72 - Home

An eerie, unsettled feeling swept through Cassidy as she eased her silver Toyota Tundra into the driveway.  Instinct had her nudging the nose to within a foot of the garage doors, but it felt as though she were visiting an old friend instead of coming home.

Leaving the family keepsakes in the vehicle, she scooped up only her purse before stepping out and turning in a slow circle.  The grass looked just as it always did this time of year – lush and immaculate due to the lawn service that was automatically drafted from her bank account once a month, along with the utilities and mortgage. 

She knew how many steps it was to the gate in her white picket fence and her hand automatically jiggled the catch just the right way to get it open.   The key still stuck just a little going into the back door and she unconsciously entered  the passcode for the security system that had kept her house safe for the past four-and-a-half months – along with the neighbors on both sides. 

So confident was she in those two things that she had only popped in a few times while her grandmother was bedridden.  Then she had driven away on that fateful night without giving a second thought to her house, knowing that the cute little two-bedroom would be safe and secure until she returned. 

What she hadn’t counted on was returning as a different person. 

Not bothering to stop in the living room that undoubtedly needed dusting, she dropped her purse on the counter when cutting through the kitchen to access the hallway.  Cassidy’s heels were kicked away and her clothes peeled off by the time she was fully inside the bathroom that was spacious in comparison to the cabin's, yet only a fraction of the size of the one at the Omni.

The familiar scent of her shampoo, the water pressure that wasn’t quite strong enough, the shower gel that she stocked up on twice a year at Bath & Body Works...  All of those things should have been comforting, but they merely contributed to the inner disquiet that wouldn’t quite go away as she wrapped her hair in a towel and her body in the ratty old chenille robe she’d had since Calliope was a baby.

Finally feeling clean, she curled into the leather living room chair to power on the cell phone she’d been using for past couple of weeks.  It had been weighing heavy in her purse since the moment she stepped out as a free woman, but she had been unwilling to turn it on before now.  She feared that, if there were messages from Jon, she wouldn’t be able to smile as nothing were wrong and Libby had been hard enough on her as it was.

Cassidy hadn’t realized her sister had known so many specific varieties of “special” when it came to stupid, but she did and took great delight in sharing them.  Libby was pro-Jon and could not grasp the logic behind the breakup.

It didn’t matter that Cassidy had explained the three options quite plainly.  One, Jon divorces his wife and loses his chance at the Titans.  Two, Jon’s wife finds out that he’s still seeing Cassidy and he loses his chance at the Titans.  Three, Cassidy steps aside, Jon stays married and gets the Titans.

There was only one scenario that Jon came out of with a football team, and that was the only one that would suffice in Cassidy’s mind.  Apparently, that fell between “cotton-pickin’ stupid” and “window-lickin’ stupid” on Libby’s list.

The phone finally came to life, pinging repetitively until there were three text messages, two missed calls and one voicemail displayed on the screen. 

All from Jon.

Steeling her emotions, she chose the text messages first, finding that the first one had arrived yesterday.  From the the content, she assumed he’d somehow gotten her hand-written message within a couple hours of it being written. 

[2:00 PM]JON: Beyond pissed @ u right now.

I figured you would be, baby doll.

The other two had come this afternoon, on the heels of her release.  Scott must have called him right after they parted ways at the jail.

[2:17 PM]JON: Call me.

[3:12 PM]JON: I know ur out.  CALL ME

They weren’t pain-free, but they weren’t brutal.  The voicemail might be and she would be wise to turn off the rapidly dying phone and never listen to it.  Hearing his voice and finding out just how angry he was with her was nothing but a sick form of self-torture, yet she couldn’t stop herself from executing the motions that would make it happen.

A few taps later, she hovered between the Play button that would broadcast the message over speakerphone and the Delete button that would leave only the pain of the unknown.  Exhaling loudly, she laid her finger on the Play button and his voice filled the room. 

“I don’t know if your sister gave you my message or not but, in case she didn’t, I want you to know I’m just as stubborn as you are.  Do you remember that day in the bathroom?  When I told you that lack of a formal arrangement won’t stop me from seeking you out?  That shit’s still true.  If you really wanna end this, you’re gonna have to have guts enough to tell me, Cassidy.  Passing me a note during homeroom isn’t gonna cut it.  Call me or count on seeing me.  Soon.”

It was nothing less than she expected.  Particularly when Libby had delivered his message earlier, saying that if Cassidy didn’t have her head out of her rump by morning, that it would be forcibly extracted.  She believed that Cassidy should tell Jon about Dorothea’s subtle threat and let him make his own decisions.

If that didn't come to pass, Libby would spend the entire five hours of tomorrow’s gold retrieval trip badgering Cassidy into passing that decision authority along – or would call Jon herself.  Whatever it took to exorcise the stupid, as she so eloquently put it.

That dire warning coupled with the promise of Jon’s stubbornness told Cassidy that the moment she would like to avoid was coming sooner rather than later.   The clock was quickly ticking away to the time when she would have to put on the performance of a lifetime and create the illusion that she cared more about herself than she did him. 

It would be a hard sell.

The phone flashed up a warning message along with a loud beep, stating that the battery was critically low.  Considering that the charger for her “real” phone, which was an iPhone, wouldn’t charge the inexpensive pre-paid model, she reached into the end table for a scrap of paper and a pen to jot down the number of the man she needed to speak to most urgently – David.

She purposefully powered the phone off before transferring Jon’s contact information to her iPhone.  If she couldn’t contact him, then she wouldn’t be tortured with the temptation to do so.  He would turn up soon enough on his own.

Dialing the number she had scribbled, Cassidy put it out of her mind.  Worrying about it didn’t accomplish anything but worrying.

“Hello?” 

“David, hi.  It’s Cassidy,” she immediately identified herself, knowing that this number had to show up as unknown. 

“Dixie chick,” he greeted pleasantly.  “You got everything worked out, I trust?  Or are you calling from jail in need of my investigative prowess?”

Plumb nuts.

“I’m out,” she confirmed on a laugh.  “They issued me a citation for burning without a permit and leaving a burn site unattended but, since it was technically my house, they couldn’t do anything more.  I paid my fine and am once again a law abidin’ citizen.”

“And Jon knows, I assume?”

“I expect the lawyer told him, yes.”

There a pause and then, “But you haven’t talked to him?”

Knowing David and his inquisitive nature, he was about to ask why and she didn’t really want to talk about it. 

“I haven’t,” Cassidy affirmed and took the bull by the horns to firmly redirect the call.  “Listen.  The reason I’m callin’ is to be a nuisance and ask if there’s any way you could ship my suitcase and other things that got left behind?  I’ll reimburse you, of course.”

Another pause.  “Yeah, no problem.  Text me the address and I’ll have it taken care of first thing in the morning.  So is this your house phone number or what?”

“No.  It’s my normal cell.”  Filling him in on why she’d had the other one, she concluded with, “I guess you know about all of my family drama now?”

“More or less, other than what you’re actually fighting over.”

Stifling a groan and wishing she could forget that particular detail herself, Cassidy untwisted the terrycloth knot on top of her head and piled the towel into lap so that she could finger comb her wet tresses while talking.  “I’ll tell you as soon as it’s resolved if you’re still curious, and I’m sorry you got pulled into this whole mess.”

“No big deal,” he assured her casually.  “Helped me out of a lazy-ass rut, as I believe Obie called it.”

That was another loose end that she’d forgotten about.  “You think you could apologize to him for me, too, since the old phone’s now dead and your number is the only one I got out of it?  I hate that he wasted all that time on me.  Tell him I’m not sure how to make it up to him, but I’ll figure somethin’ out.”

“First of all, I still think it’s bullshit you’re not going to pursue music and second, that’s two red flags you’ve thrown at me in as many minutes.  I admirably minded my own business about your lack of contact with your boyfriend, but the fact mine was the only number you saved?  No.  Can’t let that one go by without comment.  What gives?”

This poor man had been unwillingly sucked into the vortex of Cassidy and Jon’s relationship.  He didn’t need to be sucked into the messy details of it.

He marched into it with a brass band, nosin’ around and makin’ demands just like he’s doin’ now.  State the facts and move on.  It’s the quickest way to get the dog off the bone.

“Jon and I aren’t together anymore.  Thank you for sending my things, and I’ll text you that address right away.  When you get an estimated delivery time, I’d-”

“Stop.” He interrupted in with authority, evidently attached to the bone he’d found.  “Back up. Why aren’t you together anymore?  Because he sure as fuck hasn’t mentioned that little factoid.”

So she gave him the same spiel she’d given Libby – she was breaking it off, it wasn’t fair to her, dirty little secret, et cetera, et cetera.  The only thing she left out was Dorothea’s involvement due to David’s relationship with Jon and his family. 

“You bitch.”

That was Cassidy’s reward for not pointing fingers and stirring a pot of ill will for Dorothea.

Shifting in the chair with a sigh, she rubbed at her temple.  Jon’s anger was something she had slowly been preparing herself for, but David’s anger had never been on her radar.  Even if it had been, she didn’t think anything could’ve prepared her for sharp pain those two words delivered.

“David...”

The man on the other end of the line was more interested in voicing his opinion than listening to anything else she might have to say.  “Not two days ago, you sat in my motherfucking house and told me that you loved him.  Now that you don’t need his help hiding from your fucked-up life, it’s over?”

“Don’t judge me when you’re only rememberin’ part of the conversation,” she snapped, his accusations automatically putting her on the defensive.  “I also told you I’d only hurt him under extreme circumstances.  I’m doin’ what I have to do.” 

“Extreme circumstances, my ass.  You manipulated and used him.”

Well, wasn’t that a laugh?  She’d done nothing but nurse Jon Bon Jovi’s every whim and desire, and this was the thanks she got.

Jon of Arc got burned at the stake.  Martyrs don’t get tickertape parades, Glory.

No, they didn’t, and for the first time it frustrated her.  She was tired of people calling her stupid for the way she loved Jon, and David was going to bear the brunt of her frustration. 

“Stop bein’ an idiot.  If I was gonna use him, I sure as hell would’ve gotten more than heartache, high heels and a legal referral outta the deal.  Ask Jon what he’s buyin’ this week, because that’s what he gets outta this.  Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m exhausted.  Thank you again for sendin’ my things.”

A single jab of her finger disconnected the call, and Cassidy let the phone fall to her lap before pressing her face into open hands.  When did breaking up with a man starting involving every-damn-body else?  This really wasn’t anyone else’s business but hers and Jon’s, yet everyone felt obliged to flaunt their point of view and ear her to shreds in the process – even her own sister.    

How in the hell was she going to survive this?  After going one harrowing round with Libby and another with David, she was as beaten, battered and drained as any prizefighter would be.  There was no way she was going to survive the main event.