by Tasha Black
They all followed behind the curtain to a surprisingly bright room with glass doors overlooking a small grassy courtyard. There was a table at the center of the room with two half full water glasses on it. The counter top next to the table held a coffee maker and a row of mugs.
“Do you guys want something to drink?” Aunt Stacy asked.
“We’re fine,” Cecily said. “This is my friend, Solo. We came here because… because he needs to ask you a few questions.”
“Oh, okay,” Aunt Stacy said, giving Solo an appreciative once-over. “Nice to meet you. I hope you kids are staying in town for a while. You’re welcome to my guest room.”
“It is a pleasure to meet you as well,” Solo told her honestly. He would have preferred they meet under less auspicious circumstances, but he was glad to have the chance to connect with someone important to Cecily.
“Well, what would you like to ask me?”
He considered. There did not seem to be a mannerly way to ask her what he needed to know.
“Cecily tells me that you once… dated Dirk Malcolm when he was filming a movie in this town,” he said at last. “Is that true?”
“Oh,” she said, looking less surprised than he would have expected. “Um, yes, Dirk was here to film a movie and that rumor certainly spread around this town like wildfire.”
That was an answer and also not an answer.
“Was the rumor true?” Solo asked.
Aunt Stacy bit her lip.
Solo looked down at the table to give her a moment to compose herself. He hoped that she would want her niece to have the truth.
The sunlight from outside hit the water glass in front of him, shooting a glare into his eye.
He reached out and pushed it away.
A clear image of Dirk Malcolm holding the cup dropped down around him.
“He was here,” Solo said, letting go of the glass.
“Here? But, you didn’t even have this place back then,” Cecily said.
“No, he was here today,” Solo said. “Earlier this afternoon.”
“Oh, Cecily,” Aunt Stacy said, “I…I…”
She began to cry into her hands.
Solo grabbed the water glass and closed his eyes to let the curtain of memory fall around him.
Dirk Malcolm stood in the doorway of the room.
Stacy poured two glasses of water into the cups, glancing up at him nervously.
“Stacy, I wouldn’t have recognized you,” Dirk said.
“Oh boy,” Aunt Stacy said. “You’d better sit down.”
“I never stopped thinking about you,” Dirk told her.
“Well, you’re wrong about that,” Stacy told him. “I need to explain something.”
“Listen, there’s nothing to explain,” Dirk said. “I was young and dumb. I didn’t know my butt from a hole in the ground—”
“—I’m not her,” Stacy yelled.
“You… I’m sorry, what?” Dirk asked.
“My name is Stacy Page, but you didn’t sleep with me, you slept with my sister,” Aunt Stacy said.
“I—I did?” he asked.
“Her name was Agnes, after our grandmother,” Stacy said, handing him the glass of water and indicating the seat in front of him. “But she always hated that name. Thought it made her sound like an old lady.”
“Agnes,” Dirk echoed.
“When you approached her, she freaked out and gave you my name instead. She never thought hers was cool, and she wanted to impress you, I guess.”
Aunt Stacy smiled fondly.
“Wow,” Dirk said. “Where is she now? Is she still in town?”
“No,” Aunt Stacy shook her head.
“Doesn’t matter,” Dirk said. “Wherever she is, I’ll go there and find her. I was young and stupid when we met. My Red Hot Alien Summer was the first movie I ever headlined. I thought all I cared about was my career, and that a good woman like your sister wouldn’t be able to keep up with my lifestyle. I know better now. I would trade it all for another chance to be with her. I’ve always felt like I left a piece of myself here with her. I’m sure she’s settled down with someone else, but I still want to tell her how much she meant to me.”
“Oh, Dirk,” Aunt Stacy said, tears brimming in her eyes. “She passed away four years ago.”
There was a moment of silence and then Dirk Malcolm dropped his head into his hands and his shoulders racked with big, ugly sobs. This was real and horrible - nothing like the movie, where a single tear ran down his manly squared jaw.
Solo couldn’t help but feel he was intruding on a moment not meant for his eyes. He removed his hand from the glass and looked to Cecily’s aunt.
“Her mother begged me not to tell,” she said helplessly. “Everyone already said I was a wild child anyway. And she was always such a good girl.”
“Do you want to tell her or should I?” he asked.
“Her mother didn’t want her to know,” Stacy pleaded.
“I want her to know,” he said.
18
Cecily
Cecily looked back and forth between her aunt and the man she was learning to love. Something terrible was passing between them and the truth of it was shimmering just out of her reach.
Solo turned to her.
“Do you want the truth?” he asked.
“Yes,” she told him without hesitation.
“Your father is Dirk Malcolm,” he said.
Cecily blinked.
“No, he had a fling with Aunt Stacy,” she said.
“No,” Aunt Stacy said. “He had a fling with your mother.”
“I don’t understand,” Cecily said.
“Your mom and I were still living at home with Grandma and Grandpa,” Aunt Stacy said. “Your mom was a senior in high school, I was nineteen and working at the hair salon. When they came here to film that movie the whole town went crazy. “
“You guys used to talk about that,” Cecily said.
“Anyway, your mom met Dirk at the record store,” Aunt Stacy went on. “She was young and so lovely and shy. But they took to each other immediately. When he asked her name she got nervous and gave him mine instead.”
“She never liked being Agnes,” Cecily said.
“Exactly,” Aunt Stacy said. “They snuck off together whenever they could. On his last night in town, I slept in her bed so she could go out with him.”
“You had a later curfew because you were older,” Cecily guessed.
“Yeah,” Aunt Stacy said. “Or because I was a lost cause.” She laughed and rolled her eyes. “Anyway, they had quite a romantic evening out at the gorge. But he told her before anything happened that his career was taking off and that he wasn’t in a good place to have a relationship. She knew what she was getting into. She made her choices in spite of that.”
Cecily nodded. That sounded like her mom, fair and practical, but not a person to cut the fun out of her life.
“She took him at his word,” Aunt Stacy said. “And though she shed some tears when they all left town, she never held it against him. He’d been honest with her. She would only say that she missed him and wished she had something to remember him by.”
Cecily bit her lip.
“She missed her period the next month,” Aunt Stacy said. “I went to the drug store for her and got her a test. Sure enough, she was pregnant. So he had left her something to remember him by after all.”
Solo put a hand on Cecily’s back and she was grateful for the comfort.
“Dirk sent her a whole bunch of letters in the months after that,” Aunt Stacy said. “But your mother would never have allowed him to give up his career for you two. She knew he was too honorable not to do the right thing by her if he ever found out about you. So she ignored the letters and soon enough they stopped coming. I know because they were all addressed to me. She never did tell him the truth about her name. Of course Coleen at the post office couldn’t keep her mouth shut, so the whole town new about it before long. It was
good thing he had my name, or it would have all been too obvious. Even as it was, I was pretty surprised no one ever put it together.”
“Wow,” Cecily breathed.
“And your mom did give you a good life, all by herself, didn’t she?” Aunt Stacy asked.
“She sure did,” Cecily nodded.
“Anyway, I have no idea how, but your boyfriend is right. Dirk did come here today. He left not an hour ago,” Aunt Stacy went on. “He wasn’t looking for you, and I didn’t tell him anything about a child. But he did let me know that I could reach out to him if I ever needed anything, and if I ever wanted to talk about your mom.”
Aunt Stacy pulled a card out of her pocket and slid it across the table. “In case you want to call him yourself.”
Cecily shook her head, and stood up.
“Please don’t be angry with him, Cecily,” Aunt Stacy said. “He doesn’t know. He loved her. He just didn’t realize it in time. And… and please don’t be too angry with me either. My little sister was my world. I couldn’t break her trust. I love you, Cecily.”
Cecily bit back her anger and her sadness.
“I’m upset, Aunt Stacy,” she said carefully. “But I’ll get over it. Right now I need to leave.”
“I understand, honey,” Aunt Stacy said. “I’ll be here when you’re ready. Whenever that is.”
Cecily nodded and headed through the curtains and into the nail salon, and from there out onto the sidewalk.
She could hear Solo jogging to catch up with her.
“Do you want to tell everyone what’s going on, or should I?” Solo asked gently.
She turned and saw that their friends were approaching, looking curious.
“I don’t know if I’m ready to talk about it,” she said. “Would you mind filling them in? I just kind of want to sit down for a minute.”
“Of course,” he said, squeezing her shoulders and pressing his lips to the top of her head.
Cecily lowered herself onto the bench overlooking Main Street as Solo headed toward their friends.
She took a deep breath, then let it sink in.
Dirk Malcolm is my father.
Cecily had wanted to know who her father was ever since she could remember, and the truth was that he was someone she had met professionally once or twice. She knew what he looked like. She knew the sound of his voice.
Hell, he was going to be in the movie she and her friends were working on. How was she going to deal with that?
All the information she’d spent a lifetime craving was hers now.
She looked out over the village streets she’d walked as a child, always thinking the sunshine would seem brighter, and the birds would sing more sweetly if she only knew who her father was.
And now she did.
But it was funny. The world seemed just the same as before.
19
Solo
Solo approached Cecily.
She was still sitting on the bench, gazing out over the street, just as she’d been when he’d left her to tell their friends the news.
They had all gone back to the cafe to grab an early dinner and give her a bit of space.
Cecily looked calmer than he had expected, given her recent news. But she didn’t necessarily look happy.
Solo was generally very pleased with the ability of the human facial muscles to indicate every possible gradation of emotion. But this was something else, this calm, blank look. He wondered if she might be meditating to prevent herself from becoming over-excited.
“They’re all very happy for you,” he told her softly as he sat down beside her. “And you must be excited too.”
Cecily didn’t respond.
“I can’t believe that he is right here in this town,” Solo went on. “Or certainly close by if he was at your aunt’s place just an hour ago. If we call him now maybe you can meet here, in the place where he knew your mother.”
“No,” Cecily said.
Solo was so taken aback he didn’t know what to say. He waited, hoping she would help him understand.
But she remained as still as a star.
“Why not?” he asked her at last. “I thought you wanted to know your father.”
“Dirk Malcolm epitomizes everything that makes me not want a man in my life in the first place,” Cecily said. “He’s the ultimate non-committal playboy.”
Solo gazed at his love.
He hadn’t recognized happiness in her face because what was there was resignation.
“It sounds like maybe Dirk has changed his mind about what he wants in his life,” Solo said.
“I don’t want to be his guinea pig,” Cecily said. “I found the answer I thought I wanted. Now I just want to get out of town as soon as possible.”
“Don’t you want to give him a chance?” Solo asked. “Give yourself a chance to see what having him in your life would be like?”
“I don’t,” Cecily said.
“Are you sure?” Solo asked.
“I don’t want to talk about it anymore,” Cecily said.
Her eyes were as dull as her expression. He had never seen her this way. As long as he’d known her, that mischievous spark had danced in her eyes. Now it had vanished.
“Okay,” he said. “Go ahead and join the others. Grab something to eat. I’ll take the RV to the gas station and pick you guys up afterward.”
“Thank you for understanding,” Cecily said softly.
Solo nodded, though he didn’t understand at all.
He watched her as she walked back toward the cafe, afternoon sun setting her auburn curls alight.
His hand was in the pocket of his jeans, worrying the edge of a bit of paper.
Her words from this morning echoed in his head.
If you try to trick me again it’s over.
He pulled the card out of his pocket and looked at it. He had grabbed it from Aunt Stacy’s table, then jogged after Cecily. She didn’t know he had it.
The front of the card had Dirk’s photograph. He was smiling. The constellation of freckles across the bridge of his nose was the same as Cecily’s.
Solo flipped the card over.
On the back a phone number was neatly jotted. Dirk’s personal line.
Solo ran a hand through his hair.
He had a choice to make.
If he called Dirk and told him everything, he would lose Cecily forever. She had told him herself that if he tricked her again it was over.
If he let her crush down her feelings and move on without talking to Dirk, maybe she would eventually come around and be Solo’s mate. But she would never really have the answers she needed. Never really be able to move on with him.
Solo sighed.
If the choice was to lose her or to live with a half-version of her, there was no choice at all.
It wasn’t about him.
It was about helping Cecily.
20
Cecily
Cecily jogged through the town square toward the park.
Dark storm clouds were forming overhead and the scent of rain filled the air.
She had been halfway through her meal when Kirk whispered to her that Solo needed her to meet him as quickly as possible at the little park where they’d stopped on the way in. He’d told her to meet Solo under the weeping willow.
Cecily tried to imagine what Solo could possibly want. As far as she could figure it he either wanted to break up, to mate, or to try and convince her one last time to confront her father.
None of those options appealed to her.
For all that men accused women of being drama queens, in Cecily’s experience, women were pretty laid back. It was men who were always declaring their intentions, demanding answers and summoning a person to a strange meeting place when all she wanted was to eat her soup and sandwich in peace.
She reached the park and headed over to the willow. As a child she had loved hiding under its branches.
She entered that shaded space but Solo wasn’t there.
A piece of paper rustled against the trunk of the tree.
Cecily grabbed it.
Dear Cecily,
If I hadn’t seen the vision of you as a child I wouldn’t have understood how much you needed to know more about your father. I did not mean to take that memory from you, but I did. And I can’t unsee what I saw.
You deserve to know your father.
And, Cecily, I think he deserves to know you too.
I haven’t told him who you are to him. But by the time you read this, he will be waiting at the park bench.
Whether or not you go to him will be your choice.
Yes, I have deceived you again and I know what that means. I am going back to Stargazer to turn myself in to the lab. You won’t have to see me again.
If this meeting brings you peace, it will have been worth it.
I will always love you, Cecily.
Yours,
Solo
Cecily tucked the letter into her pocket.
He was out there. For better or worse, her father was out there.
She took a deep breath and stepped out of the protective shade of the willow.
“Agnes?” someone called out brokenly.
She turned, surprised to hear her mother’s name, and saw Dirk Malcolm sitting on the bench, right where Solo had said he would be. The sunlight brought out the rusty highlights in his hair.
“Sorry, you look like someone I know,” he said.
She studied him a moment, trying to decide.
“Wait.” His eyes lit up. “I do know you. Cecily Page, right? Beatrix Li’s friend, the special-effects guru. What are you doing here?”
It was easier than she’d expected to go to him.
“This is my home town,” she explained.
“Wow,” he said. “That’s crazy.”
“What are you doing here?” she asked.
“I was trying to right an old wrong,” he told her.
“Maybe I can help,” she said. “Let’s sit down.”
He sat on the bench and patted the seat beside him.