Jonquil. It’s what she’d named her daughter. She’d been in
Paris for two days when Dr. Lucky Charms called her with the
results of the genetic testing. It was great news by all accounts, he claimed. You have no STD’s, and by the way, your baby was
perfect. It wasn’t deformed, no genetic anomalies. She was just
in the wrong place at the wrong time.
She.
Somehow this news propelled Stephanie into grief all over
again. Hearing that her baby had been healthy and normal, in
many ways, made it worse. Knowing it was a girl put a face on
her and made her real.
She’d left the studio that day and wandered the streets in a
daze, snapping pictures and battling tears. Though she struggled to lock it away in a vault, an image started to form in her mind: a little girl with Philip’s fair hair, Steph’s pale skin, and blue green 99
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eyes. His good looks and her sense of humor. And both their tempers. Their daughter would have either been the leader of the free world or more likely, the cause of its destruction.
As she drifted in the direction of her apartment, Steph
passed by a well-manicured park. Though it wasn’t far from
where she lived, she’d never even noticed it before that day. A
mother pushed her little one in a swing, and a father played ball with two young boys. Two little girls rode bicycles down the
tree-lined path. Unable to resist, she entered the park, diving
head first into her pain under the guise of taking a shortcut to the Jardin des Plantes Greenhouses.
By the time she reached the first greenhouse, tears had
started to fall in a steady stream. She no longer even bothered to wipe them away. Steph felt a well of repressed grief overflowing from the bottom of her soul. She never even got to see her baby.
Never held her. Never got to bury her or even give her a name. It seemed ridiculous to name a child that had never taken her first breath, but Steph suddenly wanted to nonetheless.
As she sat on a bench outside the Jardin, an ancient little
man in a beret wandered by with an arm full of lively looking
yellow flowers. He paused in front of her with the most heart-
wrenching expression of empathy she’d ever seen. He stepped
forward and plucked one from the bunch.
“Pour vous, Mademoiselle.” He offered it to her. Steph
smiled through her tears and took it, pointlessly swiping at her cheeks.
“Merci à toi.” She sniffed, glad she knew enough French to
politely thank him. His random act of kindness made her hate
herself for every time she’d ever brushed by people as if they
didn’t exist. He nodded in response to her. As he walked away,
she knitted her brows and called after him. “Monsieur! What’s it called? The flower.”
He smiled at her with a wise, knowing nod. “Jonquil.”
Steph went home and dug out a vase, placing the jonquil
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flower in some water. Later, as she sipped a glass of wine, she
searched the internet for the flower’s meaning. She discovered
the flower was descended from another whose name in Latin
meant “stupor” or “numbness.” Jonquil, as the name, seemed
only more poetic.
From that day forward, every time she was in Paris she
stopped by the Greenhouses. She wasn’t sure if this was healthy
or dysfunctional. She didn’t care.
Thinking about Jonquil was a slippery slope. She’d gone on
antidepressants a couple of weeks after that and had been trying to wean off of them when the “Fire Woman” video hit the top
ten. Thinking about the video made her physically ill, especially now that she knew Phillip had slept with his co-star. The entire thing now had a certain Kevin Wiley-style taint to it, and it
crushed her to put Phillip in the same category as Kevin.
She couldn’t think about either of them—it was not a day
for wallowing. She needed a diversion. and she needed it now.
She hitched a ride to the village center, where she breezed into the swankiest looking boutique and bought a sea foam green
sundress, silver jewelry, and designer sandals. She then headed
for the restaurant her new friends from the beach had recom-
mended. The atmosphere was casual, al fresco, and the food was
high-end perfection. She gorged herself on shrimp, listened with total fascination to a forró band. She downed drinks with the locals, including Enrique “the flirty chauffer” who evidently had
the night off. He made an adorable stab at speaking English. She still couldn’t understand a word he said, but he sure was fun to look at.
Enrique brought her back to the pousada and proceeded to
make a lame attempt at a pass which she dodged. He called after
her in Portuguese, as she rushed away, feeling a bit like a tipsy Cinderella at midnight. She decided making out with one man
who wasn’t her boyfriend a day was her limit.
She managed to get to her room unnoticed by the wedding
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guests, who were having yet another one of Yara’s meticulously
orchestrated soirées. Finally back in her room, she realized that she’d had a bit too much sun and her ankles had been a feast for mosquitos. She showered and brushed her teeth repeatedly, trying to rid herself of the lingering taste of Phillip. When that
didn’t work, she took a sleeping pill and crashed.
A horrendous pounding racket blasted her awake.
“Stephanie Brier, open this door immediately, or I swear I’ll
bust it down!” Cedric called from the hallway. Steph rolled over and looked at the clock. It was noon. She’d slept for almost 12
hours. Damn Ambien. She probably shouldn’t have washed it
down with rum.
She climbed out of bed and yanked down her robe from the
closet, sending the hanger springing across the room with a loud clatter. She tossed it on and padded over to the door. As the obnoxious pounding continued, she unlocked it and wrenched it
open. Cheyenne and Cedric both glared at her from the other side of the
