The Stranger Behind My Orgasm

Finnegan

My daughter had my eyes and my mother’s eyes. I had spent fourteen years being grateful she hadn’t inherited anything else from Mother.

Victoria had always said they were unsettling, how we all had them but they were in different shades.

"...and Mrs Davies said the experiment was too ambitious for the science fair but I already sourced the materials so she can say what she wants,"

"Angel."

The gym was quiet except for the pull of the cable machine and Angel’s voice coming through my earpiece, excitedly.

"What? Mrs Davies can say whatever she wants, why can’t I?" She scoffed.

"Because she’s your teacher, princess,"

"I’m not in the classroom right now, Daddy, I’m in my room. She’s not my teacher here. Also Rosie helped me set up the display board which took forever because Rosie kept saying stuff about color coordination and it was so exhausting, God, I wanted to shove the board in her mouth,"

"Angel!"

"Relax, I didn’t. I shoved a cookie in her mouth instead," She giggled, the sound teasing my ears and easing the heaviness on my chest. I missed my little angel.

"The peonies you sent are perfect, Daddy, they match my room exactly and I already used three of them for the pH experiment which Mrs Davies also said was too ambitious. I think that just means she didn’t think of it first and she’s being sour about it."

That dragged a chuckle out of me and she squealed on the other end. "Score! I made you laugh,"

"You always make me laugh," I murmured, releasing the cable I was pulling and reaching for my bottle of water. "Mrs Davies is wrong about the experiment."

"Duh, Obviously. I already wrote up the methodology. Do you want me to send it to you, Daddy?"

"Of course you can, Angel," Pride surged through my chest. "Is there anything else you need? I’ll come over this Saturday, can I bring them along?"

My daughter made a long list of things she wanted while I made a mental note of them. She was my pride and joy, the only good thing Victoria had done for me.

I set the water bottle down. "Princess, has your... Did your mother call you?"

"Ooh, what is this new foreign concept you speak off, Daddy? A mother? Where do they get those? Is that some kind of candy?"

"Angel, you know what I’m talking about," I sighed.

"Merriam Webster describes a mother as a woman who has a caring relationship with her child. By that definition, I don’t have one,"

She was fourteen years old and she spoke like this. I didn’t know whether to be proud or devastated. Victoria had ruined things completely with Angel. As she did with everything.

"Your mother is complicated," I murmured. "It has nothing to do with you okay, Princess?"

"Ugh, she’s not complicated, she’s crazy," She sniffed. "She didn’t call me for my birthday Daddy. She didn’t come for the science fair last term, or any other term. She doesn’t come see me in school,"

"I know. I know, baby." Victoria was the worst mother on the planet, that much was clear. If I could just find that evidence so she could be out of our lives. How was she fucking other men and for some crappy reason, she had never been caught? What the hell was going on?

"When is Aunt River coming?" Angel mumbled, switching the topic immediately.

"Soon, my Angel. Soon. I’ll see you this weekend okay?"

"Okay Daddy. Rosie’s going home for the weekend so I’ll have the room to myself and you don’t have to talk to Mrs Davies if you don’t want to because she has been insufferable lately,"

"I’ll talk to Mrs Davies, okay? She’ll need to tone down her insufferableness’".

My daughter cackled on the other end. "That’s not even a word! I love you, Daddy,"

"I love you forever, my Angel."

"Andddd?"

"Nothing you do can ever make me hate you," I added, a chuckle escaping my lips.

The call dropped and I sat in the quiet gym, dragging a hand down my face. Divorcing Victoria had never seemed more urgent. I was tired of her hovering above my daughter’s life like the sword of Damocles.

I had loved Victoria once. Genuinely, completely, like a fucking fool. After the incident, I had taken her in my arms because I couldn’t bear to see her in pain, showering her with all the love in the world.

But it was never enough.

Stalking out of the gym I made my way down the hallway to my bedroom.

"I tell you, it’s a mess out there,"

Oh, hell no. Was that Mother’s voice? When had she arrived?

The dining room light was on and I stormed towards it. My mother and wife sat at the dining table, having dinner and chatting like long time buddies.

Mother’s green eyes flicked up and found me. "Finn, stop hovering at the doorway and join us,"

Victoria didn’t look up from her plate. Her brown hair was down, framing her heart shaped face. There was an obvious hickey on her neck and I knew mother saw that, but of course, to her, Victoria’s done nothing wrong, all of this was my fault.

It never made sense to me.

"I just came from the gym, I’ll eat later," I said dryly, turning to leave.

As I moved, I heard Victoria set her fork down with a small sigh as if she carried the whole world on her shoulders. That pretentious bitch. "You see what I have to deal with? I don’t know why you made me marry him,"

My feet stopped moving. Made her marry me?

"Devin was the fun one between the two of them. With Devin I would have had a happy life. A real life. Finn is so....so, so stiff and cold,"

So that was what all this was about? Devin? In the end, it was always about Devin. My mother’s favorite and apparently Victoria’s. I could just hear my twin brother laughing in his grave right now, that devilish grin on his face.

But wait, what the hell did Victoria mean my mother made her marry me? And why would my mother who loved my twin brother, Devin so much, even do that?