Love's Forbidden Flower (27 page)

Mom can barely speak as she continues looking at Julian’s massive hand holding hers. “Do you agree with them?”

“The doctors seem to know what they are talking about. I'm far from being a doctor and know very little about the brain. What I can do though is, with your clearance, take a copy of the test results to the doctors at Vassar and get their opinions. Would you like me to do that?”

Mom nods her head and fights back tears. “You are very kind. I guess that is my only hope.”

It’s likely my defenses, but feelings of ambiguity surround me. My heart tells me that I'm devastated, but my mind is so busy holding it together for Mom and tending to her that my sorrow is placed on hold. Someday it's going to unleash, and my pity shrouds anyone around me when it does.

While most of Dad's days are spent at home, there are periods when hospital stays are unavoidable. These times always hold added tension, partly because of the situation and partly because the doctors are terrible at communicating in a way Mom can understand, adding to her sense of denial. In an effort to help me retain my sanity, Julian valiantly takes time away from his free Fourth of July weekend to help. The situation is surprisingly peaceful on the surface, but if you dare to look beneath, you’d better be armed.

While setting some lemonade on the patio table, I observe Donovan and Julian silently shooting each other intimidating looks. Lucky me gets to stop the battle of testosterone before it rages.

“All right. Now what? Weren’t you two going to use all that astriction playing catch?” My hands sit mockingly on my hips in confrontation of the two men determined to start World War III.

Donovan looks like a five year-old accusing a bully. “He started it.”

“Oh, please! What are you two bickering about?”

Silence.

My entire body caves in surrender. “Are you just not telling me, or did you forget how it started?”

More silence. Looks of confusion reverberate.

“Oh, you've got to be kidding me! You guys really can’t remember how it started?”

They look at each other blankly before Julian also regresses. “He called me Sasquatch!”

Donovan throws up his hands and storms off. Laughter is almost insuppressible, but the juvenility of the display makes me too astounded to release it.

“What the hell is it with that guy? He has got to be the cockiest bastard I've ever met. Don’t you think he's a little odd? I mean, what kind of guy sneaks around his sister’s apartment spying on her?”

“Obviously the one who wants to get his ass kicked.”

“Lily! I don’t think you're seeing what's going on here. Have you taken a good look at how he treats you? You two bicker and snap at each other all the time. There's something not right with him.”

“What are you talking about?” I ask, although I’m well aware. It seems obvious enough that the appalled Julian sees it too. The fact that he's freaking me out is a little hard to disguise right now.

“He looks at you unnaturally, like you're some lost love or something, and he turns on me in a heartbeat and gets all territorial. Then, when I asked if he was challenging me, he said the threatening one is your ex-boyfriend. What the hell is that about?”

Damn it! While it's admittedly nice to have some reassurance that this is not all in my head, Julian's totally on to Donovan. Thank God Mom is still at the hospital and Donovan is out of earshot. God only knows what kind of trauma this would cause, especially now. Julian is hitting too close to reality, and he needs to be heaved away from it before he sees my end.

“What? Christopher? Threatening? Oh, that's just hysterical!” And it is very amusing when thought of in the physical sense, but Donovan nailed it: When it comes to my affection truer words cannot be found. Christopher is a threat to any man I'll ever give the time of day. Just hearing his name tugs at my heartstrings.

“Wait. Is that the one in Manchester, England? All the way across the Atlantic?”

“Finally someone knows where Manchester is!” My relief in Julian knowing the obvious seems to frustrate him even more. “Seriously, we both know you could crush Donovan with one hand, therefore you could pick up Christopher with two fingers and fling him to Pluto.”

Julian still looks annoyed, as if his words have gone unregistered. Looking as directly into his eyes as possible, I take his hands in mine and speak in earnest. “
I hear you.
I'm sure it seems weird, but you don't have any siblings. Donovan sees his baby sister out in the real world, and he's worried. He knows I'm capable of taking care of myself, but that doesn't change how he feels he should be looking out for me, especially with what's happening with our dad. Add the fact that I have a man he doesn't know practically living part time under my roof and, well, maybe you can see where he's coming from.”

Finally Julian starts to buy it, his tone softening as he slides his arms around my waist. “You'd think he’d try to get to know me instead of acting like I'm some kind of threat. He seems like a jealous bastard. I don’t like how he treats you.”

My hand playfully runs down Julian's chest to his abdomen, commanding his attention be distracted. “Well, I'm sure he is. Have you looked in a mirror lately?”

“Huh?”

“It just bewilders me how you have absolutely no clue how amazingly gorgeous you are. Every guy should be jealous of you.”

Manchester: Paul Eccles, the veteran music mogul who propelled songs from a vastly talented stable of young writers to the top of the pop charts for the last 47 years, died last night of sudden heart failure. He was 71.

My shoulders drop at the weight of the news. Is that Christopher’s father? Christopher rarely speaks of him, and if not for Grace always pining over her beloved Paul I wouldn't even know his name. The bottom of the article holds the answer.

Eccles is survived by his wife of 43 years, Grace, and their five sons, Paul Jr., Richard, David, Robert, and Christopher.

A whirlpool of emotions sucks me under. My poor Christopher. It's 11 P.M. in Manchester—not too late to try his video chat. It rings a long time before he answers.

“Hi, luv,” he says. The bags under his eyes and his gravely voice answer my question before I can ask it.

“I just read the news. How are you?”

“Oh,” he says languidly. “I’m not so bad but Mum's a wreck. The lads all escaped the house to get away from her, but I couldn't leave her alone. She's destroyed. How did you hear? Oh, I guess that's silly to ask. It’s probably in all the papers.”

“I wasn't sure the article was about your father until it mentioned you and your mom. You never told me who your father was.”

“It didn't seem important. When people know you're the son of someone famous they treat you differently. I knew you wouldn’t, but I've had a lot of unearned privilege because of my father. When I was in America no one knew any of it. I got to be meself and not me dad’s son.”

“Is there anything I can do?” With a kiss on my fingers my hand reaches toward his image.

“No, luv. You're already doing it. You called at exactly the right moment. You never fail me.” He too reaches out as if to grab my hand.

Sharply he turns his attention to Grace's voice wearily calling out, “Christopher, there's a man downstairs that needs something signed. Can you help?”

“Sure, Mum.” His stare drags back to the screen. “Mum is under strict orders not to sign or do anything. We’ve already had a swindler at the door.”

“Can I talk to her?”

“You sure you want to?”

“Yes. I really do.” My eyes water merely thinking about Grace, a woman who has just lost a man she's loved for almost fifty years. To me her undying love for Paul is both an inspiration and a source of fear.

Grace sits at Christopher's desk; looking about as bad as a woman who's spent a day crying over the loss of the only man she ever loved is entitled. “Lilyanna, darling,” she sobs. “It's so good to see you. How I wish you were here.”

My own tears stream with hers. The attempt to hold it together for Grace’s sake is futile as the more her sadness is seen the more it is absorbed—like it transfers across the miles. “Grace, I'm so, so sorry. I know you loved Paul very deeply. I will never forget all the times you told me how much you missed him and all the wonderful stories you had. You were so lucky to have each other.”

Grace pulls the tissue away from her eyes. “Thank you, dear. I’m so glad that you and Christopher still speak. It gives me hope for him. I worry so much for my son.”

My limbs weaken at the increase of sorrow filling her eyes. Maybe this is why Christopher has been so distant.

“He's such a stubborn lad, just like Paul. School has him miserable, and he can’t keep up. He locks himself away, and studies his books and tries to play things that are above him on instruments he doesn't enjoy, and it rarely works out. Oh, why didn't Paul let Christopher fail that audition? Christopher never should've gotten into that school. Now he feels he has something to prove, but everything he touches falls apart.

“He should have stayed with you. He should have done what Paul and I did and stood by each other. Maybe if we had waited longer to marry we wouldn't have had so many problems, but I wouldn't trade a single one for anything. Every time we yelled we still loved each other. I wouldn't even trade moving away for a year because in the end I got to come home, and it was better than it had been in ages. He was the love of my life. Actually, he was so much more than that. He was also my soul mate. I’ll see him again. Soul mates never really leave each other, do they? Oh, somebody please tell me I’ll see him again.”

Nothing else in the world exists as I lock on Grace’s words. In her grieving, Grace answered so many of my questions, not only about Christopher’s life but my own. Christopher hasn't been reaching out to me not because he no longer cares, but because he's failing at something that was a part of the reason why he left me behind.

But that is not all I learn. Through Grace’s words something critical that has been overlooked for years is finally assimilated and incontrovertibly simplifies the complex relationships that plague me. I've always thought that a soul mate and the love of your life are the same person, but that's not necessarily true. Donovan is my soul mate. On the deepest of all levels I know we have traveled together before, and we will travel together again. This time there was the unfortunate circumstance of landing in the body of what would be his sister, a body that is taboo. It's a cruel and evil twist of fate.

The relieving news is that doom is not upon me after all. The love of my life can still be had; maybe it's Donovan, maybe it's Christopher, I know it's not Julian. Maybe it's someone still unknown to me. How can you know who holds the crown when there's still so much in front of you?

A white bookmark slowly rises in my hand followed by my sheepish peer. “Truce?”

“Are you sure? I know you still have a lot you want to say, especially after our last run-in.”

“Yeah, but I don’t want to fight about it. I don’t want to fight with you ever again. Can we talk? Can
I
talk? You just have to listen.”

“Yeah,” he groans reluctantly. “Come on in. No one else should be home for a few hours.”

Donovan throws his books on the coffee table before plopping down on the sofa and putting his feet up on it, then crosses his legs and arms as if he is allergic to human proximity. Cautiously I sit close to him, pull on his arm, and wrap it around my shoulder. Though he looks as if he fears I have the bubonic plague, my head dare rests on his shoulder.