Sunshine Cures All Ills Ch. 03

Between last night and this morning I got 4 hours of sleep. All the help that came had given me enough time to move out. Paul rounded up his cop friends and his relatives for starters. When the paramedics from the surrounding towns found out, some of them jumped in too. Jeannie and her friends were able to properly pack away my breakable things for storage in a matter of an hour and a half. And they came with boxes. She'd done this before.

Jeannie was moved out of her apartment into Mrs. Murphy's spare bedroom when she fled her abusive husband over a year ago. Same group of people helped. A day later, her stupid jackass of a husband showed up at Mrs. Murphy's and started swearing and threatening Jeannie from the front porch. Wrong neighborhood to do that in. The Sauganash neighborhood of the north side of Chicago has a lot of active and retired higher ranking Chicago Police and Fire officers, and politicians too. Mrs. Murphy's block was particularly tight. Damn fool was shut down at one minute by at least 1 glock pointed at his head. It was quickly followed by a second pointed at his crotch. Both guns were fielded by passionless steely-eyed 30 year Chicago Police vets that both had worked gang crimes. By 2 minutes, he was eating dirt. In this neighborhood, no body messes with Mrs. Murphy, the wife of a late Chicago Fire Department Captain.

Helena had offered and I accepted one of her spare bedrooms on the condition that I have dinner with her a couple of times a week, and I speak Polish with her. Her husband, Paul's father, died from a heart attack about 5 years ago and it sometimes got a bit lonely for her. Paul's other brothers had moved away and married. No grandchildren, and because they live so far away, the sons and their wives don't visit very often. She said I could stay as long as I wanted to and leave whenever I felt I was ready. Most of my things were placed in storage for the time being, I wasn't going to need them right now.

I brought a change of clothes for Mark. This included a pair of baggy shorts that he hated, but would fit over the bandage on his knee. Walking into the hospital as a patient's relative was different for me. It was my turn to negotiate the medical bureaucracy and personalities. I was partially pleased with the results of the changes. Hospitals and doctors used to be completely in charge. Now they both have to be more attuned to who they are actually serving.

I walked into the Ortho outpatient area. He was transferred there this morning at 6 AM, another way I got the staff to delay his leaving. I checked in with the nurses' station. With the update, I asked for transport to take him to the lobby. Closing my eyes, I took a deep breath and entered his room. The discharge nurse was just completing her tasks.

He was silent when I arrived and I tossed him his change of clothing. Without a word, he shuffled to the bathroom to change. The transport worker arrived after he went in to the bathroom. I told the worker that I'd meet them out front of the main entrance, so I wasn't even there when Mark exited the bathroom.

Getting the car, I pulled up to the front entrance. Transport helped Mark into the car and put the plastic bag of his remaining clothing in the back seat. It was eerily silent between us. He waited until we closed the car doors and were alone before he said anything.

"Honey, I'm sorr..."

"You can stop that right now. How in the world could I accept you bedding another woman let alone getting her pregnant?"

"But honey, I'm..."

"When we get out of this car we can begin to talk. There have been a few changes at home."

"But honey, I'm..."

"Shut the fuck up asshole."

He was shocked while I continued, "When we get to the apartment, I'll drop you off at the rear entrance. You can get your own ass in the door while I park." It was a chilling silent 20 minute drive home, well, to his home, to his apartment.

Mark hobbled slowly to the rear door and waited for me to open it. No wallet, no phone, no keys. No future either. After I opened the door, he limped to the kitchen table and sat down. I sat down across from him and looked at him. One deflated sack of shit. He's gone from the top of the world to rock bottom. Well, not yet rock bottom. There were a couple more surprises in store.

"What do you have to say for yourself, Honey." The honey stung him like venom, again.

"I didn't mean for things to get out of hand. You've been working afternoons and she came on to me and ..."

That was the que, and Wendy walked into the kitchen. "I came on to you? You really live in a fantasy world. You were the one getting everybody going out after work for the past year. You've been buying me drinks left and right for weeks. Listening to me talk about how hard it was with Tommy on the road. You worked hard at getting me. You preyed on the problems I had at home. What I did was wrong, but what you did was worse."

Mark jumped at her words, his anger popped and his mouth opened before he thought. "What is she doing here? What the fuck is she doing here?"

"My dear soon to be ex-husband" and I paused. That hit him between the eyes. He flinched. He may have been thinking he could salvage this, but the look on his face said it all. He was shocked that I was done with him. I'm sure that he didn't think that the little mouse leaving him would ever happen.

"She's your new roommate. She needed a place to live as you helped destroy her life with Tom. You also needed somebody else on the lease, and she's on the lease as of this morning. It was accepted by the landlord already. She's got a better credit rating that you do."

Wendy was still looking at him with anger in her eyes and said, "You stay away from me here. I've got the bigger bedroom, you get the smaller one in back. Somebody is going to have to drive you to work and back, so you'll have to be nice to me."

"I don't have to do anything, I'll call my buddies to help out."

That's when Wendy brought out his phone, wallet and keys. "I got these from the apartment this morning." She put them on the kitchen table and backed away.

That's when I started laughing. "I'm sure you tried to get ahold of the three of them at the hospital, didn't you? Couldn't get through? Why was that?" Looking at the phone I said, "Mark, you've got a ton of voice mails. You'd better listen to them before you open your mouth again."

The anger on his face said it all. He finally figured out it was over with me. He realized that he had to move one. "You might as well as listen to 'em right now. It'll save us all some time."

He felt pushed and it was all out of his control, and he couldn't do a damn thing about it. He unlocked his phone and stated listening. I guess the quality of the sound was bad or the couple of punches to his ears did a little bit of damage. He had to crank it up completely. With the room quiet, we could hear it too. The first came from Horacio. It was short and bitter. "We're done Corey. Won't ever be in contact with you again. Don't ever call." His face showed surprise and confusion.

The next one came from Kevin. "It's over. You no longer exist for me. Don't ever call me again." We could hear his wife in the back ground asking if he was finished calling that son of a bitch before he hung up.

The third was from Cory. "Mark, you gotta get bail for me. I got picked up and they THINK they found stuff on me. Mark, you gotta get me bail." Mark's face froze. There was real fear in his eyes. He was about to go to the next message when the doorbell rang. I got up to answer it

I went to the front door and saw that it was my mother-in-law Lucy. Mark's mom was happy and overjoyed. "I'm going to be a grandmother. When is the baby due?" and she gave me a big hug.

She realized immediately that I was as stiff as a board and did not hug back. "What's wrong Michelle? Has something happened to the baby?" Only then she looked around the living room. All that furniture was mine, and it was all gone. It was replaced by Wendy's hastily packed belongings. Wendy walked into the room with Mark hobbling behind her.

"Lucy, I'd like to introduce to you the possible mother of your grandchild, Wendy. You see, until the birth and they can do a DNA test, we won't know for sure who the father was." The shock on her face was terrible. She always knew that her son was fast and loose. There is no way to make someone grow up, no matter what you do. I couldn't blame her. In fact, I felt sorry for her. She was a good woman. Here was more damage from Mark. So many people, so much damage. Before the wedding she shared with me that Mark would start settling down now. Now she realized that her dreams for us just went up in smoke.

She looked at her only son, "Is it true? Have you've been with this woman?" There is something about a mother, a mother with fire in her eyes that makes the strong shake.

The room went silent and her eyes burned a hole into his skull. He nodded yes. This was the first honesty from him that I'd seen.

"But she was on the pill, it can't be mine."

Wendy blurted out, "I never was on the pill this year. You kept telling me that you loved me. The only birth control pills I had was an old prescription from a year ago. It did bad things to my body and I had to stop taking them. Tommy was careful. You liked to ride me bareback when you got me drunk."

This time, it was his mother that was crestfallen. A 'possible' grandchild, and not with Michelle? Her joy crashed on the rocks.

"Mark, there's a couple more things I need to say." I looked at Wendy. "I got tested for STD's this week. The eyes of all three of them started to pop out. "Fortunately, I was negative." There was a sigh of relief before I continued looking directly at Mark, "But I tested positive for ecstasy. Why did you give me ecstasy?"

"NO! THAT WAS AN ACCIDENT. You used a glass that I had stored some..." he quietly continued. "It was only a trace amount, I never meant to slip you anything."

He mother went ballistic "YOU STUPID ASSHOLE. YOU GAVE YOUR WIFE DRUGS? Did you do that to the mother of your unborn baby too?"

Before he could answer, I broke in. "Wendy, you were given a drug screening at the ER. You'll need to ask for the results." Then I looked at Mark, "Cory's been arrested for dealing drugs. Don't you think that they may show up here with a warrant in a matter of minutes?"

Mark's face went from fear to terror. Doing jail time and having a record was going to put a crimp in his life for the rest of time. Using all the control she could summon, his mother said quietly, "Everything, get everything now. Bring it all out. Don't waste a second."

Mark hesitated for a couple of seconds when she bellowed out "NOW".

He hobbled to the front closet and stared. "IT'S NOT HERE. YOUR WINTER COAT IS NOT HERE."

Before I had a chance to scream, his mother screamed "YOU HID YOUR DRUGS IN HER COAT?" Then she slapped his face.

He recoiled and collapsed on the floor. The three of us picked him up and put him on a folding chair. Asshole was going to let me be the fall guy. I was feeling better and better about what I decided to do with every revelation.

Lucy asked for a glass of water and Wendy got it for her. She was shaking with rage at her son and threw the glass of water in his face. This shocked him again. "You have 5 minutes to tell us all, everything you've done wrong. One lie, one skirting the hard and fast truth and you're going to be looking at jail time. I AM YOUR LAST HOPE. YOUR LAST SUPPORT. YOU LIE, EVEN A LITTLE BIT, YOU'RE TOAST." She grabbed the front of his shirt and shook him violently. "ANYMORE DRUGS?"

Mark was trapped. I don't know if his mother would turn him in, but she was playing that card now. He realized that he could no longer take a chance. "There are no other drugs."

There was a sigh of relief from his mother until I asked the next question. "What about your drug money that Cory's been using to finance his drug buys?"

Mark was becoming numb, he may have more secrets, but these were the top ones for jail time. All he could do was to look at the floor and mumble quietly, "I loan him $2K and get back $2,500 each month. He has the $2K right now."

Lucy just shook her head, and began to dial a number. "Hello Karen, oh yes, I'm doing fine. Can you put Bill on. It very urgent." She paused, "Yes, I'll hold." We looked on in silence. It was apparent that Mark knew who she was talking with.

"Oh Bill, Mark is in a bit of trouble. Serious trouble." She paused, "Drugs are the worse part of it." Then she paused again, listening intently. "Can we come on in immediately? Yes, OK. We'll be there in 20 minutes. Bye."

Lucy looked at me. She was filled with rage and fire and sorrow. "I'm so sorry Michelle that it's ended this way." We both leaned in for a hug. I could feel her stifling a sob. I was too. "We can talk later. He is still my son, my stupid dumb-fuck full-of-himself son. I'll see if he can stay out of jail." She looked over at Wendy.

Wendy had been trying to fade away into the wall the entire time we were in the living room. Lucy walked up to her and reached for her hand. "I don't know what the future will bring, but if Mark is the father, he will responsible. You have my word." Then she looked at Mark and said sharply, "Get moving, I'll bring the car around the front."

I stifled a sob, I had promised myself that I wouldn't cry. "You've been a wonderful mother-in-law, I'm sorry that it's ended this way."

"I am too Michelle, I am too. I had such great hope." She gave me a hug, "He just wouldn't grow up." She grabbed her purse and went out the front door.

I turned and looked at Mark. He was still sitting on that folding chair, dripping from the glass of water that was thrown on him. He had time to switch from looking totally defeated, to his loving and caring face that I had seen so many times before. He really could get an academy award for his acting.

I walked over to him and stood in front of him. Looking him square in the eyes from three feet away, I said my goodbye. "I finally realized that you've never loved me. All you're about is using people for what you want."

He shot right back, "Oh yes I do, I do love you."

"No Mark, you've always loved yourself more than anyone else. There's no room there for anybody but you. I'm done. It's over. I have a life to restart. You've got a life to try to rescue from your own trash heap."

"But Honey, she didn't mean anything. I really do love you."

It was my turn for acting. I stopped and looked away, like I was considering something good. Then I turned back and smiled at him. And in a soft, tender, sweet voice I looked at him and said "Wpierdalaj gowno swojego psa" His face lightened, he had hope from the softness of my voice. His face lightened, he smiled. He also had no idea what I just said.

I took one step back and in that most gentle voice I answered his pleading, "Honey, I just told you to eat your dog shit."

I turned away and walked to the back door, listening to his denials and his 'love' for me. This mouse didn't have to roar. I only had to walk and I was able to walk away from him with my head held high.

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"Michalina, vhy you do this? Vhy you go see him? Marky no good. You know. Vhy?"

"Helena, I know that. I know that it's real hard for him to change. I'm not counting on it." It's been 6 months since his world blew up in his face. Tomorrow we go to court and finalize the divorce. He's said he's changed. I don't know.

I paused for a minute and then continued, "I really did love him. I just don't know if he is capable of loving anybody but him. Maybe almost going to jail and almost becoming a father did something to him. A lawyer's negotiations saved him from jail, a miscarriage saved him from fatherhood. I don't think anything can save him from ending our marriage tomorrow."

"Michalina, Vhat about the baby? Vhat about the knee? Vhat about his mamma pull strings for him? Vhat about drug in your coat? Vhat about.."

"I know, I know, I know. He's wrong for me. I don't think this will change anything. Seriously." I exhaled. I exhaled the past 6 months of getting my life successfully back in order. Tomorrow it will be all over, the final time in front of the judge.

"I'm taking you out to dinner tomorrow after my divorce is finalized. Any place you like. It's on me." I got a grudging ok and I left to go to my room.

She's right. Mark's still wrong for me and I still don't trust him. We've met a few times to talk some things out. I did have a need for some form of closure, what ever I could get from that gowno. I did get some truth out of him. But it was only some truth. But I did see the changes in him. That's why I agreed to meet him after work today, at about 11:30 at his normal hangout bar.

I didn't go to work this afternoon, I took the day off today and tomorrow. Getting into my closet, I put on a borrowed black wig from Jeannie, colored sunglasses and a frumpy set of clothes that I'd never ever wear to paint walls with, let alone go out in public. I was going to arrive at his bar at 8. He was expecting me at 11:30. It's a 4 AM bar with lots of people there. I was going to see him in his element. All I hoped was that I wouldn't get hit on and my cover be blown. Jeannie was going to pick me up for a 'girl's night out'.

I came down the stairs and Helena looked at me and smiled. "I know you good girl now. I know you not trust Marky. How you get to bar?"

"Jeannie will pick me up in a few minutes." Then I heard a car horn beep twice, Jeannie's beep style. "She's here now. Don't wait up for me."

"I come? I vant come. Ve have good time? Three?"

That made tremendous sense. Jeannie had joined us for dinner a couple of times and she even started to pick up some more Polish, at least the food and a bit of cussing. A table of two young women and an older one. Who was going to bother us? "Well, what are you waiting for Helena? Grab your coat, it's cold outside."

Jeannie was the first to enter and scouted out the place. She spotted Mark at the bar with a couple of guys and what looked like their dates. We were able to get into a dark corner where we could see most of what was going on. I kept my back to Mark and the other two women were able to observe and give me a play by play.

For the first half hour it was the typical bar scene. Talking, laughing, toasting yelling at the TV. The Blackhawks were playing and the last year was great for them. It was now the playoffs and it was getting tense.

All of a sudden, Jeannie muttered something. "You don't have to worry about Mark." She pulled out her phone and hit the phone app. "He hasn't changed at all Michelle."

"Vhat he do? Vhat he do? Vhat Marky do? I miss, Hawks goal, we ahead."

"Michelle, be careful looking that way. Don't allow him to see your profile. Here, use the menu to shield yourself."

I grabbed the menu to do that and the waitress came running on up. First time she's been attentive all evening. Jeannie told her that we needed some more time and would flag her down when we were ready.

I waited for her to leave before I tried again. Jeannie continued, "Do you see the girl in the red skirt? She'd been hanging on the tall blond guy all evening that's at the TV by the pool table now. They'd been kissing and holding each other all night. She's got a ring on her finger with a shiny stone that's she's been showing everybody. From their interactions, they're an item. The blond guy went to go to the washroom and then went to watch the game at the other bigger TV. The Hawks are in overtime. He's not paying any attention to his girl at the bar."

That's when she paused, "And I saw Mark's hand grab her red skirted ass for a great big squeeze. All she did was laugh. The lady's been drinking and is willing and Mark's done it at least twice." She looked at me and asked, "Is that enough for you?"