Sealed with a promise

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Sealed with a promise Page 24

by Mary Margret Daughtridge


  Dra­pes of gray Spa­nish moss, swa­ying un­der the ap­pro­ac­hing storm, drip­ped from the li­ve oaks that sha­ded Mar­ket Stre­et, in­ten­sif­ying her diz­zi­ness. Em­mie knew she ne­eded to sit down be­fo­re her legs ga­ve way. Wro­ught iron ben­c­hes we­re pla­ced at in­ter­vals in shady spots along the stre­et, but the next one was too far. And an­y­way, the tho­ught of pas­sing out whe­re the­se stran­gers co­uld see her ma­de her fe­el even sic­ker.

  Just ahe­ad, in the yard of an old whi­te ho­use, sat a hu­ge hydran­gea bush, fi­ve fe­et tall and just as wi­de. The sap­phi­re blue flo­wer he­ads, the si­ze of soc­cer balls, glo­wed in the gre­enish light of the co­ming storm. In Em­mie’s di­so­ri­en­ted sta­te she tho­ught the bush ra­di­ated strength and po­wer. Her he­ad spin­ning and the ed­ges of her vi­si­on dar­ke­ning, she stag­ge­red to it.

  She co­uldn’t ha­ve be­en un­con­s­ci­o­us long. Fat drops of ra­in stung her fa­ce and dam­pe­ned her clot­hes when she be­ca­me awa­re aga­in, but she wasn’t so­aked. And she must ha­ve ma­de it to the hydran­gea be­ca­use its mus­ty-gre­en scent fil­led her nos­t­rils. Abo­ve her he­ad a hu­ge blue flo­wer dip­ped and bo­un­ced with each drop that struck it.

  All the an­gu­ish of the past ye­ar se­emed to ha­ve dis­sol­ved in her last mo­ments of con­s­ci­o­us­ness, and for the first ti­me sin­ce her pa­rents had put her on the pla­ne for the Sta­tes, she simply exis­ted whe­re she was, not wis­hing she we­re so­mew­he­re el­se, not wis­hing for an­y­t­hing at all.

  She dis­co­ve­red that the hydran­gea blos­soms we­re ac­tu­al­ly mil­li­ons of tiny trum­pet-sha­ped flo­we­rets that spre­ad in­to fo­ur blue pe­tals aro­und a lig­h­ter blue thro­at. Each flo­we­ret was lif­ted to its pla­ce by a pa­le blue stem fi­ner than thre­ad. This was her first ex­pe­ri­en­ce with lo­oking in­to the he­art of li­fe and her first ex­pe­ri­en­ce of con­s­ci­o­usly se­e­ing things the way they we­re, not the way she tho­ught they we­re or wan­ted them to be.

  A drop of ra­in pel­ted her squ­are in the eye and snap­ped her away from her ti­me­less con­tem­p­la­ti­on, but so­me rem­nants of that mo­ment of cla­rity, when for one in­s­tant she had se­en past the il­lu­si­ons that dan­ce on the sur­fa­ce of the world, re­ma­ined.

  The con­nec­ti­on bet­we­en fas­ting and lying be­si­de a bush in the ra­in was as ines­ca­pab­le as a ge­ometry pro­of. As an ex­pe­ri­ment in fin­ding an­s­wers, fas­ting was an ab­y­s­mal fa­ilu­re. She knew she wo­uld not do it aga­in. Whet­her she wo­uld pray aga­in re­ma­ined to be se­en, but she tho­ught not.

  Emmie ti­ed her swe­ater over her he­ad li­ke a scarf and tuc­ked her scho­ol­bo­oks un­der her T-shirt, suc­king in a bre­ath when the clammy plas­tic co­vers to­uc­hed the ba­re skin of her mid­riff. On wob­bling legs she wal­ked the rest of the way to her gran­d­mot­her’s ho­use.

  Emmie dri­ed her hands and wat­c­hed the wo­man in the mir­ror do the sa­me. She hadn’t tho­ught abo­ut that day for ye­ars. Why had that me­mory co­me back now? It had be­en a wa­ke-up call, a cle­ar war­ning that she had to de­al with prob­lems her­self, wit­ho­ut help from her gran­d­mot­her, her pa­rents, or God.

  Do- Lord wan­de­red Em­mie’s li­ving ro­om whi­le he wa­ited for her to fres­hen up. It was go­ing to ta­ke lon­ger than he had tho­ught to win her trust. He lo­oked at the tit­les of the bo­oks open fa­ce down on her desk, ca­re­ful­ly put­ting them back in the sa­me or­der he fo­und them. Her com­pu­ter was in sle­ep mo­de, not tur­ned off, and when he jos­t­led the mo­use, the scre­en lit. A lit­tle ga­me he pla­yed was se­e­ing if he co­uld gu­ess pe­op­le’s pas­swords. It was ama­zingly easy. Bir­t­h­days, pet na­mes, fa­vo­ri­te co­lor, fa­vo­ri­te rock gro­up, bir­t­h­p­la­ce-pe­op­le men­ti­oned them in con­ver­sa­ti­on all the ti­me. All he had to do was pay at­ten­ti­on.

  He frow­ned. He didn’t know any of tho­se per­so­nal de­ta­ils abo­ut Em­mie. Whe­re she was born. Whe­re she grew up. What her pa­rents’ na­mes we­re. She knew all the tri­via abo­ut him, al­t­ho­ugh she was the only per­son ali­ve who did. He had cre­ated a fund of amu­sing sto­ri­es, which he co­uld re­co­unt by the ho­ur. They we­re a smo­ke scre­en so ot­hers wo­uldn’t no­ti­ce he didn’t talk abo­ut his ori­gins. And yet, un­til this mi­nu­te, he hadn’t no­ti­ced that pri­va­te in­for­ma­ti­on abo­ut her wasn’t co­ming thro­ugh. He do­ub­ted if her le­aving out facts was as con­s­ci­o­us as his. It was li­ke she fa­ded away be­hind her in­tel­lect.

  On the ot­her hand, he co­uldn’t ac­cu­se her of ke­eping sec­rets. If he as­ked for her pas­sword, she’d pro­bably tell him. Just li­ke she’d told him he co­uld get aro­und her no-sex-on-the-fir­st-da­te ru­le.

  As it hap­pe­ned he didn’t ne­ed the pas­sword to get in­to her fi­les. A do­cu­ment tit­led “Re­me­di­al Con­ver­sa­ti­onal En­g­lish” was open in the win­dow. Hel­lo. Did you ha­ve a ni­ce trip? Was the traf­fic he­avy? It’s ni­ce to see you. Isn’t it a ni­ce day?

  Who had she be­en ma­king this list for? Not her­self. She didn’t chat­ter, but she didn’t ha­ve any prob­lem hol­ding up her end of a con­ver­sa­ti­on. In fact, she was mo­re in­te­res­ting to talk to than-the tho­ught bro­ke off. Her first words at the do­or had be­en, “Not a pity fuck.” It wasn’t even clo­se to, “It’s ni­ce to see you.”

  The pi­eces of the Em­mie-puz­zle he’d be­en as­sem­b­ling sud­denly in­ter­loc­ked. He co­uld see the pic­tu­re emer­ging now. He had al­ways se­en that she was vul­ne­rab­le. It had be­en so easy to see that it had blin­ded him to the truth. A lump ro­se in his thro­at. He un­der­s­to­od what kept go­ing wrong. What had be­en wrong all the ti­me. Why all her sig­nals se­emed to be on go, and God knows he was re­ady, and then the mo­ment wo­uld va­nish. Po­of. The prob­lem was with him. He hadn’t wan­ted to se­du­ce her.

  Not that he didn’t want her. He did. Wan­ting her was li­ke a to­ot­hac­he in his who­le body. And it wasn’t an ex­cess of scrup­les that held him back. If he tho­ught se­duc­ti­on wo­uld ma­ke her his, he’d do it. She was a plum ri­pe for the pic­king. He co­uld do it. She was sen­ding out co­me- hit­her sig­nals cle­arly now. Even tho­ugh she hadn’t sa­id an une­qu­ivo­cal yes, yet, it was only a mat­ter of ti­me. He had only to ke­ep pus­hing her. And that’s exactly what he co­uldn’t do. Didn’t want to do.

  The tro­ub­le was, he wan­ted her to want him. The lon­ging went too de­ep to ha­ve words to des­c­ri­be it, even to him­self. If he pus­hed her, ti­me’s one-way do­or wo­uld swing shut, and he’d ne­ver know if she wo­uld ha­ve cho­sen him.

  He knew what the tro­ub­le was, but dam­ned if he co­uld see what to do abo­ut it.

  Ca­leb tap­ped on the bat­h­ro­om do­or. “Yo­ur pho­ne is rin­ging.”

  Not re­ady to lo­ok at him yet, Em­mie ope­ned the do­or a crack and stuck her hand thro­ugh.

  Still re­gar­ding her ref­lec­ti­on, Em­mie flip­ped the pho­ne open. “Dr. Cad­din­g­ton.”

  “Hey!” Pic­kett’s vo­ice ca­me over the pho­ne. “Did you turn yo­ur pho­ne off and for­get it aga­in? I’ve be­en le­aving you mes­sa­ges all af­ter­no­on.”

  “No- well, may­be yes.” Em­mie co­uldn’t re­mem­ber exactly what she’d do­ne with her pho­ne. “What did the mes­sa­ges say?”

  “I want you to me­et me at Aunt Lilly Ha­le’s fa­mily re­uni­on.”

  “I tho­ught you we­ren’t co­ming ho­me un­til Chris­t­mas.”

  “I wasn’t, but the last twen­ty-fo­ur ho­urs ha­ve tur­ned we­ird. Tyler’s bir­t­h­day is this we­ekend. Jax has had to go out of town.” Out of town Em­mie and Pic­kett had ag­re­ed was co­de for do­ing so­met­hing sec­ret that co­uldn’t be spe­cu­la­ted abo­ut. �
��And the­re was a let­ter in this mor­ning’s ma­il from Tyler’s gran­d­mot­her, La­uren-ac­tu­al­ly, from her law­yer.”

  “Bad news?” La­uren and Jax had be­en loc­ked in a cus­tody dis­pu­te over Tyler. Pic­kett and Jax had ho­ped the­ir mar­ri­age wo­uld ma­ke the qu­es­ti­on of cus­tody mo­ot.

  “I don’t know whet­her it’s bad or go­od. We ha­ven’t he­ard from his gran­d­mot­her sin­ce the wed­ding. Be­fo­re then, she was cal­ling him two or three ti­mes a we­ek. But the let­ter says she’s go­ne in­to re­hab. In the event of an emer­gency, we’re to con­tact the law­yer.”

  “You me­an she’s go­ne for al­co­hol tre­at­ment? That so­unds li­ke go­od news.”

  “Well, it is, of co­ur­se, and for Tyler’s sa­ke I ho­pe she gets bet­ter, but it’s too so­on to get ex­ci­ted abo­ut the pros­pect. In the me­an­ti­me, it’s Tyler’s bir­t­h­day. His birth mot­her is de­ad, and both his fat­her and his gran­d­mot­her are in­com­mu­ni­ca­do.”

  That was just li­ke Pic­kett. She was thin­king of how Tyler wo­uld fe­el on his first bir­t­h­day af­ter lo­sing his birth mot­her. For Tyler’s sa­ke she was mo­re than wil­ling to ma­in­ta­in a re­la­ti­on­s­hip with a mot­her-in-law left over from Jax’s first mar­ri­age. “Do you think she sho­uld ha­ve wa­ited un­til af­ter his bir­t­h­day?”

  “Not re­al­ly. When a per­son is fi­nal­ly wil­ling to se­ek tre­at­ment, it’s im­por­tant to act right then. I don’t know if he’ll be hurt if she do­esn’t call or send a pre­sent. He’s re­al­ly too lit­tle to ha­ve bu­ilt up tho­se ex­pec­ta­ti­ons. The ma­in re­ason for co­ming ho­me is that Tyler enj­oys ha­ving co­usins so much, and he do­esn’t know many chil­d­ren he­re yet-”

  “And you know you can trust yo­ur fa­mily to ma­ke a big de­al over his bir­t­h­day.”

  “Well, I can. An­y­way, will you co­me too? Aunt Lilly Ha­le has al­re­ady as­ked me if you’re co­ming.”

  Gra­ce had sug­ges­ted she at­tend as a way of re­ve­aling her ma­ke­over to a fri­endly audi­en­ce, but Em­mie had let it slip her mind. De­li­be­ra­tely. She hadn’t wan­ted to go if Pic­kett wo­uldn’t be the­re. The ha­bits of be­ing un­no­ti­ce­ab­le we­re still strong, and she didn’t think she co­uld fa­ce the crowd, if her pre­sen­ce was abo­ut her. An­y­way, the re­ve­al, such as it was, had al­re­ady hap­pe­ned.

  Ever­y­t­hing chan­ged if Pic­kett was go­ing to be the­re. “When is the fa­mily re­uni­on?”

  Pic­kett chuc­k­led in fond exas­pe­ra­ti­on. “To­day, silly. That’s why I’ve be­en cal­ling you and cal­ling you. I’ve got to see yo­ur new clot­hes. I’ve got an idea for a few items I think you sho­uld get. Gra­ce’s tas­te is in­fal­lib­le, but, you know, se­ri­o­us. You ne­ed so­me fun clot­hes too.”

  “Fun clot­hes? You me­an sports clot­hes?”

  “No. I me­an ap­pa­rel, the pur­po­se of which is en­ter­ta­in­ment. That’s a fo­re­ign con­cept for you, isn’t it? I’ve got to ad­mit I hadn’t fully gras­ped the pos­si­bi­li­ti­es myself un­til Jax,” Pic­kett ad­ded with a chuc­k­le that was po­si­ti­vely sultry.

  Mo­re than ever, Em­mie reg­ret­ted that she hadn’t be­en aro­und for Jax and Pic­kett’s co­ur­t­s­hip. This was a si­de of her fri­end she’d ne­ver se­en be­fo­re. Be­ing in lo­ve had evi­dently bro­ught out new ele­ments in her Pic­kett’s per­so­na­lity. The­re was a new kind of con­fi­den­ce abo­ut her, a de­eply per­so­nal self-as­su­ran­ce. Em­mie was a tiny bit shoc­ked and a tiny bit en­vi­o­us.

  “What kind of fun are we tal­king abo­ut he­re?”

  Pic­kett gig­gled. “The kind you’re thin­king abo­ut. But al­so fri­vo­lo­us or pro­vo­ca­ti­ve thin­gs-li­ke you’d lo­ok gre­at in high-he­eled bo­ots.”

  Emmie was on the ver­ge of po­in­ting out how ut­terly im­p­rac­ti­cal high-he­eled bo­ots we­re when she got a pic­tu­re of stan­ding in front of Ca­leb we­aring them. And not­hing el­se. Her he­art did a do­ub­le bac­k­f­lip.

  “Say you’ll co­me, Em­mie.”

  “I don’t know. Ca­leb is he­re.”

  “Oh, that’s right! So much has go­ne on he­re, I for­got to­day was the day. How did it go?”

  “We went to the open ho­use, but Ca­leb got thrown out.”

  “Is he the­re now?”

  “He’s in the li­ving ro­om.”

  “Whe­re are you?”

  “In the bat­h­ro­om.”

  “Why are you in the-for­get I as­ked that. This con­ver­sa­ti­on has go­ne way off track. But now, you’ve got to co­me be­ca­use I’ve got to he­ar the who­le story, and I’ve got to tell you what I think sent La­uren in­to tre­at­ment.”

  Chapter 24

  Ca­leb was in Em­mie’s big blue ve­lo­ur easy cha­ir re­ading a bo­ok, his tie lo­ose­ned, his sho­es kic­ked off, his fe­et in cof­fee-brown socks prop­ped on the ot­to­man, when Em­mie re­tur­ned to the li­ving ro­om. He had swit­c­hed on the stan­ding lamp be­hind the cha­ir. The light bro­ught out the gold in his red­dish-brown ha­ir and dwelt in lo­ving li­nes along the pla­nes and an­g­les of his fa­ce. He wasn’t han­d­so­me, and he ne­ver wo­uld be. He was be­a­uti­ful. Her ar­tist’s eye no­ted the co­lor com­po­si­ti­on, pa­lest yel­low shirt, to­bac­co brown slacks, de­ep blue cha­ir.

  His legs we­re cros­sed at the an­k­les, his el­bow prop­ped on the ar­m­rest, his he­ad sup­por­ted by the he­ad­rest. Light, ref­lec­ted from the open bo­ok, lim­ned the un­der­si­de of his chin and fo­und the gol­den frin­ge of his las­hes. A bu­oyant lig­h­t­ness fil­led her chest as if so­met­hing she had wa­ited and wa­ited for had at last tran­s­pi­red.

  In a way she co­uldn’t de­fi­ne, he had ma­de the cha­ir, the lamp, the cor­ner of the ro­om, his, and he lo­oked com­p­le­tely at ho­me the­re. Ex­cept for Pic­kett, not that many pe­op­le en­te­red Em­mie’s spa­ce, and as a ru­le she felt mo­re at ease when they left it. From now on, the ro­om wo­uldn’t lo­ok qu­ite right wit­ho­ut him.

  His eyes lit in wel­co­me when he saw her. He held up the bo­ok so she co­uld see the co­ver. “Asi­mov’s I, Ro­bot. I to­ok it from yo­ur bo­ok­s­helf. Ho­pe you don’t mind. It’s one of my fa­vo­ri­tes.” He mo­ved his legs to one si­de on the ot­to­man in a cle­ar in­vi­ta­ti­on for her to perch the­re.

  Emmie sank down on the low fo­ot­rest. A fa­int, warm shock tra­ve­led thro­ugh her when her hip ca­me in con­tact with his cros­sed an­k­les. His to­es, tho­se long, strong, ele­gant ro­ugh-hewn to­es stro­ked ac­ross her but­tocks in what might ha­ve be­en an ac­ci­den­tal set­tling, might ha­ve be­en a ca­ress. Em­mie was mo­men­ta­rily di­ver­ted, but his ex­p­res­si­on was so in­no­cent she re­tur­ned to the su­bj­ect of the bo­ok.

  “Mi­ne too. I li­ked the three laws of ro­bo­tics. I lo­ved them so much I com­mit­ted them to me­mory. ‘One: A ro­bot may not inj­ure a hu­man be­ing or thro­ugh inac­ti­on al­low a hu­man to co­me to harm. Two: A ro­bot must obey a hu­man’s or­ders ex­cept whe­re to do so wo­uld con­f­lict with the first law. Three: A ro­bot must pro­tect its own exis­ten­ce ex­cept whe­re to do so wo­uld vi­ola­te ru­les one or two.’ In the sto­ri­es, the ro­bots must ma­ke mo­ral cho­ices wit­hin a nes­ted hi­erarchy of va­lu­es.”

  “Unh- unh.” Ca­leb sho­ok his he­ad. “The ro­bots we­ren’t ac­ting mo­ral­ly. They’re mac­hi­nes. The three ru­les we­re a de­sign fun­c­ti­on to ma­ke them har­m­less.”

  Aga­in, she felt a stro­king mo­ve­ment of his toe ne­ar the small of her back. This ti­me she ca­ught the play­ful gle­am that ac­com­pa­ni­ed it.

  “True. Ne­ver­t­he­less, as the three ru­les are we­ig­h­ted, they are a per­fect, lo­gi­cal en­cap­su­la­ti­on of Chris­ti­an ide­als
.”

  His smi­le left “inte­res­ted” and sha­ded in­to “indul­gent.” “Do you think an­yo­ne li­ves by them?”

  “My pa­rents do. The first law of ro­bo­tics sum­ma­ri­zes the com­man­d­ment to lo­ve one anot­her and the Gol­den Ru­le. The se­cond ru­le is abo­ut ser­vi­ce. My pa­rents’ li­fe pur­po­se is to ser­ve, and the­ir obe­di­en­ce is to the laws of God.”

  “What hap­pens when Bib­li­cal com­man­d­ments con­f­lict with the first law? The Old Tes­ta­ment re­qu­ires the fa­it­h­ful to sto­ne pe­op­le for ever­y­t­hing from we­aring the wrong clot­hes to sas­sing the­ir ma­ma.”

  “Right. De­ute­ro­nomy 22:5 and Exo­dus 21:17-altho­ugh yo­ur tran­s­la­ti­on is ex­t­re­mely lo­ose.” Em­mie rol­led her eyes. “My pa­rents are Chris­ti­ans, not 4000 BC de­sert no­mads. Christ’s com­man­d­ment was: ‘lo­ve one anot­her.’ It su­per­se­des all the ot­hers.”

  “How abo­ut lo­oking af­ter them­sel­ves?”

  “They wo­uld say self-ma­in­te­nan­ce is in­cum­bent upon Chris­ti­ans-the body is a tem­p­le and all that- but they be­li­eve it co­mes third. The first two are much mo­re im­por­tant. I think I lo­ved the bo­ok be­ca­use at last I co­uld see the lo­gic on which they ba­sed the­ir li­ves.”

  “The lo­gic? Not the fa­ith?”

  “Fa­ith didn’t work for me. I ha­ted that they had sent me to li­ve with my gran­d­mot­her. I knew they lo­ved me, but it was a pa­ra­dox. If they lo­ved me, why didn’t my hap­pi­ness mat­ter? If I co­uldn’t stay with them, why didn’t they co­me to the Sta­tes with me?”

  “Why did they send you to Ame­ri­ca?”

  “Two pe­op­le with our mis­si­on we­re kid­nap­ped and held for ran­som by ter­ro­rists. They we­re tar­ge­ted be­ca­use they we­re Ame­ri­cans. My pa­rents sent me to li­ve with my gran­d­mot­her for my sa­fety.

  “ I, Ro­bot put the cho­ices they ma­de in­to a fra­me­work I co­uld un­der­s­tand. For my pa­rents, the first law me­ant they ne­eded to stay and mi­nis­ter, des­pi­te pos­sib­le harm to them­sel­ves. Ho­we­ver, they co­uld not, thro­ugh inac­ti­on, al­low me to co­me to harm. An­y­way, I was a typi­cal self-ab­sor­bed te­ena­ger. I wan­ted them to be de­di­ca­ted to me, not to God.”

 

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