This is the second excerpt from my upcoming new novel. All comments and reviews welcome!

DAPHNE

Everyone thinks that I live such a charmed life, Daphne sighs to herself.  If they lived just one day in my shoes they would know that this is no way to live… 

The comments she gets from her friends only make her feel even more guilty.  I should be happy, she thinks to herself.  All the women I know or care to talk to seem to admire me and say they wish they could live my life.  But each day that passes makes it harder for me to just get out of bed in the morning.  For what? 

Daphne has no doubt that her husband loves her.  He gives her everything she could ever want – except time and affection.  He is always so ‘macho’ and worried about his image, he hardly ever hugs or kisses her, particularly not in front of the kids or in public. 

“Tony, can I have a hug?  I need to be hugged by my man tonight”, Daphne said sweetly to her husband as she cuddled up next to him on the living room sofa.

 “Where are the boys?” he asked.

“Clifton is in his room and T.J. is off to his meeting.  I just want to feel close to you tonight.  Want to take in a movie, eat some popcorn or take a stroll down by the beach?  The sunset looks beautiful this evening”, she says, looking wistfully at the sunset through the expansive living room window.  The wondrous burnt oranges & yellows of the sun danced invitingly on the gently rippling, azure blue ocean waves.

 “Yeah, looks nice, Babe,” Tony answers his wife as he glanced briefly at the romantic sunset.  Then he quickly went back to staring at the glowing blue light of the TV, watching “Any Given Sunday” on the tube.  He was thoroughly not interested in leaving his current post.

“Baby, can we just spend some quality time together?  I see you so little and I love you so much.  But I need to feel loved, to be touched, be held by you, to talk to you, be made love to by you, ANYTHING from you!”

The “be made love to by you” comment finally got Tony’s attention.  “Now Babe, you know I’m ALWAYS down for some good lovin’! But damn baby, Cliff is home!  You don’t want him to see us doing ‘the thang’ now, do ya?”

Actually I DO, Daphne thought to herself.  If he did, he might get a damn clue!  But now’s not the time to bring that up…

“What’s so wrong with our kids seeing us show a little affection for each other?  We’re married, we love each other, and I think it would be good for the boys to see their parents sharing an intimate moment – a hug or a kiss, or just holding hands...”

“They’re boys Babe, they’re MEN! They don’t wanna see all that mushy stuff!  They know how to handle women – they’re MY boys!  They get it from ME!” 

“I think they still need to see us together, showing some love and affection for each other,” pleaded Daphne.

“Oh, I see you want THIS bad, dont’cha Girl?” he says, grabbing his crotch with both hands.  “C’mon to Daddy!  Let my boy hear what to do with his woman”, says Tony as he grabs her arm and whisks her off to the bedroom.

Oh my God, here it comes, Daphne thinks to herself.

Ten minutes later, with Tony sound asleep and snoring nosily from the master bedroom, Daphne is back in the living room, flicking channels with the remote, and crying silently, reflecting on the state of her life as it stands.

She would try often to talk to him about what she needed from him, and true to form, he usually just said, “OK Baby, I’ll try.”  He would then throw more money or an expensive gift her way in a lame attempt to pacify her.   He just didn’t get it.

Daphne would do anything if he would just take her by the hand, go for a romantic walk in the park, lie in bed with her and talk - just spend some quality time with her.  If he would only cuddle her in bed; eat popcorn and watch movies in bed with her; make passionate love to her like he did before the boys were born, instead of having sex with her like she was some sort of basketball play – the ‘roll on, execute, then roll off’ play - she could cope a little better. 

But this was just the tip of the iceberg.

The boys need quality time with Tony as well, and she has slowly come to realize they really don’t know their father, nor does he know them.  It may be too late, as they are already 15 and 17 years old, and she has had to raise them practically all on her own. 

She has to take the oldest, Tony Jr., to rehab again in the morning in Upper Marlboro. He will be gone for 6 weeks.  He is the only one in the house who even notices on occasion when she is feeling down or depressed.

He tries to help by giving her a hug, saying “It’ll be alright, Mom”.  But now he is battling his own demons and needs help himself, and she is doing everything in her power to make sure he gets it.

Now, Daphne has SERIOUS worries about Clifton since she walked in on him about a month ago masturbating in HER bathroom - wearing a pair of HER underwear and HER high heels.  Daphne has since found about a dozen porn magazines hidden under Clifton’s bed.  They feature mainly pictures of naked MEN.

She fears confronting him about the incidents because she doesn’t want to hear what the answer is.  He’s been avoiding her as much as possible too.  They’ve been like two ships passing in the night.  However, Daphne also knows that neither of them can go on like this.  On top of that, she fears what Tony Sr. will do once he finds all this out, as macho and image-conscious as he is.

Daphne is an only child, and her parents are now gone.  She can’t talk to her husband, but eventually she must tell him all this - but how?  None of her few precious friends knows what is really going on.  She has no one to talk to.

She stares blankly at the television screen, but she sees, hears and feels  nothing.  The world is completely blocked out, and she could hear the silence as she sits on the silk sofa in her beautifully decorated, multi-million dollar house of hell. 

It is deafening.

 
 
 
 
 
 Copyright 2006, R.M. Green