Freefall

 

 

For more years than I care to count, I have had to chase away the darkness. Always trying to stay one step in front of it, and knowing that it was always there; lurking around every corner and hiding in every shadow of my mind. It was a constant reminder that my mind was fragile. A step or two from the edge. That I would never be able to let down my guard, for to do so would mean certain death.

I've heard that most seemingly sane people with seemingly healthy minds are only a thought away from being able to commit a heinous crime or inflict bodily harm on another person. But for the grace of God, we all go. Grace is a wonderful gift from God and he freely gives it way to us whether we are deserving of it or not. Its part of what makes him God. But in just the same way that we are perpetually close to crossing over an invisible line from sanity to psychological delusional behavior, then we are as easily susceptible to fall from that life sustaining grace.

I'm not entirely clear on the logistics of my crossover. The 'when' and the 'where' remain blurry in my mind, and right now I don't want a synopsis from any well-meaning family or friends, and I certainly don't want to hear any medical mumbo-jumbo from these idiot doctors who think they know me and presume to analyze my thoughts and...motives. Everyone considers me a freak, and want me to claim that I have a 'dual personality' or an alter ego, but why I ask? There is no other identity inside my head. There's only me. I am not crazy. Not anymore.

I was told that I could say I was insane and not responsible for my actions. Okay. Maybe I am a little insane, but I do take responsibility for my bad deeds, so that wouldn't fly...right? I mean I would have tried that defense before what happened when maybe I had planned to do something before I did it, but like I've been trying to explain to these idiots that I hadn't made any previous plans ...its that I seized the moment when it was right.

Nobody knows the real deal but me. Others may assume, presume, or whatever...but only I know what really went down the moment I turned the corner and right now I ain't talking. And no; I may not be too clear on the when and where, but one thing I am clear on is the why. Make no mistake; I know why. 

It was a slow but steady buildup of the small things, you know. Things like being ignored over here, and not included over there that kept piling on across time until a big ball of indifference had formed. That ball grew and grew and its sheer size caused it to roll forward gaining momentum, eventually crushing me like an emotional avalanche.

Because I simply could not take anymore from my friends. I'd had it up to and over my neck. It was mere foolishness on their part to push me. All these years and she didn't have a clue as to who I really was. None of them did. But they all smiled up in my face and hugged on me and pretended to include me in their bourgeois lives.  They said they loved me like a sister. Twenty-five years of lies and deceitfulness and the worst part of it all was the condescension and the two-faced pretense that I had allowed (probably out a desperate need to belong) to blind me to the reality of their toxic minds.

So, I didn't have the financial resources that the others did. I worked every day to make a living. The money I received from my divorce settlement had been used to finance my daughter's college education, both undergrad and post graduate degrees.I put her first and didn't mind going into the bank as the Manager of the Consumer Loans division every stinking day of my life five days a week to sit and listen to why other folks needed to borrow money. And to talk to them about the pathetic details of their pathetic lives.

My friends never asked me much about my work. No, they were too busy discussing their own lives of independent means. I never measured up completely to their standards of suburban  Mac Mansion living excellence, fancy cars and clothing allowances. I lived comfortably and was well dressed and all within my budget. I was able to vacation with them,go on shopping sprees and ladies nights out but they had no clue as to how I managed it. They took for granted I was just like them.

And the men! Always a new man in one of their beds. Men...men...men. And boozing it up going from one place to the other all the time. Hardly ever spending time with family. But they all had their reasons for their lifestyles, and I was determined not to judge until one night when I'd had the realization that I couldn't stand it another day. Somebody was going to pay for making me feel like a charity case. And out of the three of them; it didn't matter who. I was going in and taking no prisoners and let the collateral damage fall where it may.

I didn't have to plot or plan. Once I made up my mind I would take action I didn't waste time thinking about minor details. I knew that when the timing was perfect that it would come to me and the how's and whatever would easily follow through. 

It was the time of the year for us to get together and plan our annual vacation. Last year it was Kingston, Jamaica. We all had a blast on that trip (and it took me six months to pay it off of my Visa) and we were all in agreement that we escaped the island by the skin of our teeth. What had started out innocently enough, quickly took on a sinister and dangerous turn. But, I digress. We had decided to meet at my house for dinner, drinks and vacation planning. The day and time was set and I had made all of the arrangements to entertain the ladies in the style that we had all become accustomed to. I left the room where we'd all assembled to retrieve the serving trolley full of delicious treats for us from my kitchen.

There had been a nagging, pestering thought near the front of my mind for a couple of days before they were supposed to come over. It was a recent barrage of unkind remarks that I had been on the receiving end of, carelessly made by one of the girls to the other three. I wasn't supposed to have overheard them, but I did. As I've said earlier, I have been the recipient of their stupid remarks and the butt of their jokes for years, all supposedly made in "good fun cause you know we love you girl". Of course they all loved me and meant no harm when they'd been caught red handed. 

It had been said that I had an off-putting habit of trying too hard to please, and that sometimes my smiling face made me look ridiculous. I had an annoying way of always trying to be a goody two shoes and that didn't I know that I was too old to dress the way I did? And that I had been seen coming out of a consignment shop with shopping bags which obviously meant I'd made purchases there. If she can't afford to run with us, why does she keep trying? And for crying out loud, doesn't she know that hair color looks awful on her?

A different voice this time saying that they knew I had to borrow money to get by and should they offer to help pay for my vacation expenses? Another one asked why didn't I know that my furniture was badly coordinated and why for the love of roses didn't I buy a new car? They must have sensed my presence because I heard a distinctive "Shh" from the third one.

I had not meant to eavesdrop, but I had honestly left my phone in the living room and since it's charge was nearly gone, my intention was to get it and leave it on the charger in the kitchen. Innocent enough.I held my head up and kept my back straight, and pasted my "ridiculous" smile on my face as I re-entered the room. But the damage was done and in that instant I knew what I had to do. I felt the coldness close around my heart and squeeze it like a vise. I felt the nauseating disgust rise up in my throat, threatening to spill out of my mouth like a geyser, but I showed none of this and my poker face did me proud. The time would come and I'd show them.

There is no rewind button for real life where you can go back and take a closer look for clarity. There is no pause button either where you can suspend life until you're ready to live it better. It's only the now and the hereafter, and the latter will be too late. Too late for apologies,for make-ups and possibly too late for forgiveness. Satisfied for the moment that I'd avenge my broken heart, I smiled normally and wheeled the trolley in.They were none the wiser that someone had just cut her own throat.

What are your comments on this?

 

Many of us are suffering in silence from the pain of betrayal from friends and loved ones and broken friendships.  We tend to put our friends and loved ones in unrealistic places; never expecting that they would hurt us intentionally or not.We may chose to forgive and forget and move on; which is the healthiest and the best method, but for some of us its just not that simple. Of course the degree of the action is what determines how long and how fierce we may hold a grudge. A mind is fragile and its tensile strength varies from one individual to another.

Joy and Pain

 Joy and Pain

In another hotel room across the hall from where the unholy tryst was taking place, sat three other people who had one thing in common. They were all interested parties in the goings-on between the woman and the man who were currently engaged in sexual acrobatics in the California style king-sized bed.

Margaret Claudette Richardson and Stanford Morris Clayton Jr., had more than enough space to do anything they wanted to do. She was lithe enough to be manipulated and he was strong and virile enough to handle her mature lovemaking. As perverted as it may have seemed, it was indeed a great match because they fit together like pieces of a perfectly constructed puzzle.

But there was another scenario being played out in the room across the hall, and neither one of the lovers were aware that the other was being twice duped. In other words, Stanford Jr., did not know that he was being used as a means to get back at his own mother, and Claudette had no idea that one of the reasons he'd been so readily agreeable to their union was because he himself was a pawn in someone's else's game. He was being maneuvered by the master game player in a match for retaliation against his own father.

Let me explain. Some time ago, Helena Clayton was involved in a brief affair with a man named Griffin McCoy. At the time of the affair, Griffin was separated (but not divorced) from his wife Honor. The affair between Griffin and Helena lasted only a couple of months, but it was long enough for Griffin to fall in love with her. Griffin already had a grudge against Stanford Clayton that was the result of an encounter on the golf course. He had hoped that one day he could get his revenge. Initially, he began to come onto Helena (when she brought her Audi into the dealership for servicing) as a way to get his payback; but he had not counted on having real feelings for her.

Then, her husband found out, and beat her up badly. Griffin vowed revenge against him again for another reason...the violence against the woman he loved, and for being pathetic enough afterwards that she took him back. Honor McCoy wanted her own opportunity for getting satisfaction against Helena Clayton. And to have Helena's only male child having an affair with one of her own best friends was simply too delicious to pass up! But...how did she manage to finagle Stanford Jr., into the situation?

It's like this you see. Claudette hatched the master plan in her own sick mind. She approached Stanford one night at one of his local hangouts. She was able to persuade him easily enough into agreeing to sleep together because as part of his nature; he is like a dog in heat when it comes to sexy women, and let's face it...Claudette is one sexy gal. Okay...now Honor just happened to witness Claudette and Stanford together that night, and when she saw Claudette's hand coyly come to rest on Stanford's thigh, she immediately became suspicious. So, while they were in deep conversation and ignorant of being watched, she slipped into the booth behind them where she could comfortably eavesdrop.

She heard enough to know when and where they were planning to meet. She then contacted Griffin, brought him up to speed, and Griffin made a phone call of his own to the third interested party; a young woman by the name of Goddess Blessing. Honor had met Goddess when she had come into her boutique to shop. It seemed as if the woman had a bottomless purse. She spent a great deal of money and brought along several friends and her sisters who had limitless funds as well. Honor and Goddess became personal friends, and Honor's revenue from her shop skyrocketed to the top.

It turned out that Goddess was from a very, very rich old southern family who were the descendants of a prominent family who were pioneers in the mercantile business. She lived on a huge trust that had been left to her and her sisters from somebody that had died a long time ago. She and her sisters lived a for real jet set lifestyle and were used to having only the best in life as well as having their own way. Goddess was the last woman that had been jilted by our young buck, and was more than willing to take part in the plot. Now...admittedly...Goddess was partly responsible for the breakup, but hey; what can I say? A woman scorned...a rose by any other name...right?

So, Goddess was best friends with the woman who was head of HR for this hotel, and it was no problem for her to gain access to the room and provide a setup for the three partners in crime to do their thing.

Stay tuned next week to find out more about the goings on in the room across the hall, and more about what they plan to do with what they have witnessed.

Don't miss it!!

Conspiracy Theory

Probably more people than want to admit it believe in conspiracy theories. I'm talking about the unexplained effects of chain reactions that stem from unexplained phenomena. Not necessarily the deep conspiracy of Roswell, New Mexico, but the kind of things that occur unexpected. The sort of situations that are twisted so tight into a maze of questions to which there are no apparent or plausible answers, and no one who could provide them is inclined to do so.

So the story goes in the murder of Bryce Meyers. It is now several weeks later from the date he was shot to death, and Alexis Martin is really no closer to knowing the full story of how and why he was killed as she was from the beginning. She had spent everyday of the first two weeks after that alarming phone call from Abigail alternating between being in a scary "day mare" and an all too real reality.

Alexis had been questioned twice more at the hands of the local police. The second time she received a visit from Mercer Holding and Artie Callahan the first detectives to question her; and the next time she had the privilege it was with two different ones. Although she found the whole thing to be a big, royal pain in the rear end, she couldn't help but be impressed with the new duo. Two women detectives who were both in their mid-fifties and were so sharp and at the top of their game that they made the other two look like rookies. Detectives Rosalyn Baker and Charlene Harris were deceptively friendly, and cunningly solicitous. They knew how to lead a person into saying things unawares, simply by lulling one into a false sense of security.

But now, she had been assured by the first two detectives that there would be no more questions and her cooperation had been greatly appreciated, but in essence they were done with her. Alexis was thrilled to hear this, but she had a lot of questions of her own that she could not get answers to. She never heard from Abigail again after the one time she visited her in jail. This happened just before Abigail suddenly disappeared from town.

Nothing else about the case appeared in the news, and the last thing she was able to hear was quite disturbing. In the beginning she had felt a heart-wrenching sympathy for Bryce's mother. She could not imagine how heartbroken Melinda Meyers must be. But about three weeks after his death, Alexis was attending a meeting of her local business women's chapter, and was the recipient of some startling news. Pretty darn sure that she was not meant to overhear this, Alexis could not believe her ears.

According to the overheard conversation, Bryce's parents Kyle and Melinda Meyers were persons of interest in an ongoing federal investigation. All of their personal assets were being scrutinized and although they had not been frozen yet, it seems to be just a matter of time before they would be, and federal warrants issued for their arrests. And the clincher was this: Bryce was a personal friend of the  Special Prosecutor who was in line to work the case. The SP had been gleaning information from Bryce for months to be used against his parents.

And...Abigail Vanderberry had led him on to the point when he fell in love with her and they became engaged and planned their wedding. The wedding was never meant to take place, and all of the money that had been spent for the elaborate affair had been front money. Abigail was an undercover agent and her job had been to bring him in after the farce had been played out enough to reveal what she needed to know about his parents. Somewhere along the way, Abigail fell in love for real with Bryce, but then hours before the wedding was to have taken place (or so it was supposed to) she shot Bryce to death. The original plan was to have been for her to leave him a note with an explanation of why she walked out on him, and to dump him at the altar. Real love was not to have been a factor.

Kyle and Melinda had been planning to empty their bank accounts and open new off shore ones before their son had been killed. They had bought a new house, arranged to sell the one they currently lived in, and had wrapped up all of their domestic affairs in readiness to make a move to Tahiti. They had planned to be gone before the nuptials, based on a tip they had gotten that Abigail was in fact, not the person she pretended to be.

Nothing about this whole situation made sense to Alexis. However, she was grateful to be out of the mix. Now perhaps she could put all of it behind her, and get on with her life. It would be a most welcome change to get up in the morning and not feel as if she was living in a state of suspended animation. She may never get all of the answers to her questions, but she would draw a great deal of comfort from the money she had earned as the wedding planner. Thankfully, the check had cleared and now the plush cushion the cash made in her account was sufficient to make her willing to abandon the whole matter, and leave the conspiracy theories to the buffs who savor them.

Which is what she did as she hummed a jaunty tune all the way to the bank.

Down the Up Staircase

Within the space of a few minutes; five at the very most...all of the plans, the hard work, the anticipation, the pride in her first major accomplishment vanished. Like the ashes from a slow burning cigarette her dreams went up in smoke. Or like wisps of a fine vapor may be a more accurate description. But any way you sliced it, her world and her state of mind had turned upside down sideways...like it had stopped turning on its circular axis, and stopped on a tilted angle.

Her phone had rang as she started up the staircase, and she answered it with the same upbeat and happy tone of voice that mimicked the way she was already feeling inside. When she got the news, she sat down on the step, and she didn't remember actually ending the call. She only knew that for so long a time she had sat there on the same step where she had sank after receiving the call. Her mind was a blank for a while, and she sat staring at nothing; her eyes focused but not seeing.

The phone call had been from Abigail Vanderberry her bride-to-be. Abigail had informed her in a matter of fact way that there would be no wedding taking place for her. She had called it off in a brief conversation just prior to making the call to Alexis with her now ex-groom Bryce Meyers. The fact that Abigail was so calm and controlled was in itself chilling. She had shown no sadness, no remorse and no ; well...emotion at all. She had simply made the statement that the wedding was off. She did however, answer one question that Alexis had managed to ask her before she became completely stunned, and that question was 'What happened?' to which Abigail had spoken in an almost disembodied voice "because he's dead, and I killed him".

When Alexis heard these words, she came within a hair of passing out completely. Instead, she simply sat there in a semi-catatonic state. Minutes passed and finally, Alexis came back to her senses. Her breathing was shallow, and there was an intense pain behind her eyes that was not only hurting like hell, but was causing her vision to blur.   At last, she tried to stand by bracing her hands on either side of her. She did stand up, but when she started to move she discovered that her limbs were numb from sitting for so long. Holding onto the banister for support, she steadied herself, and took several deep breaths to restore her normal breathing rhythm.

But she couldn't decide whether to go the rest of the way upstairs, or to go back down the staircase.
She stood there hesitating and her cell phone rang again. She looked down at the phone still in her hand as if she held a foreign object in her hand. While she stood hesitating, the ringing stopped before she could even look at the caller ID display. It immediately rang again, but this time she did press the talk button and in doing so, it was like spurning herself into motion. She went back down the staircase as she spoke into her phone. It was one of her best friends on the other end...Claudette Richardson.

Claudette was calling to check on her and to make sure her anxiousness hadn't taken over her and to get all of the last-minute details about the Vanderberry-Meyers shindig. Immediately, Claudette could tell something was terribly off key here. She had to call Alexis' name at least three times before she was sure Alexis was actually there. She held on and listened in silence as she received the update she was calling to receive although it was definitely NOT the content she had expected.

After Alexis had relayed all of the information that Abigail had shared with her, she suddenly remembered something, and spoke it out loud...Oh my God! What should I do? I've just been the recipient of a murder confession; should I call the police? Claude...what should I do?

Stay tuned.