Cindy's Prince

by Bush, Christine

  ****

  Prince faced the closed white door. Cindy Castle was gone. The cab ride back to the library took forever. As the cabbie swerved in and out of traffic, Prince slouched in the back seat, feeling like an actor in a bad, bad movie. He had kissed her. The horrified look on her face told it all. He grimaced.

  That face always showed a lot of emotion. He’d seen the joy in her face when she was happy on the bus, the compassion when she spoke to the crying child at the library. He’d seen the contempt at his bus ignorance, and her reaction to his kiss. Sure, he’d probably shown bad judgment to follow that irresistible urge.

  But her reaction? That could be listed as a new one in his kissing history. No woman had ever reacted like that before! But then, he’d never done such an outrageous thing.

  He scowled, feeling the next thought and hating it. No kiss had ever meant so much. Ever. What was that all about? This cheerful, compassionate woman looked anguished at the thought of kissing him. He wanted to bang on the door until she opened it and he could kiss her again. Like a caveman. He shook his head, staring out the smeared cab window.

  The whole thing could be described as ridiculous. He’d return home and get his head straight, get back to his normal and predictable and suitable life. He’d gotten the job done, and there was no need to get mentally sidetracked by the whole escapade.

  Though even aside from the kiss thing, there was no sense of completion of his “mission”. He remembered the distaste she showed when she looked at the package, and how she tossed the precious bundle he had hand delivered into the closet. As if she couldn’t wait to get it out of her hands and out of sight. Almost in fear.

  What was that all about?

  Not his problem, he kept telling himself. Just as well he was done with it. His phone rang.

  “What’s taking you so long?” barked his father’s gravelly voice. “I wanted you to take that New Jersey politician out for drinks, to keep him busy. You should have been back hours ago.”

  Prince counted to ten. “I got held up. Locating this woman took longer than I expected, but the package from Ben was delivered.”

  “Waste of time, tracking down that little chippie. I had no idea you would take so long. I hope she appreciates it.”

  Prince thought of her face, her reaction, the package on the top of the closet. Appreciate wasn’t the word he would choose, but he didn’t say it. “Well, it’s done. She’s not a chippie. She’s a nice woman, raising her sister’s kids.”

  “Riff raff. Other people’s kids. Sure sign of trouble. Good example of what not to be.”

  Anger flashed, and he clenched the phone in his hand. He opened his mouth to speak, but his father cut him off.

  “Got to run. See you tomorrow.” With a click, the phone went dead.

  Prince sighed as the cab jerked to a stop in traffic, the driver yelling out the window as a bus cut him off. He was sweating, and his shirt was sticking to his back. The air conditioner in the cab obviously did not work. But he’d tolerate the cab. At least he wasn’t on the bus. The cab veered from lane to lane, and he looked forward to getting back into his Aston Martin, turning on his state-of-the-art CD player and chilling himself with a working air conditioner.

  As they pulled up to the library, he handed a twenty to the cabbie, who fumbled and mumbled and scrambled around in his pockets for change, until an irritable and impatient Prince snarled, “Keep the change.”

  Without wasting a second, the cab sped away from the curb and back into traffic, like a yellow flash. The cabbie could move quickly when he wanted to. Prince clenched his jaw as he turned to find his car.

  There was no car. He found the fire hydrant where the car had been. The hydrant remained, the car did not.

  “You looking for that fancy James Bond car?” A teenage boy with low-riding baggy pants and untied sneakers approached, smirking. He had his hands in his pockets to hold up his pants.

  Prince’s jaw tightened. “Yes. My car. You see it?”

  The boy laughed. “Hard to miss that one. That’s one bad car. How come you leave a car like that parked at a fire hydrant? The city came and towed it away.” He stuck a thumb in the air to point the direction.

  His blood pressure rose. Much as he wanted to say some sharp thing to the kid who chastised him, he knew the kid had a point. “Do you know where they took it?”

  “Probably down by the river. There’s a big lot there where they hold ’em.” The boy scratched his head. “Still don’t know why you left a car like that there. That’s disrespectful to some fine wheels.”

  “I was in a hurry to get to the library.” Prince sighed. Even as he said the words, he knew how dumb he sounded.

  “Man, you must really like books. Rich people. Go figure.” The kid shook his head and started sauntering down the street.

  Prince didn’t blame him. He was shaking his head at himself, too.

  The next few hours were not something Prince Highfield wanted to remember. He took another cab to the lot where towed cars were stored. He faced the burly man with the tattoo on his forehead, who had insisted on collecting an enormous amount of money. He found his beloved car scrunched between two large minivans, a scratch marring the door.

  Prince turned to the burly man. He intended to complain, but one look at the stony faced guy who stood flexing his fists made him change his mind. As a teenager, he had spent years with his teeth in braces, working on his GQ profile and getting rid of his overbite. He had the Highfield nose, straight and to this date, unbroken. He figured he had a better-than-even chance of meeting one of those fists if he gave the man even an iota of a hard time. And this had not been his lucky day so far.

  He got behind the wheel of the cherished car, trying not to look at the half-smoked cigar protruding from his normally pristine ashtray. He just wanted to get out of there.

  Which he did. With a squeal, the little car leaped to life, sped out the metal gate, blending into the traffic. The outside air was still hot. Prince flipped a switch and the air conditioner hummed. The sounds from the quadraphonic sound system filled the car. He had returned to his world.

  He wanted to put the whole awful afternoon behind him, but his mind refused to let it go. Visions haunted him. He thought about the carefree happy sway and dancing eyes of the girl named Cindy Castle even as she rode that dreadful bus on her way home from work. Something about the look of her had made him happy. Then he thought about how those eyes clouded over when he announced he had a package from her brother-in-law. That look had come and gone quickly, but it didn’t look like grief. The expression looked like fear. For some strange reason, that bothered him. Just about as much as her look when he had kissed her. But not quite.

  He put aside the thoughts as he arrived at the Highfield Estate, the wrought iron doors of the driveway swinging graciously open as Ernie, the security guard, recognized him.

  “Hi, Ernie!” he called out the window. “How’s the wife and kids?” Ernie had worked for the family for years, and was proud of his brood of four.

  “Getting more beautiful by the day, Mr. Prince. And we’re expecting another one in the fall.”

  “Good for you, Ernie. I’ll start campaigning with my father for another raise, then. We’ve got a few months to wear him down.”

  Ernie put his head back and laughed. “Thanks, Mr. Prince. Sure worked the last time, and I appreciate it a lot. You have a good evening now, Sir.”

  The gate smoothly closed behind him, and the car moved down the long drive, past the main house. He rolled to a stop beside the spacious guest house, the place Prince called home for the last six years, since graduating from Princeton.

  He thought about Ernie Walker and his growing family. Kids. Ernie sure loved his. He would put up with any struggle for his family’s sake. Prince didn’t know a thing about kids, having been the youngest in his family, with no cousins, and to date, no nieces or nephews. The thought of that kind of dedication—and of kids—was foreign to him.

&n
bsp; The next vision that came to his mind was Cindy Castle, with two children almost attached to her. And she didn’t look like she minded a bit.

  Single, working, raising kids—her life had to be a struggle too. What was that like?

  He opened the door to the guest house, comforted by the light airy feel, the stylishly placed furniture, the big spotless windows and recessed lighting. Suddenly he remembered his peek into the tiny living room of Cindy Castle’s row house. He’d bet its dimensions were smaller than his dressing room upstairs. How did people live like that?

  As he made his way through the house, he pulled off his clothes and grabbed his swimming trunks from their spot by the patio door. Within seconds, he executed a respectable dive off the board and plunged neatly into the refreshing water in the tiled pool off the patio.

  This was his world. No hot busses whose drivers demanded exact change. No fussy librarians shushing him. No tiny houses, clinging children, missing cars or ogres with tattoos staring him down.

  His head broke the surface, and he took a deep breath. The water refreshed him, washing away a lot of the day’s feelings. But not all. He could still see Cindy Castle’s expressive eyes, remembering the way she had moved him. This was a new feeling for Princeton Edmund Highfield, and he decided it deserved more thought.

  Chapter Three

  The wiggling and giggling stopped when Cindy settled herself on her little blue chair in the children’s library, and pulled a book from her large bag of props. She looked out at the attentive sea of young faces before her, gathered expectantly on the carpet.

  Story hour had begun. “Is everybody ready?” she asked with an enthusiastic grin, laughing at the chorus answering her.

  This was the very favorite part of her job as a librarian, bringing stories and her love of books to preschoolers. From her bag, she pulled a tall pointed hat with a pink stream of tulle flowing from its pointed top. She plopped it onto her head. Instant Princess.

  The children ooh’ed and ah’ed.

  “The first story today is The Princess and the Pea. It’s a really old story about how the town discovered the identity of the real missing princess. Here we go.”

  She read the story, spoke in character voices and made expressive faces. She demonstrated piling imaginary mattresses high up into the air.

  The kids loved every minute.

  She looked out at them, mostly three to five years old, their faces a variety of colors and shapes, some dressed like fashion models, some wearing ragged hand me downs. A row of parents and babysitters sat behind them.

  “And they all lived happily ever after!” Cindy removed her hat.

  The kids clapped and giggled as the story came to an end. “More!” they chanted. “Tell us another one.”

  She looked at them, her face scrunched in thought. “Well, I suppose, hmmmm.”

  “Pullleeeassee?”

  “Well, if you think you can keep being such good listeners.” She grinned, and reached back into the bag. This time she pulled out a big yellow hat and a big red book with the picture of a small brown monkey on the cover. “Time for Curious George.”

  For the next half hour, she read the story, acting out the voice of the man in the yellow suit, as well as leaping up occasionally from her stool to parade around like a monkey, head scratching, monkey grunts and all.

  The children were mesmerized, eyes wide.

  When the story finished, she jumped up. “Follow me!”

  She demonstrated her perfected monkey stance, arms swinging low in front, and every one joined in, grunting and laughing while they paraded around the children’s library like a monkey parade. It was a happy group who later disbanded to check out books and head home.

  When the library returned again to its usual quiet, Cindy returned to her desk to complete paperwork, still smiling about the success of the story hour. Kids needed stories. This was important stuff. She remembered how her mom had cuddled with her and her twin sister Sally on the couch before bed, reading them fairy tales, poetry, and picture books. Later, when she learned to read, the tables turned, and she read aloud to her mom. Her mom had instilled the love of books. Those were happy days.

  She missed her mom. And her dad, although he wasn't into reading much, preferring real life. He worked as a cop in the city. She’d lost him when he’d been killed on the job when she had been still little. Then she and Sally were seventeen and juniors in high school when a car accident took their mom.

  When she thought back to that time in her life, her stomach still knotted at the pain and the loss. The twins were taken in by her mom’s elderly Aunt Margaret, who was a sweet though sickly lady. The girls reacted in two different ways to their grief. Cindy threw herself into her schoolwork, and had passed many a night reading out loud to Margaret when her eyesight failed. She cherished the peaceful memory of their time together.

  Aunt Margaret sure filled a void in her life. She passed on right after Cindy’s high school graduation. Cindy packed her bags, and moved onto the campus of LaSalle University, where she earned a scholarship to study Library Science.

  Sally chose a different path, giving up on school and becoming wild and reckless, finally getting involved with Jimmy. Pregnant with Morgan, she married far too young, and they had few skills for living life. Jimmy had been in one scrape after another, and their relationship was tumultuous at best. Jimmy was clueless about fatherhood. Morgan was a toddler when Sally became pregnant with Hannah. And then, Sally died giving birth. Even the thought of those nightmare days brought waves of pain. And Jimmy went from bad to worse.

  Cindy had just finished college when she took responsibility for the children, making a promise in her heart she would treat them as her own.

  She finished her paperwork and returned her file to her desk drawer. She loved her job. Being surrounded by books constituted her idea of heaven, and sharing those stories with kids simply made her day. And when she went home at night, she made sure to share that “book magic” with Morgan and Hannah every single day, so they would experience it too.

  Morgan and Hannah. They were the loves of her life. Even when they were covered by peanut butter and slopped marshmallow creme into her hair. They made her smile. She let herself get lost in thought as she date-stamped library slips.

  They were sparkling, happy, well-adjusted children, and she gave thanks every day for that. While she retained a breath left in her body, she would make sure they stayed that way. She frowned as she thought of the handsome stranger who had arrived on her door step yesterday, wanting to deliver a package sent by Jimmy. Jimmy.

  Even though a year had passed, she still couldn’t believe Jimmy was dead. Disappointed as she had been with his life choices, she had never wanted that to happen. Never. How did life take these twists and turns?

  He hadn’t been ready for marriage and parenthood. She had come to understand that. He struggled with life, associating with bad characters and participating in activities she didn’t even want to know about. He and Sally were estranged by the time Hannah arrived, and for a while, he disappeared. His absence was a relief, because she didn’t want his bad choices to affect the kids.

  The last time they talked, he had been heading for the army, which surprised her. He returned to town to apologize and to say goodbye. He had messed up his life, he admitted, and gotten in over his head. He promised to make a fresh start, stating one way or another, he would make up for what he had done. She hoped it was true, for his own sake, even though she held strong doubts. Then he was gone.

  But his past hadn’t gone with him. Cindy shuddered at the memories. From the day he departed, she was haunted by late-night phone calls from angry male voices, demanding to know his whereabouts and threatening her. When she complained, the police took the information but could do nothing. For a while, she thought people were following her.

  Her anxiety grew. When she came home one day to her house ransacked and searched, her panic hit its peak. The next day she moved and changed
her phone number. Whatever trouble Jimmy stirred up in his life, she would keep her children safe and try to forget the past. No one had bothered her since.

  The government located the attorney she hired to take care of the children’s affairs. An officer came to deliver the news of Jimmy’s death in a raid in Iraq. The finality broke her heart. She always held onto the hope the day would come when he would someday grow up, and show love to his children. She had to put those hopes for the future behind her, along with the negative thoughts his past would catch up with them. And she had done a pretty good job of staying in the present.

  Until the man on the bus. Was the package a reminder of Jimmy that opened old wounds? Or was it a slip back into fear, and the realization she remained very easy to find if someone really wanted to find her? And if so, what could she do about it?

  She sighed, and went back to her work.

  ****

  Princeton grabbed a book from the shelf in front of him, opened it randomly, and pretended to be reading. He found himself staring at a picture of bug-eyed creatures with antennae. He had pulled out a book about garden pests. Not quite a good choice. He made a giant effort to appear fascinated with the color picture of a beetle chomping holes in a rose petal.

  He had turned into a stalker. His gaze lifted from the beetle pages to see if the librarian who had been quizzically scrutinizing him had moved on. She had. He took a deep breath, and went back to his task.

  Why was he watching her: the bus-girl, Birkenstock-wearer, story-lady, who had shown absolutely no appreciation of the box he had so gallantly delivered yesterday? He, Princeton Highfield, had rolled out of his bed this morning with only one thought on his mind.

  Just what about the girl from the library had imprinted her on his mind? He had done his job. He had delivered the parcel. The task was over. Only it wasn’t over. He let out a frustrated sigh. Just one day later, he found himself back in the library’s echoing stateliness—though this time he scoured the area for a legal parking spot and filled the parking meter to the brim with quarters—and wandered from room to room until he found her.