by Nicky Webber
‘See, it’s a sort of flat pocket paper holder thing. Looks pretty old,’ he said, excited by the find. ‘There are some handwritten pages in there, scribbled to Nana by some other guy.’
‘Really? Don’t be ridiculous!’ Maddy said, taking the leather-bound wallet and opening it. Neatly designed with pockets on both sides, it was a practical way of carrying passports or travel documents. It could slip into the inside of a man’s suit jacket and protect official paperwork from too many folds and damage.
She carefully pulled out a delicate sepia onionskin page, with beautiful inked handwriting making it challenging to read. On one side of the wallet was an arrow-shaped leather piece that locked into a small leather tab to secure the two broader leather folds. Maddy gently pulled out the first handwritten page, trimmed along the top with a delicately inked design.
Darling
How I have longed for you through the endless nights since our parting. I miss you terribly, every moment of every day. I am still not sure when I’ll be home but talk around the traps is that if we push the Jerry back behind the lines by October, we’ll get some leave. I am hoping and praying this happens so we can at least be together again.
With love and fondest affection,
Maxxx
‘Well?’ asked Hawke, watching his mother’s expression change to consternation. ‘See what I mean?’
Maddy frowned, ignoring her son, and read the brief note again. ‘I’ve never heard Mom talk about any guy called Max. Sounds like he could be a British soldier.’ She flipped the page over, looking for any dates or return address. There was nothing. She glanced at her son, who raised his shoulders, conveying ignorance of any potential facts.
‘Hard to tell where the hell it comes from,’ he said. ‘I’ve looked through everything in the cardboard box where she kept her private stuff. No matching envelope either.’
Hawke gripped the other item in his obscured hand. He lifted it towards his mother. ‘There was this, too. It appears to be some kind of diary,’ he stated expressionlessly.
He had read some of it upstairs, flicking through the compact pages, absorbing snatches of information. Handwritten fragments of the diary’s pages were very alarming. Hawke knew certain passages would mortify his mother. So he pretended he hadn’t opened it. Maddy grabbed the dark leather-bound diary, tied together with a frayed and twisted pink ribbon, brittle to the touch. She carefully loosened it and randomly opened the ancient pages. She immediately recognized her mother’s careful handwriting, like delicate waves, rhythmically touching each page, perfectly formed to communicate each heartbeat. The ‘f’s’ and ‘t’s’ were distinct and stood out from the other cursive words, like branches of a tree, bending with the ebb and flow of her meaning.
Maddy snapped the book closed. A faint puff of dust merged into the air. ‘I’ll read this later. Clearly, it’s personal,’ she said in a clipped tone.
Without missing a beat, Hawke nodded. ‘Sure, I got that. I didn’t read it if that’s what you’re thinking?’
‘No, I wasn’t. But really, it’s none of our business.’ Hawke silently raised his eyebrows in agreement.
‘Let’s get on with it,’ she said as Hawke turned to walk back upstairs and continue clearing the other rooms and boxing up his grandmother’s past. He realized how this woman, this person who was a girl once, a lover, a friend, full of laughter, energy, and fun had come to this. Here they were, outsiders pawing through her private and most personal stuff and shoving it in a fire or giving it away to charity. In the end, life amounted to nothing, he thought.
It took them another week to clear the house and have Vida’s home ready for sale. Maddy couldn’t face reading her mother’s diary, not until she had time and was in the right frame of mind to cope with whatever was unearthed. It would have to wait.
CHAPTER 16
Wedding Vows
The long list for Suzie and Bruno’s wedding arrangements submerged both families, with only a few days left to complete. As maid of honor, Sacha organized the groomsmen, Hawke being one of three men in body-hugging navy suits to grace the occasion. Suzie’s groom, Bruno, after some roller-coaster career moves, had finally qualified as a rookie in the Fraud Squad with the local New York Police. His criminology degree gave him a kick-start.
Blood, sweat, and torment plagued his existence for the first six months in meeting the exacting standards of military arms handling along with a need to achieve consistent peak fitness. At last, he had found his feet and was proud of himself with a secure career, providing the impetus for his proposal to Suzie Jones. The dedicated, broad-shouldered Bruno knew he would make Detective in double time. At least, that was his plan.
The vaulted ceiling of the traditional stone church seemed to encapsulate the enthusiastic congregation. They crammed the rows of wooden pews decked in small bunches of wildflowers and miniature pink roses. The crowd of well-wishers smiled at the happy couple standing in front of the white linen-covered altar. Although Bruno and Suzie had signed up for a traditional wedding, they had snubbed the custom of popular hymns and organ music. Instead, a multi-music Wi-Fi system played some of their favorite songs through online access to many speakers, positioned explicitly for their special day. The crowd hummed, some sang along, barely considering this innovation to be a clue of what was to come.
The Minister, a short, squat man, almost bald with sparkling, playful blue eyes that danced across the gathering, and back to the beaming couple before him, turned to Bruno, dressed in a dark navy blue suit, crisp white shirt, and delicate pink tie. Two tiny pink rosebuds, barely open to the world, surrounded in Baby’s Breath, a portent of things to come, displayed their delicate minuscule puff of lime-green leaves nurturing the corsage pinned to Bruno’s lapel.
The congregation fell into hushed anticipation as Minister, dressed in full-length white robes with a twisted rope around his inflated waist, cleared his throat. The sound magnified through the microphone, invisibly clipped to the underside of his garments.
‘Repeat after me,’ said the kindly man with a large silver crucifix dangling from a long chain around his thick-set neck.
Suzie gripped her small bouquet of tiny roses, wild pink flowers trembling alongside Baby’s Breath, to steady her rising nervousness. This was really happening, she thought with sudden surprise and disbelief.
Father O’Connor turned his cool, judicious head to Bruno and smiled warmly, repeating the words. He solemnly nodded, taking every word with the seriousness it commanded.
‘I give you all that I have,’ stated the Priest, glancing down at the Bible he held in both hands. The rich sound of his Irish accent reached out to the hushed gathering as he paused for effect. ‘I give you my body, my worldly goods, and my love.’
Bruno repeated the words in a firm voice, which reverberated like music, filling the Church to the brim.
‘All these things I pledge thee in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ,’ continued Father O’Connor. ‘With my body, I thee worship and with all my heart and earthly goods what is mine, is yours.’
Bruno smiled into the beautiful face of his blonde bride and repeated the exact words without hesitation. The congregation seemed to give a collective sigh, as the Minister glanced towards the new bride.
He turned, smiling at Suzie resplendent in her long white tulle dress, her satin toed shoes just peeping out from beneath the floor-length hem. Father O’Connor flashed a smile at the young bride, wearing a garland of miniature pink roses and wildflowers woven into her softly curled hair.
‘Repeat after me,’ the Priest said.
‘I will take all that you have, your body, your worldly goods, and your love.’ Suzie giggled as the congregation gasped uneasily. She carefully repeated the words of the solemn vow they had both practiced in the weeks leading to this event.
‘All these things I pledge thee in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ,’ stated the Priest, who leaned forward and whispered the rest of the vow into Suzie’s ear.
/> An expression of sober determination occupied her face as she glanced up at Bruno’s serious appearance. ‘With your body, you’ll worship mine, and with your heart, you’ll always give your devotion to me. You will provide me with all your earthly goods. What is yours, will always be mine?’ She paused.
There was an audible silence as friends and family tried to process the words they had so clearly heard in the wedding vows.
The newlyweds suddenly burst into gales of laughter, trying to suppress their laughter for the sake of the ceremony. There was an uproar of shrieks from the attending guests, so loud that no one heard the Priest boldly say, ‘I now pronounce you man and wife! Bruno, you may kiss your lovely bride.’
It was 2 am when a slightly disheveled Sacha and Hawke arrived back at their apartment, drunk with celebration and copious glasses of champagne. They were both carrying their shoes as he unlocked the front door and pulled Sacha inside the untidy apartment. Bruno and Suzie were on honeymoon, so they had the luxury of complete privacy.
Hawke pushed the door closed after them, bolted it shut, and leaned in, pressing his lips against Sacha’s neck. He gently kissed her warm porcelain neck, moving upward towards her left ear.
‘I think we should get married,’ Hawke said, sounding almost sober.
‘Really?’ Sacha asked, not convinced.
‘Yeah, for sure. Why not?’
Sacha smiled at him and kissed him on the lips. ‘You know I would take you seriously if you hadn’t consumed three bottles of champagne.’ Sacha smiled. ‘So let’s just wait until tomorrow and see if you feel the same in the cold light of day.’
Sacha turned to face him, and they both smiled at one another. Pressing his body against her beautiful, lithe form, Hawke ran his open palms over her hips, smooth in the midnight blue bridesmaid’s dress. He had watched her all night as she moved amongst the wedding guests, her glittering laughter, her graceful movements as she worked her way around the room. He wanted her; the desire for her was unbridled and transfixed with its overwhelming focus. She had looked up at him several times during the evening and winked at him, drawing him into their own private love. She gave him that secret signal around 1 am. Her delicate finger pressed along the length of her nose, across her cheek, moving down over her collarbone. The wayward finger slowly dragged across her chest and into the cleavage peeping from the scalloped neck of her dress. She didn’t take her eyes off him. There was no mistaking her tormenting signal. It couldn’t have been more transparent, a lightning rod indicator to take her home NOW. So he did.
Once inside the apartment, he pressed her closer, trying to merge his body into hers. She could feel his excitement swelling against her thigh. He nuzzled her neck, pressing her against the living room wall, holding her tight, and exhaled warm air against her delicate ear. ‘I love you, Sacha,’ he breathed, his voice heavy with lust, ‘and I always will.’
They kissed with deep longing, and Hawke knew she belonged to only him. Sacha’s closeness and comfort charged his senses. He pulled away and looked deep into her azure eyes. She surrendered herself to him, and they both succumbed to infinite desire.
He grabbed her hand and pulled her to the bedroom. The bed was still unmade from the mad rush of the morning, busy with dressing for the wedding. He flung the duvet to the side and held her, gently moving her backward onto the white linen bedsheet. They both removed one another’s clothes. It was a haphazard affair, fraught with frantic fumbling as their haste and desire competed for attention. Within minutes they both lay naked, pressed against one another. He could feel her racing heart and immediately struggled to control a profound need to be inside her.
She understood and pressed her hands onto his shoulders, forcing him to roll over. The soft, fresh cotton of the bedsheets drove Hawke to the edge. He flipped her, wanting to roll her onto her back again. But she took charge, pushing him onto his back and quickly straddled him, her thighs pressed against his. He instinctively held her breasts, silky smooth fruit of his desire.
Hawke wasn’t sure how long he could resist the rising, almost uncontrollable desire for her. Clenching his teeth, he held his breath as Sacha straddled his body, slowly lowering herself onto him. He was counting backward and adding the previous number to the next to distract his mind. Hawke remembers to put out the trash before 11 am, ready for the Monday collection. Images of the recycling bin stacked with glass bottles and cans flittered into his mind. How much would the bin weigh? Sacha began moving slowly. He gasped and moaned, reaching his hands to her hips to make her stop. He closed his eyes and blew out his breath, counting down again to hold her still to reduce the throbbing risk of exploding.
Two minutes later, he was back in control, or so he thought. Rampant, crushing desire overwhelmed him as Sacha moved again, almost imperceptibly. It was as if a starter’s gun had triggered. He arched his head back, releasing a loud groan of pleasure and relief. A calm engulfed them both as she fell forward onto him, her exquisite breasts pressed against his chest as she shuddered with pleasure.
CHAPTER 17
Erik’s Dilemma
On the drive over to visit Fred’s father, Erik Davis, Maddy sifted through her mind, reassessing the various conversations and draft budgets they had both discussed over recent months. Every few weeks, there seemed to be another significant expense adding to their financial worries. With the last payment on Maddy’s mother’s funeral completed, Fred had finally paid off Hawke’s medical expense, after eighteen months.
But now some hard decisions had to be agreed over Erik Davis’ long term care. There were obvious signs that at 88, he was way too old to be living alone, but the cost of placing him in care would just add more debt to their collective overdraft. Earlier they had extended their mortgage to cover some of Hawke’s medical costs, and Logan had helped pay for $26,000 worth of additional chemo drugs to ensure Hawke had a better chance of a full recovery. Maddy didn’t expect to have to pay him back, although Fred had insisted, he would. They loaned Hawke money for the additional post-graduate financial certification he needed for his new job. Shortly after that, Fred lost his job and was out of work for nearly eight months. They had converted all the accumulated debt into a second mortgage against their shared home. There was no real wriggle room left to allow the borrowing of more money.
‘Hey, Maddy, did you hear what I said?’ Fred was turning off the highway and onto his father’s street.
‘Oh sorry, just going over last night’s discussion about our ever-increasing debt drama,’ she said, pulling a face and sighing.
‘I know.’ he glanced at her before indicating and turning into his father’s driveway. ‘It gets me down too.’
‘Somehow it always works out.’ Maddy attempted a positive spin on an otherwise dark cauldron of increasing stress for them all. Fred had recently struggled with depression and was now on medication to help. So, the last thing she wanted was to add more worry to the accumulated burden that occupied most of Fred’s waking hours. She smiled at him. ‘It’ll be okay. When you think of the amounts we’ve paid off, it’s been phenomenal. So, we just need to keep calm and carry on doing what we’re doing.’
‘Yeah, I guess,’ Fred said, flat-faced and non-committal. He knew his father’s living costs could be a real burden, just as they were trying to emerge from recent years of high financial costs.
Fred pulled up next to his father’s Halifax home. The place was the oldest, smallest, and worst maintained in the vicinity. Its neglected single level tile and plaster exterior with gutters adrift in two prominent places had rusting downpipes beside paint-flaked soffits. The entire run-down appearance of the property blended with the rough-looking window frames. Hawke and his older brother Blake had spent a couple of weeks in the summer repainting the plasterwork, but there was no time or money to give a lick of paint to the flaking doors and window frames.
In the back of Fred’s mind was the hope of selling the small three-bedroom house and generating some money to transfer his
father into low-cost retirement facility. Neither Maddy nor Fred had broached this concept as part of a real future plan for the old man.
Erik was reed-thin and leaned slightly to the left as if the gentlest breeze would topple him over. He was spotlessly clean and well-groomed, doused in Old Spice with his thinning hair saturated in Brylcreem. His iron-gray hair slicked back from his close-shaven face complemented his neatly trimmed eyebrows arching over his sharp, analytical eyes. He wore colorful striped home-knitted sleeveless sweater-vests all year round. He had four of them in varying, unfashionably garish gradients of clashing color which he wore over his white-collared shirts. Short sleeves in summer and long-sleeved business shirts in winter. Often his well-worn cotton shirts suffered from frayed collars and cuffs, especially the yellowing over-worn shirts he loved the most. Every Saturday, he hand-washed them, along with his underwear, in the bathroom sink. He explained to anyone interested in listening to the elderly man that he was still living independently, cooked and cleaned for himself. He would proudly proclaim that he did the laundry too, by hand, to save electricity.
He couldn’t afford a dry cleaner but carefully draped his gray suit over two hangars on the backyard clothes-line and let them air outside once a fortnight until dusk. About once or twice a year he would drag out the ironing board and use an old pillowcase to press his suit with a heavy old steam iron. Not much steam came out of it these days, and it sometimes leaked scalding water onto his trousers and the hard linoleum floor. He was grateful that the seams of his pants weren’t shiny, and his suit still looked first class. Fastidious and meticulous in every way, he was a compliant man of very few words. Erik did not want to rock the boat, especially as he knew that these were his last days.
