Destined (32 page)

Description:
 
A castle tower is struck by lighting
coming from dark clouds, flames shooting out of the windows and raining down
from the sky. People fall toward the ground, which cracks open beneath them.

Meaning:
 
Violent upheaval, disaster and crisis.

The telephone call from Sarah Bennet came early Tuesday
morning while I was still in the kitchen baking scones. She wanted me to come
to a special meeting with the Main Street merchants that afternoon to discuss
merging our forces for the upcoming promotion. The key players in town had
already been approached, and everyone was in favor of the collaboration. Plans
were moving forward, and we needed to confirm the budget.

Sarah
offered to organize a team of volunteers to work the event, with herself as the
head of the stage crew. She had a lot of experience with lighting and sound
systems for open air events, having organized several arts festivals and
fundraising concerts. I was relieved to have access to her skills and good
advice. She took a big burden off my shoulders, and now I could concentrate on
hiring the performers and getting the merchants to agree on our cooperative
marketing campaign.

When Henry came downstairs for his
breakfast, he poked his head around the corner for a quick peek before entering
the room. I caught him doing it. When he saw that I was smiling at him, he
ventured hesitantly across the threshold.

“Good morning, Emily! Did you have,
um, a good weekend?” he inquired timidly.

I nodded, a huge smile on my face. He
brightened up and smiled back at me.

“Really?” he asked eagerly. “How
marvelous!” He chuckled in a satisfied way, and looked very pleased.

“Thank you, Henry,” I said earnestly.

He blushed and looked bashful,
lowering his head and muttering, “Hmph! Don’t know what you mean!”

“Tony told me that you helped to set
up the house, lit the candles for me, all that.”

“Did it work?” he asked, looking up
with a glint of mischief in his eye.

“I loved it! And I felt very
appreciated, by both of you.”

“You are, my dear, you are! “ he said
emphatically.

“Well, I appreciate you too, Henry,” I
said, turning to put a warm scone on a plate for him, placing it on the kitchen
table. “And after this weekend, I appreciate Tony in ways I never would have
dreamed of!”

We both chuckled. Henry sat down and
settled in for a chat. I poured a cup of coffee and served it to him. He
watched me chop celery for a minute or two while he ate and drank.

“So, things are going well between you
two, I gather?” he inquired curiously.

“Yes, Henry, you were right.”

“I was? Most gratifying. What was I
right about this time?”

“About the path ahead. I shouldn’t
have been so afraid. I’ve seen it too, now.”

He considered this rather seriously
for a moment.

“And what does Tony say?” he asked.

“He says…exactly what I want to hear,
whenever I want to hear it. And the rest of the time, he listens. He is the
perfect man! He even cooks.”

Henry laughed wheezily, slapping his
knee.

“Oh Emily,” he panted, wiping his
eyes, “That was a good one!”

“I’m not joking, Henry,” I protested. “He
is the perfect man, for me, anyhow. I waited a long time to finally meet him. I
can’t believe how lucky I was the day I knocked on your door!”

“We were the lucky ones, Emily.”

“We all are, Henry.”

We smiled at each other with mutual
affection. Giving me a pat on the shoulder, he went back upstairs to check on
his eBay auctions.

Life floated along like a dream for me
over the days and nights that followed. I was surrounded by a pink bubble of
happiness, and my creativity was spinning along full tilt. All the merchants
were buying ads in the special newspaper insert that was planned to cover the
downtown promotion. This was now going to feature an illustrated map of
downtown in the centerfold, plus a schedule of the entertainment events.
Several of the stores, including mine, were being spotlighted in short written
profiles, each with a photo.

I networked with the local arts
organizations to find performers, and it looked like our grant money would be
coming through. We were keeping it simple, with just six performances under the
tent between Friday evening and Sunday afternoon. One was a story-telling
session for kids early on Saturday morning, and the rest were various types of
live music.

I booked street performers to work the
weekend as well, organized in shifts to cover both the Main Street and Market
Street shopping areas. I hired several clowns, a juggler on stilts, a woman who
made animals out of balloons, folk singers, guitar players, a drummer, an
accordion player, three magicians, and a man with a pair of trained dogs who
did acrobatic tricks. It was shaping up to be a fun, lighthearted, family
event.

Now the only thing I really had to
worry about was the weather, which is always a huge gamble with an outdoor
festival. I sent positive, sunny thoughts out into the universe, picturing
crowds of happy shoppers enjoying perfect summer weather with a slight breeze,
not too hot, under clear skies.

I went over to Sorrentino’s to talk to
Josie about the plans. Rocco was already there, sitting at the table in her
kitchen.

“We’re gonna set up a freezer chest
outside and sell
gelato
,
Italian ice cream in little cups,” she said. “I was thinkin’ about cold drinks
too, people are going to be hot and thirsty, I bet!”

“I’m sure you’re right,” I agreed. “But
they’ll be hungry, too.”

“Yeah,” Rocco said, “We can sell pizza
by the slice on the sidewalk, too. I got it covered.”

He was leaning back against the wall
with his feet stretched out, his fingers laced across his stomach.

 
“How about you?” he asked me, “What are you guys planning?”

“Henry has a bunch of books picked out
to sell for just a dollar,” I said, “And we’re digging through all this great
stuff down in the basement to see what we can mark way down. It has to be a
real bargain to get people excited, according to what they said at the last DBA
meeting. That won’t be a problem, though. You should see what I’ve been finding
down there!”

“Like what?” Josie wanted to know.

“Like, a big stack of that blue and
white Chinese porcelain, rice bowls, I think they are. They’re beautiful, but
Henry said they were incredibly cheap when he bought them twenty years ago, so
it’s a perfect sale item. I’m only halfway done unpacking the shipping crate,
there may be something else good in there too.”

Bella had been down in the basement
with me when I finally opened the crate under the stairs. Frankly, I was a
little nervous about doing it by myself. I was tempted to tell her about our
resident spirit, but there were no more signs of a ghostly presence and I
didn’t want to spook her so I kept it to myself.

“We’re going to have two tables, one
for books and one for the other stuff,” I told Josie and Rocco.

“You’re a good girl, Emily.” Josie
patted my hand where it lay on the table. “You do a good job for that old man.
He’s lucky he found you. You know, when his wife died, we thought he was never
comin’ out that door again.” She shook her head dramatically.

 
“Yeah,” said Rocco, “It was pretty sad. But Henry sure seems
to be taking an interest in things again now!”

“I knew her, you know,” said Josie. “We
used to have coffee every morning.”

“You and Margaret were girlfriends?” I
asked, realizing they would have been close to the same age.

She nodded sadly. “Yeah, sure we were.
She used to help me take care of the boys when they were little,” she said. “God
never gave her any babies of her own, you know. But she sure did love kids.”

Rocco excused himself and said he had
to get back next door to stir the sauce. That left me alone with Josie in the
kitchen.

“So?” she said, with a knowing look.

“Huh?” I answered warily.

“I hear you’ve been going around with
that guy, the one who used to have the fancy car!” she confronted me, her hand
on her hip.

“You mean, Tony Novak?”

“That’s his name? What kinda name is
that?” she asked curiously.

“It’s Tony Novak’s name,” I shrugged.

“Yeah?”

“He’s originally Czechoslovakian,
actually.”

“Ohhhh, yeah?” she considered this as
though it were a very bizarre fact. “I never met anybody from that place
before. He speaks English and everything?”

“Yes, Josie. He speaks like six or
seven languages, including Italian! His parents live in Italy, he was raised
there.”

Her face lit up. “Ohhh! Yeah? That’s
great! You gotta bring him over sometime!”

“I will. He’d love it.”

“I bet he hasn’t had a nice red sauce
like they make back home for a long time,” she said, getting up. “I’ll make
somethin’ special for him. Here,” she said, bustling happily around the stove
to pack some stuffed shells with extra red sauce into a plastic container. “You
take this home tonight and heat it up. He’s gonna be a happy man!”

“Thank you, Josie,” I said, touched by
her excitement.

“You like this guy, Emily?”

“Very much,” I nodded.

She smiled at me and reached up to
pinch my cheek affectionately.

“You’re a good girl, Emily,” she said
again. “You tell him that. Make sure he appreciates you!”

“I will, Josie. And, I think maybe he
does appreciate me. That’s one of the things I like about him!”

She nodded in approval.

“He got a good job, Emily?” she
considered.

“Well, not at the moment. He’s, um,
self-employed. But he did interview for a teaching position at the University a
couple of weeks ago.”

“Oh, that’s good!” she said, raising
her eyebrows. “That’s a real good place to work. They got good benefits there.
You tell him to take that job! Then you marry this guy and make some babies,
Emily. You’ll be a great mama!”

The timer went off on the stove and
she turned to open the oven door and peer inside. I thanked her for her sage
advice and the food for Tony, and left her to her cooking.

I served the stuffed shells for dinner
that night at his house, adding hot garlic bread and a green salad. Tony’s
furniture had just arrived from London, and we ate sitting at a real table for
a change. And what a table! His dining set, with seating for eight, was
authentic Chippendale. I understood now why he had gone to the trouble and
expense to ship his things. There were some wonderful antiques, many of an age
that one only finds in Europe, where “old” means something very different from
what it does here. And there were signs of his travels in Asia, beautiful rugs
and wall hangings, brass tables and lamps and big heavy candlesticks, silk
draperies and a carved teak screen inlaid with ivory. While the pasta warmed in
the oven, we moved things around and argued over what should go where.

“I want to use the screen upstairs,”
Tony insisted, folding it up to carry it to the master bedroom. “It can cover
the electronics when we’re not using them. It spoils the mood to see all that
technology when I’m trying to meditate!”

He had already placed a small Buddha
statue in the center of the round brass table, and we each had a favorite floor
pillow nearby. We hadn’t sat down to meditate together yet, but I was looking
forward to it. I was curious to see what it would be like to try to communicate
while “traveling the inner planes,” as it was called in the books that Tony had
loaned me.

Tony and I had not spent a night apart
since that first weekend. I tried to take my cat and go home to my apartment,
but a couple of hours later he followed me over there. When he knocked on my
door, he claimed to be having an attack of withdrawal pangs from his sex
addiction. I took pity on him and let him come inside.