Into the Night (50 page)
He frowned slightly. "Alyssa... ?"
"The woman Sam's hot for. After I met her, I said some things that weren't very nice. She was so beautiful and thin and I'm so fat. And he's more than hot for her," she corrected herself. "He actually wanted to marry her, which is completely insane."
Ihbraham thought about that. "Because he's white and she's not?" he asked.
"Don't you think that would be cruel to their children? Which world would they belong to?"
"The last time I checked there was only one world," he countered mildly.
"That's not true," she argued. "And you know it. You wouldn't go to that meeting because it was in a part of town where you don't feel safe. And I'm sure there are parts of this city you could go where /wouldn't feel safe."
"And for that—because of that—you'd throw away a chance for love, for real happiness?"
"What if they had a son?" Mary Lou said. "How is Sam supposed to raise a son who's black? How is that black child going to feel being shut out of his father's world? It's way harder for a young black man to succeed in America than a young white man. You can't deny that."
"So you think it's better simply not to have a life filled with love and sweet children like Haley than it is to try to change these different angry worlds and make them one good place where everyone is welcome?"
"Change it, yeah," Mary Lou said. "Like that's going to happen in this lifetime."
"So should all non-white men and women in America therefore stop having children simply because life will be harder for them than it will be for your white children? And what about Haley?" he asked. "Haven't you given her her own burden? Alcoholism can be hereditary-—I'm sure this is something you know. And this is your potential gift to her, just as my son—were I to have one—would be born with his own struggles to endure."
Mary Lou started crying again. That was no fair. This wasn't about Haley. He shouldn't have brought her into it. And yet she knew he was right.
"I should never have had her," she sobbed. "I know it."
"But you did." Ihbraham stood up and started raking again, his movements almost jerky. "So take full responsibility. Be honest—both with yourself and Sam. See what happens. Maybe you will be able to start over with him. Maybe if you
try to understand and accept him as a complete man things will be better between you. Maybe you'll fall in love with him and he'll fall in love with you. The honest you. The one whom you show to me all the time. Not this deceitful person who lives in his house, cowering with all her fear and shame."
Oh, Lord, he was right again. She had been cowering.
"What if he kicks me out?" she asked.
"What if he doesn't?"
"Yeah, but what if he does? Or what if he moves out?" She had to know. "Will you help me? I need to know that you'll help me. Ihbraham, please, I really need you to be my sponsor right now. I need to know that I have someone to go to, someone to trust, if things get really bad Please!'
He stopped raking. Opened his mouth. Shut his mouth. Shook his head. Started raking again. "I can't be your sponsor. No. I'm sorry."
"Why not?"
He just shook his head.
Her voice came out sounding very small. "Is it because you hate me now after hearing all of this?"
He laughed at that. "No, I don't hate you."
"Then why?" She didn't believe him.
Ihbraham looked at her and sighed. "You really must know?"
"Yes," she said.
He put down his rake and held out his hand to her. "Come here."
Mary Lou didn't hesitate. She stood up and went to him willingly. Took his hand.
"Don't be so sad," he told her. "Today is a good day to start fresh, to change all that you don't like about your life, so don't cry anymore, little one, okay?"
He pulled her close, into an embrace, and she held him just as tightly as he held her, her face against his shoulder, against the soft, sweet-smelling cotton of his T-shirt. She could feel his cheek against the top of her head.
"I'm so glad you don't hate me," she whispered, finally lifting her head to look up at him. "But I don't understand—"
He kissed her.
She saw it coming, saw his gaze flicker down to her mouth, saw him slowly lower his head and...
His lips were unbelievably soft and he tasted just as exotic as he always smelled. His beard and mustache were raspy against her cheeks and chin, but not as rough as Sam's perpetual two-day-old stubble.
His kiss was so much like Ihbraham himself—gentle but in complete command. He knew exactly where he was going and how to get there as he kissed her deeper, longer, his hands sliding down and across her back, pulling her in to him.
It was meltingly lovely. It was heart-stoppingly perfect. It was completely, shockingly exactly what she so desperately wanted.
A man she really liked—who wanted her the way she longed to be wanted.
Except he was black. Or brown. Certainly non-white.
Although who the hell could tell what color either of them were while her eyes were closed, while she was kissing him?
Of course, anyone watching could certainly see.
Mary Lou jerked back away from him and he instantly let her go. And there she stood, staring up at him in shock.
He'd kissed her. And she'd kissed him back.
And she wanted to kiss him again.
She couldn't look at him. She had to turn away. Her head was spinning.
"This is why I must not be your sponsor," he said in his same musical, gentle voice, as if whatever had been left of her uncertain world hadn't just collapsed into rubble and dust. "My friendship for you is no longer just a friendship. So you see, it would be inappropriate for me to offer you guidance or counseling of any kind. I could not trust myself not to take advantage of your trust. You need a sponsor with no ulterior motives, Mary Lou."
She didn't know what to say, what to do.
"Go home," he commanded her. "Go and talk to Sam. Tell him the truth and then figure out a way you both can be happy. If you truly let him know you, I'm certain that he'll come to love you, too."
She turned, and ran for her car.
* * *
"So," Vince said. "Hawaii, 2003."
Charlie looked up from the kitchen table, where piles of papers were spread out around her. She was, quite possibly, the only person in America who did her taxes in early November, because once the holiday season started, "things got too hectic."
Hello! January, anyone?
But no. That tax return had to be sent as close to January the first as possible, in order to properly conclude the previous year. And if she did most of the work now, then all that was left to do during the busy holiday months was just wait for the bank's and other documents to arrive.
And hope to hell that if they finally did win the lottery, they'd earn enough to be able to afford to pay an accountant to fill out those forms all over again.
But really, how could he complain? All he had to do was sign his name on the line that Charlie pointed to. God bless her for doing all the work, for taking care of the details of their lives, for doing the things that would have made him pull out all of his remaining hair.
"You really want to go to Hawaii next year?" she asked him, those little worry lines appearing on her forehead between her eyes.
"We've never been," Vince said. "Maybe it's time, huh?"
She was silent, just looking at him, and he felt a stab of doubt. Maybe she really didn't want to see Pearl Harbor, to see where James had died, to visit his grave. Maybe—even after all these years—that would be too hard for her.
Maybe he was the one who needed her to go there to see those things. Maybe he was the fool who needed to be sure James Fletcher truly had been laid to rest.
All these years, and he could read Charlie's mind. Except when it came to James.
Ignore him and maybe he'll go away. And if he doesn't, well, just be glad that out of the three people in the room, you're one of the ones who's still alive. Vince had lived for years with that philosophy.
Don't mention him, don't talk about him, don't think about him if you can help it.
There had actually been weeks—months, even—during which Vince hadn't had a single thought about Charlie's first husband.
But James had always come back.
James had been there, in spirit at least, at every crucial, important moment in Vince and Charlie's lives.
It was James who had finally gotten him in to talk to someone important about Tarawa, about his hopes that a special team of swimmers could be formed to keep such disasters from happening again.
He'd woken up that morning—the one after that night with Charlotte that had been such a mixture of sheer pleasure and pain—to find she'd slipped a note under his door.
He'd reached for it with dread, praying it wasn't another apology.
Vincent, it said in Charlie's no-nonsense handwriting. Please get dressed today in your uniform. We have an appointment at eleven o 'clock.
He was probably the only man on earth who'd walked into a meeting with FDR, disappointed to be at the White House.
He'd hoped, right up to the minute that he and Charlotte had climbed into the taxi, that they were going to Maryland, where a marriage could be performed without any delay.
But Charlie had had something else in mind.
Apparently when James had won that posthumous Medal of Honor, there was a big ceremony at the White House honoring all of the heroes of that terrible day. Charlie had been supposed to attend, but she'd had the flu. President Roosevelt had extended an invitation to her to visit him at the White House at her convenience—provided his schedule allowed.
And that January morning in 1944, his schedule apparently allowed.
"Be concise and to the point," Charlotte instructed Vince quietly as they were escorted to the Oval Office.
"Thank you for doing this," he said. He knew his words were inadequate. She was giving him a chance—a slim chance, but a chance nonetheless—to participate in this war in a way that could make a difference.
And probably get him killed.
He saw that in her eyes, loud and clear, despite the fact that her face was a calm mask. "Yes," she said. "Well. No doubt I'll regret it."
And then there they were. Face-to-face with the President.
Vince could remember reaching across the huge desk to shake FDR's hand. He had no idea what he'd said.
Tarawa. He told President Roosevelt about what it had been like at Tarawa. He told him about growing up the son of a Cape Cod lobsterman, and about his idea—to use his strength as a swimmer to provide information for island invasions.
He remembered the glint of light against the president's glasses, the smell of his cigarette smoke, the aide who stepped forward to rush him and Charlotte out of the room when they'd overstayed their allotted time, the slight gesture from Roosevelt that made the man stop and back away.
He remembered being offered a seat on a sofa, as Roosevelt pushed himself out from behind his desk and joined him at a small sitting area. The president told him about a team of men already formed and training in Fort Pierce, Florida. Underwater Demolition Teams or Combat Demolition Units, they were called. It was Vince's idea almost exactly, already set into motion.
Somewhere during the conversation, after FDR asked him if he'd be interested in joining this team of men, after Vince had told him a heartfelt "Yes, sir," Charlotte quietly excused herself from the conversation and left the room.
It was a victory, but it was bittersweet. He was to leave for Florida almost immediately.
He'd gotten what he thought he'd wanted.
Except the one thing he wanted most of all, more than anything, was a woman who didn't want him.
At least not until fate intervened.
"Yes," Vince said to Charlotte now. "I really want to go to Hawaii. Will you think about it?"
"Why is it so important to you?" she asked.
And suddenly he knew.
It was because he'd lived James's life.
Vince had lived the life that should have been James Fletcher's. He needed to make this pilgrimage to pay his respects to the man whose death had made Vince's happiness possible.
"Just think about it," he said. He grabbed his car keys from the box by the door. "We're out of milk. I'm going to go pick some up."
She put down her pencil. "Vincent—
He fled.
And he realized, as he pulled out of the garage, that for all these years, it hadn't been Charlotte who didn't want to talk about James.
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