"I would turn down the whole damn shoreline for this. I could live here the rest of my life."
Micah laughed. "Let's say we look inside before declaring plans for the rest of our lives, huh?"
I was undeterred even after a tour of the small home. Sporting two cozy bedrooms upstairs, one much larger than the other, both with slanted ceilings from the rooftop; I couldn't help but think how perfect it was. The small room could make a great nursery.
The rest of the house sat on the main floor. A living room, a kitchen with windows on three sides – all with breath-taking views of the surrounding mountains – and a small dining area. The house was modestly furnished, but had all of the basic necessities.
"I can rearrange the furniture if you don't like it the way it is," Micah said.
"What do you mean? We shouldn't be moving around the owner's furniture."
Micah took a deep breath. "We are the owners."
It took me a moment to process it. "What?"
"I, or rather we, bought the place. Your name’s on the title too."
I looked around, awestruck that I actually owned something this great. Well, half of something, technically.
"I hope you're not mad," Micah continued. "I just loved it so much, and I was so excited to see you and actually start our life together. I thought we were close enough to the Chakra, but in a somewhat private place, away from— "
"Shh." I put my finger up to his lips. "Shut up and let me think."
He couldn't shut up. "If you don't like it just say so. It would sell easily enough. I was supposed to propose to you here – Susan had it all planned out."
"Micah. Shut. Up." I don't think I had ever heard him talk so much in the span of two minutes since I had known him. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. The sweet and tangy scent of hibiscus drifted in through the windows, but it was the homey scent of ginger that made me smile. It smelled like home. More than home. It felt like everything I imagined heaven to be.
I felt tears gathering under my lids, and when I opened my eyes they brimmed over. "I love it, Micah. Everything’s perfect. Thank you." I hugged him. It was awkward, with the baby in-between us.
"Wait. The baby." I suddenly remembered. "What are the hospitals like here?"
"Not the best. Which is why I was expecting the doctor to stay…"
"Oh, please. That doctor would have killed one of us, if not both."
"What?"
"Don't you do background checks on the people that you hire? I mean, first Vayu – then Doctor Mengele."
"Ok, ok – ease up. Vayu was well established within the organization; been with us almost as long as I have. No one saw him coming—"
"Not even with all that glitter?" I raised an eyebrow.
Micah ignored my interruption. "And the doctor was Cato's doing. It was my impression he was well ensconced within our community and at the very least maintains our secrets."
My lower back was starting to ache. I rubbed it. "What you guys need is an HR department."
"Want the job?" Micah moved behind me, pushed away my hands, and did a much better job of alleviating the pain.
I hummed in pleasure, and let my head fall back on his chest. "No way. I'd spend all my time dealing with sexual harassment claims against you."
"What?"
"The ones I'd be filing. You know, because of inappropriate touching..." His hands were kneading lower and lower, working out the non-existent kinks in my buttocks. "Lewd comments..." He leaned forward, licking my ear and commented on how big my breasts were getting. "And sexual advances." His hands snaked around to grab hold of my hips, pulling me back into him. I rubbed up against him, then angled my head back, mouth open, hungrier for him than I ever had been.
We kissed again. His lips were so soft, and his tongue so insistent. For the first time in months, I felt the urgent tingling inside and yearned for him to push me back on the couch, spread my legs and...
Knock, knock.
"Damn it! Someone's here." He reluctantly let go of me, and I had to work to steady myself. He looked back at me as he went to answer the door. "There are drinks and snacks in the kitchen. See if there is anything you like."
As I scoured the refrigerator and came out with orange juice and yogurt, giggling floated in from the living room. I straightened, back and shoulders going stiff with anger. Female giggling, the fake, flirty kind that was too high pitched and forced. The kind that told the receiving end, I am totally into you and would suck your... Jesus, what was wrong with me?
I closed my eyes and summoned Arianna.
Is someone interfering? I asked. Someone who can't keep their hormones in check?
No, Kaitlyn. She answered almost immediately. That is all you.
More giggling, but this time inside my head.
Great, no one to blame but myself. Much harder to deal with your faults when you couldn't pin it on anyone else.
"Kaitlyn – are you ok?" Micah was in the doorway to the kitchen, his brows furrowed. "Your face is going red."
"Qu'avez-vous dit?" The culprit moved next to Micah, placing one hand on the bulge of his bicep. Her eyes went slightly wider with pleasure as she pawed his arm. She held a feather duster in her other hand.
I squeezed the yogurt cup so hard, the lid popped off, hitting me in the face and squirting yogurt down the front of my shirt. The heat in my face increased, embarrassment heaping on top of anger.
She turned at the noise and gasped seeing me, removing her hand so quickly from Micah’s arm you'd have thought he was on fire. Which he would be, if he didn't choose his next words carefully.
"Kaitlyn, this is Marie, the maid. I forgot she was coming today." He kept his voice soothing, like he was trying to talk down a stomping rhino.
"I see. And just how often does she...come?" I breathed through gritted teeth.
"Once a week."
"Qui est-elle, Micah?" The way she said his name, Mee-ka, the last syllable stressed with an extra high pitch, caused me to bring back my yogurt-wielding arm, taking aim for her face.
"Kaitlyn!"
I looked at him, confused. "What?"
"What’s the matter with you?"
"What is the matter with me? With me?? Oh, I don't know. Maybe I'm upset because while I was stuck at the Chakra, pregnant, under constant attack, trying to figure out whatever is going on inside me with these Shades - you are gallivanting around, getting 'dusted off' by French maids."
"You’re being ridiculous."
"No." I looked down at myself. "I am being a pregnant, stressed out woman, covered in vomit and yogurt, and now I have to compete with the likes of her?"
The air around us crackled with electricity. I felt my hair rising up and out in reaction to the static. I straightened, arms puffing out with invisible lat syndrome. The entire effect gave to the appearance of me growing, and the little French puff, still standing next to Micah, now shrank back in fear.
Micah stepped toward me, holding out his arms as if to intercept me should I go for her. "There is no competition, Kaitlyn. Look at your left hand. Who’s wearing the ring?"
I looked down, and smiled. "You are right, dear. All the better to hit her with." I curled my hand into a fist, intending to use the ring like a set of brass knuckles.
The tart let out a scream, turned tail, and ran for the front door. I whirled my right hand in a circle, lassoing what air would come to me in that quick few seconds, and hurled it her way, effectively pushing her the last few steps out of the house. The last thing I saw before the door slammed shut behind her was the tiny, pink thong that disappeared between her butt cheeks under her too short skirt, as she went sprawling face first down the porch steps.
Suddenly quiet after the maelstrom of yelling and wind, I looked at Micah, smoothed out my hair, and said, "I need a shower."
His mouth was open, somewhat in shock, but he pointed. "Bathroom’s upstairs, towels in the closet."
"Great."
When I came back down the s
tairs, toweling off my wet hair, Micah was standing on a stool, dusting off the top of the living room fan with the instrument left behind by the maid in her haste to leave. Smells of a roasting chicken drifted in from the kitchen.
He stepped down from the stool and looked at me, wary. "Better?"
I considered the scene. He could have very well followed her out the door, but instead, he chose to stay behind, cleaning where she left off and making me dinner. I smiled. "Much."
He sighed in relief.
So did I.
Chapter 29
The White Elephant
That evening, after dinner and a few games of cards, Micah suggested we go to bed. I was suddenly nervous. I was much, much larger than the last time we had seen each other, and I wasn't sure if I'd be comfortable sharing my awkward body with him. Judging by his subtle touches, romance was definitely on his mind.
"Don't be nervous," he said when I curled into myself at his touch. "Here, let me give you a massage."
I obediently rolled over on my side, away from him, honestly relieved that I could hide my face, which was certainly flushed with embarrassment.
His fingers kneaded into my lower back, smoothing out kinks that had been long-time residents. Slowly but surely, his hands worked their way lower and lower, then around to the front.
I stopped him there. “I’m sorry – I don’t think I can do this.”
I could hear the frown in his voice. “What’s the matter?”
“Don’t be mad.”
He almost sounded exasperated, “I’m not mad. Just tell me what is wrong.”
“I want to…do this with you, but I don’t think – I mean—”
He stopped me with a kiss. A quick peck on the forehead. “If you aren’t comfortable, it’s fine. I can wait.”
“Really? You can turn it off just like that?”
“Well, no. But I’ll survive.”
I relaxed back into the pillows and smiled. “Not if you keep inviting that maid over.”
He laughed. “I don’t think she’d come over again if I promised her a million dollars.”
“That’s debatable.”
Our conversation petered off, but our wakefulness did not. I tossed and turned for what seemed like hours.
"I need to sit up."
"More pillows?" Micah stacked them all behind me and to my sides.
I frowned, guilty at keeping him awake. "What about you?"
"Trust me, I've slept in worse places – and with worse pillows."
A few minutes of silence and he asked, "Can you sleep?"
"No."
"Do you want to talk?"
No I didn't. "About what?"
"Maybe about Shawn's manual. Alex said you guys finished going through it."
Automatically bile began rising in my throat. I thought of all of Shawn's correlations between manmade disasters and the planet's attempt at avenging them, and how scarily spot-on some of his assumptions were. I thought of how he had planned to continue the depopulation effect, and then I thought of my dream, hand in hand with Shawn, standing on a mountain of dead bodies.
My fists squeezed into tight balls of white, my fingernails cutting into my palms. "No, I can't – I can't talk about it."
"It's ok." He stroked my hair. "I'll get what I need from Alex."
We fell silent again while I tried to relax, concentrating on the strange hum of exotic insects outside. The walls of the house did nothing to block outside sounds. I thought of my Seattle apartment, and how quiet it was. Delivery trucks and loud pedestrians right outside were never heard unless I had the windows open. My apartment sat on top of a bakery. The smell of donuts and fresh bread drifted up to me by five a.m. every morning, but I never heard a sound. I wondered whom the apartment had been leased to after I left, and I couldn't help but wonder how perfect the place might have been to bring home a new baby.
Just me and her, in our private, quiet, dark little place - safe from the world.
"I love you, Kaitlyn." Micah said rubbing my belly, reminding me he was a very large part of this equation.
"I love you, too,” I responded. “Go to sleep, Micah."
I stroked his hair and waited until I heard the deep, steady breaths of sleep coming from him, then carefully snuck out of bed. Sleep wasn't going to come any time soon, and there was nothing more frustrating to me, even now, than being unproductive.
A trip to the bathroom, a small snack of dinner leftovers, and a quick rummage around the living room for reading material left me bored out of my mind. I walked out onto the back deck and breathed in the humid air. The scent of ginger came to me again, along with the sound of the waterfall from across the darkness. I looked in its direction, squinting. Once my eyes adjusted, I could spot it. The blue of the water glowed slightly, beckoning me. I couldn't resist.
I took the steps down from the deck and started on the path toward the waterfall, wearing nothing but my thin, wispy nightgown. The weather was fine, but shoes would have been a smart choice. After the second time stepping on a sharp rock, I cursed loud enough to illicit a return response from a wild monkey high in the trees above. I turned back to the house to retrieve footwear.
I was stopped short by Micah's glowing green eyes, and nearly jumped out of my skin. "Jesus fuck you scared me!"
He didn't respond.
"I was just going for a walk."
His eyes glowed so bright in the dark it was unnerving.
"Are you mad?"
Finally, he shook his head and said something.
I repressed the urge to shout out 'hallelujah'.
"Kaitlyn, please. It could be dangerous out here. What if something happened?"
"Not in our neighborhood, sweetie." I tried to lighten the mood. I took his hand and pointed at the waterfall. "Look. If you saw that you would be doing the same."
He finally smiled. "Yes, but I'm not eight months pregnant, emotionally unstable, and capable of creating large-scale natural disasters."
"Hey! I'm not emotionally unstable!" I withdrew my hand and attempted to cross my arms. My difficulty ruined the desired effect. I threw my arms down at my sides and huffed in frustration.
"Case in point…"
"Oh, shut up."
"Come on, if you want to see the waterfall, let's see it together." He took my arm in his and led me down the path, footwear forgotten for the moment on both our parts.
The walk there was more taxing than I cared to admit, but it was beautiful in the dark. Reunion was a whole new world once the sun left the sky. The nocturnal animals and insects were out in force, and perhaps noisier than their daytime counterparts.
We stopped as a chameleon made its way lazily across the path. "I thought those things were supposed to blend in. There's no way we would've missed that."
Micah shrugged. "If it was blending in – we would've stepped on it. Mother Nature has a way of looking out for herself."
I immediately thought of Shawn’s theories, wondering if Micah would ever buy into them.
Micah clapped his hand at the chameleon to hurry it along. It paused, turned one beady eye toward him, the other still looking forward, then continued at his slow pace once again, clearly unconcerned.
I laughed. "Look at that. My big bad wolf throws down with a lizard one-tenth his size, and loses."
"Ha, ha," Micah retorted. "Just keep a look out for the bats."
I froze. "Bats?"
“Flying foxes. Oh, and the rats."
I hunched my shoulders up around my neck and put my hands over my head as if the creatures would join forces and attack at any moment. "Ok. Not looking so much like paradise anymore."
"Oh, look at the big bad Gaia.” His turn to mock me. “Wielder of flame, commander of water, Queen to the air, and ruler of earth. But throw a rodent her way and—"
I punched him in the arm.
"Oh, come on. There's nothing really that dangerous out here." He put his arm protectively around me and left it there for the rest of ou
r walk.
Being that close to him was once again causing a stir within my body. While the air around us smelled of sweet, tropical spices, Micah smelled like campfires and pine trees. My stomach suddenly rumbled. I really could have gone for some smores.
I held my thoughts in check, curious if he could read them like at the Chakra. If he could, he gave no indication one way or the other. Perhaps he didn’t care if all my thoughts inevitably led to food. At least I had an excuse, for another month or so, anyway.
Trying to keep my mind off of food, I asked, "Have you researched the geography and topography of the island much? I mean, does it lie on a hotspot like the Chakra or Galapagos?"
"Yep. Got that covered." He tapped his temple as if having already thought of it made him the smartest man in the world. "This place is a neutral zone, so to speak. For you, it doesn’t take away energy but it doesn't add to it, either. But the same goes for me – or Shawn. No one gets an advantage here."
"Might be best, not knowing who the baby will take after." I stopped short, realizing my mistake. "I didn't mean – "
"I know,” he said a little too quickly. “It's fine."
But it wasn't. Micah was trying to build a perfect future, and the perfect picture of a family, but the truth of the matter was the baby might not even be his. This was our white elephant.
I leaned in closer to him, squeezing his arm, trying to let him know I was there for him as much as he was there for me. The waterfall was getting louder, and we could feel the light mist before the falls even came into view.
We rounded a grove of short trees and thick bushes, and emerged into a small open area. Going forward, the path ended abruptly in a steep cliff to the base of the falls, leaving us about halfway up the waterfall.
The scene took my breath away. The water seemed to come out of nowhere; the dark cliff blended in with the night sky. It was like the water was emerging from a black hole, a different world altogether. The intensity and speed at which the water fell was frightening, but air blew up at us in gentle, brief puffs, as if to calm our fears.
"This is a popular dive spot," Micah said loudly enough so I could hear him over the water.
I took a step toward the edge of our spot, extended my neck and peeked over. The white, churning water in the pool below, bright compared with the dark surrounding cliffs and sky, almost looked luminescent.
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