Cards of Love: The Hermit

by Cora Brent

  “It was my idea,” I said, staring into the darkness and remembering as Deirdre planted a comforting kiss on my shoulder. “Having everyone fly out to see my fight.”

  “You never could have known,” she said. “You never could have predicted what would happen.”

  I swallowed. “I arranged to charter the plane. I was…showing off I guess.”

  She wrapped her arms around me and pressed her cheek to my beating heart. “They loved you,” she said. “They wanted to support you. They were your family.”

  There was a tone of sadness in Deirdre’s words. I suspected it didn’t have anything to do with me. My arms circled her and I felt a shiver run through her body even though it sure as hell wasn’t chilly in here. I pulled the sheet up to cover her, surprised once again at the protective instinct that surfaced when I was around her.

  Deirdre of the Sorrows.

  I tried to choose my words carefully. “I want to ask you things too.”

  She sighed. She knew what I meant. “Okay.”

  “But only if you want to tell me.”

  Her answer was a long time coming. “I do. I’ve been wanting to tell you for a while.”

  I waited, figuring she was sorting through things in her head before she said them out loud. I’d already been a witness to her raw pain once. At the time I got the feeling she hadn’t planned to tell me anything and wished she hadn’t so I did the only thing I could think of at the time. I left. But I wasn’t going anywhere now. I’d wait for her to stammer out the whole hideous story one piece at a time if that was what she wanted to do. And if she wanted to cry her heart out afterwards I’d hold her until the sun came up.

  “His name was Alexander,” she began.

  And when she got to the end she did cry while I held her as close as I could.

  Chapter Nine

  DEIRDRE

  His name was Alexander and sometimes he’d show up at my house in the company of his father, an intimidating hulk of a man with cold eyes and bursting with Russian-accented profanity. Both of his parents worked for my family, his mother as a part time maid and his father managing security at three of the motels my family owned, which were among the many businesses my grandfather kept his fingers in.

  Sometimes when I picture Alex I still think of him as a small boy, quietly standing in his father’s shadow with a shock of black hair that would remain unruly as he grew. Whenever he’d spy me peeking between the bars of the second floor stair railing or sidling around a corner he’d grin or cross his eyes trying to get me to laugh. I’d cup my hand over my mouth to stifle any sound because my grandfather wasn’t a man who appreciated the sound of laughter, particularly the sound of laughter from children who were supposed to be relegated to the east wing of the massive hundred year old art deco mansion and not listening in the shadows to things they didn’t understand.

  I was a lonely little girl who craved adventure outside the small world I’d been born into. I’d never been anywhere outside my hometown of Barringer. I was schooled at home by my mother and more than anything I wanted a dog but my mother told me to stop asking because my grandfather couldn’t stand animals. Books were my constant companions but they weren’t enough. I wondered about the little boy named Alex Paskevich because he resembled neither his frightening father nor his stout, serious mother. My mind had been set alight by the myths and fables of my favorite books. I decided Alex might be a foundling. Or a captive being held for ransom. One day I found him sitting outside my grandfather’s study tracing patterns in the Oriental carpet with his sneaker while thick cigar smoke and bawdy laughter crept out of the gap at the bottom of the door.

  “Are you a captive?” I whispered.

  He wasn’t shocked by the question. “No. I’m Alex. And you’re Deidre.” Then he smiled and pulled something from his back pocket. “Do you know how to play War?”

  I watched as he began shuffling the brightly colored cards. “I don’t know what that is.”

  Alex took a seat on the bottom step of the dramatic staircase and patted the empty space at his side. “Sit down. I’ll show you.”

  Alex lived with his parents in a crowded neighborhood that used to house factory workers when factories still existed in Barringer, the quaint Adirondack town that was known for its apple picking and fall foliage and little else. After my father’s abandonment my mother returned to her maiden name and decided to change mine at the same time. And so I grew up in a big house like a heroine straight out of a gothic novel, a privileged Kilmartin with a frail mother, three fearsome uncles and a grandfather who was hard to love. After my mother died and my Uncle Greg successfully argued that I should be allowed to attend the local public school I was relieved to find Alex – my only friend at the time - in my class. The other kids didn’t disguise their curiosity and I was surprised to be an object of interest. I’d understood that my family name was well known, that I lived in the largest house in town and that my grandfather was a man of some consequence. But I’d always remained quietly in the shadows, heeding my mother’s advice to avoid bothering the men in the house.

  Richard Kilmartin was probably the most formidable five foot two man since Napoleon. Incurring his fury for any reason was a prospect to avoid. Once he broke my Uncle Greg’s nose with one swing of a dinner plate because of a disagreement about some cryptic business matter. It wasn’t the first time. Uncle Greg would never retaliate even though he was a head taller than his father and far stronger. He just sat there with blood dripping on the antique lace tablecloth that had belonged to my grandmother before she died of skin cancer at age forty. My mother silently handed her napkin to her brother and he mopped up the blood on his face without saying a word. My other uncles, Cliff and Robert, kept eating as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened while the family patriarch said in the mildest tone, “No arguing on the holiday,” and then began eating his mashed potatoes. It was Thanksgiving.

  “Don’t ever trust them,” my mother warned me only a few days before her death. I’d been sound asleep when the sound of her frail voice woke me and I saw her there in my doorway like a ghostly wraith in a pink nightgown.

  The ghost sighed. “I’m so sorry, Deirdre. I should have told you that sooner.” By the time I rubbed my eyes and focused she was gone and the next morning she was sick again, unable to get out of bed. She never did get better that time and I was left to wonder if that strange moment had really happened after all.

  Despite the fact that my grandfather’s menacing shadow hung over my home life, I didn’t spend too much time worrying about him, mostly because he was indifferent to me. There were occasions when he’d order me to appear at some public function or a gathering of his associates and those were the only times I’d hear pride in his voice connected to my name.

  “My beautiful granddaughter, Deirdre,” he’d announce and I’d stand there with a self conscious smile under the scrutiny of admiring eyes while trying not to squirm beneath the itchy fabric of whatever fancy dress he’d demanded that I wear. But other than being sporadically trotted out as some kind of family heirloom or expensive ornament he left me alone.

  By the time I was in high school I’d forgotten about my childhood loneliness because I was busy. The grief over my mother’s death never really faded and there was no one at home who paid me much attention but I had friends, so many friends. I was class president, a cheerleader, the center of every social circle. There was no shortage of boys surrounding me and I knew I could have any one of them.

  But there was only one I wanted.

  “Why don’t you ever try to kiss me?” I asked him the night Barringer High won its first game of the season, thanks in no small part to the forty yard field goal kicked by Alex.

  He grew shy at my question, turning away and gazing into the bonfire while our classmates shouted and drank and dry humped all around us.

  “I never knew for sure if you wanted me to, Deirdre.”

  I changed positions, kneeling in front of him so h
e’d have to look at me. “I’ve always wanted you to, Alex.”

  He was a gentle kisser. I’d been kissed before but never like that, with such sweetness and reverence, and the instant our lips met I knew I loved him, that I’d probably always loved him since we were two little kids making faces at one another outside my grandfather’s study. We fell hard and fast. There was less than a year left of high school and we made plans, neither of us doubting that every move we made from now on would be together. We were the fairy tale, the king and queen of the homecoming court, the beautiful couple everyone sighed over and envied. Let everyone be jealous, I thought. Let them wish they had what we had.

  I should have learned something from my books. I should have known that the most favored love stories are the ones slated for doom.

  Sometime in that magical autumn the association between my grandfather and Alex’s father had soured, although Alex’s mother, Galina, continued to work in our house. I didn’t think much of it until I learned that Ivan Paskevich had returned to Russia, leaving his wife and son behind. Alex did not have a good relationship with his father, who was prone to violent outbursts, and was not sorry to see him go. My grandfather was heard to utter the name ‘Paskevich’ like a swearword and Alex hesitated to come around the house but I was sure there was no reason to worry. Whatever Alex’s father had done to anger my grandfather, it had nothing to do with him, nothing to do with us. Besides, my grandfather had no interest in who I spent time with. In all likelihood he hadn’t even noticed that Alex and I were together.

  Alex and I lost our virginity to each other on a cold night under the stars. Afterwards as my fingers idly played with the wild waves of his thick black hair I knew I’d never love anyone else the way I loved him. I told him so. He looked at me, held my face in his hands and said, “I’ve always loved you, Deirdre. I always will.”

  It was a blustery late winter afternoon when I was called down to the front office at school. There I found my Uncle Greg waiting for me. I hadn’t seen him in a while, maybe three months, maybe longer. He’d been living temporarily in Albany, working on some kind of business venture. Of my three uncles, Greg was the only one who ever showed any interest in my well being, asking questions about how I was faring at school, slipping me some extra cash for shopping trips to the mall. It was Greg who’d persuaded my grandfather to buy me a Land Rover for my sixteenth birthday, Greg who always made sure I had everything I needed when a new school year began. He wasn’t a friendly man and having him around was no substitute for a real parent but it was better than nothing. I smiled when I saw him and didn’t understand why his expression was so grim. He had a cigar in his hand, as he always did, but it was unlit.

  “Go home, Deirdre,” he said and it wasn’t a request. “He’s waiting for you in his study.”

  A vague chill swept over me because ‘the study’ was where my grandfather existed during most of his waking hours, a place of mystery and dread where he could be heard railing threats at whoever had displeased him. The last time I’d been summoned there was three days after my mother’s funeral. My grandfather had frowned at me from behind his mahogany desk and said that he had not expected to be saddled with the care of a child at his age. He warned that if I gave him any trouble I would be promptly shipped off to a strict Catholic boarding school. As much as I disliked the idea of existing in the big house with my rather formidable male relations, the idea of being sent away made me tremble to my core so I whispered a very timid, “Yes sir, I won’t cause trouble.” That satisfied him enough to dismiss me. I’d kept my promise ever since. I was at the top of my class at school, steered clear of drugs and alcohol and volunteered at the local hospital in my spare time.

  Uncle Greg trailed me the whole way home in his black Escalade. He pulled in right behind me in the circular driveway and watched me until I left my car and went inside. As I walked down the long corridor toward my grandfather’s dark paneled study I told myself there shouldn’t be any reason to be afraid. Whatever the rumors about my family, and there were many, I’d never suffered any violence under this roof.

  A door opened and I nearly collided with Galina Paskevich. She never said much, always scurrying through the dark hallways with her head down, but when she saw me she usually smiled. Now she was blinking away tears and buttoning her blouse with shaking fingers. Our eyes met and hers shifted instantly, a mask of artificial calm overtaking her face.

  “You’ll find your folded laundry on your bed,” she said, the soft hints of her Russian accent trickling out. Then she pinned her hair back into a tight bun and brushed past me.

  “He’s waiting, Deirdre,” my Uncle Greg warned.

  I hadn’t even seen him enter the house but there he was, standing eight feet away and now he was smoking the cigar he’d held earlier. If he’d witnessed the odd encounter with Galina Paskevich he didn’t appear bothered by it.

  I exhaled and opened the heavy door.

  My grandfather was at his desk with his back facing me as he contemplated the bare maple tree in the courtyard. My eyes were drawn to the wall on my right, where a giant portrait of my great grandfather had hung for decades. Sean Kilmartin glowered at me from his frozen position. A penniless Irish immigrant who’d arrived in the Adirondack region over a century earlier, the results of his ruthless ambition were rumored to include a substantial body count. In any case, the destitute teenager from Clare County, Ireland had owned nearly half the businesses in Barringer by the time he died of a stroke in this very room long before I was born. His painted eyes seemed to follow me and he appeared displeased by the circumstances surrounding one of his descendants.

  “You wanted to see me, Grandpa?” I asked, unsure whether I ought to take a seat.

  He didn’t turn around. “You’ve been keeping company with the Paskevich boy.”

  I was a little startled but still didn’t see a reason to worry. He didn’t sound angry.

  “Yes. Alex is my boyfriend.”

  “Sit down.”

  I obeyed, sinking into the leather armchair that seemed designed to make its occupant feel as if she were being swallowed. He turned around then, very slowly. Someone who didn’t know him might judge his appearance as comical, with wispy white hair and oversized ears that stuck out. But today there was something about his unblinking stare, so rarely turned in my direction, that made me understand there was a reason why people feared him.

  “As of today you are no longer seeing Alex Paskevich,” he said.

  “What?” My mouth fell open. My grandfather had never paid the slightest bit of attention to the boys I dated. “Why?”

  “Because no member of this family is going to rut with the son of a goddamn Russian thief.”

  I shook my head, my cheeks flaming at his insinuation. “I don’t know what Ivan did but it has nothing to do with Alex.”

  “Sons are clones of their fathers. And this isn’t an argument, Deirdre. You’re going to end it. Today.”

  He thought the conversation was over. He picked up a gold pen and squinted at some paperwork on his desk.

  “No.”

  A snowy eyebrow rose and his eyes, amber colored eyes that I’d inherited from my mother who inherited them from him, focused on me. I thought if I could only explain to him then he’d understand.

  “I love him, Grandpa. I really do. And he loves me.”

  He set his pen down. I tensed, bracing for an outburst, but when he spoke his voice was lethally calm.

  “Deirdre, I’m going to explain something to you since you’re too much of a stupid little girl to figure it out for yourself. Alex Paskevich sees you as an opportunity and a ripe fuck. Nothing more.”

  “You don’t know anything!” I blurted, ashamed of the way my voice caught and of the hot tears that threatened to spill down my cheeks. “Nothing at all.”

  He wasn’t impressed. “Quit your childish hysterics. Nobody is interested.”

  “And if I refuse? Will you break my nose with a plate too?”
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br />   His eyes narrowed. People didn’t refuse my grandfather. They just didn’t. I prepared to defend myself in case he decided to hurl the nearest object at my face the way he typically did with his sons when they defied him. But his response was much crueler.

  “You ungrateful little bitch,” he spat with disgust. “I always thought your mother spoiled you too much. I don’t believe in hitting women, no matter how stubborn and ridiculous they are. But know this. I’m prepared to pay young Mr. Paskevich a handsome sum if you won’t make the smart choice. And to teach you a lesson he’ll be instructed to humiliate you.”

  I laughed and tried to sound braver than I felt. “That’s absurd. Alex would never abandon me for money.”

  “No?” My grandfather grinned, something he rarely did. It was a horrible sight. “Your father did.”

  I couldn’t breathe for a moment.

  “Liar,” I whispered.

  “I’m a lot of things, Deirdre. That’s not one of them.”

  All my life I’d seen my father’s rejection as the act of a selfish man who simply didn’t want to be burdened with a sick wife and child. But the truth turned out to be even worse. He left because he’d been paid.

  “Did she know?” I choked out. “My mother. Did she know what you did?”

  He shrugged. “Of course.”

  “Don’t ever trust them. I should have told you that sooner.”

  “But why?” I wailed. “Why did you do it?”