Life Is Short But Wide (34 page)

In a few hours, Herman looked around the room they had built, almost satisfied. Cloud went home. Herman was tired, but he went to the florist, and bought a huge bouquet of mixed, colorful flowers.

“It looks too bare out there right now for Myine to see how it’s going to look; so I’ll just set a small wooden table out there, with two wood chairs, for the time being, and set the flowers on it.” And that’s what he did. Then he went home to shower, and try not to fall asleep.

The chairs, table, and flowers were already in the sunroom when Herman rang the doorbell at about 4,:3o or 5:00 that evening. Myine opened the door with a bright, eager smile, and held her hand out to him. “Herman, come in, please.”

Herman tried to respond with cool dispassion, “Myine, Myine.” While he was thinking, “Mine, mine. Oh, Lord, please let this evening go well. I don’t want to scare her.”

She had on a soft, silken, pale-green dress that buttoned down the front; she looked lovely in it.

He smiled, pleased at her effort. “You dressed for … dinner?”

“Oh, Herman, this ole thing? I thought it might lift your spirits. I’m always in … some ole pants, or worn-out dress.”

“You always look good. Always.”

They enjoyed a good dinner, and after, she gave him a few vitamin pills. “I know you work hard, Herman, and I know you don’t always eat right. You need a little extra.”

“Oh, I can always use a little extra. Thank you. Say, you want to go downstairs and see how your room will look when we’re through?”

Myine stood, ready to go, “Yes. I’ve been, but I want to go again. I’m so excited, Herman.”

“I am, too. I hope you like it.”

As they started down the steps to the basement, Myine was in front of him. He put his hands on her hips, and held them there all the way down, saying, “Don’t fall.” Her hips seemed to roil beneath his tender hands.

She laughed, saying, “Herman, I’ve been coming down these steps for years.” But, she didn’t remove his hands, and neither did he.

There was a door to the sunroom, for privacy within the house; he made a little show of opening it. “Open O’sesame!” Then she walked slowly into the room that was empty except for a large, low-shag, sky-blue rug in the middle of the room.

Myine blushed as she said, “I put that here today after you left.” They laughed, and he said, “It’s pretty. I’m glad you are thinking of your new room!”

“Oh, Herman, I could never come in here without thinking of it as ‘your’ room. You built it.”

He was right on the verge of happy as he said, “Okay then, let’s say our room.” She was on the verge of happy, also.

He led her to the doorway leading outside, and opened it,
showing the little table with a huge bouquet of flowers on it, and two chairs.

She loved everything. Love was in the very air of the rooms. Herman moved the table so it would be in front of the chairs, and put the two chairs closer together, playfully saying, “Have a seat, ma’am.” He sighed, saying, “It does not look so good right now, but I’m going to make a little Japanese waterfall. And plant a delicate, slender tree, and some small evergreens. I was thinking of putting a big aquarium tank in that room, so you can get a whole new feel to the house down here.”

“Oh, I love it, I love it, Herman.” She turned to look at him, “I do, I really do. It’s strange how little changes can make such a big difference.” She reached for his shoulder, to pull him toward her, then he gently dragged her chair closer to him.

Herman smiled down at her, getting ever so close to crossing that verge of happiness, right into it. “Well, thank you, Myine. Now, let me ask you something. I look at all this work we did in here, and … I wonder. Do you think I could have a kiss? A real kiss?”

Myine blushed, for no reason except her shyness, and said, “Oh, don’t ask me that, Herman. You don’t have to ask that. Of course, you …” She leaned over to kiss him, but he stood up. “I don’t want a side kiss, I want a kiss. Don’t blush, Myine. It’s just a kiss.”

Myine stood up, stepping closer to Herman, as she lifted her face. He held her face with one hand, while pulling her real close to him with the other. When he raised his face from hers, he didn’t step away from her, he held on to her, and asked, “Do you know how long I’ve wanted to do this?”

Myine stood silent, still looking up at him, her lips closed, but smiling. He smoothed her hair, and murmured sweet sounds in her ear as he pressed her body even closer to his. He raised his head, his eyes searching into her eyes, slowly, steady, slowly, before she closed them. She felt his warm, soft lips on hers. She felt the muscle in her lips let go as she kissed him. Her lips, then, bloomed and softened under his lips; as did her body.

Feelings were rushing through her body, and suddenly she was overwhelmed by a delirious joy as she clung to him. She was filled with such a hunger she had never felt before. “I desire him,” she thought to herself, joyously, “I want all of him in all of me.”

The sounds of the wind in the trees, a distant roaring in her ears, were mixed inside her head. She seemed to feel the earth spinning beneath her feet. Her heart sang. “Is that my heart?” she asked herself. She opened her eyes and saw the stars, bright as flames; and Herman.

Her knees weakened; he put his arms closer around her and lifted her into the empty room, onto the sky-blue rug on the cement floor, into the darkness; hot, struggling, and full of the voices singing in her heart.

She remembered what Juliet had told her about relaxing, and picturing what he was doing to her, in her mind. The emotional feelings broadened, physical sensations widened, everything expanded the feelings she felt as he entered her body with his. Suddenly, something in her hips made a spreading, tender explosion, and her body and head were filled with the sound of her body singing.

In a moment, he started to say something to her, but she
stopped him with her fingers. “No, just let me lie here, and feel the feelings of you and me. Us.”

He held her tightly, but tenderly, and murmured in her ear, “That was my hope, forever and ever. For you and me. Us.”

She had not needed the jelly-crème this time.

He had moved past the verge of happiness, over the edge, and was deep in the center of his happiness, finding ecstasy, and rapture there. He had brought her with him. He didn’t come alone over the verge, and into the depths of love; they journeyed together.

(My  My  My  My)

Now, life being life, and love being love, in no time at all, Herman took Myine to be his wife at the earliest possible time. Myine couldn’t stop smiling, and Juliet was smiling, too, throughout all the days, as she baked the wedding cakes, and sewed here and there on things she wanted to give Myine.

Myine wore a simple long white silk dress, and a veil. Her bouquet was made up of purple orchids and pretty branches from the foliage on the land. Herman wanted her to have a grand bouquet, but Myine told him no.

She said, “You must not understand. This way, with the foliage from here, all my family will be with me.” That was what she wanted. Herman didn’t really mind; he was going to be part of her, part of her family. He smiled to himself, “My family at last!”

It was a small wedding in the front parlor of the main house: “home.” All through that week, every time the couple passed near each other they brushed against each other, touching in any way possible. Smiling all the time.

Herman, naturally, moved from his garage apartment into his new home almost before it was possible, doing everything at once. But, Myine wanted him “home.”

After the small family wedding, no one had to leave because everyone who was at the wedding was already home, except the minister.

Of course, Lola was there, beaming. Poem flew over from France a few weeks later to see Myine’s new husband. She liked him, but it didn’t matter to Myine anyway. Poem looked beautiful in her Parisian clothes. Myine held the young woman, as she said, “Girl, pardon me. Young lady, you look beautiful. I know your grandmother and Monee are proud of you!”

Then they talked of Tante’s ill health. “She is old, Aunt Myine. Older than you. But she still dresses every day, in case someone comes to call. I don’t think she will be with us much longer. Her health has suffered for a long time now. She thinks it is a secret, but we know. She can hardly get around without a walker, and some help. She always liked secrets.”

Poem left, traveling on to New York for some conference in international business affairs. Her mother had wanted her to major in business law and administration, and she had.

She came back to Wideland on her way home, to tell Myine she was coming back to live there awhile. Herman and Myine took her to look at some land, but she wanted the old house right across the street that was for sale, cheap, and sitting on several acres.

Herman told her, “Poem, that house is cheap, but it will cost you a fortune to fix it up for you to live in. A fortune!”

She answered, speaking to Myine, “I don’t care. The best time of my life was living here with Aunt Myine, in peace. I miss it. I miss the trees, and the grass, the animals; just everything country. The space! I live in a beautiful city, but you know what I really want?”

She turned to Herman, saying, “I want a cow, a dog, a cat, some chickens like we used to have, and lots of land of my own to walk around on. Like you, Aunt Myine.”

She looked thoughtful a moment, then said, “I met a nice man at the conference. It might develop into something. But, even if that does not turn into anything, I still want to come here, home, to live and breathe again.”

Herman and Myine left her desires to her own decisions. They gave her the keys to Herman’s old garage apartment. “This is your place when you come to get your house ready.”

Herman’s stepsons, James and Jerome, lived in Philadelphia and San Francisco, respectively. He told them, “This is your apartment when you are in town with your families. You’ll be at home here. Myine and I just don’t want anyone to live there all the time. It takes away from our space and peace. But we love you, and you’ll be welcome.”

Even Wings Val used the apartment when he came home on breaks from college. When he was graduated with a computer science master’s degree, he was going to be on the road and in the air a great deal traveling for his work. He was still young, but had decided he didn’t want to keep living in any large city.