New England, New Romance

Chapter 5

Her boys were climbing all over the play set at the park leaving Laney alone with her parents on the porch, iced teas in hand. Laney had watched her mother literally bite her tongue multiple times today. Now that they were alone Laney knew her mother would open the floodgates of her opinions. Laney looked at the iced tea and wished it was something stronger.

"We know you and Jeff are having a hard time but you haven't tried counseling and Jeff is a good provider. Don't you think you owe it to the boys to keep the family together?"

Her Catholic parents did not believe in divorce; it was not condoned by the church, and they would prefer to repress issues and act like they didn't happen to keep up appearances. Surprisingly only two family members across three generations of her large Irish Catholic family were divorced. Soon to be three, and her parents did not want that distinction.

"I think it is better to show the boys how to honor your commitments by staying faithful and not cheating, to teach them the consequences of your actions, and by modeling a healthy relationship," Laney asserted to her mother, yet again.  "Jeff has a whole new life planned with his floozy. I am not giving up my self-respect and devaluing who I am to stay married. Nothing good will come of that." Laney tried to keep the spite and hate out of her voice when she talked about Jeff. He had been a good man and she loved him until he lied and cheated and broke her heart and ruined their lives. How could her mother tell her to go back and suck it up?

"Darling, they are little," her mother countered. "All they will know is that you took their father away. The woman never wins in these situations. You will not be better off without him."

Laney took a deep breath. She looked at her father who sat passively with no expression on his face. "Mom, seriously? This is not the 1950's. They may not understand now but they will when they are ready to; and if I stay, growing up with parents who hate each other would be so much worse for them than the divorce would be. You keep forgetting that Jeff has moved on. He does not want me." Laney caught a sob in her throat and tried to cover it by putting her drink to her lips.

She looked out at her boys happily conquering the jungle gym. Alex had just turned twelve; he would understand a lot more than Jackson who would be nine in a few months. She would be there to love and support them no matter what and it would be okay.

"Mom and Dad, I respect and appreciate that you waited to talk with me when the boys were gone. Please don't say anything in front of them. We will not discuss the subject of Jeff and I getting back together again. That is not going to happen and discussing it doesn't help anything. Okay?"

"Laney, you have always been so stubborn. Have you even asked Jeff to take you back?" her mom queried.

"Off the table," Laney said, trying not to lose her temper. "No more on that subject; it is closed permanently, Mom."

"What about your boys? How are you going to take care of them? You are going to be out there in California all alone with no family."

Laney was beginning to wonder if that was really a problem. She could hang up when her mom got too into her business but in person she was trapped and her mother was relentless.

"Are you going to have to move? Can the boys stay in the same school? Where will Jeff live? Will the boys still play sports? They are going to have trouble in school you know. That always happens. ..."

Laney let her mom go on and tuned her out, mostly. These were all the questions she had that she didn't have answers to yet. Jeff had started out saying she and the boys would keep the house and that he didn't want to disrupt the boys' lives but the longer he was away and the more time he spent with her the less he seemed to care about disrupting the boys' lives. He actually seemed happy when she asked if she could bring them to New England for the summer. She found out later from her attorney that was because he could claim she had abandoned the house. The longest she could stay away was a month and then they had to move back in. She had to make sure he wasn't living there that month and changed all the locks. It felt terrible. She felt terrible. Her mom droned on making it worse.