Wild Things (15 page)

The evening passed without remarkable incident, other than my heart racing occasionally and a frequent feeling of vertigo. I tried not to look at Sydney, and worried that she might suspect. She didn't seek out my company either.

My bedroom was delightfully European, and its diversion helped me get a good night's sleep. The Italian marble fireplace and large canopied bed distracted me from thinking about the predicament I was in. I pictured Eleanor, perhaps brushing her hair dry in front of the fire.

* * * * *

After breakfast Eric confessed that he had a conference call he couldn't get out of and said his mother would show me her gardens while he was busy.

"But I promise that's the last interruption," he said, with his usual smile. Like hot chocolate on a fall morning, his charm warmed my heart. Why couldn't I love this man as I ought?

"Promises, promises," I said as easily as I could manage. "I'm well rid of you anyway. I want to see everything, and I can't do it with you kicking pebbles and asking if I'm done yet."

Carrie laughed. "You do know him well, don't
you?"

"He was dreadful at a Lincoln Park Zoo benefit." I was shrugging into my Windcheater in the foyer
when I heard a light tread on the stairs. I knew who it was without looking. Eric's warmth paled in comparison to the rush of heat in my face and arms. Suddenly I felt as if I were standing in front of an open oven door.

"Hi there. Sorry I missed breakfast."

"You were up too late working," Carrie said, her brusque tone softened by the look of genuine caring and concern she gave Sydney.

"Unavoidable," Sydney said. "But now I can lolly-gag all day."

"Why don't you tag along with us, then," Carrie said. "I'm going to show Faith the garden. We can wait while you get something to snack on."

Sydney disappeared into the breakfast room, and Eric headed for his father's study. Eric senior appeared briefly in unmistakable golf attire, asked after my comfort, kissed his wife, and whisked out the door. Sydney reappeared with one of the fresh croissants that had been on the breakfast table, and the three of us left the house and headed north on a wide foot path. Already moving vans were delivering tables and chairs to be carried in through a high and wide set of French doors. I glimpsed a vaulted ballroom as we went by.

Carrie was a brisk walker. Keeping up precluded idle chatter, but Sydney and her mother exchanged family information while I trailed behind, taking in the beauty of the morning.

The lawn eased into oak trees, and beyond the trees was a meadow long enough for football. A gravel path skirted the meadow and led past a grouping of picnic tables and a huge fire pit. It seemed so far away from the rest of my life.

Soon I could hear the babble of children over a high fence covered with thick ivy. The fence was artfully woven among the existing oaks and maples, and we followed along the fence until we came to a maintenance gate.

"Good morning, Mr. Torres," Carrie called. "How many buses this morning?" Sydney and I paused at the gate while Carrie and a man hidden in the depth of a beekeeper's suit went over how many children were expected for the day and which bulbs had been brought in and which were mulched and whether the pruning of the white birches should wait until Indian summer had passed.

Some matter of concern must have come up, because Carrie gestured once, wildly for her, though it was just a flick of one arm. "Syd, I've got to go talk to the tree surgeon," she called. "Can you take Faith on a tour? I'll catch you up."

Sydney waved her consent. "They'll talk for hours," Sydney said, heading along the path that skirted the fence. "A hundred kids or so — not too many. We shouldn't be overrun. They're setting up a Halloween activity area in the main garden, so let's go over to the Moroccan garden, okay?"

I nodded my assent and followed her along the wide pathway. "Why just kids? Why not the general public?" I tried not to look at her and found myself instead noting the pristine crease in her blue jeans and the brilliant flash of her scarlet silk blouse in the sunlight.

"Follow me," Sydney said, and we walked around the inside of the fence to where more children were making their way into the heart of the garden. "Stand right here and watch."

The shoulder of her gray suede jacket brushed mine — I hated myself for being so aware of it. I couldn't take in the scene before me for a moment, but then I saw what Sydney meant.

A group of eight- and nine-year-olds came in from the main gates and around the planters of evergreens. They pushed and shoved, bickered and laughed as kids do, but when they came around the planters and saw the long plaza of brilliant colors, the flash of water in the fountain at the far end, and beyond that an open patio ringed with jack-o'-lantern lights, their mouths fell open. Arches crowned with different greens invited exploration of Old English, Japanese, Italian, and Moroccan gardens. Most of the kids went silent for a moment—then they laughed and rushed forward, even the ones who looked far too cool to think a garden would be any fun.

Two girls ran by us holding hands and giggling, their innocence and pleasure a tangible thing, bright and pure. Sydney took my arm and pulled me across the plaza toward the Moroccan garden, and for a moment I felt the sweet innocence of youth and took her hand.

"You have to see my favorite plant," she said, pulling me along. "It blooms in fall."

My palm tingled, and a searing happiness filled me. The sunlight was heavy with gold, and a light breeze redolent with the last of Indian summer lifted wisps of hair from Sydney's neck.

She showed me everything — the dormant rosebushes, salvia in crimson and bright blue, the herb garden that made us both sneeze and giggle as we blew our noses. Then we ran to the long meadow be
yond the main garden where annuals and perennials were being turned to seed for next spring. Beyond the plantings was a long meadow of tall grains — barley and wheat and other grasses left to go wild. Sydney told me it hid a game fence that kept the wildlife sanctuary's herbivores out of Carrie's plants.

As we walked through the tall grasses, tiny gold seeds dropped from the heavy pods onto my hair and shoulders. I looked up for a moment and watched the tapered stalks brush at the sky. I felt seeds slip into my shoes and down my shirt and told Sydney they tickled.

"I know," she said. She walked ahead of me with her arms out, brushing the tall stalks as she walked, creating a' golden flurry behind her. She looked like an earth goddess. "We used to do this when we were kids. The grass seemed a mile high then."

We peered beyond the fence, but no wild creatures came out of the undergrowth to see us. As we turned back toward the garden, hidden from us by the wall of grasses, Sydney took my hand again with the same innocent gesture as before, but this time innocence fled me and I trembled.

"I'm sorry," she quickly said. "I — I shouldn't have."

"It's okay," I said.

She stood looking at me and I found myself lost in the velvet of her eyes. I couldn't say anything. I just looked my fill.

"I know better," Sydney said, biting her lower lip. "If I were Eric's brother I wouldn't just touch you like that — Eric might not like it."

"But you're not his brother," I said, puzzled.

She fixed me with her gaze again, and I saw her lips part with a soundless exclamation. "Eric hasn't told you, has he?"

"Told me what?"

"I'm a lesbian."

My body swelled, my skin trying to pull away from my bones, aching toward her, pulling me toward her, and I gasped, just loud enough for her to hear.

Her face flickered with a moment of anger, and then that passed as she realized I wasn't shocked. She realized what I was, what I was feeling, and she swallowed.

"It isn't just me, is it?" As she spoke I noticed a pulse beating in her throat and my lips trembled. "Dear God. I thought it was just me. I came home this weekend so I could get used to you being with Eric. So I could put my... feelings in the proper category. But it's not working."

"It's my fault," I said, the words breaking out of me. "I shouldn't feel this way. I can't help it. I don't want it. I've never wanted it."

"But you can't help it. Don't do this to Eric," she said softly.

"I won't. Not feeling this way."

"Don't do this to me," she said, as if I hadn't spoken.

"I'm not doing anything to you," I said.

Her hands came to my face and she cupped my cheeks. Her thumbs brushed under my closed eyes. I could tell she had stepped closer, my arms sensed the heat of her. I knew when she kissed me it would burn, and I might never recover.

"You look at me that way," she said, her warm
voice coating my ears as I kept my eyes tightly shut against the glow of her, "and it makes me want what I've given up. Women. You."

I was shaking as if chilled to the bone, but my body was rippling with fire. Her thumb brushed a tear from my cheek. Into the whisper of the grain stalks moving in the breeze I said, "Don't make me beg. I can't do that again."

"Oh no," she said, her tone so alarmed I opened my eyes. "I wouldn't." I felt her fingertips tremble.

I said, "Kiss me."

My body rose to hers, and I felt as if I was coming out of my old skin and into the fresh new life of her arms. Coming home, coming alive, she seared my bare defenses as her arms came around me and then her mouth found mine.

I was hungry for the taste of her but was surprised by the sound of our kiss — my heart hammering in my ears, her low moan, my startled breathing, her fingers brushing down my face. Each sound so small, but they filled me with passion as fiercely as the pressure of her mouth and the warmth of her lips.

She kissed me again, and our mouths opened to each other, drinking deeply and sweetly until she drew back. A breeze stirred the grain, and a dusting of gold drifted over us. I couldn't take my gaze from her lips — peach with golden glints now — and this time I went to her and kissed her with all my pent-up need, then more softly as emotions were stirred that I hadn't experienced before — nothing like what I felt for Eric, and nothing like what I had felt for Renee.

"Faith," she murmured against my mouth. She pushed me away, then pulled me into another kiss as if she couldn't help herself. "Good God, what are we doing?"

She kissed me again. I pulled her to the ground, and through the flurry of gold I saw the vivid sky and reached up to pull it down over us. Safe and warm in her arms with her heart pounding against mine.

I lost track of time in those breathless, heady kisses. With a laugh of joy, she rolled over and pulled me on top of her, then drew my head down to hers, her lips calling mine. In this golden place, outside of time, I knew what I was and what I wanted. I wanted her. I shyly caressed her arms, and the softness of her ribs as we kissed. Sensing that she would not stop me, I lightly ran my hands over her breasts. They fit in my palms as I had thought they would.

Less shyly, she unbuttoned my blouse. I welcomed her mouth with a sigh of delight. She slipped my bra straps off my shoulders and kissed the newly bared skin.

"It's like I thought it would be," she murmured. "I knew your skin would taste like this."

I said the first thing that came into my mind. "You're melting me."

She looked up with a smile. "Am I?"

I nodded, feeling inarticulate. "It's the heat of your eyes."

She smiled again, and the velvet brown went purple. "I'll try not to burn you."

I pulled her mouth to my breasts and whispered, "You already have."

She went rigid, her lips so close to my skin I felt the tingle of her breath. "Oh Jesus."

"What?"

She looked up at me. Her eyes had gone brown again, a dark brown full of trouble and indecision. I wanted to pour myself into them and trembled when she licked her lips nervously. For a moment she inclined her mouth back to my breasts, then she rolled onto her side, covering her eyes with her arm. "Jesus," she said again.

I looked down at my half-naked body, dusted with golden seeds except where her mouth had been. With shaking fingers I rearranged my clothes and then looked at her. Her fists were clenched and her entire body was taut as a bowstring.

"Sydney," I said softly. I put my hand on her hip. "It's okay."

"Don't," she said violently, rolling away. "I can't. I don't... Eric's in the way," she said. "I can't do this to him. And I... I don't need this right now. I —" her breath caught with a half-sob. "I promised myself I would have a personal life sometime in the future. After I get the party nomination. After the election. After I make a difference. I can wait." She looked at me. "Oh damn. You don't want me. You can't want me."

"I do," I said quietly. "But this isn't going to work. I mean it would. Right now." I looked down at the crushed grass and grain. "Right here. But not after."

She rolled onto her feet and offered me her hand. I thought it more prudent to ignore it and scrambled to my feet.

"We can't do this," she said.

"No," I echoed. "We can't."

We stood there for a long moment, and I knew I couldn't be the one to turn away. Finally, Sydney said, "We'd better get back," and she led the way through the swaying grain, a flurry of fool's gold in her wake.