Life Begins (7 page)

Chapter 7

              Apparently, Žarko had declared open war on the English language. Everything from the television to simple conversations involved the Serbian language. Her son didn’t seem to mind the change and just did what he did throughout the day while accepting the pointing and simple words taught to him. Jane wouldn’t notice the difference, considering she was too young.

              But, it wouldn’t have been so bad if it were just Žarko doing it. No, he had his daughters only speaking in Serbian at home. Then, there were the sudden Serbian language books showing up for her to start looking at. Those she could ignore, but it was when Jason started calling Žarko
tata
like the girls that she knew that she really was in trouble. No amount of talking to him seemed to change his mind. Žarko treated him like a dad would and that was all that mattered in the little boy’s mind.

              They had all even stopped calling her daughter Jane. Josie had already started the paperwork to legally change her daughter’s name, but had a hard time getting Žarko to agree to pay for the name Zaire, even though it wasn’t his daughter and shouldn’t have mattered to him. He had even put it to a vote, letting everyone, including the baby have a say. She wasn’t nearly surprised when her own kids voted against her, though baby Jane’s hand going in the air was questionable. She happened to often sleep with her hand in the air in the first place, so she refused to have it count as her voting with him for Juljiana.

              “I think that we should at least compromise, even though she’s my daughter and it should be my choice,” she finally told him after she’d put the kids to bed. They were in his room where they could close the door and keep their discussions quiet.

              “I care because babies do not have father.” And he would be right because of the circumstances involving her ex-husband, but that didn’t mean that Žarko had to be their father. She was still holding out for God to send her an actual husband, one that would be well suited to her personality and level of faith.

              “Why should that mean you get a say?” It wasn’t right that he got to sit calmly on the bed, in his underwear, while she had to pace back and forth trying to get him to see reason.

              “Because I plan to keep you and babies and it is my money that is paying for name change.”

              She stopped right in front of him, hands on her hips as she confronted him. “My children and I are not pets.” She went to avoid him when he grabbed her left forearm. The tug sent her falling into his lap. “Stop.” She tried to wiggle away from him, feeling uncomfortable with the fact that her breasts were in his face.

              He tipped himself back on the large bed, causing her to fall on top of him, thereby allowing him to fully hold her captive. “Do not be silly woman.” She crossed her arms over his chest to put some space between them. “You are being like wife, so I expect you to treat me like husband.”

              “Except we’re not married. You don’t get wife rights,” especially because she felt him digging into her stomach. “How about this? You marry me and I will see what I can do about treating you like a husband.”

              He was quiet as he stared at her. “I am not sure that I want to be married.”

              She nodded. “I know. That is why I’m saying this. I think that something strange is going on between us and it is making it confusing for our children. You leave me to take care of your girls so that I have to sleep here at night when I have an apartment. You bought beds for my children, which tells me you thought about what you did. You have me dependent on you and I have no indication that our staying together is going to continue. You do things like this, knowing that you tempt me to do the things I shouldn’t. I’m trying to create boundaries so that I don’t lose myself in you because I have no idea what’s going to happen when you leave me.”

              “I just said that I am not leaving and am paying to change the name of baby.”

              “But you want her named your way. I have always wanted my daughter to have the name Zaire. I have always thought it was pretty.”
              “It is nice name, just not right name. Unless we do Juljiana Zaire Knežević. ”

              “Not if you don’t marry me. Otherwise I expect her to stay Jones.”

              “Convince me.”

              Which way? With him, she never knew what he was fully thinking “What if I don’t want to convince you?” He allowed her to sit up, but she couldn’t break his hold long enough to stop straddling him. She wasn’t sure why his strength surprised her, considering. “What do you want from me?”

              “I want you to be free.”

              She couldn’t help the slight smile touching her lips. “That seems the exact opposite of what you’re offering. It sounds to me like you’re making me a mistress.”

              “How is that?”

              She rolled her hips against him. “You’re hard against me.”

              “I can have sex without you being mistress.”

              “But you can have me as a mistress because you’re providing the income I need.”

              “You are working for it. Mistress is prostitute for taking.”

              She snorted with laughter. “That was rude. Some women feel they have no choice but to give a man their body because no matter how progressive the world says it is, the world still belongs to men.”

              “You made choice to be housewife.”

              “And I don’t regret it. I enjoy taking care of this family, even though you are a difficult man to deal with.” She found she wasn’t trying to manipulate the situation when she bent down to kiss those constantly sneering lips of his. “You want me to give myself to you, while you decide to take my kids. Where’s my real benefit?”

              “You get to cling to me during the night while I am naked.” She tried to roll off him, but he didn’t allow that. “What do you want as benefit?”

              What did she want? He took care of her kids’ needs. He paid off the hospital bill and lawyer fees. He was willing to help pay for changing her daughter’s name. It didn’t take much energy to care for his daughters and he himself wasn’t too demanding. He even seemed to love having her children around and gave them the attention of a father that she’d been dying for them to have.

              Maybe most of her problem was the fact that she kind of wanted that for herself, to belong to somebody that was going to take care of her like they did her children. She wanted to be a family and have a real family experience, the way that other women were able to achieve. Yes, she didn’t feel the need to work a job, but that didn’t mean that she didn’t have dreams. She wanted to be with someone who was going to support it.

              She lay her head on Žarko’s chest, listening to his heartbeat. “I want to be a family,” she finally said quietly. “I think that I want to be able to have a husband and have my children call someone dad. You can’t just have my children without taking me. It has to be the whole package.”

              She felt him take a deep breath and release it. “Then I will take your family. We will speak of the terms of your surrender to me.”

              He finally allowed her to roll off of him. She laid there, staring at the ceiling as he got up and prepared himself for bed. “This is the height of insanity. You do know that, right?”

              “We can do what we desire because we are two adults.” There was a short pause before he said, “You do know we are changing Jason’s name, too.”

              She covered her face with her hands. “Why? His name is fine.”

              “Is not fair for Juljiana to have Serbian name and not brother.”

              “You are making it more difficult for me to explain this to the group. They already think that I should stay far away from me and now I’m starting to agree.”

              His weight joined her in the bed. She couldn’t help but turn to her side to look at him. His left hand settled on her hip. She guessed that it was supposed to be a soothing motion, but she knew him to be almost incapable of soothing anyone’s emotions. “Why are we still in group? We don’t need it.”

              “They are still my friends and I’m not yet married. I want to be able to go to group until you put the ring on my finger.”

              “You will have me pay for wedding?”

              She traced the veins along his tattooed forearm. “I don’t know that I want another actual wedding. When I married Gary, his parents paid for this extensive ceremony. I think that this time, I just want to relax and enjoy it. Maybe it can be just us and the kids, with maybe Marisol as our witness?”

              “Or, we can just have the kids and ignore everyone else.”

              She tried seeing if pouting would give her the advantage. She got nothing out of him other than his usual look, which caused her to sigh. “Fine. We’ll talk about it. Put our terms on the table.”

              He suddenly pushed at her. “Take those jeans off. It is time for bed.” She rolled completely off the bed to do just that.

~*~

              She had no kids for the weekend and Josie couldn’t be happier. In a magnanimous decision, her mother decided to take all four of the kids, presuming that she and Žarko were dating and desperate to be alone. Mostly because of him introducing himself as her future husband.

              That had been embarrassing, considering her mother had never been enthused by interracial dating, but as always, Žarko’s girls managed to win the day, because the Lord knew that Žarko had very little charm to him. For the girls alone, Ms. Maven Jones decided that she wanted to keep everyone for the weekend, just so she could get to know them better.

              Josie thought it more because her mother expected her to behave like a wild animal and start humping Žarko just because. It made Josie a little frustrated by her mother’s continued need to disrespect the fact that Josie chose to live a life that included celibacy until she got remarried. It was why she planned to use the opportunity away from her kids to hide out in her apartment, away from sexy Žarko and that damn sneer.

              For once, she felt as if God were on her side because Žarko suddenly had to go to work. She used that much needed quality time in her own apartment to just relax and watch some American television. She had gotten so used to sleeping in the bed that laying on the couch wasn’t nearly as comfortable, but she benefitted because she could lounge in what she wanted to, a plain white tank and her comfortable pair of blue panties.

              Žarko hadn’t mentioned anything about dinner, or when he planned to return home, but she didn’t think that it was a bad idea to have something ready. She did have to feed herself and she had never been really good at not cooking for more than one. It just wouldn’t be Serbian fair. Or, she suddenly decided, maybe she could do an internet search and see if she could find a Serbian food restaurant she could order from. Then she changed her mind. It would be best to let him be the one to decide that. He knew Serbian food better than she did after all and she didn’t want to take the risk of getting something neither of them enjoyed.

              “Besides, it’s just nice to lay here all by myself,” she admitted to herself. In her marriage, she’d barely felt like she had time to relax, Gary had her so busy with doing things. With the kids, she’d always felt the need to have some kind of activity set up to entertain Jason especially or she was always feeding the baby and trying to get things done in between the feedings. Calm like this wouldn’t last, she knew, but while she had it, she planned to take advantage of it.

              By early afternoon, she was bored enough to clean the apartment. She packed together some clothing, knowing that she would most likely be staying most nights at the Serbian household instead of her own. She took all the dirty clothes to her favorite laundromat and did laundry. It felt a bit strange doing so much work for a household of six, but at the same time, it kept her so occupied that she soon found a groove and began ignoring the extra clothing she tossed into the machines.

              Žarko called just as set the last load in the dryer. “Where are you?”

              “Doing laundry. You sound worried.” She set the cell between her ear and her shoulder while she began folding on the provided table. She heard him sigh deeply.

              “I’m tired.” Which meant he was probably smoking somewhere. Even though he tried to hide it, she’d smelled it on him enough times to know that it was a problem with him.

              “Well, you can either come to where I am, or you can go to your apartment and have a drink or something while you wait for me to come back.”

              “How much more laundry do you have?”

              “I’ll probably be finished or just about by the time you get here. Depending on how far away you are, that is.”

              “Where is laundry place?” She gave him the address. “Fine. I will come to you then.” He hung up immediately and she assumed that meant he was on his way. She turned her concentration back to the folding. She’d had to wash everyone’s items with the baby detergent just because she didn’t want to wash her daughter’s stuff by itself and mostly because she didn’t want to risk the delicate skin of her daughter since everyone wanted to hold her. She hoped that he didn’t notice.