True Love Pt. 03

"You ran away, denying him the milk in your tits," he said. "You called him a pig. You screamed to cut him loose and give him up. You cursed him when you should have been the most important person in his life." Maybe he saw a tear on her cheek, but it was hard to see in the bar lights. "You left me without a word, ruining my life and mocking all that was dear to me," he went on.

She nodded. "I…I…yes, John… I know. I know! I am so very sorry. So sorry I did that to you and…and the boy."

He grabbed the edge of the table. His knuckles turned white. "Why didn't you even bother to let us know; not even a note, Olga?" he asked. "If only to tell us why? To explain what happened or where you were going? And WHY?"

Her eyes widened. There were real tears now. "I don't know, John!" she wailed. "I really don't! I must have been insane. I just ran away…had to be away! I must have gone crazy, but I had to be away from, from you and him and everything…" Her voice drowned in a sob.

He watched her cry and steeled himself against invading feelings. "Insane," he repeated, then shrugged. "For how long, Olga? What about when you returned from that, um, insanity?"

She stopped sobbing. Her eyes stood huge and red rimmed in her narrow face -- her mouth tried to shape words, but nothing came out. She took another sip then said: "When I came to my senses I was too ashamed to come back or even call you. Sorry, John, but I was too ashamed of what I had done."

He stared at her in absolute amazement. He just watched her for a full minute, making her more nervous the longer he waited. "Bull…shit," he then said, spacing the words. She cringed.

"No, John. Noooo, noooo! It is true. I was so ashamed of betraying you and being a horrible mother and, and…you must believe me!"

He shook his head. "No, Olga. I don't have to believe you. I'll never have to believe you again. You see, I had eight years to think over what you'd done. And six years to compare what you called love with what my wife calls it. I may never know why you left us, Olga, but what you tell me now is bullshit."

She winced when he used the word "wife." She must have seen Manda at the terrace. He guessed the actual finality of hearing he had married again could still shake her. Whatever, he thought and was surprised by his indifference.

"Olga," he went on when she didn't say a word. "I came here to hear you explain. I came because you never gave me or Christopher a chance to understand why the most important person in our lives forsook us, left us and never even tried to explain herself in over six years." There were new sobs, but he went on. "And now what do you do? You insult me with a load of crap. I loved you, Olga. My god, how I put you on the pedestal of my pathetic love. Tell me, did you ever not laugh about my stupid silliness?"

She started to protest, but he didn't hear it. "Post natal depression they called it. I should understand and be patient. It happens a lot, they said. Until you ran, taking a very level headed selection of our most valuable things with you and cleaning out our savings. A distressed new mother in panic? My ass, Olga! My stupid, gullible ass!"

She started to rise, but he grabbed her wrist and pulled her back down. "You won't leave until you tell me the truth, whore," he growled, sticking his face into hers.

She winced at the name he threw at her. "Let me go!" she whined. "I told you I'm sorry. More sorry than you'll ever know. My life is a mess, my body is a ruin and it is all my fault. I can't go anywhere, okay? You go to your sweet new wife and your wonderful child, okay? Go make a nest full of new ones with her and forget about me! I am a cheap two-bit whore, dragging her drugged-out body from one fat tourist to another, okay? I am lost, John! I am over." She broke down crying, her head on the table.

A concerned waitress came by asking if anything was wrong. He told her everything was fine, but she insisted on hearing it from Tasha herself. The waitress obviously knew her well enough to use her professional name. Olga sniffed and confirmed that all was fine.

"Let's get out of here, Olga," he said, when the waitress had left. He handed her a tissue to clean her face. Then he helped her getting up. He was amazed how thin her arm was. They walked out into the cool hotel lobby, then into the soft Caribbean night. The low wall bordering the beach was still warm to the touch. The moon's silver sliver sparkled in the sea below. They sat down, neither of them appreciating the view.

"I am sorry to hear you have a lousy life, Olga," he said. "But as you said it is all of your own making. I fear you'll have to clean it up by yourself too." She nodded, then shrugged. "What happened?" he went on.

She sighed, staring down and burying the tips of her sneakers in the sand.

"You don't want to know, John," she whispered at last. The hissing surf almost drowned her words. "It would just be psycho-babble -- the useless remorse of a selfish woman who went insane because people started depending on her. First you, then little… Christopher. I just couldn't handle it." She sniffed and blew her nose in the damp napkin. Her red nostrils and teary eyes gave her the face of a small child. It made him smile in spite of everything. She echoed it with a spasm of her lips.

"Tell me anyway," he said.

"I can't," she sighed as her hands nervously rubbed up and down her upper arms. She shivered, though the air was warm. "I have to go…work. I need the money. I can't, eh, go without very long."

He looked at her and once again saw the skull shine through her skin. "You don't look well, Olga," he said.

It made her chuckle. "You can say that again."

"You should stop this life you lead," he went on, touching her hand. "It'll kill you."

Her chuckle turned into a nervous laugh. "John, oh sweet John," she exclaimed. "I pray every night it will do just that, honey! Every goddamn night. And soon, I always add. God, make it soon!"

***

"So you think she lied?" Manda's voice was close to his left ear. His hand slowly caressed her belly. They had made love after he returned. First he had licked and fingered her pussy and after she came, she had ridden his cock. Now they lay silent, sweat evaporating from their skin.

"I don't know if she lied," he said. "I think she hardly told me anything, really."

Olga had left him pretty soon after they went outside the hotel. He understood that she was hooked on drugs and needed to whore herself out to buy them. He tried to be indifferent about that. He had asked her how it had come to this and if she worked for a pimp, but she had evaded all of his questions. Soon after that she had disappeared into the night. Now he lay in bed with the woman he loved, but still could not get Olga out of his mind. "She calls herself Tasha now, you know?" he said into the twilight of the room. "She is a drugged-out whore, having to score every day."

Manda slung her leg over his body and rolled on top of him. Her mouth found his. They kissed and he enjoyed the sensuality of her sweet, lazy tongue. After she let go of him, he hugged her naked skin against his. Sleep was closing in. "John?" she whispered from the furry dark. He groaned a sleepy yes. "You still don't believe my opinion of her, do you?"

The question pulled him away from sleep's hazy entrance. He knew what she meant, but it was too painful for him to admit. "If you were me, honey," he answered, "If you had loved her like I did, you'd know that I could never believe that."

Manda stirred in his embrace. Then she rose, leaning on one elbow, her face close to his. "One thing I'll never understand," she said. "How could she have you, then leave you and end up like this?" Her fingers ran through his moist hair.

"I don't know," he said, "she didn't explain."

They kissed again. Then she said: "I won't ever leave you, John. Do you hear me? Never." He hugged her and cried. She ran her tongue over his salty cheeks.

***

It was already late in the afternoon when they came off the boat, the next day. It had taken them to the other side of the island where they swam and snorkeled all day. The water was crystal clear. John had shown Christopher the colorful fishes and crawling creatures of the Caribbean. They'd had a great time while Manda lay on deck to get an even deeper tan. She just dove in to refresh herself once in a while, or to play with them after they returned from their explorations.

When they returned to the hotel, there was a message for them in reception -- for John, to be more precise. It was signed "Olga". It only held two lines, hastily jotted down: "Eight tonight, beach wall. Same place, please be there."

John showed it to Manda. She frowned. "I thought she was done talking?" He shrugged and started to crumble the paper up, but she covered his balled up fist with her hand. "Let's go and listen."

He looked up, wondering. "Us? It says only me."

She took his hand and pulled him to the elevators. "And I say we," she said.

They had planned on a romantic night for two. First some drinks, dinner and dance -- then whatever developed. "Let's have those drinks, then walk to the spot she mentioned. We'll have some time till dinner," Manda said. She smiled and asked him to zip up her sundress. It was a maize-yellow cotton dress that not only set off her well- earned tan, it also showed quite a bit of it. No tan blushes as deeply as a fresh tan.

He kissed her neck. "You are beautiful," he whispered.

After the sitter arrived, they went to one of the many beach bars for a colorful cocktail and a relaxed view of the emptying beach. The last rays of the sun painted everything a glowing orange.

"What do you think she wants?" Manda asked. They had avoided the item until then.

"Maybe she wants to explain, at last?" John wondered. "There must be more to the story than the bullshit she gave me yesterday."

Manda silently sipped on her straw. Her hand slowly straightened her skirt. "I always thought there must be a lot more," she said. "But why would she want to tell all now?"

He shrugged. "She looks like a ghost," he said.

Manda caught his gaze. "You think she might..?" She never ended the question.

John shrugged once more. "She can't be very healthy," he then said, emptying his glass. "Not the way she lives." He rose, stretching. "Anyway, let's go see her."

Olga was on time, even early. She stood beside the beach wall, hugging her chest. Unlike yesterday she was clad in full professional war gear. Her prominent tits were on display in a lycra half-top that left her midriff free, but covered her arms. Her ribs almost poked through her skin, so did the hip bones, over low cut tights. A glaringly white pair of platform heels stood on the low wall.

"Hi again, Olga," John said when they were close.

She looked at him from the dark caves of her painted eye sockets, then turned to Manda. "I thought…" she said.

"I know," John interrupted. "But I wanted you to meet my wife." He made introductions with a flourish. "Manda? Olga. Olga? Manda." A skeletal hand slid limply into a pro forma handshake.

"I don't know if I…" Olga started, letting the sentence die unfinished.

He finished it for her. "You don't know if you wanted to meet me in the presence of my new wife? Is that it, Olga?" His voice rang rather loudly. She just let her eyes wander from Manda to him. "If that is a problem, why bother?" John went on. "I don't need this meeting, anyway; neither does she, so it's up to you."

Olga sat down on the wall. Her hand waved non-committal. "It's all right," she whispered. "I'm sorry, it's all right." John saw her tremble. Her painted fingernails scratched her upper arms through the thin layer of lycra. He sat down beside her. He saw Manda sit down on the other side. The contrast between his glowing, healthy wife and the almost transparent wreck next to her was dramatic.

"John," Olga said. "I um… I don't think I shall live very much longer. The, uh, drugs and uh, my work will take care of that, I'm sure. Doctor says a year tops, if I don't kick the habit. Maybe two. I'm strong, he says." There was the ghost of a smile. It didn't last. "I was shocked when I saw you here, John, you and your eh, wife and little Christopher. I had done my utmost to bury all memories -- not deep enough, obviously."

John felt the urge to say something, but Manda's headshake stopped him. Olga went on. "As I said yesterday, I am very sorry that I left you like I did back then, you and the boy. But I haven't been really honest with you when you asked me why." The far away surf filled her silence. "I don't think I'll ever get another chance to answer the why, though," she went on. "So I have to do it now. You see…" She suddenly started coughing. It was an ugly, raw sound from somewhere deep down her chest. Manda's arm went around the girl's crouching frame. Her hand softly tapped her back. She produced a tissue and gave it to Olga. The attack took minutes and when Olga at last looked up, her black make up ran freely down her face.

"You need to see a doctor, Olga," Manda said. "You have to go to a hospital."

But Olga vehemently shook her head, making the strands of her ash-white hair dance. "No," she croaked and coughed some more. "I'm all right again. Tip-top shape!" She grinned. It turned her face into that of a squirrel monkey's. John remembered that face -- memories overwhelmed him.

"I have to go on," she said, chasing away the monkey. "Must tell the story." Her breathing seemed back to normal. The exertion had caused one of her fake breasts to pop out of her top. She routinely pushed it back in. "I must answer the why."

"You see," she resumed, "I already had a lover when we met, John, and even after we had been living together, I kept seeing him. No, I should be more precise. He wasn't just a lover. I was his real wife during all the years of our marriage. And then I followed him here."

John stared at her as she fell silent. He suddenly found himself on top of a thousand-foot high tower, looking straight down into a boiling sea. The debris of a million futile questions jammed his brain. The world tightened into a pinpoint. He saw Manda slide off her seat, putting her arms around him. Her voice was in his ear. "I'm here, John."

"I'm so sorry," another voice said. A far-away seagull laughed.

***

She told him all he didn't want to hear. He vomited once. He ran to the sea twice and cursed the darkening sky. Manda kept him from strangling Olga at least three times.

"You only married me to have the money to sustain your real man?" he asked. "Then you killed our first child because it might have been his and exposed your secret?" She nodded, tears running down her face. "You ran away from our second child because it was mine?" he went on. She nodded again. "You must have hated me. You never loved me."

She hesitated, then slowly nodded. "Sorry," she whispered. "I never hated you, but I loved him. I was his. I still am, even after he's been dead for two years now. I can't help it. I couldn't betray him."

John jumped up, eyes wild. "Betray him?" he screamed. "What about me? What about Chris?!"

"I'm sorry." She sounded as though she were reciting a mantra. "I really am sorry."

John jumped up and started walking from left to right and back. "My God!" he exclaimed. Then he laughed -- not a pretty laugh. "My God, she is sorry. What a fool I was. You must have had a ball all those years!"

His back was to the women on the wall. "I had no choice," he heard the hoarse, ruined voice whisper. "I loved him. I had to do what he wanted. He said he had a wife and children. They needed money or she would take them away from him. He said he'd die if she did that. I loved him more than myself. So I found you for him and I married you for the money to keep him. I am sorry, John, but I could not lose him. I loved him. He was my true love."

As if bitten by a snake John whirled around. "Love? Love! Do you even know what it is? I did everything for you. I paid for your courses and your new career. I took you to the corners of the world. I… I paid for your wardrobe. I paid for your tits!" He had closed in on Olga. Her eyes were down. "Everything! I did everything for you, 'cause I loved you. And all you did was fuck him behind my back. You poured a shit load of guilt over me because I didn't save you from being raped, when in reality you fell into my arms with his goddamn goo running down your goddamn thighs. I broke my back trying to give you our child and all the time you were on the pill! For nine long months you cheated me out of the most precious memories a man and a woman can share." He once more burst into insane laughter.

Manda took him into her arms, but he pushed her away. He saw the hurt in her face. He took her back, muttering "sorry". "It's all right, honey," she said.

Olga stood aside, looking away from the embracing couple. She didn't know where to look or what to say. Then she said with a flat, lost voice: "I, eh…I'll leave now. Please forgive me -- not now, I know you can't. But please forgive me later, when you hear I'm dead. If you ever hear it."

She took her heels and turned to go, but Manda grabbed her shoulder. "Your lover made you leave with him when the child proved not to be his, didn't he?" she asked.

Olga nodded.

"He told you to take the money and run -- and you did."

Olga nodded once more.

"Let me guess," Manda went on. "There were no wife and children. But there were other women -- whores and clients and drugs."

Olga stared away, saying nothing. Manda turned her so she could see her face.

"Go see a doctor," she said. "You are young, Olga. Don't throw away your life."

John was shocked by her words. He looked from his wife to his ex-wife, the whore, the slut, the life-long traitor, his cruel humiliator. Olga still stood with her back halfway turned to them. Shadows made her shoulder blades stand out sharply.

"Olga, please listen," Manda said, pushing her back to the wall, sitting her down. "Before we go back home, we'll leave you an airline ticket at the travel agent in the lobby of our hotel. It is for you, any time you decide to pick it up. We'll also have living quarters on hold for you, back home. And an appointment with rehab facilities."

Olga just sat, shaking her head. Manda took both her match stick wrists, demanding her attention. "Do this for John, Olga. He hates you because he can't stop loving you." Manda's voice broke. The two women cried in each other's arms. Then Manda rose, wiping her eyes.

"Also do it for Christopher," she said. "One day he'll want to meet you. One day you'll want to meet him. And through John and Christopher, do it for me. They are my true loves, I'll die without them." She just stood in silence then -- even the surf seemed muffled. Once more her voice rang out. "Tell me you'll do it!"

John didn't know what to say or where to look. He felt pissed at Manda for never asking him if he agreed with her incredible action. But at the same time he admired her for what she did. Trying to save a ruined creature from death, because she was human. She said he still loved her. The notion shook him. Was she right? Was his hatred a sign of love? The acid pit of his stomach churned with a vicious cocktail of hurt, jealousy and humiliation. What are you doing, Manda, he asked himself. What on earth do you hope will come from this? He didn't agree at all with her promises. Let the whore rot. Let her get what she deserves!

He wanted to spit it out, but Olga beat him to it. "Leave me alone, Manda!" she cried out, with a sudden anger. "I don't need your mercy. Go back to your vanilla life with your stupid hubby and your bastard child. Go make a few of yourself, what do I care? I don't need your goddamn mercy!" She rose, turned and walked across the darkening sands, the whorish shoes dangling from her hand.