Chapter 253: Mimi XXXI

Chapter 253: Mimi XXXI—Ingénue

 

 

            It was until early that evening when the media circus finally left the house in peace, and the police left and all the investigators and sight seers. Michele was glad for that. The family needed privacy now.

            Mrs. Darcy was downstairs with Cecile; they had been in the parlor. Michele wondered if the woman would be taking the girl with her, if this would signal the end to a game they had barely begun to scratch the surface of. She wondered why she even cared about that at the moment.

            The plumber, an inept man whose repairs on the bathtub never seemed to take. He hadn’t seemed like someone who would want to harm the family; she had not even recognized him as the one who had attacked her before. But it must have been him. It was him. He had wanted Jana, for reasons Michele would not let cross her mind, for reasons that tore her through as she watched her daughter curled up with her brothers on the carpet, watching television.

            And they had left her alone with him. No not completely alone. Cecile had been there. Cecile had been the only force standing between the man, and Jana, and she had done her part in cementing her image as a sainted virgin savior. Now, the girl, Cecile, was truly spotless. She was heroic and pure, and everything that a mother could want in a daughter.

            Yes, Mrs. Darcy, take your daughter home now. Take her away. Michele thought. Take her home where she will let the buds of her heroism grow in her pure brain, and she will feel whiter and more brilliant and she will not want to be defiled or touched again. She has been baptized in blood, and fear, and now she can truly grow.

            Michele sighed and thanked Patrick in her mind for not having that “secret passageway” in Jana’s closet boarded up. Jana had told them everything that had happened, and that too was what saved her life. And the spider. Michele had not heard Cecile’s point of view yet, but Jana was adamant that the pet spider had done a part in this affair.

            Patrick came back into the room, Michele smiled at him, his eyes looked so tired, his mouth was sagging with stress. “I’ve taken your night clothes out of your room,” Patrick said to Jana who had jumped into his hug. “And pillows, you don’t have to sleep in there.”

            “Good!” Jana exclaimed. “I can’t sleep in there it’s evil!”

            “Yes,” Michele said, “You can sleep with us baby.”

            But Jana did not want to. That was the part that surprised Michele; she didn’t know exactly how to feel about it to begin with. Jana had seemed excited about it at first but then it came to bedtime. Cecile’s mother was leaving, by herself which was surprising. Cecile did not seem inclined to go with her mother.

            Michele looked at the girl’s face, saw the bruise and stitches under her eye. Had she ever looked more beautiful to her? My baby is alive because of her. Things would change now if Cecile did indeed stay here. Things would have to.

            As soon as Pauline hugged her daughter, said her tearful goodbyes and then left, Jana wasted no time in hugging Cecile tightly.

            “Oof!” Cecile gasped and she leaned over, patting Jana. “I’m a little sore, kiddo,” she replied.

            Jana let her go and her face was beaming. “Mom!” she exclaimed. “Mom!”

            Michele felt her eyes water as she leaned over and smiled at her daughter. “Yes darling?”

            “Cecile’s my sister,” Jana said in a high whisper. “She’s my big sister!” She hugged Cecile again, more gently. “Aren’t you Cecile?”

            “Oh,” Cecile said and she looked at Michele, almost as if gauging her permission. “Sure honey, why not?”

            Michele watched as Cecile leaned over Jana and hugged her back, her long, black hair falling over her. She had on a fresh sweater, a light, pale pink cashmere one. “I cannot believe I left you with him,” Michele said quietly, she could hear Patrick calling the boys for bed.

            Cecile looked up from Jana; her cheeks were slightly rounded, still soft with baby fat, newly nineteen. Her eyes slanted like a cat’s, and shone with their deep color. “You couldn’t have known,” Cecile said in a soft voice, her lips barely moving. “None of us could have. Perhaps we should have, but it isn’t anyone’s fault.”

            Michele nodded. “Come on, Jana it is bedtime.”

            “Noo!” Jana exclaimed. “Mommy can I sleep with Cecile tonight? I’m gonna get nightmares if I don’t.”

            Michele felt her eyes widen. “Jana, Cecile needs her rest, do not be bothering her!”

            Jana’s chin trembled and Cecile shook her head. “Mrs. Roy, it’s fine. If that’s what Jana wants I wouldn’t mind at all. That is unless you mind?”

            Michele blinked rapidly, she felt a little stung. “No, of course not,” she said lightly. “Make sure to go straight to sleep,” she said kissing Jana on her cheek, “Don’t be keeping her awake.”

            “I won’t Mommy,” Jana said with large blinking eyes. “I promise.”

            Michele lifted an eyebrow. “Good night my baby,” she said and Jana grinned through her teeth and clung to Cecile. Michele then looked at Cecile and remembered the sight of the corpse in the bathroom, the deep gouging in his arms, Cecile’s wet hair. Things were changing, evolving. “Thank you,” she said to Cecile and she kissed her softly on the cheek. “Thank you for my daughter. Be careful.”

            Cecile’s eyebrows marked slight confusion, “Careful?” she whispered.

            Michele smiled. “Good night little savior.”

            “Good night,” Cecile said.

 

            “I called Danny, I don’t know why he didn’t come,” Patrick said as Michele turned off the light.

            She pulled the blanket around her, trying to forget the sight of police tape over her daughter’s bedroom door and the blood on her carpet and bathroom floor. It was over now, and that’s what mattered.

            “Daniel did come,” Michele said. “And I sent him away.”

            She felt Patrick’s movement. “What? Why?”

            “There would have been a scene, Patrick,” Michele said, not liking the tone in his voice. “Can you imagine? At that moment when, all of this has happened and then to have a drama play out in front of all the police, and all of us with Cecile and her mother and Daniel? It would have been so, inappropriate. I was only thinking of our peace of mind.”

            “Was that all you were thinking of?” Patrick asked, and Michele heard it again. It was that tone she had heard him use before, when other things had happened, precipitating other disasters. It was an ill omen.

            She leaned up on an elbow, looked at the outline of his body in the dark room. “What else could I have been thinking of?” Michele said.

            Patrick was silent for a moment. “Not wanting to see them together, reunite.” Patrick finally said. “Not wanting Cecile to have him like that.”

            Michele felt her eyes narrow, even though he would not be able to see her expression in the dark. “Is that all you were worried about?” Michele snapped. “After everything that could have happened to our daughter, in our house, you were worried that I would be jealous of Cecile and Daniel? How selfish do you think I am!”

            Patrick didn’t answer. She glared at him, felt her fingers curl and her nails stab into the blankets. How could he think so low of her?

            “And you do not even answer me!” Michele exclaimed. “What am I supposed to feel?”

            “Nothing,” Patrick said quietly, “Just forget I said anything, yes?”

            “No,” Michele said, trying to calm down. “I won’t. If that’s what you want to discuss tonight then let’s have it your way.” Has he been talking to someone? Michele thought. Why would he jump to such a conclusion as that to be suspicious or jealous of me? He has come up with such conclusions before, but always as a result of listening to the whisperings of others. But who suspected anything between her and Danny?

            “There’s nothing to talk about,” Patrick said, but he also sat up as he said it which meant there was everything to talk about.

            “Fine,” Michele said and she sat up completely. “Looking at my actions apart from a motherly perspective, from the perspective of our game, I would have to say I acted brilliantly now that I think of it.”

            “Really?” Patrick said with a touch of sarcasm in his voice. “Brilliantly, you didn’t act; say on pure emotion and heart?”

            Michele tilted her head to one side. “Heart? How would my heart have come to play in this?”

            “How was your move brilliant?”

            Michele sighed. “In terms of our game. If Daniel and Cecile would have clung to each other during this turning point in her life, made a stand against her mother and made a vow to each other there, they would have been forever impossible to separate and we both would be sure of complete failure. I think I have prevented that. Now tell me, where does my heart come into this?”

            Again Patrick was silent and she saw him tilt his head forehead into his hands and rub his hair rapidly with his fingers. “Perhaps I am jealous,” he said. “I’ve never seen you take so long with a boy. Why is he so special?”

            Michele sighed and she leaned forward and pressed her hand into his warm back. Was Keane right? Were they indeed getting too old for these games? Mental games took so much more from the body than a physical game could.

            “He isn’t special,” Michele said quietly. “Perhaps I am slow, yes, but our lives are so much busier than five years ago, than ten. And there seems to be something tricky about this game. But Patrick would you really think I would trade everything we have together and have built together for a boy? Do you truly think you could be tossed over like that?”

            “No,” Patrick said.

            “Then there isn’t a need to bring it up,” Michele said.

            Patrick turned towards her; he grabbed her hand in his own and turned it over, and kissed her palm “We owe Jana’s life to Cecile.” He murmured.

            Michele closed her eyes. “I know,” she said.

            “What do you think?” he asked.

            Michele slid her free hand over his cheeks. “I think,” she said, steeling her heart, “That intentions can evolve yes?”

            “You don’t want me to abandon pursuing her?” Patrick asked, she could hear the incredulity in his voice. “You still want me to conquer her?”

            “What would be wrong with that?” Michele asked, she could feel her mouth twist some. “Why should we abandon everything we’ve begun?”

            “We would thank her by destroying her,” Patrick said.

            “No,” Michele said, “We would thank her by creating her.”

            Patrick pressed his hand over hers and he gathered it and pressed it to her other hand. He leaned forward, clasping her hands together almost as if they were simulating a prayer position and he pressed his forehead against hers. “Talk to me,” he said.

            “Cecile could have followed her mother home tonight,” Michele said feeling an excitement beginning in her breast. “Mrs. Darcy would love to take her newly sainted, newly heroic daughter back to New York to show off to friends and family. And if that were to happen, Cecile would miss Daniel only until she began to absorb the things everyone was saying about her. She would believe in her own purity and would resent anyone who would dare tamper with it. I daresay, Patrick that she would end up a fat, vapid, ivory skinned nun. She would waste her beauty and youth for piety and chastity and die unknown and unrecognized teaching catechism to the children of the school she used to attend.”

            “Would she really?” Patrick said.

            “Yes,” Michele whispered. “It would be unkind of us to let her do that to herself. She made a stand to her mother today and is staying here tonight. She does not want to leave and we should reward her for that.”

            “And that is my job?” Patrick asked.

            Michele kissed him softly. “Only if you are still hungry for it. It should be our duty to educate her, rather than destroy her, to bring her into a world apart from her mother and sheltered homes where she can enjoy herself and understand true rapture. And who better than you, my love to show her that? Why let her mothers destroy such a treasure?”

            “Mothers?” Patrick asked with a laugh. “She has more than one?”

            “Of course,” Michele said. “Mrs. Darcy and the Virgin Mary. Wouldn’t it be such a victory to steal away their most spotless protégé? She will be our ingénue Patrick, they don’t deserve her.”