SEAL'd Trust (Brotherhood of SEAL'd Hearts)

by Gabi Moore

  I bent down to examine the intricate inlay of white flowers with black petals, all made of wood and embedded in the glossy surface. It was the most perfect table I’d ever seen – something that would definitely transform my boring old living room.

  “It’s amazing! How much do you want for it? I have to have it.” I couldn’t stop running my fingers over its mirror-smooth surface.

  “Eh, take it,” he said and shrugged.

  I looked at him wide eyed.

  “Mark, this must have taken you hours to make. You’re crazy, let me pay you for it, for heaven’s sake!”

  “Please, I want you to have it.”

  There really was something remarkable about his smile.

  “Now I know for sure you live in lala land. Not only do you take orders from your dreams but you give away your work for free to everyone?”

  “No, not everyone. Just you.”

  The look he gave me made my knees weak. I cleared my throat and tried to distract my fingers along the lines of the flower again.

  “Thank you,” I mumbled, but I couldn’t make eye contact. It had been a strange day. When my cheeks stopped burning and I looked at him again, he was smiling mischievously at me, legs spread and hands on hips, like he hadn’t just made such an outrageously romantic gesture. Divorce had been the most painful ordeal of my life but hell, I was only a few months out and already up one marriage proposal and a cute table.

  “I should get home,” I said.

  “Sure. I’ll get Sebastian to give you a lift. Give him your address and I’ll have the table sent over,” he said breezily.

  While I was busy smoldering to death under his gaze he seemed cool, composed and easy as you please. Before I could find something to say, he quickly said goodbye and left, leaving me wondering what the hell had just hit me.

  I left soon after that with Sebastian, a friendly older guy in blue overalls who smelt like glue, and arrived at work just before two. I cursed under my breath, suddenly remembering that I had promised to pick Nicky up from pre-school at 2:30. There was no way I’d make it now.

  “Shit!” I mumbled, raced into the office and flung my handbag down. I soon had the phone in my hand, while waking up the laptop with my other hand and balking at the pile of emails that had sprung up there over the last few hours alone.

  “Hi Sandra? Sandra, it’s Kat. I hate to be a pain in the ass but could you take Nicky this afternoon? I’m swamped here at work and time’s just run away with me…”

  The crisis resolved, I threw down my phone and next tried to pick through all my emails, every last one of them labeled ‘Urgent’. The intern Melissa came around silently and plunked a cup of coffee down on my desk without saying a word.

  “Oh God, you’re an angel, thank you,” I said. She gave me a salute and walked off.

  The phone buzzed.

  “Shit!”

  Someone I definitely did not want to speak to.

  “Pradesh! Hi! Long time” I said with all the fake enthusiasm I could muster.

  “Yes, I know there’s been a delay with that, but you have to understand, the grant writers are not actually on site with us, we freelance them independently…” I picked up a gnarly looking elastic and nervously twiddled it in my fingers. “Yes, yes I understand, Pradesh, but we’ve done everything we can on our side.”

  The Lotus Program was the single most ambitious project for the empowerment of women and girls in the Indian subcontinent that any one NGO had ever undertaken, but the nasty truth was that I felt like a completely disempowered woman roughly 95% of my workdays.

  I took a pen in my hand and clicked at it viciously as the voice on the other end proceeded to lecture me. I nodded and listened, then put the pen tip on the elastic band and drew on it again and again, blackening it.

  “That’s reasonable Pradesh, and I do understand that. I’ll be following up with Miss McKenna as soon as we hang up, thank you so much for your patience,” I said, my own patience running thinner as the black on the elastic grew thicker.

  I hung up and exhaled loudly, took a sip of coffee and tried to think. Before I could scarcely form a thought my phone pinged.

  It was Anthony.

  My apologies for the rush today. I’d love to see you soon though. Can I take you somewhere for dinner, let’s say tomorrow evening?

  I groaned. I didn’t have nearly enough time on my hands to deal with irate school principals in eastern Chennai and juggle a dating life at the same time. I put my head in my hands and rubbed my temples. Maybe I should be like that hot idiot Mark. Maybe I should follow my intuition and see where it took me, since I seemed incapable of juggling all this crap on my own.

  “You OK?”

  It was Melissa. I gave her an exhausted smile.

  “Just a busy day. Lots of decisions to make, you know?”

  Just then my phone pinged again. Another message from Anthony, this time just a single emoji. The kissing emoji. Melissa’s eyes darted to the screen and quickly back again.

  “Man trouble?” she asked sweetly.

  I laughed.

  “Yes, as a matter of fact. But I’m thinking I should start learning to follow my own intuition about these things…”

  “Ooh, that sounds interesting.”

  “Trouble is I have no idea what my intuition is saying.” I had already asked for a sign and got …well, him.

  “Hey what’s that?”

  “What’s what?”

  “That on your wrist?”

  I looked down and saw that without thinking I had put the elastic band around my wrist. I must have done it while talking to Pradesh.

  “It’s uh …oh it’s nothing” I said and pulled the elastic band off. I froze. The ink I had scribbled onto it had transferred itself to my skin, leaving a perfect, uniform band of black all around my wrist.

  “Melissa, do you believe in, like, signs? You know, omens?”

  She gave me a weird expression.

  “It’s just Mark,” she said.

  “What?”

  “I said, it’s just a mark.”

  I turned my wrist over and examined the line again.

  “Nevermind. It doesn’t mean anything,” I said quickly.

  Chapter 6 - Kat

  Masooma Tavawalla. A fifteen-year-old girl who had made waves last year after creating a Facebook group condemning the Bohra community for their participation in female genital mutilation. A sweet, moon faced thing who had done the TED talks, done the morning talk show circuit and was now turning up at my office in half an hour to discuss partnering with the Lotus Program for an intervention.

  I scrolled through photos of her girlish, unremarkable face. Google images offered only the same handful of gritty social media snaps and a few stills from TV. I made a mental note to offer to pay for some professional shots for her. At the rate she was garnering attention for her cause, she’d need them.

  From all accounts she was a firecracker. Whip-smart, the eldest of seven children, outspoken and with a heart of triple reinforced gold, if the interviews I’d read were to be believed. I had only emailed with her briefly but was touched by her frankness, and her excitement to hear about out initiatives. She was a phenomenal young woman, an inspiration and a touching tribute to the robust human spirit. She was a marvel. Truly.

  Then why was I so thoroughly bored?

  I sighed and scrolled through listlessly.

  Mark.

  He was all I could think about. He had been a bright, weird spark in my boring day and I hadn’t been able to shake his memory. His cheeky smile. The carved coffee table had arrived this morning and I had stood staring at for it a full five minutes, wondering if it warranted me calling him up for a thank you drinks. People did that, right? Said thank you for furniture over drinks?

  I nervously chewed my pen and tried to remember what Anthony had mentioned his last name being, and before I could stop my fingers, they were clattering over the keyboard.

  ‘Mark Cane furniture’ I
typed and hit enter.

  The screen washed over with pictures that were predominantly black, red and purple. It took me a while to understand what I was seeing. That was him all right. I clicked a few links and found his webpage.

  I gasped and flopped back in my seat.

  Sex furniture.

  Sex. Furniture.

  Plain as day, there it was in tasteful black and red. Was that …yes, some of the pieces even had that same carving as the table I’d cheerfully received this morning. “Not the usual Balinese style” indeed. I scrolled through the gallery. Big wooden crosses that looked like they came straight from a medieval dungeon. Cages. Chairs with holes in them. I zoomed in on an innocent looking bed that on closer inspection had a pillory built into it, and heavy steel rings on each of the four posts.

  “What’s so funny?”

  I slammed the laptop shut. Melissa had come in with coffee and was looking at me with interest.

  “Nothing, just …it’s nothing. Have you heard from Masooma yet?”

  Melissa gave me a knowing look and plunked the coffee down on my table.

  “Yeah, she’s on her way now, you ready?”

  “Absolutely,” I said, and watched her walk out again. I instantly peeled open the laptop again and greedily scanned page after black page. And then there he was. I froze and took a good look at him. He was posing in a simple photograph against a giant saw, all his inky scribbles visible all along his arm. He was smiling right at me.

  I clicked “contact” and saw a custom request form. Ah. So people made requests. I smiled wryly. Perverts.

  I briefly wondered if Anthony had any idea. My eyes hovered over the “submit” button and I smiled to myself at the choice of word. In hindsight, he did seem like the type. The strange darkness in the eyes. The tattoos. The outrageously flirty smile. Did he use any of the things he made…?

  Without thinking, I started to type. The request form was anonymous, so what difference did it make? It would just be a bit of fun. It didn’t mean anything.

  I want something made for me, I don’t care what. Money is no object. I leave the details to you. I only know that when I’m finished using it, I want it to leave marks. LOTS of marks.

  I giggled and clicked “submit”. The screen went dark. Nothing would happen of course. He probably got loads of curious chancers just messing around, what with an open form like that just right on his website. I closed the laptop again.

  Still. It would be kind of cool if he responded. I had no idea what I’d do if he did, but the idea was a thrilling distraction, what with the poster girl for female genital mutilation likely to take up my entire afternoon with somber chat about the political state in India... I checked myself. That was unkind. I took a sip of coffee to clear my head. I had work to do. I knew when I committed to this job that I would be dealing with unpleasant facts, with hard, sometimes unrewarding work. I just had to be an adult about it.

  And with that I made off towards the meeting room, composing an argument in my head about why I was just mistaken, and that I couldn’t possibly be turned on right now. By the time I reached the meeting room doors and flung them open, I had completely convinced myself I wasn’t desperate for him to reply.

  Chapter 7 - Mark

  “When you get older, you’ll understand,” Anthony said. “The impulse to be a father is inborn, it’s just something natural that every man has to arrive at, sooner or later.”

  I laughed. “Spoken like a man who already has a kid.”

  “I’m serious, Mark. I used to think the same as you. If someone told me at your age that I’d one day be a devoted father, I would have laughed at them.”

  Ever since Anthony’s wife passed away these little chats about my future were getting more and more frequent.

  “Christ, Anthony, you’re like, five or six years older than me.”

  “Whatever. You’ll see. You’ll meet the right woman one day, and you’ll see just how much can change in five years. Or five days. Or an afternoon even, I promise.”

  I held my tongue.

  I rolled around the possibility of playfully prying about his new girlfriend, the flame-headed Miss Kat Lilith. But I was well aware that these occasional chummy moments were mostly on his terms. To my surprise, he laughed and said, “For instance with Kat. I don’t want to scare her away or anything, but I think she might be it. I just know.”

  I exhaled loudly into the receiver of the phone.

  “Wow. No offense, but how long have you known her for?”

  “Not long. But that doesn’t matter,” he said quickly.

  “Yeah? What does she think about all this?” I asked, suddenly aware of how badly I didn’t want to seem too interested in his answer.

  ‘Well, I think she’s been hurt in the past, you know? A divorce. But she’s interested, trust me.”

  I said nothing.

  “We’re seeing each other this evening, so I’d say yeah, she’s pretty keen. Anyway, let me get back to the grindstone buddy, I won’t keep you.”

  I briefly wondered about the ins and outs of this man’s love life, and wondered what had prompted him to suddenly share so much of it with me. But he cheerfully hung up and I found my thoughts coming undone for a moment.

  I snapped myself out of it. It was easy to scoff at his hokey old school relationship ‘advice’, but what did I know about love anyway? I didn’t exactly have the most amazing track record with women myself. Maybe he was right. Maybe not. I checked my mail again and looked at the time. An interesting consult coming up this afternoon.

  Now, I’ve be selling my wares for a long time and if there’s one thing I know, it’s that the timid, curious sorts that come all shy and reluctant to the shows, end up being my biggest clients.

  It’s always the quiet ones. The ones who start out unsure and conflicted, who say that someone else pushed them to it, that it’s just for a ‘joke’, that they don’t really mean it … it was always these customers who end up being my biggest fans, coming back for more over and over again.

  I read the enquiry again. Yup, no doubt about it. It was shot through with a desperation you could almost smell. I had asked her (if it was indeed a her!) to do some quick measurements and come for a half hour consult. If I were right, she’d be giving me the go ahead within ten minutes.

  The gate bell buzzed and I opened. And then I stopped dead in my tracks.

  It was her.

  Her copper hair came bobbing up the stairs before she did, but when she caught my eye she froze on the middle step and looked at me, waiting for me to say something.

  “It’s you,” I said.

  Her expression was strange. She hurried up the remaining steps and blushed a little.

  “Yeah, I know, it was just a bad joke, I’m sorry. I just couldn’t resist.”

  But her attitude seemed forced. Somehow, I just knew she had rehearsed that line over and over before coming here.

  “A joke?” I said, and took her jacket from her.

  “Yeah, you see, I wanted to say thank you for your table, right, and I didn’t know how to contact you, and so I tried to look for you online and then, you know …” she waved her hands nervously. “And then I found your website, and I thought it would be just hilarious to send you a request.”

  “Hilarious?”

  I watched her deflate before my very eyes.

  “Yeah, just a joke, kind of embarrassing now actually…”

  Watching her squirm was amazing. I said nothing, only pinned her to the spot with my gaze. Eventually, I took a step towards her and looked her up and down.

  “Did you honestly think that I would believe that little story?” I said and smiled softly at her. Her face flashed a violent shade of red.

  “What story? Oh, God, it was just a bad joke, I’m sorry, I was just trying to be funny…” she started again, but this time she knew I knew. I stared at her and watched her flounder. It was beautiful.

  “Jeez, I was just curious,” she said defiantly
.

  I love a lady that doth protest too much. She was so deliciously obvious. I said nothing; just waiting to see what amusing hole she’d dig for herself now. I almost felt a little embarrassed on her behalf. I checked my watch.

  “Oh, I shouldn’t have come without telling you that we’ve actually met before,” she said quickly, trying to regain her composure. “I’m sorry, that was rude of me, I didn’t want you to get embarrassed.”

  “Embarrassed? About what?”

  The color came right back to her face.

  “You know …about …about the sex furniture,” she said, bashfully hissing the words under her breath and gesturing nervously around the workshop.

  She was adorable.

  “Sex furniture?” I said loudly. “Why would that embarrass me? I don’t have anything to be embarrassed about. I make things that make people happy. Very happy,” I said, drawing out the last words and catching her eyes deliberately.

  She giggled.

  “Oh my God, that is hilarious. I can’t believe I’m actually here…” she said, laughing nervously.

  “You can’t believe you arranged an appointment with me and came with the deliberate intention of wasting my time?” I said, voice edged with sarcasm.

  The smile fell from her face.

  “Oh God. I’m so sorry” she mumbled. “You’re offended…”

  “Yeah, a little.”

  I saw her scrambling to say something, but I cut her short.

  “Look, though it’s clear you don’t take my work very seriously, I have plenty of people who legitimately are. If you wanted to see me, you should have just said so.”

  “Oh no, no, I didn’t want to see you,” she said quickly, literally waving off the idea.

  I tried hard not to grin.

  “Oh? So you really did want to commission a piece then? Fantastic!”

  The look on her face was priceless.

  She smiled. Embarrassment was a good look for her.

  “Ok, you got me,” She held up her hands. “But honestly, I’m probably not like your other customers, really. I admit I thought it was kind of unusual, kind of interesting. But I’m just curious...”