Rosethorn (39 page)

She rose to meet his eyes.

“What more is there to tell, Andrew? I suppose I can weave stories about the best osteria in Rome, how to bargain for carpets in Istanbul, how to say good day and please in countless languages. My poor passport doesn’t have space for another visa. Oh, all the stories I can tell you for days on end about being a gypsy. How Alli envies me. You remember Alli? She’s got two kids now. The most exotic place she’s ever been is Disneyland. And she reminds me that I’m living the life that others only dream of. Out of the two us, though, she’s the one who’s content. Frazzled, but content. But then she has a home, and all I have are a series of anecdotes." Sera paused to take a deep breath.

“I came back because right here,” she said as she lay back down within the circle of his arms, “is the only place that ever felt like home. All that you need to know about me Andrew, you already know. Do you realize that? Everything comes back to here. Once upon a time, in this house, I used to know who I was and what I wanted.”

“And now, do you know what you want? All you’ve done since you’ve been gone, all your wandering, and it’s led you back here."

She didn’t answer him, and perhaps sensing the guilt that had begun to seep into the edges of their newly found happiness, they instead made plans for the next day, as if they were teenaged lovers again, with no thought beyond the immediacy of when they would next meet.

*****

There was no hiding what had happened the next morning.

Sera did not have to look in the mirror to know how transparent she was—she could feel herself glowing, with secret smiles that her grandmother caught with worried eyes, restless and unable to keep from checking her watch every few minutes. Dreamy and feverish, Sera tried to keep her impatience from showing as they had their leisurely brunch and shopped at the farmer’s market.

Away from the old house, the guilt that she had ignored the night before – two missed calls from Chase, an e-mail from her editor asking about her article on Morocco, and now the discomfort of avoiding the obvious with her grandmother – was asserting itself, as unavoidable as the bright May sun.

“Don’t think,” she almost said out loud, shaking her head as if to shake off the image of Chase that persisted in appearing before her, of the night before she flew home.

Chase had grudgingly obliged one of her whims and they had taken the Metro to the Trocadero. They had strolled down the stone steps and past the fountains as someone from the square, a gypsy catering to the milling tourists and young lovers in dark corners, played “La Vie En Rose” on an accordion.

Chase had rolled his eyes, but had stopped across the street from the brightly lit Eiffel Tower, held her cold face with his gloved hands, and kissed her until she was warm. With an indulgent air, he had bought her a chocolat et pistache glace from a street vendor and they sat on a bench next to the Seine.

“Perhaps I should get you a waffle with melted noisette instead. Something warm,” he suggested as she shivered in his arms.

“Wouldn’t be the sssame,” she had said, watching the tower with the glace in her hands.

“Will you never get tired of this?”

“Shhh!” she scolded, as she waited, poised on the edge of the bench.

“Ahhh,” she said a moment later, when at the stroke of the hour, the lights of the Eiffel started twinkling, making it look like a gigantic Christmas tree against the backdrop of a Paris night sky.

Wrapped up in strains of La Vie En Rose and twinkling lights, her future was a luxurious gift presented to her by Chase. She will never again have to be alone in the most beautiful places in the world for he would always be there right next to her.

She leaned back and, deeply satisfied, she consumed her glace as they silently watched the brilliant display for 10 minutes, after which the tower lights ceased twinkling. She felt him watching her intently and so she turned her head.

“Does this feel like home?" He placed a warm kiss on her forehead.

“Mmmmm,” she sighed, eyes closing briefly in delicious contentment, mouth sticky with ice cream. “Not yet. But it will."

That was only four days ago, she realized with shock, and now she was buying a baguette, roasted chicken, smoked salmon, and browsing for grape tomatoes in preparation for a wanton afternoon with another, as if that had been some other woman making plans to live in Paris with her lover.

She did not know what to do with this contradiction, as she had subconsciously termed it, a word more comfortable than infidelity. So she ignored the troubling half of the contradiction, just as she ignored her grandmother’s strained face and delicate tiptoeing towards asking Sera what she thought she was doing, and concentrated on choosing, as if she were searching for rubies among rubble, the plumpest and sweetest tomatoes for lunch.

Beyond the next few hours she did not, would not think, not even of the looming plane trip back to New York that night.

“Don’t think,” she kept repeating to herself, as she quickly changed after the farmers market into a red wrap dress she had impulsively bought in Paris at Puces St. Ouen while Chase bargained for her
antique desk.

Circling its red strings twice around her waist, she imagined Andrew untying them, his rough hands unwrapping her from its silken folds.

She left her hair down, the way he liked it, remembering how the night before he had loosened her chignon and buried his face in it, like he used to, and whispered, “You even smell different,” as if the loss of so many years could be measured in her hair, in her scent that was foreign to him.

No lipstick or gloss, just a quick swipe of lip balm on her still-bruised lips, like overripe fruit, her feet into high heels, a quick glance in the mirror to see her sixteen-year-old self still looking back at her, then running down the stairs, like she used to, because Andrew was waiting for her.

Nothing had changed; driving as fast as she could to the old house, but wishing she could fly to him because it would be faster.

“We’ll have a picnic at Limantour, by the rocks-remember?” Andrew had suggested the night before. “Or we could go wine tasting at Napa Valley. We’re finally old enough. Or have lunch at the Lark Creek Inn and mingle with the rich people, instead of peeking in through the windows like we used to.”

“Is that your repertoire of seduction?” she had teased. “Beaches, wineries, expensive restaurants?”

“I don’t suppose any of that would impress you now.”

Kissing him to take the sting away, she had whispered, “Of all the places, in all the world, no one has ever shown me what you have. It’s your fault I’m restless."

“No, I want to be here,” she had said as they tumbled, “In your bed. As long as I can, before I have to fly back.”

It would never be enough, she realized, as she weighed the handful of precious hours they would have today. No amount of time could make up for what they had let slip through their fingers. It doesn’t matter anymore, she thought as she parked the car and checked her reflection in the rearview mirror.

There was no other word for it—she was luminous, marveling at how she had shed the aura of mystery and pretense of self-control so willingly.

Paper bag full of food in her arms, she walked through the gate, breathing in the roses that had opened that morning. She entered the unlocked door without knocking, impatient and eager as she called out Andrew’s name.

Her voice echoed in the empty rooms of the old house. He did not come bounding down the stairs or appear from the hallway, so she stood uncertain in the foyer, her happiness cracking a little with slight panic. She set down the bag and mounted the stairs.

“Andrew, I’m here,” she called out again, her voice a little shrill.

He wasn’t in his room, although the unmade bed made her smile. She picked up the shirt he had been wearing last night and brought it to her face. Sharp longing filled her as she inhaled the ghost of his smell.
She started going from room to room, even though she could already tell she was the only one in the house.

She tried not to recall the last time she had been alone here. This is different, she told herself, clutching Andrew’s shirt close to her heart.  

She jumped when from somewhere a phone started ringing. She ran back to his room, remembering the phone she had seen on his dresser, and picked up.

“Hello?” she asked, breathless.

“Oh, good, you’re there." She sank to the floor in relief. “I called your grandma’s house but you’d already gone.”

“Where are you?”

“I am so sorry." She could hear some hammering in the background. “My subcontractor’s behind, so I have to stay for a little while longer. I’m going to be an hour, tops. Wait for me?”

“What do you think
?” she laughed.

“This is surreal
,” he whispered. “You answering the phone. I can’t believe it.”

“I know. For a minute, when I walked in and you weren’t here, I had this horrible thought that I dreamt it all." She heard herself sound like a forlorn child, but there was no pretense left in her. “That I had made up last night.”

“I’m leaving right now.”

“No, no, no. Don’t. You need this job. Victorians don’t come cheaply. I’ll wait. We have some time.”

“I’ll be there as soon as I can. And we’ll talk, okay? We have some plans to make. I’m not about to just let you go.”

Her heart jumped in her throat then, as she realized that she had been waiting for him to speak of a future beyond this afternoon.

*****

Laughing at how she had become clingy and insecure overnight, Sera shook off the fear that had begun to overtake her. She set about arranging their lunch and rummaged for dishes and silverware in the largely empty kitchen cupboards. She took off her heels and dragged the tiny table from the kitchen to the large drawing room with the starburst window and wooden griffins. She found a crate to accompany the one chair, and set out two mismatched plates, battered aluminum forks, and tumblers she had scavenged from the kitchen.

Then, taking a knife, she went out to the front yard and, humming barefoot in her red dress, she strolled among the briars cutting with some difficulty an armful of roses, which she arranged in a green mason jar to sit in the middle of their humble table. She laid the baguette on a diagonal and set out the salmon, chicken, and a chilled bottle of Pinot Grigio.

Popping a ripe grape tomato in her mouth, she surveyed her handiwork.

“Perfect,” she declared out loud as she noted how, despite the incongruity, it all somehow fit in the grand living room, remembering all the impromptu picnics and rag tag meals of their youth. “Better than Napa or the Lark Creek Inn.”

“Are you real?” she had asked him last night as her fingers wandered in disbelief over his sun-warmed skin. “And this house,” she had exclaimed as she climbed out of bed, suddenly unable to keep still, “Is it finally going to live again?”

He had said nothing and just watched her as she stood by the window, amused. “I can’t wait until it’s all done. This house has been neglected for so long, forgotten and sad. It needs to be loved. Don’t laugh.”

“I’m not laughing. I just can’t believe you’re here.”

“I always imagined that this house was meant to have a big family in it, you know, children running up and down the stairs and all over the backyard." Seeing that his smile wavered, she had said quickly, “And parties. Can you picture it?"

She had felt like twirling, like she had that morning, giddy in the beauty of the restored jewel room.

“A huge table groaning with the weight of platters and platters of food, plenty of wine and scrumptious desserts. Vases all over the house bearing bouquets of wild roses from the garden. Music playing and its rooms full of people.”

She came back to where he was. “Remember that party at Miss Haviland’s? With the paper lanterns and votives? It should be like that, don’t you think? The way it was meant to be." 

It will all come true, Sera thought as she surveyed her handiwork. The two of them will be the ones to salvage this house from sadness and decay. They had been given what the sea captain and his wife and Miss Haviland and her soldier had not—a second chance.

The phone started ringing again, so she sprinted up the stairs to his room, just in time to pick it up.

“Are you calling because you’re on your way?” she asked hopefully. He sighed in the other end.

“We’ve hit a snag
,” she groaned. “I have to stay until it’s fixed." He lowered his voice and she could imagine him turning to a corner so no one else could hear. “I’ve never wanted to be somewhere else as badly as I do right now. It’s killing me that you’re so close and I can’t get to you.”

“How long?”

“Can you hang on for another hour?”

“I’ll hang on for as long as it takes."

*****

She lay in his tousled bed, holding the pillow to her body as if it were him, closing her eyes and imagining him opening the door, walking in, and enveloping her. She was starting to feel unmoored without him to anchor her in this great big house with its empty rooms.

She went through his drawers, handling his folded shirts and rolled up socks. In his closet hung jeans and button-down shirts and some suits. Intuitively, she realized a woman had picked these out for him, probably along with the expensive bottle of cologne on his dresser.