“I am sorry, son.” Mike said softly. He felt betrayed. Sonny never mentioned the woman before. Mike realized, for the hundredth time, Sonny would never confide in him.
Carly hated her curiosity. She wanted to hit Sonny. She wanted to scream. She wanted to tell him what she thought of his lies of omission. However, she needed to know more. She needed to know about the woman who preceded her. “What happened to her?”
Sonny laughed in spite of himself. “Morbid curiosity?” His voice lost any traces of humor as he continued. “I can talk about her.”
”Sure you can. You open your mouth and move your lips. Talk, Sonny.” The situation failed to amuse Carly. She was going to hear everything.
Sonny closed his eyes and pictured the woman he had loved so deeply. The image hurt. He had no problem picturing her. He did that at least once a day. However the pain was too deep to share. The thought of talking about his first wife overwhelmed him. He didn’t know where to begin. “It isn’t that easy.”
Carly tried to keep her emotions from getting the best of her. It wasn’t healthy. She laid the photograph she was holding on the table beside her. Underneath it, she found one she had not seen before. She examined it in stunned silence. “The child?” She asked softly.
--
“You what, V?” Ned asked after noticing her pause. He feared she was about to announce her engagement to Simon. “What is it Venus? Please, tell me.”
“This isn’t easy.” V said softly. She hated this situation.
“What isn’t easy? You can tell me anything. You know that. We are best friends, remember?” Ned smiled at the end of his sentence. He hoped his dimples would soften her mood.
“Simon and I broke up.” V admitted softly. She felt like a failure. Only one man, in her entire life, loved her. She couldn’t make it work with him either.
”Oh Venus. I am sorry. What happened?” Sincere concern sounded in Ned’s voice.
“It didn’t work. I guess, I should have known a yearlong pleasure cruise would be too much. I got bored. I wanted to be working, helping my friends, getting something, anything, accomplished. He didn’t feel the same way.”
Her voice sounded sad, defeated. Ned took her hand. “Are you okay?”
“I wanted it to work. I wanted to love him the way he loved me. I wanted to feel loved.” V admitted softly. Then she blushed. “Oh Ned, forgive me. I don’t know how I could be so callous? I came here too help you. We are talking about me….”
Ned interrupted her mid apology. “Venus you don’t need to apologize. I want to know about your life. I am your friend. I want to help you through this.”
”But I came to help you.” Venus argued.
--
Emily smiled warmly at Nikolas. “I forgot about your family situation. Maybe, you can help. Is it silly of me to want to find him?”
Nikolas took her hand. “When I thought Stavaros was my father, I wanted to know him. He was gone, still, I wanted to know everything. I used to run around the house looking for evidence of him. Of course, it was easy to find. The island is a shrine to him. I sat at his place at the table. I went to all the places I had seen in pictures of him. I hoped, by being there, I would get a sense of him.”
Emily smiled. It helped to know that she wasn’t alone. “I still take down my mother’s things when I miss her. I try to remember what she was like. I try to imagine what she would look like. Sometimes, I try to hear her voice in my head. If I think about it really hard, I can almost hear her voice. But by the time I realize I have it, it has gone.” Emily stopped when she felt the tear run down her cheek. “Sorry.” She whispered.
Nikolas lifted her chin. Bringing her eyes to his own, he spoke sincerely. “Em, don’t be sorry. It is normal to miss your mom. It is normal to want to find you dad. There is nothing to be ashamed of.”
The tears running down Emily’s face had yet to subside. “My parents, Alan and Monica, they have taken good care of me. It seems like I don’t appreciate them or something.”
“Oh Em, of course you love them. You don’t have to do this if you aren’t ready.” Nikolas offered in an attempt to lessen her tears.
She shook her head. “I need to know.”
Nikolas nodded. “Let me help you look, okay?”
“What if I find something? What do I do then?” She hoped he would have some answer. She didn’t know what to do.
“Let’s see if there is anything in the boxes first, okay? We can decide what to do from there.” Nikolas’ voice remained soothing. “Where should I begin?”
“These look interesting.” She handed him a stack of old letters. “I guess we can read through these.”
Nikolas felt odd reading through the old letters. It felt as if he was entering a different world. He worried it wasn’t a world he was meant to see. He felt like a voyer, yet, curiosity drove him further into the letters. He read intently for almost an hour. Then he found something startling. “Em.” He said in a quiet, shocked voice.
The expression she saw on his face, when she turned, confused her. “What is it?”
~~~~~~~~~~
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