Shady Acres

Cookout part 1

“Aunt K, Aunt K” I hear as I feel a small tap on my face drawls me out of sleep. “Mama says it’s time to get up and come down to breakfast.” As my alarm goes off. 6 a.m. comes early.

“I’m up Mr. Man. I promise I’ll be down in just a few minutes; I have to get ready first and then I will be down and ready to help, go on and let your mama know” I mumbled sleepily. Breakfast was delicious, Cat is one of the best cooks I know. We finished breakfast and prepped the last-minute food and finished setting up. Pal started grilling the meats and while a few of the other men started setting up a bomb fire when the other guest that had not stayed on the property showed up.

It seems like every time I walk out of the house the crowd here seems to double.

“Everyone from the town normally comes’ Cat spoke behind me while I nearly jumped out of my skin being startled.

The cookout is in full swing everywhere you look there are people laughing, carrying on cheerful conversations, children are running around, music is playing all around everyone seems to be having a good time.

“Hey Kar!” I turn as I hear my cousin Pal shouting my name. “Come here I have some people I want you to meet.” I walk over to the group of 3 middle aged men and my cousin.

“Kar this is the mayor, John.” Motioning to the older of the 3 men. “John this is my cousin Karyssa she’s staying with us for a while.”

“Its nice to meet you, Mayor John.” Shaking his hand.

“It’s nice to meet you as well Karyssa, Pal and Cat speak highly of you. If you are looking for work while you are here, feel free to come down to town hall and we’ll get something worked out for you.”

“Well, I’m not looking at the moment but if I do I might take you up on your offer.” I smiled back.

“And this is Jake and Josh. They both work close with me and the community.” The mayor continued.

“Nice to meet you both.” I said with a smile and nod.

“Pal you son of a B*tch where you at?” I heard a loud voice jokingly behind me. I turned to see a very attractive, muscular man with brown hair and blue eyes with tattoos all over the skin of his chest and arms, clearly a biker judging by his cut he’s wearing.

“Liam I swear if you don’t stop cussing in front of the kids I’m going to sew your lips shut!” Cat said side hugging him.

“Kar, come meet Liam.” Pal said, motioning me to walk with him.

“About time you get here .” Pal said handshake hugging Liam.

“Yeah I had to drop Zack off at his grandmothers. They might swing by here later, but he wanted to spend the day with his grandparents.” He said while I just stood to the side kind of awkwardly, until he turned to me “And who is this angelic creature standing here.”

“Kar, this is Liam. Liam this is my cousin Kar.” Pal motioned between the two of us.

“Nice to meet you.” I held out my hand for him to shake. I’m kind of feeling like I’m starting to feel redundant. Not being here for the past couple years is starting to make me feel like I missed out.

“Oh, stop” he said swatting my hand away. “We hug here.” He said pulling me in. During the hug all I could think about was he smelled nice. The next voice I heard was like I was being dunked in a freezing cold ice bath.

“What the h*ll K!” I turned to my ex-husband standing there with flowers in his hand.

“What are you doing here Shawn?” I said with an attitude.

“Well, I was invited, and I came to bring my wife home.” He sniped back at me.

“What?!” I turned to face where Cat and Pal were standing.

With their hands held up and shaking their heads no they both said in unison. “It wasn’t us.”

I turned back to him and questioned “Who?”

“it doesn’t matter who.” He said walking closer “I entertained your idea of ‘getting a divorce’, now it’s time to stop all this and come home.” Stopping right in front of me.

“You need to leave.” I stated taking a step back.

“No its time to come home.” He stated sounding as though he was starting to get mad.

“No you need to leave.” I stated and turned to walk away. Until I felt someone grab my arm and turned to look at the hand that was holding my arm. I swear I am about to snap on this man.

“You don’t get to leave me and walk away from me K.” Shawn said trying to sound sincere.

“Walk away, me leave you?” I can’t believe it. I am about to snap on this man. “You need to leave.” I stated done with all this.

“Oh Shawn you made it.” My mom sang joyfully walking towards us.

“Mom why would you invite him”

At the same time he said.

“Oh I wouldn’t miss spending time with my Family.” He said pulling her into a hug.

“No!” I shouted, making them jump and pull apart. “I’ve had enough. You don’t get to do what you did and then come here and pretend we are family. You need to leave before I tell everyone why we got a divorce.”

“Baby, Come on. Come home.” He said trying to seem sweet. Walking over to try to hug me. “We can work things out and I can forgive you for hugging this scumbag.” , motioning to Liam.

“This is your last warning leave.” I said finally.

“Baby please don’t leave me” he begged. That was the final nail in the coffin. I snapped.

“Leave you? Leave you?” I turned to Pal and my mom “you wanted to know what happened to for us to get a divorce? Well, I’ll tell you. We have been trying to get pregnant for a year. So we decided to go to a fertility clinic to see if something was going on…”

“Kar I made a mistake. Its time to forgive me and come home.” Shawn interrupted.

I ignored him and continued.

“they did all kinds of test and we found out we were not compatible to have children together. After discussing with the doctor about our other options, we went home and he went to go get us some dinner and after about 30 minutes, I tried calling him, got sent straight to voicemail, after another 30 minutes I tried calling him again.” Tears were on the verge of falling, “so after I went to the Italian restaurant that was down the road where he was supposed to be going to and found he wasn’t there. I decided to check his location and he was at his exs house. I called again and left a voice mail to call me trying to give him the benefit of the doubt. Come to find out instead of being at home grieving about the fact that we couldn’t have kids together, he was at his exs getting laid and getting her pregnant. I was all alone to grieve our family that we couldn’t have. And you waited for 3 days before you came home and the only reason you came home was because you needed something. And that’s the only reason he knew I had packed up all my stuff and moved out. So no. I will not be coming ‘home’. No I will not be your wife anymore. You left me. You left me you do NOT get to come here and try to make me be the bad guy and beg me to come home.” Quitting my rant. Looking at all the shocked faces.

“I think you need to leave.” Pal said to Shawn.

“I made a mistake, please come home and lets work this out.” Shawn begged walking closer to me again.

I only realized Liam was close to me when he stepped in front of me between me and Shawn.

“Bud, I think its time you leave.” Liam motioned to where all the cars were parked.

“I’m not your Bud. And this conversation is between me and my wife.” Shawn said rudely.

“Shawn, I think its time you leave.” My mom finally chimed in.