by Cecy Robson
What I want, I’m no longer sure I can have.
I bend and kiss her head. For all that she is or isn’t, she’s still my momma.
Cassie follows me out to my truck. “Can I have twenty dollars?” she asks.
I turn around and take in her face that’s too made up, and the clothes she shouldn’t be wearing. I want to yell at her to snap out of it, to not be her mother, or her grandmother, or hell, anyone of my sisters. Instead, I reach in my wallet again and hand her a few bills, knowing that for now, this is all I can do for her.
“Thanks,” she says.
“You know it doesn’t have to be like this,” I tell her. I don’t have to explain myself, she knows what I mean.
She shrugs. “This isn’t so bad. It just is what it is.” She takes the bills and runs them between her fingers to smooth them out.
I take another good look at her. Christ, she’s just a kid. But already she’s probably been through too much. “You’ve got my number in there?” I ask her, motioning to her phone. She nods. “Make sure you keep it. If I can ever help you, I will, okay?”
She nods briefly and glances down. “Can I ask you a personal question?” she asks. She doesn’t wait for me to answer. “Was it love? What you felt for that rich girl?”
“It still is,” I answer truthfully.
She smiles softly, it’s only then I see that little girl lying beneath all that makeup. I think she wants to know more, but when she doesn’t ask, I slip into my truck and drive away.
In less than an hour, I’m headed back to Kiawah, knowing my house won’t be my first stop.
Chapter Twenty-nine
Trinity
Today should have been a good day. I immunized the last few children from the neighboring village, then helped the team finish the new water system this village so desperately needs.
There are cheers when the first trickles of water shoot from the spout. The children rush forward, cupping their hands to have a taste. And while their smiles warm me, the joy I feel is minimal and fleeting. I don’t feel emotions the same anymore. At least, not the good kind.
Feelings that evoke sadness or pain, those I feel to the extreme. I walk away as more people gather and in the direction of the small cinderblock house where I’m staying.
“Trinity,” Marty calls. He jogs up to me, leaving the crowd of squealing children happily splashing themselves. “Hey,” he says stopping in front of me. “Pablo says they’ll be playing their guitars tonight. Do you want to come listen with me?”
I shake my head. “I’m tired. Long day, you know?”
I don’t dare tell him I’ll go another time. I think he likes me and I don’t want to encourage him. If I think about it, I suppose Marty’s a fine looking man. This is his second tour with the Corps, and he’ll probably be a “lifer” if his U.N. aspirations fall through.
He says he’s passionate about helping others, and believes he was put on this earth to serve. I guess he’s being honest. He seems like that type of man. Once upon a time, he probably would have been someone I could connect with. But I don’t connect with anyone. Not anymore.
“Goodnight,” I tell him.
I trek up the steep cobblestone road, waving to the children running past me eager to get their turn at the spout. I pause as I reach the bright orange-colored house, the one where the little old lady who thinks I’m cursed lives with her daughter.
“Only darkness could fade a girl’s smile like Trinity’s,” she told Pablo.
No, ma’am, I wanted to say. Heartbreak can do it, too.
I stayed at Callahan’s house over a week, waiting for him to return. He’d left his cell phone charging on the kitchen counter. Whether it was intentional, or unintentional, I’ll never know. All I know is that September became October and he never came home.
The only person who had heard from him was the owner of Your Mother’s. He called to tell her he’d quit and to thank her for the opportunity. So when October 15th came, I said goodbye to everyone I loved and stepped on a plane bound for South America . . . well, almost everyone I loved.
The sun begins to set as I reach the top of the hill. Chickens skitter past me in their haste to find their nests. I sigh and rub my shoulders, feeling unbearably tired.
The house where I live is just ahead and to my left. I should go right to bed given how I’m feeling. But sleep is something of a lost luxury, one I don’t foresee reclaiming any time soon.
I open the front gate, forcing a smile when my sweet landlady waves from where she’s sewing on a rocking chair beneath a large mango tree.
“Buenas noches,” I yell. She’s almost deaf and I doubt she hears me, but I don’t want to be impolite.
I cross the small courtyard that separates my room from the rest of her house. There’s not much to my tiny dwelling, more like a cinderblock room big enough for a bed, desk, and wardrobe.
Metal bars line the windows and doors. I use my key and lock the door behind, leaving the privacy panel open so the evening breeze can sweep in and hopefully spare me from some of the thick humidity.
I pour myself a glass of water. After a few sips of the tepid liquid, I sit and write another letter to Becca.
Dearest Becca,
I’m sorry to hear about Hale’s daddy, and everything that surrounded his passing. I’ve written him a few letters, but I haven’t heard back. When you talk to him again please let him know I’m thinking of him and sending him my love.
I miss you and wish I could see you. You asked me in your last letter how I’m doing? In truth, I’m not doing so great.
Tears blur my vision. The first falls and drips onto my paper, causing the ink to run. But I continue, because only to Becca can I say what I say.
I’ll never forgive myself for what I did to Callahan. I screwed things up so bad. There never seemed to be a good time to tell him I was leaving. But I should have found one. Even if he left me sooner, I owed him the truth.
I wipe my eyes, remembering the look of devastation and anger on his face. I hate myself for hurting him, and pen these same thoughts to my letter.
I know you’re convinced he’ll wait for me. But I think you’re wrong. It’s already been eight weeks since I last saw him.
The reality of my words won’t allow me to continue. I drop my pen and cry into my hands.
My momma used to tell me time heals all wounds. I once believed her, but I don’t anymore. For as much time that’s passed, the pain I feel surrounding my break up with Callahan remains raw and constant.
Not that I don’t think I deserve it.
Or believe it wasn’t my fault.
My fear is he’ll move on―find another girl, and maybe even be married and have a child by the time I return. But what scares me more is that he won’t―that he’ll regress and become that recluse I first met, the one drowning in his own pain.
I don’t want him to be with anyone else. To touch anyone else. Or love anyone else. But if it means his happiness, I pray to God that love with another is what he finds.
My eyes sting at the thought, but I mean what I say. If there was ever a man who earned his happiness and peace, it was Callahan.
“Aqui,” someone squeals.
I straighten. Here?
The voice is familiar. I recognize it as Elbia’s, the little girl with the long hair who looks for me after school so I can check her blood sugar, and braid her hair.
“No. No. Aqui.” She giggles. “Aqui.”
I wipe my eyes, not sure what she’s up to. When I hear her laugh again, I shove the chair away and rise, thinking I better take her home when a more familiar, and very deep voice says, “Here? Trinity’s here?”
My heart stalls along with my breath when Callahan’s large body steps in front of the metal bars that make up my door. His stare latches onto mine when he sees me standing there. Like me, he’s simply cemented in place. I clasp my hands over my mouth, to stifle my sob, barely believing he’s here.
Callahan reaches fo
r the door, rattling the bars when it won’t open. I hurry forward, my hands trembling as I unlock it with my key and step aside to let him in. He rushes in, tossing his heavy pack and hauling me to him.
The door clangs shut as I fall against his chest, gripping him so hard I’m sure I’m crushing him.
“I’m sorry,” I choke out. “God, I’m so sorry.”
He strokes my hair, letting me cry. “Shhh. It’s okay. I’m here now, baby. I’m here.” His lips sweep kisses all over my face. But when his mouth nears mine and I turn, those sweet kisses become something more.
It’s like we were never apart, and we never stopped loving, our bodies pressing tighter and our mouths claiming each other. Callahan scoops me in his arms and carries me to my bed, lowering me so I lay across his lap. Slowly, he edges away, taking me in as if I might somehow vanish.
My hands stroke his beard, relishing the familiar tickle of his whiskers. “I can’t believe you’re here,” I stammer, crying all over again.
He smiles softly, lifting my hand to kiss and prove he’s with me. “I was worried you wouldn’t see me and turn me away.”
“Why would you think that?” I try to take a few breaths and calm, but my words release in shaky spurts. “I’ve been lost without you.”
His hold on me tightens as he clutches me to him. “And I’ve been nothing without you,” he admits, his voice rough. “Nothing mattered anymore when I left. . . I love you, Trin. God, I love you so much.”
“I love you, too,” I whisper . . .
An hour later, he’s gathering a sheet around our naked bodies and tucking me against him. My hand skims across his chest to rest over his heart.
“I’m sorry I hurt you,” I tell him, my voice just above a breath along the dimly lit room. “I thought if you knew I was leaving, you would never give me and us a chance. I liked you from the beginning. But then we grew close, and telling you became that much harder.”
His hand trails down my arm. “I didn’t like what you did, but I can’t be sure you were wrong in what you thought. I came to Kiawah to be alone, and that’s how I might have stayed if you didn’t find a way to get through to me.”
“I still shouldn’t have done it.”
“Maybe,” he admits. “But I’ve thought about that day I left too many times. It’s in the past, baby. Let’s leave it there where it belongs.”
“Okay,” I say quietly, even though I’ll never stop feeling bad for what I did, and how I made him feel.
I press a kiss to his chest and push up on my elbow so I can see him. He traces his finger along my jaw, staring at me with those blue eyes that have haunted my dreams, and stirring a tickle with his touch that makes me smile.
“God, I’ve missed this face,” he says.
My grin widens, despite the lingering sadness I’ve carried for so long. “How in the world did you find me?”
“Your daddy helped,” he explains. “I went to see him to talk over a few things.” His hand smooths through my hair. “I flew all night and travelled on bus most of the day. The bus got me as far as the neighboring village and I walked from there. But once I arrived, I didn’t know where to look.
“There was a guy near a fountain of sorts. I approached him, knowing he was American and introduced myself, told him who I was and that I needed to find you.” His voice lowers. “I knew he knew you, but he refused to tell me where you were. I wasn’t in a good mood. It took a shit ton of time to get here so I told him if he didn’t tell me, I’d knock the peace right out of his corps.”
I cover my face, but then drop it away. “I think you mean Marty. He’s not a bad guy. He probably just wanted to make sure I was safe.”
“No. It’s more like my arrival ruined whatever the hell he had planned for you. If it wasn’t for that little girl tugging on my arm and pointing up the hill when she heard me say your name, Marty would be on the ground bleeding.”
I lean closer and kiss his cheek. “The little girl’s name is Elbia. She’s my buddy.”
I snag a small frame from the top of my desk and hand it to him. “I showed her your picture and told her all about you.”
He scans the photo Becca took of us the night he sang to me at my house. “That’s the first night I kissed you,” he says quietly.
“I know,” I answer, sadness finding its way into my voice. I don’t want to ask what I do next, but I have to, knowing I can’t leave. “How long can you stay?”
He pauses. “How long do you want me?”
Tears fill my eyes and my voice cracks. “Forever?”
He hands me the picture and scoots out of bed, reaching for his boxers and jeans. I place the frame back on the desk and scramble to the edge of the bed, gathering the sheet around my breasts. “Callahan, where are you going?”
He sighs and yanks on his clothes. Except for his shirt and socks, he’s now fully dressed. “These past few weeks have been hell,” he tells me.
I wipe my eyes, trying not to full-out cry. Please don’t leave me.
“I never want to feel like that again,” he continues, his beautiful eyes welling as they meet mine. “If you agree to be my wife, I won’t have to, and neither of us will ever know another night apart.”
He drops to the floor on one knee and pulls a ring from his pocket, taking my hand as tears of joy and shock run down my face. “Trinity Summers . . . will you marry me?”
Epilogue
Callahan
Three minutes.
That’s all we have left.
Three minutes more and this ends.
But as I stare into the eyes of my son, and see him laughing as he rocks on his belly, three minutes more of tummy time doesn’t seem like long at all. “You’re a lot tougher than that book says. Aren’t you, soldier?”
He squeals when I tickle his chin. People say Cal junior has my eyes. Maybe. But the sparkle of mischief within them, and that wide contagious grin, that’s all his momma.
I adjust my hips against the sand, thankful that for once the agonizing ache is a thing of the past, and so is the numbness I once searched for like a friend.
My eyes tear when the breeze picks up and shoots a bit of sand in them. The sneeze it stirs makes Cal giggle so I don’t mind. A laugh from my son is well worth a little sand, and a lot more.
I pick him up and kiss his chubby cheeks in time to hear a car pull up the driveway. It’s not long after that that those familiar footsteps bounce through the house.
“Batman? You out back with Robin?”
I chuckle. “Yeah. We’re out here, baby.”
“Robin” starts flapping his little arms excitedly the moment he sees Trin walk through the back door. Can’t say I blame him. She’s only been gone a couple hours, but like him, I missed her the whole damn time.
She smiles brightly and reaches for him. “Hi,” she says, drawing out the word. “Here’s my little super hero.” She cuddles him against her, but greets me with a kiss packed with one hell of a sizzle.
She tugs on my bottom lip as she pulls away. I grin against her mouth. “I wouldn’t start anything you can’t finish,” I tell her.
“Now, baby. When have I ever not finished?” She tosses me a sly look over her shoulder as she carries our boy back into the house. “Besides, you need to give me something to do once our little bird goes down for his nap.”
I rub my jaw and chuckle. For all I suffered, I’m convinced she and our baby must be my reward. It almost seems wrong for a man like me to be given such love, to have his heart so filled with joy, but I’ll take it. And like I promised Trin on our wedding day, I’ll never let us go.
I find them lying on our bed as she feeds him. It’s cold in here from the air blasting through the A.C.. I grab the blanket at the foot of the bed and gather it around us as I lie beside them, positioning my body so I can see my pretty wife’s face. She smiles when I stroke her cheek.
“Did you get to see Hale?” she asks.
“Yeah. For bit.”
Her face s
hadows with concern. “How’s he doing?”
“He’s all right. These past few years have been rough, dealing with what he’s had to deal with, and being so far away. We’re supposed to get together later for a beer and talk.”
“That’ll be good for him.” She adjusts the blanket around Cal’s shoulders and asks, “Did you ask him about dinner Friday?”
I try to keep my face neutral, but it’s hard since I know what she’s really asking. “Yeah. He said he’ll be here.”
She raises her brows, hope sparking that gleam in her eyes. “Did you tell him Becca will be here?”
“I did.”
“And?” she presses.
“And what?” I ask, doing a shitty job at playing dumb.
“Callahan . . .”
I chuckle. “Well, for a man you claim had lost his grin. He sure found it when I told him she was coming.”
Knowing Trin’s all but planning Hale and Becca’s wedding, I quick change the subject. “How was lunch with your momma?” I ask her.
She gives me “the look” the one that tells me she knows I’m trying to distract her. But even so, she answers. “It was good. Landon sold his robotics technology for a cool fifteen million.” She shakes her head. “Everybody used to tell me I was the smart one. Little did they know Landon would graduate from M.I.T and develop something so high-tech it would change the world.”
“Yeah. Your daddy told me all about it when he was over earlier. Also said Landon donated ten of those millions to his charity.”
“Landon’s always had a good heart.” She loses her smile. “Too bad he had to go and marry that stripper who broke it. Good heavens, she and her bedazzled vagina were awful.”
I laugh. I don’t tell her Landon probably thought he’d scored big time. Instead I fill her in on my talk with her daddy as my fingers leave her face to smooth over Cal’s soft curls. “Owen wants me to help spearhead the charity, oversee construction, and talk to some of the vets. He’s hoping between the two of us, plus some of the boys from the V.A., we can figure out who’s home is in need of repair, or who doesn’t have one so we can build it for him—or her.”