Chapter 6 – Wandering on Horizon Road, following the trail of tears

Bette was at The Planet, catching up with Alice and Dana. Her thoughts were with Tina, tough. It still amazed her that her girl was mother now, a married woman at that. She still felt uncomfortable knowing she was about to tear a family apart. But then again, wasn’t it better to have a happy mommy divorced from your dad than to have an unhappy mommy that was still together with a man she loathed more day after day?

“Hey, Bette, are you there?” Alice waved her hand in front of Bette’s face. Bette looked up, not really knowing what the blonde was talking about. A wave of guilt overflowed her. She hadn’t seen these two women in seventeen years and there was plenty to talk about, but she just couldn’t get her head to it. Tina was everywhere, in every pore of her, she seemed to be the core of her being. So many things had changed during the years, but some things always remained. The love she felt when she thought about those eyes, those eyes that reflected her soul. When she thought about the scent of her hair, taking her to other worlds, to outer space, Tibettespace. To a place she felt she truly belonged, there and nowhere else. When she woke up, the first thing she thought about was how it should have been Tina lying next to her, and not just a random woman, Jodi, or nobody at all. When she had taken one of those random women to bed, she always felt like a traitor of love. She had already made the biggest mistake in her life by always obeying her father and whenever it was another body that Tina’s begging for her attention, it was another fault added on the long list.

Melvin Porter was still the same he had been so many years ago. It was an older and more bitter version to be accurate. The fact that his second wife had left him was still something that he hadn’t been able to process. He was retired already and the doctors didn’t give him very long anymore. His heart was in a bad condition and there wasn’t anything they could do, because Melvin didn’t take their advice on taking it easy and keeping calm. He still intervened at Porter & Dorson Law Firm, where everyone pretended to take his advice but just did what they wanted once he left.