His Christmas Gift ; Decadent Holiday Pleasures

by Janice Sims

  Still, when he’d first come to the United States on scholarship to MIT, he’d met other students who did believe they were better than he was. They showed it by excluding him from certain activities, by complaining that they couldn’t understand him when he spoke. He spoke perfect English now, but then, he’d had a thick Bahamian accent. He hadn’t lost his lilt; he simply didn’t let it out in academic settings. Only with friends and family.

  In many ways, he was a self-made man. It had taken him years to build up his confidence. Had his incarceration torn down some of the walls he’d erected around his psyche? He was not the type to go around quoting self-affirmations. His insecurities were unfounded, and he knew it. That didn’t make the feelings go away, though. He had to concentrate in order to block them.

  When the colonel opened the door and called, “Dr. Braithwaite, your family is here to take you home,” he’d frozen in his tracks, fear suddenly gripping his insides. He realized, when he saw Alia Joie’s face, that he had not remembered her with precise accuracy. The woman before him was exquisite. She was tall and shapely with the body of a dancer, lithe and athletic looking. Her nose, eyes, ears, chin and mouth were perfectly formed, and he couldn’t imagine them being any other way. Her crown, in all its glory, was long and obviously healthy and strong, as any African queen deserved. He couldn’t wait to run his hands through it.

  His Alia Joie had been pretty, too. Beautiful, even. What was causing the altered perception of her outward appearance? He wasn’t sure. This was, indeed, the woman he’d married.

  When she spoke, he calmed down a bit. He was positive the voice was Alia Joie’s. But then, they’d spoken on the phone since he’d gotten back.

  He hoped she couldn’t read the confusion in his gaze when they stood there looking into each other’s eyes. Her eyes were cinnamon colored. His memory agreed with that, at least. Her skin was dark chocolate with reddish undertones. Beautiful skin. And when she began kissing his face, he felt how soft her skin was, and exhaled with relief.

  She smelled wonderful, like some tropical fruit, papaya or mango. He said something stupid like, “You’re more beautiful than I remembered. I must have been good in my former life.” What the hell did that mean? Would she think he had lost his mind in Abu Dhabi, talking about another life?

  Finally she’d asked what she could do for him, and he’d said, “I just want to sleep in my own bed with you, babe. I feel so tired.”

  Truer words were never spoken. He was tired, and his brain needed rest. As they were walking to the door to join the others, who were waiting in the hallway, she asked, “Do you need to get your things?”

  “I already have everything I need,” he’d said.

  * * *

  They checked into a hotel to rest in comfort while the plane was being readied for the return flight to New York City. Alone in their hotel room, Alia lay in Adam’s arms in bed with the lights dimmed, dressed except for their shoes, as both of them tried to sleep. However, neither of them were able to. She had the crazy idea that if she slept he wouldn’t be here when she woke up. For the last hour or so, she’d been smiling so much her cheeks ached.

  “I don’t know what to tell you,” Adam said when she’d asked him to tell her everything. She’d regretted asking because maybe he wasn’t ready to revisit the horrors of what he’d been through. “I don’t want to give you nightmares.”

  “Tell me what you’re comfortable saying,” she told him, snuggling closer to him. She loved the feel of his beard on her face. “I don’t want to rush you.”

  Her body was reacting to his nearness. No sex for over two years was taking its toll on her. But, just as she didn’t want to rush him into revealing everything he’d been through for the past two years, she also didn’t want to be demanding when it came to sexual intimacy. That had to come naturally. It was unreasonable to assume they’d fall back into their former routine of honeymoon sex. That was how it had been between them. They were learning each other, exploring what brought each other pleasure. She was tingling just thinking about their lovemaking.

  She tilted her chin up, gazing into his eyes. “Or don’t say anything—just hold me.”

  “I can tell you that they didn’t physically torture us,” he offered. “When we were snatched, we did get knocked around until we cooperated, but after that there were no beatings. They withheld food if we wouldn’t talk to them, though. And none of us would tell them what they wanted to hear. We all lost weight.”

  “They didn’t get any information out of you,” Alia said.

  “They didn’t get anything out of any of us,” Adam said softly. “Whenever I was questioned they would threaten me with the fact that they were waiting on orders from the higher-ups—whether or not they had permission to go ahead and kill us, or continue to try to get the information they needed out of us.”

  “You were mentally tortured, then,” Alia surmised.

  “And they kept us isolated,” he said, nodding slightly. “When we first got to the facility, we were alone in a room for several months. Then, once a week, they started letting us see each other.”

  “Those bastards! They knew isolating you would be worse than keeping you together.”

  He nodded slowly. “I started talking to myself.”

  “Oh, baby,” she sympathized.

  He looked deeply into her eyes. “God knew what he was doing when he made Adam a companion. Man isn’t made to live alone.”

  Alia silently cried, thinking of him alone in that room, not knowing if he’d get out alive. “I hope they’re punished for what they did to you and Arjun and Maritza and Calvin!”

  “Honey, they’ve already been punished,” Adam assured her. “I’m not certain, but I don’t think many of them survived the night we were rescued.”

  “I mean the higher-ups,” Alia clarified.

  A guarded look came into Adam’s eyes. “I can’t say what the government is going to do about them. If anything. I can’t even talk about the outcome of the work we were doing in Abu Dhabi. The government will tell the public about it in their own time. And that’s all we can say about it. So I’m sorry if you’re disappointed that I’ve come back home empty-handed. We’ve lost two years of time we could have been together because I chose to go to Abu Dhabi. I...”

  Alia put her hand over his mouth. “Stop! Stop saying those horrible things. I never blamed you for going over there. You’re a man with a big heart, Adam. I never thought for a moment that you wouldn’t go. You were just trying to help save the lives of countless military men and women. I’m proud of you! Yes, it’s true, I didn’t want you to go, but that was because I’m selfish where you’re concerned. I love you and I didn’t want to be without you. We had been married less than a year, and I didn’t want to share you with the world. But I know now that sometimes I’m going to have to share you. I want you to be whomever you want to be. I don’t want to dictate your actions. Marriages don’t last when spouses try to control one another, and I want to grow old with you. Just like my grandparents, parents and your parents.”

  “I’m just afraid I’m not the man you married anymore,” Adam said.

  “Kiss me,” Alia ordered as she met his eyes.

  He seemed hesitant to do it. He looked into her eyes for a long moment, then lowered his gaze to her mouth. She moistened her lips, trying to fight back more tears because it appeared that her husband was afraid to kiss her. She didn’t dare initiate it because if he turned his face, preventing it, she would be devastated.

  After what seemed a long time to her, he pressed his mouth to hers, and she closed her eyes. But his lips were immobile, like he was just learning how to kiss and was waiting for her to teach him. Then he ground out, “Oh, God, I’ve missed you,” and on his exhale, the kiss transformed into something rife with longing. It was slow and tender, and sweet, and so sensual that her nipples got hard and she got wet between
her legs in a matter of seconds.

  He climbed on top of her and she opened her legs to welcome him inside of her, but they were only assuming the position, because they were still clothed. The kiss deepened and they moaned with pleasure, grinding on each other, her feminine center throbbing and his erection growing harder by the second.

  Then he stopped kissing her, looked down at her and said, “It’s too soon.”

  With that, he got out of the bed and went into the adjacent bathroom. The next thing she heard was the sound of the shower water turning on.

  Alia sat up in bed, breathing hard, wondering if she’d pushed him too far out of her own need for intimacy. She got up and walked over to the window to peer at downtown Arlington. It was a Saturday, but the business district was bustling with activity. Life goes on, she thought cynically, even when you think yours is standing still.

  That was the attitude that had gotten her through her separation from Adam. The knowledge that even if your life felt like it was falling apart around you, the world kept on spinning, and you had to keep going, too. There were times when she had felt like just lying down and dying. But she didn’t. Her family wouldn’t let her give up. However, the burden had been on her. They couldn’t have prevented her from doing something drastic if she’d chosen to do it.

  Somehow she’d found the strength to pray for Adam’s release every day. To go to work. To maintain her relationships with friends and family. To care whether or not she ate right and exercised. Even the basic things were hard to do. Depression was just one tub of ice cream away. She kept working on herself. Shoring up her strength because, by God, the women and men she’d grown up with didn’t just give up. They fought. They endured. They got off their butts and made a difference in the world.

  She smiled at her reflection in the glass of the window she was looking out of. Adam needed time, that was all. He needed time to adjust to life. She didn’t selfishly want the old Adam back, because she knew that wasn’t a reasonable thing to wish for. She simply wanted an intact Adam who remembered the strength inside of him, and remembered where he came from, and what kind of people he came from.

  There was no way her Adam was going to let the people who’d imprisoned him win by virtue of his collapse. No way!

  * * *

  When he came out of the bathroom, having showered for the second time that day, Adam felt not cleansed but somehow more in control of his emotions. Alia Joie was sitting at the little round table near the window, a chessboard on the table. She’d put the pieces on the board and smiled at him when he entered the room. “Do you feel up to a game?” she asked innocently enough.

  Tension drained out of his body when he saw she was not going to react to his abandoning her on the bed a few minutes ago. He knew, however, that Alia Joie was a shark when it came to chess, and she’d eat you alive if you gave her the chance. She wasn’t fooling him with that demure smile on her beautiful face. She was depending on his inability to decline a challenge.

  He sat down across from her. She rolled her shoulders, a sure sign that the game was on and she meant to beat him and then dance on his grave.

  “You and your dad still have your weekly game on Sundays?” he asked.

  “It’s tradition,” she said.

  “Who won the most games while I was away?” he asked as he made his first move. Her eyes were keenly watching the board although her right index finger was moving up and down his arm in a sensual manner. She grasped his hand and squeezed it reassuringly, then released it.

  It was to let him know she understood why he’d had to leave her so abruptly and take a cold shower. It told him that she was patient and she loved him and was going to see this through with him, no matter how long it took. That was why she’d brought out the chessboard. Chess was a game of strategy. It was also a game you didn’t rush through. You had to be able to outthink your opponent. You had to be able to anticipate his next move in order to ensure the safety of your pieces on the board.

  Of course, what her motives could be were all assumptions on his part, but he’d be willing to bet he was right.

  “Oh, he still beats me most of the time,” she admitted, elbow on the table and her chin resting in her hand. “He’s played the game a lot longer than I have. Plus, he’s sneaky.”

  Adam laughed. “Your dad’s not sneaky.”

  “Sure, he is,” she said, laughing with delight. “He tricked me into going to business school. I was all set to go to art school, but he wanted me to learn the business instead. You can have a head for business and a heart for art, he said. But the business couldn’t wait. I was the eldest. I had a responsibility. He didn’t go in for that ‘a son will take over the business after me’ routine. He wanted me to be as competent as a man. We’d been playing chess for a long time, and sometimes I would beat him. I thought I was good enough to accept his challenge when he said if I could beat him in a game, he wouldn’t protest any more about my wanting to go to art school instead of business school. You know what happened?”

  Adam looked down at the board. She had him in checkmate already. “Something like what just happened here?” he said, grinning. “He beat you and you went to business school.”

  “Yes, my love,” Alia Joie said, her eyes sparkling with joy. “And I didn’t regret it. I didn’t neglect my artistic side, though. I went to art school for a while and found out the classroom didn’t suit me, so I’m basically self-taught like Gauguin, van Gogh, who studied only briefly, and Grandma Moses. I have the best of both worlds. I’m good at business and art. Want to play another game?”

  Adam started positioning the pieces on his side of the board.

  “Two out of three?”

  “If we have time before the plane’s ready,” she said nonchalantly.

  “Oh, the way you play, I’m sure we will,” he said.

  She just smiled sweetly at him and trounced him in two more games.

  By the time they boarded the plane that evening, he was looking forward to getting home and resuming his marriage with this intriguing woman. He just wished that he could get over the anxiety he felt at making love to her. It had been so overpowering earlier that he’d had to run away from her and jump into a cold shower.

  It wasn’t that he didn’t want to have sex with her. The thought of not pleasing her was the problem. And he couldn’t recall ever doubting his ability to please her before.

  Chapter 5

  “It used to be a hotel,” Alia Joie said softly as the two of them stood in front of the building he would soon be calling home. A hired car, which was gone now, had brought them from the airport. Adam gazed up at the five-story building. It was an elegant-looking creamy-white stone building. As they approached it, he saw a golden plaque around three inches high and eighteen inches long that read: The Village.

  “Grandpa and I used to walk past this place and he’d tell me stories about it. He said it was one of the best hotels in Harlem when he was young. I don’t know if you’ve ever heard of The Green Book, being born in the Bahamas, but back before black people in America had civil rights, traveling around the country without getting caught in areas where they weren’t welcome required planning. Victor Green, who was a postman here in Harlem, started making a list of places where a black traveler could find shelter. This hotel was on that list. A lot of black celebrities stayed here when they were in town—Ella Fitzgerald, Cab Calloway, Louis Armstrong, Sammy Davis Jr., Lena Horne...although Grandpa was quick to add that Ms. Horne was a hometown girl and had relatives nearby. Yet, she still liked to luxuriate in a room in this very building when it was a hotel.

  “I named it the Village because of the old saying—it takes a village to raise a child, and this is where I want us to raise our children. In this village of Harlem, where Mom and Dad are just down the street.”

  They walked up the steps, and the doorman called, “Mrs. Braithwaite, welcome home from
your trip!”

  Alia Joie smiled at the elderly gentleman and said, “Mr. Stewart, I’d like you to meet my husband, Dr. Adam Braithwaite.”

  Adam could tell by the surprised expression on the man’s face that he’d had no idea the purpose of Alia Joie’s trip had been to bring home her long-lost husband. It was apparent, though, that Mr. Stewart was well aware of his existence.

  Mr. Stewart, a tall, slender African American in his sixties with snow-white hair and mustache, removed his forest green hat, which matched his forest green uniform. “Well, I’ll be! Dr. Braithwaite, welcome home, sir!” He offered his hand, and when Adam reached out to him, he clasped Adam’s hand in a firm grip. His brown eyes danced. “This is wonderful news, just wonderful!” He glanced at Alia Joie, who was beaming. “Mrs. Braithwaite, I’ve never seen you look happier. God bless you. God bless you both!”

  “Thank you, Mr. Stewart,” Adam said with a smile. “It’s a pleasure to meet you.”

  “The pleasure’s all mine, Dr. Braithwaite. Now, you two young people get on in here. I’m sure the others are going to be happy to see you, too!”

  And with a tip of his hat, he ushered them into the lobby of the immaculately maintained building and returned to his post.

  “This is beautiful,” Adam said, his voice echoing off the walls of the high-ceilinged lobby. If he had to guess, he would say that the floors were Italian marble. As they walked into the lobby, to their right was a wall of mailboxes for the tenants. To their left was a sitting area with two comfortable leather couches and a modern glass coffee table between them.

  As they walked farther into the lobby, he also noticed stairs on the left, which looked brand-new. They were made of a light-colored wood, varnished and covered in dark green short-nap carpeting.