Chrysalis, p.9
Chrysalis, page 9
“Are you still thinking about Paris?” When she asks, I know she remembers a conversation we once had. Apart from Chicago, it’s the only place I’ve really wanted to live.
“I think I’d still like an apartment there, and maybe some project work,” I say. “But being here has made me realize how much unfinished business I have in Chicago.”
She seems to digest this for a moment. And I wonder whether what she’ll say will lead us to the conversation—the one we’ve never had, but that we need to have more than ever.
“What will you do?” she asks instead. “With all your money?”
“I spend all my money,” I admit simply. “Apart from what I’ve saved for Ella, for the house, and retirement, I give it away.”
“To the foundation?” she asks.
“Among other things,” I say. “But, basically, yes. I’ve put I all back into the neighborhood.”
She thinks about this for a minute.
“What would you do with all my money?” she asks.
I have no idea how much she’s worth, but I’m guessing it’s in eight or nine figures. Darby’s money is very old and it comes from both sides.
“With no kids to pass it on to? No inheritances to leave? I honestly don’t know. But I wouldn’t wait until I was dead to give it away when so many people could use it now.”
“Hey, Kat?” I call out to her through the open door.
“Yeah?” she answers.
Kat and I only shout back and forth like this in the early mornings, when we’re the only people in this part of the office.
“What is the Forever Floating Health Spa?” I ask.
My calendar says a car is coming to pick me up at 11:30 for an appointment I don’t recognize.
When I hear her footsteps, I look up from my desk. She leans against my door, crosses her arms, and gives me a pointed look.
“You’ll need to have a chat with Andrew about that.”
I raise an eyebrow. Andrew rarely schedules for me anymore, and I’m surprised that he’s put something on my calendar now.
“Whatever it is, it sounds serious,” she continues. “He told me to warn you that if you don’t go, he’s going to cut off your monthly shipment.” Now it’s her turn to raise an eyebrow before she turns around and goes back to her desk.
I have Andrew on speed dial.
Unsurprisingly, he sounds cheerful when he picks up. “Morning, Michael! You’re in early.”
But I cut to the chase. “Cutting off my candy supply? That’s low.”
“That’s only if you don’t go. So go, and I’ll keep the shipments coming. Maybe I’ll even double up.”
“Explain to me why I’m spending two hours of my day getting a massage at a spa that’s halfway across town and another hour in a car getting there and back?”
“It’s not a massage. But I should look into those, too.”
“Then what the hell is it?” Curiosity piqued, I google the spa and start reading at the same time as Andrew launches into an explanation.
“It’s time in a sensory deprivation tank. It induces a state of theta sleep.”
“You know I’m not six, right? I don’t need a nap, let alone one that costs $250 an hour.”
“Darby said it’s supposed to be extremely relaxing. Maybe you ought to give her a call…”
But I don’t call her. I work through my to do list for the morning and decide I’ll thoroughly research whatever this is on my way to the appointment. I’ll lie in a ten inch deep pool of water that is heavily saturated with epsom salts. The chamber will be cut off from sound and light and, in the absence of outside stimuli, I’ll slip into a state of deep relaxation, so long as I can calm my mind. I’m doubtful about that last part, but more confident than I would’ve been a month ago. I have to admit, I am more relaxed since Darby sent those meditation head phones.
I never would have gone for either of these ideas had she bothered to ask permission, but I can’t blame her for resorting to this. The idea of her treating me still makes me uncomfortable. I don’t want her to think that it’s her job to fix me. But I also know it’s time to stop being cryptic about this part of me. And I want to show her how many things I’m still willing to try.
After a brief orientation, I’m shown to my suite, where I’ll shower and relax into my tank. The high concentration of saline will make my body buoyant. From what I read on the way over, this practice, called “floating”, yields amazing results. But when I step into the tank, my mind is wired and I’m anxious about whether it will work. I try to use meditation techniques I’ve learned but I’m disheartened when my mind wanders. But it feels nice, and I think about my beach vacation with Darby and spending time with her by the side of the ocean.
“Mr. Blaine?” a voice is calling. “Your session for today has finished.”
It isn’t until the insistent knocking registers that I realize I was asleep. But waking up doesn’t feel like it normally does. I feel rested, and even a little blissed out. I’m still in a euphoric haze, and a very good mood, twenty minutes later when I step into my car.
“Customer service,” Darby says when she picks up the phone. “To leave a thank you message, stay on the line. To leave a complaint, hang up and don’t call again.”
“I feel like I just got a full night’s sleep,” I smile.
When I tried to make my next appointment at the front desk, and to pay for the visit, I learned that both had been taken care of. The appointment is a standing one, and I’m booked for the same time next week. At this point, I don’t even care whether it does anything for my anxiety. The lack of sleep is catching up to me and if this can help with that, it will be worth my time.
“The results are supposed to be progressive,” she says, and I can hear shuffling papers in the background. She must be in her office. “The more you do it, the easier it is for you to slip into a prolonged theta state. And you’re right—the theta state is the most restorative frequency that occurs during sleep.”
“Have you ever done it before?”
“No, not personally. A friend told me about it,” she says, and I know that by “friend”, she means “colleague”. She thinks that anxiety is my primary diagnosis. She’s figured out by now that I don’t want to be medicated and that I’ve tried the obvious things.
“Maybe you should try it,” I say gently. Because I’m starting to feel a bit like roles are reversed for how stressed out and exhausted she’s been most days. She’s not a chronic insomniac with an anxiety disorder like I am, but she’s been burning the candle at both ends.
“I can’t think about that right now.”
The paper sounds in the background stop and the joking tone from when she picked up has been replaced by the one I’ve heard from her more and more. It sounds grave and more than a little pessimistic and I don’t like it at all. She sounds less like herself when we talk nowadays. My trip back to Chicago can’t come soon enough.
“You take such good care of me, baby,” I say.
“We take care of each other,” she whispers.
I am alarmed when I hear tears in her voice. A second ago we were talking about flotation tanks.
“When I get home next week,” I say slowly, “We’re gonna spend a lot of time together and you’re gonna tell me all your problems. Okay?”
“Okay,” she says.
When she sniffles, I think it breaks my heart.
I’m roused from a jet-lagged slumber when I hear girly-sounding giggles. I got so little sleep on the plane that after Bex picked me up from the airport this morning, I hit the guest room and crashed.
“Is he really going to pee his pants?” I hear Ella’s little voice ask.
“I guess we’ll have to see.” My heart begins to thunder at the realization that the second voice is Darby’s.
I flex the fingers on my left hand to find that, unlike my right hand, which is cozy warm next to where I lay on my stomach under the covers, my left hand has been carefully removed. It now hangs down to the floor, not at all where I put it, and sits in a bowl of warm water below.
“You two are unbelievable,” I murmur sleepily, turning toward them and prying my eyes open.
“Did you pee, uncle Michael?” Ella asks hopefully.
I flick water at her then and she giggles like a maniac. “No.”
I sit up to look at Darby who is so very beautiful, and who I can hardly believe is standing, in the flesh, before me. She bites the corner of her lip and smiles at me. I can’t help but smile back, despite the prank she’s just pulled. I don’t take my eyes off of Darby as I speak to my niece.
“Go help mommy with dinner, sweet pea. Darby and I are going to have a little talk about how it’s not nice to put good little girls like you up to dirty tricks.”
Ella giggles again and I hear the retreat of her feet as she runs out the door and down the hall, already yelling to Bex, “Mommy! Uncle Michael didn’t pee!”
“You’re hilarious,” I say sarcastically, rising fully from the bed, my smiling face contradicting my words.
“You have no sense of humor,” she accuses, smiling right back.
I’ve been anticipating this moment for the better part of three months. But the wait is over and in one fluid motion, my arms are around her waist, sweeping her into the embrace I’ve been craving.
“I missed you so much, cupcake,” I say, my face serious as I bury it in her hair.
“I missed you, too, babe.”
My hand slides up to the back of her neck and I feel her inhale deeply as she buries her face in my chest. She loves the way I smell. I’ve known this since the beginning. And don’t think I didn’t take a shower with my special soap before my nap, because I sure as hell did. She smells like herself, too—a mixture of her Molton Brown Pink Peppercorn and some expensive salon shampoo. I thread my fingers through her hair a second before I smooth it and tip her face up toward mine.
I can’t help touching her like this, and it takes effort to keep my fingers from exploring her a bit more. I miss the softness of her skin, the intertwining of our fingers, my thumbs on her cheeks. I’m busy thinking of something to say other than “I love you” or “you’re beautiful” when a glint from one of the diamonds in her snapdragon necklace catches my eye. It’s the first time I’ve seen it on her. The picture didn’t do it justice.
“I still get compliments on it every day.”
And I know she’s seen me looking. I’ve wondered how often she wore it. Every time we Skype, I’ve noticed that she has it on.
“What do people say?”
I slide my hands down her arms and intertwine our fingers. Her face is inches from mine, and looking into her tiger-eyes has already mesmerized me.
“They tell me that whoever gave it to me is a keeper.” She is adorably shy as she says these words.
“What do you think?”
For a split second, her face turns serious, and I think that we might actually start to have this conversation, but she shrugs.
“I don’t know. He’s not that cute. Dumb as a doornail. Terrible in bed. Choosing jewelry is his only redeeming quality.”
“That’s a shame,” I play along. “Anyone who would have a piece like that made would probably move mountains for you.” I tuck a stray wave of hair behind her ear, and her eyes turn serious again.
“I’m so glad you’re here,” she says and I see all the pain she’s been hiding, not over me—over other things in her life that are going wrong.
“I’ve got you,” I say as I pull her in tight once again.
I sit on Bex’s back steps, not caring how much the freezing stone beneath my ass is chilling the skin under my clothes—it’s been months since I’ve seen a good snowfall and I’ve missed it. Darby commented on my tan earlier, and, indeed it’s in the low eighties most days in Sydney. I’ve taken to running outside again and am spending more time outdoors. But the snow…I’ve forgotten its magic, and how I love the special quiet that seems to settle over everything as it falls.
The back door creaks open quietly, and moments later, I feel Darby’s warmth next to me. Ella had begged to have her read her a bedtime story, an honor she usually reserves for me, but I don’t mind.
“I think she’s more excited to see you than she is to see me.” From the corner of my eye, I see her smile at my lighthearted comment.
“I do better character voices than you,” she baits, shrugging, “…or so I’m told.”
“But can you recite The Cat in the Hat from memory?” I challenge, turning my head to fully look at her.
God, she’s beautiful.
She nudges me playfully. “I guess you’ve got me there.”
Now that we’re alone, my impulse to hold her again, to kiss her, to declare myself to her, is becoming harder to ignore. It’s only been a few hours and I’m halfway to breaking the promise I made to myself—to let her set the pace. Not that every cell in my body isn’t reminding me how much I need to touch her, because each and every cell is and I certainly do. But I can’t leave Chicago without saying things that must be said.
But now we are silent in this serene, simple moment, sharing breath as we gaze to one another amid the falling snow. Her eyes lower to my lips for a long moment and a slow blush colors her pale cheeks. Two things happen at once: both my cock—and her eyes—jump up in alarm.
“It’s getting late.” She casts her eyes aside, toward where the back porch light is illuminating the quickly falling snow. “The roads will be bad soon. I should get home.”
“The roads will be bad now. You shouldn’t drive.” Saying it in response to her obvious excuse doesn’t make it less true. I’d never let her drive anywhere in weather like this. “You can have the guest room.”
“Afraid I’ll jump you in the middle of the night?” She asks it self-deprecatingly. I hear the thread of truth, see the fiber of it in her eyes.
I fix her with a pointed look. “We haven’t seen each other in three months. We wouldn’t just wake up Ella—we’d wake up the whole fucking neighborhood.”
And I can see her mind drift for just a second—she’s picturing it—the way we fuck after we’ve been away from one another, the way she screams when I fuck her that way. But I also see the moment when that thought passes and something different sobers her eyes.
“I don’t know how to be around you, Michael. I don’t understand the rules anymore.”
“There are no rules,” I say quietly. “No more agreement. No limits to what we can be.”
“No more knowing how to be around you…” she fires back gently. “No knowing where I stand.”
She looks out at the snow as she says it, her voice resigned as she points it out.
“It’s always been up to you, where you stand with me.”
The insecurity in her eyes is still there, but so is that intangible thing we share, that special knowing that passes between us when we’re together. Moments like this are what I’ve missed—even with things unsaid, something incredible hums between us when we’re this close. Even with so much to decide, I’m ten times calmer in her presence.
“You’re the best hugger, do you know that?” she whispers.
I move up a step so that I’m directly behind her and situate her between my legs. She leans back into me and I wrap both arms around her. This is better—far more intimate—than the way we were sitting a few seconds ago.
“I want to hold you all night…” I whisper, my chin on her shoulder. “But I don’t want to fuck things up. And I know I don’t have the right to ask you for anything.”
It’s started to snow harder, and she shivers in my arms. It’s an excuse for me to hold her tighter.
“We don’t have to figure everything out tonight,” she says. “We have all weekend.”
I kiss her temple. “We don’t have to figure everything out this weekend,” I counter. “Whatever happens, I want it to happen because it’s right—not because my travel schedule makes you feel like there’s a deadline.”
She melts into me at that moment, coming even closer, nuzzling in to rub her cheek against mine. The energy between us feels as magical as the snow.
“Why aren’t you in the guest room with Darby?” a six-year old voice demands in a too-loud voice that is very close to my face. “I thought she was your girlfriend,” the same little voice accuses as I open my eyes.
A petulant Ella stares down at me from where I am lying on the sofa. I sit upright and wipe a hand over my chin. Apart from the jet lag, I was up thinking half the night.
“I don’t know if she wants to be my girlfriend, sweetie.”
I yawn. By now, I’m a master at redirecting the attentions of first graders whose questions are better left unanswered.
“I think you should get married,” Ella continues as if I haven’t spoken. “I can be the flower girl and Buddy can be the ring bear.”
It takes effort not to laugh. Buddy the teddy bear has been Ella’s constant companion and dearest friend since she was two. “What’s a ring bear?” I ask with put-on confusion, eager to hear her explanation. Ella’s vast life experience means that she has an answer for everything.
“The ring bear…” my eyes whip to the stairs as I hear Darby’s voice, a second before I see her feet descending the steps. “…is the bear who walks down the aisle and gives the bride and groom their rings.”
Ella, who’s holding the bear in question, places him on the ground and shuffles him forward in a way that makes it look like he’s walking. She and Buddy make it to the stairs in time to meet Darby at the bottom.
“Why don’t you want to be Uncle Michael’s girlfriend?”
“Stop harassing Darby and come in here to get your waffles,” Bex calls from the kitchen.
Ella’s eyes light up. “Yaaay, waffles!” she nearly screams, running out of the room and forgetting about the wedding completely.
Darby is still smiling at Ella’s retreating form as she makes her way into the room. It gives me a moment to just enjoy looking at her. She seems happy, luminous, even, and I feel something deep stir inside me when she finally looks my way. I rise to greet her, putting my arms around her and kissing her temple. It feels entirely natural—our warm embrace, the soft voices we use when we bid each other good morning. Like the afternoon before, a simple greeting doesn’t feel like enough. Once we’re in one another’s arms, we spend a good long minute there.
