Stranded in Paradise (21 page)

Beep.

The lack of genuine concern in Len's message irritated Tess. How about an,
“Are you okay? Were you hurt in the fire?”

Then message two started in. “Okay,” it was Len again. “So, Chuck isn't working out as I'd hoped. . . . Are you calling in to hear your messages? . . . Um, call me.”

“Hey, Tess,” Len again, for the third message, “Look, Babe—we're hurting here—I've been following
Alana
on the Weather Channel. Looks like she got pretty ugly. Air traffic's resumed—I know you didn't stick around to help with the cleanup so I know you're back. Where are you? Come on, I'm waiting to hear from you. Things are a mess here.
Connor.com
needs you. . . .”

All in all there were eleven calls from Len, all essentially the same. The twelfth call was from Carter, checking to see that she'd arrived safely; sweet, unselfish Carter.

Her finger hit delete. She'd waited, had been sure Len would make just such a call, but somehow it didn't satisfy as she'd hoped. There was still a hollowness in the pit of her stomach.

A second later, the doorbell rang. Groaning, she thought about ignoring the intrusion. She was tired, had severe jetlag—the last thing she wanted right now was to relive the events of her vacation in paradise.

Whoever it was leaned on the bell with persistence. Len? He wouldn't dare show up—not without warning her first. When she opened the door, she found her next-door neighbor, Herb Franklin, steadying a large vase of red roses. He smiled when he saw her. “Thank goodness—I thought we had a prowler.” His features sobered. “I thought you planned to be away a few more days. I heard someone come in and I came to investigate.”

“Lucky criminal,” she said as she eyed the voluminous bouquet. And such lovely extravagance—at least three-dozen crimson American Beauty's were arranged with sprigs of baby's breath. “Are those mine?”

Herb handed her the crystal vase. “They came today—and one yesterday just like it, and a similar one the day before.” He flashed an apologetic grin. “It will take me a few minutes to get the vases all over here.” He turned and trekked back to his residence. For a fleeting moment she hoped they were from Carter but just as quickly she realized that would've been impossible since he couldn't very well have sent them when she was still in Hawaii. She opened the card and read the inscription:

We need you, Tess.
Call
me. Len.

At 12:50 A.M. Tess sat up and pitched the heavy comforter aside
.
Denver streetlight filtered through the bedroom curtain. Tylenol; she needed a pain reliever. The smell of roses was overpowering. A jackhammer pounded in her right temple, and her ankle ached. Even an earlier soak in the whirlpool tub had failed to loosen the tight muscles coiled in her shoulders. Having grown accustomed to the sound of surf breaking along the shoreline, now Tess found herself disturbed by Denver's sirens, the crunch of steel-belted tires on packed snow, and wind howling up the apartment eaves.

Getting out of bed, she crammed her feet into slippers and pulled on her robe. As she walked through the front room, she switched on lamps. The darkness bothered her, the gloom, the uncertainty of what lay in the shadows.

I'm being maudlin,
she warned herself as she entered the kitchen and picked up the teakettle and filled it with water.
You're weirding out, Tess.

Waiting for the water to heat, she sat at the table and peeled an apple, watching the peel grow longer and longer. She was so fascinated by the progression that when the teakettle blasted a shrill whistle she jumped as though someone had fired a cannon through the window.

Moments later she dropped a bag of Lipton in the cup, thinking about Len's earlier messages.
Call me.

Well, Len, I have called you—everything in my arsenal of bad names.

Propping her chin on her hand, she dunked the bag up and down in hot water and wondered why she didn't feel justified. Cleansed. She had gotten want she'd wanted, hadn't she? Len Connor on all fours. He had called. Her position with
Connor.com
was waiting to be reclaimed.

With a fat raise and a sizable bonus at year's end, no doubt.

So where was the elation? The thrill of victory?

Life wasn't fair. Wasn't that what Stella had said? And the old movie queen's wisdom was profound.

Her mind flew back to her talks with Stella and Carter. Hadn't she told Carter that she wanted to finally trust God? Yet she knew that if that was ever going to happen she had to let go of the one thing that held her back—no, the two things, she decided. First, she needed to get over what Len Connor had done, and second, she needed to forgive her mother. She absently stirred the cup of tea as the apple lay forgotten beside the cup.

Starting tomorrow morning, she was going to find the real woman. The real Tess Nelson.

The dilapidated row house stood like a war-weary soldier backlit by the early morning Indiana skyline. Tess had never come to see her mother without calling first, but then this January had been anything but typical for her.

She proceeded up the snow-packed walk. Her breath puffed a frosty vapor in the bitterly cold air. A man wrapped in a shabby-looking overcoat and wearing a fedora exited the building carrying a long-handled shovel. If the tenants wanted snow off their walk it was up to them to remove it. There was no hired help to do it here as there was in her condo.

The man nodded as she passed. Years of bleak existence looked back at her.

“Morning.”

“Good morning.” She opened the glass door marred by hundreds of handprints and stepped into the foyer. Mailboxes lined the chipped, painted wall; a potted plant that might once have contributed oxygen no longer even tried. Dead leaves gathered in a shallow pool at the base of the cracked terra cotta-colored plastic.

She pressed the elevator button. The cables clicked as the car slowly started its descent to her. Her eyes scanned the squalid conditions and she was assuaged by guilt when she thought about her warm apartment, filled with trendy furniture and Beeg's watercolor prints. How could Mona live here? Steel doors labored open and Tess waited for the bouncing elevator car to stabilize.

Hesitantly entering the cave, she removed her winter gloves and pressed the sixth-floor button. The tiny room smelled of perspiration and wet dog. She watched the light buttons and thought about how hard it would be for a woman Mona's age to transport heavy sacks of groceries to the sixth floor. She leaned and pressed the button again. Then twice more before the door shut.

Getting off on six, she walked down the long hallway that reeked of fried meat and burnt toast. She paused in front of Mona's apartment: 607.

Drawing a deep breath, she rapped on the door that held a pink faded plastic floral bouquet on its surface. She could hear Katie Couric and Matt Lauer chatting with Al Roker in the background, something about the unexpected snowfall in the Big Apple that morning.

She listened to the sounds of footsteps and bumps emanateding from inside the apartment, as if someone was searching for something to throw on. Shortly the door creaked open a crack and for the first time in sixteen years she met her mother's eyes.

“Mama?”

The door shut as the security chain rattled, and then the door opened fully. Mona stood in front of her with a faded turquoise chenille housecoat half off her shoulder, hair poking out of red Velcro curlers. A Winston sagged from the corner of her mouth. Clearly she was surprised to see Tess, though she made some effort to remain unreadable. “Who died?”

Tess managed a wavering smile. “Nobody. I know I should have called, but I . . . thought maybe it's been too long. I should pay a visit in person.”

Mona's gaze raked her and Tess was suddenly self-conscious of her blatant show of affluence compared to her surroundings. Why hadn't she worn jeans and running shoes? Her mother stepped back, motioning her inside. “You don't need more money, do you?” she said.

“No, Mother.”

She entered the cubicle of an apartment, her eyes skimming the interior. A closet ran the length of the entryway. Small living room, tiny kitchenette. One bedroom off to the left. At least the bed was made. A stack of books was piled on the end table with prescription medicine vials— six of them. A pair of glasses lay open beside them.

A twenty-one-inch television, with what looked to be an ancient Nintendo attached, blared from its perch: a scarred, inexpensive pressed-sawdust table that could be purchased at Kmart and hand assembled. Her eyes skimmed the picture taken shortly after Mona and Roy's marriage. She'd seen it throughout her childhood. The photo had been taken in front of a Woolworth's in Texas. A nineteen-year-old Roy was wearing a sailor cap, and sixteen-year-old Mona wore her hair upswept. The smiling couple looked happy.

Once Tess took a seat, Mona closed the door and slid the security chain back into place. “Thought you were in Hawaii.”

“I got back day before yesterday.”

“Is it nice?” Mona took her coat and draped it over the back of a kitchen chair. Dishes with dried food cluttered the sink. A skillet of bacon grease congealed on the two-burner stove.

She shrugged. “It's tropical.”

“Expensive, I hear.”

Tess smiled. At nine dollars a pound for fresh asparagus, she guessed it was safe to say prices were high.

“Very.”

Shuffling past her, Mona made her way to the frayed sofa. As she passed the table bearing the Nintendo, she switched the television off. A deck of cards in Solitaire order splayed across an aluminum television tray facing the couch. An ashtray, overflowing with butts, lent its evidence to the smoky smell that permeated the tiny quarters.

Grinding out one cigarette, Mona flicked a Bic lighter and lit another one as she studied Tess beneath shaded lids. The years had been cruel to Mona Nelson. Lines etched her leathery skin like erratic road maps, paving the way to eyes shrunken deeply back in her skull.

Tess fished in her purse for the envelope. “I've brought your money back.”

“Good.” Mona peered at the offering through a veil of blue smoke.

She laid the money on the end table. Silence surpassed the sounds coming from the low-rent housing hallway—someone running a vacuum, an infant crying in the distance.

A child was the product of his environment, that she would agree. Sadly, for the last thirty-two years she had practiced Mona and Roy's belief, lived under the assumption that Christianity was a lie. Yet in the past week she'd come to see that they had been wrong, she had been wrong. She had witnessed not only God's existence but His love for her. She'd seen it in Stella and Carter, in their willingness to reach out to her. Now it was her turn to reach out in forgiveness.

Her eyes scanned the squalor. There had to be a stronger reason for life than this. Tess saw before her a woman who did not need to be feared, but a woman to be pitied. Her heart swelled with a long forgotten love. Mona had lived her whole life in an aura of distrust and desperation. Perhaps her lack of spiritual awakening was a by-product of her own painful childhood. Instinct told Tess that Mona held the key to her emotional restoration, and she knew the key could not turn in the lock without forgiveness and compassion. Mona was sixty-two years old. She lived in an empty world of cigarettes, computer games, and soap operas.

“Is there anything I can do for you—anything you want?”

“No, I do okay. A neighbor lady takes me to the grocery store and to pick up my medicine on Saturdays. I do all right.”

“I want to pay your bills each month.” She drew a long breath. “Send me the amount you need and I'll send you a check.”

“I don't need your charity.”

“I know you don't. This is something I want to do.”

“Well.” She shrugged. “If you have money to burn go ahead.”

Tess suddenly bent to give her mother a stiff hug. She felt Mona's hand touch the back of her hair.