33 Adam
33 Adam
Hu ? , Vi ? t Nam
one year later
“I can feel you staring at my ass,” Evie mutters out of the side of her mouth.
Surprised, Adam stumbles, then laughs. She’s not wrong. There’s a delicious tightness to it as she climbs the rough terrain
in the rainforest, her calf muscles tensing, the sweat running down her calves. The temperature in Hu ? is marginally cooler than when they were last here, but it’s still difficult to get used to the subtropical climate after
all their time in Northern California. Adam never thought he’d get used to the chill in San Francisco, but it turns out, he
enjoys the brush with seasons. Of course, it’s easy to enjoy anything with Evie by his side.
At the moment, they’re a world away from their row house, on their way to the Phong Nha caves again. This time, they have
a full tour with them. There will be no getting marooned on a deserted beach. No skinny-dipping in a dark pool of water or
making love on the sand, as much as Adam would like that. This time, they opted for a hotel for the night, after which they’ll
meet Ruby and—shock of all shocks—his parents for lunch the next day.
“Better I look than grab, right?” he whispers darkly in her ear.
“Pervert.”
“You’re acting like you don’t want it just as much as me.”
She flushes tellingly and swats at him. “Get all this out of the way before we see your parents, Quy ? n.”
He makes a dismissive gesture, then corrects her. “Quy ? n-Lang, thank you very much. They won’t care. We’re married, and with Ruby now single, we are the surest path to perpetuating
their dynasty.”
“Perpetuating their dynasty,” she groans. “There it is. Killed my hard-on.”
Evie walks ahead of him through the rainforest, her steps sure in her well-worn boots, now a regular hiker after their time
near the redwoods. Every time he sees her, he can’t help thinking of her beaming face as she turned to him in San Francisco’s
City Hall, ready to make it official. Though they’d married quietly, Evie in a white slip dress and Adam wearing a navy suit,
they’d had a large party afterward at Auntie H ? o’s house—their house.
Lillian, Graham, and their baby daughter were there, along with the rowdy band of creatives that Adam reluctantly accepted
as their adopted children, if adopted children got roaring drunk and composed arias in claw-foot tubs at midnight and observed
absolutely zero boundaries when it came to bedroom doors. The first thing he’d done after he moved into the house was change
out all the locks, so they’d actually work. Evie had laughed at him, but she soon saw the wisdom after he pulled her into
their room, soundly turning the lock for hours—and hours—of blissful privacy.
“Speaking of dynasties,” Evie calls behind her. “Do you think the Cabinet of Curiosities is in good shape for the winter retreat?”
Adam puts on his operations officer hat, a role he’d been all too glad to accept. “Enrollment was pretty high; we actually
had to waitlist a few. There’s never enough room for the potters. They require so much space .”
“They’re the nicest, though! Half our dishware is made by the potters. Including that penis-shaped chalice that you always
wind up using for the Saturday salons.”
“The one you thrust into my hand every time, because you think it’s hilarious?”
“Yeah, that one.” Evie giggles.
“The potters are all right,” he admits. “More useful than the poets, of course.”
“Hey.” She sticks her tongue out at him. “We bleed on the page . Not like you soulless marketing robots, who only bleed buzzwords.”
He laughs. “I make it a personal mission to bleed as little as possible, metaphorically or otherwise. I hear you have an aversion
to blood. But, Evie, winning that city grant meant we were able to offer a couple of full scholarships. One of them was awarded
to a young woman from Kansas. Tori Sanchez.”
“I saw her application,” Evie says, her voice softening. “In her admissions essay, she wrote that her mom died earlier this
year. She needs a new start.”
“I thought you’d appreciate that. If the money holds out, there will be a recurring scholarship in your father’s name.”
Evie reaches back to squeeze his hand. They’ve run a few other retreats and each unfolded so successfully that the social
accounts for Cabinet of Curiosities buzzed with tagged photos, DMs, and requests for interviews from local press outlets.
The formula for Cabinet of Curiosities is a simple one: The nonprofit gives creative people space away from their normal routines
to create and find community. But the magic is in the details, like the beautiful, fresh meals served family-style every night
and the in-home masseuse services offered each Friday, and the Saturday night salons where everyone can share a work in progress
and receive gentle, nurturing feedback.
Adam reflects proudly that it’s actually Evie who’s the magic. She brings everything she loves about community into one place, always selecting participants who are generous
and (generally) ego-free. It’s a kind of matchmaking, she says, picking the right mix of characters for a retreat. Sometimes
she consults her psychic, Bà Oanh, whose fees she’s tried multiple times—to Adam’s chagrin—to write off as a tax-deductible
expense.
Nowadays, Ruby will often call Evie for business advice, and Adam doesn’t blame her. Evie manages conflict with such wisdom
and calm that Adam can scarcely recognize the scattered woman who initially arrived on the tour. She’s the one who can coax
inspiration from even the most deadlocked artists, often sitting with them in silence until they find their way out of the
darkness together. She tells them that she’s been there, in that hopeless place. And they believe her. They trust her because
she’s one of them.
But despite the fact that they could be holding these retreats consistently, they only run them twice a year. For one, they don’t need the income. Love Yêu was recently acquired by a huge, international dating conglomerate, and Adam sold his shares for a hefty fee, channeling much of it into Cabinet of Curiosities and reserving the rest for their pet hobby—travel. Ruby is still the CEO of Love Yêu for the time being, but knowing her, she’s itching for another business venture.
So far, they’ve held off on opening more retreat sessions, because Evie needs the time and space for her own work. Her second
book of poetry comes out soon, already flush with rave reviews, and she’s been head down on her memoir, a rewarding if emotional
feat that has taken a lot out of her. She and Grace often talk on the phone, rehashing the old memories and crying over Evie’s
father. Adam regrets that he never met him or Auntie H ? o, but Evie assures him that they would have been nearly as in love with him as she is.
Now, standing at the entrance to the cave, Evie shoots him a brilliant smile, and his heart clenches at the audacity of its
own luck. His wife. For years, he searched for a way to check off that last box, a way to finally make his parents happy. But it was only in
daring to flout their expectations that he could find his own path—earned and sincere—to joy. At the end of that path will
always be her .
And his parents have come around, in their own haughty, grudging way. It helped that Ruby supports their relationship entirely—and
that her own divorce offered a kind of distraction. Adam was relieved to see that after the initial turmoil died out, Ruby
was eager to start anew. She has always deserved better than Th?ng (those tribal tattoos!), and now she recognizes that. She
jokes about going on the tour for her own purposes this time around.
Adam joins Evie in the cave, taking in the cooling temperature and jagged fossils along the edge. The shadowy cavern is still
and quiet, with a distant twinkling of lights from the headlamps of another tour group.
“They call this the Dark Cave,” he whispers, wrapping his arms around her from behind.
“A bit on the nose.”
The tour guide tells them they can take in a mud bath if they choose. Everyone else peels down to their swimsuits, then hops into the earth-toned pool, sinking up to their necks in warm mud. Usually, Evie would be game too, but she shakes her head and leads him away from the group, threading her fingers through his.
“No mud for you, sweetheart?” he whispers into her neck.
“My thoughts are dirty enough without it.” She spins to face him, then wiggles her eyebrows. “Besides, I have a proposition
for you.”
“Yes. The answer is always yes.” He kisses her on the nose, moving down her face to reach her lips. But she ducks away.
“Focus! I was thinking...”
“Dangerous.”
“You have no idea. What if we buy a house here? In Vi ? t Nam? I know you miss it. You gave up so much for me. You shouldn’t have to give up your home too.”
He shakes his head. “Home is where you are.”
She grins and swats at him. “Put it on a doily, mister. I’m serious. We can afford it, and I would like to be able to think
about hosting international retreats someday. I miss it here. It’s my heritage too. Ruby and I were talking about combining
a writing workshop with a tour—can you see it? Marrying inspiration with travel and the best instructors? We could offer fellowships
from donors. Your parents’ hoity-toity friends would jump at the chance to appear in a bestselling book dedication. And we’ll
need some headquarters overseas if we’re going to make it happen.”
He groans. “You and Ruby are going to empty our bank accounts.” But his brain begins to add up numbers. He knows he could
get some of his friends on board. And they could build on the highly successful formula that he and Ruby created. Plus, he
and Evie could travel on the tours themselves, as hosts. She could write, and at night, they could make love on the balconies
overlooking a private beach...
A smile spreads across his face. He admits, “I can see it.”
“I knew you’d come around,” she crows.
“That took all of five seconds.”
She winks. “Longer than I expected, honestly. And—who knows? Maybe someday, we’ll fill our Vi ? t Nam home up with more than just irascible artists.”
When she bites her lip, looking through her lashes at him in a silent question, he sees that too. A future filled with miniature,
sleepy-eyed versions of her and vacations up the coast of the South China Sea and sticky fingers reaching into the barrels
of saltwater taffy on Pier 39. The two of them, heads bent together after a long day, sighing with satisfaction about their
full, complicated, always surprising life.
He says without hesitation, “Yes. Yes to all of it.”
When he meets her mouth, it’s with a crushing heat, a desperate will for her to see what’s in his heart. He wants her to feel,
with no doubt in her mind, the jubilant, overflowing love he holds for her—and for their blooming future. Into the kiss, he
presses his confidence that they will make a life together, one step at a time, filling each busy hour with even more joy
than they ever thought possible.
But as her lips meet his, hungry and answering, he realizes that she already knows what he’s thinking. They have always been
able to speak without words. Theirs is the language of stars and heat and overwhelming possibility. Theirs is the result of
an existence lived bravely. Lived together.
And maybe somewhere far away, there’s an old woman clucking in satisfaction, knowing that her greatest wish for her niece
has come to pass, though not without the dips and pivots and wild turns that accompany every life worth living.
Every wise woman knows this truth: a joyful life is never simple. If anything, those wild turns are the point of it all. One
only has to remain faithful to the destination.
The wise woman in the clouds blows a kiss down to her niece, which Evie feels as a shiver that fades as quickly as it arrives.
Hand in hand, Adam and Evie slip away into the sunshine, leaving the silence and darkness of the cave. Turning the page for
a new couple to make their own brave, unforgettable leap into the radiant unknown.