The Adventures of a Love Investigator, 527 Naked Men & One Woman

by Silkstone, Barbara

  “Call him,” Sam says “It’s really important to him. When I told him I was working for you, he almost came through the phone lines.”

  My heart does handstands while my body shakes as if I’ve caught a bad chill. I don’t want to tell Mark I’ve just been plucked off the side of a sailboat. I look for a reason to delay the call. “I need time to think. I have to fix my makeup.”

  “Makeup?” Sam sounds bewildered. “It’s only a phone call. He pleaded for you to call him right now. Here’s his number.”

  “I need to look in his eyes when I speak to him.”

  “You never said anything about looking in his eyes. Usually I don’t get these happy endings. I’m so excited for the two of you. Call him! And please let me know how this turns out.”

  With a self-deprecating grin and wobbly legs I inch my way back to the bow where both clients are sitting with smirks on their faces. “Now that I have your attention and I’m sure that you’ll never forget me, I’m going to excuse myself. I have to make a call ... from land.” I walk to the side of boat and eye the nasty dock. Did I dare to jump again?

  “Wait! Both men are on the feet in a flash. They pull the boat closer narrowing the gap and hand me onto the wooden steps. “You okay?”

  “Sure,” I say. “Do this all the time.”

  I head back to my car, thankful for being alive. Once in the driver’s seat, I pull out the number Sam gave me. The phone slips from my hand like something you’d hold in a dream and slowly let go. If I follow through I’m about to hear a voice from the near side of a quarter of a century. Once I dial, I’ll have all the answers I’ve been searching for. Maybe the dream is better than the rampant fantasy that’s run roughshod through my emotions these past years.

  I scramble to grab the phone. My fingers slip on the key pay. I check the battery. It’s fine. It rings once.

  Strange, his voice isn’t familiar. “I can’t believe it’s really you. I’ve spent my whole life looking for you,” he says.

  I’m frozen with the crystals of vague emotions. All the things I’ve waited years to say fall from my mind like dead butterflies. I’m left speechless as I hear his delicious laughing voice.

  “I’m amazed. You did something I’d dreamed of doing so many times but lacked the courage. I’ve never stopped loving you. I loved you from the first minute I laid eyes on you. You’re my soul mate,” he whispers.

  Why is he telling me so much so soon? And with such urgency? I sense this is to be our only conversation and in a panic I say, “No matter what was happening in my life, you were there in my heart. I’ve always loved you.”

  I’m amazed we can speak so freely, so quickly, about things that weighed so heavy in my life.

  There is a pregnant silence hanging suspended between us. He who speaks first loses. I risk it. “Oh, Mark. Every city I traveled I would crack open the phone book and search for your name.”

  He sighs, “And I looked for your face in every crowd, wherever I was. I’d think I saw you and then be wrong. I’ve only had two loves in my life, you and my wife.”

  The words “my wife” are painful and so I step over them as my world spins under me. Are we coming together? Will it be that easy? No. I think not.

  Mark leads the way as we begin to pour facts and dates and times into each other as if a portal had opened and a stop watch was clicking off our last minutes on earth. I feel myself come undone as all the strings that held me together for over two decades open up completely. I imagine I can feel him touch my cheek.

  For seven years he made countless trips to my parents begging to know where I was. “Your mother turned me away every time. She would slam the door in my face.”

  “She never told me you were looking for me.”

  “I finally gave up. I met Amy, fell in love and we married.” He hesitates. “She’s Jewish.”

  We were just kids, madly in love, but still living with our parents. We had no control over our lives. I would never have been accepted in his world. My heart understands now.

  My senses begin to warm. I remember the comfort of his moss green sweater and big strong arms. I remember his laugh. It was a great laugh.

  “Hmm. I’m so glad we did this.” I say sensing our phone time is almost over.

  “You did this,” his voice carries a smile.

  “Why were you so hard to find?”

  He laughs. “I’ve been here all the time. Sam just told me I live twenty minutes from your house. We traveled the world to settle within miles of one another.”

  My first love was under my nose the entire time. Was that fate playing a practical joke?

  The next step would be to meet. I wish to feel his joy just one more time. It would bring closure. I start to ask if we can but he cuts me off.

  “A couple of years ago,” Mark says, “I made one of those stupid blunders men do. My wife and I were talking with friends about first loves. I said I had never gotten over you. That was a mistake and it upset my wife a lot.”

  I melt into the receiver, my heart a cube of ice on an August afternoon. “I’ve lived my life so that there were no ‘what if’s’ ... except for you. You’re the one thing left undone in a full life.”

  Mark sighs. “I couldn’t hurt my mother and now I can’t hurt Amy. You were my first love but you can’t be my last. I can’t see you. In the end the only thing we have is our word. When I was boy, I gave my word to my mother. When I became a man, I gave my promise to my wife.”

  Now I realize his urgency to call was generated by Amy’s absence. She might be shopping or having her nails done while I was temporarily reuniting with her husband. The pain of his words, his rejection of the suggestion of just seeing me one more time, is too much. The remaining pieces of my heart break like glass on concrete. I listen to his breathing. I can’t let go. I’m not strong enough.

  “We’ve both lived the lives we were destined to live. Our love was a feeling. My love for Amy is my word. Just the thought that I remembered you caused her pain. She’s my wife. You’re my mythological perfect love. I’ll always hold the memory of you. Goodbye.”

  He hangs up.

  And I head home, in shock.

  I’m on the outside looking in. Now I can barely sleep. I feel body parts I never knew existed. Everything aches. I have to touch his face just one more time.

  The first pinkish rays of sunlight work their way into my room as I finally doze. In my dream Amy comes to me wearing a head scarf and a hospital gown. She places her hand on my arm. She’s terminal. I don’t know how I recognize her, but I know it’s her. I feel her pain and reach to comfort her. She speaks in the wordless way of dream visitors.

  “Take good care of Mark,” she says. “He’s always loved you. I’ve sensed your presence in our marriage.”

  Still dreaming, I wipe a tear that tickles down my cheek. “But who gets to keep him in heaven?” I ask. Amy gives me a puzzled look as she starts to fade and I begin to wake. Wait!” I say. “You or me? Who gets him forever after?”

  I stare out the window at the full glory of morning and wonder if my dream meant anything. My pillow’s wet with tears. A dozen questions flicker in my consciousness. What about soul mates? How is love valued in heaven? Is it by the length of time or the strength of love?

  There is that moment of truth when you choose action or inaction and that choice tells you who you really are. I don’t like me as I leave a cheerful message for Mark at his office. I trump up a story about having to be in his neighborhood next week on real estate business. “Can we meet for lunch?” I have to know if my dream carried a hidden meaning.

  Sleep will not come to me. I hear my heart beating in the darkness. “Please, Mark, don’t call back. You have no idea how much this means. Don’t call ...” I’m holding a lit match to see how close it will come to burning my fingers. If it causes me pain I have no one to blame but myself. He has to be the man I thought he was. If he’s a man of honor, a man of his word he won’t call me. But what if he doe
s? Then who is he? More importantly, who am I? It’s the woman who chooses to have the affair. That’s a hard lesson I’ve learned in my travels. But this isn’t about a sex. First loves rarely are.

  I make myself cry by whispering in the darkness, “Once upon a time in the very beginning there was a guy with a smile that could light up my world ...” If I could just look in his eyes one more time.

  CHAPTER SIXTY-FOUR

  Sal laughs at me. “What is it with you and the refrigerator hugging?” he asks.

  “You don’t know what you’re missing. A refrigerator can be a very comforting thing.”

  He looks at me in his lopsided, loving way.

  “They’re like these big purring boxes.” I can see he’s not getting it. “Never mind.”

  “So ... did Mark call you back?”

  I think of all the possible answers I had dreamed of and then give him the best one. “No. He never called.”

  “I’m sorry,” Sal says as he stands beside me, leaning on his refrigerator.

  “I’m not. Now I know I had it right, at least the first time.”

  CHAPTER SIXTY-FIVE

  Sometimes when the lights are low I think I see him. Just before I doze and as I perch on the edge of waking in the morning.

  CHAPTER SIXTY-SIX

  Real love and first loves are separate gifts ... or are they? I’m giving a book talk for a large group of senior citizens. They enjoy listening to stories about first loves. Most of them have been fortunate enough to have married their childhood sweethearts. The world was much simpler back then. I share my adventures as the love investigator. The hour is over. They applaud and thank me for the memories.

  My papers are spread over the podium and as I gather them, a tiny elderly lady approaches me. She introduces herself. “I just had to tell you my story so you would be encouraged. My first love and I – we lost each other when we were teenagers. He married someone after I married my husband. My love was married sixty-two years when his wife passed. Last year my husband died. My love had been watching my life at a distance for all of his life. He came to me and proposed last month. We’re getting married this Saturday. Then we’re driving cross country to his home in California.” She smiles a shy grin. “We’re old enough now to understand real love. I’m ninety-two and my love is ninety-four. You don’t get but one chance at the real thing. Just be patient,” she says as she squeezes my arm. A spritely old man comes up behind her and kisses her cheek.

  The one thing I learned from interviewing over 500 men is that life is a game; we just don’t know all the rules... but every day we learn a teeny bit more. We learn just enough to make ourselves smile.

  Barbara Silkstone is the best-selling author of The Fractured Fairy Tales series that currently includes: The Secret Diary of Alice in Wonderland, Age 42 and Three-Quarters; Wendy and the Lost Boys; and London Broil.

  Silkstone’s writing has been described as “perfectly paced and pitched – shades of Janet Evanovich and Carl Hiaasen – without seeming remotely derivative. Fast moving action that shoots from the hip with bullet-proof characterization.”

  Barbara Silkstone loves to hear from her readers.

  You can write to her at: barbara_silkstone@yahoo.com

  Fractured Fairy Tales by Silkstone

  Criminally Funny Fables

  The Secret Diary of Alice in Wonderland, Age 42 and Three-Quarters

  This author has a unique narrative voice, and reading the story is like taking a smooth slide into Alice’s surreal world. The premise is outstanding – a classic we all love, with a contemporary, intelligent twist.

  ~ Elizabeth Lindberg, author Upper West Side Stories

  Purchase for your Kindle at: Amazon

  Wendy and the Lost Boys

  Be aware, this is not the Peter Pan story you want your kids reading. It is clearly intended for adult readers. Yet it appeals to the childlike part of us that loved the classic original stories. Combine that childlike love with modern politics and technology, and you get this smart, snarky, hilarious mystery. The story is richly developed and leaves you guessing until the very end. I am liking this grown-up version of Peter Pan even more than the original.

  ~ Tiffany Harkleroad for Tiffany’s Bookshelf

  Purchase for your Kindle at: Amazon

  London Broil — the sequel to Wendy and the Lost Boys

  The snarky Python sequel to Wendy and the Lost Boys. A murderous rollercoaster ride through London during a killer heat wave.

  ~ Ravan Reviews

  Purchase for your Kindle at: Amazon

  Snow White – coming 2012

  Bonus excerpt from

  The Secret Diary of Alice In Wonderland,

  Age 42 and Three-Quarters

  My heartfelt thanks to Lewis Carroll for the quotes I pulled out of the Rabbit Hole.

  Chapter One

  Curious how our lives can take on the shadings of a fairy tale, the line between reality and fantasy becoming fuzzy.

  New Year’s Eve morning, fourteen hours to a fresh start. I parked my Jeep at the far end of the mall lot and speed walked toward Macy's for a quick stop at the Lancôme counter to get my favorite wrinkle-poofer. The gentle Miami winter sun kissed my face.

  A striped cat crossed in front of me, stopped and grinned. A full set of human teeth. I closed my eyes and shook my head. When I opened them, he was gone.

  I heard the low idle of a car driving slowly behind me and looked over my shoulder. A dark limo with a tinted windshield was following me. Instinct kicked in and I broke into a trot. The limo moved forward. I had reason for concern. Two women had been murdered in separate incidents in that very parking lot the past year.

  Halfway to Macy’s and still not sure if I was being followed; I zipped through the line of cars, stepped over the grass median, into the next lane, and ran.

  The limo looped around. I fumbled in the side pocket of my bag and freed my cell phone, punching in 9 and 1. The phone slipped from my sweaty hand, hit my shoe and slid under an SUV. Screw it. Leaping over the bushy islands that stood between me and safety, I fell flat on my face, hitting my cheek against the turf. I pulled a clump of my red-blond hair away from my eyes.

  “Ms. Harte.”

  I looked up at a man’s face in the window of the limo. He had a droopy, walrus-like mustache.

  “Ms. Harte, we'd like to talk to you.”

  “Call my office.” I threw him a pissy look as I scrambled to stand.

  “It's about Leslie Archer.”

  “Who?” I played dumb.

  Before I could run again, two men stepped out of the car and grabbed me. Twins, Tweedle Dum and Tweedle Dee dressed in dark clothes; both had noses that twisted to the right beneath scarred brows. They lifted me into the car by my elbows.

  So this is how it ends. I flashed on the headlines – Alice Harte, Miami Real Estate Broker, 42 and Three-Quarters, Found Murdered at Biscayne Mall.

  A stocky guy sat shotgun. He had slicked back hair, a hard-set jaw, bull-neck and sunglasses perched on large ears. One Tweedle took the driver’s seat and the other sat directly across from me in the rear-facing back seat. Next to me was the man with the walrus mustache, a portly guy with prominent front teeth, a derby and pince-nez glasses. He said, “Ms. Harte, I’m an attorney. My name is Walter Lewis. I represent Marc Hare.”

  My heart rolled over. I knew the Hare name.

  “We’re going after your employer, Leslie Archer, for fraud and racketeering, civil RICO. You’ll be testifying against him.”

  “Look, whoever you are, I know nothing about Leslie Archer’s business. I just work for him. I've been trying to quit. He won't let me go. I'm no good to you.”

  “Exactly why you are good to us – you're part of his inner circle. We want everything you can dig up on him. You will take the stand against Archer.” He poked his fat finger in my face.

  I reached up and smacked his hand, hard. The backseat Tweedle grabbed my wrist and bent it. I yelped in pain.

&n
bsp; The thick-necked man in the front passenger seat looked at me through his sunglasses. “Enough bullshit. You know the name Jug Hare?”

  Jug Hare had been a small time contractor with a wife and five kids. He was found beheaded days after he filed suit against Leslie Archer.

  “Jug was my baby brother. I’m Marc Hare. I’m sure you’re afraid of Archer, but he’s the least of your worries.”

  Leslie Archer scared me in many ways. But who was Sunglasses? Why should I be afraid of him? He talked lawsuit, but he looked and acted like a thug. I’d met his kind before. I narrowed my eyes and said, “I’m not going into court again, not for you, not for anyone.”

  I felt like I had stepped into a gangster film. All I wanted was face cream, now I'm some sort of witness against Leslie for a guy who acts like he might be even more dangerous.

  My gut churned. “Leslie has won every lawsuit thrown at him. What happens when you run out of money and can’t keep your suit? Where does that leave me? He’ll kill me.”

  Sunglasses answered not trying to conceal his venom, “I’m taking the bastard down, one way or the other. And if you had a hand in my brother's death, you’re going with him.”

  My gut churned harder. For months I'd feared being accused of participating in Leslie's slimy and possibly illegal shenanigans. I looked at Marc Hare. Leslie was dead meat and I might be the side dish.

  “You’re testifying,” Sunglasses said in a bone-chilling hiss.

  I wanted out of that car. “When is this going to happen? I need to get away from him before it does.”

  “You don't get it,” Walrus Mustache said. “You're going to continue working for Archer and keep your eyes open until your deposition.”

  My stomach was like a washer on spin cycle. “Deposition?”