After the Sun Sets (18+)

CHAPTER 16a - Baptism pt.2

Laughter rang around the room as Carmen told them about her latest bingo adventures. Lora smiled, the images of vicious old ladies at each other's throats filling the back of her mind, not quite making it into focus. She noticed Jonathan rolling his eyes before returning his attention to his laptop.

He found this kind of talk tedious and for the first time, Lora understood why. Her mind was weighed down with more important things and her mother's stories seemed trivial.

Lora looked at the faces of her four children, all smiling brightly. None of them looked guilty or apologetic for being happy. For laughing at ridiculous, meaningless stories while their father was stuck in bed trying to sort out the store's books.

They were in trouble. She knew that. They were barely breaking even. Without him restoring the pieces, selling was hard, no matter how great the find was.

But Jonathan told her not to worry. Worrying about money was his job, not hers. And for the first time in her life, she listened to him. Not because it wasn't her job but because she had more pressing things on her mind. Things that were urgent and undeniable. Things that filled her with guilt.

For one thing, she regretted the fact that it was a Sunday. God's day. Neurosurgeons didn't work on Sundays unless they were called in. For a brief moment this morning, as she donned her most wholesome top and dabbed makeup on the purple spots on her neck, she hoped someone would need Owen's services. Maybe there would be an accident or a complication that needed urgent surgery.

She wondered whether her mother or Jess would offer to keep Aiden and Siena for the night so that she could have some more time to herself this evening. A second later she chastised herself for wanting time away from her beautiful children. She felt guilty for shying away from her duties. She felt guilty for not going to mass for the past week. And the reason for that was because she felt too ashamed to go. How dare she face God when she couldn't repent a single moment with Owen? Her mind was full of him, making her want more. More of him. More of the woman she was when she was with him.

She turned her attention to Jess and wondered whether it secretly affected her too, that her main source of happiness stemmed from sin. Or maybe, the reason for her smile not quite reaching her eyes was because James wasn't by her side today. He had to stay home and study. She hoped it was the latter. She wanted nothing to tinge her niece's contentedness.

Why then did she let every single thing affect hers?

Because you are an adult. You should know better.

That ever-present voice. Ever-sarcastic. Ever-sneering. It may have sounded like Hannah in her head, but the words were hers. Her sister merely repeated them to her.

She cleared her throat and looked up. Her eyes met Jona's again and for the first time in her life, she was afraid he saw her.

#

The picture frame flew across the room and crashed against the wall.

"Jonathan!" Lora screamed. Tears stained her cheeks as she tried to calm him down.

"What? What?" he roared before uplifting the overbed table and sending all its contents to the floor. "That son of a bitch! He set me up! He set me up!"

"What are you talking about? Nobody set you up!"

"He set me up! He made a fool of me!" he cried one last time before collapsing into his pillow, sobbing uncontrollably.

Lora went up to her husband and tried to console him. She couldn't imagine what he was feeling. The pain, the anger, the crushing disappointment. This was his last chance at a normal life and this man, this mortal man with his stethoscope and long list of questions, had just destroyed it.