The flip side

Fair day to you all.
I am Charity, the third of the triplets. My sisters are both much better at this than I, so I hope you'll all bear with me. I thought to continue where Faith left off; tell you more of our lives.

As Faith intimated earlier we are both wed to Outsiders who are not only best friends but as close as any two brothers could be. At first I found that rather odd since they are so different in nature and background. But once I learned how they came to know one another it wasn't so odd at all. Both of our husbands were only children; one the son born of wealthy, privileged parents (Charity's beloved) and the other (my beloved) born the son of poverty stricken parents. As fate would have it both were children who lacked for loving parents. One was raised by a succession of nannies and the other was left mostly to his own devices. Naturally, they attended different schools, one private and the other public, but both happened to have an avid interest in ranching.

My husband was in the third grade when his father went to work on a ranch that provided housing for the married ranchhand's and their families. It was there that our husbands met and soon became fast friends. They grew up together under the watchful eye of the ranch foreman who took both of them in hand and educated them in ranching. When they graduated high school Faith's husband was sent off to a prestigious university to study law while my husband worked on the ranch to earn the money to go to the local university to study veterinary medicine. By then his father had moved on and his mother had passed away and he had only himself to worry about.

Both graduated at the top of their classes and when Faith's husband returned home and decided to buy his own ranch, he offered my husband a partnership. At first the going was rough, as neither had much money, so they bought a rundown spread that had been repossesed for back taxes. Each of them started their own practices and lived in the old rundown house, eking out a living until they became established enough to begin reclaiming the land and repairing house and buildings. Within five years they were able to begin purchasing cattle and quarter horses from good bloodlines and they were on their way to becoming respected ranchers, as well as with their separate careers.

I met my husband when he was chosen as best man and Hope and I were chosen as maids of honor for Faith and her husbands wedding. Unlike Faith's situation, ours wasn't love at first sight. On first meeting my husband (we don't use their names for obvious reasons) I found him to be quite handsome, but much too aloof for my taste. As we were partnered for the wedding we were polite to one another, and no more. In fact, I got the impression he thought me to childish and boring. Hope, and I tend to have mischievous streaks (so does Faith but I didn't want to involve her) and I talked her into playing the twin-trick on him (give him a taste of how childish we could be). She agreed since she was of the same mind that he seemed to look down his nose at us, as if we were snobby brats, and he barely gave Faith much more consideration. We also convinced ourselves that he thought Faith was marrying for money and position and that really pushed our buttons.

Anyway, during the practice sessions for the wedding Hope and I dressed alike and changed places each time he had to walk one of us down the aisle. And each time we deliberately made his suspect he wasn't walking the same woman, me, down the aisle each time. But we couldn't get him to voice his suspicions so we decided we'd do it again, on a larger scale, at the upcoming dinner the groom's parents were holding prior to the wedding. We decided that called for a change in tactics and we dressed completely different so that he would think he knew which of us was which. All through the evening we would sneak off to the lady's lounge and switch attire and when he deigned to speak to one us and he would call us by name, one or the other of us would correct him and pretend to despair that he had enough sense to ever connect the dots. By the middle of the evening he was positively smoldering because he knew exactly what we meant him to know; that we were deliberately switching in the effort to embarrass him in front of others.

What I hadn't banked on was him being a gentleman. Not once did he call us on it and when Faith's husband pressed him to dance with me, I expected him to really rake me over the coals for what I'd done. Instead, he got his own back in a completely unexpected way. While we danced I began to see through what I'd formerly thought was arrogance, to the real man. That got my attention and I began 'sensing' him. To my utter dismay I learned many things that made me realize I'd unjustly judged him. Here was a man whose childhood had been destroyed by an abusive father and a mother too faint of heart to come to his aid; who'd been bullied all through school because he was poor; who'd been rejected most of his life by females for that same reason; and a whole host of other unfairness. I felt like such a bitch for adding to those burdens, for I realized that it wasn't arrogance he wore like a suit of armor but the pride that cloaked his wounds.

I knew he wouldn't appreciate pity and I struggled the rest of that evening to keep it well hidden. For the next three days I dreaded the wedding when I would have to be in close contact with him, and those three days were pure hell in which my sister and I did much soul-searching and were unable to absolve ourselves of the heavy guilt that weighted our shoulders. Unknown to us our aunt knew what we'd done and what we were going through but she kept it to herself and left us to deal with our dilemma. I felt most guilty since I had been the first to misjudge him and enlisted Hope in the foolish folly.

Now remember; we thought no one was the wiser for that foolishness but the two of us and the object of our folly. So you can't imagine our distress when, before we left home for the church, our aunt cornered us and delivered a scorching remonstrance as only she can do without even raising her voice. She shamed us; told us how disappointed she was with us, and generally made us feel so badly that we were near tears. Then she turned to me and just shook her head. I didn't need to be told that she was most disappointed in me and I knew what she expected of me; what I should've already done.

So it was that two thoroughly chastised young Witches were forced to put on smiling faces for our sister, and walk down the aisle with the man whom we'd wronged, without giving away our misery. 'Twas a difficult thing to do, at best, and no one but us and our aunt knew our tears were not of joy, but of self recrimination. I was so terribly unhappy that I couldn't wait for the reception and my chance to set things right. I kept looking for my chance to get him alone so I could apologize but nothing seemed to work in my favor; particularly since he avoided Hope and me like we had the plague and understandably so. To add to that, there were numerous times that my aunt engaged him in conversation and I feared she would take it upon herself to apprise him of how disappointed she was with us. When you're over wrought and wracked with guilt you can imagine all sorts of things, and by the time the couple had taken their leave I was in a fine stew (should have known my aunt wouldn't interfere but didn't), and when he finally came over to me I was sure he was about to deliver his own feelings on the matter festering inside me.

Instead, he smiled; complimented me on how beautiful he thought I looked then turned and walked away. I couldn't bring myself to call him back because I didn't want him to think worse of me than he already did and why I cared became glaringly obvious during the next week. I finally had to admit to myself I was smitten by a gentleman of the highest caliber and that I'd blown any chance of earning his respect. In steps the Fates.

The following week while I was at school one day my beloved malamute, Tor, took sick. When I got home Aunt Beth told me he was in the barn, seriously ill, and that she'd called a Veterinarian whom she was expecting at any moment. I raced out there to be with him and found what anyone with a beloved pet would never wish to find. Tor was unsteady on his feet, eyes glazed with madness, and foaming at the mouth. He charged at me several times, growling and whining by turns, and forced me into a corner. I was too distraught to think to use my powers of Witch to extricate myself to safety and there I stood cowering in the corner as I watched the pet I'd raised from a pup go into a crouching stance, preparing to attack me. I never saw the Veterinarian enter the barn. I watched Tor leap with fangs bared, heard a deafening crack then watched him crumple mid-air and fall at my feet in a heap. The silence seemed to swallow me and when I finally looked around, it was to see the man I'd been agonizing over standing there with a rifle in his hands. The horror of what he'd done descended on me and I fell to my knees in anguish and despair.

He came to me and sat down beside me while I wept and then at some point he took me on his lap. When I got to the point that I could listen he explained to me what had prompted him to bring the rifle we kept behind the door in the kitchen. Aunt Beth had already told him of her fears that Tor had rabies and when he got to our home and learned I was outside with Tor, he said a feeling of dread went through him. He spied the rifle, snatched it up, and ran for the barn. And he explained that the tranquilizer gun he'd brought with him wouldn't have stopped Tor in time to keep him from biting me, so he shot him to protect me. I knew he was right but it didn't help my feelings. He sat there and endured my tearful tirade without a word in his own defense and then he helped me up and walked me back to the house.

He stayed that evening and even though I was furious with him, I at least had the good sense not to add to the rest of my sins. Late that night I finally came to realize he'd saved me from a great deal of pain and I went downstairs to find him sitting by himself at the kitchen table looking so tired and dejected it brought me to tears. It was then that I sat down and offered the apologies he so deserved. Imagine, if you can, my complete surprise when he leaned over and took my hand and told me he understood the reasons for both my former and recent behavior. His utter lack of blame compounded my guilt and the tears came again. I wept so hard and so long I made myself sick and guess who swept me up in his strong arms and took me to the bathroom and held my head while I was sick? Aye, the man I'd treated abominably. After he bathed my face he carried me to my room, put me into bed, and left with the promise he would call me that afternoon.

Thankfully it was Saturday and I didn't have to go to school and when I awoke around noon and went downstairs, Aunt Beth told me he'd spent several hours decontaminating the barn and properly disposing of Tor before he'd left. As she made me a cup of tea she told me that it wasn't him whom she called in the first place but that he'd responded because the other Vet was out of town and and his office had contacted the only other Vet in the area. Then she handed me a note he'd left for me and left me alone in the kitchen. It was several moments before I could force myself to read the note, for I feared it would be the last contact I would ever have with him. The note read: "I wish things could've worked out differently and I could've saved Tor for you but sometimes things happen that are beyond our ability to control. In time I hope you will come to forgive me and know that if I could've done differently I would have."

His signature followed and right then and there I decided I was going to find some way to earn his forgiveness for my childish behavior. I called his office but he was off for the day and I decided that rather than call his home I would go there, instead. I pulled myself together and with my aunt's blessing headed out to find him. I found him in the barn behind his house grooming horses. Imagine my surprise when I stood there in the doorway listening to him telling a beautiful palomino stallion that his friend had offered to sell him his half of the ranch but that he couldn't handle both the ranch and his career, alone. I heard the pride, unhappiness, and ultimate resignation in his voice and knew how much it cost him to give up the only real home he'd ever had. I couldn't bear that he was losing what he'd worked so hard to achieve. I went to him, made my apologies which he graciously accepted, and then I set about putting things right. The rest is history. We were married, and he still has what he worked for, only in a different place; my aunt's estate, which is now a working ranch, where we live next door to my sister and his best friend.

Why have I told you all of this? To show you that Witches can make the same mistakes about Outsiders that they make about us. Lucky for me, learning that I'm a Witch didn't bother him in the least, in fact, he rather enjoys his wife's differences. Hope I've given you something to really think about that will help you understand that all of us have work to do to set our houses in order, Charity.