The Culmination (39 page)

He laughs. “Excellent.” There’s a long beat. He grabs my hand. “Thank you, Sarah.”

“Oh no, thank
you.
I definitely enjoyed that as much as you did.” I snicker.

“No, thank you for the
mural
.” He motions to the room around us. “Now that I’m getting a chance to look at the details, it’s even more amazing than I realized.”

“Oh man, I was so frickin’ excited to show it to you. I was bursting out of my skin.”

“Did you do it all yourself?”

“No. Not even Michelangelo could have painted all this in three days. I designed everything and then hired two artists to help me paint it. I did all the detail work on the vignettes—but the other painters took the heavy lifting on creating the forms.”

“I love that our girls will grow up surrounded by these words and images.”

“I figure we’ll use this room as a nursery for now. And when they get older and want their own rooms, we’ll make this room a playroom or library or something.”

“I love it.” He beams at me, his eyes sparkling. “Our girls are so lucky to have you as their mom, Sarah.”

I squeeze his hand. “They’re lucky to have you as their sweet daddy.”

He shakes his head in disbelief. “I can’t imagine what it’s gonna be like for them. You know, having a mom
and
a dad.”

I shrug. “I have no idea.”

“And not just a mom and dad—but a mom and dad who are crazy about each other and them. That’s pretty cool.”

“Do you think your mom and dad loved each other the way we do?”

“Of course not. Nobody loves each other the way we do. We’re the greatest love story ever told.”

I grin. I love it when he says that. “Well, do you think your parents at least had a love story?”

He pauses, considering. “I don’t know. I was too young to know one way or the other. I know my dad loved my mom, insofar as he was capable—but I’ve often wondered how the fuck
she
could have loved
him
?” He purses his lips, a thought almost visibly winding its way through the gray matter of his complicated brain. “But, maybe... hmm. Maybe when she was alive, he was a different man than the guy I knew later in life? Maybe she was his goddess and muse, the way you are for me?” His entire body stiffens with an apparent epiphany. “
Holy shit
.”

“What?”

“I just realized something—something big. Oh my God.”

“What?”

He sits up. “I’m him.”

There’s a long beat. I keep thinking he’s going to elaborate, but he doesn’t.

“Jonas? What are you saying, love?”

“I’m saying I’m my fucking father—the only thing standing between me and him is
you
. But for the Grace of God I go.”

I’m flabbergasted. “You’re nothing like your father, Jonas. Nothing.”

He gesticulates wildly, his realization apparently slamming him upside the head. “Oh my God. Sarah.
I am
.” He rubs his face. “I just realized my mom did for my dad what you do for me. She
saved
him. She
redeemed
him.” His mind is clearly racing right now. “When he lost her, he reverted to his natural shittiness and spiraled. If my mom hadn’t died, who knows what kind of man my dad would have become? What kind of father to Josh and me he might have been?”

I’ve got goose bumps. “You’re not like him, Jonas,” I say flatly. “You’re not capable of cruelty—I don’t care what the circumstance. You’re just not capable of it.”

“If something were to happen to you, I guarantee you everyone would say about me what I just said about my father: I can’t imagine how the fuck could she have loved
him
.”

“Oh my God. Stop. Just stop. You’re being crazy right now, Jonas.”

He stares at me, his eyes blazing.

I jut my chin at him. “You’re nothing like him, Jonas.”

He exhales and his entire body visibly relaxes. He lies back down, heat wafting off his body.

We gaze at the walls in silence for a long minute.

“You’re so much like her,” he says quietly.

He’s never said this to me before. I know this is his highest compliment.

He weaves his fingers into mine and we lie quietly for a few minutes, staring at the images on the walls.

“Thank you for saving me, Sarah.”

I touch the tattoo on his chest. “We saved each other, baby.”

He pulls me to him and we gaze quietly at the images surrounding us for several minutes.

“My chin isn’t really that big, is it?” he finally says, breaking the silence.

I chuckle. “No.”

“Thank God. And why do I only have one eye in that one?” He points to himself depicted as a shaggy, blue beast. “You and the girls have two eyes. Why am I the only one-eyed weirdo of the family?”

I start singing the Sesame Street song about one thing not being like the others and he laughs heartily.

“Actually, I just thought one eye seemed sillier. I had to make sure all the monsters were silly—didn’t want to cause any monster-induced nightmares in this room.”

“I thought maybe it was a coded reference to my ‘one-eyed monster’?”

“Ew, Jonas, no. This is our
babies’
room. You’re the only person alive who would ever think that.”

He laughs and looks around again. “Whoa,” he suddenly says. “There are quotes intertwined in the stars.”

“Yeah.”

“How did I not notice that before?”

“They just look like swirls in the galaxy if you’re not paying close attention, especially in this low lighting.”

“That’s so cool.”

“Isn’t it? It turned out so well.”

“‘Never lose infinite hope,’” he says, reading one of the many quotes swirling among the stars on the wall. “You’ve always loved that one.”

“Yup. Martin Luther King Jr.”

“‘Hope is the dream of the waking man,’” Jonas continues, reading Aristotle’s quote.

“Epic Rap Battles of History!” I shout, harkening back to the exact thing I said about these two quotes in one of our very first email exchanges.

Jonas laughs. “That was my first clue you weren’t gonna be the usual kind of girl.”

“
That
was your first clue? Not the fact that I emailed you in the first place?”

“Actually, yeah, I knew you were unlike anyone I’d ever met the minute I saw the header on your very first email.” He sighs. “My Beautiful Intake Agent.”

“You were so damned irresistible, Jonas.” I sigh. “My Brutally Honest Mr. Faraday. Oh my God. Those sad eyes. Those tattoos on your forearms. That cocky attitude. Those abs. Good lord, you were sex on a stick.”

“I
was
sex on a stick?” He motions to his ripped abs with a cocky grin on his face. “There’s nothing past tense about me, baby.” He grabs his balls. “This right here is one hundred percent
present
-tense.”

I know he’s being funny, and I realize my timing is strange, considering Jonas is grabbing his balls right now, but I’m suddenly overcome with sentimentality. I can’t believe that damned application landing in my inbox three and a half years ago has led me to this moment—to being a wife and mother. To being part of a
family
. I swallow hard.

“Sarah?”

I touch Jonas’ chiseled face. “You’re the love of my life, Jonas Faraday.”

He bites his lip, obviously surprised by my sudden earnestness.

My heart is suddenly racing. “You always express yourself so beautifully, and I never know how to convey the depth of my feelings to you.”

He motions to the room. “I think you conveyed your message pretty damned well.” He pulls me to him and kisses me deeply, and the minute his tongue slides into my mouth, my entire body electrifies.

I put my forehead on his chest, right on the sun and the moon. “Read some more quotes to me, my love.”

His fingertips glide down my naked back for a moment. “‘Courage is a kind of salvation,’” he says softly. “Are we planning to raise daughters or Marines?”

“We’re planning to raise beasts. Ass-kicking little Faraday beasts.”

“Amen.”

“Hellz yeah.”

His fingers travel down to my ass. My skin is starting to ignite. My crotch is starting to throb.

“Ah, there’s a good one. ‘Sometimes the questions are complicated and the answers are simple.’ Who said that?”

“Dr. Seuss.”

He laughs. “Oh my God, I love it. I thought you were gonna say Gandhi or someone like that.”

“No, Gandhi’s over there.” I point.

“‘Where there is love there is life.’ Another good one. You can always count on Gandhi to say something smart.”

“Yeah, that Gandhi was a smarty-pants—or, rather, a smarty-sari.”

Jonas laughs. “You funny.”

“I funny.”

“‘The best thing to hold onto in life is each other,’” he says, reading yet another quote. “That’s a sweet one. Who said that?”

“Audrey Hepburn.”

“Really?”

“Yep.”

“Wow, you’ve assembled quite an eclectic assortment of philosophers on these walls.”

“I figured it was time to give Plato and Aristotle a little backup—get a little fresh perspective, maybe.”

“Plato, Aristotle, and Audrey Hepburn.”

“Are you implying Audrey doesn’t belong on the wall with your boys?”

“Not at all.”

“Because that woman was pretty spectacular.”

“Indubitably.” He pulls me into him. “So I have a question, Mrs. Faraday. Do you want to channel all that passion of yours into defending the spectacular Audrey Hepburn or do you want to use it to get spectacularly fucked by your horny husband again?” He presses himself into me and it’s quite plain he’s ready to deliver on option number two.

“Hmm. I think I’m gonna go with ‘Getting Spectacularly Fucked by my Horny Husband’ for four hundred, Alex.”

Jonas puts on his game-show-announcer voice. “The answer is... eighteen feet.”

I press my finger against the tip of his penis and make a buzzing noise. “What is the length of Jonas Faraday’s erect penis?”

“That is correct, Mrs. Faraday. What does she win, Johnny?
Well, Alex, Mrs. Faraday wins... a brand new washer-dryer set.
”

“Yay!”

We both laugh.

“Although, actually,” Jonas says, “you won’t need that brand new washer-dryer any time soon. I’ve been meaning to tell you: I lined up a housekeeper. She’ll be starting in a couple weeks.”

“What? You mean to
live
here?”

“Yeah. Live-in.” He pauses. “She’ll be our housekeeper slash nanny.”

I sit up. “You hired a
nanny
?”

“We talked about this, remember?”

“Yeah, and I said
no.
”

“No, you didn’t. You said, ‘We’ll see.’”

“That’s code for
no.
”

“Well, how was I supposed to know that?” He smiles, clearly trying to be charming, but I scowl. He exhales. “She’s Mariela’s cousin. Rosario. She’s coming from Venezuela. I just got all the immigration paperwork settled this morning. She’ll be here in two weeks.”

“And you’re just now mentioning this to me?”

He sits up and lets out a long exhale. “Sarah, for fuck’s sake, don’t go all Latina on my ass. You were lying in a hospital bed. I thought you were dying. I panicked and called Mariela.”

I soften. “Oh.” My stomach tightens just thinking about the hell poor Jonas endured while I was lying blissfully unconscious in my hospital bed.

Jonas’ face has turned red. He looks genuinely upset. “How the fuck was I supposed to take care of two newborns all by myself
and
try to run a company at the same time?”

I touch his cheek. “I understand. I get it. It’s okay.”

He looks distressed. “How was I supposed to do that, Sarah?”

“I understand, baby. But I’m okay now, love—there’s no need for any help now. We can do this, just you and me.”

He rolls his eyes.

“Why did you just roll your eyes?”

“Because you’re being stubborn. I’m trying to make our life easier and you’re just so damned set on being self-sufficient all the time, to a fault.”

“It’d just be weird to have some other woman living here, helping me care for my own children.”

“That’s not weird at all.”

“Yes, it is. My mom never had any help from anyone. Growing up, it was always just my mom and me—the two Musketeers. And that’s why we’re so close to this day—because we only had each other.”

“That’s what you’re worried about—your babies not bonding with you because Rosario’s here to help us out?” He touches my hair. “Baby, no one can ever take a mother’s place.” He cups my cheeks in his large palms. “I happen to know this from personal experience.”

He’s melting my resolve. I think it’s distinctly possible I’m being irrationally stubborn about this issue, but I’m not sure. I’ve never been a mother before. And I’ve certainly never been a
wealthy
mother before. I bite my lip.

He flashes his most magnetic smile. “How about this? Let’s agree that Rosario will come live with us as our
housekeeper
.” He runs his fingertips down the length of my arm. “She’ll help with the cooking and cleaning and that’s it. Okay? Whether or not it ever evolves into pitching in with the babies now and again will be totally up to you. You’ll just play it by ear. See how you feel.”

Well, jeez. When he puts it like that, it’s a no-brainer. “Well...” I say. “Can we give her one of the rooms way on the other side of the house so she doesn’t hear me when I howl like a monkey?”

“Of course, baby.”

“Why are you smirking like that?”

“Because when you get going, anyone within a mile radius of this house can hear you loud and clear. Speaking of which...” His fingers brush between my legs, making my skin pop with goose bumps. “I think it’s time to make my little MILF howl like a monkey right now.”

“Oh, I’m a MILF?”

“Of course, you are.”

“Yay. I’ve always wanted to be a MILF. That’s so cool.”

He kisses me deeply and slips his fingers inside me. “Well, actually,” he mumbles into my lips, “you’re a MIGF.”

“A MIGF?”

He spreads my legs and positions his hard-on right at my entrance. “A Mom I’m
Gonna
Fuck. Right fucking
now.
”