The Tears Of A Clown

Chapter Eight

She had no desire to go digging back into the old days when they had all manage to move on since then.

Lizzie was right, some things were best forgotten. so she hastily brought the main subject back to the fore, about their plans for the surprise party for Melanie and Ricardo.

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Later, it was still on Maria’s mind. When she found her mother in her caravan making supper, she found herself watching her thoughtfully

“Mom, are you in love with dad?” she suddenly asked her aloud.

Melanie had been getting plates out of the cupboard. But now as she moved put them down on the table, she turned to look at her daughter in bewilderment, wondering what made her ask such a question.

“Why do you want to know that for?” she tried to keep her tone light

Maria shrugged, “Oh, y’know I was just thinking lately about how you were the same age as me when you got married, and you mentioned how it was an arranged marriage I just got to wondering about how it must have been for you both,” she replied carefully, “I mean it seem to work out for you ok, I was just wondering when you realised you and Pops were in love,”

Maria noticed her mother’s face seem to redden, and she looked a little uneasy, unable to look her in the eye.

“Well, I don’t know exactly,” Melanie finally replied with a certain honesty.

She never thought that she and Ricardo were in love in the usual traditional sense.

In fact she couldn’t even recall either of them ever openly uttering the words, ‘I love you’ to each other since they had been married, it had never seemed necessary for some reason.

They had just been happy in the beginning that they had finally learned how to make their marriage work and deal with each other for their children’s sake after the difficult start to their marriage

And up until now, when Maria had brought this delicate subject up, Melanie had never had to consider if she was actually in love with her husband, so she wasn’t sure how she could explain this to her daughter, who assumed they were.

“But you are happy to be married to him now, aren’t you?” Maria asked suddenly worried that her parents affection for each other was all for show, and perhaps underneath they still didn’t like each other.

Hearing the anxious note in Maria’s tone, Melanie frowned.

She was wondering why her daughter was suddenly so concerned about their marriage. It wasn’t like she and Ricardo had been fighting, or were being particularly disagreeable with each other lately, to put such thoughts into her head

“Of course I am,” she soothed her with a smile, “I am very happy being married to your father, ” she replied truthfully “I don’t know what I have said or done to make you think otherwise” she then laughed

“Oh but you haven’t said or done anything,” Maria then hurriedly assured her realising it could get tricky if her mother started to probe into why she was so concerned,

“I was just wondering that’s all,” she said. Then she got up and she went over to give her mother a hug, “I am so glad things worked out for you and pops, because I know you belong together, I am so proud to have you both for my parents,

” She then declared warmly

Melanie's eyes narrowed suspiciously as she pulled away, surveying her daughter, wondering what was behind this sudden show of sentimental feeling, which was so unlike her, "You are either after something, or you are sick; that is the only explanation I can think of, for your strange behaviour," she remarked dryly

Maria laughed at her mother’s assumptions “I hate to disappoint you Mom, but this time you got it wrong,” she informed her.

At that moment Ricardo came into the caravan, “Ok, the food better be ready, I am starving!” he announced briskly

“It won’t be long,” Melanie assured him, before turning to her daughter, “Maria go and find your brothers and tell them their food is ready”

“Sure thing Mom,” Maria replied cheerily, and as she passed her father, she found herself impulsively giving him hug and a kiss on the cheek, before almost skipping gleefully out of the caravan.

Ricardo stared after her for a moment, taken aback by her odd show of affection, before turning to Melanie questioningly, “What’s with her?”

“That’s what I am still trying to figure out,” Melanie replied, before turning to the small stove to stir the stewed beef she was making.

Ricardo came beside her, enticed by the smell of the food and wanting to check if it was ready, his arm automatically slipped around Melanie’s waist as he did so, “Hmm, that smells good,” he announced sniffing up the aroma from the pot wistfully

Melanie shot a sidelong glance at Ricardo’s profile as he stood next to her, and found her mind going back to the strange conversation she just had with her daughter. Recalling Maria’s question, and now found herself pondering on it

“Was she in love with her husband?”

If it meant just being this near to him still send a warm glow through her, and she didn’t want to be anywhere else except by his side, that even now at this very moment all she wanted to feel his mouth on hers, and craved his attention, then she reckoned that perhaps she was in love with him.

But it was only now she was able to admit it to herself. The discovery send a whole new warmth tingling through her body, and she found herself pressing herself closer to him with a strange sense of happy contentment that she was his.

After the accident and they had agreed to try and make their marriage work, Ricardo had taken his role of husband and father a lot more seriously and she knew he had not strayed with another woman since then, but still their relationship had not been the warm and fuzzy kind of love, and full of sweet endearments.

Ricardo was just not the sentimental type for that kind of stuff. She didn’t imagine he ever would be, but she wouldn’t want him any other way either.

And yet right now, as she looked up at him, she felt all warm and fuzzy, though he was totally unaware of it thankfully.

But he must have sensed something in her demeanour, as he glanced around at her, noticing the way she was looking at him, with just a touch more tenderness than usual.

First Maria’s unexpected display of affection, now his wife was looking at him oddly. He couldn’t figure out what was going on with the women in his family. Did they know something he didn’t

“What’s wrong?” he asked a little warily

“Nothing,” Melanie smiled, then kissed him on the cheek, deciding to keep her private feelings for him to herself for now, so she could just enjoy them, “Go and sit down and Ill serve you dinner”

He only too happily obeyed.