by Luanne Rice
“Then you can be ‘Ceke.’ ”
Her filmy shirt was working. He didn’t laugh at her joke or continue with the banter. He kissed her. This was a kiss to end all kisses. Chloe’s knees gave way. Luckily he was big, strong, and holding on tight: He caught her and held her and covered her mouth with his and touched his tongue to hers, igniting her in a way she had never believed humanly possible. She hoped he didn’t know it was her first kiss.
“Oh,” she said. That was all, and that was enough: It said everything. Oh the sky is falling, oh my God, oh dear, oh wow, oh it’s all over. Zeke took her hand. His wrist bandage was gone. His palms and fingertips felt rough. She imagined all the time he spent surfing in the ocean. He led her through the stream. He was wearing motorcycle boots, but she had white sneakers on—now they were dirty, soggy white sneakers.
She didn’t care. It seemed fun and romantic. As they climbed the small rise, her ankles itched as if little night bugs were attracted to her wet skin. Tall grass tickled her calves. A pair of deer were grazing off to the left. She tugged Dylan’s T-shirt and pointed.
“Aren’t they beautiful?” she asked.
He didn’t reply, but just hugged her again, more insistently and lovingly than before.
The deer seemed oblivious, although they must have sensed a human presence. Chloe felt an inner shiver and thrill: It was a good sign, like being blessed by the deer. They liked Zeke, or they would have run away. Sometimes when Chloe saw wild deer she thought of her real mother: She would be graceful and beautiful, just like them. She would have big eyes and a patient way. She would blend into nature.
Holding Zeke made Chloe feel like part of nature. The way he held her was the most romantic thing in the world. Both so tenderly—as if he was afraid he’d crush her with his strength, and passionately—as if he wanted to kiss her all night long. His lips were hot and delicious. This spot was invisible from the barn cupola, and Chloe was glad. She didn’t want anyone seeing this.
“Chloe,” he said, forgetting about the Z names.
She couldn’t speak because his mouth was on hers. Something big and hard inside his pants was pressing against her leg. She knew what it was. It excited her a little, but scared her a little, too. She imagined what Mona would say. She pushed Mona from her mind, but Mona came back again and made her feel like laughing: this thing was hard. What must it be like to be a boy and suddenly, with very little warning, have part of your body turn to rock?
It must feel weird. It must be very inconvenient. Chloe giggled, then felt horribly embarrassed. She hoped Zeke would think she was just clearing her throat. She felt a little nervous: She hoped she wouldn’t have to see it. She really wasn’t quite ready to see it.
Now Zeke lowered her onto the ground. He patted down the grass, making a nest: Chloe loved that. He understood nature; this was what deer did, when they wanted to lie down together. Chloe stuck her nose into his neck and sniffed, just exactly as if she were an animal. The impulse just came over her!
His hands went up under her sheer shirt. She arched into the feeling, then caved in on herself: the sensation was too intense. Now one hand was unzipping her jeans, and he was leading her hand to the front of his pants. His jeans had buttons. Five of them. The hard thing was pressing against them. She felt very shy. She didn’t really want it to spring free, but she knew that he was expecting her to help it do just that. Her hand seemed frozen. She tried to will her fingers to work, but they wouldn’t. He guided her and whispered, “Just pull.”
What did that mean? She felt a true jolt of fear. She was afraid of looking stupid. Girls should know how to do this, shouldn’t they? When a boy said “just pull,” girls should know what to pull. Besides, they should want to “just pull.” What was wrong with Chloe, that she didn’t? Keeping one eye open, trying to get her fingers to work, Chloe watched Zeke do it himself: He pulled the front of his jeans, just gave it one good yank, and all five buttons popped open.
She almost laughed at herself for being so dumb, but then she saw what was inside: the thing she had been waiting for and, okay, kind of dreading. It was her debut penis. Her first, ever. No brothers, no previous boyfriends to have seen before. She held herself back from saying, “Yikes.” It was just there, between them. His hand was inside her jeans, his finger hooking the edge of her panties. It was all so much and weird, she almost jumped up and ran across the brook.
She raised her head just slightly, to look into the big eyes of the mother deer. She was just staring from across the field. Chloe felt her love. Chloe’s love flowed back. She had a strange, falling moment of thinking about her own mother, wondering whether her mother had lain down with a boy in the middle of an orchard sixteen years ago.
“Are you okay?” Zeke whispered.
Her eyes filled with tears. She didn’t want them to. She wanted to be happy and give him what he wanted. She wanted to feel like doing whatever they had started. But she had a lump in her throat.
“I don’t know,” she whispered.
“Is it your first time?”
She nodded.
He smiled, brushing the hair back from her eyes. She blinked, and a tear squeezed out of the corner. It ran down her cheek, and he stopped it with his finger.
“We don’t have to,” he said. “We can stop.”
She swallowed, glancing over at the deer. All the other deer had disappeared, but that one, the mother, just stood watch. Chloe felt her telling her it was okay, that she could be brave and ask for what she wanted, that she didn’t have to go all the way.
“It’s kind of,” she began, “the first time we’re getting together . . . and I thought . . .”
“We’d just hang out,” he said.
She half laughed, half cried. It sounded so normal, but the way he said it made her realize what a boring idea it was. Zeke was a guy who surfed with sharks, rode his dirt bike without a helmet, met dark-haired girls in starlit orchards.
“I thought . . .” she said.
But then he kissed her again, and differently. It was so soft and gentle. He held her as if she was a baby bird, breakable and precious. His hand was tentative. His kiss was warm and slow and it made something inside her rise and grow—the sun, maybe. His kiss made the sun rise inside her. Chloe kissed him.
Her arms were around his neck. Her heart beat against his. She wanted to cry, but she wanted more not to. Their bodies were so close. Their skin slid together. Chloe was starving to be held. She was yearning for touch so much, she thought she might die of it. He was doing something below their waists. Pulling his pants down, inching her panties down. Chloe barely cared.
She just held on tight. His lips brushed hers. Now he brought himself between her legs, easing them apart. It started out sweet and easy, then got, well, rough. He didn’t mean to hurt her, but her back chafed on the ground. Dirt and pebbles got into her bottom. He pushed his penis against her.
Should she say it hurt? She bit her lip. Her head hurt from the pressure of not crying out. Was this supposed to be what it felt like?
“Relax,” he said into her ear. “Just let it happen . . .”
“No, but,” she said, tears hot in her eyes.
“Come on, relax,” he said.
In his excitement, he hadn’t taken her pants all the way off. They were bunched down at her feet, stuck on her wet sneakers. His pants were around his ankles. His motorcycle boots clunked into her calves. She cried out.
“You’ve got to let go,” he said, his mouth wet against her ear. “Like riding a wave, like surfing a wave . . .”
Now he was inside her—she could hear him groan with relief. He was hard and hot and she was wetter than any wave he had ever surfed, and she felt him surfing her, felt her wave break just as if it were glass. She lay on her back as the wave broke and broke, and her tears were saltier than the sea, and she cried for her mother and the deer and when she looked around for the beautiful dolphins, all she saw was sharks.
When it was over, Zeke gave her
another kiss on the lips. Then he rolled over onto his back—not an easy thing, because their legs and pants were sort of tangled together. She reached for a handful of grass, pulling it up out of the ground, and she used it to wipe herself. She did that over and over.
He sat up. She heard him stand, and she looked up and saw him buttoning his jeans. Waiting for him to give her a hand seemed like an exercise in futility, so Chloe just pushed herself up and tugged her panties and jeans up. The sound the zipper made going up seemed violent in the quiet night. Both she and Zeke avoided all eye contact as they finished getting dressed.
“Guess it’s late,” he said. “I’d better get you home.”
Did he think it was a date? Chloe couldn’t quite speak.
“You ready?” he asked. He hesitated, then offered her his hand. She was too frozen to take it.
The stars were brighter than ever. They blazed like a trillion bonfires in the sky. Chloe watched Zeke shrug as she failed to hold his hand. She saw him make his way down the hill, and she heard him splash through the brook. Standing still, she heard branches cracking as he made his way up the bank and into the orchard.
“Chloe?” he said.
She didn’t reply. She couldn’t.
“Bye, then,” he said. After a few more seconds, she heard the engine start up.
Bye. Her mouth made the word, but she had no voice.
The stars made her skin glow. She could feel the starlight on her arms and body, all the way through her filmy see-through shirt. When she turned around, to look at the deer, she saw that it had run away. A cry bumped up from her chest. She had wanted to see the deer’s big steady eyes.
Chloe was tired. She wanted to lie down. She walked right past the spot where she and Zeke had been. It wasn’t a real nest. She wanted a real nest. She wanted her real mother. When she got to the spot, near the trees, where she had seen the mother deer, she got down on her hands and knees.
She found indentations in the tall grass. The deer had stood right here. Chloe circled around and around. She pressed the grass down, made another nest. Curling up on her side, she felt the warmth surround her. She imagined it was from the deer, or from her mother, or just from the earth. It didn’t matter. It was all the same thing.
Then Chloe began to cry, and all the stars disappeared.
Dylan was true to his word: he took Jane to Campus Dance. They walked up College Hill from the restaurant, toward the sound of the orchestra. Jane hadn’t walked around the Brown campus for almost sixteen years—since she had left that spring of sophomore year. When Sylvie had graduated four years later, Jane had been “too busy,” at work in New York.
The hill was steep. Every step was an effort, and she knew it had to be even more so for Dylan. She slowed her pace so he could keep up. But the truth was, the closer they got to Brown, the more her heart felt squeezed.
“What happened?” she heard herself ask.
“To my leg?”
“Yes.”
“It’s nothing,” he said.
But she knew it was, so she took the opportunity to stop and catch her breath, while giving him a long expectant look.
“I got shot,” he said. “And it did some damage.”
He sounded tense, and stopped talking. He resumed climbing Angell Street, and Jane had no real choice but to follow. She had so many questions for him, and she wanted to keep from thinking about her own past, so she caught up and walked alongside him.
“That’s terrible,” she said.
He didn’t reply.
Carrie Tower came into view, the tall brick bell tower that marked the northwest corner of the green. Horace Mann was off to the right. Jane’s eyes flicked over, then away. Music drifted across the green. They walked through a space in the wrought-iron fence, and Jane headed for the tower.
“The dance is this way,” he said, grabbing her hand.
“I know,” she said, her heart racing. It all felt like too much for her. Hundreds of bright paper lanterns illuminated the night sky. They swung in the breeze, lanterns of gold, vermilion, persimmon, and azure. The orchestra played; people danced in the night. It was just like going back in time—sixteen years.
Dylan followed her to the base of the tower. They stood together, looking up. It was almost a hundred feet tall, and Jane knew that it came with a sad, beautiful legend—but she hadn’t stayed at Brown long enough to know what it was.
“Do you know the story?” she asked.
Dylan nodded.
“Can you tell me?”
He paused, and she saw him narrow his eyes. He stared up to the clock on top. “It was built by Paul Bajnotti as a memorial to his wife, Carrie. She was the granddaughter of Nicholas Brown.”
“Of Brown University,” Jane said.
Dylan nodded. He led her to a plaque on the base, and she crouched down to read the inscription. “‘Love is strong as death,’ ” she read out loud.
Her palms were sweaty, and her head felt light. How could words about death remind her of that night sixteen years ago? She had lain on a floor with a boy she loved, and they had brought Chloe into being. That wonderful girl with the dark hair and cool blue eyes, with the love of animals and enthusiasm for life, had started her journey just across the way.
The music and the lanterns brought everything back, a fast track into Jane’s memory bank. Lost in her own thoughts, she almost forgot about Dylan. He just stood there, staring at the inscription.
“It’s true,” he said. “Love is as strong as death. Stronger.”
Jane made the connection: This tower was a memorial to a man’s beloved wife. Amanda and Isabel. She looked up into Dylan’s eyes. “What are you thinking?” she asked.
“About those words. And how true they are.”
“Your wife . . .”
He hesitated. “We were separated when she died,” he said. “I was thinking about my daughter.”
“Isabel,” Jane said, remembering the picture in Dylan’s kitchen.
“You asked me earlier about my leg,” he said, gazing down at Jane.
She nodded, waiting.
“I almost lost my leg,” he said. “The bullet shattered the femur, and it got infected. I’ve had twenty-two surgeries, and right now I have more steel than bone in there. But that doesn’t matter . . .”
“It does matter,” Jane said.
Dylan shook his head. His eyes flicked up the tower again, then back to Jane. “No, it doesn’t. Because the day I got shot was the day they died. Amanda and Isabel. I couldn’t protect them. After it happened, I couldn’t even pick up my daughter. I couldn’t carry her—she needed to go to the hospital, but I couldn’t even move.”
“It wasn’t your fault,” Jane said, stunned. “I know it wasn’t.”
Dylan didn’t answer. He closed his eyes. Jane’s throat ached. She glanced over at the old English Department and felt the presence of Chloe, just as if she was standing right there. She knew that Dylan was sensing Isabel, that his love was stronger than her death. She knew that their daughters were with them.
Without even thinking, she took his hand. The orchestra was playing, and the music was lush and romantic. It filled Jane with emotions she hadn’t felt in many, many years. Dylan’s hand felt so solid. Paper lanterns illuminated the trees. The shush of the wind sang in the leaves.
He smiled for the first time since dinner. But it was a great smile, brighter than all the lanterns in the trees, and it made Jane smile right back at him. They just stood there, in the shadow of the tower, holding each other’s hand. How had they gotten here? Jane and this wounded, reserved man who just happened to be Chloe’s uncle. Jane blinked slowly. He linked her with Chloe. They were a secret triangle, the three of them.
“Well,” he said, as if the mystery of sudden connection had stunned him as well.
She smiled a little wider.
It happened so easily, almost without them noticing. How could this happen this way, so fast? They each took a small step closer to each
other. His arms slid around her. Jane pressed against his chest, and she felt a ripple go through her body, as if she’d just come to life. Her heart beat very quickly. The music was so pretty. She tilted her head back and closed her eyes, and he kissed her.
The paper lanterns turned to stars. They swung wildly in the sky. His beard felt good against her skin. She turned to air. The years flew by and went backward, all at the same time. She was Carrie in the tower, she was Chloe in the orchard. But then, feeling Dylan’s hands moving slowly on her own back, tasting his lips on hers, Jane knew that she was solid, real, here.
He whispered, his mouth on her ear: “Dance with me . . .”
She was already in his arms. The music had already taken hold. They moved together. The dance was just like an embrace, only with feet moving. Dylan’s limp went away. His leg was perfect, fine, healed. Nothing bad had ever happened. Or, everything that had was swept away by the night, the lanterns, the stars, the tower, the inscription: Love is strong as death.
Or, as Dylan had said before they’d started to dance, stronger. . . .
CHAPTER 17
Chloe was tired. It seemed weird that just as summer was about to get rolling, she could barely drag herself out to feed the cats every night. The thing was, it was exhausting to go out in the fresh air. The breeze would move, ruffle her hair, caress her skin, remind her of being touched. The cats would brush up against her—all the mothers and fathers and kittens, meowing and mewing and tickling her skin. Where Chloe had always loved physical contact with the cats before, now it made her want to hurry through the feeding and get back to her room. It reminded her of that night, almost a week ago. Zeke.
Back inside, the house was still. Her parents liked air-conditioning. Chloe used to beg to open the windows. Before, when she was home alone, she used to fly through the house, shutting off air conditioners and throwing open windows. Now she was just as glad to have the mechanical hum, the technological cool. The sound quieted the thoughts in her head.
The phone rang, and it was for her. Chloe had avoided the phone for days. Mona wanted to know when they were working at the stand. Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, Chloe told her. So, why haven’t you called and how was the meeting? Mona asked. The big secret romantic in-the-orchard meeting? It was okay, Chloe finally said. But Zeke’s kind of a jerk. I don’t like him anymore.