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“You did it, you’re taking a couple of days off work!”
“Yes, Franck, how do you like that?” beamed Bob. “I haven’t used my vacation days for a year and a half, and Julie said she’d look out for anything that needed me.”
“How is Julie? Did you have a good time with her?”
“Oh. It was a nice dinner. At Luigi’s.”
“I took Regina there too. Funny, Sal told me not to go there, warned me about the kitchen. Good strategy, warn people not to go to your main competitor.”
“It was a good dinner, but it was all about her boyfriend. And she fell asleep at The Music Man. Can you believe that? She barely woke up for ‘76 Trombones!’ But she did help me with the McIver place.”
“Really? How could she do that?”
“She found some genealogy charts that showed I’m related to the other McIver. Well it didn’t show that, actually. It showed that I was…Franck, I saw the box.”
Franck widened his eyes for a moment.
“I found a letter you must have left on the floor,” said Bob. “By Samuel McIver. About the death of Moses. And I read the deed and the little note with it, and the other letters. Sorry – I tried to return Samuel’s letter to your room and when I spotted the key in the box, I couldn’t help opening it.”
“I’m glad, actually. I never got the chance to show you. You were in bed when I found the key and then gone before I woke up in the morning. Did you read everything?”
“I did. It blew my mind, as you might say. Including the old deed.”
“Yeah, I forgot to tell you about the deed. I meant to show that to you especially. I don’t think I even looked at it. Anything interesting?”
“Well there was a note with it from the Robert McIver of that day, giving the house to Josiah so he did have authority to sell, or basically give the house away, for a dollar, to Lutetia. Julie found that my family is related to that Robert from back then. So if Robert was Josiah’s uncle, that’s my connection to Josiah and Lutetia’s son Moses. And to the other Robert, today’s owner of the house.”
Franck gave him a pained look. “Yeah, he’s today’s owner, if my signature didn’t screw everything up.”
“Julie discovered something else, that Robert was the city’s Registrar of Deeds at the time, so the land transactions wouldn’t raise anybody’s eyebrows but his own.”
“I hope we can sit down and understand all this when we’re not like ships passing in the night. Here I am back and you taking off. What happened with Lucy?”
“Lucy, Lucy. I can’t believe it’s happening. We were like kids, so happy to talk to each other. Like we had never been apart. How does that work? How can it possibly happen to someone like me? I can see it for you because you have adventures, but me? I just have to go down there. If I didn't, I wouldn't get anything done for thinking about going down there.”
“Wish me luck,” said Franck. “I might be in jail by the time you get back.”
“Franck, it can’t work that quickly even at the worst. There would have to be lawyers and a trial and all that sort of thing. I think Zeke was bluffing.”
“I don’t. And anyway I don't have money for lawyers and all that. And I don’t feel like looking over my shoulder every time I go out at night. But we’ll see. I have nothing for Zeke. Robert is coming back up to Port Haven tomorrow. Maybe he can tame the wild beast that grew out of my wild ride. Or maybe I can get some help from Dawn. I didn’t even tell you about her. She’s amazing. I could be with her all day and night and not get tired of her. We just had great talks on the plane down and back up–did I tell you we were on the same flight both ways?”
“No, I didn’t hear about that.”
“She’s got frizzy hair.”
“Well there you go. What more do you need?”
“She plays violin. She even knows the Franck Sonata. She did a gig down in North Carolina with one of the bands she plays with. Kind of a cross between classical and folk.”
“Maybe you’ll see her again and I’ll get to meet her?”
“Oh yeah, for sure. Turns out she only lives a half hour away.”
“Well maybe she can help you.”
“Oh, she’s already done that. I can’t stop thinking about her.”
“No, I mean, help you with this Zeke thing. I really think he’s bluffing about the threats.”
“No he is not. And I wouldn’t want to mix Dawn into this. It’s my mess and I’ll have to lie in it, as they say.”
“Look, keep in touch if anything develops. I’ll be back on Tuesday.”
Bob flew to North Carolina, rented a car and with a light heart, felt like he was still flying as he drove to Lucy’s house even though it was two hours from Charlotte, in the northeastern part of the state.
Lucy was waiting, alone in the house. Both Robert and Rosa had gone to an airport hotel in order to take an early morning flight to Boston.
The reunion felt magical. To each other, Lucy and Bob looked a little more settled but otherwise not so different from when they had last seen each other.
It was easy for them to go out together. They went to a diner, to a bookstore, to a café, walked around downtown, talking and talking, about Lucy’s accounting courses, about Bob’s title searches, about unglamorous things, and about people they noticed around them, about family, about friends and former friends. All of it was easy. Some of the talk they might remember later and some not, but they wouldn’t forget the light in each other’s eyes, the eagerness of the banter, the lightness of step, the quickness of mind, the contagion of smiles.
When they got back home, they made some tea and talked some more. And then, settled in the living room, there was silence.
They sat together on the couch for a while, basking in the events of the day. Being together seemed as full as talking to each other.
“I’m sorry I didn’t get see your mom again. It’s been years. Is she as put together as ever?”
“Oh she is. She’s the one that kept me together when I needed her. Some people my age couldn’t come back home and get by, but she made it pretty easy for me. Not perfect, but I can’t complain, and I do like being with her.”
“Is she alone? I never hear about your father.”
“My father’s not around any more. My mom’s alone in some ways all the time, but in other ways is never alone. Did you ever meet my brother Craig?”
“He could have been the one who answered the door when I first came to get you, maybe.”
“Probably. He was in and out back then. He’s nine years older than me. His dad was from Liberia. I never got the whole story from my mother but I remember that when we were studying about Africa in school, Mom told me how Craig’s dad had come over from Liberia and how his people, only a few generations before him, had been slaves here, and went back to Africa, though not back to the same area they originally came from, of course. I think my Mom and he got divorced. He might have been sent back by Immigration, or maybe he just left, and went back to Liberia for his own reasons, I'm not sure of the story.”
“What about your own father?”
“Well, he died when I was 10. Sweet and gentle man, but very busy, that’s what I remember. Too busy. I like the way he and Mom met. He owned a general store in town here, so he was always working there, it seemed to me. But he liked to paint and draw when he wasn’t working or when business was slow. He like to draw customers, and they liked him, too. A lot of them still have his drawings in their houses. Once he started drawing my mother, he kept asking if he could have a drawing session with her, and she would always go. That’s how they fell in love. It wasn’t so easy for them because he was one of the only Jewish people in this part of the state. It didn’t seem to bother him, or he never let on that it did. He had a great sense of humor about it all. Very funny sometimes. I didn’t always get his jokes but Mom always laughed at them, even when they were about people who had been mean to him. He’s the one who started calling my mother Rosa. I don’t know why. But it’s a nice name and it stuck. Her real name was Lutetia. Kind of hard to say. I think my name was a cross between Lutetia and Lucille Ball!”
“It must have been hard when your dad died.”
“Oh, you have no idea. He died on my tenth birthday, actually. I killed him.”
“You what?” For a horrible moment, Bob realized how little he knew Lucy, and how much might be boiling under her surface that he could know nothing about. He didn’t think he had anything similar simmering inside himself. Maybe to her, parts of him were totally alien, but he'd never hurt anyone outside of football and a few fights. Never came close to killing someone. He took a breath and wondered what to say.
“Well," said Lucy, "I still remember it very clearly because it was so awful. It didn’t occur to me that my Dad would leave home for the store and actually go to work on my birthday. I was having a party and everything. So when he left for the store that morning I remember crying and holding him back and then he got away from me and went out the door and I just cursed him and hoped he’d die for not staying home for my birthday party. And then he did. He had a massive heart attack and died that day. I was sure for years that I had killed him with my curses. Nobody could convince me otherwise. I had to figure that out myself.”
A weight lifted from Bob. How foolish he could be to think she'd killed somebody.
Lucy hung her head. “That year was the worst. It was around the same time that we heard Craig’s dad was killed in the civil war over in Liberia.”
The air was warm. As if his body was on a northern clock, Bob kept feeling it ought to be chilly but it wasn’t. It was comfortable. Lucy leaned into him as he held her tight. The house was nearly silent. A car whooshed by outside. It was dark and they could hear each other’s breathing. Finally, Lucy spoke up about things that had gone unsaid.
“Bob, I can’t tell you what kept me from calling you after I left you. Some kind of shame or just the way you can feel awkward about someone and never quite get over it because there's no one to push you. Once the silence went on for a while it felt like it couldn’t be broken, and everything about you was all done and gone, in my mind. I taught myself to just move on. But I couldn’t escape, really. This is going to sound strange, but I couldn’t help feeling that every time I went out with a guy, I was cheating on you. What an odd thought, since we were hardly together and our short time didn’t deserve that kind of feeling but there it was. Mostly I went out with Brian, and when he wanted to marry me, it was no surprise to anybody. Our engagement lasted two years. I kept finding reasons to get away and kept hoping to sort of find myself somehow because there was something about Brian that just wasn’t for me. But I could never figure out what it was. There was just no reason not to be with him and no reason not to marry him. We were a good couple and everyone thought so. So why did I keep feeling something was wrong?"
"But you must have loved him."
"I couldn’t think of a single reason not to marry him. And there were lots of good reasons to marry him. But I couldn’t find in my feelings anything that made me feel like I wanted him. I kept hoping someone would talk me out of it, but everyone thought it was a match made in heaven. So we did get married. But my heart was never there. I could have gone on and on like an automaton if it weren’t for the thought of having children. That began to terrify me. He was the wrong father. My belly was not meant for his children. I just knew that. I had to get out. It was miserable. Nobody understood. My mother was the only one who was really there for me. She was wonderful.”
Again Bob found himself imagining chilly air outside and a warm fire in the fireplace. He pictured them cuddling up in front of the fire. The image of a fire passed, but the warm feeling lingered. In the dark and quiet of the house, they cuddled up, and their kisses began.
Languidly, Bob pulled away from Lucy and felt with the back of his hand the warmth of her flushed face. He slid his hand gently to the nape of her neck.
“Lucy,” he said slowly. “It’s time for my side of that story, I guess. I thought I had put thoughts of you behind me. College follies, I told myself. But every time you get mentioned, or I think of you, a dull ache comes into my chest, not like a pit in my stomach, that would be how it feels to be afraid or nervous. No, it’s higher than my stomach. My heart, maybe. It’s like that ache you get when you feel like you’re about to cry. And when that comes, I can’t stop thinking about you. I can think of all sorts of reasons why I shouldn’t think about you or care about you. We shouldn’t be a match, I tell myself. But none of that seems to matter. That ache in me is for you and I can’t stop thinking of you. I just love being with you, and I want to keep being with you, spend any time we can get together. You make me feel lighter, I can’t help it. I’ve tried. I’ve tried to reason out why this should not be. Different backgrounds, years spent apart from each other with no interest showing between us, our only connection being basically a weekend! Nothing changes the fact that when you are with me I feel lighter, happier, like I could float, as if I could do anything easily, run lightly, do things for you in a flash and without a thought."
He wasn't ready to look her in the eyes. “But a minute ago," he said, "When you said you killed your father, it was like you poured cold water on my head. How stupid for me to think I know you.”
“Oh! I was just being dramatic, I guess!” said Lucy. “Dramatic for a bookkeeper, anyway. Future accountant, I should say. I’m supposed to be boring, I think.”
“Yeah, Franck would say that.”
“I like it, though. It’s not just numbers. It’s the who and how and why of everything that goes on in a company. And a company is really just a bunch of people with ambitions and hopes and quirks and changes of heart.”
“I know. My Dad was an accountant.”
“Was? Is he still around?”
“Retired. They’re down in Florida now. But they’re coming up for Thanksgiving. Hey, you should come up! My mom wants to make a big dinner and wants me to invite a ‘girl’ like Julie from the office, the one I told you about. It would be amazing for my Dad to meet one of the so-called cousins from North Carolina. Course maybe he’d have a stroke or something.”
They laughed.
“Maybe I will come,” said Lucy. “That might be really nice. I’d like to meet your mother, too. This is all her fault, you know, that we know each other.”
“Lucy, being with you is too easy to be wrong. We get told so much that we’re supposed to love people but we never get told what love is. This has got to be it. It doesn’t depend on anything you or I do. It’s just there, and it’s not going away. I think it’s never going to let us down. Lucy, this is so different. I’ve never let myself talk like this or talk this much about love. Thanks for letting me babble. Thanks for being here. Thanks for keeping me in your mind. In your heart, really. Sounds like a script for a show, but it’s real. I should be singing a love song right now! I think I love you. I want to stay with you. Can we do that?”
Lucy basked in this monologue and felt no need to say a word. She pulled Bob to her shoulder and hugged him gently and then tightly. Their bodies wriggled so that they lay down onto the couch, matched, part for part, from head to toe. They breathed together. Their intimacy was a universe of its own.