40. Maggie
40
maggie
This whole week we’ve stolen away any moment we could during the day. I’ve spent evenings cooking with his daughter not talking about her dad. Someday I hope to graduate to a nighttime date.
He’s kept the sexy, dirty Colt at bay since the bat house dalliance, but I want to unleash him soon. We’re both dying. But between school and his kids we’re short on time even during the day. Sloane’s having nightmares lately, so he didn’t sneak out and Daisy’s schedule has been cut short. We mostly meet for coffee and make out.
Maggie: You know we had much more sex as teenagers than we do now.
Colt: None. We’re having none and it’s fucking killing me.
Maggie: Agreed. {Picture of cleavage} What are you doing now?
Colt: School applications with Daisy. No more pics.
Maggie: Call me when they go to sleep.
Colt: Un jour
I continue slicing lemons for more limoncello. The neighbor taught me how to make it. I’m kind of addicted to perfecting it and I’m constantly sticky. I do it to keep busy at night but I’ve made an insane amount of limoncello. Last count, I had sixty bottles going.
We’ll all be on the road together for a week to Paris, and I’m hoping I’m not squirely the whole time. I’ve kept the secret from Mak and so has Colt from his brothers. I have butterflies thinking of all the time together, but also seeing these people I love and rarely get to spend time with.
I lay on my suitcase that’s full of fruit, to zip it closed. “Mongoose, bats, and other assorted things living in the walls! Do you hear me? I’m out of town for the next seven days. I left food out for you, but stay out of the common areas. I can’t stay with you in my space.”
There’s some scratching. “Look, I’m aware you probably miss the bulk of the bats but it’s time it’s just you and me, Mongoose.” There’s another scratch and a small yowl. “I know. Mak and Lizzie will be there. It’s going to be amazing. I’ll be back in a week. There’s extra melon, open tins of sardines and greens out back. You’ll have to find your way. As will I, I guess. Do you think this is stupid? I mean, instantly wanting to be with Colt?”
There’s no noise, and I realize I’m talking to a creature in a wall. I hoist my weathered bag I bought at an open market in Paris all those years ago. I’ve had it repaired at least four times. I’m buzzing with excitement, but I feel shitty that this should be a trip they take with her.
I’m twisted in my head. It’s terrible she died but hope creeps in. I don’t know what to make of it all, and we haven’t talked about what happens next. Even as we jump into this week with the kids and our friends, I have no idea what’s on the other side. I’m not sure I’ve ever felt lighter, like a teenager. I haven’t texted Mak back in a week and she’s getting antsy. It’s going to be awesome to see her and surprise her.
Maggie: Not dead. I’m okay.
Mak: I’m sorry, who is this?
Maggie: Sorry. I needed to be alone.
Mak: Been six whole days. Thought we were done with this shit. Tony is tired of me asking him to contact the Missing Persons FBI task force. We were going to get you-know-who to tap his important dad to find you.
Maggie: I’m fine and I’m closer than you think.
Mak: No, you’re not. I’m in France. Fuck you if you’re at home.
I smile to myself as I drag my bags down the stairs
Maggie: Life has a funny way of working out.
Mak: Don’t do this again. I can’t take it. Also, there’s a possibility I’m pregnant.
Mak: Fine! Trot off to your clandestine spot in your mystery life. Leave me here wondering if I’m pregnant or not.
Maggie: Wait, like right now?
Mak: No, in like a month. Of course, now.
Maggie: Don’t you work at a hospital. There are tests available to you.
Mak: I took one and I’m not but the point is you missed the freak out. You missed the relief and epic night of drinking.
Maggie: I’ll make it up to you. Sorry.
Mak: Hope there’s a hot guy at least. You need to cleanse that palate.
Maggie: As a matter of fact…
Mak: Call me soon.
Maggie: We will talk so soon. I swear on my life.
Mak: In that case I won’t expect to hear from you.
Maggie: I pinkie promise. We’re not done discussing this, but I have to go.
Mak: Love you. Call me.
I sit on the crumbling stoop out front in the sun, waiting for my ride. I’m excited to get to know Sloane. And him. He makes me excited. I know he’s not like a magic salve that will cure all my burns, but the fire I feel when I’m around him can’t be denied. We don’t know what all our longing and fantasies will look like but for this weekend I shove it all down. I’m so flipping sick of going over every detail of what happened or what’s going to happen. I’m reveling in sitting in the Tuscan sun surrounded by too many lemons and a slight breeze and tonight I’ll toast some people who have been in and out of my life. And maybe, I’ll get to kiss my soulmate. I want to get lost in his kiss long enough to forget to remember the pain.
There’s dust on the drive and the wisteria hanging over the entrance jostles in the wake of his red car arriving over the small ridge. My whole body smiles and I stand up, trying not to clap and squeal that Colt is coming to pick me up so we can go back to the beginning.
He jumps out and the girls wave to me from the back seat. He comes around the front of the car, eyes sparkling, and my breath is a thing of history. It’s gone. I’m alight and awash with too much joy. I can’t contain it, and his smile tells me he feels the same. He runs a finger lightly over the top of my hand as he grabs my bag, making my breath hitch. He looks up at me and says in a low raspy whisper to just me.
“Me too. Breath gone. You look so fucking beautiful, and I want to touch you so badly. Hold you and kiss you and let the world slide away but—” as if on cue Daisy beeps the horn.
I finish his thought, “…But the world awaits you and it’s right here with us so we should probably go.”
I slide into the passenger seat and hand back a batch of lemon bars to Daisy.
“Seriously? More lemons?”
“Look around. What am I supposed to do, just let them rot?” I can’t do that. I can’t be that wasteful and as long as the grove is under my care I’ll figure out how to take care of all of them. “I do have sixty bottles of limoncello going and I’m not even sure I like limoncello anymore. Perhaps I can sell it to tourists at the market. There’s my second act, no more teaching. I’m selling lemon hooch.”
Colt laughs as he gets into the car.
Sloane stuffs her face with a lemon bar while her sister tsks. I turn back and Sloane muffles a mouth full. “Thanks. You’re a real one.” I grin not knowing what that’s supposed to mean. Currently, she’s dressed with a flower headband around her forehead like a throwback to the hippie era but pulling it off. She puts her feet up on the window and leans over toward her sister.
Daisy shoves at her sister and complains, “Ew. Dad. Get her on her own side.” Colt gets into the car.
“This is how we behave around company? Knock it off.”
“Dad, how long?” Daisy asks.
“You know the car isn’t even on yet. But if you ask me again, we’ll drive straight through.”
Daisy protests. “No! The good pizza place is at our normal stop. And it’s in France.”
“Oh, so you do know how long the trip is.” Colt snarks at Daisy.
Sloane sits up and leans between the seats and says to me, “We like to do the long part on day one. Get up early and get there by lunch.”
“Have you been there a lot?”
Daisy adds, “Since we were babies. But only one road trip so far, but Liliana always has the good stuff all ready for us when we get there.”
“Liliana?”
Colt turns onto the road. “Hayden’s mom.”
“She’s like a grandmother that hugs when no one is watching,” Daisy says and it breaks my heart. Hopefully, Colton’s parents will bypass the photo op someday.
Sloane adds, “Mom’s mom will hug us without a camera around but sometimes it feels like she’s doing it because she’s supposed to.”
She shrugs and I lean back through the seats to cover up the fact that I want to touch Colton. I want to reassure him even though we’re not talking about anything until after this trip. Push it down, Maggie. Answers, questions and consequences after Paris. I whisper, “AQC.”
He whispers it back and turns on the radio.
Sloane sits crisscross apple sauce on the seat and I ask. “And what’s on this best pizza in France? You know we live in Italy?” My hand drifts to his thigh, and he makes a delicious sucking noise through his teeth.
Daisy answers, “Nothing if she knows what’s good for her.”
“Dais, explain to me this hostility. You know like you do with cooking. Lay it out so I can learn,” I ask. His hand covers mine. My blood blooms in a burst of bright pink and yellow of a springtime meadow. I’m still shoved between the front seats, looking at the two of them and hiding our touches.
Daisy wraps her arms around her middle. “She’s so annoying.”
I glance at Sloane and then back to Daisy. “That’s her job. She’s the little sister. She’s there to remind you of how annoying you were at that age.” I squeeze her knee as his hand slides to my knee. I’m all bunnies hopping in a verdant field and water sparkling in morning sunshine. His touch, his light caress is all the missing pieces of me that were lost under the table when someone higher up than me was putting my puzzle together.
Daisy rolls her eyes and puts her earbuds back in.
Sloane tosses up a peace sign. “I’m all about love, peace and harmony. I don’t know what you’re saying, Daisy. Just let it all float by.”
Daisy points to her sister. “See.” I chuckle a little, knowing Daisy didn’t turn on her earbuds.
“How would you want to resolve this?” I ask her.
Daisy thinks about it. “It’s fine now.” I nod and there’s a slight bit of pressure instead of the gentle caresses he’s been drawing on my skin. Suddenly the secret touches of this man become something else. I move slowly back into my seat, so he has time to remove his hand to make sure the girls don’t see. I sink into my seat, glancing over at him, and he adjusts his khaki shorts. I lick my lips so he can see me out of his peripheral vision.
“Stop it,” he whispers.
And I dig down into my bag on the floor for my book but on the way to sitting back up I catch his look. “Not sure I can.”
The pizza was fantastic. The cranky teenager and her ‘love the one you’re with’ sidekick were not. They were so not. They constantly bicker, and I’m not their teacher or their elder in any way so I got nothing. Colt had to keep interjecting and finally send Daisy back to the hotel room so Sloane could finish eating. I learned she only likes pizza with mushrooms. She’s reading the Electric Kool Aid Acid test because she thought it was about the history of Kool Aid.
Colt was horrified. I was impressed. I recited the first stanzas of the poem Howl by Alan Ginsberg to her. Something I was forced to memorize in college. She was duly impressed. I never loved the poem or truly understood it, I just like the musicality of it. I didn’t want to pick Robert Frost like everyone else, so I randomly picked it. But reciting it now at thirty-two hits differently than eighteen.
Sloane’s telling Colt about some song and my mind drifts to all the things that can be reexamined years after their first exploration. I wonder if time is messing with me so I can make sense of the pretzel logic of everything.
And then I grin at the poem’s line, “listening to the terror in the walls.” I sigh and lean my head against the window while watching some light rain spatter around this little place in Lyon. A foot nudges mine as Sloane sits back and smacks her stomach.
“Good grub. I tell you.”
He reaches out to her with his foot pressed against mine. “You ready? Slygirl? Let’s get some sleep.” There’s a hitch in her breath and she blows out and it’s shaky. It’s a slim second and her face changes. She gets up and he pulls her onto his lap and holds her. A well-practiced routine or maybe he’s just that intuitive with his daughter. She snuggles into him, and my soul cracks open a little bit more. Seeing him tease her then hold her. She’s clutching him. He’s cooing into her ear. “Have your moment. Feel it, little Sly.”
Then I hear a little bit of sniffling, and I feel as if I’m intruding. I pull away, and he looks at me over the head of his eight-year-old. He tries to pull me back. I shake him off and walk towards the exit to get to the hotel.
In a small teary voice, I hear her say, “Maggie?”
I turn and see her little streaks down her face. Her amber eyes so much the color of his. Both sets looking at me and imploring me to stay. I turn.
“What is it, sweet Sloane?”
She wipes her face with the back of her hand. “Sometimes I have a moment. Doesn’t make any sense because I was having a good time. But suddenly, it will hit me she should be here.”
I cover my heart flustered and embarrassed at my intrusion. “I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t be here. I’m sorry.” I turn to walk out and Converse low tops scramble after me. She grabs my elbow.
“No. It’s fine. I just get sad sometimes, and Daddy says I have to feel it. Unlike my sister, who likes to push it down.”
I stutter and stammer in my reply. “Don’t push it down. I’m intruding. Oh. I don’t know. Sorry. I’ll just go to sleep. You can go to sleep. Be with your Daddy. He’s a pretty great guy and a good one to talk to. This place was a great suggestion. It was the best pizza, but I have had one other one in Phoenix of all places. That was really good and I think about it all the time.” I take a breath, there a strong hand on my shoulder, and a hand pushing my hair back.
“Focus, Mags,” he says with that sweet tone.
I grin at him. “Sloane. I’m sorry to intrude.”
She shrugs and takes my hand. “It’s fine. I’m allowed to miss her and enjoy pizza. And you can be here too. Mommy always said there can never be too much love or people to share it with. And I love this pizza.”
Colt grins and removes his hand from me, and I feel every ripple of air between us. I turn back to Sloane.
“I saw a patisserie when we walked here. What are your thoughts on pastry?”
Colt answers, “We’re a pro pastry household.” His smile curls up at the corners, and he looks a bit like he did in Paris ages ago.
“Groovy, man,” Sloane says, “And if we can find that elephant ear thing for my crabby sister, I think that might mellow her out.” I laugh and Sloane doesn’t drop my hand as she yanks me to the door. Colt’s hand on my back guiding me into some unknown terrain. He’s him but so much of him is in them now. It’s hard not to love him, and it’s harder every day not to love them. Even when I didn’t know who Daisy was, there was like a shimmery piece of her I was drawn to like a mongoose to a wall. Is that even a thing? But I was drawn to Daisy and now I know it was because of him.
“Pastry is on me but one condition. You have to tell me a favorite story about your mom. Not a sad one but one that’s stupid or silly,” I say. Her face lights up and there’s a light finger drawing a line down the back of my arm. I look to the right and see Colt grinning a sweet sad smile.
“She loved pillows. Like a lot….”
This will be the moment I point to when I realized I was falling in love with his girls. And the moment I’ve set myself up for quite the heartbreak, because it’s not just him anymore, they have the power to break me too. I’m still not trusting any of this.