own again.
I would survive if it killed me.
Everyone left on Sunday evening. I don’t know why. From experience, I knew that traffic surrounding Paris on Sundays was horrible from 3:00 in the afternoon until 10:00 at night. But maybe sitting in a Lamborghini or a Ferrari was pleasurable whether the wheels were turning or not.
Cranwell was late in coming downstairs for dinner. From the sound of their footsteps, both he and Lucy seemed subdued, as if each step on the stairway was leading them one step nearer to doom. I already had a piece of
He paused at the bottom stair, his forest green crewneck and dark gray slacks blending into the shadows. When he looked at the island, his face registered surprise. He queried me with his eyes.
“If you’d like to open the wine, then we can eat before it gets cold.”
Lucy let out a great sigh, which managed to lighten the air around us. We both smiled as we watched her settle herself on the floor. I was still smiling when I looked up to find him watching me.
Grabbing the corkscrew, I handed it to him, and then we settled on our stools to eat.
For the first time, there seemed to be nothing to talk about. Fear washed over me. It wasn’t going to work. Beginning to feel more and more self-conscious, it seemed like the sound of my chewing and swallowing had been magnified over a loudspeaker.
“Cranwell-”
“Freddie-”
We had spoken at the same moment, so we laughed, embarrassed.
“You first.” He was insistent.
I’d completely forgotten what inane thing it was that I was going to say. So I took a deep breath. And staring hard at my plate, I said the first thing that popped into my mouth. “About yesterday morning.”
In my peripheral vision, I saw Cranwell freeze.
“I’m sorry. I had a dream.” That sounded lame, even to my own ears.
“Peter?”
I nodded.
“I guess it’s never easy competing with a ghost.”
“I’m… well… attracted to you.” It was the truth. My cheeks flamed as I said this, but I tried to ignore them and kept on speaking. “You told me once that I needed to move on. That I had to get over Peter. And I am. I’m trying. It’s just that I’ve known about God since I was three years old. I always went to church, before I went to college. I knew everything there was to know about God, Cranwell, but I never told any of it to Peter. If he’s in hell right now, it’s all my fault.”
He bowed his head at that point and was still for several moments before he spoke.
“Freddie, it’s not your fault.”
“It is.”
He raised his brown eyes to mine. “Wait. Just listen for a second. It seems to me that everyone is responsible to God for the state of their own soul. He’s left it up to each individual to make a choice-for themselves. Maybe Peter would have become a believer if you had talked to him, or maybe he wouldn’t have. Sometimes people won’t listen to those closest to them. Sometimes they need a stranger to tell them. Sometimes they don’t need words at all. God doesn’t need anybody to tell others about Him; He’s arranged the world itself to be His testimony. Let Peter go, Freddie. If there’s anything I’ve learned in the past year, it’s that no matter how much you wish, you can never change the past. The only thing you can do is change the present.”
He reached for my hand and took it in his. “Please don’t be embarrassed about yesterday. I wish I
The corner of my mouth turned up in the start of a smile. “Thank God.”
Cranwell began to smile too. “Thank God.”
He lifted his glass. “To us.”
I clinked it with mine. “To friendship.”
Something close to gratitude passed between us after that as we sat and ate. What we had said to each other would never be said again, but it had made that morning romp a squall passing through our relationship rather than a hurricane stalling over it. And after that, there were a million things to talk about.
In hindsight, I was glad I’d had the courage to say what I did. I would have missed the companionship had I sent him upstairs.
Several hours later, he left with Lucy to return to his room. He stopped on the first stair and turned around to face me. “Freddie-”
I held my breath.
“Thank you.”
Bringing the dishes to the sink, I washed them with shaking hands. Then I went up to my lounge and spent most of the night going over grant applications for the foundation.
“Let me help you.”
I peered between my legs.
Cranwell was standing on the garden path, so I stood up for a stretch. Planting gardens made for backbreaking work. I put my hand to my lower back and arched my spine, trying to pull the kinks from it.
“What can I do?”
He was standing there in his suede leather jacket, Italian leather loafers, and brown moleskin trousers. I tossed my braid behind my shoulder and pulled my hat farther over my ears. “Unless you want to ruin your shoes and permanently stain your pants, I’d just stay right where you are.”
He looked down toward his feet. “These? They only cost two hundred dollars.” He stepped carefully into the plot and made his way toward me.
Lucy, disdaining the dirt, found a comfortable flagstone and curled herself upon it.
Unbuttoning my brick-colored corduroy jacket, I tossed it to him, and then I pushed up the long sleeves of my thermal shirt. Looking down, I saw that my faded jeans were already stained with dirt, along the hems and the knees. They’d wash. I tried to think of something that Cranwell could do that would keep him from becoming too soiled. I finally decided he could follow behind me, sprinkling seeds into the holes I’d dug.
We worked for a good hour and a half before I declared that it was time to stop. I put my jacket back on, becoming cold after the sudden halt to our labor.
We returned the tools to the garage and walked together back to the kitchen where we perched ourselves on stools.
“Would you mind just giving my back a little push, right there?” I pointed to a place near my spine on my lower back where my muscles had spasmed.
“Where?”
Pulling up the back of my jacket, I pointed.
He put a hand on my shoulder and the other to my spine, grinding a knuckle into my muscle. “Too hard?”
“Not hard enough.”
Cranwell took his hand from my shoulder and reached it around my rib cage to support the pounding he was giving my back. “Better?”
“Yes.”
He moved up my spine slowly, pushing first with his fist, then with his knuckles and fingers. His hand at my rib cage splayed to keep me from being pushed over by his efforts.
He happened onto a knot.
I cringed.
“Does that hurt?”
“Like torture.”
Using a thumb, he tried to relax the spot. It refused to loosen. “Just a second.” He lifted the hem of my shirt and slid his hand up against my skin.
