Mayne Attraction: In The Spotlight

by Ann Mauren

  “Given that the stone here already belonged to you, I’m not sure if this ring qualifies as a proper engagement ring. I could make you something else…if you’d like.”

  He was looking at the ring while he spoke.

  I sniffed and used the napkin in my free hand to dry my face. “I wouldn’t waste your time on that.”

  Besides, that finger is maxed out on parking space as it is...

  “You know, there’s no reward for good intentions. I need you to agree to marry me before I can make good on any of those.”

  He smiled holding my eyes, searching my expression.

  At that moment the scopophobic sensation, which I had completely lost track of, resurfaced, weighing heavily on my neck. My eyes followed the unseen source to its origin. At a window seat, close to the door, over Gray’s shoulder, sat Ash, facing me, staring at me, a depth of emotion and turmoil in his eyes I had never seen before, even that fateful day at Tinseltown.

  Had he heard our conversation? Or was he reacting to the tears on my face? The tears accompanied by a joyful smile that would be difficult to misinterpret, especially as the man sitting with me played absentmindedly with a new ring on my left hand. I felt ill. I felt horrible and evil and mean. I looked away and back down at our hands. Gray had just asked me to marry him and I had to get my face together before I mortally wounded him, too.

  Stalling for time I said, “Can you ask me this again, when I’m not such a mess? In a more memorable place, instead of over a cheeseburger?”

  I laughed a short laugh, but it sounded off, and I knew it.

  Gray had seen the turn of my countenance as it played out, and then combined with my request, he too must have sensed the watching eyes. He leaned out of the booth to look behind towards the direction of the windows and the door. The table was empty.

  Chapter 31 – Scrapbook

  I already missed the warmth and comfort of my king size bed. As I dawdled under the covers, enjoying the novelty of a morning to sleep in, I contemplated my fascination with contrasts, and how fully such matters could be explored and evaluated during the coming week while camping. We had just spent our last night at The Fairmont Banff Springs for the next three nights, though we did not check out because apparently the expense account Gray was working from funded high end hotel rooms whether they were being used or not. In this instance they would serve as very expensive closets for our things while we went backpacking.

  I was starting to become anxious over the fact that Ash seemed to have disappeared. I knew I should call or text him, but I was having trouble figuring out how to begin, and even more trouble with how a conversation with him should end.

  So I kept procrastinating, hoping that he would contact me—as if somehow that would make it easier for me—but he didn’t. In fact, when I heard noises from next door and peeked out into the hall, I found that people with two small children and loads of luggage were moving in. My heart sank at the realization of what that might mean. Had he given up on me so quickly? Without even talking to me about it first? Would he really just walk away, even after we were supposed to be engaged as of two days ago? If that was the case, then he definitely had made it easy for me. He was certainly honorable enough for that. But my heart ached for him. I tried to put myself in his position, viewing the situation from his perspective while turning the ring he had given me back and forth in the morning light, streaming in a warm ray through the glass. It felt like I was sinking in emotional quicksand. Contemplating the contrast in his expression when he had given me the ring as opposed to the look in his eyes the evening before at the pub brought tears to my own.

  Gray came in on me through the unlocked adjoining door just as I had sunk to my lowest point. He was very sweet, opting not to ask me questions I wouldn’t be able to answer any way. In fact, he didn’t say anything, he just led me from where I was standing in front of the dresser over to the couch and sat me down on the edge, sitting close by me with one arm around my shoulder and the other holding my hand. He had picked up a box of tissues along the way and they were now conveniently resting on my lap.

  After I had literally blown through what was left in the tissue box I began to settle and smooth out. Then I realized I still had the aquamarine in my hand and that Gray was looking at it with me. I was shocked at my reckless carelessness. But then I decided that maybe it was for the best. Why should I hide anything from him? Hiding things from each other is how we found ourselves in this position in the first place.

  When I felt like I had a voice again, I began.

  “I imagine you’re wondering how I came to have this, aren’t you?”

  I smiled weakly. His eyes, which had been gazing at the ring, turned up to gaze into mine. His expression was unreadable.

  “I saw it in a jewelry store window. Huh. I guess that would have been about this time last year. It was the most beautiful ring I had ever seen. I wanted it. I stood there looking at it for a very long time, fantasizing about what it would be like to wear it on my hand. Then, not too long ago, Ash surprised me with it when I agreed to marry him. I never dreamed it had a sister.”

  I was looking at the ring while I spoke. I couldn’t bear to look at Gray, too fearful of his reaction, and worried it might spark a whole new and embarrassing episode of copious lacrimony (uncontrollable crying).

  I put the aquamarine on the third finger of my right hand. It was slightly tight, but it fit. Then I bent my fingers and pressed the ends of my knuckles from each hand together comparing the rings as they sat side by side. They were deep shades of pink and green, with opposite proportions of blue: the bixbite just a hint, and the aquamarine more blue than green, giving them each their own rare and resplendent coloring.

  Since I had decided to be open, I wanted to give Gray that opportunity as well.

  “What did you mean when you said your Dad promised to keep an eye on me?”

  Though, I already knew the answer. It was a test to see if he felt the same way I did about honesty and openness.

  He looked deep into my eyes. Then he kissed me. It wasn’t long or deep. It was soft and sweet and reassuring.

  “I’ll be right back.”

  And he stepped through the adjoining door into his room. When he returned he was carrying a leather binder. He sat back down next to me and examined my face once more.

  “Now, you have to understand something. This kept me going all that time I was waiting for you. It was my life line. It made life bearable for me. It made my week, every week. And I just wanted you to be safe. So please don’t be angry.”

  Then he opened the binder. Inside clear sheet protectors held in place by a golden and brushed leather version of a three ring binder were color images on letter size paper, laid out sort of like a newsletter, or a magazine article with captions under the pictures and paragraphs providing more detail on the activities and events pictured.

  Each page had between two and four shots. Each shot was a picture of me.

  Gray looked at me warily but began to relax as he sensed my lack of surprise, anger or revulsion, or even embarrassment. But that gave way to confusion as it registered with him that I should have all of those reactions and worse, in the realization that he possessed a secretly compiled scrapbook of the last year of my life in his hands.

  It was interesting and educational to see where it started and exactly what they had captured. I had struck upon them very early indeed—within the first few months, in fact. The very first picture was of me outside on the deck, just staring off into space on a warm spring day—the leaves on the trees were barely there. I was probably thinking about Gray. At that point I rarely thought of anything else.

  I noticed that there was no mention of the drug store or Great Wolf incidents, but that made sense when I considered how explanations of either situation would have gone over with the client.

  The pages of the spring were very boring. In the beginning, some weeks only had pictures of the back of my head in a car as I was being dri
ven back and forth to school. Those were the really bad times, when I slept as much as I could stand. Then there was a picture of me on the Belle of Louisville with Mom and Hoyt. In the picture I looked oblivious, though I wasn’t really by that point.

  My finger played over the picture of me in my mom’s Derby outfit the day I went to the downtown branch of The Bank of Louisville.

  Gray chuckled and said, “I really liked the hat.”

  But I kept moving, not wanting to explain.

  You could see where things began to pick up for me life-wise when my pictures started to include my new Goth friends. I had been looking silently at the pages until this point. When I saw a zoom in on Trevor looking particularly scary, (one of the few times I wasn’t in the frame) I laughed out loud.

  “What did you think of my new friends?” I inquired, unable to hide my amusement.

  “I was worried at first. Especially when I thought you might get hit on by that,” and he pointed at Trevor. “But it was obvious that you were very happy so I figured it was a good thing. A strange thing, but a good thing.”

  “Just like me,” I said, a little bit sourly.

  “A very good thing,” he replied and leaned in to kiss my cheek.

  The pictures of my driving lessons in a cherry red muscle car were funny to look at. Apparently we had not been alone at the Kentucky Speedway or the DMV. And somehow they were able to get a copy of my driver’s license to include with the report for that week.

  Gray said, “You looked really good behind the wheel of a Corvette. Would you like me to get you one like that?”

  I was fairly sure he was joking but I played along any way and said, “Sure, so long as it’s pink.”

  He chuckled and kissed my cheek again, squeezing me in a tight embrace this time.

  I was only about half way through but I flipped to the end, out of curiosity. To my surprise, the pictures on the last page were from this week. There was a shot of Gray and me sitting together on the banks of Bow River. Next was an image of us walking into the dining room downstairs. It had not been my imagination. People in the picture were definitely looking at me. Another shot captured our lunch together at Lake Louise. I was staring off into space again, but in a different galaxy—no surprise there.

  Nothing I had seen so far had made me too uncomfortable, not until I reached the last picture. It was on the flat boulder at Lake Oesa, and I had Gray’s face in my hands, kissing away at him. That was damaging. It was probably exactly why I hadn’t heard from Ash, and might never again—that along with whatever he had seen and heard at the pub.

  “That picture alone was worth the entire program. They got the best moment of my life on film.”

  Gray’s smile was decidedly victorious looking.

  I closed the book.

  “You don’t want to look at the rest of it?” he asked, clearly disappointed.

  “I don’t need to.” I replied.

  I could feel the emotions coming back and I knew some of the things I would see next would cause them to spill over in the form of more tears.

  Gray examined my face while I stared straight ahead, scenes of my life in the spotlight scrolling through my mind. Finally he sighed and took my hand in his.

  “You took that remarkably well, Ellie. You don’t seem as surprised or upset as I thought you’d be. Why is that?”

  He was very sincere. Now I was the one being tested.

  “As of the Belle of Louisville picture, I knew about the ‘transparent’ security team. I found out about them by accident, but I decided to play along because they turned out to be very helpful,” I said, with a tone of finality.

  Gray wore a dumbfounded expression—something I’d never, ever seen—it was very satisfying.

  “Do you mind telling me how?”

  I just looked at him and shrugged.

  “You’re amazing. When are you going to stop surprising me?” he asked, his hand framing my chin.

  I switched gears while he was being pleased with me.

  “Does it upset you for me to wear this?”

  My mind had settled on the most helpful of security agents as I fingered the aquamarine he had given me. He thought about that for a while, and I knew he was deciding between what he wanted to say and what he thought I’d want to hear.

  He drew in a breath and sighed in a long exhale.

  “As long as it doesn’t upset you. I had your hand in mind when I designed it. As long as you wear it on the right side, I’ll never complain.”

  Then he tenderly kissed my left hand, starting with the bixbite ring and continuing in a line along the top of my hand. Gently turning my wrist upward, he kissed there too, following a path all the way to the inside of my elbow. For movements that had nothing to do with my lungs, his actions made it surprisingly hard for me to breathe.

  I had been longing for the time when I could wear my aquamarine openly. I had no idea what bittersweet emotions the fulfillment of that wish would involve. The two incredible rings, mirroring each other on both my hands made very fitting symbols of the men they represented. The aquamarine stone and Ash: I had stumbled across them both, stared long and hard, imagining that each was mine, and somehow I got my wish for both at Lake Louise. The bixbite stone and Gray: Both were something my grandpa wanted me to have, and I discovered at Lake Oesa that both had been mine all along without realizing it.

  I couldn’t rightfully hold on to both rings or men. There was no justice in that. But parting with either would be horribly painful for me, and potentially fatal for one of them—if my own reaction to being on the receiving end of a rejection from either of them was any guide.

  Then it occurred to me that the solution lay in the notion that I probably shouldn’t be wearing any rings at all.

  Chapter 32 – Pitch Pile

  After the bizarre trip down memory lane, Gray put the scrapbook away and led me into his room where our backpacking equipment was arranged on the floor in front of the window. He’d had his things shipped to the hotel from his place in Raleigh, and at his instruction, I’d had mine shipped from home, though nothing was technically mine. The tent, sleeping bag and mat, even the backpack itself were all from the Lidia free store. Now we were going to check through our gear and provisions in preparation for our outdoor adventure, which would begin early the next day.

  Not long after, there was a knock on the door and Gray jumped up to go answer it. I don’t know who I was expecting, though the unreasonable side of me was hoping it might somehow be Ash. Instead, he greeted a petite, dark haired lady who marched purposefully right into the center of the room. She was dressed very casually in jeans and a tee shirt with a Banff National Park logo on the chest. She wore her longish curly brown hair in a braid, very similar to the way I had my own hair tied back at the moment. She was one of those very healthy but slightly weathered looking people who could be in their twenties or forties, with no way but a birth certificate to be certain. Her eyes were dark and piercing, and she exuded business-like confidence as she assessed the look of the room, our gear, and Gray and me.

  “Ellie, I’d like you to meet Elsie. She’s going to be our guide this week.”

  Even in a formal introduction, Gray used my sobriquet (an affectionate or humorous nickname). In fact, I had never heard him speak my given name. I wondered if he actually knew what it was. I tagged that question for follow-up.

  Rising to my feet, I approached to shake her hand. She seemed so businesslike that I almost aborted my opening joke, but on an impulse I pushed ahead anyway.

  “So you’re the person who’ll be taking me to pee in the woods at night? It’s very nice to meet you.”

  There was that normal interval of time where people questioned whether they’d heard me right and then decided on the proper reaction. To her credit, she accomplished these mental calculations faster than most and laughed out loud, with pleasure.

  Then she said, “Well, it’s nice to meet you too. But you should know it will cost you somet
hing extra if you expect me to wipe!”

  I bet we could expense that.

  I loved her immediately, and apparently my joke did positive things to her estimation of me.

  After some opening pleasantries with Gray, who apparently knew her from before, she explained to me that before she would accompany any hiker into the woods as a guide it was mandatory that she be allowed to check the contents of their pack and the quality of their gear. I could see the logic when she explained a few of the scenarios that had led to this unbendable rule.

  “First there was the time that these two guys forgot to pack the tent they were supposed to be sharing and we all three had to cram into my one person digs.”

  She shook her head and laughed.

  “Then there was the time this idiot brought fresh beef to make chili around the campfire. We had two grizzlies show up before dinner to help unpack the meat. After that I decided I wasn’t going to die of vicarious stupidity and I always check packs or I don’t go. No offense,” she said, giving me a rueful smile.

  I wondered if she was arktophobic (fear of bears) or just idiophobic (fear of idiots).

  “I know I can trust Gray here, but I’m afraid I’ll have to check your stuff out before we go. I’ve seen things in people’s packs I never would have known to ask about. It’s just safer if I have a look for myself, little girl.”

  That was kind of funny because she wasn’t all that much taller or bigger than me. In fact she was probably smaller in her frame than me, just more muscular than me over top it. I bet we could probably wear the same clothes. I loved it that she was going to be our fearless leader as we trekked though the wilderness. I had found another heroine to admire and I couldn’t be happier.

  She got to work examining my things. I had no fears though. I knew everything would be just as good and appropriate as anything Gray possessed, possibly better.

  “Is this your gear?” she asked as she picked up the neatly compacted tent that looked brand new, though I had been assured that Hayden Christensen had once been a guest inside it.