by Sasha Fino
“Let me lead you to the creek; you will enjoy seeing it.” Max said changing the subject
“I would like that, but I should stay close by in case Annette comes looking for me.”
“If you have a cell phone with you, she can call if she needs you.”
“You are right! I forgot about my cell phone. Lead the way, she said, smiling Max took her down a path at the side of the creek. Blanche was transfixed by the way the lights twinkled on the water. They sat down at a table for two
and talked while they watched the creek meander alongside
“I own an art gallery in uptown Sedona, and I love working there you never know who you might meet. For exercise, I love running and swimming. And I have a daughter who is a real handful.” Max opened the bottle of wine he brought with them and gave a glass to Blanche
“My dream is to someday open a coffee house in uptown Sedona,” Blanche confided to him
“Then why don’t you do it, Blanche?” he asked her
“I would love to, but I don’t think it’s in my cards.”
“How do you know that, Blanche? What if it is?” Max paused as they gazed in each other’s eyes. Max was the first to break the silence that hung in the air between them
“There is a shop that would be perfect for a coffee house in the plaza where my gallery is located.”
“I can’t afford to rent a shop. I am between jobs right now. I recently lost my late sister’s husband, and my niece, their daughter, has come to live with me. I’m all she has. I would love to open a shop, but I have other responsibilities that must come first,” Blanche told him
“I understand,” he said, taking a sip of wine, sitting close together.
“I could swear that I’ve seen you recently, in town.”
“Maybe in one of the stores,” Max replied softly. He was determined to play his cards right and let Blanche learn to love him, instead of his wealth. He hoped, beyond measure, that she would be attracted to him.
“Maybe…”
As they watched each other, Max realized that even though they’d just met, he was in love for the third time in his life?
“How was your dinner?” Max asked her, changing the subject, “Wonderful. Not only was it delicious, but I didn’t have to prepare it!” Blanche exclaimed with pleasure.
“Yes, it is unusual to have the traditional rubber chicken replaced with a New York strip steak,” Max said. He heard his voice deepening with sexual desire for her
“I must tell you something. I usually don’t do this.”
“Do what, Blanche?”
“Drink wine under the stars by a creek with a man who I have just met.”
“But that’s part of what makes life worth living for Blanch.” Their eyes met, with that fire in her eye. He knew all needed to recognize, he leans in to touch her lips with his.
Before Blanche could welcome his kiss, Annette rounded the corner, racking the mood between them.
“There you are; I’ve been looking for the two of you everywhere.” Annette stopped to catch her breath.
“What is it?” Blanche asked her friend.
“Blanche, I hate to do this to you, but I need to go home now. Jordan called to say his school project requires him to light a fire, and I don’t want him playing with a flame when I’m not home.”
“I can certainly understand that.” Blanche looked at her friend and then back to Max, then she stood up. Max didn’t want Blanche to go, but realized they had to leave.”
“Well, it was nice to meet you, Max. Goodbye,” she said
“Good night,” Annette told Max
For the first time in his life, he was not sure what to say, they nearly kiss. Blanche and Annette started to walk away. Annette went on about her son.
“Blanche, wait! If you want to stay longer, I can drive you home if you’d like,” Max said, standing up from the table and walking over to them.
Blanche stopped walking and turned around to face Max. He could tell she was thinking about it
“I would like that. Annette, do you mind?” Blanche asked her
“Of course, I don’t mind, have fun!” Annette said as she hugged Blanche as they repeated their goodbyes. Blanche and Max were alone once again.
“Is the auction over yet?” Blanche asked. She could faintly hear an old Dean Martin song playing in the background
“I guess so. Now there will be dancing until the last person leaves.”
“Blanche, would you like to dance with me?”
“Yes, I would love to.”
Max took Blanche’s hand. When he gazed into her eyes, he wondered if it was magic, he felt between them. He knew he had to find out, as they danced to the sound of the creek and the faint music coming from the room beyond as Max held her tightly to him as the shard a passionate and romantic kiss.
Kimberly and Lexy were walking back to the limo, talking about this and that, when they encountered Ms. Patella and Kasey’s father locked in a passionate embrace lip-to-lip.
The two girls stopped in their tracks. Kimberly couldn’t believe her eyes. She had never seen her parents’ passion, and her aunt and uncle were basically estranged. She looked over at Lexy with awe. The lovers were right in their path
Kimberly started to walk ahead, hoping that Lexy could follow quietly when a tree branch snapped underfoot and made a loud sound in the stillness. Ms. Patella and Mr. Tenney stopped kissing and looked up at them.
“Oh, hello, Ms. Patella, and Mr. Tenney. Nice evening, isn’t it?” Lexy said, “Ms. Heller and Ms. Aldridge, what the hell are you doing here? I can write you up for being here,” Ms. Patella said, pushing Mr. Tenney away from her.
“You can’t. The last day of school is this Wednesday, remember?” Lexy said. Kimberly was sure they were in deep trouble
“We are sorry, but my aunt forgot her purse and asked me to retrieve it. Lexy was over, and we took her limo to pick it up since neither of us is old enough to drive,” Kimberly said thinking her lie was in Lexy’s most beautiful tradition
“Kimberly, I didn’t take you for a liar. I can make you two repeat ninth grade next fall for this. I don’t know why you two are here, but I bet you are up to no good!” Ms. Patella yelled at them. She looked like she could kill them both
“I swear it’s the truth!” Kimberly replied
“And we were not spying on you two making out,” Lexy quickly added “Heller!”
“Sweetheart, calm down,” Mr. Tenney said. “I think we can come to an understanding here.”
“No, I’ve been waiting to get them alone for a long time!” she said, walking up to Lexy. “Tell me the truth now.”
“It’s nothing to do with you like you always think,” Lexy said. Just then Mr. Tenney’s cell phone went off
“Sorry, I need to take this,” he said, looking down at the number on his cell and quietly walking away. Ms. Patella was alone with the girls
“Hard to believe you, Heller. How do I know you are not recording this to show Monday in class!” Ms. Patella yelled in Lexy’s face.”
“We didn’t, so piss off! Leave us alone. You think that we don’t have our own lives outside of school? Sorry to tell you that we do!” Lexy spat back in her face
“Then, why are you here? I know you two are planning to ruin the evening.” “It has nothing to do with the fundraiser or you two,” Kimberly said looking right into Ms. Patella’s eyes
“We don’t care if Mr. Tenney is sleeping with you to ensure that Kasey gets good grades
“You tell her, Lexy.”
“I love him, and he loves me!” Ms. Patella exclaimed Lexy laughed it off
“Looks more like playing around to me,” Kimberly said, giggling. Ms. Patella stopped what she was about to say and looked at them. Then in a voice that she never dared use on her class, she said,
“You two have never seen true love because both of your mothers died during your infancy. Lexy, your dad, plays around, and I bet he’s never had a girlfriend for
more than three months. As for Kimberly, I know that your Dad was in the Army, was caring for you, and had no time for romance. You are now living with Dean and Blanche Burlington, who is as romantic as ticks. I met Mr. Tenney, Peter, before Kasey was ever in my class. We met at a friend’s party, after I broke up with your father, thanks to you, Heller, and what can I say, one thing leads to another, and soon I knew I was deeply in love with Peter. I couldn’t eat, couldn’t sleep, and can’t breathe without him. I know that Peter has a wife, but she is coldhearted to him and Kasey. I also fell in love with Kasey, and she looks up to me as a mother figure. True love is real, and I have it, and I will never let him go.” A tear slid down Ms. Patella’s face when she had finished.
Kimberly looked at Lexy, waiting for her to say something, but she didn’t. Kimberly dared not to be the one to speak first.
“You knew only half the story, so now you know all of it. We hide what we do. Mr. Tenney’s wife doesn’t leave him. They have to stay together to preserve the vineyards. If they divorced, it would all have to be split. You girls have the 411 on my love life, and I will let you go free. Go, before I change my mind and never breathe a word about what I’ve told you to a soul!”
Kimberly and Lexy stood there looking at her.
“Go, now!” she yelled, the tears streaming down her face. Kimberly ran as fast as she could toward the limo, with Lexy right on her tail
Chapter 10
You are a great dancer, Blanche,” Max told her on the way to his car. It was past ten when they left the creek.
“Thanks, you are not bad, yourself. I miss dancing; I used to dance all the time,” Blanche said, smiling at the moon, wanting to kiss Max for an unknown reason that she can't explain.
“Why did you stop?”
“Life didn’t turn out like I wanted it to. Back then, I wanted to travel the world, go off to college, and make something of myself. Fall madly in love, marry, have a houseful of kids, and open a coffee shop in the heart of Sedona. I know that it is a common lament in women of my age,” Blanche told him. Then for the first time in her life, she gazed deeply into a man’s eyes
“It’s not too late to follow your dreams and change your life around.” “Oh, no, I can’t.”
“I think you can, Blanche,”
“This is crazy, we just met hours ago. I don’t know you, you don’t know me, and here I am telling you my bogus dreams,” Blanche said throwing her hands up in the air
“I’m interested. And now I want to show you my life’s joy, that’s my art gallery. I think you will like it,” Max told her.
“Now? Almost eleven o’clock?”
“It’s a central location, so it’s on the way wherever your home is,” Max said as Blanche stopped walking and looked at him as she thought about it. She stood there while her heart pumps as he leans in to kiss her. Knowing full well what’s to come.
“Yes, I’d love to.”
“Wow, is this your car?” Blanche asked once she saw Max’s sports car “When you own one of the best art galleries in town you can buy a car like this,” Max said acting like it was no big deal
“I don’t want to know your last name or anything more about you. Tell me, did your life work out the way you planned it?” Blanche asked once she was seated in the car.
“If I say ‘yes,’ would you kill me?” Max asked as he started the car and drove away
“No.” Max took a second to think and then started to talk
“I always knew what I wanted, and I always got it. I wanted to inherit my father’s business, and I did. I wanted to have an art gallery, so I opened one. I married my college sweetheart, and she gave me a beautiful daughter, but she passed away giving birth to our child. I can’t get over her death or move on with my life. She always wanted children, and she never got to see our daughter. I have never told a soul about this before.”
“I am truly sorry for your loss, Max. I understand what loss can do to a man, and for all intents and purposes, my husband was lost to me many years ago.”
“I knew you would understand. I love my daughter more than all the money in the world and life itself. She will always come first. And I have never blamed anyone for my wife’s death.”
“You sound like a great father, Max.”
“Thanks. If you didn’t realize your dreams for the future, what have you done all these years instead? How has your life turned out?”
Blanche looked at her lap as they turned down Sedona’s main street. There were very few lights to preserve the darkness for viewing from Lowell Observatory in nearby Flagstaff, Arizona
“I used to work at a hotel as a tourism booking agent, but when the economy took a turn for the worse, they had to lay me off. I married my high school sweetheart, and we planned to leave here, but life threw a hurdle in our path. I became pregnant and miscarried, so we kept trying until Bethany was born. But she was sickly, and at age five, she left us. Women have to be reliable, but my husband couldn’t deal with it and turned to drink and chatting on me with other women. I was hurt, yet over the years, I turned my eye the other way. In his current state, he can’t rise above a low paying job, and with my loss of income, it is impossible to make ends meet. Then, with the deaths of my mother, sister, and brother-in-law, my niece came to live with me. Like you and your daughter, she is the light of my life now. Blanche wiped a tear from her eye.
“I am so sorry, Max. I don’t know you, and here I am, crying and telling you everything about me. I wouldn’t dare tell another soul what I told you tonight, and I’ve only just met you and may never see you again after tonight.”
“There is a saying that sharing your troubles with a stranger puts them in perspective and helps you find your way. I, too, have told you things that I never told that to anyone before. You share many of the fine qualities I found in my late wife, and I had never thought I’d meet anyone like you before tonight,” Max whispered to her
“I want to be with you for a night, Max!” Blanche exclaimed without thinking. “I mean, we would probably not going see each other again.”
“Just as two ships that pass in the night,” Max told her.
” Yes, we can do that.” she shyly replays.
“Alright,”
“You are an amazing man,” Blanche commented while she turned in her seat to face him
Max laughed at this while he made a right turn into the plaza
“Wow, your art gallery is at Heller Plaza,” Blanche said looking out the window
“Yep!”
“Max Heller’s Plaza. Wait a minute, are you THE Max Heller?” Blanche considered as she put two and two together
“Yes, I am. Does it change anything?”
“I am Kimberly’s aunt,” was the only thing she could think to say to him,
“No, kidding?! It’s nice to finally meet you. Kimberly is a great girl; she’s the first true friend that Lexy has ever made.”
Blanche was speechless. She felt like a damn fool for telling her life story and asking to sleep with Max Heller. Max parked the car and ran around to open the door for Blanche without saying a word,
Thanks,” she said as she got out with her mind all aflutter
“Does it change our relationship?” he repeated as they strolled toward the Gallery
Blanche stopped and looked at his face in the dim light. She felt a slight electric jolt in her heart and kiss his cheek.
“No, Max,” Blanche told him. Max and Blanche just stayed where they were and stared at each other for a minute
“Well, I want to show you the empty shop that would be just right for your coffee house, but first, let me give you a tour of the Gallery.”
“I can't open a café here if I spend a night with you. Someone would find out or can see us together?”
“They won’t. Trust me. Opening your coffee shop would bring you one step closer to your dreams. Make it come true. Just take my hand and follow me, Blanche. I bet your daughter, Bethany, is looking down on you from heaven and
wishing you on,” he said. While offering his hand to her, listening to her heart for the first time in a very long time, Blanche took his hand.
Kimberly and Lexy were at the Heller Mansion sitting on Lexy’s king-sized bed with their pj's on. They looked at each other, still blown away by what Ms. Patella revealed just hours ago. They wondered if they really knew what love is
“My father loved my mother; do you think that was the kind of love Ms. Patella was talking about?” Lexy inquired
“I don’t know, Lexy. The more I see going on in life, the more I realize that my dad kept me in the dark.”
“Like what?”
“For weeks now, I saw how you and your father have this really close relationship, and my father and I were never like that. He never explained sex or love to me—just told me babies arrive on their parents’ doorstep. Anything I wanted to know about my mother, I had to draw out of him. He was always on the base hanging with the guys. I was surprised that he wanted to get married again. He always wanted a son, but don’t get me wrong, I love him and miss him very much.”
“Wow, you never told me that before.”
“Maybe Ms. Patella was right.”
“Yes, I know, but my father always said he loved my mother very deeply. Maybe there is more than one kind of love. But who knows—the only time I’ve seen them together is in photos?”
“And is it me, or does everyone in Sedona know that my aunt and uncle have an unhappy marriage?”
“You can say that again.”
“Why does she stay with him?”
“Got me.”
“I can’t see why.”
“Don’t look at me; I am not an odd couple's counsel to tell you why your aunt still stays married to the Pig, who hurt her. I still can’t figure out why my loving dad sleeps with girls who could easily be my older sisters,” Lexy said looking at Kimberly
“Maybe it is for a reason we don’t know.”
“Man! I can’t believe that my Dad broke up with Brianna, and I had nothing to do with it,” Lexy said getting back to herself
“So much for our plan!” Kimberly said as Lexy hopped off her bed and started o pace