Tailwinds Past Florence

by Doug Walsh

  “Oh, that’s pretty. Is that from that bead place in the malls?”

  “Yeah, Pandora. Edward picked it up for me before the trip.” Kara turned the leather bracelet so the glass beads bunched together atop her wrist. “He knew I felt awful about storing my engagement ring in a safe deposit box so he got me this. One bead for each of the continents we plan to visit.”

  “That’s sweet. So what country are you most excited about seeing?”

  “Oh, that’s easy. Definitely Spain.”

  “Picasso, right?”

  “He’s part of it. But I’ve always wanted to visit Seville and the Andalusia region. I can’t wait to see the Flamenco dancers and the white villages. And the olive groves—I love olives,” she said.

  “Don’t forget the tapas!”

  “And the wine!”

  “Cheers to that,” Brenda said, clinking the sudsy coffee mug she was washing with the one Kara was drying.

  “I can’t wait,” Kara said, thinking about the coming months. “And I’ve heard it’s easy to find good camping in Spain.”

  “So, you don’t mind camping?”

  “Not at all. I love waking up in the outdoors.” Kara looked out the window toward the lake, admiring the reflection of the moon on the water.

  “Well, you’re young. You’ll be wanting a hotel once you’re my age.”

  “Edward already does. I think he’s convinced that I’m some sort of princess. Fancy cars and a big house. I don’t know where he gets it. To be honest, I’ll take a bus and a burrito over a limo and lobster any day.”

  Brenda laughed. “So, what about Edward? Where’s he looking forward to going?”

  “I’m not really sure. Probably Scotland. He loves whiskey.”

  “Oh, Tom’s the same way. The only place I’ve ever heard him say he wanted to go was Ireland. For the whiskey, of course.” Brenda rolled her eyes and the two laughed.

  “Too funny! They’re all the same, aren’t they?”

  “They really are. But it looks like you’ve got yourself a good one.” Brenda smiled at Kara and yanked the plug from the sink. “I’m glad you emailed us. Tonight was fun.”

  “It really was.” Kara gave Brenda a brief hug and repeated her earlier thanks. She was appreciative of the hospitality, of course, but as she lost herself in her thoughts, she realized she was thankful for so much more.

  Kara had finally forgiven herself. She was through feeling guilty for planning to divorce Edward. For weeks her chest would tighten every time she saw him, every time someone asked about him. And then the trip started and she felt even worse for being … No, Kara, you’re not going to beat yourself up over that anymore.

  A spark jumped along her spine, plucking her vertebrae like harp strings.

  Poor Brenda, alone in this kitchen all summer long. Kara turned away as a guilty smile played on her lips. Thanks to Brenda, Kara now knew that everything she felt these past months was perfectly normal. Healthy even. Brenda was a glimpse of the future she avoided. All the years of coming in second were over. I won.

  When Kara turned around, she saw Brenda’s eyes were pink and watery. The two were the same, but headed in different directions, and Kara sensed they both knew it.

  Brenda took a deep, sniffly breath in through her nose as her lips tugged at the corners in a wide smile. “Let’s go sit in the den and wait for the men. I want to hear more about you and Edward. It’s not every day I get to meet a couple of soul mates.”

  Edward stood on the dock, swirling the black granite cubes around his empty highball glass as he listened to Tom’s proposal, trying to not let his enthusiasm show. But each word sounded better than the last and, well, he never had much of a poker face in the first place.

  “I’ll set you up with an office in Seattle and match your previous salary to start. Bonuses are based on the assets you gather.”

  “Net deposits? Not performance?”

  “Well, yeah. Haven’t you been listening? I’ve got programs that read the charts. I’m not hiring you for your investment knowledge. It’s your Rolodex I want.”

  Edward squinted in Tom’s direction, puzzled at the reference.

  “Oh, for chrissake, your contact list.”

  Edward laughed while nodding his understanding, then erased his smirk. Careful, keep it professional. How could he be this lucky? Every day another sixty miles in the saddle and not a step closer to getting back to work. It was driving him mad. And then this. The one couple in western Minnesota available to host them, and the guy turns out to be a veritable Willy Wonka. A job in private wealth management was the holy grail of finance jobs: reduced hours, big money. And a corner office with my own support staff!

  “I don’t know what to say. Thank you.”

  “Say yes.”

  “Yes,” Edward said smiling. “I’m definitely interested. But are you sure you can wait for us to finish our trip?”

  Tom’s entire body stiffened. “Who said anything about waiting?”

  “Well … I thought—”

  “That’s too long to be out of the game. You’ll be worthless to me. Your contacts won’t even remember who you are, and they sure as hell won’t trust a guy who goes gallivanting around the world for three years. No, you need to start next month.”

  Edward’s knees buckled as his billowing sails fell slack, the wind stolen. The dock was steady, the lake calm, but his head swam with growing nausea.

  “I …” Edward began, then turned toward the house. Through the kitchen window, illuminated by a golden square of light, he saw Kara, laughing. Nearly two months spent battling the cold and the wind and wishing he had kept his damn mouth shut and never lost his job. And now all he could think about was the smile on Kara’s face every morning when they started pedaling. There wasn’t a person anywhere in the world happier in that moment than she was. He picked at a cuticle as he watched her, not noticing until he felt the sting of the cold air on the torn skin.

  “What’s it going to be, Edward?”

  He turned to face Tom. “I, I can’t. This bicycle trip means everything to Kara.” Edward closed his eyes and sighed.

  “Forget the damn bikes! You’ll have enough money to see the world by yacht,” Tom said, dotting his exclamation with a thrust of his cigar. “I’m offering you the chance of a lifetime. You think there are going to be any doors open to you in Seattle after what you pulled? It’s not exactly Wall Street, you know, where people expect you to act like an asshole from time to time.”

  “I know. I can’t. She’d never forgive me,” he said, his chin falling.

  “Uh-huh. Had a feeling you might say that, especially once I saw you two completing each other’s sentences at dinner.” Tom ran his hand along the side of the floatplane and strode past Edward, shaking his head.

  Edward kicked at a pile of ropes and searched the water for his reflection. Looking back from the moonlit ripples was a memory of his eight-year-old self, the birthday boy stood up by his father, a marketing executive overseeing the Windows 95 launch. Young Edward had fled to the solitude of the dock behind his family home on Vashon Island after his father called to say he had to work late. Again. And there he stayed, toeing a rope intertwined with sun-baked kelp, his face burning with disappointment and resentment, until his father came home to retrieve him.

  He could still remember his father slowly setting his leather briefcase down on the grass before walking out onto the dock. Rather than an apology, or a present, or even a hello, his father offered advice.

  “Do you remember what you ate for your seventh birthday?” his father asked.

  He shook his head, sniffling.

  “Do you remember the trip to Disney?”

  Young Edward nodded while wiping his nose with his shirtsleeve.

  “And the trip to Whistler?”

  He nodded again, recalling the fond memories of that winter’s ski trip to Canada.

  His father knelt, grasping his son by the shoulders, holding him at arm’s length, f
ace to face. It was hard to look his dad in the eyes—it still was, even to this day—but he didn’t dare look away. “Whistler, Disney, this house on the water,” his father said, gesturing out over Puget Sound, “Those are the things you’re going to remember when you’re my age. Not whether I was home for dinner or what we ate on your birthday. It’s why I work the hours I do, Ed. It’s so you and your mom never have to want for anything. So I can be the provider I promised to be when I married your mom. Does that make sense?”

  Edward scrunched his face, trying to understand.

  The boy who would grow up to earn his MBA and be managing multi-million dollar accounts by the time he was 26 said it did, even if it would take years for it to sink in.

  The dock tilted as Tom approached. He looked three inches taller than he was a minute prior. Edward lifted the glass to his mouth and tongued the stone cubes, searching for a drop of whiskey.

  “I’m not a guy who makes many mistakes in life, Edward. Know why that is? I see the icebergs coming and correct course before it’s too late. And that’s what I’m trying to do here. There’s not a soul who works for me who isn’t at least forty-five. Most are pushing sixty. And it’s not by coincidence. I’ve heard too many damn horror stories about these so-called Millennials. About how soft they are, how they think they know everything but are too damn afraid to make a decision. People say they have no concept of business hours, they want to wear goddamn flip-flops in the office and ride scooters in the hallways. And then you give them these things and they come back asking for a mental health day because their pussy hurts.”

  Edward snickered. How many times had he heard this same rant before? Another self-important Baby Boomer thinking he’s the only one who ever logged a full day’s work.

  “I offered you that job because I need the company to get younger. I need guys who the new money can relate to; guys who know what the hell Snapchat and Insta-whatever is and don’t need to take a pill to screw their wives. I thought you were who I was looking for.”

  Edward felt himself scowling and tried to interrupt, but Tom continued, seemingly unperturbed.

  “I’m not even sure I’m talking to the right person. The Edward Vaughan I thought was coming to dinner was the one Ron Madsen used to rave about. Ron said you had my work ethic.”

  Edward’s eyes widened with shock. Ron wasn’t known to give compliments. “I’m him. It’s just that now’s not the right time.” Edward raised the magazine still in his hand, “But I am this guy.”

  Tom grimaced and rubbed the back of his neck as he turned away, lost in his own thoughts.

  Edward knew he should be pleased. That Tom was selling past the close was terrific. Nevertheless, he felt a dread knifing toward him from across the lake, like the dorsal of a shark set to swallow him whole.

  Tom spun to face him with a mischievous twinkle in his eyes. “So you’re really that guy?”

  “I am.”

  “Prove it. How about we play a game. A contest. You like games, Ed?”

  “Sometimes,” Edward said, clearing his throat.

  “I think you’re going to like this one. I just thought of it. We both want you to work for me, right?”

  Edward bobbed his head in a noncommittal manner.

  “But you’ve got this bike trip in the way. And that’s going to take how long?”

  “Two or three years, depending on the route Kara wants to take.”

  “What if it was the route you wanted to take?”

  “I don’t follow,” Edward said, wrinkling his brow.

  “I’m willing to hold that job for you, but only if you can prove you have what it takes. That you’re a man who knows what’s right for his future—his family’s future—and can put this fool’s errand in its proper slot.”

  “I can’t—”

  “Let me finish, Edward. I don’t tolerate being interrupted. I’m proposing a contest. Continue with the bike trip. Give that pretty wife of yours her dream vacation, but hurry the damn thing along. Get back to Seattle and be ready to start six months from today. Enjoy the spring and summer, then get the hell back to work. You do that and I’ll make you a very wealthy man.”

  Edward was speechless, the roller-coaster of the past few minutes taking his breath yet again. He could only stand there, staring, expecting to hear it was all a joke. Tom arched his eyebrows twice as he took a puff on his cigar.

  Edward’s mind was off and running. He could envision the map on which they plotted their route. So much north-and-south. So much zigzagging. If they straightened it out, maybe took a train across China and increased their daily mileage, it could work. But Kara. She’d never go for it. Never in a thousand lifetimes.

  “What’s it going to be, Edward? Mind giving me an answer? It’s getting cold out here.”

  Edward snapped to, caught off-guard by Tom’s impatience, but confident. “Can I sleep on it? It’s a great offer, but I need to think about it. I need to talk with Kara—”

  “What’s to think about?” Tom demanded, striding closer.

  He stalled as his mind reeled and Tom breathed down at him, glaring, blowing smoke in his face.

  Edward retreated a step and looked down as his feet bumped the rope, reminding him again of his father’s words. Like I promised when I married your mom.

  “I need an answer now, Ed. I’m flying back first thing in the morning.”

  Edward realized he’d be able to retire early, they’d never have to want for anything. Kara would never have to work again. They could start a family, get a house on the water just like the one he grew up in. Their vacations would be second to none.

  “Okay, Okay,” Edward said, practically panting as his stomach twisted itself into knots. “Six months,” he agreed.

  “Excellent,” Tom said, clapping him on the shoulder. “Around the world and ready to work on October 23rd.”

  Edward knew perfectly what agreeing to a six-month timeline meant, but Tom’s verbal announcement of the date landed like a sledge to the midsection, crushing that part of him that was excited moments ago. With a hand on the plane for balance and his voice cracking as he spoke, Edward called after Tom. “You need to promise me something.”

  “What’s that?” Tom didn’t turn to face him.

  “My wife can’t know.”

  PART TWO

  Chapter 9

  Thursday, February 12 — Florence, Italy

  Hours after his sudden appearance in Florence, and still hoping it was all a hallucination, Alessio found himself pondering the younger man staring back at him in the washroom mirror as he smoothed the wrinkles from a forgotten, olive-colored shirt. His chest and shoulders were broad, their muscles not yet repackaged as the older man’s flab he’d grown accustomed to in his later years. His jaw was angular, neck taut, and his hair thicker, wavier than he was accustomed to. He swept his hands through his hair, smiling at the way his biceps flexed, and watched as the strands cascaded between his fingers—just as he had done with Sylvia’s hair in this very apartment.

  But Sylvia was in the past and he was somehow, inexplicably, in the future.

  Alessio slumped against the sink, hands clutching the basin, his head hanging, tugged by the lead sinker of his discomfiting memories. It had taken years to get over the rejection, to cease writing her, and to forfeit any attempts to win her hand. Swearing off future trips to Florence, he retreated to his home in Malta, to his ever-hardening heart and isolation, eking out an existence off his savings after surrendering the trade that cost him his one true love.

  The more he thought about it—about her—the easier it became to accept being young in the future than how he grew old in the past.

  Now he was back in Florence. Whether through divine intervention or perhaps only in a dream, he didn’t know. A thought came to him as he tried to work out his new age: Maybe he had come back at thirty-three, resurrected just like Jesus Christ. Alessio laughed, forgiving himself the blasphemous thought. He turned to the side and lifted the hem of
the shirt as he sucked in his stomach, listening to its rumbling. I’m going to be as thin as Jesus, too, if I don’t get something to eat.

  Alessio had been sneaking longer and longer glances out the window throughout the morning, marveling at the brightly lit shops, the colorful horseless carriages, and the array of black ropes strung between the buildings. The shock of the world outside the window had worn off, but it had taken him all morning to amass the courage it would take to venture out.

  Having already tested the key he found while mining the apartment for clues, he braced himself for mockery and the filth of public roads as he stepped beyond the threshold, barefoot and disheveled.

  He descended the wide granite steps to the first floor. It was dark but the hall lights blinked on as he reached the landing. “Chi è la?” he whispered, afraid. Nobody answered. More sorcery, he thought. A pair of floppy brown leather boots sat on a mat outside a door. He hesitated, then dashed on tipped toes, swiped the boots, and disappeared down the stairs to the ground floor. The shoes were at least two sizes too large but better than nothing.

  Alessio steeled himself against the fear of the unknown lurking beyond the massive doors at the end of the hall. Self-preservation implored him to stay sheltered; the need for food drove him out. It had been years since his last visit to Florence, and he would need to reorient himself. He paused, eyes closed, visualizing his route when the door swung open, striking him in the shoulder, and nearly knocking him over.

  “Mi dispiace,” apologized a man entering. Alessio slipped past without eye contact, flushed from his burrow like a frightened rabbit.

  For all the changes that had taken place since his last visit in 1845, it was the cleanliness that proved most shocking. Alessio walked the center of the pedestrian street, marveling at the stonework sparkling underfoot and the scent of focaccia, not filth, which perfumed the air. Though the incessant whine of the motorized velocipedes was a nuisance, he found it far less offensive than the rivers of horse piss that soaked the cobbles only yesterday.