The three of them shared information about what they’d learned in the various seminars they’d all attended throughout the conference, and Natalie was impressed by the abundance of information they had gleaned about elephants, though their specialty was big cats. All three leaned into each other to listen and talk though they had to compete with the music, and Natalie found herself excited by the conversation, engrossed in it until Seth returned.
She got a whiff of his cologne, the scent enticing and insistent. Her attention wavered from the conversation. When he held out his hand toward her, it felt natural to rise and drift into his arms for another round of dancing, but by the second dance, she stifled a yawn.
“I’m sorry. I haven’t been up this late in almost a year. We’re all usually headed for bed shortly after the sun sets at the sanctuary. But you know that.” She pulled back from Seth’s shoulder, amazed to see his clear black eyes less than a couple of inches from her own. His gaze drew her in, and she puzzled at what it meant. An emotion. A question. A chemistry that she could not—and did not want to—deny. Then a sliver of doubt crept between them. She backed off, and he turned away, gave a little cough.
“Let me take you to your room, then.” Seth steered her back to the table, now empty, and they collected their belongings and headed for the elevator.
She leaned against the back wall of the elevator, her palms against the cold steel, her eyes fixed on the flashing light as they rose to the sixth floor, her room. She tried to ignore the way he’d held her elbow as they walked through the hotel’s hallways, could still feel his touch, though he had let go when they stepped into the elevator. He pressed the floor, but he hadn’t moved away, and if she had flexed her little finger, she could have touched him now. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see his eyelashes flicker, the edges of his nostrils flare as he breathed. She wondered whether he felt the same curiosity she’d been fighting.
What would it be like to kiss him? It both terrified and thrilled her to think about the touch of his lips against hers, their breath intermingling, his hands on her waist. She pressed the small of her back against the cold elevator wall, rebuking herself for being a silly romantic female, then the elevator stopped and he turned to her, smiling, his nose millimeters from hers, and paused for what seemed like long moments though only seconds had passed.
She shifted to the side. “My floor.”
“Mine, as well,” he said and swept his hand in a gallant half circle. “Ladies first.”
Her gown made a shushing sound as she stepped off the elevator then fluttered soundlessly against the carpeted hallway floor. Without speaking, they walked down the long hallway to her room, and as she fumbled for the card key, he reached out and touched her hand with the tips of his fingers. She glanced up and this time, there was no denying the look in his eyes and no doubt that as he lowered his head, his lips reached for hers. Gone were the thoughts of what to say and how to say it, gone were the worries about what she would do if this moment came to pass, gone were the doubts as old as her high school memories. Instead, his soft lips touched hers, gently at first, and then with an intensity that matched the way his arms wrapped tightly around her, and she realized that they had been moving toward this moment from the first time she studied the angles of his face in the dim light of Sophie’s enclosure. She realized that her curiosity and imagination were only one miniscule piece of reality, and that now, this moment, this warm rush of blood flooding from the depths of her belly and throughout her chest, her hips, her heart, and the back of her throat was so welcome and strange and recognizable and true that she wanted more.
And then the door to the room swung open and he followed her inside, pressed her against the wall, dropped what he’d been holding—she was no longer sure what it had been—and murmured her name and that he wanted her and that she was more beautiful than anyone he’d ever known and would she, could she.
Her gown slipped to the floor slowly and his hands traced her shoulders, the tight muscles of her arms, all the way to her fingers, and as they palmed both hands, he pressed her arms above her head against the wall, and left breathless kisses down the sides of her face, in the hollow of her throat, along her breastbone, tracing the laciness of her bra and slipping along the soft skin of her belly to the concaves of her hip bones, and his warm tongue found the edge of her panties, pushing them down, and all the sounds in the world went silent, and she was his.
Thirty-Six
Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed, citizens can change the world.
Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.
-Margaret Mead
Natalie peered out into the darkness. What was the sound that had awakened her from a sound sleep? Where were the cars and lights from other buildings? Her room was on the sixth floor, not that far above the city streets. When she’d been getting ready for the night’s festivities, she could hear people calling to each other in the street below and the sounds of traffic going by. Now, nothing. Across the river, the golden spires of the Grand Palace reminded her of the day she and Parker and the kids had wandered through the maze of buildings to see the golden and emerald statues, so much grandeur, such opulence. Danny had been fascinated by the statues of the gods and when they reached the Temple of the Emerald Buddha, he acted his age and said, “That’s it? All the other statues are much bigger than this one.” She’d had to shush him because heads turned.
Surely something had woken her up. She glanced back over her shoulder at Seth still sleeping soundly and a ripple of butterflies erupted in her stomach. He’d made love to her for several hours before they finally succumbed to exhaustion. His desire for her had aroused her own needs, and she’d met his every thrust, his kisses, his strong embraces. She had surprised herself, because it had been years since she’d even thought about making love to a man, and that long period of abstinence seemed quenched in one night. She’d known from the moment they met, when he first grabbed her hand to run into the rain, that she was attracted to him, but she’d gotten good at keeping up walls through the years. Tonight, they’d all come tumbling down. And it felt good.
Seth slept peacefully, a mere shadow in the evening light from the window. Moments from their whispered conversations during the last few hours repeated in her mind. He’d told her about growing up in Mumbai, the son of a local seamstress and a schoolteacher. The oldest of five kids, he made breakfast for everyone on a daily basis, got them ready for school and helped them with their homework every night, but he lived for his vacations when he could escape to his grandparents’ farm near Seoni. His grandfather, one of the village elders, knew every creature who lived on or passed through his land. He had spent years studying them, and Seth told Natalie that Papaji knew more about animals, their migration, and social habits than any other person—educated or not—that he’d ever met.
Papaji had imbued Seth with a curiosity about the animal world that he’d translated into a business over the years. Seth started as a veterinary assistant at one of the local zoos, then took some classes and worked his way through university, dropping out only a couple of months before graduation because his money ran out.
“I had to be creative,” he told her, so he relied on his wits, became a tour guide for a state forest and liked it so much that he applied for a job at the local TV station. “The rest is of historical significance.” He grinned.
Though his grandfather had died suddenly of a heart attack while tending to his herb patch, at least he had seen Seth’s first appearance as a guest on a local TV news show, and he’d been confident that Seth would succeed.
“Every time I see the green light on a camera, I think of him and send up a prayer,” Seth had said in a reverent whisper. He absently played with a long strand of her hair, then brought himself back to the moment and smiled into her eyes. “He would have loved to meet you and Sophie.”
She smiled back and almost told
him about Danny and Stephen, but she wanted at least this night, this weekend, with him before the story of the school shooting came out and her reality started seeping back into her daily life. She’d managed to step out of her media nightmare for a long while. This had become a place to start healing, which both surprised and pleased her. But she still needed more time.
She placed her hand against the window now, and its clammy coldness reminded her that this moment was very real and that hiding from life wouldn’t last forever. She sighed.
She turned, watching him sleep, and took a silent step toward him.
With one finger, she tentatively reached out and touched him to make sure the moment was real, that she was still there. In the act of making love, she’d discovered she was, indeed, still alive. Still there.
She smiled and sighed and looked back out the window.
On the street below, she saw movement. Several people running. Then more came after them, and within moments, the street was full and the sounds that must have woken her up filled the canyon between the buildings. She opened the window and a warm current of humid air made her draw back her face. She’d become so used to air conditioning for the past couple of days that she’d forgotten how hot Thailand had become over the last month or so.
Now she could see a group of people—red shirts, protestors in the same group Siriporn had been following—and behind them, at least half a dozen military.
“What’s going on?” Seth stood behind her, the sheet wrapped around his waist, the contrast between the white sheet and his brown body so enticing that she wanted to crawl back into bed with him, then another shout brought her attention back to the window.
“I’m not sure. I think this must be part of the demonstration everyone was talking about earlier. I know that there’s been some problems with the government, but I must admit I haven’t really been following it. When you’re at the sanctuary, you’re pretty much cut off from the rest of the world.”
She watched as the group of red-shirted people scattered into the darkness below, some followed by the militia who appeared to be carrying guns. It all seemed a bit surreal, like a scene from an action movie.
“Something’s obviously going on. Let’s turn on the television and see if there’s anything on the news.” Seth headed for the remote on the bedside table and perched on the edge of the bed as he scanned the channels. “Well, I never . . .”
“What is it?”
“The TV stations have all been shut down. Looks like the military has taken over.”
“What does that mean?”
“I have absolutely no idea.”
Natalie moved from the windows to peer at the television. No matter which station Seth flipped to, the message appeared the same: The Center for the Administration of Peace and Order had temporarily halted broadcast. She’d never been in a country that had the power to shut down the television stations. But for that matter, she’d never experienced a military coup d’état.
Within moments, the phone rang. Andrew had heard the demonstrations as well, and had called the front desk. Nothing they could do tonight, he told her, but they must be on the road back home first thing in the morning.
She hung up the phone and told Seth, who’d already begun gathering his clothes and getting dressed. All the warmth and passion of only a few hours ago had dissipated.
“Don’t go outside,” he warned her a few moments later as they stood at her door. “I’ll see you in a few hours.” He paused long enough to drop a lingering kiss on her lips, touched her cheek, then disappeared down the hallway.
When she turned to the window again, the sky had brightened a little. She stood, watching a few pairs of headlights cutting through the early dawn light, and. for the first time, she wondered about Siriporn and worried about both him and Mali. That must have been on Andrew’s mind when he called earlier. She made a mental note to ask him whether he’d heard anything.
Thirty-Seven
He that has eyes to see and
ears to hear may convince himself that
no mortal can keep a secret. If his lips
are silent, he chatters with his fingertips;
betrayal oozes out of him at every pore.
-Sigmund Freud
As soon as they pulled into the sanctuary’s drive, Mali caught up with the truck and stuck her head in the window. “Natalie, your mum has called at least ten times. She’s frantic. You should call her immediately.”
Without taking her suitcase to her cabin, Natalie went straight to the office phone and called home, trying in vain to explain to her mother that the situation in Bangkok wasn’t as dangerous as the international news stations reported.
“Natalie, I insist you come home,” Maman’s voice crackled over the phone. A bad connection. “We didn’t want you to leave to begin with. Your father thought you were running away, and you know you can’t run away from life. Rien ne pèse tant que un secret. You know that, Natalie darling. Nothing weighs more than a secret. It’ll follow you, my sweet.”
Natalie crossed her arms over her chest. “I wasn’t . . .”
“CNN is showing pictures of military patrolling the streets, Natalie. Enough of this foolishness. Come home!”
“Maman, I’m five hours from Bangkok, a very long distance from the uprising.” She’d never tell her mother she’d just come home from the capital city or that she’d seen military patrolling the streets below her hotel window. And even if she did tell the truth, the events in Bangkok didn’t affect the highly-isolated sanctuary. No matter what Natalie said, she couldn’t convince her mother that she didn’t see or hear or experience anything like what was going on in Bangkok.
Somewhere behind her, Natalie heard Andrew make a crack about how hysterical American women can be. She turned and put a finger to her lips to shush him. No way would he understand that Maman’s worrying had a different edge. Maman felt more upset that her daughter wasn’t dealing with her grief than she was about the uprising.
Natalie sucked in a deep breath, but before she could utter another word, her mother was off and running, rambling about Natalie’s inconsiderateness and how she could travel halfway across the world to an unstable country when she had family back in North Carolina that were also going through the grieving process, didn’t she understand what she needed to do? She had to stop running away. Natalie felt her lips and shoulders tighten and turned her back on the other people in the office as she tried to stop Maman-the-runaway-train and get a word in edgewise.
“Maman . . .”
She kept on chattering, not hearing Natalie at all.
“Maman, it’s like going from Wilmington to Asheville. That’s how far away Bangkok is from where I am . . .”
Again, Maman rolled right over Natalie’s words, still harping on how Natalie ignored her own grief, how she should be there with family who understood rather than halfway across the world, that this uprising in Thailand was dangerous and that it was imperative that she come home.
“Maman!” Natalie didn’t normally raise her voice, but sometimes it seemed necessary.
No answer on the other end of the phone. Finally, Maman listened.
“I know you’re worried, but I’m sure Nonna and Boppy worried about you when Pop brought you to the States, and I know for a fact that you didn’t go back to Provence until I was ten, so how is that different from what I’m doing? You were only a teenager! I’m thirty-six years old. Big difference. I’m not a child anymore. I own a business. I’ve been divorced and supporting myself for years. I’m level-headed and smart and well-traveled. Please, please, please calm down about this. I’m not going to step in the middle of machine-gun fire, believe me.”
Natalie paused for a moment, expecting a response. Getting none, she jumped right back in and continued. The words pummeled out of her mouth.
“Remember how the reporters made m
y world a fish bowl after the shooting?” Her throat constricted and the space behind her eyes itched and watered. “The pain of losing a child never abates, Maman. It’s indescribable. And you know that sometimes the grief is . . . well, it’s like a freight train without brakes. Uncontrollable. Even you, my own parents, cannot possibly understand the impossible agony of . . . putting one foot in front of the other.” She swallowed hard. “There’s nothing more difficult during the first year after a child’s death than just . . . living.”
When Natalie found herself smiling—even painful smiles—that first year, she felt guilty. Here in Thailand, she had been able to smile again. No guilt. Yes, she thought about Danny and Stephen all the time, but she persisted, attempting to live again.
“I’m doing what they would have wanted. I’m trying to help save some of the most sensitive creatures on earth.” She knew in her heart of hearts that was true, and it should make sense to Maman, too.
Still nothing on the other end.
“I’m still grieving, Maman. I always will be. But being here and being able to help others has proven to me that I still have something left to give. Do you understand?”
Maman sighed. “Of course, I understand. We are grieving with you, my darling. That’s why I want you home. Please. Come home.”
Natalie closed her eyes, and Seth came to mind. She wished he were by her side, offering his sympathetic shoulders and that thought surprised her. Normally, she wouldn’t long for a man’s strength to complement her own. And since he wasn’t there, she leaned against the door jamb and picked at a piece of peeling paint. She heard her mother sigh and knew she had meant no harm. What she said and did came from a place of love, yet Natalie knew that being home would mean prolonging the grief until Maman felt it was over. And lord only knows when that would have been.
The Mourning Parade Page 27
