Cruel Legacy

by K. A. Linde

  “Well, now that you’re up, you want to help me?”

  I laughed at her ludicrousness and decided, What the hell? “Fine. What do you need help with?”

  “Excellent, honey. So glad to have you home. Meet me in the attic.”

  After a quick shower, I yawned dramatically and climbed the stairs to the attic, which was a complete clusterfuck.

  My mother brightened at my appearance—the tie-dyed shirt and bell-bottoms. “Oh, Natalie, you’re so yellow again.” She mimed my aura. “There’s my bohemian girl.”

  I grinned at her and crossed my arms at all the clutter. “So…what are you doing up here, and why aren’t you at the shop?”

  “I hired someone to help with it!” my mother announced. “He’s taking over today because there’s too much to do here.”

  “You called in sick because I’m home, huh?”

  My mom hip-checked me with a wink. “Saw you coming a week ago.”

  I shook my head at her. Sometimes, I never could tell what she was going to say.

  “Now, it looks like we need to keep you nice and busy. You talk while we sort through all these boxes and determine what we keep and love and what is going to go to a new home.” New Age talk for the garbage. “So…Penn?”

  That was how I spent the next three days, helping my mom go through what felt like endless boxes of junk in the attic. I was beginning to think that she was a real hoarder. I was throwing out way more than her because some of it I’d never seen in my life. Other times, it was like reliving all of our military travels one box after the other. One labeled San Antonio, two labeled Germany, one for Indiana. The home movies that we couldn’t watch were added to a pile to figure out how to put on the computer. Baby clothes were stashed away for my and Mel’s future children. The best childhood drawings were kept. The rest tossed. My old writing was a definite keep.

  And the whole time, I talked. My mom listened. We didn’t solve anything. But the work was cathartic, and so was the time with my mom.

  On the third day, when we’d finally reached a midway point that meant we could get to the farther back boxes, I stumbled on one labeled Natalie College. I ripped into it.

  I wasn’t surprised to find swimming trophies and medals, old school notebooks, and notes that Amy and I had passed back and forth. I laughed at a stack of pictures that we’d taken with a disposable camera that included mostly the sides of our faces, blurry images, and general nonsense. I put that box aside and rifled through the one underneath it.

  My hand stilled on a picture of Amy and me in Paris together the summer after high school graduation. It had been taken only days before I met Penn, tipping my world off its axis forever.

  I carefully placed that in the Keep pile, and when I glanced back inside, my gaze snagged on a bit of shiny metal half-hidden underneath a baseball cap. I moved the hat aside. My breath caught, and I gingerly reached inside and pulled out the love lock.

  Tears welled in my eyes as I held the precious thing in my hand. A little lock with the letters P & N on it. Penn had given it to me that night in Paris. A tribute to my romantic sentiments, as I’d been so sad to hear that the city had removed all the locks from the bridges. He’d wanted us to have our own.

  I’d come home and promptly thrown it into my stuff. Too angry with him to keep it, too in love with him to get rid of it. Oh, young love.

  This was a relic. A remnant of the girl I’d been when I first met him. Young, innocent, eager and desperate for someone to really see me. Penn had been it. He still was it. He’d always been it. The guy I measured everyone against. The one perfect night, ruined by the worst possible morning.

  But that was all gone. Replaced by the last year and a half of time together. Every smile and kiss and laugh. Every writing session and Totle snuggle. Every time he’d just looked into my eyes and known. Like I had known. All along. Even if we’d both made mistakes along the way. And tried to wreck it all.

  And now, he was there again. In Paris, without me.

  I clutched the lock in my hand and decided then, No. No, this wasn’t going to happen. I wasn’t going to stay here another minute and wait for him to make a decision. Agonize over whether he was going to come back from his conference or at the end of the summer. Wonder if he could forgive what I’d done.

  My eyes slid to my mother, and she just smiled. “Did you figure it out?”

  “I’m such an idiot.”

  “You’re young. You’ll grow out of trying to be anything else.”

  I kissed her cheek. “Thank you, Mom.”

  “I love you. Now, go get him.”

  I raced down the stairs and into my room. I found the open suitcase I’d brought from New York with me. The mound of designer clothing that Penn had insisted would help me fit in. He’d been right.

  I dumped it all out on the floor.

  Then I found the few outfits that I’d left here in Charleston before moving to the city. The bohemian clothing that had always been my staple. Whether or not I fit in had never mattered to me.

  I liked flowy shirts, flare jeans, and moccasins. I wanted embroidery and tie-dye and excessive patterns in my life. I wanted it all.

  I hastily threw it all into the suitcase. I snatched my untouched computer bag off of the table, bought the first plane ticket to Paris, and vowed to make this right.

  Chapter 39

  Penn

  “Penn, your work on the Aristotelian ramifications in sexual partnerships is so fascinating,” Dr. Angelica Duval said as we stepped out of the final panel for the afternoon and back toward the lobby.

  “Thank you. I enjoyed your latest article as well. I was glad to see The Journal of Philosophy taking such a progressive stance,” I told her.

  She smiled up at me. The same smile she’d been wearing the whole conference. The one that said she was the prettiest woman in the discipline and she was used to being flirted with. That we had similar interests and right now would be a good time to ask her out.

  But I didn’t. I kept walking. Into the noisy bar full of relatively nerdy philosophy professors, drinking too much and discussing theory at volumes unnecessary for the space. That was just how these things went.

  A pair of colleagues came to say hello to us and invited us to dinner the next day. We both agreed easily, and they shot me a knowing look before they left. Perhaps everyone here thought that Angelica and I would be involved by the end of this thing. Or that we already were. It couldn’t be that I thought she was an excellent scholar and enjoyed her work.

  Then again, I was the person who wrote about sex professionally. What did I expect them to think?

  I rubbed my temple and thought about the scotch waiting for me in my room.

  “Are you okay?” Angelica asked, touching my sleeve.

  I hastily removed my arm. “Fine.”

  “You know…I’ve never done this before.” She took a step closer to me. “Do you want to get out of here? Go get a drink?”

  I stared down at her small pink lips, the chocolate-brown eyes, and rosy cheeks. The look of desire painted on her face more than the makeup. It’d be so easy. If the entire idea didn’t make me nauseated.

  “Actually, I’m seeing someone,” I said, putting more distance between us.

  Space from Natalie didn’t mean this space. Time to figure out what was going on with Natalie didn’t mean acting like an idiot. I didn’t want a damn thing from this woman in front of me, except her company on philosophy panels. What she was asking for, she would never get.

  “Oh,” she chirped, straightening. “I didn’t know. With your research, I thought—I mean, just…forget I said anything.”

  Color rose in her cheeks, and then she awkwardly stepped back and disappeared into the crowd. Well, I couldn’t have handled that worse. That scotch was sounding more and more pleasant.

  I headed to the front desk first to pick up a package that had been delivered for me. I’d received a text earlier that day, but I hadn’t had time to leave th
e conference center to collect it.

  The man behind the VIP counter lifted his head at my approach. “Ah, Dr. Kensington,” he said, holding up his hand. “Let me get your package.” He retrieved a padded envelope. “Here we are.”

  I took it out of his hand and looked at the innocuous envelope. “Do you know who sent it?”

  “I wasn’t here when it was delivered, but I was told that a woman dropped it off earlier this morning.”

  “Huh,” I said with a shrug. “And no clue as to the contents?”

  “Are you concerned? Should I have it tested?” the man asked in alarm. As if anthrax were inside it.

  “No, no, it’s fine. I was just curious. I wasn’t expecting anything.”

  “Well, let me know if you need anything else.”

  “Thank you,” I said before carrying the package upstairs to my suite.

  I dropped it off on a counter and was surprised to hear the clunk it’d made when it hit the wood. Well, now, I was even more curious.

  But first, scotch.

  It had been a long day. One panel discussion of a chapter of my book. One panel where I was the discussant for three rather dry papers and thankfully Angelica’s. And three other panels that I’d been cajoled into attending. It had been four too many for one day.

  A headache was forming at my temples. I knew it had more to do with trying to escape the fact that I’d left Natalie behind in New York than the panels. I’d been tempted to text her every day since I arrived, but what would I say? Sorry for abandoning you in the city without a word?

  And then the longer I put it off, the harder it seemed to be to find the words. Maybe the words weren’t right in a text anyway. It was a conversation we needed to have in person. If I hadn’t had this conference, I would have already booked a flight home. Jet lag be damned.

  I took a long sip of the scotch and sighed with relief. I’d been wanting that all day. It had been a long while since I’d been this desperate to day drink. It was amazing how watching your life fall into shambles could do that to a person.

  I sank into the leather chair and stared out the open window overlooking the Seine and Notre Dame on the island beyond. What was left of it. I felt for the cathedral. Like my insides had also been burned through and I needed to once again be rebuilt to my former glory.

  My fingers reflexively reached for the envelope. I set down the scotch and tore open the top flap. When I turned it upside down, a metal lock fell into my hand, and a small note fluttered into my lap.

  I flipped the gold lock over and looked at it in shock. A small smile playing on my lips. It was the love lock that I’d given Natalie all those years ago. The P & N I’d scrawled elegantly in Sharpie on the front.

  I’d been such a con artist at the time. Doing anything to earn her trust and devotion. I enjoyed it as much for the manipulation as her pure joy in it. She didn’t know what I was doing, and looking back, maybe I didn’t either. I saw something different in her then. I didn’t need the full night to walk the city with her to get in her pants. But I had done it anyway because I couldn’t get enough of her. Here was the evidence of the young love that had struck me before I even knew its real purpose.

  My fingers curled around the metal, holding it tight in my palm. If this was here, that meant…Natalie was here.

  My heart thumped in my chest as I retrieved the forgotten note.

  It all started on a park bench in Paris.

  Meet me?

  —Nat

  She’d flown all the way to Paris? And just left a note and the lock?

  I downed the rest of my scotch and grabbed my jacket before I gave it more thought. If she was here, then I wasn’t going to make her wait. She’d likely already been there for hours, considering the package had been delivered earlier that morning.

  As I strode out of the lobby and into the bright light of day, I had no idea what I was going to say. What she’d done…was every bit as awful as I’d blamed her for. I’d been just as bad. And I’d helped her get there.

  But that didn’t mean I was ready to forgive her or move on from it. I needed to see her though. Needed to know what she was thinking by flying out here. Did she think that she could change my mind about it all if she spent the money and surprised me? I’d told her we could talk after Paris. I didn’t yet know if her arriving here early was a good or a bad thing.

  I’d have to decide that when I saw her. Decide what to do about it all.

  I hopped into the first available cab and gave them directions to the Tuileries Garden in front of the Louvre. This had all started after we ran out of the Palais Garnier and down near the waterfront. I was amazed she still remembered which one it was. But perhaps that night was branded on her memory as much as it was mine.

  After paying the taxi, I walked through the garden, which was still alive with tourists exploring the grounds. When we’d come here, it had been one or two in the morning, and we’d had the place to ourselves. I navigated around the crowds and came up the back way to our park bench. I didn’t want her to see me first.

  Then she came into view. All orange-patterned wide-leg pants tucked up underneath her as she sat cross-legged on the park bench. Her shirt was a flowy white gauzy material that I’d seen her wear dozens of times when we lived together in the Hamptons. Her silvery-white hair was piled high on the top of her head. An oversize bun flopping off to the right without a care in the world. In her lap was her computer as she typed furiously into an open document.

  It was like stepping back in time. And seeing the bohemian vision who had put a spell on me straight out of the Atlantic. The goddess who knew herself and didn’t care an ounce what anyone else thought of who she was.

  I’d stalled when I saw her.

  But then I took her in…really took her in.

  I smiled.

  And moved toward the Natalie I’d first fallen in love with.

  Chapter 40

  Natalie

  Maybe he wasn’t coming.

  I hadn’t really considered that when I put this plan in place. He could be furious with me and wouldn’t appreciate that I’d flown all the way here and wrecked his plans. I chewed on the end of my pen and stared down at my open document. This was stressing me the fuck out. I’d been so confident when I got on that plane.

  I tossed the pen onto my open notebook next to me and went back to typing on my computer, working on the new book. I couldn’t do anything about whether or not Penn would show. I couldn’t make him spring up out of nothing. The only thing I could control was this right here. And I was going to keep writing until he showed. Or didn’t.

  “That is quite an outfit,” a voice said behind me.

  I jumped out of my seat, barely catching my computer before it crashed into the grass. “Penn.”

  He didn’t give me any of his telltale signs that he was amused. Or even…that he was glad to see me. I’d probably fucked up. Oh well, too late now. I was too relieved to see him to do anything but smile at his beautiful face.

  “Natalie,” he said calmly, slipping his hands into his pockets. “What are you doing here?”

  “I was wrong,” I gasped out. I set the computer down on the bench and faced him. “I was so very wrong about everything. And you were right all along. I just didn’t realize it all until Enzo.”

  He looked at me quizzically. “Enzo?”

  I shook my head. This wasn’t coming out right. I’d made all of these plans on the flight over, and now, my sleepy brain was trying to ruin this. “I flew home to Charleston after you left. I went to see Amy, and Enzo had moved in. That’s why she’d renovated the guest bedroom. They were living together, and I didn’t even know. I’m her best friend, and she hadn’t even told me that they were living together or anything. She said I was busy. I wasn’t busy. I was too fucking self-centered to see what I was doing to my life. To look past my need for revenge to what was really happening all around me. The damage I was causing to even my oldest friendship.

  “So,
I took a step back and saw how out of touch I’d been really. Then, well, Amy, Mel, and I had another cleansing to close the circle. I don’t even know if that makes sense to you.” I warily peeked up at him.

  “You burned more things and went skinny-dipping?”

  “Technically, yes,” I said with a grin. “We burned my book. Tore out all the pages and gave them up in offering as a ritual burning to cleanse what had happened between my first ritual burning and the last. Then I let the water wash it all away. It was about me. About me coming back to myself.” I gestured to my bohemian clothing. “You know, the real me.”

  “I see. You think a ritual burning and new clothes change who you’ve become.”

  “No. It’s not that at all. It’s that the person I was when I did those things, the black hole that I had fallen into, it’s gone. The things I did to Katherine and Lewis and the mountains I climbed to take them down…I don’t want to be that person anymore. I don’t want to be a person you turn away from. A person who you think could have my closest friend in New York arrested. What happened to Jane was horrible, but I didn’t do it.”

  “I know,” he said.

  “You do?”

  He nodded. “When I went to see Court, she told me that you didn’t know. That she hopes that you can forgive her. That she never wanted to hurt you.”

  “Good,” I whispered. My stomach twisted at the words.

  I had been worried about Jane. I couldn’t believe what she had done to get to the place that she was at. Especially because I’d had such kinship with her. I could have been her under different circumstances. So desperate to belong that I broke the law. I was thankful that I’d never gotten that far. Gone to that place.

  “How is Court?”

  “Pissed off. But my mother is confident that all charges will be dropped. He was glad that I was there.”

  “I bet he was. I’m glad you two are getting along.”

  Penn shrugged as if waiting for me to say more.