My secretary announced over the loud speaker, "Eric Davis on line four. Eric Davis on line four."

Instantaneously, my heart was absolutely pounding. d.a.m.n it, d.a.m.n it, d.a.m.n it. My hands were sweating and shaking. THIS was not the behavior of a happily married woman. I knew it. I hated it. I didn't have to answer the phone. I knew this, but I did. I was so nervous, as I picked up the phone and simply said "h.e.l.lo."

"h.e.l.lo there little Miss Marissa, how are you this fine afternoon?" his voice danced across the phone.

It must have been yet another year since we'd spoken this time, why did it always feel like just a few days?

"I'm just fine Eric Ashley Davis, how are you?" My eyes smiled at him though he couldn't see that at all.

"I'm just great. Back in town again, thought I'd give dinner with you a stab again."

I longed to show him my success and would love to have him see my own little world. The world I thought I'd created to negate every harm or shortcoming I thought I'd experienced. I couldn't deny the force of my feelings. But, I couldn't risk going to see him. Though in my mind I raced through the possibilities, I never could do it.

Of course I knew David would not appreciate or approve of his overtures anymore now than he would have a few years ago, or of the part of me that wanted to see Eric again. It bothered me, no tortured me, that when Eric would call that my heart would leap out of my chest, it would just pound the whole time, my breath quickening and my hands sweating. I'd have to go through the whole process of telling myself that it was over for a reason. He'd never made it happen, wasn't that enough? Just stop it!!!

"How are you?" he asked me, seriously.

"I'm great! Things are wonderful." I wasn't lying. They were great. It wasn't as though I thought of him every minute of every day, not anymore. "How are you?"

"Business is awesome; I'm having another amazing year." This was always the case, one year better than the one before. He was a business wizard, a sales genius. Never mind I had to argue with David to get to work, stay there, and not leave for home early every day.

Again my heart has a mind of its own. My body is not cooperating with my head, which is telling it not to act like it is in love with Eric anymore. So I said, "I've got some news!"

"What is it?"

"I'm pregnant! We're having a baby!" I exclaimed, and I truly was happy.

"That's great!! When's it due? Do you know what you're having? A boy or a girl?" and so on until I said when I was due and we were having a girl, and we'd bought a new house, and a new car and the business was going gangbusters. Finally the excitement died down and there was a little silence between us on the phone. Long enough for me to just feel awkward about my conflicted feelings of excitement about my married life, my new baby, the business and the way my heart still pounded like a silly girl's when he called.

"Are you happy?" he asked me, and he really wanted to know.

I didn't answer immediately. I was happy enough, but David did have his weaknesses and at times they did make me weary. "We have our ups and downs Eric, but mostly I feel like his strengths are my weaknesses and that my strengths are his, and we're making it work. I love him. You know this."

"Yeah. I wish we could still be friends." He said.

"Eric... He would be furious about our talking. He would never understand. I'm pregnant with his baby. We've been married a long time now. It isn't right for you to call, you know?"

"I'm friends with a lot of my other old girlfriend's and no one else acts like he does...." And he just stopped short. Surely he understood there was truly something for David to actually be jealous of? "You don't want me to call again?"

"I will always want what's best for you, for you to be happy...but I just don't' feel right about it. I'm sorry." I said. Something inside of me wanted to cry, and I hated that. It felt like self betrayal, and marriage betrayal, and maternal betrayal, and what's more it was a connection that couldn't do anything but get lost in a maze of inappropriate feeling and attachment.

"Ok. I understand. You take care of yourself. I'm happy for you Marissa. I won't call again - even if it is really hard not to do." He quietly said.

And he didn't, he didn't call me again.

Chapter 18.

A few short months later I had my daughter Brittany Nicole and her birth was fraught with crises and making sure both she and the business stayed alive became my only occupation. I was focused more on surviving than on thriving after I became a mother, and my son Joshua followed quickly upon the heels of Brittany. I found myself the President and CEO of a four million dollar technology firm and the mother of two beautiful children.

My business grew wildly and then deteriorated, a perfect mirror of a wild roller coaster economy until finally the NASDAQ crashed and the media sugar coated it by saying it had "corrected". I used to wryly say, "Yeah, the NASDAQ corrected my whole freaking life." But I was in good company and there were many young and spirited CEOs taking their lumps and figuring out what to do next.

David and I struggled tremendously through the loss of the business. It was impossible for me not to feel that his lack of commitment and enthusiasm to the task hadn't made a big contribution to the impending failure of the enterprise. David was entirely too creative in his efforts to pull us out of the hole and save the business and I was constantly having to play moral advocate to his relaxed sense of ethics. Our time was spent more and more with consultants and accountants and bankruptcy attorneys. We were about to file a Chapter 11 but we had a reorganization plan that seemed like it might work if all went well. I felt this was a b.u.mp in the road, not the end of the road, and I had confidence in my ability to do it again if I needed to.

We were on vacation on Cape Cod when I told David I wanted another baby. He thought I was crazy to want another child while we were having our first breathing room in years. We didn't really finish the debate about getting pregnant. That night, I partied for the first time in fifteen years. The next morning we got up and went whale watching on the Atlantic and I was in heaven.

Within days of our return though, my health suddenly seemed precarious and I just didn't feel quite right. Shopping for groceries a few days after our return the smell of salmon in the store threw a wave of nausea over me. I was falling asleep at 7:30 in the evening and no amount of coffee seemed to make me energetic. I had all the symptoms I'd had so many times before. I wasn't just wondering if I were pregnant, I was pretty sure of it, but I kept getting negative test results for a whole month.

Finally I went to the doctor to discover that I really was pregnant! I was happy about it. The doctor insisted I could not have gotten pregnant in Cape Cod, even if I had felt pregnant since the return of our trip the month before.

A few weeks after confirming the pregnancy I was taking Brittany and Joshua to a birthday party. Several of our employees had bailed out, taking customers from us that didn't belong to them and they hadn't earned, and I was starting to feel less confident in our ability to survive the NASDAQ crash, and in the economy in general. President Mommy was feeling worn and David was too self absorbed to really put anyone before himself, family or otherwise.

We were early for the birthday party and while I didn't like to let the kids have pork, they said they were hungry and we went into a McDonalds. We're standing in line, Joshua on my hip, Brittany telling me what she wants and chattering on about how she likes French Fries and can she please have them right now?

Suddenly, I felt a gush of hot wet thickness moving down my legs inside of my jeans. This didn't feel like water breaking had when I had Joshua, it was slow and thick and I could feel the heat of it as it traveled. I panicked inside, but stayed calm for the children, and hurried to the bathroom with my toddlers. I stood by the sink, still holding Joshua on my hip, and Brittany still chattering away. Sliding my hand into my pants, finding the wetness, I pulled it back out again I found it covered in hot, red, dark blood.

I didn't want the children to know I was in danger and I didn't ask for help. I should have called an ambulance but I was afraid I'd lose track of Brittany and Joshua and so I rushed out of the restaurant to the van. Out of my right mind with worry I drove the three of us a few miles to the hospital. I reasoned that it would be faster for me to drive and that it wasn't far enough for me to lose much blood before I got there.

I parked close to the entrance and pulled the kids out of the car quickly and walked into the Emergency Room. The waiting room didn't have many visitors and a few people turned towards me as I came in, distraught, crying, and laden with children.

"Please, please, help me." I started sobbing as I carried Joshua in my arms and pulled Brittany along beside me into the emergency room. A nurse rushed to greet me.

"I think I'm losing my baby. There's blood everywhere."

She looked at my quizzically because the children were fine.

"No. I'm pregnant. I'm bleeding. It's everywhere."

They pulled me into a room and laid me down, cutting off my jeans. The blood was profuse and bright red. It covered my clothing and was quickly getting onto the gurney bedding. The nurse seemed to slow a bit and was tending to me but no longer really rushing as I thought she should.

"Have I lost the baby?" I said trembling "Ms. Stone, you've probably lost a pint of blood. Yes, I'm so sorry, but you've lost the baby." She said, and I just collapsed into her arms and cried my heart out.

Soon David was there and he came into the room and he was worried and frightened but I didn't' feel that he was as sad as I was about the loss of the baby. "It's just like everything that I was afraid of going wrong with this pregnancy has gone wrong, and the timing is just terrible."

I sensed he was relieved on some level and I was angry with him for feeling that way about our child, and hurt that he was relieved. The nurse came and went and finally she told us, "I need to give you an ultrasound just to make sure all the tissue has been expelled from your uterus so you won't be vulnerable to an infection."

I sobbed all over again and felt numb and miserable and wanted to curl up and cry forever.

The machine arrives without a technician and sits there by the bedside for quite some time. I don't care really, because I'm stricken with grief and exhausted besides.

Finally the technician comes and she apologizes for the violation when I'm suffering a loss. David is gone with Brittany and Joshua, and I'm alone in my sorrow. She gently moves the blanket aside and puts the gel on my abdomen. It's cold because we're in the emergency room.

She places the receiver upon the slippery surface of my skin and suddenly gasps "Oh my gosh! There were three!"

There on the screen I see the strangest sight.

There are three separate orbs on the screen. The first is mostly collapsed and empty, folded in upon itself and I thought to myself it explained why I had bled that first month. The last is empty but appears damaged at the base, and she points at it showing me where the bleeding is coming from now. But, amazingly, miraculously, in the center to my complete amazement there is a baby, much larger than the four weeks my doctor insisted that I must be at that point and there is clearly movement from this little gem. There's a baby, and it's alive!

"There's still a baby!!" I shouted and I started crying all over again, but this time for joy. "How far along am I? It looks so big!"

"I'd say you are ten weeks pregnant" she said.

"Ten weeks?!? I KNEW I got pregnant in Cape Cod. I knew it."

The technician is suddenly my best friend and we are both so happy to see the baby well, and alive. Even so I am mystified to see not just one other placenta but two. They are completely distinct, completely different from one another, definitely three, two empty ones and the third completely secure.

Later the doctor appears to say that I had "a" vanishing twin and wondered if we weren't mistaken about the third sac. Yet, it was there, the nurse and the technician saw it, heard him and gave me a knowing glance...as if to say "You know, and we know, that we really saw that..." and I realized too that each of the sacs was a different shape, and none mirrored the shape of another.

I was instructed to stay in bed as much as possible, and to lift as little as possible in order to get Nathan here alive and well. I spent five months flipping between news channels while Bush and Gore seemingly made a mockery of our election process. Nathan had two siblings we'd lost in that pregnancy and I laid in bed still bleeding for five more months hardly allowed to get out of my room, not allowed to carry Joshua or Brittany and exhausted beyond belief.

Chapter 19.

David did not seem as happy as I was that there was still a child on the way. He was angry, resentful at having to go to work early, work through lunch, come home later than he wanted and then take care of two children. I could understand that he was tired and that it was hard, but I felt if he loved us that he'd do what was necessary for a while to make sure we were all ok.

My father seemed to feel compelled to tell me how irresponsible it was of me to "insist on having this baby" when I had so many business and financial obligations. I was furious he'd imply that the life of my child, any child, but his grandchild should be sacrificed for the sake of commerce. Worse, for a business destined to fail at this point no matter what I did our how hard I tried. Staying afloat long enough to keep the health insurance intact was the most important thing to do. So this "philosophic conversation" as he described it ignited an argument between us that had been fueled by 25 years of his pushing me out of our family, ostracizing me, for telling about the things he'd done when he was too drunk to even know his own name.

The distance between David and I just seemed to grow deeper and while my focus was just getting Nathan here, David's was getting me back to the place where I was taking care of him and no one else. Further, David resented that I had the audacity to argue with my father no matter how outrageous what he'd said or done was, and I felt not only that David did not understand me, or want our baby, but worse that he didn't care about me or the baby's well being. I was beginning to feel that I'd carried the heavy burden of David on my shoulders long enough, and any man with a law degree completely paid for by Mommy and Daddy ought to be able to make of an independent contribution than he seemed able, willing or prepared to make. Whatever affection and love I'd had for David was waning, miserably, and I felt trapped.

Years had now pa.s.sed without any contact from Eric. Despite that, my mind frequently wandered back over and over again to that "Oh my G.o.d, that is some

sweeeeeet......" echo that just rippled over and over in my mind. Any s.e.xual thoughts on my part were quickly followed by that image, that sound, the light, the color, the flowing gauze, the feeling, the chills, the desire, the happiness at Eric's being mine for that one glorious moment. I must have relived it thousands of times. It grew to be my solace as the months and then years pa.s.sed and it slowly became evident that all the things I'd aspired to in my marriage were just simply not meant to be.

By the time Nathan was born the distance between David and I was a gulf. Having Nathan took all day long waiting and waiting with no progress and then suddenly in ten minutes flat I was complete and Nathan was trying to leave my body without anyone there on the receiving end to greet him.

It was clear that the business was lost by then and all that was left was the paperwork of closing it and the transfer of some $250,000 worth of business that I could manage for the following year working part time from home. My health had been compromised for so very long by still undiscovered threats. The week before 9-11 my husband, my colleague, my three children and I traveled to San Francisco in an effort to meet with my new business a.s.sociates. They were lovely people, from India, and I liked them and enjoyed learning about their culture, their lives.

Traveling south of the city, my entire family and my a.s.sistant meandered Highway One all the way to Monterey, strolled the city near the aquarium and then we ended up on the beach at Carmel. Here I was with three incredibly small children, heavily laden with excess pounds, sadness, millions of dollars in debt and the loss of the promise of my bright future. The prophesied marriage was displayed in its full horror before me and I stood there on that beach facing those rocks, watching the spray once again. The sound of the surf steady and loud, it insulated me from having to reveal my thoughts.

The sound of my children on the sh.o.r.e behind me tunneled through to my consciousness, and I was more alone in my connection with my husband than I'd ever been on my own, despite the fact that it was he, and not Eric that stood on that same sh.o.r.e with me that morning. I had confided the secret of my regret in the loss of Eric in my a.s.sistant Kimberly, but I felt in the extremity of her youth, she couldn't possibly appreciate what the revelation to her truly meant to me. She didn't know this was the one site that stood apart in my heart with Eric. That I stood in the same place he'd stood with me thirteen years before, knowing I could never be myself with David in the way that I had been able to be myself with Eric, not understanding why I'd been able to make the bridge the way I had with one and not the other. I had never felt so utterly alone in the company of others in my entire life.

Chapter 20.

Two more years pa.s.sed, with the horrors of the World Trade Center collapse, a war and an economy that couldn't be resuscitated, and of course with the promised silence from my long lost love. The inevitable end of my marriage was upon me. We had lost a home, several cars, land, savings, and two businesses, not to mention what const.i.tuted our marriage. I'd lost fifteen long years of sobriety, what felt like my youth and my beauty. A confrontation with my father and my family over the s.e.xual abuse was in full swing and David resented that I took the time and s.p.a.ce to address this betrayal because it meant I wasn't available to do his bidding, in the way he wanted it done.

I was on anti-depressants. They didn't really help, as I wasn't chemically depressed. So I drank. I got stoned. I prayed seemingly unanswered prayers. I took care of the children during the day while David attempted unsuccessfully to sell mortgages and took unfair advantage of all our friends leaving them with more debt and less money in their pockets and more in his own, and he smoked pot in the yard in front of G.o.d and everyone, including our children. I felt my life was a disgrace; I was living in a nightmare that anyone would have been unhappy in.

David was in the habit of dispensing family medications and every night would put my antidepressants in my mouth, even if I complained of this behavior or others, he would persist in them, just wearing me down with the repet.i.tion of the exact same form of disrespect on a daily basis.

He hated me for no longer supporting him financially. I hated him for making a mockery of all that mattered to me.

One evening I'd been drinking, not very heavily, but I'd had a few gla.s.ses of wine. I was playing a game on the computer and David arrived with my medicine. I put my hand out for it, but he insisted on stuffing them into my mouth again. He had added two Somas to the prescription delivery without my realizing that they were there, or what they were. They were especially strong pain killers sent to him by his best friend from Yeshiva that now lived in Connecticut and was a physician's a.s.sistant. Danny was not supposed to be sending samples in the mail, but that had never stopped David and Danny, the bother of following the rules for these two was unheard of.

Their relationship was exceedingly, oddly too close. David would never remember my significant days without prompting and would frequently gloss over them as though they didn't matter to him at all, yet he killed himself to celebrate those he had with Danny. They joked incessantly about being h.o.m.os.e.xual lovers. I began to suspect, and said to Danny's wife that it wouldn't remotely surprise me after ten years of being with David, that those two weren't joking about the depth of their connection. She didn't even raise an eyebrow. I never had proof, but it seemed the only reasonable thing to conclude eventually, that David was really in love with Danny, and no one else.

I had my usual allotment of red wine to wash the pills down, after the kids had gone to bed. I had fallen into the unhealthy habit of swearing I wouldn't drink that day, and then with my rising fury against David each night, I was descending into quelling my anger with drink. Time had an odd quality to it. It slipped through my fingers and more and more time pa.s.sed by without my doing anything about the nightmare, but inside of my world time pa.s.sed excruciatingly slowly. This evening though, beyond being numb, I was unusually off, tired, and climbed into bed much earlier than usual, and pa.s.sed out long before midnight.

Once I was unconscious David entered my bedroom, where he had not been welcome in a very long time. He started making overtures, removed my clothing and I vaguely remember his trying to have s.e.x with me, struggling, saying "No." and then pa.s.sing out again.

I'm told that psychically I have to tell this story twenty to forty times to release myself of the horror of it. I'm so ashamed, disgusted that I chose HIM to be anything at all in my life at all, but most especially to be my love, my husband, the father of three beautiful children that I love and adore. The one person that understood the exact nature of the betrayal of my own family, in particular of my own father, the one person who knew the horror of the legacy they had delivered to me, and this is how he exacts his revenge. I understand just how intelligent David is, I also understand how committed he is to getting what he wants. I understood, implicitly, that he had exacted the perfect revenge, the thing he knew that would devastate me the most.

While he said what my father had done in fondling me and covering it up was "reprehensible" what he did was to rape me, a.n.a.lly, admit it to my father and my friends and then later deny it and his admissions all together. Somehow, in his mind, he doesn't seem to understand he can't go back and deny it not that it's inconvenient to face the truth.

I woke up to an absolutely pounding head ache. I was groggy, disoriented; my body was one tremendous, heavy, throbbing ache. I opened my eyes and David was in my bathroom adjoining my bedroom, making a mess of the sink shaving. He'd leave for me to clean up, as usual. The look on his face was menacing. I realized my a.s.s was slimy, my a.n.u.s very sore and uncomfortable. I noticed an open jar of petroleum jelly at the foot of the bed, finger indentations deep in the goo, lid nowhere to be seen.

I was overcome with horror and disbelief.

Scant memory returned to me as I realized what happened. He senses that I am awake; I must have made some kind of a noise in my realization. His face

is hardened, unapologetic, and cognizant of what he had done. He looked at me with contempt in the reflection of the mirror, without turning towards me, continuing what he was doing without pause.