Or maybe it was just because he was embarrassed. Not so much about what Woodward had said—all of that seemed reasonable, even possibly true—but because the facts had been there and he had ignored them for this long.
“Fuck,” he muttered.
Nicotine or not, he picked up his cigar and took another puff.
“But what about the tire tracks? You don’t think—”
“You want my advice? Just forget about the car tracks, the rusty porch swing, and all that shit. Forget about this photo”—he tapped at the picture of what they had once believed was Arielle and her mother and father—“and—ah, shit, it hurts to say this—but try to forget about Arielle.”
Martin’s face got all screwed up, and his friend reached out and put a comforting hand on his shoulder.
“It’ll take time, but I think it’s for the best.”
Martin scratched the back of his head.
“You’re right,” he said, his words surprising even himself.
Woodward brought the cigar to his lips, drawing smoke into his mouth. Martin leaned back and did the same.
“You’re right,” he repeated, more to himself than to his friend.
The question was, could he really forget about her? About the woman who was more than enough for him?
Martin exhaled a large, thick cloud of smoke and watched it rise and twirl in the air.
So random, those individual streams of smoke; each seeming to follow their own secret, hidden path through the air, through life.
And then when they reached near the ceiling, the tendrils were blown away by the spinning fan overhead, their lives, once so thick and powerful, gone. Dispersed. Eliminated.
Maybe, with time, he could start again without Arielle.
Maybe.
Part III – Harvest the Seed
Chapter 34
The warm air billowed around Arielle’s naked body, clouding her reflection in the mirror. She closed her eyes and breathed the steam in through her nose. It was hot, almost scalding, but she didn’t mind.
The hot air helped her think.
She reached out and scrubbed the mirror with her hand, nearly pulling it away when her skin touched the startlingly cool surface. Then she leaned back and took a good look at herself.
It had taken more than a year for her to lose the weight she had put on at Coverfeld Ave. And it had taken more than a year after that, almost two, to get her body back near to where it had been before. All things considered, her hard work had paid off.
Almost.
But no matter how hard she tried, it would never be quite the same again.
Her hands moved to her now flat stomach, her fingers finding the scar that ran from just beneath the center of her chest and extended all the way to the top of a small mound of soft blond pubic hair. It was a hideous cicatrix, a half-inch-wide gash that was lighter in color than the surrounding skin. Inside the indented scar was a crisscrossing network of disorganized fibrous tissue like threads desperately trying to keep the two sides together. And then there were the dents, the dimples of skin on either side of the wound, a permanent reminder of the staples that had once punctured her flesh.
Her fingers moved up and down the scar’s length like a demented, organic keyboard. It was rough, uneven, hideous.
The fog in the bathroom again clouded the mirror, hiding the grimace that marked her pretty face.
If Martin were here, he would tell me that I’m still beautiful. He would kiss my scar, I know he would. He would kiss it and hold me as I cried into his arms about another void in my memory, another time and place I can’t remember.
But Martin was not here. Martin was gone; he had left her, abandoned her.
She didn’t blame him, though, not really. But he could have at least written her back. Just once. He could have written her back and said he didn’t want to see you anymore; she would have understood that. Because even that would have shown that he cared—on some level, it would have confirmed that he still cared about her.
But not responding, that was the worst.
The letters.
She remembered the letters.
She remembered the letters, and she remembered the mice. The horrible sound of their padded paws running across the cold, wet stone floor like an eternal tap dripping into a porcelain sink. But that was all she remembered.
A shudder ran through her just as the door to the bathroom was pushed open.
“Mommy? Mommy, I can’t sleep.”
Arielle immediately turned and snatched a towel from the rack and wrapped it around her stomach. Then she faced her daughter, pasting a fake smile on her full lips.
“What’s wrong, sweetheart?”
The girl rubbed her eyes with both hands.
“I had a nightmare,” she replied with a frown.
“The same one?”
The girl nodded. It looked as if she might cry.
“The other girls, they’re teasing me. Pulling my hair, telling me that I’m different. That I’m weird. That you aren’t my real mommy.”
Arielle squatted and took her daughter in her arms. Then, in one smooth motion, she swept her off her feet.
“It’s okay, sweetheart. You can sleep with me tonight. I’ll keep the nightmares away, I promise.”
Chapter 35
“It’s complicated,” Martin replied, averting his gaze.
“Yeah, how so?”
The directness of the response surprised Martin and he glanced up quickly. The woman across from him was good-looking in the traditional sense, with long dark hair that flowed down past her shoulders, and equally dark eyes that stood out on her pale skin. Her full lips were painted a deep red. She was wearing a white blouse that was cut just low enough to show off the top of her breasts, to let anyone who might be interested know that they were indeed full, but not so low as to look sleazy.
“Well?” the woman raised her Styrofoam coffee mug and gave it a swirl. “I have a lot of coffee left, you know?”
Direct. No skirting issues with this one.
And Martin liked that; it was one of the major reasons why he had agreed to be set up with her. That and her full breasts, of course.
He took a sip of his coffee, and the woman’s mouth twisted into a frown.
“I’m not getting involved with someone who’s complicated, Martin,” she informed him.
“No, Stace, it’s not like that. It’s, well—” he took a deep breath, “—well, I have a wife, but…”
The woman, who gave the air of keeping her emotions close to her substantial chest, let her guard down, her eyebrows moving upward in surprise.
“You’re married?”
She picked up her coffee cup and swirled it again, suggesting that while a moment ago it was full, it might now suddenly be emptied. Or maybe she was just no longer thirsty.
Martin shook his head.
“My wife left four years ago. Just packed up and left. I’m working on the divorce now, but because she just disappeared, these things take time.”
The woman’s expression went from surprised to intrigued.
“Really? And you say it’s not complicated?”
Again Martin shook his head.
“It’s not. She left and I’ve moved on. Haven’t seen or heard from her in years.”
He could tell that Stacey wanted to press for more, wanted to know details about how their relationship had ended, but the woman was as astute as she was direct, and the wall he began erecting was something that she picked up on quickly.
The truth was, he hadn’t thought about Arielle in a while. He had done what most men would given his situation, at least men that were embarrassed and hurt: he buried his feelings in his work. And eventually one week bled into another, and his concerted efforts to find Arielle became less and less concentrated. Staying away from Woodward had helped, as was separating himself from that life—his past life. Which included selling their home and moving into a bachelor pad in the city. Going to new bars, res
taurants, most of which he had successfully helped buy or sell, as was the case with most commercial buildings in Batesburg—a welcomed side-effect of burying his feelings. And then the divorce idea had been proposed by the firm that helped with his real estate transactions. That too had been a hard, but necessary decision.
And now this: four years later he was on a date. Sure, it was only a Friday afternoon coffee date, but it was a date none-the-less.
A step forward.
“Would you look at that,” Stacey said suddenly. “Coffee’s all done.”
Martin frowned, thinking that he had scared her away. It was his first date in a long, long time, and he liked Stacey.
The woman threw her head back and laughed.
“Just kidding, Marty.”
Marty; Arielle used to call me that.
He shook his head and forced himself to smile back at her.
“Actually, I am done my coffee. But maybe next week we can do this again?”
Martin raised an eyebrow.
“You only drink coffee once a week?”
She laughed again.
“No, silly. Next time you get to take me out to dinner. Which I eat every night, by the way.”
Martin’s smile transitioned from forced to legitimate.
“Great. Let me take you to your car,” he offered, standing.
She shook her head.
“Nope. The next time you’ll see me will be at dinner.”
Martin nodded.
Her directness—he liked that. At nearly forty-five, he had no time for games.
They parted ways with a semi-awkward hug, and Martin left the coffee shop on foot. It was a beautiful afternoon and with the sun shining high in the sky, he had opted to walk from the office instead of drive. Thankfully the heatwave that had seemed permanent just a few days ago had broken, making his walk pleasant.
As he made his way back toward his office, he was surprised that the smile that Stacey had put on his face remained. It felt good to speak to someone of the opposite sex outside of the office. Really good.
Am I officially ‘dating’ now, is that it? Can I say that?
It was a strange thought, but it was also a good thought.
Martin made a sharp turn onto his office’s street, and bumped right into a woman in a dark dress, nearly knocking her to the sidewalk.
“I’m sorry,” he said, taking a step toward the woman who was huddled over, clutching her stomach as if she were winded. “You okay, ma’am? I didn’t see you. I was just enjoying this beautiful weather.” Martin attempted a smile, but the woman remained in a crouched position and his concern quickly grew.
He moved closer to her and rested an arm gently on her back. She was all skin and bone beneath the dark dress.
“Ma’am? You okay? I didn’t—”
The woman finally raised her head and Martin froze mid-sentence. Strands of black hair hung in front of her face, but they were so thin that Martin could make out hawkish features that seemed to bury dark, deep-set eyes.
And he recognized that face.
“I—I—didn’t—” he stammered.
He recognized the woman’s face, but couldn’t place it right away.
The woman appeared to recognize him too, as her sunken eyes seemed to widen. Then she straightened her body with what seemed like considerably effort and grumbled something.
In an instant, the woman was off at a considerable clip down the sidewalk, leaving Martin gaping.
What did she say?
It sounded Greek or maybe it was an Italian dialect.
It sounded like, filing something.
Filing Oscar? Was she from one of the clerks down at the city hall? Someone who filed my deeds of sale?
Martin shook his head.
No, that wasn’t it.
He continued to stare as the woman made it to the street corner, still moving quickly as if she were late for an appointment.
As she reached the corner, she raised her hand to flag a passing cab. Martin focused on those trembling fingers, realizing that this too reminded him of something. Not an open hand, as she was gesturing now, but a closed hand delicately holding something.
Fingers that had once held a small piece of burning wood.
Filia obcisor.
“Wait!” Martin shouted, finally mobilizing. “Wait!”
He broke into a jog just as the woman closed the car door.
Martin stopped running and stared at the car is it passed, his eyes meeting the woman’s through the window.
It was the woman from the church all those years ago, the one that had been standing at the painting of Raymond Nonnatus holding a candle for someone that she had lost.
It was the woman who had shouted at Arielle, one of the three that had chased them from the place of worship—the place that neither of them belonged.
Chapter 36
Arielle snuffed out her cigarette beneath her heel as soon as a woman walked into the park with her young son in tow.
“Careful on the stairs, Hope,” Arielle hollered to her daughter as she watched her blond hair bounce up the plastic set of stairs for what felt like the hundredth time. In a moment, she would reappear at the bottom of the slide, a giant smile plastered on her face.
“Okay, Mommy,” Hope shouted over her shoulder.
Now it was Arielle’s turn to smile.
There was no question that Hope wasn’t like other girls. For one, she was reserved, quiet—an introvert. Or, as Arielle preferred to consider her, a deep thinker. This didn’t bother Arielle. In fact, Arielle herself had become quiet ever since she had moved away from Batesburg. If nothing else, her moving away necessitated becoming more secretive, and while at the outset this had proven difficult for her, in the end it was a good thing. In the end, she’d learned more about herself and what made her tick. And that had to be a good thing.
Adopting a slight variation of her maiden name—McLernon—Arielle had taken Hope and traveled south immediately after she had left 1818 Coverfeld, eventually settling in a small town in Georgia. It was far enough away from her past life so as to not be recognized or tempted, but it wasn’t so far away to completely forget about where she had been.
Starting—or re-starting, as it were—her copywriting business hadn’t been all that difficult, at least when it came time to acquire or reacquire clients. What had been difficult, however, was completely giving up on her other business; losing the name, shutting down the website, emailing her old client list. That had been hard. Not technically, of course, but psychologically. It had been hard because it was something that she couldn’t readily undo. Theoretically, she could return to Batesburg, she could move back into her house with Martin, but what she couldn’t do was email her list again and say, “Hey, look, ignore the last email, I’m baaaaack.” If nothing else, her clients demanded consistency.
In the end, the need for fresh income had forced her hand.
Arielle was deep in thought when she first caught the woman walking toward her out of the corner of her eye.
Of course the woman chose the bench right beside hers. Mothers always did that for some reason; assumed that just because they were at the same park and that you both had a child that you wanted to talk. To make friends. That you had something in common. In fact, the only thing that surprised Arielle about this woman was that she didn’t sit directly beside her.
Eight benches in this park, Arielle counted, and she chose the one next to me.
Still, despite her apathy, she couldn’t help but watch as the woman bent and tended to her son.
“Petey, be careful on the swings, okay?”
Swings? The boy can’t be more than two years old, and he’s going to go on the swings by himself?
Petey nodded and tried to turn, but his mother grabbed him just before he took off. He was a cute kid, with shaggy blond hair cut straight across his forehead.
Thomas. He looks like Thomas Woodward.
“Not so fast, cutie-pie!” The woman
rubbed some sunblock into his button nose.
Arielle was curious where she got the sunblock from, as there was no bottle in sight. Did she have a repository in her wrist? Like Spiderman’s webs?
These were secrets that only moms knew, ones that Arielle was trying to discover.
The boy tore away from his mother and made a beeline directly for the swings.
Swings? Really?
Arielle turned her attention back to her own child, and when she didn’t immediately see her, her heart skipped a beat.
She snapped to her feet.
“Hope? Hope!”
Her daughter poked her blond head from behind a plastic steering wheel atop the play structure, and Arielle breathed deeply.
“Yes, Mommy?”
“Nothing, sweetie, keep playing. Just make sure I can see you.”
“Okay, Mommy.”
And with that, she ducked back down behind the plastic that was painted to look like wood. A pirate ship, a fort, a firetruck; whatever you wanted it to be.
Arielle fell back into her thoughts, trying her best to discourage the woman on the bench beside hers—who she just absolutely knew was staring at her—from striking up a conversation. Mostly because all of these conversations were the same.
And boring as hell.
Arielle didn’t think about Martin all the time, just most of the time. It got especially bad when she wasn’t with Hope; in the evenings, or when Arielle needed a break and sent Hope off with their babysitter. Truth be told, the idea of raising Hope by herself wasn’t something that she was terribly excited about. She was, despite what she had been through, a new mom, after all, and reading books, watching shows, even practicing wasn’t like the real thing. And it bothered her when people tried to pretend it was. Go watch all the hockey games on TV that you can feast your eyes on. Read every book on strategy, stick-handling, hitting, defense, everything you can possibly find. Now go step on the ice. Do you feel ready? You’re good to play in your first game?
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