Almost Paradise

by Olivia Cunning

  with a coating of ice.

  “I dan ear duh faws,” Eric said.

  “What?”

  He braved a few seconds of frigid temperatures to tug his scarf down. “I can hear the falls.”

  She stopped and tugged her earmuff from her head to listen. Frozen branches creaked overhead, Eric’s boots scraped along the sidewalk several steps, and a truck beeped rhythmically as it backed up somewhere in the distance, but over it all she heard the thunderous roar of thousands of gallons of water tumbling over the falls. The sound felt out of place among the slumber of the ice-coated trees and the peacefully floating snowflakes, but as they walked past the bluff and she could see the river gushing over the edge and crashing against the rocks below, her breath caught. Along the edges where the water flowed less chaotically, long icicles had formed to frame the waterfall with cascades of water frozen in time.

  “It’s beautiful,” she whispered, her words lost in the thunder of the falls.

  “Wreftakeh,” Eric said.

  She glanced up into a familiar pair of eyes. The rest of him was unrecognizable. “What?”

  He jerked his scarf down around his neck and left it there. “Breathtaking,” he repeated.

  She cuddled against him, her cheeks freezing, her eyes stinging from the cold, her breath hot and moist in her scarf. But on the inside she was warm just because Eric was near.

  “I’m glad we came in winter,” he said close to her covered ear.

  “Even at risk of freezing your ass off?”

  “Yep. It’s enchanting.”

  She had to agree. She was sure the falls were beautiful year round, but she couldn’t imagine anything more beautiful than the ice formations along the edges. At least she thought that until Canada turned on the colored lights across the way and the water and ice and freezing mist took on a hued glow.

  “Wow.”

  Eventually they returned to their room. Except for parts of his face, Eric was toasty warm. Rebekah, on the other hand, was completely frozen.

  “That’s the last time you make fun of my snow pants and parka,” Eric said as Rebekah shed her clothes and climbed between the covers, her teeth chattering.

  “Come warm me up,” she said, stretching out beckoning arms in his direction.

  “No way in hell, woman.” He dropped his coat on top of her.

  It was still warm from his body heat, and she burrowed into it gratefully.

  “Order some soup,” she said. “And hot chocolate and coffee and tea and anything else that’s warm.”

  “So bossy,” he said as he picked up the phone.

  “Please,” she added, curling into a small ball as she tried to fit her entire body into his coat. Tahiti was sounding pretty nice at the moment. If they got an early start, they’d reach Bangor late the next day and then they could head off to those warm sand beaches Eric had wanted from the start.

  The storm blew over during the night, dumping several inches of snow first. The locals assured them that they’d gotten off easy. This time of year, lake-effect conditions could drop several feet of snow from one storm. Rebekah couldn’t even wrap her head around that amount of snow on the ground. The minivan protested mightily when Eric started her, but he let her run while he used his new ice scraper to clear the windshield. The Volkswagen was used to mild Californian temperatures as well. It obviously didn’t appreciate being forced to run on a cold December morning. Rebekah wasn’t running so well herself. The only thing that had managed to warm her the night before was Eric’s hot, lean body, but she doubted he’d be willing to strip off his clothes to make love to her in the back of the van just then.

  The city streets were treacherous, but the highways were clear. She marveled at how quickly the roadways had been made passable. There were a few slick spots, and Eric took it slower than he normally would—he was a bit of a lead foot—but Rebekah’s anxiety was soon replaced with wonder as she watched the stark white scenery slip by her window.

  “Have you decided if you’re going to meet your grandparents yet?” she asked as nonchalantly as possible. She was curious how he truly felt about this idea of hers. The closer they got to their destination, the more she worried that coercing Eric to meet these people was a terrible mistake. But these people were his grandparents. Grandparents were always wonderful, loving individuals. What could possibly go wrong?

  “I’ll decide when we get there,” he said, never taking his eyes off the road.

  Her heart ached for him. She could only imagine the thoughts tumbling through his mind. How hurt would he be if they didn’t accept him? And if they did, would it make him truly happy? That was all she wanted for him, his happiness. But now she wasn’t so sure she’d forced him down the right path.

  Please, God, let them love him as much as I do, she prayed silently.

  Chapter Nine

  When Eric’s stomach rumbled its desire for lunch, he realized Rebekah’s plan to get to Bangor that night just wasn’t going to happen. They’d just entered Vermont and it was already after noon. Eric knew she wanted him to have enough time for a long, happy visit the next day before they caught their plane to Tahiti, but winter driving was stressful for seasoned Northerners. Eric was so tense by noon that he felt like he might snap in half. He tried to convince himself that his granny-on-Sunday driving was due to the road conditions, not the idea that when they reached Bangor, he’d be forced into a very uncomfortable situation. He knew well what kind of person his mother had been. She wasn’t the first woman to choose drugs over providing a loving, stable home for her child. More than likely, she’d come from a similar home and didn’t know how to break the cycle of drug abuse and child neglect.

  He was probably lucky he’d never met his so-called grandparents.

  Yeah. Lucky.

  Eric rubbed at the tension in his face with one hand, and tilted his head side to side to relieve the drum-head tight muscles in his neck.

  “Why don’t we stop somewhere for the night?” Rebekah asked.

  Eric took his eyes off the road just long enough to gape at her. “This early?” He knew how much she liked that schedule she’d pretended to abandon days ago.

  “We can make a snowman.” She smiled. The concern in her pretty blue eyes ate at his gut. He needed to do a better job at pretending he wasn’t freaking out about what lay ahead in Bangor.

  “I can go a bit farther,” Eric said.

  Rebekah perked up and offered him a cheery smile. “Does that mean you’re excited to meet your grandparents?”

  He’d promised not to lie to her. “Not in the least.”

  Rebekah’s shoulders slumped and she turned her attention back to the snowy landscape outside her steamed-over window.

  Maybe it was a good time to stop. He began to scan the sides of the road for accommodations.

  “That looks quaint,” Eric said as they zoomed past an ancient roadside motel. If quaint actually meant cheap and sleazy. “Let’s check it out.”

  Rebekah opened her mouth and he thought she would protest his idea, but after she scanned his face, she nodded. “I’m in.”

  Damn, he must look as shitty as he felt. A nap would do him good. He found a place to turn around and headed back to the inn.

  Their room was clean, but dismal. Eric groaned at the uninviting bed. “I was considering a nap, but…” He wrapped his arms around Rebekah’s shoulders and gave her a reassuring squeeze. “I think we’ve finally found it.”

  “What?”

  “The opposite of paradise.” He’d meant it as a joke, but she stiffened.

  “We’ll be in your beloved Tahiti in less than two days,” she said. “I think you’ll survive.” She shrugged out of his grasp and yanked the worn, floral-patterned bedspread from the nearest full-sized bed before wadding it into a ball and tossing it on the floor. “There. Is that a little closer to paradise for you?”

  Ignoring her testiness, he flopped face first onto the mattress, which squeaked like a colony of mice lived insid
e—because they probably did. “Maybe I’ll dream of paradise,” he said, before dropping off to sleep.

  Less than an hour later, his eyes popped open and he announced, “I need food, fun and fucked, in that order.”

  Rebekah, who was standing near the window, turned up her nose. “We’re going to have to do it standing up, because I’m not touching any surfaces in this place.”

  “Shower sex then,” he said, springing from the bed and dropping a kiss on her neck.

  “Only if I can wear my flip flops.”

  He chuckled, imagining how adorable she’d look with her legs wrapped around his hips, flip-flops dangling from her toes. “Let’s go eat before we attempt fucking in flip-flops. I’m starving.”

  The food at the nearby restaurant was surprisingly delicious and roach-free. Rebekah seemed much less cranky after she’d eaten, which was good, because he always wanted a smile on her face. On their walk back to the motel, Eric found the fun he’d demanded. “Let’s build a snowman.”

  “A snowman? I thought you hated the cold.”

  “Explicitly,” he said, and dashed to the VW for his snow pants, parka and other arctic gear. “And you were the one who suggested it, remember?”

  Neither of them had ever constructed a snowman, but Eric was sure he knew the proper technique. He made the bottom layer by rolling a snowball around the edge of the parking lot. By the time he was satisfied with its size, the frigid ball of dirty, dead-grass flecked snow was waist high.

  “I think you overdid it,” Rebekah said, the snowball she’d made for the head far smaller in comparison.

  “Nonsense.” The middle snowball was too large for him to push into place by himself, so Rebekah helped him roll it up the side of the massive bottom.

  Eric had to stand on tiptoes to put the tiny head on top.

  “I don’t think they’re supposed to be this enormous,” Rebekah said, eyeing the tottering structure that towered over her.

  Eric packed some extra snow around the snowman’s waist to keep it from collapsing and crushing his wife. “He’s awesome. He just needs a face.”

  They scrounged through the Volkswagen for parts, coming up with a few stale cheese curls, a half-eaten Slim Jim, an empty Mountain Dew bottle and a pair of drumsticks.

  “I didn’t know you brought drumsticks,” she said as they returned to their giant snowman.

  “I never know when an impromptu drum solo might be required.”

  Eric lifted Rebekah onto his shoulders and handed her the cheese curls to serve as eyes and the slender bit of greasy sausage for the mouth. He stuck the drumsticks in either side for the arms.

  “Give me the nose,” Rebekah said, leaning over his head to peer at him upside down.

  “We don’t have a nose,” he said, ramming the green plastic bottle into the snowman at crotch level. “It’s a boy!”

  “Eric! That’s totally inappropriate,” she admonished, but she was laughing so hard, she was at risk from toppling from his shoulders. “And some little kid might see it.”

  Eric pulled the bottle out of the snow, leaving an open hole behind. “It’s a girl!” He handed the bottle up to Rebekah and, as the bottle was too large for the smallish head, she just used the cap to make the nose. She also pulled off Eric’s hat and slipped it on the snowman’s head.

  “Well, now I’m cold,” Eric said as the chill seeped through his sweat-dampened hair. “Let’s go in.”

  She didn’t have a choice but to go where he wanted, as he held her trapped on his shoulders, her calves pressed securely into his chest. He nearly knocked her out on the door frame when he entered their rented room. The bed looked more inviting now. Maybe because his companion was laughing now. And he knew that after fun came fucking.

  He tumbled her off his shoulders onto the bed, cursing winter tenfold as he struggled to remove layer upon layer of outerwear. He was really looking forward to Tahiti—if for no other reason than having far fewer clothes to remove when the mood struck him.

  Chapter Ten

  When they crossed the border from New Hampshire into Maine the next day, Rebekah turned her head to read the big blue sign: Welcome to Maine: The Way Life Should Be. She hoped that sign proved true, but she feared Eric’s life shouldn’t be this way at all. The closer they got to Bangor, the further Eric retreated into himself. Maybe they should head directly for the airport and skip meeting his grandparents. If he suggested the idea, Rebekah would support his decision, but he never brought it up. Perhaps she was reading his silence wrong. Maybe he was excited. She’d never known the man to be withdrawn when he was excited before, but she was always discovering new things about him.

  They rolled into town mid-afternoon. Bangor had seen snowfall too, evidenced by banks of dirty snow on the edges of the road. The trees were bare and patches of yellowed grass peeked through the thin blanket of white. As they journeyed to the suburbs, Rebekah smiled at the whimsical, lopsided snowman in one yard. The one she and Eric had finished at their hotel the night before had been far superior—or at least larger.

  She craned her neck to gawk at a spectacular nativity scene. Rebekah noted that with a wintery backdrop, Christmas decorations didn’t seem out of place the way they did next to palm trees in California. Except those nativity scene camels. Camels looked much better in sand than in snow. She reached over to their Christmas tree now decorating the gap between the front seats and touched the glass ornament Eric had selected. He’d found his heart this year, he’d said. And now he would find his family. What could be better than that?

  The navigation program on her phone instructed them to turn into a cul-de-sac. “Your destination is on the right,” the feminine voice said as the van rolled to a stop.

  “There it is!” Rebekah pointed to a giant contemporary-styled house that looked very similar to every other giant, contemporary-styled house in the subdivision.

  “It doesn’t look like the kind of house grandparents should live in,” Eric said, craning his neck to take in the entire structure.

  “What kind of house should grandparents live in?”

  He focused his gaze on her face. “One like mine.”

  Her heart produced a hard thud. She had always suspected that he’d bought his whimsical Victorian-style yellow house to compensate for his missing family. His admission pretty much proved her theory.

  “So what do you want to do?”

  He shut off the van and engaged the parking brake. “I’m not sure. Can I just sit here and think about it for a minute? I don’t know what to say to them.”

  “Just introduce yourself.”

  He scratched his neck. “I was just in the neighborhood after driving three thousand miles and thought I’d stop by to say hey, you have a twenty-eight year old grandson you’ve never acknowledged.”

  “Maybe something a little less accusatory,” she suggested. “They obviously have no clue you exist, or surely they would have taken you in. Based on the size of this house, they could easily afford to.”

  “They could have recently hit the lottery or something. My mother was a crack whore. Rich people don’t raise crack whores.”

  “I wish you wouldn’t refer to her like that,” Rebekah said. She knew his mother had abandoned him, knew that his childhood had been horrible and lonely, knew that he had no reason to think of the woman kindly, but she was his mother. Shouldn’t that require at least a little respect?

  Eric snorted. “I’m not referring to her as anything she wasn’t. According to my medical records, I was born addicted to crack. According to police records, the woman was arrested for prostitution. So I think I’m entitled to call her whatever I want to call her, especially if it’s the truth.”

  It was so hard for Rebekah to relate to that part of his past. She’d been very sheltered growing up. She’d never even seen a crack whore, much less could she claim one as her mother.

  “Perhaps we can refer to her as a lady of the evening instead,” Rebekah suggested.

  “Cra
ck lady of the evening doesn’t have the same ring to it.”

  “Maybe we just call her your mother and leave out any description.”

  There was a loud rap on Rebekah’s window. She jumped at the sound, not having heard the approach of the woman standing next to the bus.

  “You can’t park here,” the woman yelled through the glass.

  Rebekah rolled down the window and found herself looking into eyes so like Eric’s that she couldn’t draw air.