Mikalo's Flame
Page 15
But I had to be honest.
“Thank you so much for this, Mikalo,” I said. “It’s so sweet of you.”
I took a sip of coffee. Thank god he got that right.
“So, you enjoy it?” he asked. “You want more?”
Oh god no, I wanted to say.
I had to tell him the truth.
“I’m so sorry, but I can’t eat this.”
He stopped, putting his fork down.
“What do you mean? What is wrong?”
“Well, the eggs are raw here and then overcooked and really tough here. And I think there’s, yeah, now that I look, I’m absolutely sure there’s a bit of shell here and ...”
Mikalo started laughing, leaning back in his chair, his hands to his face as they wiped away his sudden tears.
“Are you okay?” I asked, more than a little confused.
I had expected a reaction, of course. But this? Laughter to the point of tears?
“You are right, my Grace,” he gasped, his face now red. “It is very horrible.”
He suddenly stood and, his eyes dancing and his wet cheeks flushed red, leaned forward, grabbed my head in his hands and planted a big kiss on my forehead before taking the plate from me.
Walking back to the stove, still fighting fits of giggles, he dumped the eggs in the garbage, put the plate in the sink, got a new one from the cupboard, and, once more at the stove, got back to work.
“I thank you,” he said as he broke the eggs into the bowl, apologizing to the shells, of course.
“What do you mean?” I asked. “I’m not sure what’s really happened here. Did you mean for the eggs to be horrible?”
“Of course,” he said, quickly looking at me. “I wanted to see if you would eat something that could not be eaten or if you would trust me enough to say ‘No, my Mikalo, this is wrong and is something I cannot eat’.
“And you, my Grace, you made my heart so happy by being brave, even if this courage would hurt my feelings, by being brave to be honest. It is not an easy thing to do sometimes, being honest.
“But you love me enough to trust that I will open my ears and hear you and not be hurt.”
He watched me again, my new omelet cooking in front of him.
“This is why I thank you,” he finished. “You are a wonderful woman and that is one of the many reasons I love you with all of my heart.
“And, of course, I would not let you put them in your mouth to eat them.
“No, no, of course not,” he then said before focusing again on the eggs.
I couldn’t help but smile.
He was right, of course. It was a difficult thing to do. And I was afraid of hurting his feelings. But I knew I could be honest and, even if it wasn’t something he wanted to hear, he’d know I was coming from a place of love.
In all honesty, I thought as I watched him quietly coaxing “his lovelies” to cook up “beautiful and tasty” for “his beauty who is very hungry”, we were at a great place, Mikalo and I.
There was love, there was trust, there was great sex and a lot of laughter. We had passion and honesty, occasional doubt followed by clarity, and we talked. A lot.
What we had really could be the foundation for something long term. And that was something I really wanted.
I mean, who wouldn’t? He teased his food while cooking it. If that wasn’t sexy, I didn’t know what was.
And his eyes had danced. When he laughed.
I thought of Radek Byzan and his lovely Ronish, then. How she had looked forward to seeing his eyes dance even when they were old and grey. And how he had cradled her photo in his hands.
Mikalo now approached, a new omelet on a new plate quickly placed in front of me.
It looked perfect.
I said so.
“No,” he quickly said after a brief pause, suddenly taking the plate away and heading back to the counter.
“It needs the green on top,” he explained as, his back to me, he opened a drawer, got out a knife, and started chopping parsley.
“Mikalo, it’s okay,” I said. “I don’t need it. It was fine without.”
He shook his head.
“No, no, it is the most important part.”
The chopping stopped and, once again, he returned, placing the plate in front of me.
The yellow omelet sat on the plate, a light sprinkling of green covering it.
And in the middle of that green sat a small red velvet box.
My heart stopped.
The box was open, a diamond ring sitting in its center.
He had kneeled in front of me, Mikalo.
“My Grace,” he was saying. “Please, say yes.”
Chapter Forty-Three
Yes.
Three letters.
One syllable.
One simple sound.
I’d said it millions, maybe billions, of times in my life. Often without even realizing how important this small word truly was. It was a throw away word. One said almost in passing.
But today, this morning, Mikalo kneeling before me, my omelet untouched, my coffee growing cold, the ring still sitting in the box, the box on the eggs surrounded by parsley, it was the most important word in the world. The most important word I’d ever say.
And I couldn’t say it.
It lay trapped in my throat, somewhere between the lump and the breath I couldn’t catch.
“My Grace,” he said, his voice almost a whisper. “I cannot say how much I love you. There are no words for such a feeling. Almost from that first moment I saw you with the coffee and all those papers in front of you, in the coffee shop, alone and working hard, needing someone to love and someone to love you, I knew it would be you. I knew my life would be with you. I just knew ...”
He stopped, unable to find the words to describe what he felt.
“It is not a thing I can explain, my heart,” he then said. “There is not an answer that is easy There is never an answer that is easy.
“But my heart, it spoke and I listened and it said ‘this girl is for you and you will love her until you are no more and she will love you ... now go and speak and let her into your life’.
“And so I listened and it was right. I did love you. I do. Still.
“Always and forever until I am no more, I will love you.”
He paused, bent his head low, his forehead almost resting on my knee, and then continued.
“Even if you will not love me.”
His hand went to his face, then. I knew he was wiping away tears.
No, no, no, I wanted to scream. I do love you. So, so much.
But I can’t speak, Mikalo. The words, they won’t come. Just like Blazen’s “I do”, they were there, yes, but they wouldn’t come.
You are everything to me, I wanted to say. You are a dream come true. Yes, we haven’t known each other long and, yes, our road is long and there will be bumps and turns and bullshit to get through.
Yes, yes, yes, I know all this.
But I cannot imagine my life without you in it. And if I can walk this with you as your wife, then, oh my god, yes. A million times yes.
The word just wouldn’t come.
For god’s sake, it was a simple sound. And I couldn’t say it.
He lifted his head, his cheeks wet, and reached up to take the ring from the box.
“This ring,” he explained, holding it in his hand. “The diamond, it is new, a gift from me to you, but see the emeralds on the side? Here? Those were my mother’s.”
He stopped, then. Another tear fell.
He wiped it away as he swallowed and then cleared his throat.
“And the band, here,” he said, catching his breath as he pointed out the silver ring itself. “This is what my grandfather first gave to my grandmother when they were in love. They had little, almost no money, and he had saved for a long time.
“But this was a treasure to them, this simple silver. It was then a treasure to my mother and my father.
“And now
my heart hopes it will be a treasure to us.”
I was crying now, the tears rolling down my cheeks, my shoulders trembling.
And, still, that increasingly important Yes wouldn’t come.
“My Grace,” he then said, his tone worried, his voice revealing the fear he now felt that I would reject him. “My days, they need to start with you, dreaming next to me. I need to feel you there. And my nights, they will not be happy unless I can hold you and kiss you and reach out with my arms to wrap you into me, hold you close and feel your breath and your heart beat.
“I want those days to be weeks and then months and then years and then even more years. Those days with you, I want them to be forever. I want you to be in my life always. I want you to be my life.
“Always and forever, my Grace,” he then repeated. “I will love you until I am no more. Please, tell me this is what you want, too.”
He waited, watching me.
My hand suddenly in his, he slipped the ring on my finger.
It fit perfectly.
“Please,” he said again, his voice now small, his brow furrowed, the tears now unapologetically spilling down his cheeks.
“Please.”
The lump in my throat remained.
The word still wouldn’t come.
But I could nod.
Yes, I could nod.
And so I did.
I nodded.
Tears rolling down my cheeks, my hand in his, his ring now on my finger, I nodded.
And then I nodded again.
And then one more time.
I nodded.
Yes, my Mikalo.
Oh yes.
THE END
MIKALO'S FATE
Summer 2013
Table of Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
Chapter Thirty-Four
Chapter Thirty-Five
Chapter Thirty-Six
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Chapter Forty
Chapter Forty-One
Chapter Forty-Two
Chapter Forty-Three