Chapter 36 - A Week Of Monday Mornings

 

 

 

Without breaking the lip lock that they are in, Jon reaches for the cordless phone on the end table that was at their heads and answers the call. 
 "Hello?" he says, slightly mumbled.

"Dad?"

Jon pops up, "Yeah, Steph?"  Jon sits on the edge of the couch next to Beth and talks to his daughter.  Beth takes full advantage and slips her hand up the side if his shirt and starts to rub his stomach and his chest.  "What's going on?"  Jon is a little concerned, because of the time, but it wasn't unusual for Stephanie to call at this hour when she was at her mothers.

"Is Beth there?" Stephanie asks her dad. 

"Yes she is, hang on a second."  Jon looks at Beth, "It's for you."  Beth gives him a curious look, having no idea what she may want to talk to Beth about. 

Beth takes the phone, "Hey Rose, what's up?"  Beth sits up on the couch and moves her legs so Jon could sit back. 

 

"Beth, you said I could come to you about anything, right?" Stephanie asks her, in a shy tone that tells Beth that the subject matter was going to be sensitive.

 

"Absolutely anything." Beth assures the teen on the other end of the phone.  "Talk to me."

 

Beth can hear Stephanie take a deep breathe before she asks, "What did Dalton do to you?"

 

Beth can't talk.  Beth can hardly think, "Um, what do you mean Rose?"  Beth manages to mumble, grabbing Jon's arm to get his attention.

 

"I heard my mom on the phone talking to her friend about what happened.  She said that Dalton did a number on you.  What does that mean?"  Stephanie asks, and she tries to sound grown up, but she knows that she's asking a question that has an adult answer to it.

 

"Steph, can you hang on a minute.  I need to talk to your dad.  Ok, give me one second." Beth covers the mouth piece of phone and says to Jon, "She wants to know what Dalton did to me.  Do the kids know?"  The look of panic remains the same and then gets worse as she sees Jon's face take on a look of concern.

 

Jon takes the phone from Beth, letting her catch her breath and says, "Stephanie, where did this question come from?"

 

"Dad, mom was talking to Kristy and I heard her say that Dalton did a number on Beth, what does that mean?"

 

"Did you ask your mom?" Jon asks her, thinking that she didn't.  He knows that if she had asked Dorothea, she would know all the sorted details.

 

"I didn't ask mom, I would rather get the info from you or Beth - you guys are always honest with me and mom treats me like a child."

 

Jon does the best possible thing, given the situation that they were put into this very moment, "Can we talk about this when you come home?"

 

"Did he hurt her or something dad?" Steph asks, wanting to  know what happened.

 

Jon takes a deep breath and let's it out slowly, "He did, but we will tell you all about it when you get home, okay?"

 

"Why not now?"

 

"The phone isn't the way to do it, hon.  But we will tell you, I promise."  Jon is hoping that he's convinced her enough that she won't go to her mom and ask anyway.  "You can wait two days, can't ya?"

 

"Yeah.  Is Beth okay, dad?"  Rose asking, armed with the information that dad told her about Dalton hurting Beth.

 

"Sweety, she is fine.  We can talk about this when you get here, but please don't talk to your mother about it."

 

"I won't.  I love you dad."

 

"I love you too baby girl."

 

Beth says loudly, "I love you Rose!"

 

"Dad, tell her I love her too."  Steph tells her dad.

 

"I will.  Good night, Steph."

 

"Good night dad."  Their conversation is over.  Jon set the phone back on the end table and says, "That wasn't fun."

 

"There's that name again, working it's way into another intimate moment between us."  She stands to go get a drink.

 

"Do you want to talk about this?" he follows her, knowing that she needs to vent.  He can see that she is even more pissed that his name has touched the kids.  When will Dorothea stop with her bullshit and when will Dalton be just a memory?

 

"I think we do need to talk about it.  We need to talk about what the bitch said and what just happened with Rose." Beth sees the writing on the wall and knows that they need to deal with this right now.

 

Jon opens the fridge and asks her, "What's your pleasure?  White or red?" referring to what wine she wants.

 

"Whatever, just bring the whole bottle.  I don't even need a glass."

 

Jon brings the bottle over to her and sits next to her at the island.  "Ok, let's talk."

 

"I have to know, do you ever think about Dalton, or even Brian for that matter when we are making love?" she asks, looking right into the windows of his soul.  She needs to read him before he talks.

 

"Never."

 

"Dalton never enters your mind when you make love to me in every way?"

 

"I try very hard not to think about him at any time, Beth.  Because when I do, my thoughts go back to that dark place and I want the fucker dead."

 

"When we're in the shower, you never thing about him?"

 

"No."

 

"When your face is planted nicely between my legs, you never think about him?"

 

"Absolutely not." his scowl gets a little deeper.  "Babe, he is always the furthest thing from my mind.  How often do you think about him?"

 

"It gets less and less as the days pass, but I'm concerned now.  He seems to come up at the most inopportune time."

 

"We can't control that."

 

"What are we going to tell Stephanie?" she wants to know what his thoughts are on it, as she thinks it should be a lower rated version of the truth.

 

Jon leans over and puts his head on her shoulder, "I think we should tell her the truth, or fill in any blanks that she may have. I assume that they have heard stories, but she's the only one that has the nerve to ask; she gets that from me."

 

"I agree, we should tell her the truth.  I don't want to down play it or hide it, on the off chance that she hasn't heard anything about it.  And then someone tells her about it and she learns that we lied."  Resting her head on Jon's, she adds, "Gotta love Dorothea."

 

"We'll take it all one day at a time."  He kisses her head and asks, "Can we please get back to where we were before Stephanie called?"

 

Laughing, Beth says, "Let's go to bed."  She spins around on her chair and gets up, "Take me to bed, Mr. Bon Jovi." she reaches for his hand.

 

They have been together long enough that the routine just comes naturally, she does her face and teeth while he pulls on running shorts after he strips his clothes off.  When she's done with her make up removal and teeth, she puts her night clothes on and he does his face and teeth.  And they always seem to meet at the edge of the bed.

 

Climbing in bed, meeting in the middle, Beth kisses his lips and says, "Thanks for not going all Italian on me about going to go see Dot."

 

"All Italian on you?" he laughs, "What the hell does that mean?"

 

"Thanks for not blowing up on me.  I know that you're pissed about it." she smiles at him and snuggles into the crook of his arm.

 

"You're going to do what you want to do, sometimes I just need to accept it.  I hope that you think twice before you do it again."

 

She kisses his chest, "I'll think about it."

 

They laid there in a lovers embrace in what turned into an awkward silence.  The silence was broken when Jon asks her, "Babe, are you okay?"

 

She lifts her head to look at him and asks, "Yes, why do you ask?  Better yet, what do you mean?" her hand rubs his belly and his chest and that takes her attention for a second.

 

"It seems like something is bothering you.  Are you dealing okay?  Do you need something from me?" he looks down at her and she can see that he means what he's saying.  The look of concern on his face scares Beth a little bit.

 

"Babe, I'm fine.  Other than this shit with crazy in the Hampton's - I've been good."

 

"Are you sure?"

 

"Yes Jon, why do you think that I'm not?" she asks in a way that he knows that he better answer her.

 

"Your glow is gone, and your demeanor seems guarded." he says.

 

"I have no idea what you mean by that, please explain."

 

He slides up a little and leans against the headboard, her head lands on his lap and he plays with her hair.  "You seem a million miles away, half of the time and then when you're here on this planet you go 150%.  Your behavior has made me question if maybe you were on drugs."

 

She sits up, "Drugs?  Are you kidding me?"

 

"Beth, you are go go go go go or gone a million miles away.  The happy medium is gone and I want to know if I can help you get it back."  he reaches up and runs the back of his hand down the side of her face.  "I miss you."

 

"I have a vineyard to get control of, we need to get our shit together here because the kids come home in a couple of days and school starts soon.  You need to get divorced somehow and I assume you're working on material for a new album, which means you'll leave soon for a tour."

 

"We have lots of time, can you try to relax?"

 

"I am relaxed."

 

"You just had a bottle of wine."

 

"I'm still relaxed.  Are you looking for things to be wrong?  Everything is under control."

 

"THAT'S my point.  Everything IS under control and you do it with no help.  Stop that." he snaps at her, not meaning to.

 

"Do you want to tell me what's really bothering you?  Because I haven't changed the way that I do things - you fell in love with me being a take charge get it done kind of girl." Beth isn't liking the way that this is going. 

"Honestly babe, I don't know where to start............."

"The beginning is always the best place?" she teases.

"I want a baby."

"A baby what?" she asks, not even thinking that he is bringing this issue back to the table, so soon.

"I want us to have a baby."

"Whoa, what does having a baby have to do with me taking care of what needs to be taken care of?" she boasts back at him, seeing that he's 100% serious.  She thinks about having a baby with him all of the time, but she knows that she could never handle another loss. 

Jon takes her hand and explains, "I need you to let others help you take care of all of it, you don't need to do it alone.  I have people in place and pay those people to do what you do, even though they don't do it.  I want you to let them, so we can focus on our family, and that needs to include a baby."

"Jon...."

He puts his hand up to stop her and she pushes his hand out of the way, "We had this discussion just the other day, Jon.  I don't want to keep having it on regular basis." she says and she says it with heavy conviction.  "I'm not ready."  She starts to get up off the bed when he stops her dead in her tracks with his words.

"Well, I am."

She stops and looks back at him.  "It's not all about you, believe it or not."

"Can we at least talk about it?" he asks, with a little bit of cockiness in his tone.

With a deep sigh and her fingers going through her hair, pulling at the end she says, "Yeah, we can talk about it, but the bottom line is this Jon - it's my body and my choice.  And right now I choose NOT to risk losing another baby again.  That would send me over the edge and I would never come back.  EVER."

Jon knows that he's on the edge of a big fight, but this was something that he needed to talk about, and it's something that he should be able to talk to her about; without fear that she may get mad and leave again.  So, without reservation he starts with, "I thought that the decision to have a child would be a joint decision.  I never thought that you would claim your body as yours to try to prevent us from having a baby.  My God Beth Ann, I want nothing more than to have a child with you."  he scoots to the edge of the bed and sits in front of her, "You are not the only one that suffered that loss or fears having to go through it again.  I feel everything that you do, but I deal with guilt because I wasn't there for you in the beginning."  he rests his head on her stomach and puts his hands on the back of her legs - holding her in place.  "I lost them too.  I'm scared that it will happen again, but we can't let that run our life.  You said it yourself the other day, no more living in fear, well that's what you're doing."

Beth looked down at him and felt what he was saying.  She can see how badly he wants to have a baby, but seeing that doesn't change her mind.  It doesn't even open the door for conversation,  she knows that she could not go through that again - mentally, physically or emotionally.  "I'm sorry, I can't agree to it, Jon.  I can't risk it again."