first few times.”
“Thanks for the warning.”
“So, what really happened? I don’t want the story you told mom, I want the truth.”
“He wants us to butt out Shawn, said I could get hurt if I didn’t stop asking questions.”
“Did he hurt you?”
She shook her head, “No, I hurt myself though. He was holding my arm and I tried to get away from him, as soon as I told him I was hurting, he loosened his hold.”
Shawn frowned, that didn’t sound like something a Dimera would do. It wasn’t something he would have done either, been reluctant to hurt someone and it made him think about everything they’d learnt so far and how easy it had been to find incriminating evidence. Either Lucien Dimera was a novice, which didn’t make sense, or they were barking up the wrong tree, which didn’t explain the threat. Shawn was all too afraid that perhaps they in deeper than they’d first thought.
“Okay,” Hope said as she brought in a tray laden with food, “I wasn’t too sure what you’d be in the mood for but-”
“You decide to bring everything?” Shawn joked with her as she placed the tray over Tory’s lap.
“No, I knew you’d finish whatever she didn’t.” Hope responded.
“Thanks, I’m starving.” Shawn said as he started to dig in, but Tory pulled the mac and cheese plate from his grasp declaring that it was hers. Hope watched the two of them, her babies and smiled. Their bickering reminded her of how close they’d all become recently, how much of a family they were. Herself, Bo, Shawn, Victoria and Chelsea. And even though the three children had and were still going through the worst sort of pain, she was glad they still depended on each other, was glad they had each other to depend on.
As though she’d been called, Chelsea appeared at the door, “The door was open.” she explained to Hope. She turned to her siblings, “Hi… is that?” she asked, walking over to Shawn who was eating chocolate ice-cream.
“No!” Shawn said, “go and get your own.”
Hope laughed, “Sit down Chelsea, I’ll go and get you a bowl.”
“So, I here Mimi wanted to see you, did she say what about?” Chelsea asked when Hope left the room.
Victoria gave him an accusatory look, “Why’s this the first time I’m hearing about this?”
“Because on a scale, being assaulted by your husband beats having yet another talk with your wife any day.”
“But-” then she remembered that Shawn wasn’t aware that Mimi was probably going to be telling him that she was filing for divorce and she wasn’t sure if she should give her brother the heads up, especially since it was something Mimi had told her in confidence, she’d only been allowed to tell one person and she’d chosen to tell her mother. “Oh never mind, I guess that means I can’t go home tonight, might as well spend the night here.”
“Actually, Mimi mentioned that you’d be looking after Zach.” Chelsea said, “She said Hope was going to ask you, I ran into her after lunch and I assumed…”
“That’s okay Chels, I’m sure she would’ve gotten around to it eventually and since I have nothing better to do, I may as well look after my favourite nephew.”
“Hi.” Mimi said when Shawn opened the door, removing the light jacket she’d slipped on before leaving her apartment. Shawn took it from her as she admired the changes to the loft; it was neater and tidier than it had ever looked. “Love what you’ve done with the place.”
“Oh, I’m not responsible for the changes,” he said as he slid her jacket onto one of the rails behind the door, “All these are courtesy of my sister, well both of them really. Victoria isn’t all that into, ‘slumming it’ as she put it.”
Mimi greeted Belle with a smile
“So what was it you wanted to see us about?” Shawn asked, nervous about why she’d want Belle there too.
Mimi decided to just come out with it, that way they could deal with things quickly and she could go home, “I’m filing for divorce.”
Belle started to get up, “I don’t think I should be here.”
Mimi shook her head, “No Belle, you should stay. This has as much to do with you as it does with Shawn and I.”
Shawn frowned, “I don’t see how it could.”
“You will, soon enough everything is going to make sense. I’m here because your mother asked me to inform you as to exactly why we’re getting divorced.”
“If this is about last week I-” Shawn started but Mimi cut him off.
“It is. It’s about last week; it’s about finding you in bed with Belle after you promised me that the two of you were over. But that’s just a small part of it, ties into the real reason.”
“Which is?”
“Your lies.”
“As far as I know, you’re the only one who’s lied here Mimi.” Belle stated, Shawn’s facial expression said he agreed with her.
Mimi couldn’t believe how quickly they forgot, “Oh no, you do not get to turn this around on me, not this time, not ever again. You don’t get to simply erase your guilt because of my one mistake. You don’t get to throw that in my face and you don’t get to get all indignant with me. Not after what the two of you have done. My best friend and my husband, the two people I trusted most in this world.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I’m talking about the two of you kissing and God knows what else. I’m talking about your little rooftop meetings. Do you really want to know why we’re never going to be together Shawn? Think back, to when I was pregnant with Zach, no even further back. How about the night before we got married, or the night you proposed to me at Chez Rouge, how about all the nights in-between? The nights you met her on the rooftop, the times you declared your love for each other, when she asked, no begged, you not to marry me, when you kissed her. If you want to know why Shawn, think about all those nights and you have your answer.” She studied his facial expression, knew what he was thinking, “Yes Shawn, I know about it, about all of it. I’ve known for quite some time now.”
“How long?”
“Does it really matter?”
“How long have you known Mimi? When did you find out?”
“The day I left, the day I walked out on our ‘marriage’, it was the last straw. You accused me of not trying to make things work but you have no idea how hard I tried, do you know what its like to wake up everyday and know that the person you’re waking up with wishes you were someone else? Do you know what its like to fight for a relationship when it feels like you’re the only one in it? Do you Shawn? Because that’s what it was like for me every single day and when I found out about your little affair-”
“It wasn’t an affair.” Belle chose to point out, it was a bad mistake, it reminded Mimi that she was in the room.
“That’s subjective. And really the only person’s view on what went on between the two of you is mine wouldn’t you say?”
“Mimi if you’d let us explain…”
“Explain what? I know what happened Belle, I don’t need you to paint a picture for me, the one I have is already clear enough. Oh God, I cannot believe I was so stupid. ‘It’s okay Meems.’, “I forgive you sweetheart.’, ‘I want us to start over.’ lies, all of them lies. And to think…Oh and then there’s the worst one, the worst of all, ‘I love you’”
“I do.”
She couldn’t take it anymore, “Stop lying Shawn!”
“I’m…”
“You really do not want to be that guy right now, that hypocritical, self-righteous guy who says ‘I’m sorry’ and expects everything to be okay. It’s not okay, I’m not okay but I will be; I can promise you that much. I am not going to let you do this to me and I’m certainly not going to let me do this to me. You talk about honesty and trust and how important they both are to you and then you… Let’s see, the two of you knew, Victoria knew, Philip knew, your mother knew, Chelsea knew, that may not be the entire list, I’m sure its not but all I want to know is why I was the last to know? So lets here it Shawn, lets here the flimsy excuse you have for keeping a secret like this!”
“I didn’t want to hurt you.”
Mimi scoffed, “You didn’t want to get caught out, you wanted to have your cake and eat it too. You wanted to string me along, Mimi, the unassuming wife who trusted and felt so guilty for having kept your daughter from you.”
“No that’s not true. Mimi, if you’d let me explain…”
“Explain what? There’s not much to explain Shawn. You want him Belle, you’ve proved time and again how desperate you are to have him, well he’s all yours.” She turned from them, ready to walk out but Shawn stopped her, pulling her around to face him.
“I was scared, I wanted to tell you Mimi. I didn’t want any lies between us but you were pregnant and it wasn’t the easiest pregnancy in the world, you know that.”
Mimi shook her head tiredly, she was so sick of conversations like this, so sick of always being the bad guy, the one that was to blame, “That’s just an excuse.”
“You’re joking right? You had weekly visits with your doctor, I would be there and hear about how you were to remain as stress free as possible and you expected me to simply come out with it? I was going to tell you the day you told us about Claire, we were fighting and I thought, this is my chance, I’ll tell her and she’ll forgive me because…”
“Because I did something so much worse right? I’d forgive you because I was so desperate to be your wife that I’d overlook the small matter of adultery.”
“It wasn’t adul…” but the look on her face told him to not even argue the point, “I was going to tell you when you came back out of the room…”
“You mean after you’d already decided to walk out on me?” she asked incredulously. “Can you believe that Belle, if it hadn’t been for the small matter of my having cramps, you could’ve already had him.”
Belle had heard enough; couldn’t she see how desperate Shawn was to hold on to his wife? Could she not see how much he loved her? “Mimi, stop this! I feel-”
Mimi gave her a sarcastic smile before cutting her off, “Oh, there it is. Took you long enough, took you long enough to bring this all around to you. I feel, I want, I need, I love. God, I am so sick of hearing about you Belle. I’m sick about the fact that everything in my life always being about you. ‘Oh there she goes, Belle’s best friend, you know she’s married to Belle’s ex-boyfriend right?’ I don’t want to hear anything from you Belle, nothing you have to say holds any value with me, not anymore. I trusted you, my best friend. I didn’t even pursue anything with Shawn till I had your blessing; you said you were happy for me.”
“I was…I am.” Belle responded desperately, she’d never seen Mimi like this and she feared that this really could be the end of their friendship. If Mimi was willing to give up Shawn, she would certainly be willing to cut Belle out of her life.
“Then why’d you do it Belle, why did you do something you knew would hurt me and quite potentially ruin my marriage, my happiness. How could you do that to your best friend?”
Belle decided to go for broke, if she needed to make a last ditch effort to save her friendship with Mimi, she would do it by being totally honest with her. She needed to be, it was after all what her friend deserved, what her friend had done for her, “Okay Mimi, you want the truth, here it is. Yes I love Shawn, I will always love him, I’ve loved him for almost my whole life and I don’t want to stop loving him. He was my first love, the one guy I could always be real with, he made me really happy. And I thought I could move on but I was only fooling myself, it didn’t take long for me to realise I’d made a mistake marrying Philip and I tried everything I could to get Shawn to come back to me. But here’s the thing Mimi, he never did, not once. That night on the rooftop, I was the one who kissed him. All those other times, those times I begged him to leave you and be with me, all those time he maintained that while he would always love me, you were the woman he wanted, the woman he loved, the woman who held his heart and the woman he would share his future with.”
“And still you kept at it, kept trying to come between us.”
“Yes I did, I did because when you love someone as much as I love Shawn; you don’t simply walk away Mimi. You don’t just give in; you fight for him.”
Mimi turned to Shawn, of the three people in the apartment, he looked the most uncomfortable, “Well there you have it Shawn; I guess I just didn’t love you enough. I guess all the months I had to watch you run to her when she called, and all the times I had to put up with your disgust and contempt because I’d kept Claire from you; all those nights I stayed up wondering if things were ever going to change, I guess they just weren’t enough huh? Not compared to Belle’s love. But then again that’s the crux of the problem between us Shawn, I was just never enough.”
The phone started ringing then, “You should get that.”
“It can wait.”
“So can this.”
He relented and answered, “Shawn speaking…I’ll be right over.” He hung up and through the receiver to Mimi, “Call the paramedics, send them to your apartment and tell them to hurry.”
“Shawn what is it? Is it Zach?” but he was already out the door and racing down the stairs.
It seemed news travelled real fast in Salem, barely hours after Mimi had told Victoria that she was filing for divorce, Hope was broaching the subject. Mimi had been interrupted at work, once again, by her mother-in-law, “Don’t you think he deserves to know exactly why you walked out? If you’re serious about filing for divorce Mimi, you should let him at least know why.”
“He knows why.” Mimi said curtly, and immediately regretted her tone. This wasn’t Hope’s fault, the disaster that was her life right now was no one’s fault but her own.
“No, I don’t think he does. And I’m not too sure I do either. You don’t just walk out on a relationship, a marriage because you feel your husband should be with someone else. There has to be something that made you think that and right now, my son doesn’t know what that something is.”
“Oh, believe me he does, he just doesn’t know that I do.”
Hope picked up the phone and handed it to Mimi, “Call him. Call them. Talk to them, tell them what you know and what you feel. It might not change anything for you, you may still want to go through with this divorce, but at least you can get rid of the bitterness you feel towards them.”
“I don’t think that’ll ever happen.”
“Just call them Mimi, find out. Do it tonight, I know for a fact Victoria isn’t doing anything, she can babysit Zach if you want.” Hope offered.
Mimi took the phone from Hope and dialled Shawn’s number, “Hi Shawn, it’s Mimi, we need to talk…No, not now, is tonight okay with you?... At the loft, eight o’clock…oh and could you ask Belle to be there too, this kind of involves her too…Thank you. I’ll see you tonight.” Mimi hung up and handed the phone back to Hope, “There it’s done.”
“Now all we have to do is inform Victoria that she’s babysitting tonight.”
*****
“Let go of my arm!” she bit out.“Not until you’ve heard all I have to say. All of it!” he pulled her towards him, till their noses almost touched, for the first time in her life, she was truly afraid.
“If you don’t let me go, I’ll scream.” She warned.
“Go ahead!” he offered, “But no one is going to here you, you know that as well as I do.”
He was right of course, the room was soundproof, which was exactly why he’d chosen to sneak up on her there, “Luc,” she tried to twist her arm out of his grasp again but stopped when a sharp pain raced down her arm, “you’re hurting me.”
“You’re hurting yourself. If you’d just listen and stop struggling-”
Her arm was almost numb now and tears had sprung to her eyes, “It really hurts.” She whispered and was surprised when his grip slackened. He’d been right though, because it hadn’t been that tight to begin with, her twisting was what had injured her and not him.
“I simply came here to tell you to stop.”
“Stop what?”
“Don’t play dumb with me, I don’t want you looking into any more of my business arrangements, is that clear?”
“What makes you think I even care? About you or you ‘business arrangements’?” she shot at him.
“When you ask questions, you make waves. Make waves big enough and you’ll be in a lot of trouble Victoria, trouble you’ll find it impossible to get out of so take my advice and back off.” He warned her. Letting her arm go and walking out of the room.
But before he could leave, she asked softly, “Why’d you do it?”
He stopped, briefly. If she hadn’t been watching him so intently, she wouldn’t have noticed it, but she did. The hesitation, he’d wanted to turn around, to give her an answer, but instead he simply said, “Just heed my warning, before you get hurt.”
“It’s too late for that, I’ve already been hurt.” But he was already out of the room. As she raced to the entrance, hugging her arm to herself, she only spotted hope coming down the corridor.
“Did you see where he went?” she asked her mother.
Hope gave her a quizzical glance, “See where who went?”
“Luc, he was here, he was just here. He couldn’t have just disappeared.”
“Wait a minute are you saying he was in this building?” Hope asked her, then noticed Victoria holding onto her arm, rubbing it, “Are you okay, he didn’t hurt you did he?” The look Victoria gave her, made Hope ache right down to her soul. The pain he’d caused her just by showing up was ten times worse than anything he could’ve done to her physically. Hope opened her arms to her daughter and Victoria didn’t hesitate to walk into them. “It’s okay honey.” Hope crooned, “Everything is going to be okay.” But they both knew it wouldn’t, as far as Hope could tell, Lucien Dimera had no business seeing Tory and the fact that he had chosen to do so scared her. Tory started shaking, thinking of the warning Luc had delivered, that cool look in his eyes when he’d threatened her. “What did he say to you?” Hope asked when she felt the trembling, “did he threaten you?”
“I want to go home.” Tory said, where it’s warm, someplace Lucien Dimera hasn’t been, “Can you take me home?”
*****
She was lying under the covers in Shawn’s old room when he walked in, “Are you okay?” he asked, concern written all over his face. She had been certain the first words out of his mouth would be ‘I told you so’, but it showed her how great a big brother he was.She nodded, “This is all to appease mom, you’d think I had the flu with the way she’s been babying me.”
“Give her a break.” Shawn said as he sat down on the bed next to her, “she’s never been able to do this for you; she’ll go overboard the first few times.”
“Thanks for the warning.”
“So, what really happened? I don’t want the story you told mom, I want the truth.”
“He wants us to butt out Shawn, said I could get hurt if I didn’t stop asking questions.”
“Did he hurt you?”
She shook her head, “No, I hurt myself though. He was holding my arm and I tried to get away from him, as soon as I told him I was hurting, he loosened his hold.”
Shawn frowned, that didn’t sound like something a Dimera would do. It wasn’t something he would have done either, been reluctant to hurt someone and it made him think about everything they’d learnt so far and how easy it had been to find incriminating evidence. Either Lucien Dimera was a novice, which didn’t make sense, or they were barking up the wrong tree, which didn’t explain the threat. Shawn was all too afraid that perhaps they in deeper than they’d first thought.
“Okay,” Hope said as she brought in a tray laden with food, “I wasn’t too sure what you’d be in the mood for but-”
“You decide to bring everything?” Shawn joked with her as she placed the tray over Tory’s lap.
“No, I knew you’d finish whatever she didn’t.” Hope responded.
“Thanks, I’m starving.” Shawn said as he started to dig in, but Tory pulled the mac and cheese plate from his grasp declaring that it was hers. Hope watched the two of them, her babies and smiled. Their bickering reminded her of how close they’d all become recently, how much of a family they were. Herself, Bo, Shawn, Victoria and Chelsea. And even though the three children had and were still going through the worst sort of pain, she was glad they still depended on each other, was glad they had each other to depend on.
As though she’d been called, Chelsea appeared at the door, “The door was open.” she explained to Hope. She turned to her siblings, “Hi… is that?” she asked, walking over to Shawn who was eating chocolate ice-cream.
“No!” Shawn said, “go and get your own.”
Hope laughed, “Sit down Chelsea, I’ll go and get you a bowl.”
“So, I here Mimi wanted to see you, did she say what about?” Chelsea asked when Hope left the room.
Victoria gave him an accusatory look, “Why’s this the first time I’m hearing about this?”
“Because on a scale, being assaulted by your husband beats having yet another talk with your wife any day.”
“But-” then she remembered that Shawn wasn’t aware that Mimi was probably going to be telling him that she was filing for divorce and she wasn’t sure if she should give her brother the heads up, especially since it was something Mimi had told her in confidence, she’d only been allowed to tell one person and she’d chosen to tell her mother. “Oh never mind, I guess that means I can’t go home tonight, might as well spend the night here.”
“Actually, Mimi mentioned that you’d be looking after Zach.” Chelsea said, “She said Hope was going to ask you, I ran into her after lunch and I assumed…”
“That’s okay Chels, I’m sure she would’ve gotten around to it eventually and since I have nothing better to do, I may as well look after my favourite nephew.”
*****
She arrived at eight exactly. Belle was already there, had been for the past half hour, anxious to here what Mimi had to say, and how it involved her.“Hi.” Mimi said when Shawn opened the door, removing the light jacket she’d slipped on before leaving her apartment. Shawn took it from her as she admired the changes to the loft; it was neater and tidier than it had ever looked. “Love what you’ve done with the place.”
“Oh, I’m not responsible for the changes,” he said as he slid her jacket onto one of the rails behind the door, “All these are courtesy of my sister, well both of them really. Victoria isn’t all that into, ‘slumming it’ as she put it.”
Mimi greeted Belle with a smile
“So what was it you wanted to see us about?” Shawn asked, nervous about why she’d want Belle there too.
Mimi decided to just come out with it, that way they could deal with things quickly and she could go home, “I’m filing for divorce.”
Belle started to get up, “I don’t think I should be here.”
Mimi shook her head, “No Belle, you should stay. This has as much to do with you as it does with Shawn and I.”
Shawn frowned, “I don’t see how it could.”
“You will, soon enough everything is going to make sense. I’m here because your mother asked me to inform you as to exactly why we’re getting divorced.”
“If this is about last week I-” Shawn started but Mimi cut him off.
“It is. It’s about last week; it’s about finding you in bed with Belle after you promised me that the two of you were over. But that’s just a small part of it, ties into the real reason.”
“Which is?”
“Your lies.”
“As far as I know, you’re the only one who’s lied here Mimi.” Belle stated, Shawn’s facial expression said he agreed with her.
Mimi couldn’t believe how quickly they forgot, “Oh no, you do not get to turn this around on me, not this time, not ever again. You don’t get to simply erase your guilt because of my one mistake. You don’t get to throw that in my face and you don’t get to get all indignant with me. Not after what the two of you have done. My best friend and my husband, the two people I trusted most in this world.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I’m talking about the two of you kissing and God knows what else. I’m talking about your little rooftop meetings. Do you really want to know why we’re never going to be together Shawn? Think back, to when I was pregnant with Zach, no even further back. How about the night before we got married, or the night you proposed to me at Chez Rouge, how about all the nights in-between? The nights you met her on the rooftop, the times you declared your love for each other, when she asked, no begged, you not to marry me, when you kissed her. If you want to know why Shawn, think about all those nights and you have your answer.” She studied his facial expression, knew what he was thinking, “Yes Shawn, I know about it, about all of it. I’ve known for quite some time now.”
“How long?”
“Does it really matter?”
“How long have you known Mimi? When did you find out?”
“The day I left, the day I walked out on our ‘marriage’, it was the last straw. You accused me of not trying to make things work but you have no idea how hard I tried, do you know what its like to wake up everyday and know that the person you’re waking up with wishes you were someone else? Do you know what its like to fight for a relationship when it feels like you’re the only one in it? Do you Shawn? Because that’s what it was like for me every single day and when I found out about your little affair-”
“It wasn’t an affair.” Belle chose to point out, it was a bad mistake, it reminded Mimi that she was in the room.
“That’s subjective. And really the only person’s view on what went on between the two of you is mine wouldn’t you say?”
“Mimi if you’d let us explain…”
“Explain what? I know what happened Belle, I don’t need you to paint a picture for me, the one I have is already clear enough. Oh God, I cannot believe I was so stupid. ‘It’s okay Meems.’, “I forgive you sweetheart.’, ‘I want us to start over.’ lies, all of them lies. And to think…Oh and then there’s the worst one, the worst of all, ‘I love you’”
“I do.”
She couldn’t take it anymore, “Stop lying Shawn!”
“I’m…”
“You really do not want to be that guy right now, that hypocritical, self-righteous guy who says ‘I’m sorry’ and expects everything to be okay. It’s not okay, I’m not okay but I will be; I can promise you that much. I am not going to let you do this to me and I’m certainly not going to let me do this to me. You talk about honesty and trust and how important they both are to you and then you… Let’s see, the two of you knew, Victoria knew, Philip knew, your mother knew, Chelsea knew, that may not be the entire list, I’m sure its not but all I want to know is why I was the last to know? So lets here it Shawn, lets here the flimsy excuse you have for keeping a secret like this!”
“I didn’t want to hurt you.”
Mimi scoffed, “You didn’t want to get caught out, you wanted to have your cake and eat it too. You wanted to string me along, Mimi, the unassuming wife who trusted and felt so guilty for having kept your daughter from you.”
“No that’s not true. Mimi, if you’d let me explain…”
“Explain what? There’s not much to explain Shawn. You want him Belle, you’ve proved time and again how desperate you are to have him, well he’s all yours.” She turned from them, ready to walk out but Shawn stopped her, pulling her around to face him.
“I was scared, I wanted to tell you Mimi. I didn’t want any lies between us but you were pregnant and it wasn’t the easiest pregnancy in the world, you know that.”
Mimi shook her head tiredly, she was so sick of conversations like this, so sick of always being the bad guy, the one that was to blame, “That’s just an excuse.”
“You’re joking right? You had weekly visits with your doctor, I would be there and hear about how you were to remain as stress free as possible and you expected me to simply come out with it? I was going to tell you the day you told us about Claire, we were fighting and I thought, this is my chance, I’ll tell her and she’ll forgive me because…”
“Because I did something so much worse right? I’d forgive you because I was so desperate to be your wife that I’d overlook the small matter of adultery.”
“It wasn’t adul…” but the look on her face told him to not even argue the point, “I was going to tell you when you came back out of the room…”
“You mean after you’d already decided to walk out on me?” she asked incredulously. “Can you believe that Belle, if it hadn’t been for the small matter of my having cramps, you could’ve already had him.”
Belle had heard enough; couldn’t she see how desperate Shawn was to hold on to his wife? Could she not see how much he loved her? “Mimi, stop this! I feel-”
Mimi gave her a sarcastic smile before cutting her off, “Oh, there it is. Took you long enough, took you long enough to bring this all around to you. I feel, I want, I need, I love. God, I am so sick of hearing about you Belle. I’m sick about the fact that everything in my life always being about you. ‘Oh there she goes, Belle’s best friend, you know she’s married to Belle’s ex-boyfriend right?’ I don’t want to hear anything from you Belle, nothing you have to say holds any value with me, not anymore. I trusted you, my best friend. I didn’t even pursue anything with Shawn till I had your blessing; you said you were happy for me.”
“I was…I am.” Belle responded desperately, she’d never seen Mimi like this and she feared that this really could be the end of their friendship. If Mimi was willing to give up Shawn, she would certainly be willing to cut Belle out of her life.
“Then why’d you do it Belle, why did you do something you knew would hurt me and quite potentially ruin my marriage, my happiness. How could you do that to your best friend?”
Belle decided to go for broke, if she needed to make a last ditch effort to save her friendship with Mimi, she would do it by being totally honest with her. She needed to be, it was after all what her friend deserved, what her friend had done for her, “Okay Mimi, you want the truth, here it is. Yes I love Shawn, I will always love him, I’ve loved him for almost my whole life and I don’t want to stop loving him. He was my first love, the one guy I could always be real with, he made me really happy. And I thought I could move on but I was only fooling myself, it didn’t take long for me to realise I’d made a mistake marrying Philip and I tried everything I could to get Shawn to come back to me. But here’s the thing Mimi, he never did, not once. That night on the rooftop, I was the one who kissed him. All those other times, those times I begged him to leave you and be with me, all those time he maintained that while he would always love me, you were the woman he wanted, the woman he loved, the woman who held his heart and the woman he would share his future with.”
“And still you kept at it, kept trying to come between us.”
“Yes I did, I did because when you love someone as much as I love Shawn; you don’t simply walk away Mimi. You don’t just give in; you fight for him.”
Mimi turned to Shawn, of the three people in the apartment, he looked the most uncomfortable, “Well there you have it Shawn; I guess I just didn’t love you enough. I guess all the months I had to watch you run to her when she called, and all the times I had to put up with your disgust and contempt because I’d kept Claire from you; all those nights I stayed up wondering if things were ever going to change, I guess they just weren’t enough huh? Not compared to Belle’s love. But then again that’s the crux of the problem between us Shawn, I was just never enough.”
The phone started ringing then, “You should get that.”
“It can wait.”
“So can this.”
He relented and answered, “Shawn speaking…I’ll be right over.” He hung up and through the receiver to Mimi, “Call the paramedics, send them to your apartment and tell them to hurry.”
“Shawn what is it? Is it Zach?” but he was already out the door and racing down the stairs.
