America's Watching - After the Break

Thank you to those who wanted a sequel. Against my better judgement...here it is...

*****

It was six years after the show and five years after the divorce. Life went on.

Lynn had just put her baby down for a nap when the front door bell rang. She quietly walked through the house hoping that whoever is at the door is not so impatient as to ring the bell again and wake up Steven Walter Densmore. He was a little over a year old, but he captured her heart the first time she laid eyes on him, though right now Lynn really needed him to take a nap.

She smiles as she thinks of her husband Ross and the way they met three years ago at school. Though neither were raised in Maine, they both fell in love with the area and decided to stay there after graduation. They were married a few weeks out of college and nearly a year later their son entered their lives.

Life has not just gone on for her, it's been pretty darn good recently, but that wasn't always the case and once in a while has visions of her mother's humiliating appearance on a nationally televised reality show.

Even after six years she and her mother only talk about once a month and for only about ten minutes at the most. Thus far she's managed to keep their conversations extremely generic though she believes her mother is itchin' to say more. Lynn knows someday she'll probably have to hear her out, but would like to put it off for as long as possible.

She does get to the door before the bell sounds again and is astonished to see a woman standing with an expression of nervous anticipation laced with more than a bit of doubt and hopefulness.

"Mother?"

Lynn asked this almost not believing her eyes, but her thought was, "Damn...ready or not that someday I've been dreading is here!"

Sherry looked a bit thinner than Lynn remembered, but over all appeared healthy and well.

Not expecting her mother to just show up and unsure of what to do next, she instinctively took a step back and said, "Won't you come in?"

Sherry did just that and was soon following her daughter into the living room.

"Can I get you some coffee or tea or..."

"Coffee would be fine if it's not too much trouble."

Lynn went into the kitchen to prepare a couple of cups while also using the time to collect her thoughts. Right now those thoughts were bouncing around her head like a super ball in a phone booth. She had no idea how to approach the impending conversation and knew if she ever had to "wing" anything, now was the time.

As Lynn was returning to the living room her mother said, "You and Ross have a very nice house dear. It's not what I pictured though. It's larger than I thought it would be."

"Thank you. Ross put a lot of work into it." Lynn then sat on the opposite end of the couch than her mother.

"I hope I'm not imposing on you too much sweetheart, but I really wanted to see my grandson."

"He's napping right now, but maybe we can take a peek later."

Lynn placed her cup on the table for a moment then asked, "Did you bring your daughter on the trip?

"No...she's back home with grandma. I wasn't sure you wanted to...you know...see her."

Lynn simply nodded.

Sherry then added, "Maybe I'll bring her next time, if you'll let me have a next time."

Lynn frowned, "Let's play it by ear. I'm not all that thrilled with this visit let alone anything in the future."

She could see her mother was disappointed and quickly added, "I guess I really should meet my kid sister though." Then Lynn thought and added, "And I do mean kid sister!"

Sherry smiled cautiously not wanting to do or say the wrong thing. Lynn's response was actually more than she expected.

"It's just that I wasn't sure you would want to see her. I mean...well, you know..."

"It's okay mother. We'll see how it goes today and go from there. She's five now, right?"

Sherry sniffled a bit and said, "I'd like that. I really would and yes, she's five. Despite everything that's happened sweetheart, I would love for you to meet your sister."

"Mother, I just want you to know that I don't have anything against Lisa, it's just..."

"Oh honey, I understand, believe me I do."

Sherry flashed a sad smile, but a smile just the same.

Lynn thought, "My mother's child is four years older than mine. Nope...this isn't going to be too awkward. Lucky for us the entire country already knows our family history. Yep...lucky for us."

Lynn knew what was coming and her stomach was turning at the thought of it. She still wasn't sure what she was going to say if her mother brought up the subject of her father, but she knew that's why she was here. That and to see her grandson.

Sherry took a deep breath and asked, "How is your father dear?"

And there it was, thought Lynn. Time to address the big ass elephant in the room.

She replied a bit louder than she intended, "He's fine mother, we're all fine. Is that what you wanted to hear? You came all the way to Maine to hear me tell you my father's fine. By the way, that was a nice segue, very subtle"

After a long silence Sherry asked, "Lynn, please sweetheart...I need to talk to you about this. If you don't have any love in your heart for me I understand, but need to talk to you about this. Dr. Royce wanted me to do this long ago but I told her I wasn't ready then. A part of me knew that you weren't ready either."

Lynn looked away from her mother and stared at the wall.

"What makes you think I'm ready now?"

Sniffling Sherry replied, "I'm just hoping that you are. I know things will never be the same between us...but I just can't go on calling my baby to talk about the weather. I need you in my life Lynn."

Lynn looked back at her mother and it seemed that she was sincere if nothing else.

"I want to tell you everything I know. Can't we just have a normal conversation for once? I promise I won't hold anything back even though you may not like some of the answers. Please honey?"

Lynn was less than thrilled with how her day was working out so far, but decided to make an effort at a normal conversation with her mother. However, if she was going to do this, she wanted to at least ease into their first conversation since she graduated high school.

After a long awkward silence Lynn spoke, "So the last time we talked you said that Nancy Royce was retiring"

She knew the question sounded ridiculous as soon as she asked. Out of all the things she could talk about she led with this. It really was almost as bad as talking about the weather, but she had to start somewhere. The best analogy she could make was that it was like entering a pool slowly to give yourself some time to get used to the water temperature. Her first question amounted to putting her big toe into the upcoming conversation.

"Yes...she has retired. You know that I haven't seen her professionally in a couple of years, but we did stay in touch."

Sherry realized her daughter was tossing her some softball questions and was appreciative.

Lynn then asked, "I thought you said she wasn't that old."

"She has a medical condition. She's going to be alright, but her family doctor suggested she retire since her job is so stressful." Sherry smiled nervously and added, "Guess I didn't help her cause much, did I?"

Lynn frowned, "Guessing not."

Sherry then said, "It was probably from watching all of those clips from the show with me."

"She made you watch clips from the show?"

"Yes she did. Then we'd discussed my actions."

Lynn surprised herself with her own compassion by replying, "That couldn't have been easy."

Sherry nodded and said, "Aside from signing the divorce papers, it was the hardest thing I ever had to do. All I could think of was...that while I was doing those unspeakable things, you and your father were home watching it on television."

She quickly reached for her purse and took out a tissue and dabbed her eyes with it."

"It just wasn't dad and me, mother."

"I know that dear, it was the rest of our family and all our friends."

"And the rest of the country." "Lynn jumped in.

Sherry sniffled, "Yeah...that was embarrassing alright, but it was nothing compared to what I did to you and your father. Your father especially. My God Lynn, I'm so sorry I don't even know where to begin."

Lynn looked surprise, "That's the first time I've heard you apologize."

"I've tried. Oh how I've tried. That was one of the reasons I tried to hold up the divorce. I just wanted to tell your father in a face to face meeting just how sorry I was. Not that I deserved that chance of course, but..." her voice trailed off.

"Sorry or not, how could you have done this to us?"

Sherry closed her eyes and began, "Let me start at the beginning. Would that be alright?"

"You've got the floor."

Sherry took a deep breath and began, "You were five and had just gone back to school when I decided to keep busy by going back to work and put my college degree to good use. There was a man in my office that was really good looking and enjoyed doing things that I only dreamed of. He traveled to exotic places and ate at the finest restaurants and hob-nobbed with the elite. I was impressed and before I knew it I was flirting with him."

"So you threw away everything for his so called Mr. Right?"

"That's just it Sweetheart, he wasn't even the one I had the affair with. He was just the guy that got my motor running is all. Against my better judgement I began fantasizing about having an affair. It's ironic when I look back on it now and realize he wasn't even interested in me and actually turned out to be a faithful husband like your dad."

"Then who did you have the affair with."

"Well... I began to travel with my job. Not much, just a couple of times a year. It was at a conference in Dallas that I met this guy from our Boston office."

She paused for a moment, "I'm sorry Lynn. This is very difficult for me to talk about, especially to my daughter."

To Lynn's credit, she gave her mother the time she needed to pull herself together.

She regained her composure and continued, "His name was Charles Conklin. But Dr. Royce said it could have been most anybody at that point. She believes I was already looking to have an affair and she was absolutely right."

"Any way, he invited me down to the bar one night and a few drinks later we were up in his room dancing to a song he was humming."

Lynn rolled her eyes, "Sure didn't take much to sweep you off your feet, did it?"

"Oh Lynn...I still can't believe I did it and the next thing I knew I was waking up the next morning in his hotel room with a hangover and the worst case of guilt I ever thought possible. I tell you, if your father had seen me the next day he would have known immediately what I had done and divorced me then. Would have deserved it too."

"The next day at the conference Charles was the perfect gentleman, or so I thought. Can you believe that it was Dr. Royce who convinced me that this guy never had any real feelings for me? Damn it Lynn, a grown woman like me couldn't see it until almost two decades later."

Pausing for a moment she went on, "So the next day he sweet talked me enough to go to dinner with him and I don't have to tell you what happened then."

"You wound up in his room."

"Yep. I wound up in his room. Only this time it felt a bit different. When I woke up in the morning the guilt was still there, only not nearly as strong. The guilt was being replaced by excitement. Excitement from sleeping with a man other than your father."

"Are you trying to say you didn't know it was wrong?"

"Of course I knew it was wrong, but it was the excitement of having an affair and that your father would never know about it. We spent a couple of more nights together before heading home. Then the guilt returned."

"How do you explain meeting with him again at other conferences?"

"I can't Lynn, that's just it. In between those conference I'd be fine and somehow managed to block out the cheating. But a couple of weeks before each conference he would call or email me at work and remind me of the fun we had in Dallas or another conference. Of course I would casually forget about the guilt and potential for ruining my marriage."

"I shouldn't be telling you this, but...well...it wasn't about the sex. Your father is a kind and gentle man in every way and what I did had nothing to do with him. It was all about the thrill of doing something I shouldn't be doing?"

"Did dad ever meet him, you know, at a company party or something?"

"No. Never."

"Why did you stop seeing him? You did stop seeing him didn't you, mother?"

"He was fired for certain indiscretions with female employees in the home office. One was with CEO's wife."

"Not the best career move was it?"

"No it wasn't, dear. Yet here I was thinking I was somebody special to him and he was chasing every skirt he saw. I heard through the grapevine that he had been killed in an automobile accident. That must have been ten years ago or more. By that time our rendezvous' had been over for quite some time."

"Which one of you decided to stop."

"Believe it or not it was me. Guilt actually crept its way back in and I decided to turn my attention back to my family."

The room grew quiet for a few moments until Lynn asked, "Then why an affair with our neighbor Mr. Barnes?"

Sherry sighed, "This was a different situation. Your father had been working a lot of overtime and when he wasn't working he was going to your softball games and other activities of yours."

"So this is all my fault?"

"Oh God no, honey. This has nothing to do with you or your father. It's just that for years your father was spending a lot time with me and even though he is not the most exciting guy in the world, I was content and used to his company. At least that's what I told myself. But when he started spending more time away from me I once again became that selfish person I truly am."

"I started going out with the girls from work once in a while and your father never said a word. Why? He trusted me. And what do I do? I go out and betray that trust in an unspeakable manner."

Sherry stopped for a moment to blow her nose and then continued.

"Only this time it wasn't an affair with Mr. Barnes. It was only the one time. We met at the bar while I was out with the girls and he was everything your father wasn't. He loved to dance, was incredibly outgoing and the life of the party."

"Certainly sounds like the kind of man a happily married woman should throw her family under the bus for." Lynn's tone was filled with sarcasm.

Sherry shook her head, "At the time I was spending a lot of time comparing your father's perceived faults to other men's perceived strengths. It was a fight no man could win. Hell, the faults I came up with weren't really faults at all. I thought at times he was not attentive enough or not sensitive to my needs. Dr. Royce showed me that they were just weak minded excuses to cheat and nothing more."

"Just like the first affair, my motor was running and the one time I slept with Mr. Barnes wasn't enough to get it out of my system. Let's just say Mr. Barnes didn't do it for me. In fact, Dr. Royce suggested by this time it was like my libido was on steroids and it was also at this time when I was contacted by the show."

"Being chosen to be on that show was the ultimate case of be careful what you wish for. I was so primed to have an affair I even rubbed it in your faces before I left by hinting that I might start flirting with other men or possibly even more. Dr. Royce suggested that I was so full of myself at that point that my arrogance knew no bounds."

"You were full or something, mother, but I'm not so sure it was yourself."

Sherry smiled.

"You've got your father's sense of humor. I like that."

Sherry paused again and then continued, "I won't go into the details of what happened. You saw for yourself that I crossed the line many times over of what is expected of a married woman. Hell...from the beginning my fantasies totally took over my warped mind to the point that I was no longer playing the game that I so wanted to be on. Before I knew it, I was in too deep."

Lynn shot back, "Jesus mother, one guy was bad enough, but what about the night with that other asshole, Harley?"

Sherry shook her head and began, "Not that this is going to make it sound any better, but I thought it was Jake. By the time I found out it wasn't...well...I was too far gone if you know what I mean. I'm sorry to have to admit this to you, but I couldn't stop at that point."

Sherry sighed, "But the thing that hurt most of all was the night of the live broadcast from our house. I was absolutely crushed when the cameras were turned on and I saw the empty room and couch. They explained it that they were having technical difficulties, but I knew then they were just covering up for the fact that my family abandoned me. Those were my first thoughts. Can you believe that? I thought my family abandoned me, not the other way around."

Lynn just looked at her mother as a single tear ran down Sherry's cheek.

"It wasn't until nearly a week later that I began looking at things quite differently. Maybe you could call it an epiphany, I don't really know, but I began to look at the situation for what it was. Believe me I was horrified by my actions when I did."

Sherry then broke down and cried harder than she thought she ever could. Lynn wasn't sure how to react. She still harbored many ill feelings towards her, but this woman was after all her mother and her breaking down certainly wasn't some kind of an act.

Once she regained her composure enough to speak she continued, "The night I started to come to my senses, I went back to my bedroom on the show and realized just how foolish I acted. I should have come home then to try to salvage what was left of my marriage, but there probably wasn't much left of it, was there?"

Lynn answered honestly, "Uh...no".

"Didn't think so. So I stayed hoping to win the money. I figured your father would divorce me and I would need some money to start my life over. Then when I was voted off I figured I would go to the "Peer House" to collect my pittance. Hell, I knew my life was over and $5,000 was better than nothing."

Lynn was livid.

"Damn it mother, you still had the nerve to sleep with that asshole when you left the house."

Sherry shook her head and said, "I know that's the way it looked on TV, but that's not what actually happened. I watched the tape in the doctor's office and know what you mean. Jake told the entire nation that we had spent the night together at the "Peer House", but that was a lie."

"Why didn't you deny it then?"

"I was too ashamed of myself to offer any kind of an argument. So I just hung my head and said nothing. I just wanted to get out of there and go home, but home was not going to be anything like it was before I left."

"Lynn, when I walked across that stage that last night and heard booing, I knew that everyone saw what really happened. I was devastated."

She sighed and added, "You know what Lynn? You know how you think of something random at the strangest moments?"

Lynn said nothing.

"Well...as Jake..." she cringed at saying his name, "...put his arms around my shoulders to comfort as they were going to break, I thought about the morning I left the house and didn't even kiss your father goodbye."

Lynn shook her head and shot back, "Would have been nice if you realized that at the time. Kinda' late now don't cha' think?"

Sherry could only nod. She had no answer.

Lynn broke the brief silence with, "I have another question mother. You told me when you landed and no one was at the airport greet you, you got angry. Same goes at the house. I mean really, what the hell did you expect?"

Looking her daughter in the eye she answered, "I was afraid. Afraid of my family leaving me and afraid that I would be on my own the rest of my life. Dr. Royce believed I was angry with myself and looking to blame others."