Goodbye, Orchid

by Carol Van Den Hende

  Politely, he turned to ask her co-worker about his position. While the minion spouted crap about the importance of his role, Orchid stared unseeing at Phoenix’s dark wool coat, draped over his left arm, trying to regain control of her emotions, praying her chin wasn’t quivering as badly as the rest of her.

  “Well, happy holidays,” Phoenix said.

  She looked up. “You’re doing well?” she asked, beginning a conversation even though he was ending his.

  “I’m okay,” he said, radiating exuberance that comes from being in love. The thought struck her. He’s in love with Liv.

  “Glad you’re well. Good, that’s good,” she replied.

  “You too. Bye, Orchid.” He wrapped his arm around Liv. They made their way, slowly picking their way through the crowd.

  Orchid felt discarded, deserted again, cast off like last-season’s salt-stained boots.

  Jerk.

  Orchid watched them step away, tentative in their movement as if so wrapped up in each other, they weren’t focused on the task of leaving the party. Phoenix whispered into Liv’s ear and she looked up at him with tenderness. Pain vacuumed air out of her.

  At the bar, Orchid changed her mind.

  “White wi-ne?” her co-worker asked.

  “Double vodka on the rocks,” she ordered, then pushed her way to the bathroom.

  CHAPTER 35

  YOU DON’T UNDERSTAND ME

  Phoenix

  Well, that sucked.

  Orchid was both at the top and bottom of the list of people Phoenix hoped to see. In some ways, it shouldn’t have been a surprise to see her at an event hosted by the media agency for her brands. And she looked beautiful, except for the loser she was with.

  Rina had recently convinced Phoenix to work toward giving up his cane, which was not a problem in most places. He’d been proud that at this point he barely had a limp. However, when they arrived, Phoenix took one look at the dense, jostling crowd and pictured an inebriated guest sprawling him on his ass.

  “Good thing you’re here,” Phoenix said to Liv.

  “Oh yeah?” she asked, lifting a brow. “Emergency email? Need a deck sent to a client?”

  “Nope, has more to do with your boss’ limitations.” She shot him a look.

  “Listen, I’m not so good without my cane in crowds. Even without a drink. I don’t want to end up on the floor in there.”

  She wiped all attitude off her face. “Sure, Mr. Walker, what do you need?” She looked him up and down with concern.

  He swallowed, hating to break his hardheaded promise of complete independence. “I don’t want any calls to HR on Monday about harassment,” he instructed. “I’m just going to put my arm around you for support, okay?”

  “Of course, sure,” she agreed. He leaned on her, and she gingerly slipped her arm around his waist.

  “I just need to find my digital director. Then I’m leaving, but you can stay to network if you want,” he said. After all, that’s why he’d brought Liv instead of Rina.

  “This is not really my scene,” Liv admitted, after they’d chatted with his media guy.

  On their way out, he spotted Orchid in the crowd in an instant. He saw her ebony hair, kohl rimmed eyes and punk-vibe attire with clarity against the whirl of activity around her. As he leaned in to kiss her hello, he could smell her rose soap. His name fell from her lips as if it were only the two of them in that raucous hall. She looked at him with love. Sweet protectiveness, longing and lust slapped him as hard as if no time had passed since the last time they’d seen each other.

  His resolve nearly became untethered because, after all, he was doing better. Nadine was right; his life was coming back together. Rina showed him that maybe his injuries weren’t a big deal. They didn’t hold him back from doing the things couples do. And though he wouldn’t want to disappoint Rina, their easy courtship fell in a different sphere than the lush feelings that Orchid evoked. His jumbled thoughts arced along a hopeful trajectory.

  That is, until he saw Orchid’s expression as she stared at the spot where his left hand should be.

  She looked like she’d be sick, just as he expected. She stared so long, she looked like she might cry. Her expression punched him in the gut. His dreams mocked. She’d flee in horror at the full truth of his missing pieces.

  Wanting this to work was as foolhardy as finding a drop of hope in an ocean of sadness.

  CHAPTER 36

  YOU’VE GOT HER IN YOUR POCKET

  Phoenix

  SUNDAY DECEMBER 23

  A few nights later, the sting of Orchid’s repulsion had dulled but not dissipated.

  “Wanna come up?” Rina asked, one hand on the door to her brownstone. Phoenix had swilled enough wine over the evening that he paused before uttering his customary, “Not tonight.”

  “Come see my tree,” she said, interrupting his hesitation.

  “Is that a euphemism for—?”

  “No,” she said dryly, turning her key in the lock, “That’d be, I want to see your tree.”

  “Very funny.” He put up a finger to indicate that his driver should wait for him, and then followed Rina.

  “You’re the ad guy, but you seem to find me funny.”

  “Always have,” he agreed.

  They traversed a narrow hallway. Rina unlocked a beige door with a jangle of keys and led him into her apartment. The flicker of multi-colored holiday bulbs and electric candles in the street-facing windows lit the tiny living area. A wall of warm air met them. She flooded the room with light from a standing lamp, which reduced any chance for her décor to charm.

  “That’s your Christmas tree?” he asked, not trying to hide the skepticism in his squint.

  “Yup. The upstairs neighbors lent me their old artificial tree. Lights are theirs, too,” she explained, closing the door behind them and hanging her jacket up.

  “Old is the operative word there. They doing you a favor, or are you doing them a favor?” he asked, looking around. The furnishings were spare. He shrugged out of his overcoat and handed it to her.

  “What am I going to do? My stuff’s all in Canada. I’m lucky I got three suitcases on the plane,” she said, placing his coat onto a hanger and smoothing it with one hand, in a gesture both tender and possessive. “Would you like a drink?”

  “Sure, what do you have?”

  “Some of those first-class airline bottles.” She took the handful of steps to rummage around a kitchen drawer. “Will this do?” She held up a curvy green glass, a miniature version of a full-size liquor bottle.

  “Crème de menthe? Sure, if we’re going to throw an ice cream social.”

  She threw him a sour look.

  “Don’t worry about it. I’ll take a tour instead.”

  “That should take all of two minutes,” she said, waving a hand around the narrow room. “Living room, dining room, kitchen combo. Manhattan special.”

  “I’ll bet the place came furnished,” he noted. “Except for the tree, of course.”

  “You betcha. Next, you’re going to tell me your tree is better than mine.”

  “Euphemisms again.”

  When she faced him, he bent towards her. Soft lips brushed his. She smelled earthy, like musk mingled with brown sugar.

  “Okay, we won’t talk in code. Come with me.” She led him by the hand to the back of the apartment where a small room housed a bed, side table and closet. Streetlights shone through the bare window.

  She let go of him to pad through the dark room and flip on a soft light next to her bed. She returned with a wrapped box. “Merry Christmas,” she said.

  “I thought we already exchanged gifts.”

  She touched a hand to the chain around her neck. “We have, and I absolutely love my gift. This is just a little something more.”

  He tucked the parcel unde
r his left elbow and loosened the tape at the edges.

  “Want help with that?”

  “No, thanks.” The offer irritated him. He tore at the surface one-handed. Then, the holly-covered paper ripped to reveal a logo. Rina blushed.

  “Condoms? Is this a present for you?” He held up the box for inspection.

  “Hope so,” she smiled up at him.

  He caught her wrist to prevent her from flipping on the overhead light switch. He didn’t want to see his body. Why would anyone else? Yet, desire tussled with self-protection and its resulting abstinence.

  He leaned down to touch lips to hers. “I haven’t been with anyone since the accident,” he murmured between kisses. He kept his voice even but he could feel the tightening of fear in his throat. Where will this lead? Rejection? Repulsion?

  “Sounds like it’s about time then.” Rina wriggled free and stepped farther into the room, looking back to watch him following her. She peeled off her slate-gray jacket. “Your driver okay?” She slung the jacket over a chair.

  “Yeah, I’m sure he can wait.” He watched Rina unfastening the pearl orbs holding her silk blouse together.

  “You joining me?” she asked, as she revealed pale skin against a petal pink bra. She placed the top over the blazer. Her pants followed. She’s really very pretty.

  Phoenix walked over to the side table and placed the condoms onto a pile of business books. “Are you sure about this?”

  She slipped over to face him and reached out, grasping his arm and his hand. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

  Why not? I can give her reasons. Two, to be exact.

  “Of course, my trained actuary, you’re pretty sure about everything, aren’t you?” He stepped forwards and wrapped his arms around her naked waist, one side not reaching all the way around.

  “I’m going with fifty-fifty odds on that,” she retorted, slipping his buttons out of their openings until she reached his waistband and stripped away his shirt. He avoided his reflection in her bureau mirror.

  He buried his face into her hair. “You smell great,” he said. He kissed her, and threaded fingers through her hair. He let the silky strands flow through his grasp.

  “You smell amazing, too,” she confessed, her expression softer than it seemed in her business attire.

  He stepped back to loosen his pants and let them fall to the floor. Rina’s gaze slid down his body to the carbon fitting holding him up. He pictured what she was seeing. The stretchy fabric of his liner reached up his thigh. Below his knee, a tapered metal cylinder attached to a metal pole.

  He felt shame flame his cheeks and threw a glance at the bedspread, seeking a way to cover himself. Aw, shit. Abort mission.

  “Maybe I should take you up on that crème de menthe after all. Any booze will do.”

  She closed the small distance between them. “Hey, Walker, did I ever tell you that you’re the hottest guy I know?” She touched a finger to one shoulder and sprang back with a smile. “Ouch!”

  She ran a finger down his truncated arm. “You let me know if you need me to do something or not do something, okay?”

  “I would, except I have to tell you, I don’t know what the hell I’m doing.”

  “Me either. I’m a virgin.”

  “Really?” His mind backed up, how was he going to figure out how to move his unbalanced form and teach her at the same time?

  “I’m kidding.”

  “That’s a relief. I wish I was joking about not knowing what I’m doing.”

  She pointed at the bed. “You want to give it a try?”

  “Um, you know walking with a prosthesis has given me a really strong butt?”

  “I’m already sold.” She glared at him.

  He sat and tugged off his artificial leg and prosthetic sock, avoiding her gaze. What the hell could any sane woman be thinking, seeing his body, malformed like an unfinished painting?

  Screw it. He pulled them both onto the soft expanse of the mattress.

  In one hasty motion, Rina stripped off her petal-pink panties. His body responded to the satin of her flesh. He leaned on an elbow and rolled on a condom, slowed by the awkwardness of performing a new task one-handed.

  “You want me on the bottom?” she asked.

  “Let’s try it.” He maneuvered over her and threw the blanket over his leg. He tried balancing on the end of his arm. “Ouch.”

  “You okay?”

  “Mm-hmm,” he lied. He lowered himself onto his elbows and entered her warmth. She wrapped her legs around his. What does she make of the blank space below my left knee?

  He kissed the corner of her mouth. She shifted with him languidly, then with more urgency. The sensations triggered his hips to rock against hers of their own volition. She bucked and pushed, urging him to pound faster. He tried to comply, slipping on the leg that could find no purchase. He ignored the cramp in his thigh holding an unaccustomed position. Then, they found their rhythm and he lost himself in their movement with no sense of time passing.

  Her tension ascended into a crescendo. She threw her head back, arched up and cried out. He could feel her tighten around him. Before she descended from her high, he came with a shudder that ran the length of his body. His lungs expelled with a release like no other.

  Their panting slowed until their breathing was in sync.

  “What’s so funny?” He lay on her, heavy and unmoving. Not his best performance.

  She pressed her mouth into his shoulder, trying to control herself. She shook her head. “It’s not you. I’m a bad girl.”

  “I’m getting a complex here. How was that?”

  “Better than I could’ve imagined. You?” She rubbed his back and kissed one shoulder.

  He leaned up on an elbow to look at her. “I’m good.” He studied her for a few moments more, brushing hair back from her face. What the hell was she thinking?

  “I hate to do this to you, but I have to go. You okay if I don’t stay?”

  She nodded and mumbled, her ability to speak as relaxed as the rest of her body. “Yeah, I’m okay. Your driver is waiting.”

  He pulled on his briefs, leg and pants, and stood to zip them. Then he shrugged into his shirt.

  She watched him slip on his shoes. “Thanks for my Christmas present, hot stuff.”

  He grabbed his belt and leaned over to nuzzle Rina’s cheek. “Thank you. I like your tree.”

  He paused at the bedroom door. She waved a hand, energy apparently sapped.

  “See you next weekend,” she called, blowing a kiss.

  “Hockey, right?”

  He wasn’t really asking for confirmation. He’d teased her about arranging tickets for something in which he was barely interested. As he turned to go, he caught the reflection of his asymmetry in her mirrored bureau.

  He winced.

  CHAPTER 37

  WOULD YOU FIGHT FOR MY LOVE?

  Orchid

  THURSDAY JANUARY 31

  During a break in their media agency meeting, a junior planner hugged Orchid hello, then plunked ice into a glass. Even with fist-high heels, she only came to Orchid’s shoulder.

  “So, how were your holidays?”

  Orchid twisted open a sparkling water. “Not bad. I hung out with friends. How about you?”

  “I stayed local. Went to a bunch of Christmas parties. Drunkfests.” She rolled her eyes, which made Orchid chuckle.

  “Come to think of it, wasn’t the last time we saw each other at the agency holiday party?” Orchid said.

  “That’s right, that was some night. Did you have fun?”

  “Yeah, it was good.”

  “Weren’t you talking with one of the agency presidents? I forget his name,” she continued. She poured water from a pitcher into her glass.

  “You mean Phoenix Walker, from counterAgency?” Orchid as
ked, startled. She’d been so immersed in the intensity of her feelings, first of hope then fury, it’d escaped her that the party was a public forum.

  “Yeah, that’s his name.” The petite woman brightened. “How do you know him?”

  “We worked on some pro bono accounts, a long time ago.”

  “Oh, wow. You’re lucky.”

  “Yeah, it was good while it lasted.”

  “That was before his accident?”

  Orchid blinked. “Accident? What accident?”

  She looked confused. “Maybe I’m thinking of someone else. I get mixed up between all those boutique agencies. Maybe it was the guy at Z—”

  Orchid interrupted her pondering. “When was the accident?”

  “In the summer, I think. Really scary. I didn’t ride the subway for weeks after that. Some homeless guy tripped one of the agency heads onto the subway tracks. Amazing that the guy survived. The train did a number on him, I heard.”

  “Really? Then it wasn’t Phoenix, because he looked incredible. Like he always does.” She felt herself blushing.

  Her friend shrugged.

  A co-worker stepped over and saved her from further embarrassment. “La-dies, meeting’s star-ting,” he pronounced.

  That night, Google yielded a small sensational blurb on the perils of riding New York City subways. A picture of the empty station accompanied the article dated August 1. There was no name of the victim and his or her condition was never updated. Nor was the perpetrator found.

  Searching Phoenix’s name as she’d done many times these last months returned the expected pages of interviews, press releases, bios and news of the agency’s accolades.

  Nothing connected the two, yet Orchid went to bed with strange new questions swirling.

  February in the city, the frigid temperatures unforgiving, Orchid pulled her coat closer for the trudge home from work. She glanced into windows as she walked. As she passed one eatery, the back of a familiar head caught her eye.

  Orchid entered the restaurant and wandered towards the bar where she’d seen the mirage. She rounded the corner to familiar features. She drank in the refined cheekbones, chiseled jawbone and dark brows. As she looked up, she was met with a cold glare. Caleb locked eyes with Orchid. He was dressed in a crisp white shirt, collar open to reveal the black leather cord and horn pendant, and tailored black pants. No wonder Orchid had thought it was Phoenix; Caleb was clothed like a stylish ad man tonight.