by Davis Bunn
“My darling Asha, for some reason you fail to notice the true man. Dino Barbieri has suffered some great blow. He has lost his ability to see himself. He takes poor care of his appearance. He lives alone, yes?”
“I . . . He went through a bad divorce a little over four years ago.”
“There. It is as I said. What you do not see is the man’s potential. He is more than handsome. He is arresting.”
Asha repressed a sudden urge to confess how much she secretly thought of Dino Barbieri. “I’ve never heard you describe anyone like that.”
“Because there are very few of them, I assure you. Your grandfather was such a man. To the outside world, a grave and difficult figure. But inwardly he was as striking as this gentleman.”
Asha felt so unsettled she changed the subject. “Let’s not forget the fact that I’m still getting over Jeffrey.”
“Ah. Jeffrey. Him.” Sonya sniffed. “Los Angeles is filled with too many of his ilk. Which was why I was so pleased when you moved here.”
Asha was still trying to come up with a response, when Dino returned to the table and asked, “You’re sure I’m not disturbing?”
“You would do us great honor,” Sonya replied. “My granddaughter has been poor company, I fear.”
“Nana,” Asha protested.
“I am simply sharing the truth with your trusted adviser, no?” To Dino, she continued, “My Asha has a patient who is troubling her such that he has invaded our time together. She mentioned it was a patient because he was already present at the table. But she has told me nothing else, I assure you.”
“I know this patient. I’m not surprised to hear she’s troubled.”
It felt to Asha as though the café gradually slipped away, leaving their table isolated from the noise and the people. The three of them were captured by a very unique stillness, one that emanated from the look shared between Asha’s grandmother and her boss. When Sonya turned back, she said, “Perhaps you should repeat for Dr. Barbieri what you just told me.”
“Call me Dino, please.”
“You do me great honor, sir. And I am Sonya.”
Asha knew her mouth was ajar. She knew something had just happened. She should be able to identify it. She was, after all, a highly trained clinician. But she was still searching for an answer when Dino turned to her and said, “‘I’m listening.’”
It was one of their little insider jokes, Dino using the line made famous by the sitcom character Frasier Crane, star of a radio talk-show. Asha told him, “The patient no longer wants me as his therapist.”
Dino shifted back in his seat. “He wants a different analyst? Again?”
“He doesn’t want any therapy. He wants me to be his friend.”
Dino’s words slowed drastically. “‘His friend.’”
“Right. And no, I don’t think he means anything romantic by this.”
“You’re sure?”
“A beauty like my granddaughter learns early and well to sense when a man is contemplating the forbidden step,” Sonya said. “If she says this gentleman is not romantically inclined, I would accept it.”
Dino nodded slowly. “Tell me what happened.”
Asha gestured at her grandmother. “Is that proper?”
“You are no longer his therapist. We have an issue. Your grandmother strikes me as a remarkable woman.” Dino turned to Sonya and then explained, “Wednesday I woke Asha with the news that one of her patients had attempted suicide.”
“Oh, my darling girl. Are you all right?”
“Yes, Nana. I’m fine. Truly.”
“She handled herself with a professionalism that would have been a credit to a seasoned therapist,” Dino assured her, then turned to Asha. “Will you tell us what happened?”
Asha found it a relief to recount her Wednesday afternoon and the previous day’s conversations. Sonya was a great listener, with her flashing dark eyes and her natural poise. As Asha described the drive to Luke Benoit’s home, Dino crossed one arm over his chest, propped his elbow on his arm, and fitted his hand around the lower half of his face. The result was an intensity that left her certain he saw nothing, thought of nothing, except her.
She related how Luke had entered the house and surveyed it with the look of a complete and utter stranger. He had to be directed upstairs to the studio apartment where he lived.
Sonya asked, “The home is his?”
“His mother was born in San Luis Obispo and met her husband at Cal Poly. The home was left to Luke by his aunt, who died childless. His parents placed it in the same trust that now also handles all his inheritance.”
Dino explained, “The patient was orphaned a year and a half ago. Traffic accident.”
“Former patient,” Sonya corrected.
For some reason that comment was enough to draw a smile from Asha’s boss. “I stand corrected.” Dino glanced from one woman to the other. “What are you planning for later?”
“I’m scheduled to meet with Luke Benoit in an hour and a half,” Asha replied. “He refused to come to my office. I told him I would stop by the guesthouse.”
Dino’s easy banter was replaced by an expression of sharp concern. “So he’s serious about halting therapy.”
“Apparently so.”
“And afterward?”
“My granddaughter is making me dinner,” Sonya replied. “She is a remarkably good cook.”
“I am certain you are the cause of that,” Dino said.
“Well, perhaps, a little.” Sonya’s gaze rested on her granddaughter. “Mostly in the manner of herbs and spices and the freshness of produce. But she has an artist’s sensibility when it comes to the actual preparations.”
Dino’s expression was almost solemn, but his midnight-blue eyes flashed with a smile that did not quite touch his lips. “An artist,” he said. “My family would adopt her on sight.”
Sonya asked, “You are native to this land?”
“Five generations and counting. My forebears emigrated from Tuscany. They worked as tenant farmers, saved every dime, and bought hill country that was considered too angled for proper farming. They established a vineyard that is still run by my relatives.”
“You broke with that tradition?”
“My grandfather was the first to attend college,” Dino replied. “There was an almighty battle, one they still talk about at family gatherings. My father teaches internal medicine at UC Irvine. By the time I left for school, it had almost become a second custom.”
“That is the way with families, no?” Sonya flashed a smile at her granddaughter. “What was once an arena of conflict becomes the lore of Sunday gatherings.”
“And good-natured arguments,” Dino said. “And excuses for behavior and habits that hold no logic whatsoever.”
“What possible role does logic play in human behavior?” Sonya demanded.
“Madame, I think you would have made an excellent clinician.”
She gave a regal gesture, sweeping that aside. “I am quite content to take pride in my granddaughter’s accomplishments.”
The two of them shared a smile. Then Dino said, “Might I suggest a change of venue? Allow me to make you dinner at my home. Call Benoit and see if he’ll join us. I’d like another opportunity to inspect this young man and his altered personality.”
“But Sonya . . .”
“If your grandmother would not mind assisting us, it might actually prove useful to meet him in such a setting. We want Benoit to see us as his allies in whatever he is going through, and get him back into regular care.”
Asha glanced at her grandmother, who nodded approval. “Thank you, Dino. We’re happy to accept.”
CHAPTER 15
Lucius found himself scarcely mobile on Thursday. He spent much of the day planted in the chairs by the fountain. His limbs were leaden, his thoughts slow and disjointed. He could not make sense of the television. Reading a newspaper was impossible. He did his best to avoid looking in the mirror.
When
Asha Meisel called, she seemed unfazed by his complaints. She offered a soothing response and spoke about the body’s need to cleanse itself. She urged him to take it easy. Rest. Sleep as much as possible. Lucius took his meals in the inn’s restaurant and only ventured outside once, when he managed a walk around the block.
Thursday night Lucius dreamed of a grave. He stood before the lumpish rectangle of recently tilled earth. A new headstone gleamed at the far end. Leaves rattled across the ground, whispering to him in a cold, dark tongue. A lone woman stood beneath the shrouded sky. He could not see her face. He did not need to. When he woke, his heart pounded and his body was drenched in sweat. And yet he felt no fear. He left his little room and seated himself on a stone bench. Moonlight sparked through the fountain. Gradually the water’s music replaced the unnerving sound of lonely leaves.
* * *
Lucius woke early on Friday, as if it was just another day. The change was as astonishing as it was welcome. He felt utterly renewed. He dressed in jeans and an unironed shirt and old sneakers, the only clean clothes he had found in that young man’s wardrobe. He entered the sunlit restaurant and ordered coffee, then took his time over the lovely breakfast buffet. He forced himself to eat slowly, and did his best to set aside the barrage of questions until he was done. Then he wandered through to the front room, where he found a forgotten LA Times. He bundled it up and carried it back to his room. There was a little rectangular table set beside the front window. He pulled over the desk chair, seated himself, then spread out the paper.
The shock was far less than he might have expected. The cars, the buildings, the speech, the rainbow variety of races, everything he had seen the previous two afternoons, had readied him for this. Lucius traced his finger over the date.
The reality of what he saw there on the paper’s front page actually helped anchor him. There was no escaping the simple facts. He had died in May of 1969 and had awoken forty-nine years later.
Abruptly the room felt too confining, so he carried the paper out to the bench beside the fountain. He took his time and read the entire paper. The advertisements were an astonishment. Especially those for cars . . .
So many cars.
Then he spotted one advertisement, and his breath locked in his throat.
* * *
The sky clouded over while he sat there by the fountain. He might have remained there all day, had the receptionist not come out and informed him that he had a phone call. Lucius followed her inside, his brain still captured by the implications of that advertisement. He was directed to the guest phone, and heard himself answer in a voice not really his, “This is . . .”
“Luke?”
“Asha. Good morning.”
“How are you?”
He looked down at the newspaper in his other hand. “Surprised by so much.”
“Do you want to talk about it?”
He heard the hint of clinical detachment, the professional seeking answers of her own. “Not just yet.”
“But you are feeling better than yesterday?”
“So much. You were right, of course. Your calls have been most reassuring.”
“I’m glad to hear it.” She hesitated, but then continued. “You met Dr. Barbieri at the hospital.”
“The doctor who was there with you, but did not speak,” Lucius recalled. At the time, the name had not registered. With so much else to take in, Lucius had failed to recognize the name of his previous doctor. He stared at the sunlit world beyond the inn’s front window. So many mysteries beyond his comprehension.
Asha said, “Dr. Barbieri is as concerned as I am about your desire to halt therapy. He has invited us to his home this evening for dinner. My grandmother is in town and has agreed to join us. Will you come?”
Lucius halted his immediate response before it was uttered. That no dinner would change his mind regarding future therapy sessions. That he disliked intensely the idea of being manipulated by the medical establishment. The fact was, he faced a universe of mysteries, and he needed allies. Something told him he could trust this young woman with his secret. He took a long breath, then decided, “I would be honored to accept.”
* * *
Lucius returned to his room for the wallet he had found in the upstairs apartment. He knew Asha was addressing a young man who was not there. If he was to seek Asha’s help, he would have to tell her the truth. The inescapability of this fact actually helped seal him into the here and now.
He returned to the lobby, asked directions from the receptionist, took a card with the guesthouse’s address in case he got lost, then started walking.
Some street names were familiar, of course. He had visited San Luis Obispo on a number of occasions. But many intersections were not as he recalled, which unsettled him. He wondered if he might have passed through some unseen juncture, and entered an imperfect mirror image of the world he had left behind. He took a left off Pacific Street onto Broad, crossed Marsh, and then turned right on Monterey. He passed the Museum of Art, circled around the old Mission, then took Chorro back to Higuera. He entered a men’s shop and selected a pair of khaki trousers and a white knit shirt. The prices were shocking, but he was going to dinner with Asha and her associate that evening, and he wanted to wear something nice. Everything he had taken from the stranger’s apartment was unironed and slovenly. Lucius added a woven leather belt and dock shoes and socks and underwear to the pile, then handed over the credit card in his wallet and waited for the plastic to melt. But the salesperson merely smiled and asked him to sign. The amount of money he had just spent caused his eyes to water.
He walked back to McLintock’s for the finest burger of his life. When he was done and the waitress had removed his empty plate, Lucius took the folded sheet of paper from his rear pocket. Slowly he displayed the advertisement he had torn from the LA Times.
There across the top was his own name.
Quarterfield Motors was apparently having its annual spring bash. New and used cars. Employee pricing on most models. Seventy-two hours only.
The advertisement covered two entire pages. Lucius hated to think how much that must have cost. The page was split into distinct segments, each advertising a different line. Two were German, Mercedes and Porsche, neither of which he had carried. Two were British, Land Rover and Jaguar. More newcomers. Then the familiar Cadillac and Buick logos, but minus the Oldsmobile and Pontiac lines that Lucius had always joined with the two other high-end GM models. And Lexus, whatever that was. And, apparently, Chrysler and Jeep were now sold as one line.
Slowly and deliberately he refolded the advertisement and put it back in his pocket. He paid for his meal and rejoined the pedestrian flow. He retraced his steps to the guesthouse, where he unpacked his purchases. He took a shower, then lay down on the bed. His limbs felt leaden and his head ached. Lucius wondered if this was some lingering aftereffect from the overdose he had supposedly taken.
He slept and dreamed of an empire that was no longer his to claim.
CHAPTER 16
It was five o’clock on Friday afternoon, and Asha was late. Lucius stood on the guesthouse’s shaded veranda and took pleasure in the swallows cutting swaths from the cloudless sky. Then he heard the sound of a racing engine, followed by Asha flying into the guesthouse’s circular drive. She signaled urgently for him to climb in. Asha had the car in motion the instant Lucius shut his door. She told him, “I got held up with a patient.”
He gripped the door handle as she took a curve at high speed. “I’m so sorry.”
“For what?”
“For damaging your schedule. Interrupting other appointments you no doubt had scheduled by . . . this incident.”
Asha cast him a hard look, but did not speak.
“I am grateful that you would invite me for dinner—”
“I didn’t. Dino did.” She halted at an intersection and drummed the steering wheel. “This light takes forever.”
“In any case I apologize for the disruption I have no dou
bt caused.”
At that moment the light turned green. She powered through the intersection, then said, “I had planned to go home, change, pick up my grandmother, then come by and fetch you. But I’m late, this is the first time I’ve ever been to Dino’s home, and my place is twenty minutes closer to Morro Bay. So now . . .”
It was clear enough what disturbed her. “You dislike having me know where you live.”
“It breaks several dozen different protocols,” Asha agreed.
Lucius decided it was not the time to point out how he was about to reveal rule-breaking secrets of his own. “I will respect your privacy. And I am grateful for this gift of trust.”
Asha looked like she was about to speak, but shook her head and remained silent. Twelve harrowing minutes later, they pulled up in front of an attractive apartment block, red bricks and stone, four stories, and set back in a well-kept lawn. Asha cut the motor and leapt out. “I won’t be long. Will you stay here?”
“Of course. I am absolutely . . .” He stopped because she was already gone.
Ten minutes later, perhaps less, Asha returned wearing a pleated khaki linen skirt and white blouse that set off her hair, now braided in a long raven rope that nestled on her right shoulder. With her walked a queen.
Asha was a most attractive young lady. This older woman was something else entirely. She was stately without effort, and beautiful in a timeless manner. All the foreign elements hinted at in Asha’s demeanor were on full display here. The impenetrable gaze, the high cheekbones, the impossibly erect carriage. She wore a simple off-white frock with a gold medallion at the throat of her high collar. The woman was understated, elegant, and completely in control.
Lucius rose from the car and walked forward to meet them. Asha said, “May I present Sonya Meisel, my grandmother. She is . . .” Asha’s gaze tracked behind them, and her expression melted. “Oh, no, no, no.”
Lucius turned in time to observe a gleaming red sports car rush toward them. The horn beeped, as rich a sound as the engine. Lucius recognized the Ferrari’s prancing horse on the hood and door panel.
