Read Online Wildflowers by Robin Jones Gunn - Free Book Online Page A

clenched her teeth. All her efforts to remain relaxed flew out the window, and before she could hold back her words, she stated, “You would have to have been around to notice.”
    Steven put down his fork. Genevieve knew the signal. From the look in his eye, she knew he was weary yet nonetheless willing to meet her on the other side of the line she had just drawn in the sand.
    “You knew what my career entailed when you married me.”
    “I was nineteen, Steven. I didn’t know anything.”
    “You knew plenty, Genevieve. Why is it that we can never resolve this issue? What is it you blame me for?”
    “I don’t blame you for anything. You’ve made a wonderful life for the girls and me.”
    “That’s not true. You still blame me for losing all that money in the stock market, don’t you?”
    Both of them spoke in low, constrained voices. No one in the restaurant would have known they were fighting.
    “That’s all in the past, Steven. We can’t keep lookingback.” Genevieve smoothed the stiff linen of the cloth napkin in her lap. The bitterness she had harbored for so long against Steven had become a tangled vine, winding through her heart’s garden. Many times she thought she had hacked away at the source of the problem, only to find that what had been removed was just a branch and not the root.
    Without thinking about it, Genevieve let words slip through her lips. “Besides, you had a choice. You could have put all the money in the bank.”
    Steven leaned closer. “You
are
still holding it against me, aren’t you? You think I talked you into making the stock market investment.”
    “You were the one who did all the research and had the hot lead.”
    “You could have disagreed at any point, and I would have dropped the whole idea.”
    “I know. It was a mutual decision. We did what we thought was best. I don’t hold the decision against you.” Her words were bloodless, robotic, and void of life.
    “Yes, we did what we thought was best. For you. For us. For your dad’s money. Your father would have understood. He would have, Gena. Do you still think he is somehow angry with you?”
    Genevieve didn’t answer. She thought back to their wedding day and how her father barely spoke to her because he was angry that she was marrying an American. He had performed his duty, walking her down the aisle the same way he had performed his duty of walking her to school every day. She desperately yearned for him to offer a warmsqueeze of her hand or a kiss on the cheek before he turned her over to Steven at the altar. Instead, her father had given her a stiff half-bow from the waist just as he had done for years at the school yard’s gate.
    In her mind that day had pounded his admonition, “Make something of your life that will shine brightly.” By marrying an American and interrupting her university education, her father no longer believed she could make anything bright or promising of her life.
    Then her father had turned, sat down beside her mother, and folded his arms. Genevieve stepped up to the altar, put her hand in Steven’s, and somehow transferred all that pain and disappointment into their marriage.
    Now Steven reached for Genevieve’s hand across the table and said with steady, even words, “Gena, this needs to get settled. I’m not perfect. Nobody is. Your father wasn’t perfect, either. He’s gone now.”
    “And so is his money.”
    “Yes, and so is his money. We’ve been over this before. There’s nothing we can do to change that loss, Gena. I’m trying my best here. When will you believe me when I tell you I love you? I’m here for you. I always have been.”
    Genevieve’s eyes narrowed as she looked into Steven’s sincere face. “When are you here for me? You’re leaving again Monday. You’re not here, Steven. You’re never here.”
    Steven sighed and leaned back, as if her blow had hit its intended mark. “Yes, I am leaving Monday. That’s my job. My job that I love and you hate.