by Amy Field
Jacob ignored the crazy. “Catherine Cory,” he said simply, those unembarrassed tears back in his eyes. “Will you do me the honor of being my wife?”
And she broke out into tears; happy, spontaneous, unplanned for tears. She cried and snotted all over the front of her shirt, but that didn’t seem to bother her at all, nor did Jacob seem to notice.
“Yes,” she cried at last. “Yes! Yes! Yes!” And the dozen or so other people who had been on the trip with them broke into spontaneous applause. For the first time since she first started racing, Catherine felt like she was doing what she had been made to do.
After an engagement dinner and a hearty round of congratulator libations from the rest of their fellow hikers, Jacob and Catherine decided to go on a little hike of their own. Leaving the village proper, they walked a mile or so to an overlook directly above the lodge. It gave them a full view, not only of the opposing mountains and stars, but of the village below. The lights of the village sent up a vague glow, like the whole town had a kind of florescent halo. And the starts were dancing as they had been that first night.
Jacob was holding Catherine close with his left arm. She snuggled into him and looked up into those eyes, the eyes into which she’d fallen just a few weeks ago, and which she now hoped never to crawl back out of. Much to her surprise, however, their usually lively temper was clouded again with tears.
“Why are you crying, Jacob?”
She smiled down at her and sniffled, raising his right arm to wipe his eyes and nose with the cuff of his sleeve. “I’m just, I’m just so happy.” He raised his eyes up to heaven. “I really never thought I could be happy again, after Mona.”
She smiled through the tears welling up in her own eyes as well. Then, reaching up with both hands, she pulled his head down far enough to kiss him tenderly on the forehead. His hair smelt of the forest; of pine and cedar and that crisp morning frost.
“I’m happy too, and I’m sure that Mona would be happy for you.”
“I see her in you, you know?”
“You do?” She didn’t know whether to be flattered or bothered.
He sniffled again. “Ya, is in your eyes. You are both so ambitious, both so stubborn. You set your heart on something and then your mind finds a way to get you there.”
Now it was Catherine’s turn to sigh deeply. They were treading on dangerous territory here, and she didn’t want to turn things south on the night of their engagement. At the same time, she didn’t want to start off their life together in a lie.
“Jacob,” she said, after a few moment’s silence. “How much do you love me?”
His face broadened and his eyes danced again. “You know, so much,” he said, pulling his arms out and holding them wide. “As deep as the great seas and as broad as these high mountains.”
Catherine smiled and took in the range through her tears. “And why do you love me so?”
Now it was Jacob’s turn to bite his lip. He seemed to be weighing lots of options, then simply shrugged his shoulders and said, “I love you because I love you.” He reached out and pulled her close again, kissing her on the top of her head. “Love is like that; our heads search for explanations, but our hearts are content simply with knowing that love loves love.”
“And nothing could ever change that?”
He gazed down at her, pain in his eyes. “Of course not, Sweetheart. That’s what love is, ‘for better for worse, for richer for poorer, in sickness and in health.’ You could grow old and ugly, become crippled or crazy, you would still be my Catherine; I would still be your Jacob. You have captured my heart, endlessly and hopelessly; now I am yours, period.”
Catherine treasured his words, but wondered if he meant them. She wanted so desperately to tell him the truth about herself, but tonight was just so perfect, she just couldn’t bear to ruin it. The truth could wait, at least I it’s entirety. For tonight, baby steps would do.
“Jacob, baby,” she cooed, looking up into his eyes. “We have so much to work out yet: where to live, where to work, what we’ll do…”
He pressed a finger to her lips. “Sssssh, one step at a time. There’s no need to figure everything out at once. To everything there is a season…”
“Turn? Turn? Turn?’
“Pardon me?”
“Never mind. It’s an old song.”
“I’d say. Ecclesiastes.”
“What?”
“It’s in the Bible.”
Catherine screwed up her face. “I’m saying that I have a life back home in the States. I have some things I need to tend to. It might take some time.”
“I’ve waited my whole life. I think I can manage a little longer.”
Damn that smile. It was so winning.
“And my family. They need to meet you.”
“Nothing could make me happier. Your parents must be very special people to have raised a daughter like you.”
She nodded, biting her lip. “I still need to return next week. Come with me?”
Jacob seemed to ponder that one for a moment. “I’ll need to make some calls tomorrow, but assuming the next group scheduled is small enough, I think Dina can manage on her own.”
Catherine breathed a sigh of relief. “One step at a time,” she told herself. “One step at a time.”
The following week’s group was much smaller, and they weren’t going nearly as far. It was a perfect chance for Dina to gain some experience on her own. So after a brief overnight to Jacob’s parents, who were some of the most genuine and friendly people Catherine had ever met, they were on a plane from Zurich back to Chicago. Her parents would meet her there and they would make the long drive back to Kansas City together. They would stay there for a long weekend with her parents, her brother, and his family, and then fly out to New York for Catherine to deal with some of the fallout from her publicist and to figure out next steps in terms of her career. Her mind was spinning with how to make all of this work, but for the first time in a long while, she felt hopeful about her life.
Jacob looked surprised when she rose as they called for preferred boarding. “No, wait, Catherine,” he said. “This is just the first call. They’ll announce coach in a few minutes.”
She looked down at him in his seat and smiled. “But, Honey,” she smiled. “We’re not flying coach.”
Jacob boarded the plane in a bit of a daze. They settled together in their seats, alone two to one side of the aircraft aisle. “I have never flown first class, Catherine. And I’m not complaining, but wasn’t it expensive enough to buy me a ticket at the last minute?”
She gave him her bravest smile. “Don’t worry about it, Sweetheart. I do have some money, and we’ll only be making our first trip together once.”
This seemed to satisfy him and he took her hand. Before long they were both dozing in and out as the plane made it’s way back across Europe, over the Atlantic, and into Chicago.
The whole last half of the flight Catherine’s stomach was in knots. She visited the bathroom twice to vomit, and assured Jacob that it was only the flight and the food. He clearly didn’t believe her but he didn’t press her either.
As they landed the stewardess informed the passengers that it was now okay to use their cell phones. Catherine made a split-second decision and texted her folks. “Arrived on time,” she wrote. “But held up at customs. Be half an hour late.”
“Everything alright?” Jacob asked.
“It’s fine. Mom and Dad are just held up in traffic. They said we should find a restaurant in the airport and get something to eat while we wait. They’ll text once they’re here.”
So, after managing customs and gathering baggage, they found themselves in O’Brien’s, a quaint little Irish pub inside O’Hare. They sipped shandies and ate take-away Japanese from the restaurant next door in the food court.
“Catherine,” Jacob said, leaning in and looking at her intently with those gold-flecked eyes of his. “What’s wrong? What are you afraid to tell me?”
> Her lips began to quiver and the tears welled up. “Oh, Jacob,” she blustered. “I’m so sorry. I’m not who you think I am.”
“Catherine, Catherine.” He took her hands in one of his and slid the food and drinks to one side of the table with the other. Then he got up and moved to her side of the booth. “This has all happened so fast. Of course there are things we don’t know about each other yet. I’m just looking forward to knowing you better and loving you more each and every day.”
She looked up at him with fear in her eyes. “My name’s not Catherine, it’s Katie.”
There was a deadly silence, and for just a moment Catherine worried that he might know who Katie Cory was. She needn’t have worried.
His gentle laugh rumbled from deep in his chest and he drew her close. “Catherine? Katie? I’ve been Jacob and Yakov too, at different times. You having a nickname back home doesn’t scare me, Dear One, and it doesn’t make you any different a person than the one I know and love.”
“I don’t only work in advertising for sporting goods, I’m one of the models.”
“Of course you are, you’re ravishingly beautiful.”
“I’m not poor. I make a lot of money.”
“Well, obviously, you could afford to hire me.”
“Dammit, Jacob, this isn’t some kind of joke. I’m not Catherine Cory, some hayseed from Kansas City. I’m Katie Cory, a professional speed skater and the U.S.’s best chance for a gold at next year’s Olympic games.”
His brow furrowed a little bit and he looked deep into her eyes. She wanted desperately to look away in shame, but the way he held her gaze wouldn’t permit it.
“Well, then I guess we do have a problem, then.”
Her heart sank and her face started to flush. She steeled herself for the worst. “Jacob, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to deceive you but…”
“I won’t know whether to root for the States or Switzerland next year!” And just like that, with a kiss on the head and another generous hug, she realized that her deceit wasn’t as clever as she thought it was, and that the person she’d hurt most in all of this was herself.
Her parents were waiting as they approached the arrival door. There was a moment when her dad and Jacob were both sizing one another up; it was primal, almost animal. Then, all of a sudden, her dad extended a hand and brought her fiancée into the largest bear hug she’d ever seen. Her father seldom hugged even her. This was big.
The trip back to Kansas City was long but uneventful. Jacob told stories of growing up in the Alps, life in the mountains, and of his time in the Swiss Guard. Katie’s mother, who was much more of a talker, told him about life in the Midwest, about how they had started as a newlywed couple on a small farm and running a single gas station by themselves, and how they had grown their business and their family. And, of course, Jacob wound up getting the essential highlights of Katie’s skating career as the stories were told. Periodically he would look over at her and smile, as though something were clicking about her inside of his head. By the end of the trip it was like all of them had been family.
The next morning Katie’s mother was up before the rest to fix some breakfast. She was surprised when she came through the living room to find Jacob’s large frame folded into a pretzel on the couch, cozy under a blanket. When Katie rose herself a few minutes later her mother asked her about it.
“Did you guys get into a fight last night, Sweetheart? I made up the room for the both of you.”
It took Katie a minute to figure out what she was talking about. “What? No, no, of course not. We’re just not sleeping together.”
Her mother was in the middle of cracking an egg for pancakes but stopped mid-crack. “You’re what?”
“We’re not sleeping together. He wants to wait until we’re married.”
Her mother blushed and smiled at the same time. “Why, Katie, that is so mature of you. I just, I never expected, because I know…”
She’d come to her mother herself and asked to be put on birth control at sixteen, and she never made any serious effort to hide her sexual activity from her parents. This was new territory for them both.
“Is he some kind of religious nut?” Her mother’s face showed real concern.
“I don’t think he’s any kind of nut, though he certainly seems to have a close relationship to the Man Upstairs. He’s just principled, Mom, and very, very strong-willed.”
“Like your father.”
“Mmmmm. He reminds me a lot of Dad.”
“I can see that. You know, when your father and I first got together we had to work all of this stuff out too.”
Katie stuck her fingers in her ears. “Lalala, lalala, I don’t want to hear about your and dad’s sex lives when you were in your twenties! Lalala, lalala!”
Her mom flicked a towel at her playfully. “Not just that, though that was important too. No, we had to figure out how to sort out our dreams, and which we could pursue together, and which ones we’d have to let go of for the sake of the other.”
“Like what?”
“Well, you know, I was in pre-med when your father first asked me out.”
“You were?”
Her mom nodded. “Top of my class. And when I graduated I was offered a top slot at the Mayo Clinic School of Medicine, full scholarship.”
Even Katie knew that was a big deal. “Why didn’t you do it?”
Well your dad had already opened his first gas station while we were in school. In those days he worked full time, went to school full time, and managed to find some time for me. I knew that long-term, if we were going to make his business work and have a family, something would have to give. So I let me dream of being a doctor go.”
“Mom!” Katie gushed. “I had no idea. I never meant to get in the way of your dreams.”
Her mother shook her head. “Honey, you never did. That’s the whole point. It’s not that dreams are these fixed points, that they never grow or change. I dreamed of being a doctor for a long time, all through high school and college, but when I met your father I started dreaming new dreams. It didn’t make the old ones bad, and it didn’t make the new ones better. And you wanna know what’s really crazy? I never would have met your dad but for that old dream that I had to let go to be with him.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, I got assigned to tutor your dad for organic chemistry. That’s how we first met.”
“So without the dream you wound up having to let go…”
“I never would have known the dream I was able to realize.”
Katie fell silent, and the silence was awkward. Her mother kept flipping pancakes and then opening the oven to put them on a warming plate inside.
“Mom, are you saying I need to put aside my dreams of skating to…”
Her mother held up her hand, which happened to hold a spatula dripping of pancake batter. “I’m saying no such thing. It would be wrong for either your father or I to try and convince you what to do with your dreams—they’re yours, after all, that’s the whole point. What I am saying is that this relationship with Jacob is new, and that you come from different cultures and different worlds. If the dream you choose to pursue is a life together, then it’s going to require sacrifice from the both of you, and you’re probably going to wind up dreaming something together that you can’t even fathom right now.”
Her mother’s words stuck with her, and she knew that they were true. She just wasn’t sure how to make them come true in the concrete. A few days later, once she and Jacob flew back to New York, she got a chance to try it out.
After they landed at LaGuardia, Katie made a beeline for the limo service counter. They had a car waiting.
“Wait, Catherine,” Jacob said, strangely out of breath for one so athletic. Airports seemed to exhaust him. “Can’t we just take a cab? Or maybe the subway?”
Katie gave him her best smile. “It’s okay, Honey. I have a driver. In fact, he’s waiting for us. This will make things much, much
easier.”
They rode in silence to Katie’s building in Midtown. Her condo was on the 17th floor of a highrise. The doorman greeted her cheerily, “Good morning, Ms. Cory! I see your trip was successful!”
“It was, Gary, thanks,” she replied. She smiled at the man but did not stop to introduce Jacob, who had awkwardly set down his bags to shake the old man’s hand. They shook and he smiled tightly, and together they rode the elevator up to her floor.
The condo was not palatial by any means, especially midtown standards, but it was a comfortable three bedroom, two bath affair, with a large inset 70-inch flatscreen, expensive furniture, and one whole room dedicated to Katie’s skating, both her trophies and her equipment.
Jacob set his bags down heavily by the door and sighed. “Catherine,” he said. “You said you weren’t rich. What is this? A driver? A doorman? A mansion? I know that you didn’t want to overwhelm me at first, but I’m feeling pretty overwhelmed right now.”
Katie set her own bags down on the couch and came back over to Jacob, leading him to an oversized leather recliner. “Ssshhh, Baby,” she said. “I know that this is a lot, and it won’t always be this way. But it’s how things are now so just enjoy it. Why don’t you take a little nap while I settle back in? Then tonight we’ll meet some of my friends for dinner and drinks, maybe go dancing.”
Jacob smiled at that. “I couldn’t imagine anything better than dinner and dancing with you, and of course I want to meet your friends.”
Jacob slept fitfully but rested in the chair, and Katie buzzed around the apartment, trying to get rid of anything that wouldn’t fit into her new life with Jacob. She threw out the condoms from her bed stand, erased her Internet histories, cleaned out the liquor cabinet, and in general tried to make the place look more simple. By the time Jacob rose she was dressed in an expensive but relatively modest cocktail dress and had reservations at one of the hottest new restaurants in the city.
