The Marriage Deal [Jenlisa FF]

Part 26

Hearing Lisa's exclamation, Jennie put down her schoolbooks and reached out for her crutches, hobbling over to her side. "Lisa, what is it? Who's at the door?"

Lisa took several steps back and a woman in her early sixties walked through the front door uninvited. "It's so nice to see your manners haven't improved a bit, Lalisa," she commented "Apparently, some things never change."

"Lisa?" Jennie repeated.

Lisa remained silent. "What are you doing here? You certainly weren't invited," she said to the woman.

"Is that any way to greet your mother?" she chastised. "I raised you better than that."

"You didn't raise me period. I pose the question again, why did you come here?"

'Mother?' Jennie thought. 'Lisa told me she hasn't seen her mother since her law school graduation. Why on earth would she stop by to visit after all these years?'

"Is it against the law to want to see my only child? I just returned from a Mediterranean cruise last week when I found a message waiting for me on my answering machine. My only child got married and didn't bother to inform her own mother. Do you know who left that message? You school buddy Ji-yong. I didn't even hear it from my own daughter, I had to hear it from her best friend."

"I'll kill him," Lisa vowed. "He had no right."

Lisa's mother turned her attention to Jennie, who stood five feet away from Lisa. "I'm Amelia Manoban, Lalisa' mother. And you must be the *new* Mrs. Manoban." She looked Jennie up and down, sizing her up. "Pretty. And very young. Ji-yong warned me you were younger, but not a child."

"I'm twenty-one."

"You don't have to defend yourself to her, Jennie," Lisa told her. "My mother doesn't deserve any explanations."

Mrs. Manoban chose to ignore Lisa's words. "Dear John, he always did have a soft spot for you, Lalisa. He left you everything, didn't he? Forgot all about his poor younger sister."

"You are hardly poor, mother. When are you returning to New York?" Lisa was eager for her mother to leave. The two had never shared a loving relationship.

She simply smiled at her daughter. "In a few days. But I did want to meet my new daughter-in-law and see how my girl is getting by. Tell me, is that against the law?"

"I'll call the hotel and have you set up in their best suite." Lisa headed for her study to make the call.

"That won't be necessary. I will simply stay in the guest room here. There is no need to go out of your way to make special accommodations for me."

While Lisa glared at her mother with hatred filling her brown eyes, Jennie couldn't help but stare in awe at her. Amelia Manoban blew through the house like a tornado an unstoppable force to be reckoned with.

"Oh, there is a need. It's no trouble at all to have you housed there for the duration of your stay," Lisa insisted.

"You don't have to bother; I am perfectly happy to stay right here. And don't worry about my bags," she began. "I can bring them to my room by myself. Last room on the right, correct? Across from the master bedroom?" Mrs. Manoban ascended the stairs without bothering to wait for a response from her daughter.

Jennie turned to her wife. "Lisa? Are you okay?"

"That's my room," Lisa muttered. "She's taking over my room. Now what do I do?" she felt like an adolescent all over again, being ordered around by her mother.

Jennie could tell she wasn't in the mood for joking around, so she kept her joke to herself. "Looks like you're staying in my room until she leaves."

Ella ran down the stairs. "Okay, who's the weird lady who just poked her head in my room? And what the hell is she doing here?" she demanded. "We aren't moving again, are we?"

"That would be my mother," Lisa answered. "She's staying with us for a while."

"Oh. Sorry about calling her a weird lady, Lisa."

She laughed. "No, Ella, you were right the first time. She is a weird lady."

****

"Where do you want me to sleep?" Lisa asked Jennie later that evening when they were settling down for bed. With her mother sleeping in her bedroom, Lisa had no choice but to sleep with her wife. It would be hard to explain if she were to sleep on the living room couch.

She shrugged. "It doesn't matter to me really. Wherever you feel comfortable."

"Looks like the floor it is." Setting a few blankets on the carpet, she laid herself down next to the bed.

Jennie felt bad for making her sleep on the floor in her own home. "You don't have to sleep there, you know. I have plenty of room on the bed, not to mention it won't be nearly as uncomfortable. Get up here."

"You really don't have to do this. The floor is fine. Besides, you're still hurt."

"Don't argue with me. Get your ass up here and sleep with me."

Relenting, Lisa stood up and crawled into bed next to her wife, careful to leave plenty of space between the two of them. 'Keep minimum safe distance between yourself and the temptation,' her mind told her. But she knew she'd be fighting her hormones every night until her mother left. "Thanks," she said.

"You know, I'm not a doctor, but I sensed a lot of tension there earlier. What exactly happened between you and your mother?" Jennie wanted to know.

"It's a long and complicated story. You don't want to hear about it."

She placed a supportive hand on her shoulder. "I'm not going anywhere and believe me, I'm not tired. Spill it."

"You don't need to hear about it."

"I'm your wife, even if only in name. Come on, Lisa. It might help if you were to talk about it. Get it off your chest, so to speak."

"I have issues with my mother. She's the reason my parents got divorced, the reason my father drank himself into an early grave, and the reason I never planned on ever getting married," she revealed. "Well, she's part of the reason for that."

"Why?"

Lisa took a deep breath. "She cheated on my father; she had a bevy of other lovers whom she didn't even try to hide from us. I came home from my first day of school and found her having sex with the pool boy in the kitchen. How's that for a wonderful childhood memory? Anyway, I saw what she did to my father, and I vowed the day he died that I'd never let myself be treated like that. So, I decided to never get married. My mother is a cold, heartless bitch, Jennie. Enough said."

"I'm sorry. I didn't realize."

"It's not your fault. Not too many people know the real reason."

"But it's just your mother, one woman. Not every woman out there is like her, Lisa. There's bound to be one out there somewhere who won't treat you like she treated your father," Jennie reassured her.

'That's what I thought about Bella until she did it to me,' she said to herself. Lisa nodded her head in response to her comment. "It wasn't until recently that I realized that."

"What made you change your mind about marriage?"

Lisa planted a kiss on her cheek. "You did."