Don't Tell the Moon

by LILY TEEGARDIN

  DON’T TELL THE MOON

  Sara walked into the lobby of the mid-town London temp agency dragging a suitcase behind her. Her rosy cheeks were flushed from the cold, and her fingers felt icy and wet. Living on a small island in the Florida Keys, where temperatures rarely dipped below sixty degrees Fahrenheit, Sara wasn’t used to the frigid, February weather of the United Kingdom.

  She took a slow, deep breath and exhaled it with a puff. “I won’t be nervous,” she murmured to herself.

  It’s just another job, Sara. A different country, but a job is a job. You’re not going to a beheading.

  “Easy for you to say,” she muttered back to the tiny voice in her head.

  Entering the office marked ‘HELP’ on the frosted, glass, door pane, she warned herself to appear confident as she approached a large window, spotting the receptionist on the other side.

  The pretty, young girl sitting at the office desk glanced up with a warm, inquiring expression, and didn’t seem the type to swing an axe.

  “Hi, I’m Sara Evans,” she answered her look with a smile. “Just in from the United States, fresh off the plane. Well, maybe not so fresh, but here I am.” She winced, wiping a raindrop from her eyelash.

  “Oh yes, Ms. Evans, we are expecting you.” The girl rose out of her seat and extended a neatly manicured hand. “How was your flight?”

  “Non-eventful, thank heavens,” Sara answered with a nod, her nervousness ebbing, “but tiring. I don’t sleep well on planes. I’m on my way to the hotel right now, but since my room won’t be ready for another couple of hours, I thought I’d check in with you first.”

  “So glad you did!” The enthusiasm bubbled over in the girl’s voice as she pulled out a tissue, noticing that Sara’s eyes were watering from the cold, and held it out to her. “Your employment credentials and references have come back in excellent standing. As it happens, there is an immediate position that we need to fill.”

  “Oh.” Sara blinked. “Well, I wouldn’t mind, but I haven’t slept yet, or unpacked, and I’m not certain that I would be useful to anyone for the next forty eight hours or so.” She gave the girl a hesitant smile, kicking herself now for stopping by the agency before settling in to her hotel room, and taking a good long rest.

  Sara was familiar with temp agencies, having worked for several as a nurse in the states. Since her husband’s death, she had supplemented her hospital salary by moonlighting with temp agencies, where most of the cases were home care. In her experience, all were in a constant state of emergency, as help was difficult to find and keep, and vacancies weren’t always easy to fill. It appeared that circumstances were much the same in England, and Sara now felt more confident, despite the difference of the miles between the two countries.

  Sara had registered with the London firm as a housekeeper, not wishing to take on a professional position, only desiring to make a little extra spending money to supplement her modest traveling expenses. She had enough money accrued for a six month holiday, but Sara thought that having a useful occupation during those months might be interesting, as well as helpful with some of the expenses.

  “Yes,” the girl went on with an enthusiastic tone, eager to convince the reluctant traveler. “Exactly why this might be the perfect situation for you. The client is out of town. You won’t meet him at all. His housekeeper, Myrtle, took ill last evening, and now it is confirmed that she has had a minor stroke. She will be in hospital and home recovering for six weeks, and in that time someone is required to be at the residence - light housekeeping only, and it can be a live-in situation, although Myrtle lives in her own home off site.”

  The receptionist lifted her chin and dealt her trump card.“It would save you on hotel expenses.”

  “And you’re certain that this would be acceptable with the owner - I mean my living in?” Sara was starting to consider the position as a real possibility.

  “Yes, I’m certain that would be fine. There is a small room with a bath for onsite staffing, but Myrtle has not required it. I would just need to call him and let him know that you will be staying in. It’s a lovely home. I’ve been there several times with accounting matters. The owner is very kind, and not at all demanding.”

  “It is tempting… I only intended on staying at the hotel for a short while and with luck, finding an inexpensive flat at some point.” Sara heard herself being talked into the job, hoping that the too-good-to-be-true situation truly was that.

  “Excellent! I’ll put in a call right now to verify.” The girl’s voice brightened, dialing as she spoke. “And then we’ll get you on your way.” She held up her finger as she started to speak into the telephone. “Hello, this is Ann Simmons from HELP, the temp agency. Is Alex Fleming available?”

  The blood left Sara’s cheeks as she heard the name pronounced. Surely it couldn’t be…

  “Oh, I see. Alright, well would you please pass on a message to him?” Ann continued, telling the tale of the temporary housekeeper, and the live-in arrangement, to an unknown voice on the other end. “Alright, thanks. What is your name, please? Lovely - thank you!”

  “It’s all set,” she said, turning her face back to Sara. Her smile was wide, revealing several overlapping teeth. “He will be given the message. Now all you need are the keys.”

  She unlocked the bottom desk drawer and fished around for a set of keys on a chain with the initials AF inscribed on the bronze surface. “I’ll call for a cab, and you can be on your way.”

  “My employer - his name is Alex Fleming?” Sara attempted to swallow but coughed instead, her throat now dry as paper. “Like the actor?”

  Ann laughed as she stood to hand the keys to Sara. “Ah, so you have heard of him. Not all Americans know him that well, at least from my experience. And he’s not like the actor. He is the actor. A shame you won’t get to meet him. He is a remarkable person.”

  Ann picked up the phone once again and dialed for a taxi.

  “Yes.” Sara reddened, the heat in her face now overtaking the cold, as she pictured in her mind’s eye the tall and handsome man that had taken up most of her thoughts for the past two years of her life. “Yes, I’ve heard of him.”

  Oh Dear, Sara thought, leaving the agency. Perhaps she would have preferred the beheading.

  Sara sat in the back of the black London taxi cab, her mind a million miles away with her memories.

  Remembering a day four years ago, Sara had been to the market, picking out the ingredients for the dinner that she was looking forward to preparing for herself and Roger. It was their tenth anniversary and they always celebrated it with the meal they had eaten on their first date.

  As her car pulled into the small residential boulevard, she noticed the flashing lights of the ambulances that lined the curb, at first eliciting a response of curiosity, then a growing apprehension as she realized that the emergency vehicles were stopped in front of her home.

  She had been too late to say goodbye. Roger had left her life as quickly as he had entered it one lovely spring morning, eleven years earlier.

  Sara’s eyes clouded as the taxi crossed over the bridge, enormous raindrops pelting the window and striking a swirling mayhem in the river below. She wiped an errant tear away with her thumb, not wanting to expose her most private thoughts to the cabbie who turned to look at her every few minutes, and interject a comment or two about the weather or the traffic. She knew that her pale, blue eye coloring was now vividly turquoise with the stinging tears, and she didn’t wish to make him uncomfortable if it suddenly struck him that she was crying, and that perhaps he ought to offer some comfort.

  She drew in a deep breath and exhaled it through puckered lips. As he turned once again to glance in her direction, she offered her best smile, de
ep dimples lighting up her face. If she had been aware of the cabbie’s thoughts, his absolute certainty that she was one of the prettiest ladies that had graced his cab in years, she wouldn’t have believed him. Sara had never spent much time on any sort of elaborate beauty routine. The rays of the sun had lightened and accented her shiny brown hair, and the natural foods that she preferred to eat gave her fair skin a peaches and cream complexion. She had no idea what fantasies she had triggered in the heads of many a man, and the knowledge of any such fantasies would have held little interest for her, once Roger had entered her life.

  She hadn’t expected the crushing pain that had crippled her the first three years following his death. The only way she had survived was by the simple act of putting one foot in front of the other. She had accepted every hospital shift, every temp work assignment, leaving only enough time to herself to drop into an exhausted sleep at the end of her work day.

  Sara stared through the rain spattered window, now noticing a sliver of sunlight creeping through the breaking steel, gray clouds.

  A small smile danced on her lips as she remembered the first day she had “met” the other man in her life. A private duty nursing assignment had been canceled by the client at the last minute due to the arrival of out of town family members, and Sara, finding an unusual amount of free time on her hands, had entered a movie theater a block away from the client’s home.

  Treating herself to a bag of warm and fragrant popcorn, she had entered the darkened theater, all but barren except for a scattering of couples sitting in rows far ahead of her own.

  The movie theater had always been a place of comfort for her, even in the days following Roger’s death. It was a place where she could come and sit in solitude, away from the concerned eyes of well meaning friends. Sometimes she had missed an entire feature, content to sit in the darkness, allowing her thoughts to roam freely, allowing tears to come without embarrassment or explanation.

  But this time had been different.

  From the first second she had heard his voice, her pulse had quickened in her throat. His eyes had looked into hers from the giant film screen, and nothing else had mattered at that moment. The three years of grieving had stopped right there and then, and she had walked out of the theater a changed person. The giant weight in her heart had lifted and the oppressing gloom that had followed her everywhere no longer nipped at her heels.

  “This feels like love,” she had thought somewhat irrationally, and giggled to herself, almost skipping down the street to catch the five-fifteen bus back to her neighborhood. Being a sensible person and not prone to delusions or obsessions, for a moment she had been puzzled by the epiphany that had just occurred in her life. But Sara hadn’t really cared how it had come about - for the first time in three years, she had felt a physical sensation of release from the pit of grief that she had fallen into, and she instinctively knew that this was a positive turn.

  With a renewed appetite for life, Sara had once again started to attend the world of the living; theaters, films, art exhibits, social events - and every Friday evening she would go home to have her secret date… with him. She would stop at the movie rental store on her way home from work and after much careful deliberation, pick out a yet unseen film, pop the popcorn, decant the wine, and spend the evening with the man who had cracked open the shell that had allowed her to reenter the world of the living.

  Her best friend had nailed her on one occasion, backing her into a corner at the hospital where they both shared a shift one evening.

  “I know what’s going on,” Beth said, staring point blank into her eyes with a look of both accusation and amusement. “I haven’t seen you this happy in years. Tell me the truth, missy. You’re in love, aren’t you?”

  “I guess I am,” Sara answered with a shrug, her face reddening, “but it’s not how you think, and it’s not a secret. I’m just…”

  “What’s his name?” Beth all but pinned her to the wall of the hospital corridor.

  “Alex,” Sara confessed, her heart jumping at the sound of his name coming from her lips. Had she ever spoken it aloud, she wondered?

  “Alex?” Beth screwed her face into the shape of a question mark, her dark, brown eyes searching the ceiling above them. “Do I know him? I don’t think I know anyone named Alex. Is he someone you just met?”

  “Fleming.” Sara lowered her gaze.

  “Alex Fleming?” Beth’s forehead wrinkled in deep thought. “I don’t know anyone named… oh, wait, there is that hunky English actor, but I don’t know any other Alex Fleming.”

  “Yes, that’s the one. The hunky actor.”

  The tall brunette raised an eyebrow and scowled at her. “Stop it. Who is he?”

  So Sara had explained, watching her friend’s face with care to pick up clues as to whether Beth might be thinking that she had mislaid her few remaining marbles.

  “Well,” Beth sighed and shrugged, nodding her head sagely after hearing her story, “I can’t blame you there. Most guys would kill for that full head of hair, laced around the edges with the silver streaks; and then of course there is that sexy English accent. But I was hoping that it was someone… you know…”

  “Real?” Sara challenged, her eyes crinkling in the corners.

  “Yeah - A REAL guy. But I suppose it’s a start. You are beginning to live life again and if Mr. Hunky is responsible, I am grateful to him for that.” She wrapped her arms around her friend, giving her a firm squeeze.

  Sara took Beth’s arm as they walked the corridor to the busy cafeteria. “Maybe I’m just not ready for a real guy quite yet.”

  “I’m not sure I am either,” Beth snorted in amusement. “The batch in this town leave a lot to be desired. So tell me; next movie night, can I join you? I mean, is there enough of Alex Fleming to go around?”

  “Why not? I’ll share him. I’ll even share my popcorn.”

  “Well, you are a generous soul,” Beth snorted.

  “Yes, I am, especially since you’ll be bringing the wine.” Sara threw back her head with a laugh, giving Beth a one-armed hug.

  And so was started their little club of Friday night Alex Fleming movie watching. Soon there were three or four girlfriends of varying ages who joined in, and the nights of movies and gossip always ended with happy laughter, and quite a few empty bottles of wine.

  When Sara booked the holiday to London, a city that she had longed to see for many years, her friends hooted and nodded, tossing knowing looks in her direction.

  “Off to find Mr. Fleming to keep him all to yourself,” they cackled, as they celebrated at the small informal bon voyage slumber party thrown together for her.

  “Don’t I wish?” Sara let out an exaggerated sigh, and hugged her knees, clad in red, silk pajama bottoms. She wriggled into the gag gift they had given her as a going away present - a tee shirt bearing his picture in the roll of The Beekeeper from the very successful film series of the same name.

  “What, you mean he won’t be picking you up in his limousine?” Beth elbowed her with a grin.

  Sara pouted theatrically. “No, there will be no chance of that. He is not appearing in any plays this year and in fact he won’t even be in the country. I read on the internet that he is in Switzerland filming the latest Beekeeper episode.”

  “Not that you’ve been keeping track of his comings and goings,” Karen burst out in giggles, raising her wine glass toward the would-be traveler.

  “Not I!” Sara responded with a mock-innocent look, tilting her chin upward and batting her eyelashes. Standing to model the tee shirt, she spun around on tip-toes. “How do I look?”

  “Pathetic,” they had all shouted in unison.

  The taxi pulled up to the front gate and as Sara paid the driver, she wondered to herself how she would be able to get in, and then noticed the key pad on the lock. She hoped that one of the keys on the bronze key chain would fit, and she fingered them solemnly, at the same time whispering a quick prayer to the heavens.

&n
bsp; “Please wait for a moment; just to make certain I can get through the gate with the keys I’ve been given.” She spoke the nervous words to the driver, but more so to herself.

  “Would you like some help with that, miss?’ he asked, eyeing the small and slender, pretty lady and the large suitcase he had just removed from the trunk.

  “Well, let’s see how it goes,” she murmured back, walking to the gate and holding her breath that one of the keys on the chain would work. The first key she inserted fit like a glove and turned instantly, releasing the lock on the wrought iron gate which swung at once inwards, as though by invitation. She hoped that this was a good omen and smiled at the driver who smiled back, waved, and wished her a good day.

  Walking to the front step, she observed the small garden tucking around to the sides of the modest, gray, stone building. All the foliage was presently dormant, but she could picture in her imagination how it might look in the spring, covered in greenery and blossoms. She smiled at the thought and tried the second key in the door lock. The door handle turned with ease in her hand and she entered the large foyer.

  “Home,” she whispered and drew in her breath as a pleasant smell of a mixture of wood, both new and ancient, greeted her nostrils. She reckoned that the new smell was one of perhaps a recently remodeled area of the house. The old scent hinted of lingering wood smoke, pungent and spicy. Sara was certain that it came from a fireplace that had been used many times over the years.

  She removed her boots, and leaving her bulky suitcase in the foyer for the time being, she entered the living area. Yes, there it was, the largest thing to greet her eyes – a massive stone hearth, neatly cleaned of ashes and containing fresh wood, awaiting its owner for the next time it would be called into use. She could almost see him now, wine glass in hand, tending the logs and embers with the large, black poker that stood against the iron grate.

  Her heart pounded in her chest as the realization hit her that this was indeed his home. For a split second she felt a wave of panic wash over her, convinced now that she had committed a serious crime. She should have at once confessed her feelings for him to Ann at the temp agency, and aborted this insane folly.