Chasing the Wind

by Pamela Binnings Ewen

  And then she felt the bulge, just a slight thickness to the pocket, as if the pin were holding something hidden.

  Carefully she spread the worn pocket and looked inside. There she found a faded envelope, the kind used for international air mail, pale blue paper with a thin red stripe. Carefully she unlatched the pin, sliding it from the pocket and the paper. Then she closed it and set the pin down on the coffee table.

  The envelope was folded into squares. Someone who cared about Luke had pinned this to his shirt. Amalise unfolded the envelope, square by square. The envelope was empty. She saw it had been addressed, by hand in ink, to the United States Embassy, Phnom Penh, Cambodia.

  That's all. How had it even gotten there with that address?

  And then her heart began beating a strange, rapid rhythm as she stared at the address and the handwriting. She lay the envelope flat in her lap and smoothed the paper, noting the many official certifications and the date stamps from different countries as something stirred just beneath the surface of her mind.

  Barely breathing now, she turned the envelope over to find the return address. Time stretched and twisted and turned, and then she closed her eyes, wanting to hold onto this moment, wanting to believe.

  She did not hear Jude arriving with the coffee. She didn't open her eyes or say anything when he set the cups down on the coffee table before them. And when he sat down beside her and asked in a worried tone if she was not feeling well, she couldn't answer.

  She merely opened her eyes and, with her heart pounding, she held up the envelope for him to see. Because written on the back in handwriting she knew so well, were these words:

  Mrs. A. Sharp

  5 – Dumaine Street

  Apartment A

  New Orleans, Louisiana

  "What's this?" He took the envelope from her.

  "I found it in the pocket of one of Luke's old shirts."

  Then she sat very still, remembering. It was the spring of 1975. She was sitting at a table in the Café Pontalba, addressing the envelope and writing a note. The tip money she'd saved for weeks, without telling Phillip, was on the table beside the envelope. She folded the note around the ten-dollar bills and stuffed it into the envelope.

  The money was for the shadow children.

  From that dark place where she'd buried the images two years ago they reeled, frame by frame, through her mind. The contrast between her life and that of the children on the television screen. The urgency of their plight, with the Khmer Rouge closing in. The scorching feeling of helplessness, watching suffering from across the globe in her own living room. And the guilt, knowing that she could turn off the television set the moment the news touched too deeply.

  What can one person do? she'd asked herself at that time.

  She looked at the envelope, now lying in Jude's lap, and wanted to cry. Thank you, Abba. One person had been able to do something after all. And then slowly she felt that infinite hole inside closing up at last, the emptiness that could never be filled with finite things.

  This was why she'd been given a second chance, she realized. Luke was as much her child as if she'd carried him in her womb. Looking down at the letter she'd sent on a wing and a prayer, she knew that now. With Jude still holding onto the envelope, she rose, weak with fatigue. She walked up to Luke's bedroom and lay down beside him. She didn't touch him. Just lay there watching his little chest rise and fall, not wanting to wake him. He'd had a long day, Jude had said. At last her own eyes closed, and Amalise slept.

  Chapter Fifty

  An hour later she woke—slowly—lingering in that half world between dreams and wakefulness, not quite sure where she was. As her mind cleared, it came back to her, all of it: the envelope attached to Luke's tiny shirt, the new purpose in her life, this child. She propped herself up on one elbow and looked down at Luke, feeling all at once a new kind of love, a force that almost overwhelmed her, surpassing every emotion she'd ever felt, even instinct, even survival.

  Minutes passed as she watched the child in the dark. In her heart he was her son. That's what Caroline had been trying to communicate earlier, she suddenly realized. Without even knowing about the envelope, Caroline had sensed the connection between them.

  Smiling, she brushed Luke's forehead with a kiss and slipped out of the bed without waking him. She was reluctant to leave him but couldn't wait to find Jude and tell him this. Hurrying down the steps, she smiled again, thinking of Jude and Luke as she'd seen them together earlier.

  Jude was sleeping on the couch in the living room when she found him. She picked up the cold cup of coffee and sipped it, then sat down and watched him sleep, thinking how natural it now seemed that—for her—their friendship had turned to love.

  Yes, yes. I know Abba. For his sake, I'll keep that to myself. She would store that feeling deep in her heart so that he would never know. Love is unselfish. Love is kind. Jude should be free to love Rebecca. Yet she looked at his strong arms and longed for them to hold her. She touched his lips with her eyes and longed for just one lingering kiss.

  A nostalgic feeling arose. In this moment, she was conscious that she'd always loved Jude, and she probably always would, but he would never know. Still, she would have Luke.

  Drifting up from dreams, he felt her eyes on him. Immediately he was alert. He opened his eyes and looked at her, and she smiled.

  "I thought I was the one who needed sleep." Her voice tinkled with laughter.

  Her face was luminous as she sat there, fingering that shirt of Luke's. Jude hadn't seen her look so happy in a while. He blinked and straightened his legs, touching her with his toes. She laughed and jumped.

  She talked of Luke, and her eyes shone. He thought of Luke's sleeping face lit by moonlight last night, and of the day they'd spent together. He'd loved watching the child open up, how he'd looked up with that grin when he'd hit the first nail with the hammer. And Luke was smart. He'd take him fishing, soon. Teach him to swim.

  "About the closing last night?" Her voice broke into his thoughts.

  "Yes, tell me."

  "You won't believe what happened."

  "Why does that not surprise me?"

  She laughed and told him everything. When she spoke of Robert Black's threat, Jude curled his fists, keeping them hidden down by his legs on the couch. He'd like five minutes in a room with Robert Black. Just five was all he'd need.

  She thanked him for coming to the hospital. Not just for Luke's sake, but also for her own. He'd saved her job.

  But when she came to the closing, and Bingham's disappearance, he could only stare. It seemed Bingham Murdoch had been a con artist all along, stringing along his investors for a personal twenty-million-dollar payday. And now he had vanished. Jude shook his head.

  She was still tired, she said, but wanted to see Luke before she went home. Oh, how she wanted to take Luke home with her.

  Jude invited her to stay. He'd sleep on the sofa, he said, and she could have the bed.

  She looked down, smoothed her skirt, glanced at him from the corners of her eyes. And blushed.

  Amalise, blushing?

  Without thinking, he reached for her, but she stood up. "I'll go check on him one more time before I leave," she said, heading for the stairs before he could catch up. He followed her, telling himself she was his best friend and that's how she wanted things to stay. Status quo. And suddenly he knew that wasn't good enough. He loved this woman, and tonight he would tell her so.

  So he focused on the task before him, just as he would aboard ship, charting a course one step at a time.

  Amalise stood in the doorway with Jude behind her, watching Luke sleep. Like the rooms downstairs, the guest room was square as a box, but large, with two long windows on the far side. It was already eleven o'clock at night. He wouldn't wake again until morning, she guessed.

 
Luke lay in the middle of the big bed where she'd left him, covered with a light blanket and sound asleep. She could see the bulge of the cast under the blanket, a bulky contrast to the rest of his undernourished body. His head was turned now, facing the door, as if he'd been waiting for her.

  Mak. "He's tiny in that bed."

  "Yes. Light as a feather and worn out—he'll probably sleep for a while. Last night's medicine is probably still in his system." Jude touched her elbow. "Come out on the porch. We'll hear him out there if he wakes up. We need to talk."

  Reluctantly she nodded, taking one last look at Luke. She was pretty certain how this conversation would go. Jude already knew what was in her heart. He would talk about Luke, about how difficult it would be for her to try to raise this child alone, how Caroline and Ellis had already taken him into their family. But she wouldn't part with Luke, she resolved. She was his mother—the envelope had told her that. He was her son. She would do whatever it took not to lose him now. She'd explain all of this to Jude, but in her mind the decision was made. She had no doubt that Caroline and Ellis would agree Luke should stay with her. She would adopt him.

  Pulling herself away from the sight of the sleeping child, she turned and found herself standing face to face with Jude. He was looking down at her, his hands braced on either side of the door. For a moment her legs went weak, but then he slung his arm over her shoulder as he always did and smiled, and they walked through his bedroom and out onto the screened porch high up among the trees like two old friends.

  There were two cane chairs out there, a small table, and an old cane couch that had seen its best days long ago. Now stripped of its leaves by autumn winds, the spreading branches of the pin oak in the yard below no longer hid the porch from the street. To her right Amalise could see State Street stretching toward St. Charles Avenue eight blocks away, solitary in the night.

  She sat on one chair, and Jude took the other. The late-November air was crisp and cool, reminding her that tomorrow was Thanksgiving Day. Moonlight filtered through the bare branches. Sweet olive was in the air, the fragrance most pungent this time of year.

  Amalise glanced in the direction of the guest room. "You're sure we'll hear him out here if he wakes?"

  "Yes."

  "You're good with him. He likes you."

  "He's a good kid. And smart."

  She settled back, remembering the night she'd come here looking for Jude, the night she'd left Phillip. Then as now, light ringed the lampposts in the darkness, pooling on the grass and curbstone and sidewalks below. She took this all in, mental snapshots of this evening that she'd remember later on, after he married Rebecca and this was their home.

  A dog barked in the distance, breaking into her thoughts, and another one echoed the first. Back and forth they went for a few minutes, and then there was silence.

  "I wonder if they understood each other," Amalise mused aloud.

  Jude laughed. "When you were a kid, you wondered once how many circles and squares there are in the world."

  She looked at him. "I thought you had all the answers."

  He looked off. Minutes passed in silence. She studied him from the corner of her eye, wanting to hold onto this picture, too: Jude, slouched down in his chair, looking off, thinking about ships or the river or Pilottown and some report he had to finish.

  He tilted his head, leaned his face on his hand.

  Visions of the years ahead without him smothered rational thought. He thinks of you only as his friend, she reminded herself, swallowing. But I'm not that little girl you used to know, Jude. I'm all grown up. I'm a woman now.

  As if he'd heard her, his blue eyes turned to her, catching her by surprise. Straightening up, he angled his chair toward her and bent forward, elbows on his knees, hands linked between them. In the heavy silence, she waited.

  He dropped his eyes, and when he looked up again it was with an intensity she'd never seen before. She straightened, preparing herself.

  "Listen," he said. His voice was low and husky. "Do you think you could ever get past this old friendship of ours?"

  Oh, not even that? Tears threatened, but she fought them back. She would not cry right now. Later on, when she was alone, she'd battle things out with herself. But not now. She lifted her chin. "Of course, I understand. When you're married, things will change."

  "Well, I certainly hope so."

  She spoke before she thought. "Rebecca will see to that."

  Seconds passed. Then he reached over and touched her knee. "Rebecca?"

  Her throat felt tight, and it hurt from the tension. She wanted to be casual and smart and say something that would make him smile, but she couldn't think at all.

  And then he reached across the space between them and pulled on the chair she was sitting in, tugging, turning it so that they were facing each other, and this show of physical force made her angry. She clamped her hands down on his forearms, ready to push him away. Jude was never cruel. How could he be so cruel! Her mouth quivered and she pressed her lips together as her fingers dug into those hard muscles.

  "Amalise," he said. His voice was gentle. "Look at me." He reached out and touched the underside of her chin with his fingers, tilting her face upward so that she could look at nothing else but him. She felt the tears threatening again. Then he leaned close, his face just inches from hers and he said, his voice low and fierce, "I love you, Amalise."

  For a moment she stared, and then she pulled back from him, not understanding. But in that instant his hands shot out, gripping her shoulders, and he held onto her so that she couldn't move, as if he would never let her go. And he said it again.

  Then she sat very still, listening.

  "I want to marry you. I want to spend the rest of my life with you, Amalise. And I'll wait as long as it takes for you to feel the same."

  He loosened his grip, sliding his hands down her arms. His voice grew thick, and he glanced aside and back again. "I know how strange this must seem. We've known each other for so long, and it might be hard to think of me in a different way. I know you want things to remain just as they are, but they can't because I'm in love with you." Then he gathered her hands into his and pulled her close so that their hands, joined together, covered his heart.

  She could feel his breath on her face as he said these words. She could feel his muscled chest, the faint movement of his heart as he held onto her hands, pressing them to him. And as she listened, the words seemed to float around her in pieces, like bits of a puzzle that she must put together to understand.

  Love. I. You.

  And then, he'd said her name. Amalise.

  Not Rebecca. Amalise.

  She sorted through her jumbled thoughts, through everything he'd said, rearranging, reordering the words so they made sense. Then she leaned back, studying him, looking for clues that would tell her she'd heard wrong. She waited to see if suddenly he'd turn away and laugh and tell her this was all a joke.

  When she couldn't stand it anymore, all this analyzing, this process of thinking too much, she blurted out, "But Rebecca!" She shoved her fists encased in his hands against his chest. "What about Rebecca?"

  Jude's hands tightened over hers, as if she might try to escape. Bracing his arms on his knees, he leaned even closer so that she could see the faint line between his eyes. She smelled the scent of his skin, his hair.

  He did not blink. "Rebecca knows, I think. She's known for a long time now. She's in love with her career. And I'm in love with you."

  She'd always trusted Jude. And as she watched his lips forming these words, she began to believe that perhaps something magical was happening here. She felt the first stirring in her mind and heart of something that told her this was real.

  "It's not the same anymore." He smiled that long slow smile of his and waited.

  Every particle of her bei
ng, every cell in her body tingled. "Not the same?" she repeated, brows raised, eyes wide.

  Jude let out a sharp laugh. "Oh, my feelings for you are definitely not the same."

  And in one split second everything coalesced, and a clarity and feeling of sheer joy rose up in her, a knowing that rippled through her and spread like stardust. She burst from the chair, flinging her arms around Jude's neck, and the chair tipped, tumbling down, taking them both down too.

  "Whoa!" Jude laughed, catching her, encircling her with his arms as he lay flat on his back, cushioning her fall. "Was that a yes or a kamikaze attack?"

  He was still laughing as she braced her hands on either side of his shoulders, looking down into his face. "Have you asked a question yet? I can't recall."

  His look turned grave. He shook his head. "I dunno."

  "Well. Ask it."

  "All right. Can you cook?"

  She lowered her arms, moving closer, longing for that first kiss. "I cooked a potato once, but it exploded in the oven."

  He groaned. "I remember."

  And then he turned into a blur, and her lips touched his, lightly at first, moving, exploring, and he pulled her down into his arms. She felt his hands cradling her face, and then he pushed her back, away, and gave her a long look. And when their lips touched again, she felt the memories streaming through the kiss: their years growing up, the things they'd learned together, how they'd laughed, a gardenia he'd once picked for her when she hadn't had a date for a dance. Every moment of their years together fed that kiss as friendship sanctified their love.

  When Jude finally lifted her, pretending to groan at the weight, they sat together on the floor, side by side, leaning back against the screen and talking, planning, interrupting each other, excited like the children they'd once been. They would get married soon, he said.