by Gina Watson
She’d successfully identified four cabinet members and labeled each picture accordingly. Her stomach panged loudly in the otherwise quiet room. It was then Cara realized she hadn’t eaten since breakfast.
Cara left her things in rough order and pushed the chairs beneath the table. Grasping the handle of her Longchamp tote bag brought a smile to her face as she recalled unwrapping the gift from her mother on graduation day. She turned out the light, locked the door, and headed outside.
It was well into July and she’d not heard from Max. Well, she’d not heard his voice, but there was evidence of his involvement all around her. He’d set her up and set her up well. Posh was a word she’d used several times in the past few weeks. As she hailed a cab she recalled the Visa card in the mail. He’d written a note that said: This is strictly for hailing cabs. I better not ever hear of you walking or riding the subway to and from your apartment to the Harlem branch of the NYC library. She’d been thrilled he’d known of her location because it meant he was thinking of her.
She gave the address to her Madison Avenue apartment to the cabbie, then sat back and enjoyed the ride.
“Warm night,” he said.
It was much warmer in New York during July than Cara had thought it was going to be. “When does it turn cool?”
“Middle to the end of September.”
They talked some more about the weather and when her destination had been reached Cara paid the cabbie, left a hefty tip, and exited onto the curb right in front of her building. She always took a moment to stand before it and admire the building. Electricity buzzed from the energy of the city and enveloped the high-rise apartment building. In a flash three people had exited and one had entered the building.
“Good evening, Miss Presley,” Hank the doorman greeted.
“Oh hello, Hank. How’s World Gone By?”
“Halfway through, and I’m starting to get chills.”
They always seemed to be reading the current bestseller, and so lately they’d synchronized their literary selections. “You’re further along than me…no spoilers.” She shook a finger at him.”
“This came for you.” He passed her a brown envelope.
“Thanks.”
She rode the elevator to the twelfth floor, curious about the contents of the flat unmarked envelope. Using the key to her apartment, she tore through the top of the envelope. She finally had it parted when the elevator door opened. She walked to her apartment and entered, setting her keys in a bowl on the console entryway table she’d selected at a local designer. An account had been set up for her and she’d walked into Designs by Anthony and essentially pointed to what she liked. Anthony had shared wine with her.
She placed her tote on the coffee table and turned on the lights. Sitting on the couch, she placed her thumb and finger in the envelope and pulled the contents free. A round trip ticket from New York to Baton Rouge. Instead of a date there was a date range. Confused, she unfolded the note.
Cara,
It’s been too long since I’ve held you in my arms and tasted your lips. Know that I love you and am busy becoming a better man for you. There were certain things I needed to clear up before I could ask you to become a permanent part of my life. I realized that when the consequences of my actions finally caught up with me. We’re nearly there I hope, because I’m dying without you.
Please use the ticket to make your itinerary. I figured you’d be free around Labor Day but left the dates open in case by some miracle you are free sooner. I know you wish to speak on the telephone, but if we do I know I won’t be able to keep my secrets from you. I’ve been busy and I hope you’ll approve. Email me. I do love it when you put pen to paper because then I have a keepsake that will keep until the end of my days. I cherish you.
Missing you, loving you,
Max
Cara’s tears stung her eyes. Max’s silver tongue could bring her to her knees, but his letters could rip out her heart. Like hell she was waiting until Labor Day! It was Monday. Somehow she’d take the rest of the week off. Maybe she could make it up over the impending fall holiday. It’s not like she worked the librarian’s desk. One way or another she’d get to Max. And she’d get to him tomorrow.
***
Cara stepped from the cab and waited while the cabbie unloaded her luggage from the trunk.
“There you go, miss.”
“Thank you.” She handed the woman fare plus a ten percent tip.
“Have a good one.”
“You too.” Cara couldn’t take her eyes from the stately mansion. Something was definitely different. For starters there was a Dopheine Orphanage banner hanging from the eaves of the porch. The fountain that graced the front lawn and put many Italian marbles to shame, currently housed plastic colored balls in an array of colors. Nets leaned against the stone and she imagined children using them to fish the balls from the fountain.
She left her luggage and walked up to the front door. She thought about knocking, but curiosity got the better of her and, finding it unlocked, she opened the door.
She stepped inside and closed the door. Voices drifted all around. In the large family room right off of the entryway a nun taught math to a room full of little boys. The plush furniture had been removed to accommodate student desks. The room opposite that housed musical instruments that looked a lot like the ones Max had donated to the school…and then she heard him. Max’s voice. Muffled, but he spoke about iambic pentameter.
She followed the sound of his voice to the room at the back of the house. The room that had the pillars she’d admired during her first visit to the home. Peeking in through the ajar door she saw him slowly pacing as he recited from memory some examples of the skill he taught:
“’Now is the winter of our discontent.
Made glorious summer by this sun of York;
And all the clouds that lour’d upon our house
In the deep bosom of the ocean buried.’”
At the last line the makeshift classroom broke into peals of laughter.’”
“Yes, it’s quite funny, but you do hear where the emphasis is placed. I want your poems turned in no later than Thursday and I want them written in iambic pentameter or I will not accept them and you will receive the dreaded zero for your efforts.” Students typed like mad scientists (or rather like mad transcriptionists) as he communicated the details of the assignment.
“Are there any questions?” He turned and they immediately locked eyes. Gasping he said, “Cara.” All of the students turned and it was then that she recognized a lot of the middle school boys from the Dopheine Orphanage and School.
“Max, what are you…” She giggled when the students began to whisper.
“Get your worksheets out. Sentence diagramming lesson six, prepositional phrases.”
Grumbles filtered through the airwaves. “Hey, anymore bellyaching and I’ll send Sister Myers down here to keep an eye on you.”
The grumbling ceased immediately. As they approached each other, Max and Cara’s eyes locked, the intensity physical and capable of being cut with a knife. His hand met the small of her back, guiding her through the French doors, across the porch, and into the backyard. When finally they stopped he grasped both of her hands in each one of his. With thoughts of the orphanage and the changes to his home pummeling her brain, she’d been rendered speechless. The only thing she could do was smile.
“Cara, I wasn’t quite ready for you, but seeing you standing in the doorway stole my breath. I’m not finished, but I’m getting close to being the best man that I can be.”
Dazed, Cara shook her head. “You don’t have to be the best man, Max. That you strive to be is enough for me.” He was vulnerable and his heart and mind opened. He wore a pair of black slacks and a white Oxford shirt with the cuffs rolled back and open at the collar. Casual. She’d rarely seen him looking so content. He had facial stubble, not something he would have tolerated before, and his hair had grown out giving him a sexy, bad boy appearance. L
ooking at the house she asked, “Is your home now the Dopheine School?”
“And orphanage.”
She smiled at him smiling shyly at her. “I think you need to catch me up.”
“But first I must do this,” he leaned in placing his lips on hers. His kiss lingered, turning needy and then his tongue slipped in. Whistles and hollers rang out behind them and they pulled apart to turn and identify the source of the commotion. His class of middle school boys was on the back porch cheering him on. Cara giggled.
“Take a walk with me.” He pulled her hand and led her down toward the bayou, the cover of trees affording them some much-needed privacy. “When I found out your mom had spoken to Alexander about the video I realized my old life was going to clash with my new life in ways I didn’t want it to. You expressed in an email that partners help each other in times of need and you were upset that I was pushing you away.” At a bench he sat and pulled her across his lap, placing his hand in hers. His green eyes burned with tension.
“I don’t know how to make you understand.” His gaze went toward the water. “With as much as I’ve been blessed with, I’ve also lost a lot.” His voice broke. She wanted to comfort him but sensed he needed to express himself, so she kept still and quiet. “I was reckless and careless because I was angry and hurt. I didn’t believe I would ever have a chance at a family or a full life and then I figured out that family isn’t defined by a society or a religion. Family can be friends, it can be the little old people we read to, it can be the orphaned children we mentor. Just because they aren’t my blood doesn’t mean they aren’t entitled to what I have. I needed some time to put things in orbit.” He lifted his hand and spun a finger in the air.
“Cara”—with the hand he had on her back he lifted her close so that they were almost touching—“I wanted to start this chapter with you as a different person. Not as Maximilian von Doodoo.” She chuckled. “I’m serious, I needed to make changes, huge changes because I was afraid that if I went into a relationship with you as the same ugly person that I was, I would lose you to whatever entity keeps taking the people I love away from me. I saved my greatest effort for last. If it doesn’t work, I’d rather just be dead.”
She was in tears. “Max”—she placed her palm on his warm cheek—“nothing’s going to take me away from you. Your parents weren’t taken from you because you were a bad person…my God, you were just a child.”
“I was cursed.”
“No, you weren’t.”
“Elizabeth drowned. Did you know that she was a Scholastic All-American team member? She could swim like a fish, but she drowned.”
“You weren’t there when she drowned.”
“No, I wasn’t, but something sinister was. I know it’s crazy but I had to try and rid myself of this thing…these ghosts. Long story short, you’re looking at the new headmaster for the Dopheine School and Orphanage.”
“Oh, my God…that’s wonderful! You’re a wonderful teacher for those boys.”
“I’m really trying hard to be.”
“So why are they at your house?”
“They found black mold all throughout the old place out on Forrest Road. I was going to have the entire place redone, but with the plumbing and electrical upgrades that are needed it was cheaper to tear it down and build a new facility. So while it’s being built they will be my houseguests.”
He smiled proudly. “You’re amazing. You’re a saint to those kids.”
“I’m nothing, but I’m glad you feel that way.”
“I was worried about you, Max.” She leaned her head against his chest and could hear his heart beating rapidly. “I worried about Ed Koch retaliating against you.”
“No worries, babe. Alex has taken care of the situation with Koch. I’m happy to say that one good thing came out of the entire fiasco.”
She lifted her head to look at his face. “What’s that?”
“Alex and I are once again friends.”
She kissed his cheek. He was so different than he was before. Even the stubble on his face tickled her nose. “I like this.” She rubbed her cheek against the roughness of his.
“Oh, that’s sort of out of necessity. It’s a big house, but six and half bathrooms are still not enough for fifty-three boys.”
“Good thing for you I like it.”
“I have some additional news to share with you. I hope it will make you happy.”
He seemed a little nervous and she tried to remember a time when she’d experienced him nervous. She couldn’t. “What is it?”
“You know Marcus?”
“Your mentee?”
He scratched his forehead and then took a deep breath. “I uh…I’m sort of fostering to adopt him.”
She whimpered involuntarily as her heart burst with love for the man. Tears immediately hit her cheeks. “Oh, my God! Max!”
He grabbed her wrists and intensely studied her face. “He’s a good kid, Cara. Super easy to have around. He’s interested in everything and complains about nothing. If you just give the idea a chance I know you’ll grow to love it.”
“Max, shut up! Are you crazy?” She wailed. “I have so much love for you in this moment I don’t even know how to process it. It’s the most wonderful thing that has ever happened…you adopting him.” She couldn’t stop sobbing like a hyena.
“So you’ll be his mother then?” He dropped the line and rested his chin on his chest, biting his bottom lip.
“Maximilian Reese David…you of all men know that is not a proper proposal.” She shook her finger in his face. “I want the works…bended knee, the ring, the lines, the”—
He immediately moved her over to a clear spot on the bench, and then dropped to one knee.
“If I could take any part of your goodness inside of me it would be your compassion. To see what you see…the best in people at all times. You, Cara, make life worth living. You make change worth seeking, and you make me the best form of myself. If I can give you a fraction of what you give to me, you will be rich indeed.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out his wallet. Removing a ring he held it toward her. “Cara Marie Presley, will you marry me?”
She slid off the bench and straddled his lap, almost knocking him over. “My Max. I love you and will be honored to live in this world as your wife.” She fanned her hand at him and he slid the silver ring onto her hand. “When did you get a ring?”
“After New Orleans.”
“Wow, that early.”
“You gave me everything you had to give. From that moment I was prepared to be deserving of you. Or at least to try.”
He was way too self-deprecating. She thought about the man who stood in his office and worried with his hair and cared more about the condition of his skin than the needs of others. Even then his heart had been generous. She recalled how he felt when he turned all of his confident, cocky energy on her and fire stirred in her belly. “If you weren’t deserving, I never would have given myself to you. And don’t go changing everything about yourself…I’d miss your dominance in the bedroom.”
His eyes narrowed at her. Then his arm enclosed around her waist, lifting them to their feet. “You’re lucky there isn’t an available room in the house right now or you’d be on your back.”
“Well, it’s a good thing there’s not a bed out here.”
“Speaking of beds…We’re sort of homeless. Marcus and I have been sleeping over at my cousin’s house. My room here has become a dorm for the preteens.”
“I won’t be done with my internship until April. Surely by then we can find a place.”
“I’m wondering what you think of building on David property. It’s large enough that we can have privacy, but my brothers and their wives won’t be too far away. Marcus has fallen in love with the place. Every morning and evening we go around with Ashton and Harmony, feeding the animals. It really gives him a sense of place and belonging.”
“I love the idea of building a place near your family. I can complete
ly picture Marcus and us in that space.”
Max tilted his head and a wrinkle popped up on his forehead. “What about New York?”
“What about it?”
“For some reason I thought you would look for a job there.”
She put her arms around him. “No, Max. My family is here. My mom, you, and now Marcus.”
He smiled, seemingly relieved. “And now Marcus.”
Epilogue
“It’s a hammerhead shark! “Marcus yelled as he stood beneath the arch of the glowing aquarium. “How can he tell which way he’s going?”
Max’s pinky finger had been sequestered these days. Marcus rarely let go of it. In fact nothing he owned was solely his anymore. On his free arm his wife held tight and he smiled…the truest smile he’d ever made. He loved his family of three, soon to be four. Max read from the poster framed on the wall, “It says the eyes are wide-set to enable the shark to scout its prey.”
While Marcus looked at the sharks, Max and Cara took a break and sat on a bench near the exhibit. Cara rubbed her huge belly. “Man, that chili dog is giving me heartburn.”
Max stretched out his leg and dug in his pocket, pulling out a roll of Tums. He peeled the paper back and pulled two antacids free, holding them out to his very pregnant wife. She snatched them from his palm. “You’re a saint.”
He’d learned to carry the things she never seemed to have, but constantly needed: antacids, lip balm, hair ties, and band aids for blisters.
Marcus walked up to the bench and stood, staring with wide eyes. “Is everything okay?”
“Yeah buddy, just needed a break.”
He nodded and took in the size of Cara’s stomach. “It’s a really big belly.” Cara and Max laughed at his words. Marcus was a serious little guy and rarely laughed along with them, but when he let out a few giggles Max could see some progress. After the adoption process had been finalized Marcus had been confused. He’d wondered how long the adoption would last…until he was ten years old or longer. Max had tried to explain that Marcus was family and family lasts forever. He’d taken to calling him daddy and it still brought an increase of moisture to his eyes.