Over the following week Daniel put down a deposit on the house on the condition that he be allowed to have his own inspection done and if the report was bad he could have his money back. The sellers had no problem. The home inspectors’ report on the house was just about identical to the one the sellers had available at the house. The house was perfectly sound and there was nothing wrong with it, the out buildings or the land. All five chimneys were in perfect working order as were the wood stoves and the new furnace. The electrical was just dandy, all up to code and all outlets were properly installed and working. Water pressure and water quality were excellent and that was something they’d have to keep an eye on as the property had a well and was not hooked up to public water or sewer. To that Calla pointed out those were two less bills they had to pay.

Daniel even had a title search done and it came back clean. No liens against the property, no outstanding debts. He even went so far as to research the house’s background and nothing worth note came up. By law the real estate agent had to disclose to them if a murder was ever committed in the house, she hadn’t said anything and his research didn’t turn up anything remotely like that. Everything it seemed, was on the up and up. The only drawback he could see was the fact that it was so damn isolated. Their nearest neighbor was almost a full mile down the road. The road wasn’t really a road; it was more like a dirt trail. Time to the highway for work wasn’t bad, it was just about fifteen minutes but time to the grocery store or anything remotely resembling civilization was at least twenty miles away. The neighbor thing could work to their advantage, the less any neighbors saw them and the longer the twins’ growth spurt continued, the less suspicion would be raised. However, he didn’t like the idea of having his family so far from, from, well…everything.

After Daniel satisfied himself that there was nothing wrong with the house or property, Calla and Daniel had their agent start pushing to sell their house and a closing date was set for the new house. A mortgage in Daniels’ name was obtained—if he put her on it they would snoop into her background and she’d know the price of the house, his plan was to quit claim half of the house to her after the deal went through. A very long detailed list of the furnishings currently in the house was presented to them and they went over it, crossing out the items they didn’t want and marking a star next to the ones they did. On the whole the living furniture went, except for two Tiffany lamps, a red and gold Oriental rug and the baby grand piano stayed. In the office, the books went, the desk, chair, blue and gold Oriental rug and antique Grandfather clock stayed. Just about everything in the kitchen stayed, Calla really liked the open cooking hearth and heavy cast iron pots. The dining furniture stayed as did the sterling silver flatware and crystal glasses—both were surprised to find those on the list. Upstairs Calla got rid of just about everything other than the chaise lounge, two comfy high-back chairs and the beveled mirror in the master bed room. That was too bad, while he liked their bed, Daniel was interested in the sleigh bed’s footboard, which would certainly get him more than just a little bit more leverage when they were making love.

“Are you sure you don’t want the living room furniture?” Daniel asked over cups of coffee one evening.

“It’s ugly.” Calla said with a wrinkled nose.

It was a heavy dark wood set that looked to be old and he thought she’d want it on that basis alone but it was sort of hideous. “I don’t think our set is going to fit right in that living room.” He pondered aloud. “What?” She was looking at him with particularly bright eyes.

“Well,” Calla began slowly, “we could sell it at our yard sale and buy a new set.” Was her suggestion. If that damn couch was gone then I could really get rid of Michael Blood once and for all. Was what she was actually thinking.

“We could do that.” Daniel agreed, he looked at his wife a few more seconds knowing that there was a deeper reason for her suggestion and how reasonably she’d offered it to him. Something in him didn’t want to know what it was and he went back to looking at the list. “I don’t want to sell the dining room set, Cal, it was my grandmothers’.”

“I know,” she said quietly. “I thought we would put it away for when Colleen gets married.”

“Married?” He dropped the list to the kitchen table.

“Yes, Daniel. She is going to grow up and move out, get married and have child….”

“Ah-ah-ah, don’t say it.” He waved a hand in the air as his eyes closed. “I don’t even want to think about that thank-you-very-much.”

“Oh, my poor husband” Calla said lightly, “she has to grow up, they both do. The sooner you become accustomed to that the better off you’re going to be.” She kissed her husband on the cheek. “There’s more packing to do in the kids’ room, I’m going to do some of it while they’re over at Kenny’s house for their play date.”

“All right,” he told her. “I still don’t like the idea of them growing up.” He went back to the list. “Get married. Have children, geez. She’s only 3.” Daniel grumbled and then looked up at his wife who was shaking her head at him. “Fine. It’s inevitable, I know.” He held up a hand. “I still don’t want to talk about it. I’ll be up in a bit to get some more things from our room.”

A short while later, with the list having been gone over for the fourth time, Daniel put it away and went up to their bedroom. Empty boxes were waiting to be packed. “Don’t bother with the heavy things,” he heard Calla calling from the next room, “I’ll get them when we’re ready.”

“Right.” Daniel called back. He’d start with his own stuff. There had to be a ton of things he didn’t want or need, Calla had a yard sale pile in the hallway. Going through his closet he found a bunch of clothes he didn’t wear anymore and tossed them in the ‘to go’ pile in the hall. Shirts, shoes, a few pairs of pants. Daniel dug all the way to the bottom of the closet where he came upon a shoe box. Dr. Jackson wasn’t one for keeping his shoes in the box; he thought they must belong to Calla and that they had been misplaced. Opening the top and expecting to find a pair of women’s shoes, he was unpleasantly surprised to find the box full of….other things.

David’s stash box had some very interesting contents. Five homemade DVD’s in plastic cases. A pair of Police Issue handcuffs with key. A bandanna which had been knotted heavily in the middle—didn’t take a genius to figure out that it was gag-rag. Lastly there was an overstuffed envelope, underneath which lay several photographs of Calla in various poses. In all of them she was naked, in some of them she was with men he didn’t know. As his fist closed around the envelope, his eyes shut tight. This box had been hiding down there all these years, just as their father’s Playboy Collection had done back in Chicago. It was just sitting here waiting for anyone to stumble upon it.

Numbly sitting down on the edge of the bed with the box in his trembling hands, he opened the envelope. Inside was over $1500.00 in twenties, fifties and hundreds. The image of the black man stuffing the hundred dollar bill into his hand, payment for being allowed to fuck his wife, came to him. A hundred dollars a pop, this represented somewhere around fifteen of the men David brought home to her.

“Daniel?” She was standing in the doorway.

He dumped the envelope into the box and shut the lid. “What?”

“Something wrong?” Calla was coming into the room now.

“No,” Daniel said quickly, “everything’s fine. Just go back to packing the kids’ stuff.”

“You’re sure?”

“Yeah. We’ll have some dinner in a little while, ok?”

“All right,” she left him alone in their bedroom.

Drawing his hand over his face, Daniel drew in a deep breath. He shut and locked the bedroom door before opening the box. Taking the photographs in his hand he ripped them to shreds and tossed the pieces back in the box. Next he opened each plastic case and took out each DVD, he broke each one in half and then quarters, shiny bits of broken digital disc flashed a prism at him from their place on the cardboard. Putting everything back into the box, he crept down the stairs and to the garbage cans outside where he buried it at the bottom of one of them—cash and all.

Moving out of this house was a wonderful idea…for all of them. The house had a lot of good and even great memories but, in the end, it would be best for the whole family to start over somewhere else. Some place where there were no bad memories, no ghosts in the halls, a place where they could make only happy memories together.

An hour or so later he heard her calling for him. “I’m in here.” Daniel hadn’t been able to go back up to the bedroom, he was afraid he might find more of David’s things laying around up there but hoped he had discovered and disposed of the worst of it. Now he was in his office, going through the desk and moving things around.

“There you are. It’s just about time to pick up the kids, I thought you were…..” her voice trailed off as she took in the sad look on his face. “Now I know there’s something wrong, what is it?” Calla asked as she came over to him and put her arms around his shoulders. “Oh my Gods! Where did you get that?” She asked and reached for the photograph in his hand. “Give it to me!”

“No, Kitty, it’s mine. I found it and it’s mine.” Daniel told her in a small dreamy voice and refused to let go of the picture. It was so much better than the ones he’d found in their bedroom earlier. Not only did she have all of her clothes on in this photograph, she was smiling happily though there was a hint of sadness in her eyes. Daniel thought the picture must have been taken at Sam’s house sometime in the late spring.

“It’s horrible!” She cried. “Burn it, tear it up, and throw it out!” Calla demanded.

“Throw it out?” Daniel asked with wonder. “Why would I do that?”

“Because it’s horrible! Oh, I look soooo fat!”

With one hand he reached out for hers. “You weren’t fat, you were pregnant.” He explained. “And I missed it, Kitty.”

“Missed what?” Calla was no longer concerned about the ugly photograph in his hand but with the sadness in Daniel’s eyes and his voice.

“Everything,” he whispered. “I missed holding your hair back when you were sick in the morning.”

“Oh, now there’s something not to be missed.”

“Running out at two in the morning to get you ice cream or hamburgers, whatever you wanted. Missed watching you get bigger. Rubbing your back, your feet. Hearing their hearts beat and seeing them on the sonogram. Feeling them kick inside you. Worrying if they were going to have ten fingers and ten toes and if you were going to be all right.” He turned and looked up at her with moist eyes. “I missed everything.” Daniel didn’t know which hurt worse; finding this photograph and being reminded of everything he had missed out and which would never come to him again or finding David’s stash box not more than an hour before.

Calla knelt beside him. “You were there when it was important.” She told him and smoothed the hair on his head. “You brought them into this world they wouldn’t be here at all if it weren’t for you.” Calla wanted to remind that he had been there for some of it, had felt them kicking inside of her and then thought better of it. Daniel wasn’t himself at the time so maybe he would think that didn’t count. Maybe it was best not to remind him of that at all. “Do you love them any less because of it?”

“Of course I don’t.”

“Me?”

“Never.”

“Then you missed nothing.” She laid her head in his lap. “Everything that is important is here and now, the past is over you can’t change it and neither can I.” Her arms wrapped around his waist. “What’s the sense in this, Daniel?”

“I’m not throwing it out. In fact,” he reached down and brought up to her feet and then settled her on his lap. “I think I’ll have it blown up, what’d ya say? 11x14 or 16x20? I’ll have it framed. We’ll put it in the new living room.”

“Oh no we won’t!” She protested. “You can keep it if you like.” Calla snuggled against the warmth of Daniel’s body. “I’m sorry you feel so blue. What can I do to make you smile?”

“That’s ok,” Daniel wrapped his arms around her and squeezed her tight. “You always make everything better.”

“Oh!” Calla said suddenly. “I do have something.” Daniel let her go as she climbed off his lap. “Come with me.” Calla took him out into the living room and rummaged through her own DVD collection for a few moments before pulling one off of the shelf. Popping it into the player she turned to him. “I think you’ll like this.”

On the screen a dark image appeared, at first Daniel couldn’t make out what it was until she turned up the sound and he heard two hearts beating. The black and white image began to move and he could make out little arms and little legs. “It’s an ultrasound of Nicky and Coley.” He remarked.

“Yes, Janet gave this to me after one of her infamous tests one day. I forgot I had it.” Looking over at him with wide wondering eyes she asked. “Does it make you feel better?”

Daniel leaned forward to get a better view of his digitally recorded unborn twins. “Yes.”

“Good!” Calla was pleased with herself as she rose from the couch. “Then you can stay here and watch this, I’ll pick up the children from Kenny’s house.”

“Cal? Why did you keep this?” He asked as she gathered up her car keys. “I mean, you thought I was dead, who were you saving it for?”

“Them.” She pointed to the screen. “I was going to leave it with Samantha in hopes that she would show it to them one day…..after…”

“After you were gone too.” Daniel stood up and hugged his wife again. “Hurry back, we’ve still got lots to do.”

“I love you.”

“I love you, too.” Resuming his place on the couch as she walked out the door, Daniel watched the ten minute recording three times before they returned.

End of Chapter Seven
Daughter of the Gods: Little Victories
Continue to
Chapter Eight