by Amber Burns
He only blinked at me and continued to purr, so I picked up a glass to fill and hand to her. She sat quite happily with the furry scarf over her shoulder; stroking him when she spoke.
“How long have you been living in Crystal Beach,” I started.
“I’ve lived here all my life, and I own the house my parents lived in until my mom passed away a few years ago. It’s cozy but I get lonely.” She stopped herself, “Sorry, that was too much sharing.”
I took a drink of my wine before replying.
“No, don’t feel that way, I’ll reciprocate if it makes you feel better.”
I hadn’t told anyone outside the military about what happened in Afghanistan, and neither had I let anyone get close enough to know me since I made my home here. With a deep breath I opened my mouth and it just began spilling out.
“I came back from Afghanistan after my best friend was killed. Everyone called him Maxwell, his last name. We were on a simple extraction detail, shit went wrong, and he was killed. It broke something deep inside me, and they sent me home.” I drank a bit more of my wine. “I imagine you’ve heard some stories around…”
She sat there so quietly with Armand over her shoulder gazing at me.
“I don’t usually judge until I’ve heard both sides of a story Mr. Deverroux. People can be gossipy. Besides, they probably talk about ‘the frigid nun who lives in mommy’s old house’ just as much as they talk about ‘the drug dealing violent addict’ in the Lechat house… Don’t you think?”
She chuckled as she stroked the cat, who seemed totally content and in love.
“Well I haven’t heard about any nuns here, but apparently the drug dealer is mean. Steer clear of him,” I said. “Why would they call you a nun anyway? You are young and beautiful and probably have men falling over their feet to ask you out.”
I looked toward her when she didn’t reply, and there were tears on her cheeks.
“I used to be engaged Michel, and I loved him. Again I think this is too much sharing, but I feel like I can talk to you for some reason… He left me after my mom died when I was stuck in the most horrible depression. But he was kind enough to cheat on me first with his assistant. I caught them one night, and then we split up a month before our wedding.”
I could not help but feel for this girl. That sort of experience is enough to put anyone off relationships.
“What a dick,” I said, staring out at the sea.
She burst out laughing.
“I never swear like that! But yeah, he is a… He is a dick!”
Her laughter tinkled and drifted out across the beach, making the already beautiful evening even more perfect. It was starting to get dark, so I took out the candles and lit them, sticking them in the sand all around the blanket. She went silent, as I turned toward her I saw her nervous facial expression. “Why are you nervous Annabelle?”
“I haven’t been alone with a man since Malcolm, my ex, and I am just not ready for the whole candle-light thing. I think. I should get home.” She put down a protesting Armand on the blanket, and stood.
I frowned.
“Wait! I was just doing that so that you’d feel more comfortable than being in total darkness…”
She had already straightened her top though and then smiled even more nervously.
“Yeah, sorry. Thank you, but I should go, you can do so much better than me…”
Before I could come up with a response she was walking quickly down the beach, vanishing into the dark. Her sudden strange behavior left me totally perplexed. As far as I could tell, I’d done nothing inappropriate, hell, I hadn’t even touched her. That Malcolm guy really pulled a number on her. I gathered all the stuff together, packed it into the basket and draped a dazed and half asleep Armand over my shoulder for the walk back to the house. I ate grilled cheese for dinner, and vowed to try and talk to her again. There was no way I could let this girl get away, not with what was going on in my heart for her. I knew she was made for me.
“Thank God she’d never married the other ass!” I told myself.
6
Annabelle walked straight into her house, up the stairs, and fell down into a small heap in the corner of her bedroom and let go. She had not allowed herself to mourn the end of her relationship until this very moment. Sobs ripped through her chest and pulled at her ribs so hard it felt that they might burst open to reveal the black hole Malcolm had left there. She didn’t have the strength to stand, so she curled up on the rug where she lay and cried herself to sleep right there.
The next morning when she woke, her head hurt, her neck was sore, and she felt so weak she could barely crawl to the phone. She notified her dad she couldn’t come to work because she felt sick and somehow convinced him not to come around and check on her. “She didn’t want him catching her germs,” was the excuse she used. Once she gathered the energy, Annabelle dragged herself to the shower. All she wanted was to be alone.
The water pounded down onto her aching body and soothed some of the soreness from her stiff muscles, but she still had a throbbing headache when she stepped onto the shower mat. She picked up a fluffy towel and dried herself off, walking into her bedroom to get dressed. When she opened her walk-in closet and saw the wedding dress in its pristine white garment bag still hanging there; her crying started all over again. She sank down against the closet wall and sat there on her knees staring at the bag. Through fits of agonizing sobs, Annabelle was overtaken by a deeper rage than she’d ever known in her life. It felt as though her blood was boiling.
“Was this what it felt like to grieve the loss of a relationship?” She asked herself.
She had lost three years of her life to solitude because she had been so intensely terrified of being be hurt again. What man had the right to do this to any woman? Annabelle pushed herself up off the floor and walked to her dressing table. She returned to the closet armed with a pair of large silver dress-maker’s scissors, and stood in front of the garment bag. With one smooth motion she slid the zipper open down the front and pulled out the exquisite Vera Wang creation of tulle and corseted bejewelled bodice. To an outsider she would have looked nuts as she went at the dress with her scissors. Her hair flew wild around her as tulle and sparkling fabric was flung in all directions. Twenty minutes later Annabelle sat on the floor in a mountain of destroyed fabric.
“Oh no, what have I done?” She muttered, looking at the carnage around her.
She had momentarily lost control and destroyed the single most expensive thing she had ever owned, and with that thought she grinned and started laughing manically.
“Malcolm paid for the dress!” she laughed to herself.
Her spirits were instantly lifted by the act of childish vandalism, and she put the scissors back where they belonged. Dressed in jeans and a T-Shirt, Annabelle padded down to her kitchen to fetch garbage bags. It took three to stuff the mass of fabric into, and she left it near the front door to take away at the next opportunity.
For the next three days she cleared her house of every piece of evidence of Malcolm’s existence. She threw out photo albums, trashed gifts he had given her, got rid of clothing that reminded her too much of him. She even tossed out her perfume she’d used when they were together. It was time for a total change, and by the end of it she felt able to breathe again. The process had been the catharsis she needed. She was a total hermit for these three days, not even leaving the house even to go for her walks in the evening. Finally finished, Annabelle stood on her porch looking out over the sea and thinking of Michel Deverroux.
Annabelle had no idea how concerned Michel was about her, and that he stood on his own porch every single night watching for her, waiting to see her pass by. He had gone to the shop every day, buying items he didn’t need, simply to talk to her. But every time he stopped by he found someone who wasn’t Annabelle manning the register. Within a few days Michel found his wine cellar was pretty well stocked.
But she pictured him, the slightly too long dark hair
, those unfathomable deep brown eyes, and she was curious about the tattoo on his back. He was so well built and she daydreamed what it would be like to hold him. She pictured his lips that looked so soft, with that pronounced cupid’s bow…
“Geez, down girl.” She reprimanded herself and then walked back inside.
It was just past six thirty when there was a knock on her door and she jumped up from where she sat in her kitchen to go and check on who it was. As she moved aside the small curtain at the glass she saw Michel’s profile through the door, and cursed under her breath. She looked terrible. She was sweaty, dressed in torn denim shorts and a faded old navy blue T-Shirt. Her hair was knotted in a rough plait down her back, and she wore no makeup.
She opened the door with a flush on her cheeks and stood flustered, wiping the strands of hair from her face while she greeted him.
“Michel, hi. What are you doing here?” She stood back and beckoned him inside. “Please excuse the state I’m in, and the house, I have been doing a lot of… Cleaning out.”
He looked around and commented, “You have a lovely home, and in truth I came to check that you were okay. I haven’t seen you take your walks and I got worried. You weren’t at the shop either.”
She stopped and gazed intently at him.
“You’re checking up on me?” She asked, frowning.
Michel stood with his arms crossed and looked around, everywhere but at her. He nodded, but didn’t speak. Annabelle felt suddenly very self-conscious, even more so than before she had opened the door for him, and she didn’t quite know what to do.
“Michel, I am not used to having anybody check up on me, and I am not used to anybody caring for me anymore besides my father. After Malcolm… Men scare me, and I don’t want to get hurt again.”
She stepped from foot to foot, her equivalent to a nervous twitch, and didn’t know whether to sit, stand or walk around.
“Sorry, that was a bit blunt. Would you like some tea? Coffee? I think I have decaf. Come through to the kitchen.”
He followed her and sat when she gestured to a seat for him.
“Coffee would be nice thanks,” Michel replied.
She watched as he rested his elbows on the table and put his head in his hands.
“Annabelle, I can’t explain why I had to check on you, or why I worried about you, except that I knew I had to. I have wanted to know you since the very first time I saw you in the shop, and as I said, I have wanted to walk out to you since the first time I saw you standing on that beach staring out at the sea, so desolate.” He looked up at her, “God knows, I am a bad person for some of the things I have done, a lot of the things I have done, but every part of me wants to protect you and keep you safe, no matter what.”
Annabelle was leaning against the counter, her back to the kettle as it boiled and hissed a cloud of steam.
“Why me, when you could have your pick of any beautiful, perfect holiday girl here?”
I stared at this angelic girl with the turquoise eyes and said sternly, “Do you not see yourself clearly Annabelle? You are kind and gentle, you speak with love in your voice when you mention your father, and then you work in his store during holidays when you could be off having fun. You are soft and loving to animals, I think Armand might be in love with you just by the way. Besides the lovely personality and nature you have, you are beautiful. Do you want to know what I have secretly nicknamed you?”
I looked straight into her eyes, where a few tears were forming, and she nodded. I smiled.
“Mermaid. You look most at home standing on that beach, but you look as though you want to shed your skin and disappear into the water. It makes me think about the Scottish legend of the Kelpies.”
She silently turned her back to me and finished making coffee. When she placed everything on the table, she sat opposite me with eyes full of tears now.
“Michel, no man has called me beautiful before, and Malcolm did a very good job of destroying any confidence I had when he left. I know about the Kelpies, and I wish I was one. You describe someone I do not see in the mirror, or feel when I dress.”
She wiped at her face again, and I automatically handed her the handkerchief I had in my pocket, it got a giggle from her.
“I didn’t even know men still carried these.”
“Old habit taught by my uncle, for situations just like this one.”
She frowned at me, “What? So you are frequently making women cry?”
I shook my head, “No Annabelle, but it’s nicer to be handed a cotton hanky than a wad of tissue when it does happen, not so?”
“Yes, it is.”
We drank our coffee, and when I stood to leave, just innately sensing that she needed the space, I saw three large garbage bags piled in a corner.
“Do you need help with those? There’s a dumpster in the road behind your house right? I can take them away for you?”
The expression in her eyes told me that she was torn between wanting to part with them and wanting to keep them, but her mouth firmed and set in a resolve.
“That would help, thank you.” She had stepped back from me and then hesitated, “Michel, thank you.”
With that she walked into my arms and hugged me tightly, her thin arms going around my torso. I carefully enfolded her in my own, and though it seemed far too intimate, kissed her hair and rested my chin on her head.
If I had thought talking to her was a sign, and that I needed this girl, then touching her, however innocently, was the baseball bat to the head that I was in love with her. There was no more denying it. We stood for an infinity, neither wanting to let go.
“Annabelle, are you feeling any specific connection here or am I being an idiot and misreading things?” I asked into her hair, the scent of strawberries and vanilla in my nose.
I felt her nod.
“I don’t want to let go, but I am not ready to ask you to stay yet, can you be patient with me?”
She started trembling in my arms, and I squeezed her.
“I have all the patience in the world, and I swear I will never hurt you.”
She raised her eyes to mine and said the most heart breaking words I had ever heard.
“Until you do.”
Annabelle stepped out of my arms and walked with me to the door as I picked up the surprisingly lightweight bags.
“Can you, Armand and I have a dinner date on the beach? Perhaps Friday night?” I asked hopefully.
Seriousness broken, she laughed her wind-chime laugh and nodded.
“Anything for Armand’s little purr on my shoulder again.”
I shook my head, “No fair you know, he has had more physical contact with you than I have!”
I gave a child-like pout and turned away to hear her say, “Oh Michel, but you don’t purr…”
There was a dumpster two blocks down the road behind her house, so that was my first port of call. I had to admit curiosity as to what she was throwing out, and when I tossed them into the full dumpster, I opened one bag. It took me a while to figure out what all of it was, but the garment bag in the top of the next bag gave it away; she had destroyed her wedding dress. It seemed expensive too. Granted I was a man and knew very little of these things, it just looked pricy, and I saw the name ‘Vera Wang’ in there somewhere…
It felt wrong to have gone through her garbage, but then, it was in my nature to need to know things about people. As I made my way home I stopped, a sudden ‘hallelujah’ moment had occurred in my brain. Had Annabelle hidden in her house to clear out her ex’s stuff these past few days? Was she doing something she had perhaps not let herself do until now? I walked the rest of the way home thinking I’d ask her over for dinner in two days’ time. If I was going to build a relationship with this nervous girl I wanted to know her thought process.
When I got home I found a blast from my past on my doorstep. Andrews sat on my porch with a khaki duffel bag next to him, his head and arms were resting on his knees. I stopped in my tracks when he loo
ked up and I saw the dark purple circles under his eyes.
“Andrews? Are you okay? What are you doing here?”
He looked so defeated that I felt broken for him.
“I found out you were here Michel, I heard you’d gotten back on your feet and I wanted to come see you, I haven’t heard from anyone else I tried to reach since I got back two weeks ago.”
My heart started thumping in my chest when he took a joint out of his pocket and lit it up.
“You only got back two weeks ago? How are Briggs and the others?” I asked.
He shook his head and didn’t speak, looking down at the ground between his feet again, his shoulders shaking.
“Shit. I’m sorry man,” I sat down on the step next to him. “Well please stay as long as you’d like to, you’re welcome here.”
