Be Careful What You Wish For

By Patti Militello Garner

Joanie Tilton seems to have it alla loving marriage to a wonderful man named Rich, two beautiful daughters, and a life most people would envy. Joanie, however, is not satisfied. Her marriage is beginning to stale, and she is becoming bored with being an at-home mom. So when she takes a part-time job at a call center, she considers it a step in the right direction.

When Joanie meets a good-looking man named Danny, she finds it hard to resist his charms. Although devoted to Rich, she finds herself yearning for this young man; and after they find themselves alone at an out-of-state class, she finally succumbs to his flirtations. When she returns home, she is devastated by what she did and calls it off with Danny, but he has much different plans. A fatal attraction story with a twist, it leaves you anxious to find out what happens next.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Oct 17, 2017
• ISBN: 9781546212386

Patti Militello Garner

Patti Militello Garner was born and raised in South Louisiana but has lived in Northern Virginia, North Carolina, and Nebraska, all of which shaped her interest in writing. She received a B.A. in Journalism from Louisiana State University in 1982, and spent over 15 years writing and editing for four publications in three different states. Her quirky interests/obsessions include the paranormal, Judaism, and Lizzie Borden, but she also enjoys listening to classical music, crocheting, and spoiling her grandchildren. She is currently working on a second novel that deals with reincarnation. Ms. Garner and her husband, Mike, a C.P.A. – who have been married since 1979 – currently live in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. They have two grown children – a son, Kevin, who lives in Houston, and a daughter, Rachel, who lives in Baton Rouge. They also have three grandchildren, Kelsey, Isaac and Marylyn. Contact Ms. Garner at [e-mail] or at her website, www.pattigarner.com.

Book preview

Chapter One

U nderwear. Socks. Three separate changes of clothes. Toiletries. Swimsuits. The list was endless for 38-year-old Joanie Tilton, who was getting her daughters ready for a two-week-long summer camp.

It was going to be the first time in almost 14 years that Joanie and her husband Rich would be alone, and they were both looking forward to it. In her usual way, Joanie was making sure her daughters, Rachel and Katie, would be fully prepared for this most unique and precious of trips.

As she went over her to-do list for what seemed like the hundredth time, Joanie thought about her girls. So close in many ways, yet so different, too. Rachel, the oldest, was almost 14 years old. She was tall and thin like her daddy, and sort of serious, common for an eldest child, with only a limited number of interests. She liked sports so kept her straight, dark Blonde hair short, in a pixie style.

Katie had just turned 11 and was more like her mother than her dad. She was petite in stature but still had some baby fat, a fact that she was becoming more and more uncomfortable with as she approached adolescence. She had long, dark Blonde hair, and it was thick and curly like her mother’s. She, too, liked sports, but she was more outgoing than her sister Rachel and was more willing to try new things, such as going to summer camp.

Joanie looked at the two suitcases lying on the floor in the fourth bedroom of the two-story house she’d shared with her husband for over 10 years. Each suitcase contained most of the items on the list the Baton Rouge YMCA had given her when she’d enrolled her daughters for this trip. The rest of the items she’d decided to get later, probably tomorrow, when she went out to run errands.

As she waited for her daughters to come home from school – their last day of school before summer vacation – she went over the list of errands she needed to run the next day, then checked herself in the mirror before preparing the snacks for her girls. At 38, she still looked a lot like she did when she’d married Rich at age 23. She was short, only five-feet-one, and could’ve stood to lose about 10 pounds, but otherwise she was in good shape. Her shoulder-length hair was thick and curly, dark Blonde in color, and was kept back in a pony tail or a braid most of the time. She wore very little makeup, adding only lipstick and a little mascara to highlight her blue-green eyes whenever she went out, which wasn’t very often. Rich, on the other hand, was the physical opposite of Joanie. He was six feet tall and thin. He, too, had dark Blonde hair, but it was straight and he wore a very conservative hairstyle, short and parted to one side. He had strong features and dark brown eyes.

As she brushed her hair, Joanie thought a lot about Rich. Although she was going to miss the girls horribly, she was looking forward to some time alone with Rich. Their marriage, like many, had started with a lot of passion and time away by themselves – short weekend trips to the beach in Biloxi or Pensacola, picnics, outdoor concerts, or visits to area plantation homes. But for the past two years or so, something had changed. Rich was quieter and seemed tense much of the time. An insurance professional, his job was tedious at times, but Rich was good at it. Still, lately it seemed to Joanie that the job, along with everything else in his life, was getting to him.

When she tried to talk to her husband about what was wrong, he always replied that he was just tired. She thought at first he may have been having an affair, but his reaction when she confronted him with this – along with a little amateur spying she’d done on her own – convinced her this was not the case.

Still, something seemed to be wrong, and Joanie hoped this two-week down time would help. Maybe they would have some time to really talk, to open up with one another about everything going on in their lives. Part of her wanted these two weeks to really mean something. Another part of her, unfortunately, dreaded the time alone with Rich. She found him often difficult to talk to, and many times he seemed grumpy or moody. Unlike Joanie, he was not a party-loving person. He preferred to stay home and spend time with the girls. Since Joanie had given up most of her partying when she married Rich and decided to stay home full-time once her daughters arrived, she was starting to miss it. And she resented it when Rich did not want to go out like she did. She would have even preferred that Rich take at least one night per month to go out with the guys, but he never seemed interested in doing that. Joanie, on the other hand, missed her time out with the girls, her time out in the real world.

What would these two weeks be like? Joanie was nervous, excited, and apprehensive all at the same time. In a lot of ways, she was almost afraid to hear what Rich was thinking, but most of all, she was dreading the possibility that she would have to tell Rich what she was thinking. She knew she still loved Rich, but something was different with both of them. While Rich had become more and more withdrawn in recent months, Joanie was getting back her desire to go out and be with other people – other grownups. The fights they’d had when she wanted to go out, and he didn’t, were unpleasant. And she was getting more and more frustrated with the constant compromising. In short, she was restless, and even though she still loved Rich, she was feeling more and more like something was missing from her life.

As Joanie looked at the clock and realized that Rachel and Katie would be home soon, she opened up the plastic container that held the chocolate chip cookies she’d baked earlier and made up a pitcher of juice. It was time for her to switch from being a wife to being a mother, and forgetting, at least for the time being, about all the apprehension and tension she felt every time she thought about the two weeks with Rich. She was becoming more convinced that these two weeks could easily make – or break – her marriage. It would either make the marriage better, or worse. She knew she still loved her husband, but the feeling that she needed something more than being his wife or Rachel and Katie’s mother was becoming more and more overwhelming.

How, she wondered as she put the finishing touches on her daughters’ snacks, had it gotten to this? Where had the passion gone? Why, although she loved her family dearly, did it not feel like enough sometimes? Why couldn’t she be like most of the people she grew up with, content with a home, husband and children? She felt selfish when she considered what she was feeling, and for several years she had tried very hard just to be grateful for what she had. But as grateful as she was, she could never completely shake the feeling that something was missing from her life, that she still wanted – maybe even needed – something else.

Looking at the clock one last time, Joanie decided to stop thinking about the apprehension she felt, to push it out of her mind, at least for now. She did, however, begin to think about her and Rich’s early years, which now seemed like so long ago. She kept going over their relationship in her mind, and wondered how it could’ve gone from a normal, loving and passionate relationship to the relationship it was now. Going over in her mind the life she’d led for the past 15 years, she hoped, might answer some of the questions she always seemed to be asking herself. Questions like, why was she so restless all the time? What was it she seemed to be afraid of, but not be able to identify? Why was it that no matter what she seemed to get from her life, it wasn’t enough? It never seemed to be enough, and she could not shake that feeling of emptiness, no matter how hard she tried.

These two weeks, she hoped with all of her heart, might help to answer some of these questions and get rid of the emptiness and restlessness constantly inside of her. After all, she and Rich had been married less than 15 years, and if their relationship had already hit a snag – no matter how small that snag felt at times – what would it be like in another 10 or 20 years? Joanie had heard of couples growing apart once they became parents, some even splitting up once the kids left home because they’d found they no longer had anything in common. She did not want that to happen to her and Rich, but she felt that in some ways, it already had. It was already difficult to talk to Rich about many of the things she was interested in – like politics and entertainment – and lately, it seemed the only time they agreed on anything was when they talked about their children. Joanie felt very uncomfortable with the ways things had become, and she assumed Rich felt the same way. But between Rich’s job and the activities of their two daughters, there was precious little time to talk about anything, much less talk to one another long enough to work things through. If Rich felt as uncomfortable about their situation as Joanie did, however, maybe this two-week period would help them. Maybe, just maybe, they could admit their struggles and hit them head-on. In fact, what Joanie really hoped was that, after these two weeks were over, their relationship would be like it was in the beginning. And what a beginning it was ...

Chapter Two

R estlessness had always been second nature for Joan Ann Morrison, who was born in 1960 in a small town called Prairieville, Louisiana. It was a suburb of Baton Rouge, and Joanie hated it. She felt stifled by such a boring town, and dreamed of doing something big one day. When she was growing up, she was always fascinated with the women she saw on television, especially the dancers. She and her parents, John and Anita Morrison, would sit by the television set every Sunday night and watch The Ed Sullivan Show, and Joanie always got excited when she saw the dancers in the background. Alone in her bedroom later on, she would try to imitate many of the moves she saw. She was pretty good, or so she thought, and would dance for hours before her mother would knock on her door and tell her to go to bed.

The Morrisons were a typical Southern family. John and Anita married young, and were expected to start a family immediately. Unfortunately, it did not go as they planned. After Joan Ann was born five years after their wedding, there would be no other children. Anita was devastated at first, but eventually, the couple decided to accept this as a fact and go on with their lives. They bought a small light blue A-frame house on an acre of land in Prairieville, and concentrated on spoiling their only child.

And Joanie, unlike many others, loved being an only child. She never felt the need for a sibling, nor did she envy her friends that had brothers and sisters. She loved being able to get almost anything she wanted, loved having a room to herself her whole life, and most of all, loved getting her parents’ undivided attention at all times. To her, it was heaven, the way things were supposed to be. It seemed, in fact, to make up for the fact that she was being raised in the most seemingly backwards place on earth.

In high school, Joanie tried to find ways to express herself, to quiet the restlessness that came with the feeling that she was destined for greatness, but unable to do anything about it because of where she lived. She was a dancer on the pep squad during football season, sang in the Choir and was a member of the Drama Club. She was an average student, but really came alive when she was performing, even if she was not center stage. In fact, she often preferred being in the background to being the center of attention, at least on stage or on the field.

Ever since she was young, Joanie had also felt comfortable with her sexuality. She had gotten on the Pill early in her senior year of high school by lying to her doctor and telling him her periods were painful and uncomfortable. He immediately suggested putting her on birth control pills to correct the situation, a common remedy at that time. In her true form, she asked him, but don’t those have bad side effects?, in a tone of voice that convinced him Joanie was hesitant to take the prescription. She did not want the doctor – or her parents – to know the real reason for the doctor visit, or how good she was at manipulating people to get what she wanted. But the doctor explained to her that no, the hormone dosages they now use are lower and therefore less dangerous than earlier forms of birth control pills. And Joanie quickly found out that even with the lower dosages, the Pill itself still worked the way it should have.

Joanie loved being on the Pill, and the feeling of total freedom she felt having sex without the worry of getting pregnant. Her first sexual experience, though a little awkward, was unusually gratifying to her. The boy’s name was Lee Turnley, and he had long Blonde hair and sparkling blue eyes. He was a kicker on the football team. After the very last game that Fall, as many of the football and pep squad members were at the local pizza parlor celebrating yet another victory and the fulfilled goal of going to the upcoming playoffs, he and Joanie sneaked off to his car. It happened to be his parents’ car, a light green Cadillac, with a large back seat, and as soon as they got into the car, they began to undress one another. They had both had several beers, and Joanie found that the alcohol, combined with being on a reliable birth control method, tore down what little inhibitions she had. She remembered breathing fast, almost panting, and feeling her body temperature rise as he slipped off her skirt and panties. She couldn’t wait for him to get inside of her. The sex was quick, and it was a little painful, as she had expected it to be, but she knew after that night that this was something she would want to do again, and soon.

When she graduated from high school, Joanie tried college. She enrolled at L.S.U., in part to escape small-town life, and began in the Physical Education curriculum. Always athletic, Joanie thought it would be great to be a P.E. teacher. She was fairly good at sports – track and field was her favorite – and worked hard on her courses for three semesters, but in the middle of her sophomore year, she decided to quit college. Her courses were getting more demanding, and her grades were slipping. She was still living at home, but spent many nights at local bars and night clubs, drinking the night away. She loved everything about partying – the lights, the loud music, the dancing, the cheap drinks, and most of all, the men.

Being raised in a small town had had another effect on Joanie. Although she loved her parents and was grateful for her wonderful childhood, Joanie had very mixed feelings about getting married and having children of her own. The first thing she wanted to do as a grownup, she decided, was leave Louisiana and go explore the real world. She was convinced she would eventually do just that, and if she happened to marry and become a mother later – much later, she’d hoped – that was fine, too. She just did not want to put having a family on the very top of her priority list. That top spot belonged to moving out of state and starting a new life somewhere else. She wanted something different. Something exciting.

Of course, since she quit college after only a year and a half, she was now undecided which step to take next. It had to be something that did not interfere with her social life – that was too important to her – but something that gave her a chance to save up enough money to fulfill her dreams while still living at home with her parents. She could handle living at home, since her parents never stopped her from going out at night, and she knew if she worked full-time, she would save up money quickly.

After leaving L.S.U., Joanie quickly landed a job as a receptionist for a local fencing company called Behr Fence Company. With her first paycheck, she celebrated by visiting a few local nightclubs. Often, she would meet a man in one of these nightclubs, or a customer would come in to the fencing company, and they would begin dating. Joanie loved dating but never wanted to get serious with any of the men she dated. She had to stay focused, she kept telling herself, and not get too involved with anyone. She was saving more and more money so that she could leave the area, and she did not want any of these men to get in the way of her goals, even if sex with them was great, which it often was. Totally uninhibited and confident in her ability to please a man, Joanie had no problem going to bed with most of the men she dated, as long as she’d dated them long enough to get to know them a little. After all, it was the age of AIDS, and she wanted to be careful.

One night, several years after she started working at Behr, Joanie was at a club near the L.S.U. campus called The Lonely Tiger and saw a tall, good-looking young man on the other side of the room. He had dark Blonde hair, which was straight and shoulder-length, looked to be about her age, and was wearing tight blue jeans and a white, short-sleeved Henley shirt that accented his muscles. Joanie was wearing her short denim skirt and a red-and-white striped tank top that showed some cleavage. In her usual bold fashion, she walked over to the man and introduced herself.

Hi, she said after approaching him. I’m Joanie.

Rich, he said quietly, with a slight grin on his face. Rich Tilton. She noticed him looking her up and down as they participated in small talk, something Joanie was quite used to. She was not a beautiful woman, nor was she ugly, but she was attractive, had a nice shapely figure and carried herself in a very confident manner, something that seemed to attract very easily members of the opposite sex.

After spending several hours together at The Lonely Tiger, Rich and Joanie left together. Though she normally did not go to bed with someone on their first date, Joanie felt so comfortable with Rich at their first meeting that she went back to his apartment on College Drive that very first night, and they made love. Their bodies came together in a very natural and comfortable way, as if they’d made love many times before. In fact, they had sex twice before she left to go home, and by the end of the evening, she knew she felt different about Rich than she ever had about any other man. It scared her, but excited her, too.

After their first meeting, Joanie and Rich were practically inseparable. They both worked full-time, but spent almost all of their spare time together. They visited night clubs, had picnics on the beautiful lakes at the university, went to support the Tigers at various L.S.U. athletic functions, and took weekend trips to Biloxi Beach.

Unlike Joanie, Rich was a middle child and had two brothers. Ronnie was the oldest of the three Tilton boys and worked as an Engineer with Dow Chemical, one of the many chemical plants that lined the Mississippi River in South Louisiana. His wife, Vickie, was a secretary at a law firm. They had no children. Warren, the youngest brother, was an electrician for a local plumbing and electrical company. His wife, Shelby, was a stay-at-home mother to their young son, Douglas. Like Joanie, though, Rich had a happy childhood and belonged to a close-knit family.

Rich was also an educated man. He had a degree in Business Administration from L.S.U. and after college, had answered an ad for an insurance agency. He’d planned to spend only a year or two there, but instead, he found out that this was, in fact, where he belonged. His people skills were top-notch. He was a good producer, the clients loved him, and he made his agency, Bennett and Stone Insurance Agency, a lot of money, which meant his salary was very nice, too.

Sometimes Joanie felt closed in by dating Rich exclusively and not concentrating on much else, but their relationship blossomed. She ached when they were apart, and after six months of dating, she found herself staying overnight at his place more and more often. Her parents were not entirely comfortable with this arrangement, and many times they would remind her, in a very subtle way, of her conservative Catholic upbringing. Still, Joanie couldn’t help herself. After all, she’d quit going to church – any church – immediately after graduating from high school, and had different values than many of the ones she’d been taught as a child. Besides, by this time, she knew that she loved Rich, and she was confident that he felt the same way about her.

They’d talked about marriage a few times, but Joanie was usually the one to push aside the subject. She loved Rich passionately, and their love-making became more intense the longer they dated. Still, she continued to cling to the ever-fading hope that one day, she would take off and travel to