Chapter Eight
I sat in my study, the tidy plastic box on the table in front of me. I was the opposite of tidy, sweating like I was working out despite the air-conditioning being on sixty-seven. I’d known there was no other choice but to agree to this arrangement.
Everything I accused Frances of being, I knew to be true. She believed in happy endings and fairy tales, and probably castles too. Although she wasn’t the type of woman you could hurt and be easily forgiven. For every ounce of sweet running through her veins, there was venom in equal measure. If you cut her, she bit back. With fangs.
Corey handled the arrangements, sending a car to pick Frances up at her place and transport her to my apartment, letters in tow, the way she suggested. Actually, she’d offered to bring them to the office, but there was no way I could do this sort of thing in a public place.
Which was how I found myself sitting here in a fever pitch, on a Sunday no less, a week and a half after I’d deserted Frances. Of course she’d played hardball and said this was her first available date and she wouldn’t be separated from her treasured letters.
Now she sat waiting in my living area, hopefully sipping the latte my housekeeper prepped for her before leaving. Magda usually took off Sunday for church and family, but I’d asked for a favor—one hour to help Frances get settled. Magda had looked at me like I’d spoken a foreign language. The ask was so unusual, she’d agreed.
In the current moment, I regretted everything about the day so far.
Unclipping the side of the container, I peered inside. Forty-seven letters, each one seemingly placed back in its envelope. Thinking she kept them in chronological order, I lifted the top one, sliding my finger inside the envelope and delicately pulling out the sheet of paper.
Noting the date on top, January 1st, I assumed this was the very first one.
My Dearest James,
Reading the salutation had me as unraveled as the first time I’d heard it spoken. I had been Milly’s “Dearest Mackenzie” all my life, and to now hear she used that same sentiment for someone else shook me.
It wasn’t jealousy, but rather shock. If I was being honest, I hadn’t really put a lot of stock in Frankie’s story before the exact moment she spoke about the letters. Sadly, she was hot and had piqued my interest, mentally and physically, so I went along with her ruse until she dropped the bomb on me—the Dearest modifier changed things. It proved she might be onto something, and Milly had held something close to her heart without telling me.
It also changed Milly’s final letter to me and her wish for me to find true, everlasting love.
I shook my head. I couldn’t think about my letter now when I had a stack of new-to-me ones I needed to get through.
Leaning forward, I cast my eyes on the letter again.
My Dearest James,
My resolution in the new year is to write a letter to you every week, so you don’t forget me. Or us. The day will come where we can’t be together. You know that, right?
After my first kiss, I will never, ever, ever forget you.
I can’t believe you kissed me last night at midnight, hanging from my windowsill, but it’s burned in my memory like the day we met.
I can’t believe how many times I ran into the corner store for something my mama needed and might have seen you but didn’t. Why? Because I’d been raised to be prim and not look at men. When I ran into your chest, it was destiny. Of course, I wasn’t looking where I was going, and I knew the moment I hit your body that it was meant to be.
Meeting you has been the highlight of all my days.
I’m sorry I can’t invite you into my home, and all I can offer is a perch on my window since my bedroom is in the back and private. It’s the best I can do.
I love all our moments we steal away from watchful eyes, and I promise to bring Connie’s and my special soup next time I see you. It’s not fair that I’m allowed to be friends with Constance and not fall for you. It’s a cruel world, but my papa would never allow it and my zayde would sit shiva for me. That means mourn my death.
But it’s a new year, and maybe something will change in the way the world sees you and me. I just see us as two people who care about one another.
I am counting the minutes until we walk through the zoo like we talked about.
Until then, don’t forget me.
Your Dearest Rosie
One letter, and my stomach was lodged in my throat.
Acid burned in my chest and a swell of emotions threatened to spill out from me. I hoped Frances stayed firmly planted on the other side of the apartment.
After being emotionally in check for decades, the cement walls I’d poured around me were about to be bulldozed by my grandmother’s long-lost love story.
Closing my eyes, I swallowed and put the letter on the table and opened the next.
This one was more of the same. Why couldn’t they love one another freely? Milly was already afraid of her parents learning of their affections…all of it heart-wrenching, and it was only the second letter.
They’d seen a monkey at the Prospect Park Zoo and secretly held hands while walking around. James had brought a pepperoni roll, not knowing my grandmother couldn’t eat it, and she would never forget their combined laughter over it.
My mind spun with the details. Milly took me to that zoo when I was young; she didn’t speak a word of going there in the past. It had been around since 1935, I learned from a quick Google search on my phone.
“Because she was Jewish…she couldn’t…love,” I was muttering to myself when I heard footsteps padding into the room.
“Mack, are you okay?”
Her words were soft, compassionate…while my eyes burned and my chest ached. “Please,” I said, my voice gritty and angry and raw.
“Please what?”
I didn’t know. My mind said to say go. My body said, “Stay.”
My grandmother hadn’t asked me to find love only because she wanted that for me, but also because she couldn’t have it herself. And my dad had so royally messed up in that department, and I was beginning to think my grandmother blamed herself.
The sofa depressed next to me, and my brain wanted to violently scream at Frances to get out. Except my forehead met her shoulder, and I breathed her in, allowing all that she was to calm me.
Her hand ran along my forearm, goose bumps breaking out along my bare skin, and I was shocked at my decision to let it be. We stayed like that for a while—no syllables spoken, feelings swirling, and the air-conditioning blasting.
“Want to get out of here?” My mouth formed the words as my eyes connected with Frances’s green orbs.
“Are you finished?” She took in the open letter on the table.
Shaking my head, I spoke. “No. I can’t. Right now. Can I keep them? I see how special they are. I promise, I will not do a thing and I’ll return them just as they are.”
She nodded, her palm still singeing my skin.
“I’m sorry,” I said, noting she wasn’t answering my question about leaving. “I shouldn’t have left you the other night. It was rude and inconsiderate.”
Her gaze cast away from me, I caught a small tear in the corner of her eye.
“I won’t do that again. I get why this is so important to you. It feels like a piece of history we’re just discovering. Of course it only matters to us, but it is giving off paramount vibes.”
She still didn’t look at me.
My thumb reached up and swiped the tear. “I mean it. When I say something, I take it to heart. I’m sorry.”
Finally, she met my eyes. “It was embarrassing.”
“I know. I didn’t think. It was immature.” I’d hoped to not explain, but she wasn’t leaving me much wiggle room. I couldn’t help the laugh bubbling up my chest.
“What? You think this is funny?”
With her eyes narrow slants glaring at me, I shook my head. “No. Absolutely not.” Taking her hand in mine, I asked, “Is this okay?”
I took her nonanswer as permission, knowing it was risky. We still sat next to one another, our thighs grazing since Frances had found me in a heap of emotions.
“I was hurt when you said how Milly addressed the letters—‘my dearest.’ You see, I was always ‘My Dearest Mackenzie.’ Never Mack or Macky or anything but Milly’s dearest. When she died, the lawyers gave me a sealed letter written to ‘My Dearest Mackenzie.’ She left me with a bunch of instructions on how to live my life, none of which I follow too closely.”
“And that’s when you finally believed me? When I told you how she addressed my Paps?”
I nodded.
“I’m sorry if I hurt you in the process. And if it means anything, I’m sure Milly would be very proud of your success in life.”
I couldn’t help myself—my hand reached up and gathered her hair in its grasp and I gently pulled her close. My lips met hers. I didn’t ask for permission, but her head tilted in, and her mouth opened for my tongue to enter…and I figured it was enough approval.
We stayed like that for a while, allowing some of the tension and need that had been hovering between us to seep out. Kissing, our hands traveling arms and cheeks, gathering one another closer. We couldn’t get enough. I could smell one of our scents on her, not Milly’s, and it tangled with my own bergamot mix. And the combination revved my engine. My hand slid up the back of her shirt and I felt my heart go from zero to seventy-five. Her skin was soft, delicate, and meant to be savored. My palm slid over her shoulder blade as my mouth continued to make sweet love to hers. I wanted more, maybe all of her, until I couldn’t do it—
I pulled back.
“I’m sorry,” I said for the millionth time this Sunday morning.
“Why?” She looked hurt—again by me.
“For doing that, taking us there, here, wherever we are. I’m supposed to be helping you, not hooking up with you. You’re a gorgeous woman, Frances. One of the best I’ve come along in this great big city. Milly might be proud of my business acumen, but not my personal life. I don’t do long-term or commitment or forever. I learned a long time ago, from my mom, that love is fleeting. It’s a me thing, not you.”
This time it was Frances who stood and walked out, but not before grabbing the letter I’d been reading and stuffing it in her neat container and taking them all with her.
Without a word.