53 | the other woman

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C L A I R E

Present:

"LIAR!"

Mom is the first one to break the silence after Vaughn finishes his story. I am startled when she pushes me toward Dad before stalking Vaughn, her knuckles white as she digs her nails into her palms.

"Isabelle..." Vaughn says when she walks up to him but to everyone's horror, she doesn't give him any chance to speak as she lifts a hand and hits Vaughn hard across his cheek. His head turns to a side at the impact but he doesn't react.

The sound echoes through the hall, making even the guards gasp. Vaughn doesn't lift his eyes back up to her as he stands looking at the floor. I see Doris's jaw clench, and she shoves Rose away from her, walking towards her son briskly.

"How dare you do that!" she speaks up, standing in front of Vaughn as she faces Mom. Both women look at each other with hatred and anger in their eyes.

"Your son is a liar!" Mom yells while Vaughn takes a step away from both of them, his face crestfallen as he keeps staring at the floor in a daze. "I have been quiet all these years but enough is enough! How could you lie to everyone?" She looks at Vaughn as she speaks. "You're putting all the blame on my son! My dead son! Aren't you ashamed of yourself?"

"My son is not a liar!" Doris shouts too, pushing Mom by her shoulders and Dad instantly runs towards them, catching Mom when she falls backward.

"Mind your tongue with my wife," Dad warns Doris.

"Tell your wife to mind hers first. How dare she call my son a liar!?" Doris's eyes start filling with tears. "All these years, I was blaming my child for something he didn't even do, and all because of your dual-minded son!"

"My son was not like that!" Dad booms. "Vaughn is lying. Christopher was the perfect boy. He wasn't bipolar. He's doing these to save his ass."

"He was sick," Vaughn says suddenly, without looking up. All the heads in the hall turn to him, Noah Striker's being the most oblivious one among them. "Chris never told you because he knew that you thought of him as being perfect. He didn't want to make you believe anything else. He was diagnosed at twenty and he asked me never to tell anyone—"

"SHUT UP!" Mom screams, shutting her ears with her hands. "You're lying! He wasn't like that. He was my son..." She starts to sob loudly and Dad holds her in his arms, giving Vaughn a hateful glare.

"What makes you think we'll believe your stories, Jackson?" Dad chides. "You couldn't even tell the truth about your kid to your family."

Vaughn jerks his head to look at Dad, his lips parting, and then his eyes meet mine. I swallow a gulp, avoiding his gaze as his stare burns me. From the corner of my eye, I see Doris looking startled at the new information and she looks at her son in disbelief.

"What?" she gasps.

"Oh, he didn't tell you?" Dad says to Doris. "He has a child, you know? With his ex-girlfriend."

"No, that can't be true..." Doris muses, shaking her head.

"It is," Mom interrupts. "Ask Claire how he told her that he still loves that other girl. That's the reason my daughter left and that's the reason we would never believe anything that leaves your son's mouth. He's a bloody liar!"

All the while, my heart drums loudly in my ears as I think over and over about Vaughn's story.

Suicide. Chris committed suicide.

This shouldn't be possible, then why do I believe Vaughn? Why do I trust him that he's telling the truth?

"Who was that girl?" I ask, unable to stop myself as I put two and two together. Vaughn looks unfazed, not replying. Frustrated, I step towards him, eating the distance between us until we are only a few feet away. "Vaughn, who was the girl? The one my brother got pregnant? Who was she?"

Vaughn remains as quiet as a stone, his face blank. I wait for him to say something, anything at all to confirm my doubts but he doesn't. Our parents stare at us in curiosity, Dad holding Mom to his side as she cries, hiding her face on his chest. Rose hugs Doris and they both hold each other close. Everyone waits for Vaughn to say something but he doesn't.

"That girl was me."

The voice breaks through the quietness of the hall and my heart twists in my chest when I recognize it. Everyone turns to look at the front doors from where the voice came from while I stand frozen, unable to believe who I just heard. Vaughn looks up, blinking his eyes as he looks at the doors too. I slowly spin around, knowing who I will see and I am right.

She hasn't changed the least bit in all these years, except for her dress-up, which makes her look older than twenty-six. Her red hair is tied in a ponytail behind her head, her oval face is pale, brown eyes looking ahead with all the courage she can afford. Her dress is a pale green color, the hem stitched to a decorative pattern. She has her fingers intertwined in front of her as she takes a step forward. She stumbles a little as if something is pulling her back. Beside her, David Lucretia stands with his hands behind his back.

"Thea..." Vaughn breathes behind me, his voice low. "What are you doing here?"

"I brought her here," David answers for her, shaking his head at Vaughn.

The man looks troubled for some reason. He nods at Thea when she looks at him and gestures to her with a hand to proceed.

She enters the hall with shaky legs, her steps so small that each one is clearly noticed. Everyone stares dazed at her like she is a dead woman coming alive.

"Who are you?" Doris asks her when she stops a little far from everyone in the hall, taking in the attention everyone is giving her with visible discomfort.

"I'm Thea Willows," Thea introduces herself, her voice soft as silk. "I'm the girl Vaughn was talking about."

Everyone looks surprised while I stand still, unable to decide how to react. Hearing her name from Vaughn's mouth was a different thing but seeing her here, speaking in person, is something else entirely.

"I know you," Rose utters, stepping ahead until she is standing in front of her mother. "You came to meet Vaughn at the hospital four years ago. You're his ex-girlfriend."

Thea blinks her eyes and then gives a weak smile. "Yes...I came to meet him and I am his ex-girlfriend." She looks back at Vaughn and I look behind me to see him giving her pleading eyes.

"Thea...don't..."

"No, Vaughn," Thea cuts him off. "I...I can't see you like this. It's all my fault..." She bites her lips and her eyes scan the hall, coming to a stop when they fall on my parents. "Mr. Hill, I'm sorry for the loss of your son. It was all my fault. I riled him up."

Dad looks stunned at being addressed by a stranger directly

"Hmm..." He clears his throat. "I don't...understand what you're talking about?"

"No, you don't but Claire does." I suck in a breath when Thea says my name, just as she looks at me straight. "Claire...I'm sorry you had to go through this. But you should know that Vaughn loves you, no matter what," she sighs. "I was Vaughn's girlfriend...but we broke up because I cheated on him...with Christopher Hill."

The first person who reacts to that is Mom. She lifts her head from Dad's chest as her hand finds a way to her mouth. She looks with wide eyes at Thea, her throat moving as she gulps.

"Vaughn and I were together for three years but then..." Thea continues. "Then one night, Chris showed up at my house drunk...and things happened." She shakes her head as if trying to not distract herself. "I...I realized that I loved Chris and so...I broke up with Vaughn. But then...then two years later, I was pregnant and I told Chris. He asked me to abort the child, said he wasn't ready to be a father, and that...that I couldn't handle. I broke up with him that night and two hours later, I saw in the news that he was...he was gone."

She shudders as if the memory shook her to the bone even though she wasn't there.

"And then you came to the hospital..." Rose adds.

Thea nods, tears shimmering in her eyes. "Yes...I did. I wanted to see if Vaughn was okay so I went to visit him some days later. I thought he didn't know about my pregnancy but he did and he asked me if I wanted to keep the child...because if I did, he said he would be the father of my baby."

"Why didn't you go to the Hills then?" Rose questions Thea with a little edge in her voice. "Why put my brother through all that?"

"I'm an orphan, Rose..." Thea rubs the tears pooling in the corners of her eyes with her knuckles. "I grew up in an orphanage and went to school on scholarship. After I turned eighteen, I was out of there and got a small job as a waitress because I couldn't afford any more education. I didn't get the scholarship for further studies and...and Chris always said that his parents would never accept me, that I have to wait and when he gets out of college, he'll introduce me to his parents but...then he died and...I was left a knocked-up girl with nowhere to go. How could I go to the Hills when I knew they wouldn't believe me? So I didn't and neither did Vaughn...My son is growing up only knowing Vaughn and no one else as his family. He knows no one wants him. He understands that."

"Your son?" Dad unwinds his arms from around Mom and takes two steps toward Thea. "You mean Christopher's son?" Thea nods and Dad's lips part, his eyes blinking as he takes the strange woman in. "He's...he's my Chris's son? What's his name? Is he here? How old is he? Tell me, please, Miss Willows...tell me..."

Thea sniffles, her lips breaking to a weary smile as she looks at my Dad with liquid dripping down her chin from her eyes. Mom comes to stand beside Dad with the same look of hope on her face as they both wait for Thea's response.

Thea puts a hand behind her back and looks behind her. "Christopher...honey, come out, now...It's grandma and grandpa...you wanted to meet them, right?"

Seconds later, a small boy steps out from behind Thea and Dad is the first one to suck in an audible breath.

The boy is so little, with dark hair and brown eyes. As I see him, I am instantly reminded of just one face in my mind — my brother's. The little boy has a cast on his left hand and walks with his little legs, looking at the tall people surrounding him. He is wearing a red jacket and small jeans, his black shoes small and clean.

"Uncle Vaughn!" the boy shouts suddenly when his eyes fall on Vaughn and he sprints into a run, tripping over his own feet, and is about to fall when Vaughn runs forward, picking the little thing up in his arms.

The boy wraps his small arms around Vaughn and hides his face in the crook of his neck, hugging him tight.

"Hey, sweetie...are you okay?" Vaughn talks to the boy, patting his back gently and placing a kiss on his cheek.

"You never came to meet me," the boy cries. "Mommy said you will..."

Vaughn sways the child in his arms, whispering something in his ear as he soothes him.

"Oh my God!" Dad exclaims, his voice breaking. "He looks like my son. That's...that's my son..."

Dad runs towards Vaughn and Mom follows him. Vaughn convinces the child, named after my brother, to face them and the boy does, turning his beautiful eyes towards my parents and looking at them with unspoken fear. Dad raises his arms, gesturing for the boy with a smile to come to him and the boy looks at Vaughn as if asking for permission.

"Go on, sweetheart...they are family," he says to Christopher and the boy nods in understanding.

He raises his hands and lets Dad carry him. Mom and Dad hug the boy, Dad kissing the crown of his head as they both cry, their tears falling all over Christopher's head.

"Isabelle...look, it's our Chris..." Dad says to Mom, crying hard and Mom bites her lips, running her fingers through Chris's hair. They look at Thea and I see Mom smile through her tears.

"Thank you, Thea. Thank you so much," Dad says and a single tear escapes Thea's eye as she looks at them with unmistakable happiness.

My feet stay glued to the floor as I process all that is happening around me. I look at Thea who is smiling and who looks happy and then I look at Noah, who looks stupefied and I follow his line of sight to find him staring at Vaughn.

Unexpectedly, Noah bursts into a laugh. His shoulders shake as he looks at the floor, squeezing his eyes shut until it seems impossible to understand whether he is crying or laughing. All the pairs of eyes in the room turn to him, Vaughn being the first of them to step forward.

"Fucking stupid Jackson," Noah chuckles, shaking his head and when he looks back up, his cheeks are tear-stained. His blue lenses find their sight on Vaughn. "You're a fucking idiot. People sacrifice for love, for family...what the fuck did you sacrifice for?"

"Friendship," Vaughn replies without any thought. "I did it for my friend...and I'm sorry that you became a part of it."

Noah stares at Vaughn incredulously, his lips breaking to a mocking grin. "I hope I never have to see you again. I really hope." He lifts his handcuffed hands and shows them to Vaughn. "Thanks for this, jackass."

The officer-in-charge, who had been enjoying the drama all along, rolls his eyes as he grabs Noah's arm and the cops drag Noah out of the hall. David follows them while throwing a dirty glare at Noah as he says something to the officer.

With the hall emptying now, except for our two families and the six guards who look dumbfounded at whatever happened in front of them, the tension appears to have eased. Little Christopher and his mother have become the center of attention as everyone surrounds him, even Rose and Doris. He smiles at all of them. A smile just like his father's.

I feel suffocated by the turn of events. My head feels like it has been banged somewhere hard. I don't even realize when I start to cry but when I touch my cheeks, they are wet. Everyone seems to have moved on from everything but I can't. I just can't.

Because I know the part of the story Thea Willows didn't narrate. I know that ugly part and it feels like a punch in the gut, knowing that it should have been Thea. I can't seem to make myself move and join my family. Their smiles feel fake. Them not knowing the truth feels faker. Thea being happy feels like a joke.

"Claire..."

I turn when I hear Vaughn and find him standing behind me. He looks tired and beaten. His eyes are hooded and when he lifts his hand to touch me, it shakes.

I open my mouth to say something — words of apology — when the hand he lifted drops with a jerk. I let out a gasp as I see more blood come out of his nostrils. He puts his knuckles under his nose and observes the blood. Then his eyes find mine.

"Vaughn..." I reach out to him.

"Claire...I..."

Before he can continue, his knees give out, his eyes shut themselves, and he collapses to the floor while spurting blood out of his mouth.


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