Natalie stared at him. “I went for a drive.”
“Where, Nat? Just tell me.”
“I went for a drive. I needed to clear my head.”
“Is there something going on with you two?”
“No.”
“Are you telling the truth?”
“Yes.”
“Because I think he has feelings for you, Nat. Some serious feelings.”
“And that’s my problem?”
“Fine...I’m dropping it.”
“What did you tell Asha?”
He arched an eyebrow. “I didn’t tell her anything.”
“She seems to think otherwise.”
“Natalie, I didn’t tell her a thing. This is between us. This is about what I saw last night, the moment he showed up in the restaurant.”
She mulled over it quickly in her head, little flashes here and there. She then pictured riding in the passenger seat of his car. She could feel him then. Damn it. He drove with a quiet ease, slowly, carefully, in such a focused manner, that she wondered what he was thinking, what he was seeing when he stared straight ahead of him. Donny Hathaway’s “Superwoman” was playing. It suited him well, but made her ache. It had been one of her father’s favorite songs.
Damn it.
But Scotty was still staring at her, as though he had not believed her, and was waiting for her final declaration of truth.
“I think you’ve got it confused,” she muttered, gazing at him through heavy lids. “You’re way off base.”
“What do you mean?”
“Bellamy has feelings for Zuly. They’re damn-near a couple. He told me so yesterday.”
SHE WAS A LITTLE GIRL ONCE. A DAYDREAMER, NO LESS. A stick of a figure, gazing skyward most days, as though all the answers to her prayers and queries lay beyond the clouds somewhere. Her imaginative thoughts had her floating, believing that elsewhere (wherever the hell “elsewhere” was) was the better alternative. She neglected her thoughts most days as a child, and her flightiness was something that her father had discovered very early on, but had neglected to mention to the rest of the family. He’d only wink and grin, as though the secret would be kept between them. He’d then pat her head, dub her his little cielito and go about his business.
On one particularly warm day in October, just two days shy of her eighth birthday, she wandered into the woods on her own. Her mama and papa were arguing in the kitchen with the window over the sink open. She was sure that the entire neighborhood could hear. They were fighting over her. The middle child. After Sidney’s birthday in April and Maya’s bad ear infection in June, there was no money for Natalie’s birthday. No money for the pink bicycle she’d seen at the corner store and had desired for months now. And a birthday party? Where was the money going to come from for that?
She’d never had very many friends anyway - just a few girls from her elementary school and her cousins. It never really mattered to her though.
She wanted to get away as fast as she could, so she tumbled down a bridlepath of slick wet rocks and tripped over a raised root, scraping her knee. But she didn’t cry. She never cried, not even when her papa yelled at her for fighting with her sisters. But she sat there for a while, rocking back and forth as blood pooled in her tiny hands. She didn’t need a birthday. It was all a mess of an ordeal, that she’d have to help clean up after it was all done. Sidney and Maya wouldn’t help her. They were always too spoiled for their own good.
But she wanted to disappear for awhile. Go all the way to Dunston Street, to the old ranch house where the old lady died while looking for her slipper in the backyard. She’d heard it was haunted. Nobody had moved in since.
It would be better anyway without her around. Mama and Papa could love Sidney and Maya without her being in between. No need to argue over a birthday that didn’t need to be celebrated anymore.
She got to her feet and dusted herself off. Her mama would surely lend her a whooping for getting her new pink shorts dirty.
She started to walk again, to the point where the house was no longer in view and the sun had begun to set. Dinner was coming soon. One less mouth to feed, Natalie thought. They’ll be happy. She was just beyond another oak tree when something tugged on her belt loop from behind.
“Where do you think you’re going, cielito?”
Her father’s Dominican lilt was light and articulate. She’d loved his voice from the beginning.
Natalie stopped moving. She turned to look at her papa. He’d let his hair grow out, to the point that it coiled. It was pretty, black, shiny and soft. He often let her play with it when they were sitting on the porch swing on Sundays. He’d hum a childhood tune that his grandmother had taught him and she’d sing along, watching his wide brown eyes narrow and twinkle with the pleasant ease of a settled life.
“Away,” she said.
“Were you now?”
She nodded slowly.
“Well, that’s disappointing. What do you think your mama would say? And your grandma? Hmm, cielito?”
She bounced her shoulders. “I don’t know.”
“And who’s going to help us eat that chocolate cake your auntie is baking just for you? Who’s going to open all of your presents?”
She bounced her shoulders again.
“Why would you do that to your papa, Natalie?”
He called her by her real name when he’d really been hurt.
Suddenly she cried and lunged out to him. He picked her up, and she rested her head on his shoulder blade.
He always smelled so warm, so good, so familiar. Her papa. The only man she’d ever loved.
“I’m sorry, papa,” she cried. “I’m not going anywhere.”
He chuckled. She could feel the vibration rattle her little body to life. “Good, mi cielito. Don’t ever leave me. You are the reason I wake up every morning. Most girls aren’t as brave as you, little one. But save that bravery until you really need it. Until you’re really tested.”
“When...?”
He pressed his lips into her forehead. “You’ll know when, I promise you. Your day will come. But for now, we won’t tell your mama that you tried to run away. It’ll stay between us, okay?”
She remembered smiling.
SCOTTY AND NATALIE, DESPERATE TO GET AWAY FROM ONE ANOTHER, FOUND BRANDON AND ASHA on the second floor piazza, peering out over a sea of mist-laden pine trees. They weren’t really speaking to one another, but gazing idly, shuffling every once in awhile to allow for a tourist family to snap a picture.
Natalie approached her husband from behind and wrapped her arms around his waist. He chuckled, placing his eager hands atop hers. Asha pushed away from the stone railing and stood by Scotty. She didn’t touch him.
“I was just telling Ash that I was going to have to get something sharp out of my car if you didn’t turn up soon,” her husband teased. Natalie pressed her lips into his back.
“I’m here now,” she said. “Sorry, we were on a ghost hunt. Isn’t that right, Scott?”
“Yea, pretty scary shit going on upstairs.”
“I bet there was,” Asha said.
“Did you see any apparitions?”
She remembered dawdling in a mirror on the trip back down the stairs to the first level, and seeing what she thought was the outline of Bellamy’s face. She quickly realized that it was her own paranoia causing the vision and scooted off in an attempt to erase it from her brain.
Natalie shook her head timidly, as Brandon turned around to gaze down at her. His grin was warm, genuine, and she felt just a little bit filthier. Then, he had the audacity to press his lips into the center of her forehead, as though he were placing all the faith he’d had stored up within, into her now.
I wish he could understand how difficult it was. I wish he could feel what she was feeling. But her thoughts would be the death of him...the death of them.
LATER THAT EVENING, ASHA SAT IN THE BREAKFAST NOOK, WHILE NATALIE PUT A COUPLE OF STRAY DISHES AWAY. Both women made a conscious effort not to say more than two or three words to each other, a record to say the least, and Natalie steered away from any direct eye contact. She’d washed the same pots and pans a number of times, shifting them from one side of the sink to the next, while Asha tapped her fingers on the surface of the table rhythmically.
“Need any help?” she asked.
Natalie shook her head. “No, I’m okay. Thank you.”
“Where’s Brandon?”
“Upstairs showering, I think. Where’s Scotty?”
“Who the hell knows.”
“Ah.”
Silence fell between them once more. Natalie rung out the dish cloth, but kept her back turned.
“I like the color you chose for the kitchen,” she observed.
“It was all Brandon. Blue is his favorite color.”
“I see. How is Brandon these days?”
“What do you mean?”
“How’s he liking his job? How is he liking Portland?”
“He works long hours, but I think he enjoys the challenge of it all. The people he works with aren’t too bad either. I’m thinking of surprising him in the office next week and bringing him lunch. I don’t think he gets very many breaks during the day.”
“That’ll be nice. How wifely of you.”
Natalie turned quickly to face the breakfast nook. Asha had refrained from turning on the light above her head, her brown skin shadowed in organic moonlight. “Asha, really?”
“Problem?”
“You’re being snide.”
“Am I?”
“I don’t know what you and Scotty have discussed, but leave me out of it.”
“Fair enough. But Brandon and I had a little discussion of our own. While you and Scotty were off doing God knows what today.”
“And what did that discussion entail?”
“He asked me if there was something going on with you. He said that you haven’t been this unreadable in years. You’ve shut yourself off from him completely.”
“That’s not true.”
“It’s not, Natalie? Everyone can see it.”
“Did he happen to tell you about his little drunken phone call? Did he bring that up?”
“So that’s what this is all about? Him calling Sophia? Really? Do you want to know what he said to her, Nat?”
Natalie dropped the dish rag and turned to brace herself against the kitchen sink. “I don’t really care.”
“I think you do. But what do I know? I’ve only been your best friend for ten goddamn years. We’ve only been having this same conversation since you were eighteen years old.”
“Then let’s stop it right here, right now. I’m sick of having this fucking conversation. You and Scotty have made it your own personal mission to interject your opinions into our relationship for years. And I’m sick of it! So let’s stop it!”
It was the first time she’d raised her voice in quite some time. Her throat began to ache. And she was shaking. Any second, she figured, Brandon would come tumbling down the stairs to see why. But there was only silence for several minutes while she attempted to catch her breath.
“You’re going to lose him.” Asha’s voice was cold, aloof and breathy.
Natalie turned to her slowly, eyes narrowed and strained. “Excuse me?”
“You’re going to lose him. He told Sophia that he loved you more than life itself. But it would have been easier married to her.”
Asha raised herself from the table and exhaled. “There...conversation over.”
And she walked out of the room.
She promptly walked up the stairs and into the bedroom that she and Brandon shared. She’d never really taken the time to notice how they’d managed to put everything together in such a way that reflected both of them harmoniously. Pale blues and grays for Brandon, with a touch of green on the walls and in the trimming for Natalie. There were, of course, a number of framed photographs of varying sizes dotted about the room: one from their wedding, from the honeymoon, from some UGA football game that he drug her to, and one from a night that they were bored and had decided to try out the new digital camera that Brandon had gotten her as a birthday present. She’d chosen all of them, but Brandon kept his favorite image of her in his wallet at all times: one where she was sleeping in his bed on a cold and rainy Sunday afternoon.
“Why this one?” she’d asked once. “My hair looks gross, my skin unwashed, and I’m wearing that too-big sweater from your closet.”
“Because I love you most when you’re completely vulnerable.”
Brandon was still in the bathroom as she took as seat on their bed, unmade and smelling of their togetherness. She’d started to cry, but she kept it as silently as she could. Brandon had started to sing an obscure tune, coupled with a horrible melody. She couldn’t help but laugh.
He stopped singing, peering his head out to notice her sitting there. He was smiling at first, until he saw her tear-stained cheeks.
“Tallie, what’s the matter?” he asked her, brows furrowed. He was naked from the waist up, glistening with shower water, hair still damp and combed back with his fingers. She crumbled again. Tears ran their course down her cheeks and into her open palms.
“I just need you to...”
“Need me to what?”
In seconds he was kneeling by her, hands placed confidently on her knees. “Tell me, baby, what’s wrong.”
“I just need to you hold me.”
He scooped her up quickly, hooking the length of his arms around her wholly, squeezing life back into her. She grasped at him desperately, locking her fingers around his neck, straining under the pressure of her own personal regret.
“I’m so sorry,” she kept murmuring into his bare shoulder blade.
“What do you mean? What are you sorry for?”
“For doing this to you, baby. I’m so sorry.”
“What? I’m confused. Stop crying so I can understand you.”
“All of these years...damn it...I was such a fool...such a fucking fool...”
Brandon tugged at her chin gently, then cupped her face in his hands. “Baby...calm down...take a breath...”
So, she did. Tears hiccuped through her. She stared up at her husband through heavy lids. “I’m so sorry, Brandy.”
“What are you sorry for, Natalie?”