Soaring (80 page)

Gran thought my frequent stumbles were hilarious but whenever she threw her chuckle my way after she’d witnessed one, I knew she was laughing with me, not at me. She’d long since tried to teach me that we should embrace who we were, even, or maybe especially, what she called the “special things, buttercup, the things no one else has, but you.”

For me, this was being awkward. There were times when I could forget, but if there was something to trip over or something to set crashing to the ground, I would find it.

Gran thought it was cute.

When I did these things, I’d more than once seen Henry’s lips twitch too.

Try as I might to take Gran’s advice, I found it annoying.

However, I didn’t manage this journey without the heels of my Manolos sinking into the turf, which I found irritating.

Finally, I made it to my rental car. The lanes winding through the cemetery were packed with cars, many of them now purring, cars doors slamming, wheels pulling out.

Amongst this, I heard a girl’s annoyed, whiny, “Dad!” piercing the solemn air of the graveyard.

This tone was so inappropriate I stopped in the open door of my car and looked down the road.

Some three or four cars up on the opposite side from where my vehicle was parked, there was a big burgundy truck. It seemed relatively new. It was one of those that had four doors in the cab making it a tall, long sedan with flatbed. It wasn’t flashy but somehow it was. Maybe because it sparkled in the sun like it had just been washed and waxed.

All the doors were open and climbing in them was the man who’d been watching me earlier and his three offspring. His eldest son was pulling himself into the front passenger seat of the truck. His youngest was already in the back. And the man was standing in the open driver’s side door facing his girl, who was standing in the street, hands on her hips.

No wife.

Surprising.

I heard an indistinct rumble then the girl leaned slightly forward, her face screwing up in an unattractive way and she yelled, “I don’t care!”

This was also surprising because, considering the place we were in and what had just happened in it, it was beyond rude.

I glanced around and saw some of the other attendees were obviously, but studiously, avoiding this exchange.

Since the man had his back to me and the girl had her attention on her father, I didn’t bother avoiding it. They were in the throes of a squabble. They wouldn’t notice me.

I heard another rumble then the girl shouted, “I said, I don’t care!”

To this, there was no rumble.

There was a roar.

“
Jesus Christ! Get in the goddamned truck, Amber!
”

Her face twisted and I saw her body do a physical
humph!
She then moved and climbed into the backseat of the truck.

The man slammed her door and turned to his.

I instantly moved to get in mine thinking anyone who had the means and good taste to own a Hugo Boss suit should not be so ill-mannered as to shout obscenities at his daughter in a cemetery after a funeral service for a ninety-three year old dead woman.

However, in saying that, Gran would probably laugh herself sick at what just happened. That and wander over to the quarrel and wade right in.

As with my awkwardness, she found the foibles of others amusing and got away with this because she had the uncanny ability of pointing them out to people and guiding them into finding
themselves
amusing. Gran didn’t take anything too seriously and she was quite adept at helping others see the world her way.

She’d had enough serious to last a lifetime with the man she married and the sons he gave her, and when she got out of that, she put it behind her.

The only serious she let leak in was me. How I was raised. What it did to me. What it made me become.

And Gran let me be me. The only one to do that, except Henry.

By the time I’d started the car, got it in gear and checked my mirrors, the big burgundy truck was driving by. I didn’t get the chance to look into the cab. I also didn’t think much of the fact that the man, nor his kids, approached me to tell me they were sorry for my loss.

That was probably good, seeing as I knew the kind of man he was and if his and his daughter’s behavior was anything to go by, I never wanted to meet them.

And with them gone, I found myself strangely relieved that I knew I likely never would.

* * * * *

“I should have come with you,” Henry muttered in my ear through the phone and I drew in a deep breath as I stared out the window at the sea.

“I’m all right, Henry,” I assured him.

“There’s no way you should be there alone.”

“I’m
all right,
Henry,” I repeated. “You have to be there. You do this shoot for
Tisimo
every year.”

“Yeah, which means I need a fucking break from it.”

I sighed, sat in the window seat and kept my eyes out to sea.

The sun setting had washed the sky in peachy pink with slashes of butter yellow and tufts of lavender.

I missed those sunsets over the sea.

I just wished Gran was right there, sitting with me.

“I get done with this, I’ll fly out there,” Henry said into my silence.

“You get done with that shoot, Henry, you need to be in Rome.”

“I need to be with you.”

I closed my eyes, blocking out the sunset, having wished so many times in my twenty-three years as personal assistant to Henry Gagnon, renowned fashion photographer, video director and handsome, dashing, reckless, adventurous, audacious, daring international lady’s man, that he meant it in a different way when he said words like those to me.

Not that he valued me as his personal assistant.

Not that he liked me just because he did.

Not because we had over two decades of history and no one knew him better than me and the same was true for him with me (though, he didn’t know me quite as much but that was part of me being me).

No.

For other reasons.

Now it was too late.

Not that there even was a time when that would be a possibility. He had models and actresses on his arm (and in his bed). And I’d lost count how many times I’d seen him smile his lazy smile at unbelievably gorgeous waitresses, tourists or the like and fifteen minutes later, I’d be finishing my coffee alone or heading to a park with a free few hours because Henry was away to our hotel to enjoy those hours a different way.

There was no way Henry Gagnon would turn his beautiful eyes to me.

Not then.

Definitely not now, with me forty-five, way past my prime. Even if Henry was forty-nine.

Then again, Henry’s last two lovers had been thirty-nine and forty-two respectively.

In fact, thinking on this, it occurred to me his lovers had aged as he had. He hadn’t had a twenty-something since, well…he
was
twenty-something (or, at latest, he was early thirty-something).

“Josephine?”

I blinked myself out of my reverie and came back to the conversation.

“I’ll meet you in Rome. Or in Paris,” I told him. “I just have to go to the reading of the will tomorrow and see to things here once I know what’s what. It shouldn’t take long.”

Why I said this, I had no idea except it was my job to make Henry’s life aggravation-free and I’d lived and breathed that for so long, I didn’t know how to do anything else.

The truth of the matter was Gran had a home and it was packed to the gills. I had no idea what I was going to do with it all.

However, I could easily hire an estate agency to deal with an auction and I didn’t need to be present for that. Nor did I need to be present for a sale of the property.

I felt acute pain in my midsection at these thoughts so I put them aside and returned to Henry.

“A week, at most two,” I said.

“If it’s over a week, I’m there,” he replied.

“Henry—”

“Josephine, no. Not sure you could miss the fact that you’ve been taking care of me for twenty-three years. I figure this once, once in twenty-three years, I can do whatever I need to do to look after you.”

“That’s very kind,” I said softly.

There was a brief pause before he returned, just as softly, “That’s me looking after my Josephine.”

This was one of the reasons I stood by Henry all these years.

And it was one of many.

First, it wasn’t that difficult to do my job. Henry was not a male diva, even if his talent meant he could be. He was pretty no-nonsense. I wasn’t rushing around picking up dry cleaning (well, not all the time) and trying to find a coffee shop that made lattes with unpasteurized milk.

Second, he paid me well. Very well. Actually
extremely
well. Not to mention he gave bonuses. And presents (one of these being the Manolos I wore to the funeral, another being the diamond tennis bracelet I had on my wrist at that moment).

Third, we traveled widely and he didn’t make me sit in coach when he was up in first class. No, I sat next to him. Always. Further, it wasn’t hard being the places we’d go. It was true I didn’t exactly enjoy that time in Venezuela (nor the one Cambodia, the one in Haiti or the other one in Kosovo) but only because he wasn’t doing a fashion spread but instead taking other kinds of pictures and thus we weren’t exactly staying at the Ritz.

Henry liked adventure. Me, that was a different story. But I was always at Henry’s side.

Always.

Except now.

And last, and maybe most important, he could be very sweet and he was this way often.

“I want you calling every day,” he demanded. “Check in. Let me know you’re okay.”

“You’re too busy for me to call you every day,” I told him something I should know, since, even though
Tisimo
magazine had given him a young man named Daniel to take my place temporarily, I still knew his schedule like the back of my hand.

“How about you let me decide what I’m too busy for, sweetheart. But I would hope you know by now, one of those things is not and never will be you.”

Oh my.

Yes.

So very sweet.

“Henry—” I started on a whisper.

“Now, do something good. Like go out, buy a great bottle of wine, and drink it watching some ridiculous TV show you would normally hate so you can tell me all the reasons you hate it. Do not sit around, drinking your tea and doing something worthy. Like emailing Daniel to make certain he’s on his game or trying to read
War and Peace
for the seven millionth time.”

“I’m going to finish that book someday,” I vowed on a mutter.

“Let’s not make today that day,” he replied and I smiled.

“All right. Reality TV and a good bottle of wine it is,” I murmured.

“Good girl,” he murmured back and I could hear the smile in his voice. “Tomorrow, I want to know all the ways the housewives of wherever get on your nerves.”

I smiled again before I asked, “Would you like me to take notes?”

“Seeing as they’ll probably get on your nerves in so many ways even you’ll forget a lot of them, yeah.”

“Then consider it done.”

“Right.” I could still hear the smile in his voice. “Now go. Wine. TV. And while you’re at it, buy something good to eat. And I don’t mean an excellent wedge of brie. I mean something like a bucket of chicken.”

I made a face that he hopefully could not hear in my voice when I lied, “Consider that done too.”

“Liar,” he muttered and I smiled again.

Then I said, “I should let you go.”

“For now, sweetheart. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow, Henry.”

“Be bad,” he said quietly.

“I’ll try,” I replied and both of us knew that was a lie too.

There was another pause before he whispered, “Chin up, Josephine. Always.”

“It’s up, Henry. Always.”

“Okay, sweetheart. Talk to you tomorrow.”

“’Bye, Henry.”

“Later, honey.”

I disconnected and threw my phone on the cushion in front of me.

Then I looked out to the sea.

There was no buttery yellow in the sky, the peachy pink was fading and the lavender was taking over.

It was stunning and it made me wish that Henry was, indeed, here with me. He’d take a fabulous picture of it.

I was in the light room at Lavender House, the house Gran inherited from her mom and dad when they died which was thankfully after she’d divorced her husband.

The house that had this room, five stories up a spiral staircase. A circular room that was curved windows all around so you could see everything. The sea. The outcroppings of rock and beaches along Magdalene Cove. The centuries old, tiny town of Magdalene. And the landscape beyond.

This room with the window seats all around. The big desk in the middle where I knew Gran always wrote her letters to me. Where she sometimes took and made her phone calls to me. Where she paid bills. Where she wrote out recipes. Where she opened my letters to her and she probably read them right here too.

The room that had the half-circle couch she found and bought because it was, “just too perfect to pass up, buttercup.”

And it was. That couch was perfect. It had taken seven men, a pulley and who knew how much money to get it up there through a window. But Gran had seen it done.

She loved it up here.

I loved it up here.

And I sat in this very spot years ago after I became well enough to move around a bit after she saved me from my father. I also sat in this very spot after I called her and told her I had to get away, I just
had
to
get away,
and she flew me here.

Here. Home.

Here was where I put my father behind me.

Here was where I put my world behind me.

Here was where I got the call from a girlfriend who had moved to New York to do something in the fashion world (anything, she didn’t care, and she succeeded and was then working as a minion for flash-in-the-pan diva designer who thought he was everything who had recently been fired from his job designing clothes for discount department stores).

A girlfriend who told me Henry Gagnon was looking for an assistant and she knew I loved clothes, I was an admirer of his photos and she could talk to someone who could talk to someone who could maybe get me a meeting with him.