JuDAS KISS- Eleven- Home, Sweet Home ☗ ✔ ☁ ☗ ☖ ✗

They moved to the home slowly. It took them two months to be settled completely in their own home. It was, however, organized and

decorated for Elizabeth's first birthday. Steve wanted to have a very elaborate birthday party for her. So he did. He decided on almost everything without consulting with Helen; from the list of the guests, to the kind of foods, to the cake and decoration on it. He hired a caterer for both afternoon party for the children and the evening party for adults. It was a combination of a birthday party and an open house. His parents, sisters, and one brother with their spouses and children all came. All the guests were his friends or related to him. Helen did not have anyone to invite. She though about inviting some of her old friends from college but Steve said no:

"You have nothing to do with those people anymore. It is not necessary."

Helen got to meet many people she did not know they even existed in her husband's life. It was the first time some of his family members saw Helen and Elizabeth! They all admired Helen's beauty. He had bought a dress for her for this event without even taking her with him shopping. This dress was for the evening party. It was a hot red long, fitted dress, all beaded, and strapless. It showed Helen's beautiful figure. It had a long slit at the left side of the skirt that almost came to the top of her thigh. Helen took the dress to a tailor to hem it since it was too long.

"I like to bring the slit lower; and use the extra fabric from hem to put some straps. This dress is so revealing!"

Steve looked at her with his hateful eyes and said:

"That is why I bought it. Don't you dare to change the style of it. It shows the real you; the woman who had sex with another man while I was dodging bullets and serving our country."

Helen almost cried when she put the dress on. He told her that she must wear her hair down. Her hair now was long again with the natural luster and shine that it always had. He forced her to wear heavy make up.

"Oh, my God, what is he doing to me? He really wants to show me as a whore!" Of course, these words never left her lips!

The party was a success. All his friends and family liked Helen in spite of the fact that his plan was to show her as a loose woman. It was not her dress or make up that made them to like her, but it was her natural way of speaking and acting which showed an educated, decent wife and mother, that made all Steve's friends and family to adore her. Steve plan of showing her as a bad woman, did not work; in fact it worked the opposite of what he had planned.

The house had four bedrooms, two living rooms, a big dinning room, and a breakfast room which was attached to the bright, and big kitchen. They had a big yard with pool, lots of trees and flowers. Steve's schedule was still the same, three to four days of work and the rest of the week, at home. Helen tried to get over her hurt of the way Steve had bought the house; and began decorating the house the way she liked. She forced herself to like the house; after all it was a beautiful home in a good location. She enjoyed the pool the days that Steve was not home.

Elizabeth was much calmer now in this house, as though she knew that her dad had bought the house for her comfort. Nonetheless, Helen still loved her first child, the son of Jacob, a son that she had never even had a glimpse of. He was the son of a man she loved! The tragedy of giving her son for adoption without even having a glimpse on him, weighted on her heart all the loves that were never satisfied, like love of her mother, father, a man, and ...!

She lived in a beautiful home with a husband, who had been a veteran, who was a pilot, with a beautiful daughter. Now Steve was socializing every weekend with friends and families. They were six families; therefore, every six weeks the party was in their house. He was forcing her to act as a happy wife and mother. She was the cause of envy for the other five women in these parties! But she envied all of them. She desired Jacob, Jacob only, and their son together!!

To Be Continued

JUDAS KISS- Eleven- Home, Sweet Home ☗ ✔ ☁ ☗

With Steve, everything was direct and ugly. Old days that they fought constantly, were Helen's

good days. Now to her, she was a common man, a coarse man, like her own father. For the first time she felt the influence of Jacob in her life, the way he had influenced her and treated her like a woman not a toy and because of that had changed her life! She kept recalling the episode in front of the grocery store. She kept making up scenarios in case they saw or talked with each other again, what would it be like? But they did not! All these were just illusions?

The abhorrence of feeling in her was too strong to be called anything! It was an uproar with the terrible strain of nights and the mornings after which made a combative pain; she could only understand that this would be so dramatic when or if she would gain her old bravery to feel it!!

No person who looked from outside to their lives, would not be happy to change place with them! Only if Helen could talk to them the true happenings of what really happened behind their walls and windows. Elizabeth was growing fast right in front of her eyes! She looked so much like Steve. Now that she was not hungry anymore, she was a chubby baby with double chin, big cheeks; her arms and hands and legs were fat with rolls and rolls of baby fat on them. She was a beautiful little girl since her father was a really handsome man and her mother was a beautiful woman according to everyone. The color of her hair was light brown; not blond like Helen and not black like Steve; her eyes were hazel color, again right in between the two of them. She was so happy to see her father when he came home on Wednesday night or Thursday morning; even though it was her mother, who was with her constantly and took care of her. The first word she learned was not Mama but it was Dada. Helen almost did not care; but deep in her layers of her emotions, she did care.

"How is it that I am the one that feed her hungry stomach all the time, and take care of her, and stay with her all the time, but she laughs and does her baby talk when she sees her dad?"

Elizabeth was truly in love with her dad. Steve was truly in love with his little girl. Although the father and daughter did not see each other half of the week, Elizabeth never forgot her dad. The expression "daddy's little girl" was a perfect phrase for them. The minute Elizabeth heard Steve's footstep, or his voice calling her while opening the door, she began laughing and moving her arms and legs in a way that Helen had never seen her to do them for her!!

To Be Continued