Celia's Puppies (28 page)

“
Another antibiotic,”
Honey said.

“
And surgery?” Jacob
asked.

“
Maybe. They won’t tell
me. I’m just a screaming infant here. God damn it.”

Honey’s anger and sadness were almost too
much for the men to watch. She had been so brave and strong. But
now that the topic of discharge was on the table, she had melt down
after melt down.

“
What would help?” Jacob
asked.

“
Make this all go away,
Jake,” Honey said through her tears. “Make me whole
again.”

“
I wish I could,” Jacob
said. “You know I would. Should I call MJ?”

“
He’s gone again,” Honey
said. “Just as well. I’m a wreck. Promise me Jake, you’ll help me
find me something I can do with my life.”

“
I promise you we will
build a fulfilling life for you. Together,” Sam said.

“
Jake?”

“
I promise,” Jacob
said.

“
Ok, I have to go to
therapy,” Honey said. “Good time for that. Bye.”

Sam turned to Jacob when the screen went
dark.

“
Do you have a plan?” Sam
asked Jacob.

“
Right here.”

~~~~~~~~

Tuesday night – 8:23 P.M. PDT
Malibu, California

“
The worst thing about
living with you is...” Valerie said.

Lying on the hood of her Mercedes sedan,
they were watching the stars and listening to the pounding Malibu
surf from a spot in a beach parking lot.

“
You make it sound like
there are a lot of problems living with me,” Mike said.

“
Oh, no. Well just one,”
she replied.

“
What’s that?”

“
I don’t get to look
forward to seeing you,” Valerie said. “About five weeks into being
here, I’d get this little flutter in my chest. ‘I get to see Mike
in three weeks’ I’d think.”

He leaned over and kissed her. They lay in
silence watching the stars for a while.

“
I hate it here,” Valerie
said.

Mike laughed.

Chapter Forty-Four
Marbles

Two days later
Thursday morning — 5:30 A.M.

“
Good morning.”

Jacob leaned over to kiss Jill awake.

“
Mmmm…”

Jill rolled onto her back. He slid into her
arms to nuzzle her neck.

“
Did you come to bed last
night?” she asked.

“
No.”

He pulled at her white t-shirt. She leaned
up so he could take it off.

“
Wow, third night in a
row. Should I worry?”

His response was muffled by a mouth full of
her left breast. She lifted her head to look at him. Feeling her
movement, his eyes moved to her face. Her concerned eyes caused him
to let go. He rolled to the bed.

“
What would you worry
about?”

“
Out all night with your
buddies again?”

“
Oh God, Jill. First,
we’re in the middle of nowhere. Second, the board members are
hardly my buddies. Fuck. I think they hate me. Where did Dad find
these stupid old stodgy assholes?”

Jill shifted on top of him.

“
So I should only worry
when we aren’t in the middle of nowhere and you ARE with your
buddies?”

She kissed him.

“
You, my dear.” He slid
her panties off. His hands clamped her behind. “Should never worry
about my fidelity. I am yours – mind, body and soul. Just not my
money.”

“
Are you saving that for
another?”

“
I’m not sure I have any,”
he said. “I am glad I have a wealthy model for a wife.”

“
You’re
married?”

He flipped her under him.

“
I love you,” he said. He
kissed her. His lips began an easy trip down her neck and back to
her beloved breasts. “I’ve neglected this side.”

“
What happened to your
wealth, rich guy?”

“
You’re naked,” he
said.

“
You spent your wealth on
my nakedness?”

“
If I tell you, will you
undress me?” he asked.

“
I have. Every morning,
every evening and sometimes at lunch,” she said. “You’ve been naked
almost every child free moment.”

“
It’s been a great week. I
think I’ll cry when we get on the plane tonight.” Rolling to back
to the bed, he continued, “As you know, we’ve been arguing over the
sale of the Lipson Albatross to its employees.”

“
The Board is against even
the idea of it,” Jill said.

“
Yes, the BOARD wants to
keep all the marbles to their rich entitled selves,” Jacob spit
out. “Fuckers.”

Jill rolled over to stroke his face. He
smiled at her.

“
My father and I agreed to
forgo salaries for this year, and refund the salaries we have
already taken, in order to give Lipson additional resources to meet
its projections this quarter. If Lipson meets its projections the
last quarter of 2008, the Board will allow the sale to begin. But
if Lipson does not meet its projections, the Board wants to hold
off the sale ‘until things straighten out with the economy,
especially if that man,’ meaning that black man, ‘wins the
Presidency.’”

“
You’ll have to add bigots
to your list.” Jill snorted.

“
You know who they want me
to sell it to?”

“
Them,” she
said.

“
Oh, you heard that last
night?” Jacob asked. “I can’t believe the chairman disrupted our
dinner to tell me that if I ‘wanted out so badly the board would
buy it.’”

“
I thought you were going
to hit him.”

“
When I was a kid? If
someone interrupted dinner for work, my Dad would have hit them.”
Jacob shook his head. “Did you see him get up and start to come
over?”

“
Sam? Yeah, he did look
pissed.”

“
No business at dinner. We
work enough,” Jacob said. “I must have heard that a thousand times
growing up. And they did work enough.”

“
Will you sell to the
board?”

“
No way. It’s my
Albatross. I’ll keep it. God, they piss me off,” Jacob
said.

“
Listen mister, you have a
child to support,” Jill said in her mock stern voice.

“
I also have another job,”
he said.

“
Won’t the rehab business
slow down?” she asked.

“
Probably,” he said.
“We’ll live on love.”

“
I’m serious,” she
said.

“
You are?”

“
Sort of.”

His sigh bounced off her naked skin.

“
We grow most of the food
we eat,” he said. “We own the Castle out right. Mom bought if for
like twelve dollars. The Castle is solar powered and has wet solar
heat. Outside of maintenance, our daily expenses are very low. I
also have a number of stable investments, including your old
apartment building. And, I do well in the rehab business. I have at
least two fully funded projects for next year and two funded
projects which you will help me finish this year. Val and I also
had ten million dollars returned to us from our step-sisters. In
case you forgot, you’re under contract with an established French
designer that’s just starting to gain exposure in the
States.”

“
What about
Honey?”

“
Is that what worries
you?” he asked.

“
Well everything, I guess.
The girls and I were watching the news and... It’s just a scary
time.”

“
You’ve always done it
alone,” he said. “This one, we’ll do together.”

“
And if the sky falls?”
she asked.

“
We’ll run out of Captain
Crunch. We’ll still eat what we grow, have heat, and power. We’ll
throw the doors open and invite everyone to come live with us like
a big commune.”

“
Jacob?” Jill
asked.

“
Yes, my love.”

“
Is the sky going to
fall?”

“
No, but things will
change. The process of the change may be painfully hard, but it’s
necessary too.”

“
And...”

“
What will ease your mind,
Jill?”

“
I don’t know,” she
said.

She got up. Pulling on her t-shirt and
panties, she stood with her back to him looking out at the trees.
He came up behind her to hold her in a hug.

“
I love you,” he whispered
in her ear.

She smiled.

“
Look at me,” he
said.

She turned around but did not look up into
his eyes.

“
I will always take care
of you. Even if we have nothing, I will be here, every day, to work
at your side to meet our goals. I like to work. I’ve always worked.
I will work for you, for our children and our family, every day of
my life.”

Her head jerked up to meet his eyes.

“
You’re not alone any
more,” he said.

“
Oh Jacob,” she
whispered.

He started taking his clothing off.

“
Taking your own clothes
off?” she asked.

“
I’m doing the work,” he
said. “Come back to bed.”

Smiling, she went back to bed to let him
work.

~~~~~~~~

“
Oh come on,” Honey said
through her rough breath. She was practicing her wheelchair skills
by ‘going for a walk’ around the neighborhood of Craig Hospital. MJ
was angry with her so they were moving at a steady clip. “You know
you want to.”

“
That’s not the point,” MJ
said. Taking the hand rests of her wheelchair, he helped her over
the curb.

“
I watched you with the
sex doctor. When she talked about all the sexy stuff we could still
do, you were turned on.”

“
That’s not the point,
either,” MJ said.

Using her palms, Honey stopped short and
turned slightly in front of him.

“
Hey, that’s pretty good,”
MJ said.

“
I’ve been practicing,”
Honey said. “What is the point?”

“
You KNOW what the point
is,” MJ said.

“
We were always sneaking
around when we were together before. Even when you were pissed off,
you couldn’t keep your hands off me,” Honey said. “You say I taste
the same...”

“
You do.”

“
And you don’t care about
how fucked up I am now.” Honey grinned her sweet seductive
smile.

“
You’re still incredibly
hot even though you’re paralyzed, have scars and all of
that.”

“
I’m getting a
complex.”

“
You are giving yourself a
complex,” MJ said.

“
I clearly missed some
point,” she said. “Humor me. What was the point I
missed?”

“
Why won’t you marry
me?”

“
Oh, that.” Honey started
wheeling again.

“
I almost died, Honey. You
almost died. I don’t want to fool around, mess around, or even get
laid. I want to marry you. I want to spend whatever time I have
left with you. I want to be the father of your children, have a
home, raise a family and love you every single day for the rest of
our lives.”

Honey wheeled faster until he had to jog to
keep up.

“
Stop,” he
said.

Groaning to himself, he grabbed Honey’s
handgrips and pulled her to a stop.

“
That’s very rude,” she
said.

“
Speak to me,” he said.
“You won’t talk to me about this. You either pretend the connection
is bad on the phone or the video went out or you run away. I know
you love me. Why won’t you marry me?”

Even with limited mobility in her arms,
Honey crossed her arms in such a way that made her seem completely
inaccessible. She looked away from him.

“
Talk. To. Me.”

“
I don’t run away. I
wheel.”

“
Talk. To. Me.”

“
I have an infection that
they can’t seem to get.”

“
All the more reason to
marry me. Today even,” MJ said.

“
You’re being
crazy.”

“
Plus, I already knew
about the surgery and the infection. You’re going in for
exploratory surgery on Monday, right? Our whole team’s scheduled to
be here all week so I can be here when you have the surgery. The
infection is not the reason you won’t marry me.”

She shook her head.

“
Talk. To. Me.”

“
I don’t have any idea
what my life will be like, MJ. I don’t know where I’ll live or how
I’ll get around or even what I’ll do all day. I need someone to
care for me at least three hours in the morning and at night.
You’re the only person I’ve ever been able to stand in the morning.
This person has to touch me! For seven or eight hours a day! I need
to be tilted so I don’t get sores. And that’s if I survive the
surgery and manage to beat the infection.”

“
And? What’s the problem,
Honey? We will work this out together.”

Honey tried to start wheeling again. He held
her chair in place.