She Wanted It All - Kathryn Casey [70]
In his black leather family date book, Steve faithfully recorded Celeste’s arrivals and departures. For much of 1999, she’d been gone, living at St. David’s, then Timberlawn, then the Sumner Suites and attending day sessions at Timberlawn. He’d married Celeste for companionship, but she was rarely with him. Instead, he had the twins and their friends filling the house. If the marriage ended, he didn’t want to lose them all.
“If your mother and I divorce, will you live with me?” he asked one morning.
“I will,” Jennifer said readily.
For Kristina the decision was more difficult. Since childhood, she yearned for a mother’s love. So much so that she’d chosen Celeste over their father. Now, with Craig dead, that decision haunted her. Yet, she couldn’t free herself from Celeste’s grasp. “You’re the one I love,” her mother had told her. “Jennifer doesn’t love me the way you do, Kristina. We’re more than mother and daughter.”
In her heart, Kristina believed that; in fact, she wanted it to be true. Yet such faith came at a terrible cost. Celeste forced her to lie and cover up for her, to not acknowledge the pain she caused. Kristina loved Steve, and now, as Celeste had with all her other husbands, she was being unfaithful. And Kristina said nothing.
When it came to money, Kristina understood only too well that Celeste was ruthless. Despite having access to all the money she could need, Celeste pocketed the little Kristina made working at her part-time job as a mail girl. “Lend me a little,” she said. Kristina did, but her mother never repaid her. The only way Kristina kept any money was to open a bank account and have it automatically deposited. The teenager even went so far as to find a bank that put her picture on her ATM card so Celeste couldn’t use it.
No one doubted the damage the conflict inside Kristina was doing to her. Jennifer and Justin worried about her, as she lost so much weight her collarbones protruded. With each visit to Timberlawn, Kristina came away more disillusioned. For a mother who said she loved her more than anyone else in the world, Celeste treated her like a servant.
Jennifer and Steve were both waiting for her to answer Steve. If he divorced Celeste, would Kristina stay with him or choose her mother, as she always had in the past?
It was then that Kristina realized Steve had given her the one thing she’d always wanted and never had: a stable home with a loving parent.
“I’ll stay with you, too,” Kristina told him, marshaling every particle of courage inside her. Then she and Jen hugged the man who’d truly become their father.
Life was less tranquil that week at Timberlawn. While they’d let her transgressions slide in the past, a nurse discovered Celeste had a cigarette lighter, and in a facility with suicidal patients, it couldn’t be ignored. Instead of apologizing, Celeste cursed the nurse and fumed at being caught. She threatened to leave the program and go home to Austin, but returned to the day program. From then on she flitted back and forth between the resident and day programs. It seemed Celeste had no desire to return to Austin and Steve. The arrangement, in fact, suited her well.
During the day, she attended sessions at the clinic, taking voluminous notes like a high school student studying for a test: “Beliefs create expectations. Feeling better does not equal getting better. Consciousness is the only game in town. If I can learn from my mistakes, it is more probable that the future can change.” And at night she did as she pleased. She had her suite at the hotel, her freedom, and her credit cards. She even had the cream-colored Cadillac with gold trim Steve had bought her. It had every amenity, from leather seats