Page 5 of The Cabin
He sighs, heavily. “I love you, Nadia. So much.”
“I know,” I say, smiling to myself.
“Don’t you ‘I know’ me, woman.” A snort. “I need some sugar.”
I reach out, twist on the bedside lamp. Pull the phone away from my ear, switch to FaceTime. The screen resolves into a grainy image of Adrian, covered to his chest with a hotel comforter, lying down, smiling up the phone. I flick the blankets off; pan the camera down to show him my naked body. “How’s that for some sugar?” I murmur.
He groans a laugh. “Aww hell, Nadia.” A sigh. “So beautiful. Miss you so much.”
“Get home and you won’t have to miss me, because you’ll have me.” I turn the phone so it’s on my face. “In fact, come home early, and I’ll even take the day off work and keep you in bed with me.”
“Make it two days, and I’ll be home by noon Thursday.”
I laugh. “Are you bartering with me, Adrian Bell?”
“Sure am.”
I laugh. “Fine. I’ll get all day Thursday and Friday off, if you’re home Thursday by noon.”
“You have a deal, my darling.” He passes a hand through his hair, mussing the already messy blond locks. “But be warned, I won’t let you leave the bed until at least midnight. I might even handcuff you to it.”
I wriggle, smirking at him. “Oooh, threaten me with a good time, why don’t you.”
He scrubs his hair again, and I see a Band-Aid on his forearm, on the inside, near the crease of his elbow.
“What’s that?” I ask.
“What’s what?”
“The Band-Aid. Did you get hurt?”
“Oh, that. Uh, yeah, a branch caught me. No big deal.”
“Hmmm. But it was bad enough you needed a Band-Aid?”
He typically refuses to use them. Usually he just rinses cuts out with soap and water and then super-glues over them. Which, as an ICU nurse, drives me a little nuts. So a Band-Aid is weird.
“Oh, well. My tour guide insisted. She was such an earnest, sweet little thing that I couldn’t say no. She didn’t know a thing about Revolutionary War history, bless her heart, but she was trying.”
“Sweet little thing, huh?” I tease, my voice drily sarcastic.
“Oh stop. She was all of sixteen and it was her first job, and I guarantee you she got it because her mom worked in the gift shop or something.” He yawns, and then I do.
“You gave me your yawn, asshole.” I laugh.
“You work another double tomorrow?”
“Alan is insisting I take the afternoon off. So just the morning shift.”
“Good man. I’ll have to send him a bottle of whiskey or something.”
“Alan doesn’t drink. Send him some fancy tea instead.”
“Oh, the irony,” he laughs. “Buying tea as a gift while in Boston researching the Revolutionary War.”
I want to laugh, but I’m having trouble keeping my eyes open. “I’ll call you tomorrow.”
“I love you.” Pause. “Nadia?”
“Love you, Adrian.”
“Nadia.”
“Hmm.”
“Diamond solitaire earrings, or a sapphire pendant necklace?”
“Neither. Just you. Snuggles and kisses and lots of sex and you making me that fancy pour-over coffee.”
“Nadia.”
“Sapphire. The only diamond I own is the one on my finger, the one you put there the day you proposed. It’s the only diamond I want.” I’m asleep, mostly. My brain and my mouth haven’t quite gotten the memo, because I miss him so damn much.
“Talk to you tomorrow. Sleep good, my love.”
“You too.”
“Bye.”
“Bye.” It’s whispered, barely audible.
I feel my phone slip out of my hand and thunk onto the floor, but I’m too far asleep to care.Magic; LiesI wish I could say I’m not a good liar. But that would be a lie.
I lie for a living—that’s all fiction is, after all, when you drill down to the molten core of it: I, the writer, create in my mind a pair of characters, two people who did not heretofore exist, and I strive to make them seem real. I give them backstories. I give them foibles and flaws. Scars, peccadilloes, fetishes. Like you, like me. Then I come up with a way to force them into orbit around each other. This is the plot—the path of their orbits as they intersect, creating a necessary collision. The collision results in not destruction as in true astronomy, but creation. This collision is where the magic happens. It’s the real lie. It’s a lie that these people exist, that this story is real, or even possible. The happily ever after carries on after you’ve read those words: The End. You, the reader, come to me begging for that lie. You relish it. That lie provides you with comfort, with entertainment, with emotions your real life may lack. You know exactly what I’m doing, but like any accomplished magician, you don’t know how I do it. Even the above explanation doesn’t show you how I tell my lies, or how I perform the magic, the sleight of hand, the prestidigitation which turns ideas in my brain into real people on the page.
