Defiant Destiny

by Madison Cumbee

  Smiling, I gloated, “Allow me,” as I poured her a glass. “Ta-da.”

  “My first date’s with Mary Poppins and her magical bag,” Keira mumbled as she tore off a piece of a roll and popped it in her mouth. I nearly spat my water out when she made me laugh.

  Once we were done eating, Keira and I sat and talked for a while. She had had a life before I met her, and I wanted to know all about it. My years were certainly greater in number than hers, but I still did my best to honestly answer all of the questions she had for me. While we were talking, the radio played and the sun disappeared behind the mountains in the distance to be replaced by a luminescent moon. Eventually, I produced a case full of CDs, and we listened to them instead of the radio. Since we were away from the city lights and it was a clear night with billions of stars hung for us, Keira didn’t need any kind of lantern in order to see.

  “You pick the next one,” she insisted.

  “Ok.” I flipped through the small portion of my collection I had with me and inserted the one I wanted.

  I chose the last song on the disc and once it began playing, Keira grew thoughtful while listening. Finally she asked me, “What is it that’s playing?”

  “It’s called ‘Complainte De La Butte.’”

  “It’s quite melancholy.”

  I smiled. “It’s French.”

  “It’s familiar.”

  I couldn’t help but stand up, offer my hand, and ask, “Would you like to dance with me, Keira?” She hesitated, and I saw I would have to provoke her. “Do you know how to dance?”

  As intended, Keira jumped up immediately. She retorted, “I’ve been required to attend so many cotillions that I can waltz circles around you in my sleep.”

  “I’ll be the judge of that if you don’t mind.” I offered my hand again, and her expression softened as she took it. I gently pulled her into my embrace, and we began our informal waltz in the moonlight. “One-Two-Three. One-Two-Three,” I whispered.

  “Shut up and dance,” she smiled.

  I grinned. “As you wish.”

  After a pause, Keira asked, “Do you know what he’s saying- the guy who’s singing this?”

  “Yes…” I listened and translated two of the lines for her. “He’s saying his dreams are fulfilled and that the wings of the mill he’s under protect lovers.”

  “The wings of the mill of the Moulin Rouge,” Keira stated.

  “Yes,” I confirmed, surprised. “This song is from the Moulin Rouge soundtrack.”

  I heard Keira sigh, and I looked down to see why. “I love the music from Moulin Rouge. ‘Your Song’ is my favorite by Ewan McGregor.” She peered up at me as the disc ended, and we simultaneously stopped dancing. “Will you sing for me, Uriel?”

  Her request disarmed me. And it confused me. “Why would you think I can sing well enough to please you?”

  Keira smiled. “Your voice is so pleasurable when you talk; how can you not sing well?” The full intensity of her eyes stripped me of my doubts as she added, “Please.”

  So I sang “Your Song,” and I meant every word.

  Beautiful Disaster

  Chapter 9

  Keira

  An angel’s voice echoed in my head. Before I opened my eyes, I thought about the night before. Perfection. Even the dancing. I always hated dancing with all of the pimply faced little boys who I was forced to practice with during all of those cotillion lessons years ago. But not with Uriel. He was surprisingly skilled in the art, and I shivered at the memory of how it felt to have him hold me. I could still feel his arms around me. And that voice… indescribably pure and captivating. He’s ruined Ewan McGregor for me; there’s no way poor Ewan’s singing could possibly compare to Uriel’s voice.

  I felt like Uriel was still around me. Not wanting to break this feeling, I shifted in my bed, trying to get more comfortable so that I could attempt to return to my blissful state of unconsciousness. But- why was my bed, which was personally made for me, so uncomfortable?

  I had to risk opening my eyes to see what the problem was. So I slowly lifted my lids as little as possible, and I instantly regretted that brilliant decision. My room was blindingly bright. What the heck? I thought as I reached for my pillow to pull over my unhappy eyes.

  “Uuuuh.”

  I froze. Was that a groan?

  I was about to scream, but first I looked down at what was supposed to be my pillow that I had just attempted to lift. That’s not a pillow. I propped myself up on an elbow as my eyes focused on what had just been supporting my head. Tan. Getting wider and harder looking. And then my gaze fell on Uriel’s t-shirt, followed by his neck and marvelous face. Uriel.

  “Uriel?”

  As my retinas began to accept the piercing light that was bombarding them, I was able to take in my surroundings. I was lying next to my angel, and we were still on the mountain top. I looked down at myself as a sudden fear began rising in my chest. T-shirt- check. Shorts- check. Oh thank goodness. I exhaled a shuddered breath. Even my tennis shoes were still tied securely on my feet. No one should ever have to feel that kind of panic after just waking up.

  Coming back to the scene, I gazed at my sleeping angel, and lowered myself back to my previous position on his arm. I figured as long as I was there…. For several minutes, all I did was lay there staring at him. His blonde curls had loosened a fraction during the night, and now, in the morning sun, were shining golden. His skin was glowing with warmth, and I wiggled closer as a breeze blew on us. Instantly my chill vanished. Uriel didn’t seem to notice the passing draft; his face was more peaceful and calm than I had ever seen it before. Sometimes, like in the car ride up, I felt like he had some kind of inner demon he didn’t tell anyone about and silently struggled with. I wished he would open up and let me in.

  I reached out and laid my hand lightly on his chest as it slowly rose and fell with each even breath he gathered and released. The corners of Uriel’s lips lifted slightly, and I assumed he must have woken because his hand came up to cover mine. Once our skin touched, though, his eyes shot open and his placid, happy expression dissipated. He whipped his head to look at my hand and then me. “We fell asleep on the mountain.”

  It wasn’t a question, but I nodded in response.

  Uriel jumped up and started moving at high speed. I mean, really, he was going warp-speed on me. Adrenaline packs a punch. He was shoving the dishes from our dinner in the packs, and then he pulled me up and placed me a few steps away from where I’d been so he could snatch up the blanket we’d been lying on seconds before. “What’s wrong?” I asked his blur.

  He stopped and turned to me unbelievingly. “We fell asleep,” he repeated.

  Well that clears everything up, I thought sarcastically. “Why are you freaking out though?”

  “Walk and talk,” he commanded as he pushed me back toward the trail we had taken while he carried both packs in the hand that wasn’t being used to goad me forward. Once we were back at his car- it having taken only half the time to jog the trail as it had to walk the night before- Uriel threw the bags in the back and ushered me to the passenger door. I sat, and he began to buckle my seat belt for me. “I can do that myself,” I informed him. Without a word, he closed the door on me and a second later was opening his own. Safely strapped in, I said to him, “You have to slow down or I’m gonna be sick trying to keep up.”

  “It’s a good thing we’re in a car then, and you don’t have to exert yourself.” He gave me no hint in either his expression or his tone that he was joking. So I sat silently as he revved the engine, backed out of the parking space, and squealed the tires as we drove out of the trails’ lot.

  “What the hell, Uriel?” I was holding onto that little handle thing over the window as he surprised me with his reckless speed out of the lot. “Do you have another date or something?”

  He threw me a look and lectured like I was a small child who required simple sentences to comprehend. “It’s morning. We fell asleep. We’re still on the m
ountain. I was supposed to bring you home at a decent hour. That would have been some time last night.”

  “I was kidding. And I told you that there was no need for decent hours since my parents are out of town. We fell asleep on accident. It’s okay. Really.”

  “This isn’t how things are done,” he said with an air about him.

  “So proper,” I teased with pursed lips. “Maria and Jerry will be cool. They trust me, and know that I’d never do anything I’m not ready for,” I good-naturedly snickered.

  “You think this is funny?” he almost yelled at me. We were silent for several minutes. Eventually, I glanced at the speedometer. It read one hundred forty miles per hour.

  I squealed as I took back the handle I had mistakenly released, “Holy shit, Uriel! You’re going to break the car!”

  “Please,” he dismissed my anxiety and seemed to be calming down for who knows what reason. “But now that you mention it, I don’t want to get stopped by a cop because of speeding- it would make us even later- so could you look in the glove compartment and see if there’s a radar detector in it?”

  I mechanically did as he asked with one hand while my other kept a death-grip on the handle. There was one item other than registration papers and such in the compartment. I handed him the detector and returned my left hand to the handle that supported my right. Uriel turned the device on and kept his speed up. He glanced at my face and all the anger and resolve that had consumed him before seemed to subside. He reached over and pressed the back of his hand, which was pleasantly cool now- or maybe it was compared to my face- against my heated cheek. “Keira, relax; I’d never put you in a vehicle that was dangerous, I’d never push a car faster than it was safely able to perform while you were well in it, and I’ve never been in a wreck or come close to one. You can stop clawing the handle now.”

  I didn’t listen to him. My voice was surprisingly level as I said, “You had no right to get angry with me.”

  The radar detector started going berserk, and Uriel dropped his hand as he slowed and pulled over to park on the side of the highway. I thought the loud beeping noise would mean to slow down, not pull completely over. He shifted in his seat to face me directly. “What are you-” But he cut me off.

  “I wasn’t angry with you,” he told me softly. “I was frustrated with myself. I acted irresponsibly, and I should have never fallen asleep last night.” He looked down and I felt some of the panicked tension in my body relax. “You fell asleep while we were talking and you looked so peaceful and so delicate that I couldn’t bear to wake you. I was going to carry you back to the car, but when I supported you, you slid closer to my side,” he paused, “and I decided to wait a little longer.” He looked back up at me. “I should have brought you back then, but instead I forgot myself and dozed off.” I was about to disagree with him and point out again the obvious fact that we had both fallen asleep on accident, but he continued in a firmer voice. “It won’t happen again, I promise.” He reached over and stretched one hand around my wrists and said, “You can let go now.”

  “Are you going to slow down, and not strain the speedometer needle on this SUV anymore?”

  He gave a very small laugh. “I’ll go the speed limit.”

  I allowed him to loosen my fingers from the strip of leather, and I watched as he moved my hands toward him and then kissed each on the inside of my palms.

  “Better?” he asked gently.

  “Yes.”

  Uriel smiled, and I forgot why I had been worried in the first place. “Good.” Then he pulled back onto the road. “Now I must get you home.”

  We rode in silence for a few more moments once again. Then something he had said before triggered a thought for me. “What did you mean you won’t let it happen again?” I turned to him.

  “I won’t forget myself like that a second time,” he stated like he was taking a solemn oath.

  I didn’t know how to respond. His sleeping figure flashed across my memory. I couldn’t just say what I was thinking which was, Please. Forget yourself around me as much as you want. He was disappointed in himself, I realized. Looking down at my palms, I could still feel his lips there. I slid my left hand over to rest in between us, palm up- waiting. I knew that he had noticed my gesture, and after a second, he took my hand. We rode home in silence, but it was better. I left him to his thoughts and busied myself with my own.

  When he pulled up to the curb in front of my house, Uriel got out, opened my door for me, and took my hand again. Still no words passed between us until we were standing at the front door. “I’ll call you tonight,” he said without looking me in the eye. So I positioned my head so he had to look at me.

  “Hey.” His eyes were sad as they connected with mine. “Are we good?” I asked him.

  A small light shone in his grey-blue eyes then and he leaned in and lightly kissed me on the cheek. “We’re always good,” Uriel whispered. He managed a small but sincere smile for me. “I’ll see you Monday, Keira.”

  “Okay,” I replied distractedly.

  I waited until his car disappeared before I went inside.

  ♀ ♀ ♀ ♀ ♀

  Maria and Jerry had heard the door open when I came in, and their plump figures had come racing worriedly toward me. Maria, with her graying brown hair piled on top of her head, had pulled me into a suffocating bear hug, and Jerry, in his ever-present apron, had engulfed both of us in yet another hug. After assuring them that I was perfectly fine and apologizing for not calling and explaining that time had gotten away from us, I went upstairs to my bathroom and took a long, hot, desperately needed shower. Once I was clean, I still had two hours to waste until the planned time to meet Elly at the mall for a shopping date. We needed to catch up on things, and my closet was getting dangerously bare.

  So to fill my time, I grabbed a book off my shelf and sat down. The Blue Girl by the accomplished Charles de Lint. It was the first modern book I was going to read since the beginning of school. Uriel had been bringing me classic after classic ever since he found out how much I loved reading. Even though I appreciated the literature, I had suffered withdrawal from my genre of books. So it was nice to take a quick hit before I set out for the mall.

  Two hours later, I drove up to the previously agreed upon entrance to the mall and scoped the parking lot for Elly’s car. Within minutes, she pulled up beside me, and I got out to meet her before we walked in. When she closed her car door and we exchanged hugs and “hi,” she started for the mall. “Elly!” my voice raised in shock.

  She whirled around. “What is it?”

  “Your leg!” I exclaimed. “You aren’t limping or anything!”

  Elly smiled happily. “Yeah, I know. It’s all better.”

  “But,” I began, “you just got injured like two months ago. I’m not a doctor, but I thought a torn ACL takes at least several months to heal.”

  “It does usually.” Elly shrugged. “But I’m special.”

  I gave her a look that said whatever. “And,” she went on, “I’ve been working on building up my strength like you wouldn’t believe. My doctor said she’s never seen anyone’s ACL heal as quickly as mine. But I’ve always been a fast healer.”

  “That’s awesome,” I congratulated.

  “Yeah, so now you won’t have to move at a glacial pace in order to walk with me around the mall today.” She was definitely happy about not having to wear her brace any more. Like me, Elly cannot stand being forced to stand still; we’re always moving and doing things to keep busy. It’s one of the things we have in common. “Which store should we go to first?”

  “Well I actually have a specific item that I’m looking for…” I stalled.

  “What is it Keira?”

  I threw an agonized glance her way. “A stuffy, formal white dress.”

  “Ohhhh,” Elly drug out. “The coming out dress.”

  “The coming out straight jacket would be a more fitting title,” I frowned.

  Elly laughed at my over-dr
amatization. “You mean to tell me that your mother actually let you pick the dress out for yourself? She isn’t here to hold your hand and drag you through each and every dressing room in the mall?”

  “I am to choose at least three that I think will be acceptable and then bring them back to show her when she gets home.” Elly had been forced to attend all of those cotillions I had to, so she understood, to an extent, what I was going through and how much I hated the whole thing. As for the mother issue, she had no comparable situations.

  “I’ve got all day, so we can comb through all the racks in all the stores until we find something that you and your mother will both like,” she said supportively.

  “I’m not sure it’s possible for us to agree on the same outfit, but I appreciate your willingness to help.” We exchanged a tragic look and set to work. For every outfit Elly found to try on herself, she picked at least two white dresses for me, and I was shopping alongside of her, doing the same. After our arms were aching from the amount of clothing we carried, Elly and I entered the dressing rooms. Our usual routine of trying on one outfit and walking out to judge the other’s was followed. I would come out in cargo pants and an Asian inspired top, and Elly would emerge in jeans and a flowing blouse. She would walk out in shorts and a t-shirt, and I would drag myself out in one of the numerous white dresses. While keeping with this flow, our conversation moved from school to boys. “Any guys on the horizon, Keira?” she absent-mindedly asked, no doubt only half listening since the answer was always the same: Sure. Whenever I go off to college and meet some that are actually descent. But that day, I surprised her by saying, “There’s one closer than the horizon.”

  Elly walked out of the changing room beside mine wearing a blue babydoll dress with her mouth hanging open. I guess she’d been paying more attention than I had given her credit for. “More info,” she demanded.