The Mirrors of Fate (13 page)

“
Wow, so compassionate. I’m surprised you remembered the patient was a girl,” he joked. Only a forced smile could keep his anger at bay.

Maria smiled, although his words put a heaviness in her heart. She had only a vague memory of the girl. Emma. She couldn’t even think of a last name. “No, no. Don’t make me out to sound so bad. Just call it bad memory. I have a really bad memory.”

“
Or a selective one?”

Had it not been for his sly smile revealing he was teasing her, the words would have stung even more. There was more truth to his assumption than he realized and that she wanted to admit to herself.

“
But really though,” Maria began again, “she was a very special girl.” She fell quiet for a second, affected by the memories slowly coming back to her. She remembered their special place together, the garden of their dreams. “She and I had some sort of connection.” Her heart brightened as she reflected. “Or maybe she was the only one gifted. I don’t know.” Wanting to recall nothing more, she rubbed her eyes. “Oh well, that was all the way back in ninth grade.”

She focused back on him now but was taken aback when she saw him slightly hunched over the table with his hair splayed over his face. She couldn’t see his eyes. His elbows rested on the table and his hands were clasped together in front of him. He was wringing them so tightly the skin on his hands moved and shifted.

“
So, whatever happened to the girl?” He said in a cool, controlled voice. “How often do you get to see her?”

A wave of guilt attacked the pit of her stomach. She quickly shook it off. “The last visit I had with her was about a week after I’d turned sixteen. It was a community service thing we had to do. Well, not
had to
. Visiting was the right thing to do. I’m pretty sure by now she has left the hospital and is living happily. Hey, are you okay? You look seriously sick.”

“
No, trust me, I’m fine. So did you ever go back?” he persisted.

Again her heart sank, deeper this time. She didn’t want to admit the truth, but she had to now. “No. I know it’s gonna sound bad, but I haven’t been able to go back. I know I should have, but I couldn’t find the time. Community service was the only reason I went initially, I guess.” She laughed slightly to lift her heavy heart. “But that’s just because, you know when you’re young, you’re preoccupied with yourself. I’ll admit I was at the time, but I regret that now. I wish...I didn’t have so many things going on with me.” Finally she shook her head and shook away her guilt. “But anyway, it’s been too long. She probably wouldn’t remember me if I go visit now. And yeah, she’s probably left there already. For the time I was there, though, I did all I could for her. I’d like to think I changed her life somehow.”

His slumped body language did not change.

“
I played with her,” Maria pointed out, drawn by an urgency to redeem herself, “and I even told her she’d walk again despite all the negative thoughts from the doctor.”

He was quiet only for a second after her last comment, then he raised his head to look at her. “One day you should go again. Whenever you have time. I like when people think of others, and it’s sweet you helped her out.”

When he smiled afterward, out came a breath of relief from her lungs she hadn’t known she was keeping in.

“
So, you ready to order?” she asked.

“
Of course, of course.” Alan opened his napkin with the utensils wrapped inside.

For the entire time they ate, spoke, and laughed with one another, his fingers edgily played with his knife.

•

The instant the quick rapping came at her bedroom door, Maria opened her eyes.

“
Maria!”

Reluctant to leave her peaceful blanket of sleep, Maria groaned angrily and sat up drunkenly from her bed. She listened again for the voice that had interrupted her slumber. It was late and dark.

“
Maria, open the door.” Her mother’s words were a demand more than a request.

Maria grumbled from the back of her throat and forced herself to get off the disheveled sheets. But before she even moved to the door she fell into a panic.

Damn! She still had her clothes on from her date with Alan.

“
I’m coming!” Maria yelled. Her grogginess fled quickly as she hurriedly yanked down her skirt, pulled her shirt over her head and tossed both clothing articles into any drawer she could find. She flung her closet door open and changed into an old t-shirt and a pair of white shorts.

“
What are you doing in there!?” her mother yelled impatiently and wrestled with the doorknob.

“
Hold on!” She kicked her purse under the bed and sped to the door. She unlocked it. “Yes?” She made a show of rubbing sleepy eyes. “Did you have to knock so loud, Mom?”

Her mother frowned suspiciously. “You were sleeping?”

“
Am I not allowed to sleep now, either?”

“
Don’t get smart with me,” she warned and barged past Maria into the room. She glanced around scrupulously, searchingly.

“
Can I help you with something?”

Her prying mother eventually switched on a light. “Yes you can. I want to know where you went today.”

Just my luck. How did she know?
Maria scratched the nape of her neck. “Where I went? What do you mean? I’ve been here all day,” she said in the midst of a yawn.

Her mother’s folded arms and penetrating glare were hard to ignore. “No you haven’t. While I was out I called the house twice and your father called three times. No one answered, and I find it hard to believe that you were too deaf in sleep to hear any—” She stopped suddenly. Like a bird of prey, she swooped into Maria’s face and peered into it, examining skeptically with large eyes. “Since when do you start wearing so much make-up?”

Maria froze. After all that work, like a fool she had forgotten to take off the foundation and eye liner she had put on. Her mother soon jerked back in shock. The knife of reality cut into the woman.

“
Maria...were you out? Dressed up like that...for a date?”

Maria looked away from her mother’s face but didn’t bother to mastermind a lie. Frankly, she had no energy for it. “Mom, please calm down.”

“
You
were
on a date! Maria, with a boy? Do you know what your father is going to do when he hears this? Maria, you know you’re not supposed to do that!”

Maria clenched her teeth. “Tell him if you want. I don’t care.” She went to her bed and plopped her body face down on it indifferently. A silence ensued, one long enough for Maria to create an image in her mind of what her mother’s aghast expression looked like now. Whiter than usual—devastation in her open mouth formed like a big O—distress in her eyes from the insolent, unexplainable disobedience and defiance which they had not raised her to show. Everything was so predictable here.

“
This is unacceptable. Maria, why do you always do stupid things like this? I swear, if you dare tell me you did anything with that boy! This is just ridiculous. Do you want to get yourself in trouble with your father?”

“
I don’t care, Mom. Let trouble come if it has to. I’m sick to death of it. You act as if I went whoring around the city.” The bluntness and impartiality in Maria’s words surprised them both, rendering the room silent for a moment.

“
Did you sleep with him? I guess I really wouldn’t know, would I? It’s the kind of stupid act of rebellion you’d carry on with. Maria, if you get yourself involved with people of the opposite sex, you won’t be fresh for your husband.”

“
Am I fruit? And you already know me, Mom. I have every intention of waiting until I’m married.”

“
What about temptation?”

“
Maybe I’ll fall one day. I don’t know. But I want to wait. That’s my decision and you know that.”

“
Then why bother date someone who won’t become your husband? Why do you keep disobeying us? You keep disobeying us over and over!”

“
Then I’m sorry I’m such a disappointment to you both. I guess I’ll continue to be. And by the way, when you leave make sure you close the door properly. The light gets in and it’s hard to sleep.”

Her mother went silent, and Maria had again gotten the last word in before her mother finally retreated and stormed out of the room. Maria sighed and quickly dismissed the short confrontation from her mind. She didn’t need her mother’s histrionics right now. All she wanted to do was lay there and not have anything spoil what a great way the day had ended, although it had been somewhat complicated as well.

The date had been so nice. Liberation and release were the least of the emotions she had felt when Alan touched her. Maria closed her eyes and tried to let sleep take her again as she went on recalling the end to their date.

“
I wish I could have kept you out longer,”
he had whispered.

“
I’m sorry. My parents are a little complicated.”

May’s six o’clock evening sun was still brightly lit in the sky when Maria found herself standing by the stone steps leading up to her back gate. Alan faced her and interlocked his fingers with hers.

“
Can we do this again then?” he asked. “I know I really had fun today.”

“
Of course, I had fun too!”
Wait, too eager.
“I think I’d like to see you again,” she said slowly, “but I don’t know if I can handle all the stares you’ll be getting from girls. I wanted to knock them all out today.”

“
Those girls in the Square? They weren’t staring at me. They were staring at you.”

“
Oh sure,” she said, raising a skeptical eyebrow.

He shrugged. “Who knows? Maybe they’re lesbians too.”

Maria laughed, remembering the situation earlier with Gina and Ellie.

“
Can I have your number?”

She was elated and reached into her purse for a pen. He held out his hand and she wrote down her cellular number. He did the same on her palm. “Well, then,” she said, “this is my cue.”

“
All right then.”

She would have preferred if he didn’t simply stand there with a pleasant look on his face. When she realized he was not going to take the initiative to at least embrace her, she gave him a hug instead. But when the quick embrace was over she hesitated. Their goodbye had to have more to it than just that. She fidgeted for a second and opened her mouth as if she had just remembered something important, but she was only stalling and doing an awkward job of it. Was this how they were going to say goodbye? Wasn’t there supposed to be more? She wanted more.

“
Well, then,” she began again, “see ya.” Maria sauntered away from him slowly and began her ascent up the stone steps. She was smiling all the way up to the gate so he couldn’t get a glimpse of her disappointment.

What had happened? Did she do something wrong? Maybe he didn’t kiss on the first date. Oh well, the day had gone relatively smooth, and to ask for anything more was tempting God to take back the little pleasures he had bestowed upon her that day.

She finally reached the gate with a hidden sigh, but before she could proceed any further, a shadow appeared behind her. Turning, she saw Alan standing over her. His eyes were elusively darkened by the shadow of his hair hanging over his brow. In the space of an instant her head swirled. She gasped as he tore her away from the gate and pressed her breathless against the wall. A heat in his eyes quickly disarmed her, emitting a sexual urgency that knocked into her core. Every reactive point in her body pulsated.

“
Can I kiss you before you go?” His voice was gruff and unpolished.

“
S-Sure,” she said breathlessly. “After all that, you don’t have to ask me.”

He smiled. “I’m glad.”

His head lowered and hers raised forward. She expected a fiery kiss after his show of intensity, but what he gave her at first was something much sweeter. Their lips met in a kiss so gentle it was like butterfly wings brushing against her skin. The fireworks set off inside her.

Her face grew from warm to searing hot as his hand raised and gently held the side of her face. For a sweet time, the moment was tender, their lips barely grazing each other’s, and him stroking her face and neck with long, slender fingers.

Soon he pressed his lips more firmly against hers. A soft whip of velvet coursed through her body when she felt his tongue intimately tease the crease of her lips. Maria responded, parted slightly for him, and welcomed him into her mouth. He took the invitation and his tongue slowly and sensually gave itself a tour of its warm depths.

Maria gripped his waist and unconsciously moaned into his mouth. He seemed to swallow the sound, taking it as a signal to continue, and he pulled her body close into his. Slowly and intimately his hands began exploring her.

Oh God, this was amazing. This was the first time she had engaged in something that made all her nerve endings go ablaze. Maria, inexperienced as she was, mimicked his movements. But before long she found herself having to hold onto his shoulders—the only grip on reality she could hold onto in fear of falling headfirst, right there in the open, into a romantic utopia she had only heard her friends rave about. Daylight still shone, but the way he touched her, the way his hands roamed up and down her made her feel they were in the confines of the darkest of rooms.