by Alexa Kang
“You’re leaving? So soon? I thought you would be here until the end of the week.”
“I’ve had a change of plans.” She noticed Tessa’s painting depicting a man and a woman with long red hair, naked in a passionate embrace. “Your painting…” she said in amazement. “Such exquisite use of color. Beautiful form and style too.”
“Thank you.”
Mary nodded. The boldness of the painting’s subject matter was impressive. No one she knew would dare to draw something like this. She herself would not dare. For a fleeting moment, she almost felt Tessa’s sense of freedom and lack of restraint. The feeling was breathtaking. Liberating.
But, it was not a life she knew how to live. She stepped away from the easel. “Maybe we’ll meet again someday,” she said.
Tessa smiled. It was the same polite but reserved smile as the first day they met. “I hope you’re not leaving because of what happened last night. I’m sorry if I caused any trouble.”
“Don’t worry about last night.”
“It’s great that you came. Anthony’s very lucky.”
“Yes.” She looked at Tessa. Her eyes conveyed a meaning deeper than what she would openly say. “Perhaps he is.”
PART TEN
Moonlight
Chapter 33
Everything came to a standstill after Mary’s sudden early departure. Most of the remaining activities Anthony had planned for her were canceled. Uncle Leon and his family still came for the weekend luncheon, but it turned into a simple family affair instead of a meaningful occasion.
The failure of Mary’s visit put Anthony in an uncharacteristically dour state. Tessa didn’t think much of it at first, but when his wistful mood continued for days, she genuinely felt sorry for him. Mary’s visit was the highlight of his summer, and she felt partly responsible for what happened. If she hadn’t gone out dancing without telling anyone, he wouldn’t have worried and come after her. If she hadn’t provoked Lester into a fight, he wouldn’t have been delayed all night and would have returned to Mary before the evening ended.
Not only that, he didn’t even get her into trouble for what she had done. At lunch the day Mary left, Aunt Sophia asked him about the bandages wrapped around his arm. “What happened to you?” she said to him.
Tessa held her breath. She looked at her plate and kept her head down, waiting for the worst.
“I had an accident,” Anthony said. “I hurt myself at the gym.”
She sneaked a glance at him. She couldn’t believe her ears.
“What could you have done at the gym to hurt yourself like that? Is it serious?”
“I’m fine, Mother. Don’t worry about it.”
Tessa looked at him, but he kept eating and didn’t look back at her.
But he blames me all the same, she thought and made a face at herself. The next day, he went back to work at his summer job with Uncle Leon and never said a word to anyone about what happened.
What bothered her, though, was seeing him do nothing else besides going to work. Before Mary arrived, he had planned a full week off to spend time with Mary. Now that Mary was gone, he would go to work, then come home at night and hole himself up in the den and read. His reading didn’t advance very far. Most of the time, she noticed he only stared at the pages.
He had tried to telephone Mary all week, but Mary was always unavailable. When he couldn’t reach her, he would look even more depressed.
Tessa never thought Anthony could be sad. He always seemed so in control, so organized and unassailable. She thought nothing could ever shake him, and nothing terrible could ever happen to him unless he was drafted to war.
Maybe that wasn’t a fair judgment. Perhaps there were times when he, too, could be vulnerable to things beyond his control. But how would she know that? She never knew what went on with him. He came and went between summers and holidays, and occasionally dropped in at home whenever it pleased him. When he did bother with her, it was always to tell her not to do this or not to do that. How curious it was to see there was a sensitive person with feelings behind all that.
And for all his troubles, she hadn’t even thanked him for saving them that night at the Melody Mill. She owed it to him to let him know she appreciated his help.
When he retreated to the den again after dinner, she went in after him and sat down on the sofa across from him.
“Hello,” she said.
Lying on the couch, he barely stirred. “Hey,” he said and returned to his book.
“Are you going to do anything else besides read?”
“There’s nothing else I want to do,” he said without looking at her.
“You’ll see Mary again when you go back to school in the fall.”
He frowned at the mention of Mary’s name. “I know.”
“Then why are you so morose?”
“I’m not morose.”
“Yes, you are. You’ve been sulking for days since she left.”
“No, I haven’t.”
“Yes, you have. You don’t go anywhere or do anything. All you do is go to work. Then you come home and brood in the den.”
“I swim.”
“That doesn’t count.”
“What’s all this sudden interest in how I spend my time?” He plopped down his book.
“You saved me and my friends. I want to treat you to a movie to thank you, but I can’t do that if you won’t leave the house.”
He laughed. “I don’t want to see a movie.” He picked up his book again, although at least now he was smiling.
“You’ll want to see this one. My father starred in it. He rarely does films. He prefers stage acting, so it’ll be a treat.”
“Your father?” She had piqued his interest. “What’s the movie?”
“Julius Caesar. It was released four years ago. It was the first time he made a film and he did it only because it was Shakespeare, and because Mother wanted very much to see him in one. My father’s not too fond of movie acting.”
“Why is that?”
“He thinks stage acting is more artistic. But his movie was very well received. He has a legion of fans and they all came to see him on opening night. My mother went too. She looked so beautiful and proud. She even blended a special rose perfume to commemorate the night and gave it to all the actresses in the cast. Well, she didn’t blend it herself, it was the perfume lady she found who knows how to take extracts from our roses and make perfumes with them.”
“Yes, I heard you have a rose garden at your home in London too.”
Tessa nodded. “My mother planted our garden to commemorate my grandmother, and Anthony Browning and Mrs. Browning. Back home, we plant different species of roses every summer. My mother and I would take most of the flowers to the hospital for her patients, but she would set aside some for making perfumes. She gives them as gifts to her co-workers and the actresses my father works with, and she gives me a bottle every summer. In fact, she just sent me a new bottle. Our garden must be blooming now.”
“Tessa.” Anthony sat up. “You said, ‘back home’ and ‘our garden’. Do you not feel at home here? You don’t even have a lot of your own things in your room.”
His question surprised her. She hadn’t given much thought to whether she considered the Ardleys’ house as her home. “I guess I always hoped my stay here would not be very long. If I get too attached to this place, then my home, my parents, my whole life back in London would feel even farther away from me.”
He looked at her for a moment, his eyes softened. “You’ll always have a second home here. You should know that.”
She felt a lump in her throat. “Thank you,” she said in a low voice and looked down. Not wanting to show her feelings, she changed the subject. “You’ve never seen my father’s work, have you?”
He shook his head.
“So how about it? Want to see the movie with me? The Biograph is showing a rerun tomorrow night.”
“I can’t say no, can I? That would be disrespectful t
o your father.”
“I would take it that way,” she joked. “We’re going then. The movie’s at eight o’clock. We can go after an early dinner?”
“All right.”
Satisfied, she got up to leave.
“Tessa?”
“Yes?” She turned around at the door.
“You miss home very much, don’t you?”
She looked away. The lump was back in her throat again. Without answering, she smiled and closed the door behind her.
Chapter 34
On their way to the cinema, Tessa fidgeted in the passenger’s seat while they slowed down with the heavy traffic. She leaned eagerly forward as they got closer, as if doing so would help her reach the Biograph sooner. She stared out the window, straining to see the first sight of the theater’s sign beyond the cars in front of them. Seeing her so excited, Anthony couldn’t help catching some of her enthusiasm. He cut off the car in the next lane to get them a few spots ahead. He wouldn’t have done that normally, but he was glad he did when she gave him a huge smile.
They arrived more than fifteen minutes before the film began, but her impatience already got the best of her. “Come on! Hurry up.” She hustled him along and went ahead of him. “You’re so slow.”
“Do you want some popcorn?” He started toward the concession stand.
“No!” She turned back and dragged him by the arm back toward the theater. “We have no time. We don’t want to miss the opening scene. And who eats popcorn when watching Shakespeare?”
The movie began with Caesar’s triumphant return to Rome after the Battle of Munda. Right away, the audience was treated to an elaborate set depicting the ancient city. The cast, too, impressed by delivering strong performances worthy of the Bard’s beloved masterpiece. The film would have been superb on these strengths alone, but when Dean Graham made his first appearance as Brutus, he took the production to a whole different level. His acting skills surpassed all the others. His magnetic presence kept the audience’s eyes firmly fixed on the screen.
Anthony had never seen Dean Graham before except in the photo in Tessa’s room. The actor exuded a passionate and intense energy, but at the same time, exhibited an air of reservation. For Anthony, these qualities felt oddly familiar. He looked at Tessa in the next seat and began to understand how she got to be the way she was.
He turned his eyes back to the screen. Dean Graham was without a doubt an attractive man. His soulful eyes, full of depth and emotions, drew the viewers in like an enigma. When he smiled, he seemed to be hiding a secret.
Anthony watched in awe. This unusual man was Tessa’s father? He looked at her again. She definitely inherited her father’s looks. From her hair, to her eyes, to her smile, which always carried a hint of mischief, she resembled her father in so many ways.
As if she felt she was being watched, she turned toward him and gave him a quizzical look. “What?” She mouthed the word.
“Nothing,” he whispered and returned to the movie. But his mind was no longer on the film.
About Tessa, don’t you find her attractive? Not at all? Mary had asked him.
At the time, the thought hadn’t crossed his mind. But if Tessa was like her father, then surely she would grow up to be a stunning beauty.
# # #
“Did you enjoy that?” Tessa asked Anthony as they drove home after the movie.
“I did. Thanks for inviting me.”
“I’m glad it took you away from moping around the house. You’ve taken over the den. I can’t even go in there to listen to music because I’m afraid I would bother you.”
“I wasn’t moping.”
She stifled a smile. “Okay. If you say so,” she said.
“What about you? Did you enjoy it?” he asked.
She didn’t answer at first. He took a quick glance at her.
“I haven’t seen my father in two years. This was as close as I could get to seeing him in person.”
He wished he could say something to comfort her, but he knew nothing could. He tried to divert her mind to something else instead. “You stopped going to Murphy’s?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“Did you go there a lot?”
“I did. For a while.”
“Why did you like going there anyway?”
She gazed out the front window. They had driven out of the city and were cruising along the Gold Coast by the lake. From the car, she could see the Edgewater Hotel towering over the beach and the other buildings nearby. She thought about last summer when she had gone to Murphy’s to give her winning ticket to Jack so he could take Carmina to the Edgewater instead of her.
She thought about why she continued to go to Murphy’s. Mainly, she went because Jack was there. Then Jack left, but she kept going anyway. She never asked herself why. Now, thinking about it, she thought she probably kept going because of Nadine. Nadine was the only adult here who understood her.
“A lot of reasons.” She rested her elbow on the rim of the passenger’s side window and held her head in her hand. “It’s fun to go to a place that I know would shock the sensibilities of the nuns at St. Mary’s.”
“It’s not the safest place for a girl to be. What if something terrible had happened to you?”
“Are you planning to lecture me again? I told you I can take care of myself.”
“Like you took care of yourself at the dance hall?” He laughed.
She pouted and looked out her side of the window. “Nothing would happen to me. Nadine watches out for me.”
“Nadine?”
“She’s the lead bartender there. Everyone at Murphy’s listens to her.”
Anthony thought back to the night at the tavern. “Is she the woman with red hair?”
“Yes.”
He remembered her. That woman had come up to him and Tessa when they left the bar and insinuated he was causing Tessa trouble.
“Why do you have that look on your face?” Tessa asked.
“What look?”
“Your forehead and eyebrows were all scrunched up when I mentioned Nadine. Why?”
He wasn’t aware he was doing that. “I don’t know. I guess she probably isn’t the type of woman you should associate with.”
“And what type of woman is that?” she asked, her voice wary and guarded.
“I…it’s…she’s…” The word he was thinking of was “loose,” but he couldn’t bring himself to say something derogatory about a woman.
Tessa watched as he struggled to explain himself. She had an idea of what he wanted to say. People, “good people,” always made assumptions about women like Nadine. It disappointed her that Anthony was no exception, but she was glad he at least still showed respect. He was so decent, he couldn’t even say aloud what he thought. She wondered how much it would shock his mind if he knew the types of women she had grown up seeing, like the two-bit actresses who flaunted their sex appeal to try to get roles, and the shameless women who trotted before her father hoping to catch his attention. Compared to those women, Nadine was as pure as a vestal virgin. Amused by his simplistic view of right and wrong, she sat back and enjoyed watching the strained expression on his face.
In the end, he only said, “I’m glad you’re not around her so much now.”
She shrugged and looked out the window.
But then he added, “You’re too young. She might not be a good influence on you.”
She glowered at him. The way he treated her like a child and always had an opinion on what she should or should not do annoyed her to no end. She started to talk back, but the sight of the small beach area ahead gave her a better idea.
“Anthony, look!” she said, pointing to the beach. “Can we please pull over and stop there for a moment? Let’s get out for a breath of fresh air.”
“It’s late.”
“Please? Just a quick stop? Look at the beautiful moonlight reflecting off the lake.”
He glanced over to the spot where she was pointing. The view of the
beach was indeed very nice. She looked at him with pleading eyes. Not wanting to be too disagreeable after a pleasant night, he conceded. “Okay, a quick stop. Then we have to get on home because it’s late.”
“Of course.” She gave him a big smile.
He stopped the car at the parking area behind the beach. No other car was there besides theirs. At this hour of the night, the beach was deserted.
She got out, took a deep breath, and walked toward the secluded side of the beach concealed from the road by a cluster of trees. He followed. The ambiance of the night and the soft sounds of the waves soothed him. The night air blowing in from the water was cool and crisp. He could see the clear view of the reflection of the moon glowing on the dark, calm water.
Tessa had gone on ahead of him. Halfway to the edge of the beach, she turned around. “It’s a beautiful night, isn’t it?”
He smiled. She walked a few more steps ahead, then started to take off her dress.
Confused, he squinted his eyes. When he realized she was undressing, he asked, “What are you doing?”
“I’m going for a swim,” she said, nonchalantly as if she had said she was going to take a walk. She dropped her dress on the ground and took off her underwear.
“Tessa!” he stopped and shouted. “Put your clothes back on!”
“I can’t. I want to swim and I don’t want to get my clothes wet.”
“Tessa!” He shouted again, frantic. “You’re out of your mind!”
She ignored him and started toward the water. He looked away. He didn’t know where to look.
“Tessa, come on! That’s enough. This is not funny. Get back here and put your clothes back on. Please! I’m begging you.”
She stepped into the water. She could hear him shouting and hollering behind her. She bit her lip and snickered to herself. She wondered what type of girl he thought she was now, or, would he still dare to talk to her as if she was some naive child. No matter, she thought. Serves him right. She waded in deeper and slid into the lake.