Page 21 of Inherited Light
I shook my head. “No, I’m thinking tech school or college. I would start small in a few years and teach some community education classes about carving or something.” I shrugged as if I was indifferent, but she didn’t buy it.
“Something big is going on in your head, isn’t it?” she asked, her hand on my arm again.
I slipped my phone from my pocket and found the picture of the flower vase I made Cat then handed it over. “This is the kind of woodworking I love to do.”
She stared at the screen. “Lorenzo, this is beautiful. When did you make it?”
I accepted the phone back and turned it off. “Yesterday, before I took Cat out to dinner. I could have bought her real flowers, but I know she’s a wildlife artist. I put our two mediums together and made something to stand the test of time rather than wither after a few days.”
She was nodding, but her eyes told me exactly what she was thinking. There were even a few tears in the corners when she spoke. “It sounds to me like a metaphor about life and what you’re looking for in it.”
“When I made the flower, it was a simple gift. After I took her out last night, I realized I made it because my soul already understood how special she was. And she is, Cinn. I can’t stop thinking about her.”
I leaned my head back on the couch and rubbed my hands over my face, embarrassed by the whole thing. When I dropped my hands, and glanced up, she wore a pensive expression.
“You don’t have to be embarrassed by your emotions, Lorenzo. I suspect I know exactly what you’re feeling. It wasn’t long ago I had the same strong, immediate connection to another human being. If anyone can draw Cat out of her shell I know you can, and maybe at the same time Cat will be the one to prove to us all how much you’ve become a man we should be proud of.”
“I hope so, Cinn. I want to keep seeing her. Wait, why does Cat need to come out of her shell? Last night we had a great time and connected on so many different levels.”
Cinn tapped her fingers on her leg for longer than she needed to and I finally put my hand over hers until she glanced up at me. “Cinn, what?”
“I’m not going to speak for Cat here, brother. All I’m going to say is, as a woman with a chronic illness, I know how hard it is to trust someone else with your heart. When the newness of the relationship starts to fade and the circumstances of your life begin to evolve and change again,” she paused and bit her lip, trying to keep from crying. The tears in her eyes and the tremble of her chin as she stared up at the ceiling gave her away. A dark, heavy, oppressive feeling settled over me as I sat with her. “I’ve broken his heart, Lorenzo and there’s nothing I can do to fix it. You have to understand the same could be true with Cat.”
Foster stood in the doorway as she spoke and he strode toward the couch. He knelt in front of it, holding her hands and wiping away the tears as they fell. “Cinn, you haven’t broken my heart, sweetheart, but it feels crushed right now knowing you think you have.” He tucked a loose hair behind her ear and kissed her forehead. “I know you feel like I’m disappointed, but I’m actually relieved.”
“What do you mean, Foster?” I asked, sitting on the floor so he could sit by her on the couch. My hand rubbed Brutus’s ears as he had taken notice his girl was upset again and sat at attention. I stroked his fur as much for me as for him.
Foster held her against him and rubbed her arm. “I want a child, Cinn, but I’m not willing to risk your health to have one. I’ve never believed it would be a good idea to attempt a pregnancy because I might lose you and the baby, and I can’t live without you. I can’t lose you, Cinn. I need you to understand you’re enough for me. I’m always going to choose you,” he whispered. “You need to let go of the idea you can’t make me happy unless you give me children. I don’t feel so tied to my bloodline I can’t let it fall from the face of the earth without question. You are enough for me.”
Cinn nodded against his chest and glanced up. “You say that now, Foster, but what about ten years from now? Will you feel the same way? Those are the questions that keep me awake at night.”
“Cinn, Foster isn’t Josh. You have to stop treating him like he is,” I said, frustrated for my brother-in-law.
She moved faster than I’ve seen her move in a long time. Her finger was in my face and her angry fiery eyes were right behind it. “Don’t. You have no right to say anything to me, Lorenzo,” she hissed. “You want to talk about the pot calling the kettle black. I seem to remember several times when you forgot your current girlfriend wasn’t Monica.”
Brutus didn’t like the confrontation and moved between us, giving her finger one lick.
I hoisted myself up from the floor and stomped out the door, my hands shaking. She might be upset, but all I was doing was calling a spade a spade. Telling Foster she thinks he’s going to leave her the way Josh did, is not only disrespectful, but it’s wrong. It also has nothing to do with Monica. I slammed the door to my truck, threw it in reverse and backed out, swinging the truck toward the highway.
Deep breaths, Lorenzo, I told myself. She’s upset. She loves you and you love her. I kept repeating those words for a few minutes, but I couldn’t shake the feeling I was right. If she didn’t stop thinking this way, she would lose the one thing she was trying to hold onto. I smacked the steering wheel with my hand out of frustration. Why do women have to be so damn complicated? It was the same question I asked myself multiple times years ago, when my girlfriend, Monica, left me after four years of dating.
I had a ring in my pocket and was ready to propose when she left. We dated through high school, but apparently the idea of staying in Little Ivywood for life made her sick. I begged her to stay with me, but after a few weeks of being jerked around, I decided Monica didn’t love me as anything more than a friend. She proclaimed her love for me, but now I realize how immature and naïve we both were. She wanted someone to take her places and dote on her, but when you got down to the nitty gritty, she didn’t want to commit to one person for the rest of her life yet.
Being older and wiser now, I respect and agree with her decision. If we had married, we probably would have divorced as quickly as Cinn and Josh did. The difference is, unlike Cinn let on, I’ve never treated any of the women I’ve dated since as if they were Monica. It didn’t take me long after she left to see I had my head in the sand about our relationship for a lot of years. I didn’t love her as anything more than a friend either. While the rejection stung, the truth hurt even more. I returned the ring, and stopped dating for the first six months after I started college. I had my fair share of ‘hookups’, but they always left me feeling dirty and unfulfilled.
When I finished my first year at college I stopped playing free and easy with my body and instead focused on deciding exactly what I did and didn’t want out of life. I didn’t want one-night stands. I wanted a relationship based on mutual goals and love. It didn’t seem like I was asking too much, but I’ve learned the hard way it is. There’s a reason I’ve been celibate for years. I haven’t missed the entanglements simple sex inflicts on my life. I put my energy into my career and hoped one day I would meet the woman who made me feel more than sexual tension. I wanted the whole package - intelligence, common sense, conversation, laughter, and sexual tension, in that order.
I drove into the driveway of the woman I had left last night, and put the truck into park. Last night there had been sexual tension, but also a mutual understanding of each other. There had been conversation and laughter, and a few moments of intimacy. Those moments meant more to me than any one-night stand ever could. Stolen kisses and holding hands in the park were what we would both remember, not a roll in the hay after one date. I loved the way she focused intently on keeping her chair going one handed while we held hands. It couldn’t have been easy, but she was determined not to drop my hand. Something told me walking hand-in-hand was always a dream of hers, one which was never fulfilled. I prayed, in a way, I made it come true last night.
Even knowing how important last night was to her, it didn’t scare me or make me back away from her the way I have in the past. In fact, the moments we shared last night lit a flame in me and made me want to see her again. I wanted to get to know her better and discover her wishes and dreams all while taking an in-depth tour of her soul, so I could understand her fears. Kisses and random touches stoked the fire, but when, and if, we ever made love it would be because she was the one and I had done everything in my power to understand her completely.
I took a few deep breaths and jumped down from the truck, closing the door and leaning my head on the cool metal for a moment before striding to the front of the wheelchair ramp. I channeled my frustration with Cinn into the ramp, my practiced eye measuring the planes of the house, driveway, and doors. I jogged around the ramp on the backside and squatted, shaking the pillar in the middle. It had more play than a joystick of a videogame controller, and in a structure like this, that’s not a good thing. I yanked my tape measure off my pocket and did a few measurements to confirm my fears, the ramp’s middle brace support was nonexistent. This whole thing sat like a house of cards, ready to crumble at the slightest wind. While I was behind the ramp, I measured the height of the stairs on the front and did the same on the stairs in the back. I tugged my notebook from my back pocket and my pencil, writing down the measurements.
“Are you going to stare at the ramp all day or are you going to come in?” Cat called from the front door. I stuck the pencil behind my ear and walked up the ramp, being careful to keep my feet on the outside of the boards.
“Hi,” I said when I got to the door, kissing her on the cheek. “You’re interrupting the artist in his work,” I said, motioning toward the front of the house. “Actually, I was taking some measurements. How are you?” I asked, stepping in and letting the door close behind me.
“I’m great,” she answered, tugging me by my hand as she wheeled herself backward. “I’m glad you stopped over.”
