Four Seasons of Romance (23 page)

“What about Susan and the kids?”

“We’re stringing popcorn and cranberries for the birds,”
Susan chimed in. “Don’t worry about us.”

“C’mon,” Leo prodded.
“How about it?
Just you and me.
Some quality mother
and son time!”

Catherine nodded, although something about the way he asked
seemed suspect.

They talked jollily as Leo drove west. She could tell her son
was excited, but didn’t know why, having no idea what scheme he had hatched as
they pulled into an apartment complex outside the city. When he led her to a
modest unit on the far end of the complex, she was suspicious.

Leo gave her his arm as they walked toward a large red door
as she leaned into him, grateful for the support. “Where are we going?” she
asked.

“Just trust me.”

As they approached, Catherine noticed a vase of fresh
flowers in the front window, recognizing them in an instant—lilies and black-eyed
Susans
.

Catherine looked at her son, tears standing in his eyes. Her
mind would not allow her heart to believe it could be true. Then, her oldest
child knocked on the door, the door swung open, and there in the doorway stood
a man she knew. It was the second time in her life Catherine saw Leo after
believing him to be dead. This time, she did not faint. But she did cry.

Before either could say a word, Leo pulled Catherine into
his grasp and held her as tightly as his arthritic hands would allow. Their
cheeks were damp with each other’s tears as Leo gazed deeply into Catherine’s
eyes, and she gazed back into his. Despite the lines and creases around their
edges, they were still the same eyes they remembered.
Leo’s,
hazel with flecks of gold.
Catherine’s, bright and
shining green.

They kissed politely, the way old people do. Then, they
kissed again, this time not so politely. 

Catherine’s son walked back to his car to give his parents
their privacy, the scene overwhelming him. In tears himself, he sent his wife a
text. “I’ve never seen my mother so in love,” he typed.

“Cat, I never thought I’d see you again,” Leo said, kissing
her neck and trembling lips.

“Sweetheart,” she cried, “I thought you were dead. I thought
the drinking…”

“I haven’t drunk in years,” he said. “I’ve finally got my
life together.”

“I can’t believe it’s really you,” she whispered, staring
into his deep, familiar eyes.

“Catherine, I prayed and prayed for so many nights hoping
that I’d have a chance to say these words to you,” Leo said. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry,” she whispered.

“I’m sorry for the hurtful things I told you. I was stupid
and cynical and hurt, and my addictions were making everything so much worse.
It was
all my
fault; we could have spent so many years
together if only I…”

“It wasn’t you, Leo; it was I,” she said. “I thought about
it and the things you told me that night… you were right. I was a coward, and I
did use you. And you were right—so much of my marriage was built on a lie. Leo,
if only we had been younger. If only I could go back to when I still could make
the choice; I’d never pick wrong again. Most nights are peaceful, but
sometimes, I find myself sobbing away.”

“I don’t blame you for what you did,” he said. “I was an
unstable spoiled brat, an unpredictable kid with neither the mind nor the heart
to appreciate you.”

“I was a coward for not following my heart. I might have had
stability and kids and nice things throughout my life, but I want you to know
the only truly happy moments in my life were the moments spent with you…,” she
said.

“Don’t say a word… just hold me…,” he whispered, his arms
cradling her.

“We owe our lives to this newspaper reporter,” he said after
a moment of silence.

Catherine glanced over her shoulder toward the parking lot,
slowly putting the pieces together. “That’s no reporter,” she said.
“That’s our son.”

*

Leo spent time with his son and Catherine, and they talked
the day away. Then, to give them some privacy, young Leo drove back to Fox
Chase to be with his family. He kissed his wife and told his two children how
much he loved them, feeling grateful for their special relationship… and now,
the relationship he could embark on with his father.

The four of them set to work preparing a veritable feast for
Christmas Eve as the children rolled out dough for bread while Susan basted the
turkey. Leo made them laugh by sticking toothpicks in the potatoes and making
them do a little dance before he mashed them to smithereens. 

When he returned to Malvern that evening, Catherine and both
Leos piled in the car.

“Where are we going?” the older Leo asked.

 “To our family holiday dinner,” his son replied.

“Won’t I be out of place?”

Catherine kissed him gleefully on the lips. “Why would you?
You’re family!”

Together, the six of them shared a magnificent Christmas
feast. The older Leo could hardly believe his luck. Suddenly, he was part of a
family, which now included grandchildren he never knew he had. Sixty-five years
after Catherine sat on a rock by the river and told Leo about the family they
would have together, their dream had come true. Through all the trouble,
heartache, and difficulty, and against all odds, the vision had finally come to
pass, if only for a short time.

He reached across the mashed potatoes and gravy to find her
hand. “After all I’ve done wrong,” he whispered. “I didn’t think I’d find
this.”

“It took us long,” she whispered back. “But it was worth the
wait.”

And she was right. Leo’s health, which had been suspect
before his son discovered him, improved greatly in the days that followed.
Though his joints still bothered him, there was new pep in his step. Leo
Junior, happy to play chauffeur, dutifully drove Catherine to visit him daily
or drove Leo to the house in Fox Chase. As the weather allowed, they took long
walks outside. To his everlasting delight, Leo found he did not need his cane
on many of them, feeling half his age at eighty-one.

As they sat in Leo’s sunroom or in Catherine’s parlor, they
talked, read, laughed, and cried as if they went back to being kids when they
fell in love. For the first time in decades, both of them felt complete.

Now, in the winter of their waning years, so many questions
that had always plagued them had been answered. The uncertain future that used
to worry them had evolved into the present and the past. The only future they
had now was a question of tomorrow’s spare time.

One day, as they strolled through the park, Catherine lifted
Leo’s hand to her lips, kissing it. “It’s lonely at Fox Chase. In a few days,
our son will go back to Massachusetts for the winter semester and take his wife
and kids with him. That house is far too big for me alone.”

She squeezed his hand, her eyes twinkling. “I’m not as young
as when I made those daily drives to Baltimore. I don’t relish the thought of
driving even fifteen miles in the dead of winter.”

“Fifteen miles?” he asked. “We’ve traveled much farther to
look for each other. But I don’t want to live in a mansion. You lived your
whole life here apart from me. Besides, a mansion is not really my style. But I
know we could get a great condo in the arts district.”

She stopped walking and touched his cheek. “I don’t want to
go a single day without touching you.
Without hearing your
voice.
Without this.”
She leaned in and put her
lips on his. The kiss was slow and mellow, like an old song so familiar you
could hum along to it in your sleep.

As they pulled apart, their eyes blinked open as if they
were waking from a dream. Leo tucked a strand of her white hair behind her ear
the way he used to.

“So what are you saying to the condominium in the arts
district?” he whispered.

“The answer’s yes,” she answered and smiled.

For the next five years, Leo and Catherine were inseparable.
After decades of painful heartbreak and separation, they embraced each other
with the unbridled joy of young lovers, tempered with the wisdom and experience
of an old sage. Finally, they’d found what they’d been looking for.

*

In Christmas of 2011, Catherine’s and Leo’s extended
families gathered to celebrate the holidays. The menu was decadent—delicious
glazed ham, even though Catherine’s youngest daughter Sarah protested loudly
that they should all stop eating meat because it wasn’t ecologically sustainable.
Quinoa-stuffed peppers and the butternut squash soup were also prepared to suit
Sarah’s taste.

“Hippie food,” Leo said. By then, they all knew about Leo’s
wild years in Chicago. If anyone knew about hippie food, he did.

Susan and Leo Junior brought the potatoes grand mere and the
carrot pineapple salad, over which no one made a fuss. 

For post-dinner entertainment, Lily read a sonnet from her
latest book of poems, and the younger grandchildren performed an impromptu
play. Susan and Leo had just gained a granddaughter, and they all doted on the
baby throughout the evening. As Leo Senior held her, he shook his head. Never
did he think he’d live to cradle a great-grandbaby in his arms. Yet, there she
was, pink and pretty as a picture.

“Proud of you, son,” he said, giving the younger Leo a hug.

“Now, this is the kind of sculpture I should have been
making,” the older Leo joked, holding his great-granddaughter up. “What was I
doing with granite all those years?”

Then, Leo Junior raised his mug of eggnog for a toast. The
din of talking and laughing died as they all turned to look. “I want to say
thank you to Leo Ellis Taylor. I think we can all agree he’s made Mom the
happiest she’s ever been.” He set down his mug and clapped, the others joining
in, clapping joined by hooting and hollering.

Leo pulled his sweetheart off her chair and twirled her
around, slow-dancing with her across the room and out into the hallway for a
private moment as the whole family cheered. Once alone, he clasped her close to
his heart and kissed her passionately.

“My goodness!
That was quite a
kiss,” Catherine said, the room spinning.

Leo gestured overhead. “That’s what you get for standing
under the mistletoe!”

“You know what I realized?” she asked. “We’ve spent more
time together since 2006 than we have in all the previous years of our lives.”

Leo thought about it. Even when they were kids, they hadn’t
spent every day together. But for the last five years, he had spent nearly
every moment by Catherine’s side.

He nuzzled up close to her again. “Guess that explains why
these have been the best five years of my life.”

One of the grandchildren played “The Christmas Song” on the
piano in the other room, and, gracefully, Catherine and Leo began to waltz.

“Good things come to those who wait,” she whispered in his
ear.

Perhaps they had not been “waiting” all those years. The
momentum of their separate lives had carried them along, often at breakneck
velocity, in one direction or another. Catherine had married and had the family
she’d always wanted, had become an accomplished writer, an artist in her own
right. Leo had fought in the war and drifted for so many years in a haze of
drugs and alcohol but, too, had finally found his calling in art, making not
only a name for himself, but a legacy.

No, they had not been just waiting, but their hearts had.
Now, together at last, they felt wise, happy and free, blessed to be spending
their golden years together. The stresses and concerns that once burdened them
melted like snow on a cobbled hearth, and the fire that was their love burned
bright, as it always had.

*

On January 19, 2012, at eighty-six, Leo Ellis Taylor died in
his sleep. He dreamed of moving toward a warm yellow light that filled him from
head to toe. Catherine followed Leo, reaching out to him with open arms. Calm
and peaceful; he never wanted to wake… and never did.

He died in Catherine’s bed, her body nestled close to his.
On the same night, perhaps a few hours later, she went as well. In Catherine’s
dream, the Connecticut and
Ammonoosuc
Rivers gushed
beneath her feet. There had been a heavy rainstorm, and the waters were high,
but she was not afraid.

Then, she realized she was standing on the Bath-Haverhill
Bridge, Leo beside her. He’d packed a picnic of cucumber sandwiches and cold
lemonade, and they held hands, looking down at the teeming water beneath them.
She glanced into his eyes.

“I’m happy,” she said. “But why, why did it have to be this
way? We loved each other so much, yet spent most of our lives apart.”

“If only I had had the courage to face my demons,” Leo
whispered.

“If only I had had the strength to follow my heart,”
Catherine said, tears streaming down her face.

“Let it go now,” Leo answered, “we found each other in the
end, had a son together. And even though our victory is bittersweet, we leave
the world as one, just like we’re meant to be.”

“Leo,
my
Leo,” she whispered.

“Wipe the slate clean; our time has come. Eternity waits,”
he said with that lovely smirk she adored her whole life.

“Are you ready?” he asked.

“I’m ready,” she answered, her heart soaring with
possibility.

“One.
Two.
Three.
”

And they leaped into the frothing waters, never again to be
apart.

 
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