The Jewel Box (27 page)

“I think he does. He’s feeling vulnerable and wants to do the right thing for Luke. But I know he’ll call soon. Please don’t leave. Just stay near your phone.”

Around ten in the evening, Gabriel called. The minute I heard his voice I burst into tears.

“Calm down, everything will be okay,” he assured. “Don’t you know that together we can face any problems?”

“I’m sorry, Gabriel. I tend to run from problems, rather than face them.”

“I know you do,” he said in a low serious tone. “And I clam up. But here’s the plan. Victoria is moving into an apartment, and I’m paying her rent for six months.”

“What happened to her banking lover?”

“His divorce got ugly and he’s staying low key. Just forget them and get ready to move to Pearland with me. We can work out minor details, Cherie. I promise. And you know I don’t make promises lightly.”

“I know you don’t. And I know you clam up, but I’ll try to teach you the art of candid conversation with the woman who loves you. Oh yeah, we need to get Nikki a cat.”

“A cat?” he moaned. “Oh man, I’m a dog person.”

“So am I, but no argument. Randall promised Nikki a cat and her heart will be broken if she doesn’t get one. A bigger room will have to come later down the road.”

“Don’t say ‘down the road’ Blondie. No more running away from me.”

“I love you Gabriel, and I’m sorry for acting irrational.”

“Just cancel those cross country movers and I’ll handle the rest. Love you, Blondie.”

Gabriel was my tranquility base. I hung up and immediately called Randall with an honest explanation. He reacted like a true gentleman, never asking me to return the ring. Maybe he knew I would. After all, I broke our engagement. Besides, I was careless when it came to sporting that huge rock and felt fortunate none of my friends got injured during my storytelling gesticulations.

I left my job at Ray and McKreight and wound up moving to Pearland instead of Clear Lake. Not as close to water, but close to the one I loved. Gloria brought food for a “moving in party” while the brothers arranged furniture and provided crude entertainment. After everyone left, Nikki tumbled into bed exhausted. Gabriel held my hand as we walked through the house turning off lights, and when we got to the foyer, what began as an embrace ended as passionate lovemaking against the wall. Finally found a fabulous use for foyers.

“Sorry I was such a reticent asshole,” he apologized softly against the side of my neck.

“I understand.” I pushed closer to him. “I’m sorry I was ready to haul ass.”

He squeezed said ass. “I never want to be without you in my life.”

“I second that emotion. I’m the luckiest woman alive.”

In the following year, Delilah turned over a new leaf after meeting and marrying a genuinely caring guy who treated her like she’d had proper upbringing, and treated her kids like they sprang from his loins. She purchased a custom T-shirt shop and snagged contracts with athletic departments of several schools, but also used the business to display her uncensored thoughts across her chest.

Youngest O’Quinn member, Conner, married a nice (and naïve) girl named Kim, who overlooked his screwball behavior. Most importantly, Nikki loved our life with Gabriel. Although I never regretted leaving Kent, I felt guilty for working during Nikki’s formative years, thus substituted material things for time and love. I’d molded her into a spoiled brat.

Right off the bat, Gabriel bought Nikki a Himalayan kitten and barely cringed at the price tag. He pretended not to like Mistletoe, but trained her to fetch like a dog as she grew. Gabriel threw a stick and she retrieved it, no matter how far she had to run or how many bushes she had to maneuver. He whistled. She came. And every morning Mistletoe walked alongside Gabriel’s leg as he strolled down the driveway for his daily newspaper.

Gabriel was still succinct, using few words to get to the point, and I was still verbose, using thousands of words, but never quite getting to any point. Our morning routine was similar to that of the Seventies, with me walking him to the back door, kissing goodbye, and waving to each other as he honked twice to say “I love you.” Around five each day, I cooked dinner while listening for his van, and then met him at the back door. Occasionally when Nikki locked her door to write in her journal, we utilized the laundry room to make quick love on top of our washer/dryer. If you’ve never shagged on a Maytag, you don’t know what you’re missing. Love those spin cycles.

My Julia Child’s bon appétit thingy was hit and miss, (oh, the boiled pork chops incident), but Gabriel raved about every meal I cooked, even hot dogs. We ate out a lot. We saw movies. Visited museums. Attended music festivals. And spent hours star gazing. Sometimes when I went into overdrive thanking him for being super nice about things, he’d fall back on his idiosyncratic one-liner: “I’d do just about anything for a piece of ass, Blondie.”

Their excuse was “Houston summers are too humid,” but I was sure Lauren and Skylar stopped coming for summer visits because their dad was with me again. Still, Gabriel and I spent many weekends at the family
lake house—and by family, I mean a house Gloria found on Clear Lake, made a minimum down payment with money she borrowed from Ben and Gabriel, purchased under her and Hope’s names, and then needed Gabriel as co-signer due to sub-par credit. Gloria never made a single payment, thus called it the family lake house, saying technically it belonged to all her children. Gabriel bought a boat and skis (mostly for me), so everyone swam, fished, read quietly, watched TV, or played indoor games. Then came the beauty makeover. On the fourth of July, Hope helped fifty-five-year-old Gloria “go blonde” to hide her proliferating gray hairs.

“I don’t like it one damn bit,” Conn said after Gloria left the room.

“Yeah, it looks like a gaggle of geese flew over and shat on her head,” Ben added.

“I really liked her dark hair,” I quietly told Gabriel. “It accentuated her olive skin.”

“Persuade her to dye it back,” Troy told Hope.

“Better keep those opinions to yourselves,” Gabriel said to everyone. “Otherwise you’ll be seeing some real ugliness surface from this newly tinted blonde.”

An exhausting day in the sun was followed by an evening of watching holiday fireworks on the water. When the last Roman candle fell from the sky we rushed inside to rotate turns in the shower, before racing for prime sleeping quarters. Once the brood finally settled into beds, Hope and I started chatting from nearby rooms.

“Hey, stop the goddamned girl talk and say goodnight,” Ben called out.

“Goodnight Troy, goodnight Cherie,” Hope complied.

“Goodnight Hope, goodnight Gloria,” I shouted from our room.

Gabriel yelled, “Goodnight Luke, goodnight Nikki,” prompting a series of goodnights throughout the house.

When Kim’s signoff finally reached Ben, he shouted, “Goodnight Kim, goodnight Conn Boy—don’t be milking your mongoose in the moonlight.” We were the Waltons, gone awry.

The Eighties had brought a more mature, kinder, sensitive Gabriel than the one I knew in the Seventies, and watching his father-son relationship with Luke added a new chapter to my Omnipotent Gabriel book. He had
fought long and hard for joint custody of Luke, who visited often. Good to the bone, Gabriel was charitable to persons of lesser means, always cared for stray animals, and his reticence was no longer mistaken for coldness. He loved sitting outdoors in the peacefulness of nature and made a point of watching sunsets and sunrises, claiming they could persuade an atheist to believe in God. In the late evenings he often called Nikki and me outside insisting we view the constellations as he taught her the quiet wonders of our universe. I listened as he and Nikki exchanged ideas and information, thrilled she was seeing him in
almost
the same light as me.

The lighting for us was soft and reflective, but powerful. Taking care of business around the house, we couldn’t pass each other without a quick touch or auto-pilot kiss. I was intense and fast moving, garrulous and insecure, he was patient and slow moving, soft spoken and self-assured. And my creature of habit still raked his hair from his forehead with his fingers; still kept Marlboros in his shirt pocket and always used matches; still rubbed his thumb across the tips of his four fingers as though he were dusting away grains of sands; and still sported a short moustache that drove me up an erotic wall. I loved his idiosyncrasies and every one of my personalities were totally, helplessly in love with every one of his.

18

Gabriel savored solitude, and after serving time as a waitress, I wasn’t exactly “hostess with the mostess,” but every weekend we wound up with a houseful of family. “How did our house become party central?” I asked, hearing the first visitors arrive. We lived miles from everyone.

“You can thank Gloria.” Gabriel grunted.

“I’m starving,” Troy shouted as he and Hope walked inside. I gestured to the kitchen.

Despite directing folks to food and booze by pointing our fingers instead of offering to serve, social Saturdays were fun. Thanks mostly to Ben O’Quinn. He could still spell obscenities faster than most could speak them, and although sometimes annoying, his antics had us spraying drinks out our noses. Ben had married a soft-spoken Beijing beauty he met while in the military, and when he finally brought her to Texas, we were surprised. Mei was unlike Ben in almost every aspect, but the two connected in a special way.

“We are here,” Mei said sweetly, carefully enunciating each word. She was delightful. “Bennie’s helping Gloria bring in some food I make for everyone.”

Mei had a positive effect on Ben who she endearingly called “Bennie.” Adding “ie” to a man’s name instantly lowers his macho level a notch.

Gloria walked in with Ben who was lugging a basket of goodies. Conn and Kim followed. Gloria stopped to chat, but the younger crowd made a beeline to our kitchen.

“Jur hair look berry pretty tonight,” Mei said to Hope.

“Thank you.” Hope smiled before entering the powder room.

Gloria made a quick frown at Mei’s broken English, and then blew air kisses at her daughter-in-law as Mei went into the kitchen to help Bennie set up her Chinese cuisine. Gloria squeezed into a tiny spot at the end of our sofa where Gabriel lay sprawled across two cushions.

“She’s sweet, but it breaks my heart that Ben married outside his race,” Gloria whispered to him. It wasn’t the first time she’d expressed anti-Mei sentiment.

“You fucking bigot,” Gabriel bolted upright, and passed Hope on his way to our bar.

“Sorry about his mouth,” I said quietly to Gloria. “But you know Sean would have embraced Mei without bias.” Hope flipped through a magazine. She adored Mei, but turned a deaf ear on her mother’s snide remarks.

Kent remained financially and emotionally absent, so before school started in fall Gloria finagled the legal changing of Nikki’s last name to O’Quinn. “She’ll fit in better,” Gloria claimed. “Being part of a cohesive family.”

“Yeah, before long we’ll all have the same last name.” Gabriel winked at us girls. Usually it’s the bride who decides her wedding date, but Gabriel was adamant about ours falling on May ninth—the date we consummated our relationship in 1970.