Bittersweet Promises

by Patricia Watters

  "Who was that?" Tess asked, as they drove off.

  "A neighbor," Zak replied.

  Tess gave him a quizzical glance. "Doesn't she speak English?"

  "Yes, but not here. Most of the old people continue to speak Basque. To them it's important that the language be preserved, and I agree. It's unrelated to any other language, and I hope Peio passes it on to his kids." Zak turned onto a tree-lined street of modest homes and parked in front of a white frame house. "We'll change into our costumes here."

  As they waited at the front door, Tess looked up and saw a board with the words Mata Baita painted on its polished surface.

  Catching her looking at the sign, Zak said, Navarreans name their houses instead of numbering them. It means Marie lives here." He gave her a half smile, and shrugged. "It's only logical. Marie does live there."

  The door opened and a woman with long auburn hair fashioned into a braid down her back, and wearing traditional festival dress, smiled and said, "Ah Zak." She reached down to stroke Peio's dark hair.

  Zak introduced Tess, and after Marie extended a warm welcome, she ushered them into the living room, where the sound of rock music reverberated through the wall. Marie banged on the closed door. "Katerin!" she called.

  A muffled voice came from inside the room. "I know, I know." The music died.

  Zak walked up to the closed door and called out, "Kat, you have a visitor."

  The door swept open and a willowy young woman, about sixteen, appeared. "Zak!" she squealed, before recomposing herself and leaning casually against the door frame. Her dark hair was cropped close around her face, except for a pinkish-red shock that fell over one eye. She wore a gold stud in the flare of her nostril and her lips held a cool smile. Zak eyed her cutoff shirt, snug jeans, and white boots. "Aren't you going to the festival?"

  "Sure." She positioned her tongue in her bubble gum and blew a bubble.

  "Then you'd better get ready. They're lining up to start the snake."

  The bubble popped. "I am ready."

  "Come on. I know you better than that. You've always worn traditional dress."

  "You gotta be kidding. I'd rather die first." Kat returned to the bedroom, shutting the door. The rock music clicked on again, this time softer.

  Zak eyed Marie, who shrugged and said, "Times are changing. We can't live their lives for them."

  Marie sent Zak and Peio to the master bedroom to change, and directed Tess to Kat's room. While Tess slipped into the festival clothes, Kat sat cross-legged on the bed, watching. "Are you Basque?" she asked.

  "No," Tess replied while tucking the blouse into the skirt.

  "Then why are you dressing up?"

  Tess slipped the vest over her blouse. "Because I want to."

  "You're kidding. Whatever for?"

  "Maybe just to get a taste of your world."

  "It's really pretty boring," Kat said. "There's nothing to do around here."

  Tess laughed. "All teenagers think that wherever they are is the most boring place on earth. I know I did," she said, while gathering her hair to the back of her head in order to braid it.

  Kat pursed her lips. "You weren't stuck in a place like Navarre."

  "You're right," Tess said, while braiding her hair. "I was stuck in a logging camp."

  "You gotta be kidding."

  "No. In fact, Navarre was the kind of place I dreamed of going." Dreamed of going with Zak, she wanted to say. After completing the braid, she pulled on the gray stockings, crisscrossed the shoe laces up her legs, thanked Kat for the use of her room, and left.

  When she stepped into the living room, she found Zak and Peio alone. Zak wore a beret, a homespun shirt, and baggy blue pants stuffed into high black boots, and Peio stood beside him, a miniature of his dad. Zak eyed her with appreciation. "You look beautiful, the way I always imagined you'd look."

  Tess felt her cheeks grow hot. "At least maybe I'll blend in with the crowd," she said, and hoped it would be so.

  "You'll never blend in with any crowd," Zak said, "and that's a compliment."

  "Mama's prettier," Peio spat, then ran from the house and climbed into the truck.

  "He misses his mother," Zak said. "It's his first festival without her."

  "And he obviously resents seeing me dressed the way his mother would have been dressed," Tess said, and tried not to sound bitter.

  "It'll take time, but he'll adjust."

  Before Tess could clarify if Zak meant Peio would adjust to her being a part of the family in the form of his father's wife, or adjust to his mother's death, Zak said, "Marie left. She'll be working a concession booth and said for us to leave Peio with her so we can go to the pub. She also makes a mean piperade, a Basque omelet."

  "Sounds like a good plan," Tess said, and hoped she didn't sound too enthusiastic about Peio not being with them, but she wanted time alone with Zak without Peio's caustic gaze on them.

  When they stepped outside, clouds had started to gather, threatening to block the sun, and by the time they found a place to park, the town was cloaked in gray. It was an unseasonably cold, blustery day, but in spite of the impending weather, people began joining hands while forming into a long chain for the snake dance. "Hold on tight," Zak said to Peio, while grabbing his hand and sandwiching the boy between him and Tess.

  The snake took form, winding through the streets toward the town square, zigzagging through switchbacks of people, a kaleidoscope of faces and forms whirling by, first in one direction, then in the other, the string twisting and winding like a serpent, then uncoiling in the town square where papier-mâché bulls exploded in a crescent of brilliant fireworks. Then the snake broke apart and everyone funneled towards the concession stands.

  They found Marie behind a counter heaped with paper plates, napkins and plastic forks. Her piperade bubbled on a griddle, and the aroma of bacon, tomatoes and spices rose with the steam curling from the eggs as they cooked. As Marie dished up a wedge of omelet for each of them, she said to Zak, "Why don't you leave Peio with me now so you can get to the Palombiere before the entire town tries to crowd inside."

  "Palombiere?" Tess looked at her, curious.

  "Place of Doves," Marie translated.

  "The pub," Zak clarified. He glanced at Peio, who was looking up expectedly, and said to Marie, "If you're sure he won't be too much trouble."

  "No trouble," Marie said. "I'll drop him off at your folks house later. Now go on."

  At the Palombiere, a group of men stood huddled at the entrance under a wooden sign displaying a white dove. As Zak and Tess approached, heads turned toward Zak.

  "Hey, Zak... de Neuville... Yo, Zak," voices called out, greeting Zak, who nodded to his friends as he nudged Tess through the door into the quaint old pub. They wove past scarred wooden tables and slid onto a long bench. Zak turned to acknowledge someone who clapped him on the shoulder, then waved to another who called to him across the room.

  "You're a popular figure in this town," Tess said, feeling like an outsider.

  "That's because I grew up with most everyone here."

  Tess sensed a deep camaraderie among the people. She also felt a vast cultural separation from them, even more so because she was dressed as one of them, yet she didn't understand their language or identify with the kind of traditions that dictated who married whom, which seemed out of another century. She also felt eyes on her, like she was being assessed.

  The low quiver of a drum accompanied by the faint sound of a flute, brought conversations to a halt. Zak leaned toward her, and said, "They're building up to the Zamalzain, the dance of good against evil. It's a difficult dance. In order to do it right, the dancer has to start learning it when he's very young." He nudged her and pointed.

  Across the room, a dancer dressed in rags and wearing a grotesque mask staggered onto the floor as if drunk. Moving with exaggerated motions, he shuffled his feet to the rising sounds of the flute and the insistent rhythm of the drum. Then someone set a glass of wine on the floor in f
ront of the dancer and stepped back.

  "He represents evil," Zak said. "When he dances, watch the wine glass. If it spills, evil's defeated and good wins out. Now the crowd will pick someone to represent good."

  As Zak spoke, someone called out, "Come on, de Neuville." He looked around and waved a negative hand. Someone tugged on his arm, and the crowd began to clap and shout in unison, "De Neuville, de Neuville, de Neuville." Several men dragged Zak from the bench, then one of them set a wine glass on the floor in front of him.

  Zak nodded in resignation and turned toward the masked dancer. His legs moving in time to the music of the flute, his upper body rigid, Zak faced the dancer across the filled wine glasses. He brushed the rim of the glass with his foot before executing a series of intricate steps around it then backed away. The masked dancer approached his own glass, his feet moving above and around it, then backed off. Zak again approached, this time executing steps so fast and close and intricate, his glass wobbled, yet remained standing.

  As Tess watched, she realized how deeply the Basque culture was ingrained in Zak. She saw it in the proud way he held his head as he performed the complex steps, and she sensed it in his regard for the traditions, and his resolve to hold onto their unique language, and his strong alliance to family.

  Voices rose as the dance worked up to a climax. Then Zak leaped into the air, alighting on the rim of his glass, and as quickly, soared away. The glass rocked precariously, but didn't spill. The dancer of evil took his turn, landing firmly on the rim of his glass, but when he leaped away, the glass rocked and tumbled onto its side, spilling the wine.

  The room reverberated with cheers and shouts. And Zak flopped down on the bench beside Tess and drank a long draft of beer. Then he mopped his brow with a wet towel that had been passed down to him, and said to Tess, "That used to be easier. I think I'll teach Peio and let him take over from here. So, how did I do?"

  "You were amazing," Tess said, knowing she'd always hold the scene in her mind, and in her heart. Then she asked Zak the question that had been hovering in her mind ever since they arrived and she saw how much the people of Navarre were a part of his life. "You're a wildlife biologist now, but your father sent you to France to learn about wine making so you can take over the winery someday, and yet I remember distinctly you talking about raising sheep. How will you reconcile all that?"

  "I won't," Zak replied. "Having Peio changed everything. I want what's best for him, which is growing up in Navarre. So as soon as I'm done with the eagle program I'll be moving here so Peio can continue attending the Basque school. It's also where I want to raise a family." He took her hand and she didn't pull away. Instead, she waited for him to say what was on his mind.

  Lifting their clasped hands to his lips he kissed her knuckles, then fixed his eyes on hers, and said, "I told you I wanted to set things straight about what happened. The part I left out was... although I married Mirande shortly after I got to France it was a rebound marriage for both of us. She never stopped loving the man she'd been engaged to, and I never stopped loving you. We both knew it, and we both accepted it, and we thought we could make a life together in spite of it. When she got homesick and returned to France, I could have gone with her, but being together wasn't important to either of us, so I stayed here and she stayed there. Peio was the only thing holding us together. I also knew, before I married her, that the only way you and I could be together would be if we turned our backs on our families and walked out of their lives. I was ready to do that, but I couldn't let you do it no matter how much I hated your father at the time, because I knew it would become a wedge between us that would always be there. I guess the time just wasn't right for us. Does this make sense?"

  Tess eyed their clasped hands and nodded. "Do you still hate my father for what he did?"

  Zak shook his head. "I came to terms with that years ago. If it had been my daughter, I would've done the same thing. The only problem I have with your father now is the same problem I have with mine. They're both stubborn as hell. But it's the way they are, and they're not going to change. So, if I've answered all your questions, can we try again?"

  Tess looked beyond him to the group of men in berets at the next table, and the bevy of old women in head scarves, and the cloaked shepherd standing by the doorway. "I don't know. This is a pretty close community. If you glance around you'll see the way they're looking at me, like I'm a fraud trying to be one of them, and whenever I'd hear Basque spoken when I'm around I'd always wonder if they're talking about me. And your parents, especially your father, have made their position clear."

  "Things are changing here," Zak said. "You've seen how Vince is, and Marie's daughter too. I'll probably be facing the same thing with Peio when he gets into high school, but sending him to the Basque school will help preserve some of the old traditions, even if it's just an appreciation for his heritage. You'd have friends like Marie here. She took to you right away."

  Tess thought about the years after Zak left, when she'd waited, all the while wondering where he was and why he didn't return for her, then finally marrying a man she didn't love.

  "Honey, give me another chance," Zak said, while looking steadily at her.

  Tess held his heartfelt gaze. How could she not give him another chance? She'd never stopped loving him, and she'd never stopped wanting him. She was still a little uncertain about living under the same roof with Alesander de Neuville, and she wasn't sure she could live in a town where the people never accepted her, but maybe after some time passed, things would work out. Drawing in a long breath, she said, "I'll give us another chance, but until we can determine if it will work this time it has to be substance and no sex."

  The hint of a smile played about Zak's lips. "None at all?"

  "Maybe a little light kissing but nothing more."

  "Then we'll start now." Zak trailed a finger slowly along her cheek and down her jaw and under her chin, and when his thumb traced the line of her mouth, Tess tipped her face up and their lips blended in a slow, unhurried kiss.

  Tomorrow she'd worry about moving logs, and property line disputes, and Zak's father's resolve that Zak marry a Basque woman, and the fact that Peio wanted her out of Zak's life, but for this one day, Zak was all hers, again.

  And then she remembered the day was not yet over. They still had to go to Zak's parent's house to pick up Peio. She'd never been there, but she knew Zak's father wouldn't welcome a girl from Baker's Creek masquerading as one of them, even if it was only for a festival. "I need to change out of these clothes before we get to your parent's house," she said. "I'm sure your father would take offense to seeing me dressed this way."

  Zak looked at her as if in agreement, then the expression on his face turned to one of misgiving. "When I turned Peio over to Marie, I gave her the bag with our clothes in it, but my father knows we've been to the festival. He'll understand."

  Tess heard Zak's words, but they were not spoken with conviction. And the fact was, Alesander de Neuville would not welcome a woman posing as one of them in his home, especially the daughter of Gib O'Reilly. She hoped their visit would be brief.

  CHAPTER 10

  Vineyards covered the hills on both sides of the long drive leading to Zak's parents' home, although in the distance she saw hills with sheep, but directly ahead, at the end of the road, the house loomed like a stone fortress sitting on a knoll. Zak described the house years before, but Tess never pictured it as being so massive, and with the dark clouds gathering above, it looked almost foreboding. "It's so big," she mused.

  "My great-great-grandfather built it with separate living quarters for three generations and a lot of descendants," Zak said. "It's designed so the eldest son marries and stays with the family and eventually takes over."

  "The eldest son, being you."

  Zak nodded but said nothing. Another little dose of reality, Tess realized. Three generations of Basque under that huge roof. Yet, only Zak welcomed her to this house. "What about your grandparents?
Do they still live here?"

  "My grandfather passed away, but my grandmother's in the same quarters where she lived with my grandfather." Zak pulled the truck to a halt out front. "You'll meet her. She likes to be with family."

  Tess got out of the truck and pulled her sweater closed against the cold damp air. Although it was not yet evening, clouds blocked the sun and the sky was dark and menacing. She turned her attention to the stately home. An ancient wisteria vine wound its way above the front windows of the lower level and followed the curve of the arched entry. A blustery wind whipped its lacy leaves, tossing them aside, revealing a nameplate over the front door. She stepped closer and tried to read what it said, then saw that the words were in Basque.

  "It means, Sweet Promised Land," Zak said. "My great-great-grandfather was a second son and inherited nothing, but his father sent him to America, telling him it was the Promised Land, and his fortune would be waiting for him there. When he met my great-great-grandmother, shortly after arriving in America, he decided his father was right."

  The front door swept open, and Zak's mother appeared, holding a bottle with a large rubber nipple. Under her arm, a newborn lamb wiggled to be free. Tess caught the surprised look on the woman's face and realized Zak hadn’t told his parents they'd be stopping by.

  Frantziska's gaze brushed lightly over Tess's costume, then she glanced beyond Tess at Zak, and said in an uncertain voice, "Hello, son. We weren't expecting you." She backed away for them to enter.

  Zak nudged Tess inside. "Didn't Marie say something when she dropped Peio off?"

  "Vince brought him home," Frantziska said. "Peio's in the shop watching Vince work on that awful car of his, no doubt asking a thousand questions so he can get one like it someday." She pursed her lips in disapproval. "We prefer it when you have Peio. A six-year-old boy is impressionable, and Vince is not such a good influence." The lamb squirmed in Frantziska's arms.