If Alec had his way, he would live in the country, preferably by a large body of water. Lake Champlain would do very nicely. Or they could move to Ontario and settle somewhere within walking distance of the lake by the same name. Like outside Kingston, for instance. Or Oshawa. Or...
Only now there was Suzy, and that complicated things. A lot. “Why do women always complicate things?” he wondered. “First Sandra and now Suzy. Ah, women…” he sighed deeply.
As if living so far away wasn’t enough, Suzy’s schoolwork made demands on her time. Different schools have different agendas. But despite all that, he needed to see her, be in her company, her presence.
Soon Mount Royal and the Lachine Canal lost their appeal. And Alec found himself more and more often on the bus to NDG just to hang out with Suzy, anywhere, alone, sitting on the floor, talking and talking and… given half the chance—just being there.
His dad saw Alec sneaking in one evening close to midnight. He smiled sadly.
“Ah, yes, mother. Almost fourteen. That’s what hormones do to a growing lad. Once awakened, they play havoc with your metabolism.” Then Alex Senior looked at his wife already half asleep. “I remember…” he murmured, “it wasn’t easy.”
Alec’s fortunes took an unexpected turn in the fourth week of the new school year. The “Entrance Tennis Tournament,” started in the third week of the school year, had reached its finals. Alec lost in the semis to a guy twice his size, but he and Pete were the odds-on favorites to win the doubles. Imagine Alec’s eyes when he, on entering the court, saw Suzy sitting in the front row of the bleachers, right next to her father. His knees almost gave way. He felt sure he would not be able to hit a single ball. They won 6:2, 6:4, after a tough second set. Alec couldn’t help stealing glances at Suzy, who seemed to clap her hands practically each time his racket connected with the ball. If it weren’t for her, they would have won both sets to love.
After the presentation, Alec’s mom invited Suzy home for supper. Dad promised Mr. Norman, who had previous engagements for the evening, that he would drive Suzy home at a decent hour. After an early supper, Alec and Suzy went for a walk.
The first thing Alec noticed was that Suzy kept stealing glances at him. He was, of course, doing exactly the same.
“You really are very good,” were her opening words.
“I presume you are referring to my tennis?” he countered.
It really was different on land. You had to know what to do with your hands, where to look, how to behave. It wasn’t as natural. Even talking was different. And then they reached the water’s edge at the Lachine Canal. They shared memories there.
“I really like the water.” Finally he was close to his element.
“Me, too,” she shot right back. “I wish my parents would move to the country, or by a lake or to Ontario, or something...” she caught herself. “Only... only now... it would be nice, though, wouldn’t it?” Her voice lost some of its enthusiasm.
“Me, too,” Alec affirmed with equal lack of eagerness. “It would be nice, though.” And then he had an idea. “We could come visit you and go sailing on Lake Ontario!”
“We could race each other...”
“Or race together against other boats...”
“I’m sure we would win...”
“Every time!”
Alec stood, the wheel firmly in his left hand, his Suzy by his side wiping sweat from his brow. The wind whistled, the crests breaking on both bows, the sails billowing...
His right arm drew his sword, raising it above his head. He cast his eye with derision at the infidels cowering below the bridge. Let anyone dare to approach his lady. Anyone!
“...it would be nice, wouldn’t it?” Suzy sat on the beam supporting the lock. She didn’t look that happy at all.
“We can sail together next year, maybe... on Lake Champlain, I mean.” Alec consoled her. “It’s not so far away...?”
Everything on the tail end of the Canadian winter is always far away. It’s almost in never-never land. They sat, side by side, in silence. After a while Alec picked up a stone and threw it expertly to skim over the water. It bounced and bounced...
“Seven!” she cried. “You did seven bounces. Oh, Alec, you can do everything so well!”
And the moment she said it, her head lowered to hide a deep blush spreading over her face and ears. She looked away, but not before Alec saw. Thank the lucky stars it’s not just me, Alec thought, a strange relief filling him with great satisfaction… almost pleasure. I should go, he thought. I should leave her alone for a bit. I should go look for another stone. He knew she would be grateful.
It’s not easy being a man, he thought. Not even when you’re practically fourteen. Can’t be that easy if you’re a girl either. And on a sudden impulse he bent down and kissed her on the cheek.
“I like you, too,” he said in the deepest tone he could master. To hell with skipping stones. He was ready for deep water.
That night he couldn’t sleep. There was the Tournament, the presentations, but mostly it was Suzy. Su was everything a guy could hope for. She was shorter than he. She looked also around fourteen. Must have been. She was a good swimmer and could hold her own at the helm. And most of all, he knew she liked him. She was a real, flesh-and-blood girl who liked him.
It’s quite different when it’s your own girl. One can talk about other girls, but when she’s, sort of, special, it’s different. It’s very different. You don’t laugh at her any more. You don’t make fun of her. You feel like you have to look after her. Protect her. A little as he felt about Sandra in the dungeons.
“Sandra!” he said out loud. I wonder what Sandra would say about Su. I bet she would like her. What was there not to like? She was pretty perfect. That’s right. Pretty and perfect. Rather like... rather like Sandra that first time he saw her. But… it was different. With Sandra he was one. With Suzy? He had no idea what he was with Suzy. But he was very determined to find out.
***
Almost as though he was a mind reader, Don called about eight, just after supper. For a moment Alex Senior had no idea who was on the line until he started speaking with his phony drawl.
“It’s y’r ol’ pal Dawn, Alex mah ol’ frieeend.”
“Don! How did you know that our own sailing season is over?”
“Ah read mah man. I noah all aboot y’re poaliar reegion. Ah read books an’ all sorts…”
“OK Don, cut the crap. How have you been keeping?”
“I just came down to Palm Beach from the Big Country. The hurricane season is over, so I can take a cruise or two. When are you and the young lady coming over?”
“I’m a working man, Don, I can’t just pop over on the spur of the moment.”
“Well, perhaps y’r young lady… no, scratch that. I’m too young to be a dirty ol’ man.” Don let out a doze of hearty laughter. “Although if you weren’t my friend…” he left that hanging.
“She loves you too, Don. No kidding. I think you’ve got under her skin.”
“I bet she says that about all the sailors.”
They sparred men’s doubletalk until Alicia who’d guessed who was calling signaled Alex. “I don’t even know his name!”
“Alicia said that she can’t be unfaithful with you because she doesn’t even know your name,” Alex said quietly but not quietly enough for his wife not to hear. She tore the tiny cell phone from Alex’s hand.
“That’s not true at all, Don. Just the contrary. I only sleep with strangers. Why, I hardly met Alex till I slept with him, only he already forgot.”
“Alice my li’l young lady! Good to hear your voice!”
“And you, Don. What I was telling Alex was that, strange though it may seem, we don’t really know your name. Even your email doesn’t spell it out.”
“Yes, you do, it’s Don,” Don replied surprised. Then he chuckled. “Don stands for DON, Donald Owen Nesbitt. On my li’l spread, before they found the gooey goo on it, there were two other Nes
bitts and one extra Donald, so they started calling me Don, like an acronym.”
“I see…” Alicia could hardly believe it but it could have happened, she supposed. Don was in a habit of pulling her leg.
“…and” Don continued, quite unabashed by the lack of conviction in her voice, “I told one guy that I’d make him an offer he couldn’t refuse… He accepted. I got eleven more wells that way. It happened a week after the Goodfather premiered in our local movie house. You know, Vito Corleone… ”
Now that made more sense. She could visualize Don as the Godfather. She also finally knew whom Don reminded her of. In certain light, towards the evening, he was a spitting image of a middle-aged Marlon Brando.
They chatted for a while. They were about to hang up when Alex came up with another question. “Just what was the offer you made the other man that he couldn’t refuse?”
There was a momentary silence, then a chuckle then outright laugh. “So you’re checking up on me, pal?”
“Just curious…” Actually that’s all Alex was. Just curious.
“Well, in exchange for the patch with eleven wells, I left him two thousand acres and four thousand head of cattle.”
“That’s it?
“Well,” Don said again, “he didn’t like the gooey stuff and I didn’t like the smell of cow’s dung. I wanted to get away, out East, and smell the Atlantic, maybe Virgin Islands, maybe some other virgins... It seemed like a fair exchange. I recon he’s got a good deal.”
It did sound like it.
“You’ll never make a real Corleone, Don. You’re too soft.”
“That’s not what my wife… never mind.”
Finally they agreed to speak again and, perhaps, spend Christmas together on Don’s Catalina. There wouldn’t be much snow, but there are worse things in life than carving a chunk of time out of Canadian Winter.
They hug up together agreeing to speak again soon.
24
Once More, My Love
The view hadn’t changed from the last time. Even the enormous sun appeared not to have changed its position. The flowering trees swayed gently as though to fan them with fragrant, balmy air. Alec and Sandra were sitting on a deep window seat, the type you find in old cloisters or in medieval castles. Only the house was quite modern, as were all the houses on the Home planet.
It had been a while.
He and Sandra both seemed a lot older. More mature was, perhaps, a better word. They were wiser. Or at least Alec seemed wiser. Sandra had always been wise.
“We have to talk,” Alec said after a prolonged silence.
Sandra said nothing. There was little point. She could read his thoughts; she knew what he was going to say even before he arranged his thoughts into words. She smiled her encouragement.
“She’s very pretty,” she said finally, when Alec remained silent.
“Am I in love?” he asked. It may have sounded ridiculous from a fourteen-year-old; but in the here-and-now, Alec looked a good twenty-five, maybe thirty. Sandra, as usual, matched his age. Earthly age didn’t really matter, but it served to remind Alec that his present boyhood had nothing to do with his actual age. Also, that on Home planet you could be any age you wanted to be.
“Are you?” she asked.
“This is not a game, Sandra.” Alec got up and started pacing the room. “I really do not know what a fourteen-year-old is supposed to do under these circumstances.”
More silence.
“Why must you know in advance? Can’t you just take it as it comes?” When Alec remained silent, she went on. “Imagine yourself to be an outside observer, who is watching a young boy’s first love. It could be a beautiful experience.”
“Is that what you’re doing?” It came out like an accusation. It wasn’t meant to be. Or maybe it was. He’d asked for help and wasn’t getting any. “I’m sorry,” he said at last. “I didn’t mean that.”
“You shouldn’t be. In a way, you are right. As I am always with you, I can’t help but be an observer. But I do not spy, if that’s what you mean. You only share with me whatever you want to share... do you understand that?”
She knew the answer, of course. He did understand that but only vaguely. It wasn’t easy to know everything and yet not spy at the same time.
“It’s a question of where you, or I, for that matter, place our attention,” she added.
This was a lot clearer. He could understand being in a crowd, among many people, but listening to only one person. It was a question of attention, and of intent.
“Precisely.” That old smile was coming back. “Friends?” she asked.
He knew that she was right. The Suzy experience was a beautiful gift that had come his way. Every friendship is a gift. It is a foretaste of what it is like to be one. To lose oneself in the desire to please another.
He teased her by not answering, but letting her read all his thoughts and emotions. Assuming she wasn’t doing that anyway. Finally they both started laughing. “I could no more be angry with you, Sandra, than with myself. Although with the latter I succeed, on occasion.”
Once more they sat without talking. The sun seemed to stand still, and even the honeybees silenced their work. Time also stopped in its progression, but that was easy down here. You created your own reality.
“I suppose you were my real first love?”
“Thank you, my lord.” Sandra bowed deeply. “But you know, my love, that you can only love me as much as you love yourself.”
“And I can love others differently?”
“Of course. Love is the only commodity in the Universe that has no restrictions on variety or quantity.”
“Some commodity,” he pondered.
“It is quite inexhaustible. It is the very ground of being.”
For an instant his last descent through the abyss hovered before his eyes. Then it was gone. But in that single instant he saw the immensity of potential created, ever ready, ever available to all who cared to take advantage of it. Free, with no strings. It was more like infinite love than anything he could think of.
“There is just no end to it, is there...”
“No end at all, my love.”
“Can we ever repay such gifts?”
“By living them. By enjoying the gifts. By enjoying the greatest gift of all...”
“...life,” he finished for her.
After some more silence, he asked, “Will I ever mature to the Next Step?”
He hadn’t thought about it recently, but a sort of latent hunger had always remained at the back of his mind. The part of him that stopped his joy from being complete. Not that he had anything to complain about. But it was there, like a memory that he hadn’t yet formed.
“We are a lot closer than you imagine,” she whispered.
And this time he detected real joy in her words. It was as though she, too, needed to take that Next Step with him. As if she needed it for reasons of her own. His mind turned to all that had happened to him since he first saw the image of his Princess in the downstairs mirror. The early stages when he was, in a way, play-acting, like saving a Princess from the dungeons. Then the many talks and discussions they’d had, until he finally took the three trips to the bottomless pit on his own. Completely alone. He’d more or less figured out their meaning, although he still needed some help with the last one. He wondered if this was the right time to ask Sandra, or was he supposed to figure it out all on his own.
You have all the facts you need, her thoughts seemed to insinuate themselves into his mind. Her lips hadn’t moved.
Am I reading your thoughts? he asked wordlessly.
And my state of mind, was her cryptic response.
But she was right. He heard her, and, to an even greater degree, he felt her presence. He was looking at her sitting opposite him on the windowsill, yet her voice and her emotions were mixed with his own.
“Is the Next Step death?” he asked, holding his breath.
“You couldn’t be farther from th
e truth!” she said out loud, laughing a mixture of joy, of uncontrolled mirth, and just a little giggle thrown in. “You simply couldn’t!”
Alec was a little lost. He was talking about a most serious Step, at least he assumed it was serious, and all he got was laughter. It may be easy for her, he thought, but it’s eating me up inside. Well, sometimes. When I think about it.
“And when you’re not thinking about Suzy?” she teased him.
“I thought you loved me!”
He tried hard to sound hurt. He didn’t quite make it. She was right, of course. Wasn’t she always? Since he had met Suzy on that sail in the middle of September, he’d hardly traveled the inner worlds, he’d hardly met with Sandra, he’d hardly done anything but think about that pixy.
Sitting here, on the windowsill of their Home away from home, Suzy took on a very different dimension. He was just as curious about her, but he was not as emotionally involved. Shouldn’t he, in a world where imagination holds sway, be even more emotional?
“How come… how come I seem to be about twenty-five or thirty?”
“You are acting your real age, here.”
“Here?”
“Here you cannot lie. Nobody can. When you reach certain maturity, it comes through. It doesn’t mean that you look a hundred when you get to be old and gray. Just the opposite. Here, you always display your real age.”
“It doesn’t make sense. An old man looking young and a teenager old?”
“You know you are far, far older than thirteen when you are here.” Sandra couldn’t help smiling.
“Thirteen and a half,” he corrected. “Hardly old.”
“Here,” Sandra continued, ignoring Alec’s interruptions, “here, you might almost say you are an ideal age. Most men think they are at their best in a decade starting at about thirty-five. Before that they feel too inexperienced, later you’re too... well, too decrepit, in a way.”
ALEC: An Action & Adventure Fantasy Novel (Alexander Trilogy) Page 19
