Chapter 100 - Say A Prayer That We Might Find Our Happy Ending

The police took statements from Beth and Jon before they hauled Dani/Melissa off to jail.  Jon walked the policeman to the door and thanked them, feeling like he was a dog that had been kicked in the head. 

 

He glances up the driveway and sees all the cop cars and the news van, thinking to himself this is just what we fucking need.  

He goes back to Beth in the kitchen.  She’s still at the sink, arms locked on the counter, knowing that she’s going to vomit again.  He walks up to her and takes her in his arms and holds her tight.  She tries to fight it, but knows that it will be pointless.  Neither knows what to say to each other.  He silently blames her, and she silently blames him.   Yet no one is at fault.

Beth looks at Jon and he can see the rage in her eyes, even though she is out of breath and her hands hurt, a big part of her wants to slap him across the face.  In her mind, he brought her into their lives when he had the one nightstand with her.  She’s pissed, she’s livid and she’s heart shattered.  “Now what?”  she asks him with a little bit of cockiness.

“We make sure that she’s prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.”

Beth pulls away and looks for her cell phone.  She had a call to make, she was dying inside and she needed answers.  Finding her phone in the bottom of her hand bag, she gets it out and searches through her contacts.  When she finds the number for her doctor in LA, she gives her a call.  After three rings, Beth hears “Hello?”

“Hey doc, it’s Beth Adams, do you have a minute?”

The doctor can tell that Beth has been crying, she can hear it in her voice, “I do, what’s going on?  They were just saying something about you on the news.  Is everything okay?”

Beth takes a deep breath and says, “No, nothing is right.  We just found out that a family friend took McKenna’s life, some chick that Jon screwed.”  Beth places a lot of emphasis on friend.

“Oh my God Beth, I am so sorry.  What can I do to help?  How is Jon doing?”

“He’s a wreck, we both are.  I have a question.”

“Shoot.”

“Dani or Melissa whatever the hell her name is injected McKenna with an air bubble…..”

The doctor interrupts her, “Oh my God Beth, I am so sorry.”

Beth starts to cry and tries really hard to suppress it, but she can’t, in the most heartbreaking of sounds she’s able to mumble, “Did she suffer, was she in pain?”

“I don’t believe……….” Was all she heard and she drops the phone. 

Jon sees her complexion change and he quickly grabs hold of her, down she goes. 

He eases her to the floor and grabs the cell phone off the counter, “She just passed out!!!”

“She’ll be okay, let her lay there for a minute.”

“Did you answer her question?  Did McKenna suffer?”  he asks in a panicked voice.

“I don’t believe that she did Jon.”  And he ends the call.  He didn’t care if she thought that he was rude, he didn’t care what anyone thought at this point.  

He picks Beth up off the floor and carries her to the couch in the living room.  As he lays her down, she comes too, looking around a little confused.  “Did I pass out?” she mumbles.

“Yeah.” He sits next to her, brushing the hair off of her face, looking at every detail in her face.

“What did she say, I don’t remember.”  She sits up on the couch, pulling away from Jon.

“She said that she doesn’t think that she suffered.”

Beth isn’t stupid, Beth isn’t so grief stricken that she can’t think this one through.  “The last thing that our baby felt was that fucking bitch poking her with a needle.”  Her hand goes to her mouth, “I think I’m going to be sick again.”  She gets up and runs into the bathroom.  Jon isn’t far behind. 

“Could you get me a bottle of wine?  One of ours.” She asks Jon as she sits on the edge of the bathtub, dry heaving because her stomach is empty.

He looks at her with a look that tells her he thinks she has lost her mind, “Do you really think that now is the time for you to drink a bottle of wine?”

“Can you think of a better time?” she snaps, getting up to get it herself.  

As she walks down the hall towards the kitchen she runs into Stephanie and Dorothea.  Stephanie runs up to Beth and hugs her, making Beth cry, but she soaks up the love and concern that she’s getting from Stephanie. 

“Where’s my dad?” She asks.

Beth, motioning with her head, says “He’s back there?”  So that’s where Stephanie goes.

Dorothea and Beth are face to face and all that Beth can think to say to her is, “You better not be involved in this in any way.  If you are, you will really regret that I entered your life.”  And Beth walks on.

“Really, Beth?  Do you think I would stoop so low?” Dot blurts at her.

“I don’t put anything passed you.” She walks away, leaving Dot on her own.  She didn’t care.

 She hits the wine cooler and pulls out a Bongiovi Pinot.  Once she popped the cork she headed upstairs to the nursery. 

Meanwhile, in the living room, Dorothea finds Jon and Stephanie talking on the couch.  Stephanie has her arms around her daddy and she’s crying.  “Daddy, I’m so sorry.”

“Me too Rose, me too.” He hugs her, holding his daughter as close to his heart as he can.  She’s the only one that he has left and that hurts him.  

He sees Dorothea, “Hey.”

“How are you?  Is there anything I can do?” she sits next to Jon, placing a concerned hand on his leg.  “I scattered the news vehicles like roaches.”

He just shakes his head no.

“Did she go without a fight?” Dot asks, wondering how the arrest went.  Jon looks at her and thinks that that is an odd question.

“She had no choice, Beth beat her ass.”

“She hit her?” Stephanie asks her dad, with a half of a smile.

Jon sees the half smile and that makes him kind of smile, “She did more than hit her.  Dani wasn’t able to talk when they took her out.”

“Way to go, Beth.”  Stephanie replies, “I’m going to go see her.”  Stephanie left her mom and dad in the living room; she needed to go be with Beth. 

“Are you okay?” Dot asks Jon as she gently rubs his shoulder.  He doesn’t want her touching him, so he politely gets up.

“Do you think I’m okay?  I have buried three daughters and just found out that one of them was murdered.” He runs his hands through his hair, his frustration at an all time high. 

Dorothea knows how to handle him when he gets like this, or so she thought.  She gets up and walks to him and tries to provoke him, forcing him to deal with the issue at hand.  Little does she realize that he’s not the man that he used to be.  She can’t recognize anything that she sees in him right now.  “You are so messed up, you have no idea.”  She says, standing in front of him.  “You better get some help dealing with this and do it soon; otherwise you’re going to end up like I was, Jon.  Alone and suicidal.”

“Dorothea, go home.” He tells her, exhausted and not wanting to deal with her.

“This is my home.   Look at what you have done to it.”  She says with a disgusted tone, “You have ruined this place.”  Dot hasn’t been allowed in the house, so she had no idea what the renovations looked like.  From time to time she would catch a glance in pictures that the kids took, but she had no idea that they completely gutted it and had a complete renovation.  Her marble floor was replaced with hard wood, her colors were gone.  There was no Dorothea left in the house, with the exception of photographs.

“Please, just go.” He tells her again, “I’ll bring Stephanie home if she wants to go back.”

“I’ll wait for her.” She replies, in a calm and quiet manner that catches Jon’s attention.  She’s supposed to fight with him. 

“I’ll go see what she’s doing.” He says as he walks away from her.  He is feeling very uncomfortable with her being there and trying to get so close. “Wait right here.”

“Can I get a drink of water?”

“Yeah, there are bottles in the fridge.”

Jon walks upstairs and checks on Beth and Stephanie.  They are sitting in the nursery in the middle of the floor, Beth has her bottle of Pinot half gone and they both are laughing, “Hey dad, do you remember when Kenna threw up on your head?” 

That makes him chuckle a little, “I do remember that.  That’s pretty funny looking back at it now.”

“You acted like it was acid and going to burn a hole in your skull.”  Beth says as she’s laughing a good deep belly laugh.  She can still see him freaking out, oh my God take her; she just puked on my head!  

Beth and Stephanie laughing made him laugh.  They sat there for a minute and laughed, until Jon changed the subject.

“Steph, mom is still downstairs.  Are you going to hang out here tonight?” he asks his only daughter, reaching over and brushing bangs out of her eyes now.

“I have to go home; grandma and grandpa are taking all of us to get a family photo in the morning.”

“David?”  Jon asks.

“Yeah, we have to meet him at Central Park at like 9.” She stands up.  “Will you guys walk me down?”  They both nod their heads yes and get up off the floor.  

Beth is feeling a little tipsy and is ready to face whatever God can throw at her now – even if it was disguised as his wife. 

They find Dorothea sitting in the kitchen drinking her bottle of water.  She says to Stephanie, “Are you ready to go?”

“I’m only going so we can do the picture tomorrow, I want to come back here after that.” She says, leaving no room for discussion. 

Dot gets up and says, “Okay, we’ll see what’s going on after that.  Let’s get going, it’s late.  Your dad and Beth need some rest.”  She walks passed Jon and Beth, whom are standing side by side, the united front when Dorothea says under her breath, “I did ya a favor and cleaned out the fridge.  I pitched all of that breast milk that was in there.”