Secrets of the Suburbs Ch. 01

Dear Readers: This is Chapter 1 of a 5 chapter story. All of the chapters are completed and will be released in the next couple of weeks.

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Introduction: Move In

Susan McCall let out a low sigh as she watched the moving truck pull out of the cul-de-sac. It only took six hours longer than she'd been quoted. She shook her head and ran her hands through her long, auburn hair. Every muscle in her body ached, but it felt good. It felt good to be finally moved into her new place. Ever since her divorce 8 months earlier she had been living in a two bedroom apartment with two grown children, her daughter Alyssa and her son Frankie. She'd slept every night on a pull out couch with all of her clothes stacked in piles around her. The idea of sleeping in her own bed that night almost made being exhausted worth it.

She was leaning up against her mail box, staring down the road as the taillights disappeared around the corner. She realized that it was the first time since the horrible process of home-buying had started that she had the opportunity to really admire her new house and her new neighborhood. She breathed in the air deeply and it smell like pine and backyard barbeque. She hugged herself loosely and hoped, for the first time in a long time, she had found a place where she, and her children, would fit.

Ever since she'd first gotten married almost twenty years earlier (a marriage made necessary by Alyssa's unexpected presence) she had lived out in the country with her husband...now ex-husband. Right around the time of the divorce, Susan had realized that she'd lived longer in her husband's tiny home town than anywhere else on earth. 21 years in Fort Roth and 20 years everywhere else. Now at 42, she had decided she had had enough of the boondocks and the kind of people who lived in the boondocks to last her the rest of her life. Not that she would have chosen a divorce on her own, that was her husband's call. He'd decided to start a new family with a much younger woman.

So Susan had taken her ex-husbands "old" family and, at first, moved into the city. She and the kids had spent 8 months in a two bedroom apartment. Susan had grown up in town and she'd thought maybe it would be nice to go back. She gotten a new job there, after all. More importantly she thought that maybe the close quarters of the apartment would keep the remaining three members of her family closely knit. While she was happy to be finished with her husband (it had never been a happy union), she was terrified that her divorce was the start of a general disintegration of her family. She could lose a man she didn't love, but she couldn't bear to see her children grow apart. But the 8 months in the apartment had been a failure. She could no longer handle the cramped feeling of having the entire world in her face all the time in the city. She hadn't liked her son's junior year of high school at the urban public school. He didn't fit in. What's worse, constantly being on top of each other had been driving her family apart, rather than keeping them together. They were simply too old, too adult to deal with the lack of space. And so we'd moved out to the suburbs and Susan hoped they'd finally found a good balance.

It certainly looked pleasant from where she was standing. She turned away from the road and looked down the gently sloping, sparsely wood lot towards her new home. It was a quaint split level with red brick and white aluminum siding. There was a bedroom for everyone (finally, although Frankie's was in the sort of basement area) and it already had a cozy feel, even before they'd gotten all of their stuff into it. The lot was around quarter acre, the slope and the trees growing more intense in the backyard.

After taking it in, Susan turned and looked at the neighborhood around her. She lived in a large housing development that had been constructed on the location of a massive farm in the early sixties. Despite the fact that there were several hundred houses in the immediate area, it was hard to tell from where Susan was standing. The entire neighborhood was heavily wooded and the houses had large lots, set back a good distance from the road. More importantly, Susan's house sat on a secluded cul-de-sac at the extreme northwest corner of the development. The road leading into the cul-de-sac had a long bridge over a small creek, separating the circle from the rest of the development. The creek was somewhat wide and there were steep banks on either side of it. The end result was that the four houses in the cul-de-sac had a slightly insulated quality about them, the nearest other house was almost three hundred yards away. Susan's house was the first on the left upon entering the cul-de-sac and the remaining three housing fanned out clockwise along the circle from Susan's house.

"Oh shit," Susan said as she scanned the other house, nonetheless she plastered on her best fake smile. It seemed that her immediate next door neighbor to her left had seen them moving in. She was walking up the gentle slope of her yard, smiling at waving. Susan was not ready to meet the neighbors. She was wearing a ripped up pair of jeans and her oversized red t-shirt was still sweaty from a day spent moving boxes.

"Hi," the neighbor said cheerfully when she reached the edge of the road. Susan smiled and nodded.

"Hello," she said. The neighbor was a petite Asian woman with strikingly large breasts. She was probably only around 5'2 and had a very slim body with somewhat narrow hips. Those large breasts were pouring out of her tight summer dress. The woman had striking dark eyes and long, midnight black hair that was tied back in a ponytail. Susan wondered briefly if the breasts were real and then shook that un-neighborly idea out of her mind. The woman was quite pretty though.

"I'm Claudia Park, you must be Mrs. Wentz!" the woman said sunnily. Susan shook her head slowly and shrugged her shoulders.

"It's nice to meet you Ms. Park..."

"Claudia, please, we're neighbors," Claudia interrupted good-naturedly, slapping her hand in the air as if to bat away her last name.

"Okay...thanks...Claudia," Susan said, thrown off by the woman's familiar attitude, "But I am not Mrs. Wentz. Susan McCall, nice to meet you." Susan extended her hand. Claudia's eyebrows furrowed and she looked down briefly at Susan's house. She sort of pursed her lips and slid them to the side of your face.

"Is...Is Mrs. Wentz inside?" she asked. Now it was Susan's turned to furrow her brows. She shook her head again.

"No...No Mrs. Wentz," she said. Claudia now tilted her head to the side and looked like she was about to say something else. She caught herself and then started to speak again anyway.

"I am sorry for asking, not my business, but is your husband or...boyfriend Mr. Wentz?" Now Susan was extremely confused. Who the hell were the Wentz's and why did this woman insist on it?

"No," Susan said, trying to sound breezy, "It just me and my kids."

"Huh," the woman said. Her eyes scanned out over the rest of the cul-de-sac for a moment. Susan looked at the woman nervously. This was very strange. Not exactly the neighborly welcome she'd been expecting. The woman suddenly realized that Susan was looking at her.

"Oh jeez," Claudia said, flustered, "I am so sorry. I am not trying to be rude. It's just...when the Brandons moved out of this house a few months ago James, you know James Liston from across the street?" Susan shrugged. The woman gave a pained smile, "Well James was the real estate agent and he said he sold the house to Mr. and Mrs. Wentz and their three sons."

"I bought this house directly from the bank, even before they assigned it to a real estate agent. I had a friend who told me about it. If the Wentz family were the last people to buy it, then the story my friend tells me is that the wife got a new job offer in Tokyo and they accepted. They needed out of the mortgage quick and the bank was buying up homes to use as rental property. Gave a good price. I only got this place because I had a friend inside," Susan explained. As she spoke, she saw Claudia's eyes grow wider, but she never said anything in reaction. When she was done, Claudia simply replied.

"Oh, isn't that nice," but it didn't sound like she thought it was nice at all. There was a long silence.

"Yeah..." Susan said. Once again, the woman seemed shaken out of her daze.

"How old are your children? My Kurt is going to be 19 in two weeks," the woman said, gesturing back towards her house. Susan would later learn that Claudia and Kurt lived in the house alone, she'd been divorced for over ten years.

"Oh, Alyssa is 20 and Frankie is 18," Susan said, smiling with pride, thinking about her kids. Claudia's worried look seemed to fade and she suddenly looked surprised, maybe even happy.

"Oh, grown children! I never would have guess," Claudia said. Susan got that a lot. She appreciated that people thought she looked youthful. The biggest thing was probably her trim figure. She was around 5'6 and at 42 with two grown children probably only weighed around 115 pounds. But it wasn't just that, her hair was still shiny dark and voluminous. She always straightened it and let it fall on her shoulders. Her teeth were still perfectly white because she never smoked and almost never drank coffee. The whiteness of her teeth was particularly offset against her dark mocha skin that was still smooth, wrinkle free, and even all over her body. Her eyes were large and dark, giving her an innocent sort of appearance. Her breasts were small, something she'd hated as a young woman but loved now that they sat up high and perky on her chest when other, more endowed women (except, somehow, Claudia) had their breasts at their knees. Her ass, likewise, was smaller but toned and sat up high on her body. Her legs, now poured into a pair of tight jeans, were sveltely muscular. She could pass for late twenties on a good day.

"I can't believe you have a son that's 19," Susan said, repaying the compliment, but speaking truthful. Claudia blushed slightly but smiled. But it was more than that. She somehow seemed...relieved by the fact that Susan's children were adults. There was a bit of an awkward pause.

"Not quite 19!" Claudia said, "Though sometimes I swear... he's got a boy's brain and a man's...body." It had felt to Susan like she had been about to say something other than 'body' but she couldn't for the life of her figure out what that meant.

"Our sons are the same age," Susan said, not really sure how to respond to Claudia's statement, "maybe they will get along." Claudia reached over and panted Susan's hand gently.

"Oh Susan," she said, her voice dripping with meaning, "We are a very tightly knit neighborhood. We all get along great. I am sure you will too."

"Thanks..."Susan said, feeling that Claudia was hinting at something that she didn't understand. Once again, there was an awkward pause. Susan was saved by a voice behind her.

"Hey mom!" she heard. Claudia looked over Susan's shoulder.

"Is that your son? He is so handsome!" Claudia said. Susan turned briefly and saw Frankie standing on the front porch. Susan smiled at her son and silently agreed to herself that her son was handsome, though she felt a little strange about the fact that an adult woman had apparently noticed that her son was all grown up. Not that it would be difficult to notice. He was tall at 6'3 and it looked like he'd finally stopped growing. His build, which had once been almost painfully thin was now filling in, if still a bit lanky. He had curly hair that his mother loved, but he shaved it down to a crewcut. He had his mother's clear white teeth his father's green eyes. His skin had finally cleared up and, despite his fears, he'd had no acne scarring. In fact, he had even honey brown skin from head to toe, an almost perfect split of color between his father's pale white skin and his mother's dark mocha. Boy's brain and man's body indeed.

"What do you need honey, I am talking to the new neighbors?" Susan asked over her shoulder. Claudia raised her hand.

"I know you are busy and I am sure you have a lot of unpacking to do. I just wanted to say hello and welcome," Claudia said and then she turned and began to walk back to her house.

"Oh, uh...thanks. Nice to meet you," Susan said after her. She watched the woman walk away, still not entirely sure what to think about her. She turned back towards the house and jumped as Frankie was now standing right behind her. Her son smiled and shook his head.

"Sorry mom. Didn't mean to scare you. Or chase away the neighbor," Frankie said.

"No don't worry about it," Susan said, "I think she was done talking to me anyway. A little strange," Susan whispered.

"Well she seemed...Nice," he responded and as Frankie said the last word, he reached his hands up towards his chest, cupping them far away from his body. Susan blushed and swatted her son's hands.

"Don't do that...she could be watching. And don't do that around your mother. Make...breast jokes with your friends," she said and then shook her head. Boy's brain. Frankie laughed and shrugged his shoulders.

"Are you coming in now?" he asked, changing the subject, "You said we'd watch a movie..."

"I said we'd watch a movie if we got unpacked. Are we unpacked?"

"I am," Frankie responded. She knew it was a lie but didn't care. She didn't want to unpack anymore tonight either.

"Is your sister?" she asked. Frankie rolled his eyes.

"She's upstairs in her room," Frankie explained. Susan looked up at the second(ish) story window and actually caught a glimpse of Alyssa standing, looking out the window with her cell phone pressed to her ear. Alyssa was a little shorter than her mother, around 5'4. She had long light brown hair that naturally fell in loose curls down her back. Her eyes, were green like her brother's and she also had the same light brown skin. Her lips were very full and pink and she had a small, pixie-ish nose. Her breasts were somewhat larger than her mother's though sitting just as high on her chest. The rest of her features were almost a perfect, younger copy of Susan's. She was biting her lower lip and looking nervous on the phone. She wasn't talking.

"Who is she calling?" Susan asked Frankie.

"Who do you think?" Frankie responded. Of course Susan knew. It was her father. He'd never been a particularly good father, but Alyssa had never really cared. Long after Susan and even Frankie had had enough of him, Alyssa still kept putting herself out there for her father. And she kept being disappointed. Somehow, as an adult woman, it was getting worse. Like Alyssa couldn't take the final step towards independence until her father recognized her as a person.

"Has she talked to him?" Susan asked, her heart breaking.

"No. Voicemail." Frankie said. Susan knew she'd never get Alyssa downstairs to watch a movie. She sighed deeply.

"Come on, let's go inside," she said.

"And watch a movie?" Frankie asked.

"And unpacked," she said. Frankie groaned but, after a moment, followed his mother inside.

Chapter 1: Frankie and the Parks

It took longer than any of the McCalls had expected to unpack all of their stuff. A week after move-in day (and two weeks before Frankie's senior year of high school started) and it still wasn't finished. Nonetheless, it was set up enough for them to be able to live and move around in. Still, it didn't yet feel like home. None of them felt comfortable in the house yet. Susan hoped that a big family, Sunday breakfast might give at least the kitchen a "homey" sort of feel and so she had spent the morning cooking sausage and eggs and pancakes. She had basically ordered her children to the table (they'd both been sleeping in), and now they were all sitting around awkwardly, not sure what they were supposed to do.

"So uh...how is the food?" Susan asked after a long pause.

"Good," Frankie said brightly. In fact, it was mostly burnt. Susan had never been a good cook. But Frankie knew how important this seemed to his mother.

"There's a reason Dad always cooked the pancakes," Alyssa said. Then she looked up and saw Susan staring at her. She looked slightly hurt. Alyssa shot back quickly, "But the sausage is great...just how I like it." They lapsed into another long silence.

"So...did you all get to meet any of the neighbors yet? I finally got to meet Mr. Liston last night, from across the street. You know the real estate agent. I was surprised you know, I met Mrs. Liston and her son and daughter a couple of days ago. Well she can't be more than 40 and her children are about your ages, but her husband...he must be around 75 years old. I mean Mrs. Liston is very, very pretty. But I guess I didn't look at her as a trophy wife..."

Susan could see that her children were in no way interested in her exploits. They really hadn't cared when she'd talked about it before and they hadn't bothered to meet anyone yet on their own. Just stayed in their rooms. And so it had been up to Susan to make a good impression. She'd met Claudia, of course, but not yet her son. Then she'd met Carl Hart and his daughters Lacy and June, who lived to the left of the Park family. Now, after meeting James and Joy Liston with their son Martin and daughter Bethany, she'd gotten a delegation from each house in the cul-de-sac.

Everyone had been unfailingly polite and had welcomed Susan and her children into the neighborhood with open arms. However, Susan had noticed that, like Claudia, they had all been taken aback by the fact that James Liston had not sold them the house. When she finally met James, he had questioned her extensively, though good-naturedly, about how she had bought the place. It wasn't that they were unwelcoming in the slightest. They all just seemed a little...off about the whole thing. Still, there was nothing that Susan could really complain about. In fact, they all seemed so nice that she hoped she'd be able to get close with at least one of the people in the cul-de-sac. And there were plenty of people her children's ages as well. Maybe they would all find a place to fit in here.

"You know, all the young people in the neighborhood are around your age," Susan said for the third or fourth time in the last week. Frankie raised his eyebrows and Alyssa shook her head.

"Mom, we are adults. We don't need play dates," she said. Susan put her hands up.

"I wasn't...come on Alyssa, that isn't fair. You know what I was saying," Susan responded. Alyssa had been sullen ever since the divorce. Moving to this new house hadn't seemed to make it any better.

"I know, but you need to just chill out a little bit. I don't care about the neighbors and I don't want to make friends with June or Lacy or Bethany and I don't want to date Martin or James..."

"James is the old man!" Frankie said, not exactly reading the room. Alyssa shot him an ugly look.

"Or Kurt or whatever. I just want to go to school and be left alone," Alyssa said, sounding more like a teenager than the adult she claimed to be.

"I know you think that this is all my fault...that you had some sort of perfect life out there...but none of us were happy living with your father. You always forgive everything that he does and you never forget any of my mistakes. I didn't just this. I left because it was clear he didn't want me anymore. I did what I did for all of this," Susan hadn't meant to say everything, but she was tired. Tired from moving and tired from divorcing and tired of...everything. Alyssa looked like she'd been struck, her eyes watery. But she got herself together quickly.

"Whatever Mom, I am not trying to pick a fight. Sorry," Alyssa said and then she crossed her arms in front of her breasts and slumped down in the seat. Susan felt embarrassed that it had suddenly escalated to this again. The room was quiet for a while.