The Icing on the Cake (39 page)

The room grew impossibly hushed as Amber joined in with a voice so pure and beautiful it seemed to pierce me.

I couldn’t stop the tears that filled my eyes as I listened to the music. Amber had remembered that this was one of my favorite songs. And she and Angel had obviously spent a whole lot of time practicing their presentation. I have seen masterful performances by trained musicians, but nothing was ever more beautiful than the song performed by my two young friends that evening.

After the last note of the song sounded, a soft, reverent applause filled the room. I looked at the audience and noticed that I was not the only one with tears in my eyes. After a moment of soft applause, the clapping grew louder until all had stood up from their seats and were uproariously cheering.

Angel made his way to Amber’s side, and the two of them smiled at the audience, and then looked directly at me. My mouth turned up in a smile that couldn’t possibly reflect what I was feeling.

The applause continued for a long time, and as it did I glanced around the room, looking at the cheering crowd. It was then that my eyes settled on someone across the room: Jean-Pierre. My first reaction was to turn away quickly, but I noticed something strange: Jean-Pierre was smiling at me as he clapped. A smile that seemed to say he was proud to be a part of all of this. I couldn’t help smiling back.

The clapping went on until George approached the podium and said, his voice cracking, “Thank you. That was quite a treat.” Then he cleared his throat and looked toward the band. “Well, that’s a tough act to follow, but I guess you’ll just have to try.”

Laughs filled the room, and the band proceeded to play a slow Louis Armstrong number.

I watched Amber and Angel make their way to a table where their loved ones greeted them with smiles and hugs. “I’ll be right back,” I said to Isaac before dashing off to add my own smiles and hugs.

“You guys were amazing,” I said, hugging them one after the other. “I can’t believe you did that. It was so wonderful.”

After a moment, Isaac was at the table as well. “You have a beautiful voice,” he said to Amber. “And Angel, buddy, you were like a pro up there.”

“I messed up at the beginning,” Angel admitted bashfully.

“You were perfect,” I said. “Just perfect.”

Suddenly I felt Isaac come up beside me. He placed his hand on the small of my back and moved his face so close to mine I could feel his breath on my cheek. “Will you dance with me?” he asked.

I felt as if my legs might give out under me, and every inch of my skin felt hot and prickly. “Yes,” I whispered.

Isaac and I said our good-byes to the group, and he led me out to the dance floor. The band was still playing the Louis Armstrong song as Isaac placed one hand on my waist and held up his other hand for me to take. I shakily clasped his hand, and we began swaying to the music.

“I think you did it,” Isaac said.

I furrowed my brow. “What?”

“I think you did what you wanted to do with your writing. I remember you telling me that you wanted to write something with meaning, something to counteract the junk that’s in the media. Well, from what I’ve seen tonight, I’d say you did it.”

“I can’t believe you remember me telling you that,” I said softly.

“Of course I remember.”

I wanted to reply to Isaac’s words. To tell him what that meant to me. To ask him what that meant for us. But the song ended, and the people on the dance floor began clapping for the band. I turned toward Isaac. “Thanks for the dance,” I said briskly. I began moving off the dance floor.

“Come outside with me,” Isaac said suddenly.

I looked into his hazel eyes and said nothing.

“Please, Annabelle.”

After a pause, I found myself nodding slowly, hesitantly.

Isaac offered me his hand, and we walked outside and made our way to a cobblestone walkway that led to the beach. As we drew closer to the shore, the sound of the music from the hotel grew softer, and the gentle roll of the waves took its place. When we stepped onto the sand, I took off my shoes and held them in my hand. Isaac did the same.

Almost immediately I began to shiver in the cold wind. My thin cashmere wrap, which I had picked up from the coat check on the way out of the hotel, wasn’t doing anything to shield me from the cold.

Isaac removed his jacket and placed it around me.

“Thanks,” I said, pulling the jacket around me tightly.

For a moment, we walked silently along the shore, the moist sand beneath our toes. I listened to the soothing sound of the sea and looked up at the moon in the sky.

“Annabelle, there’s something I need to tell you,” Isaac said, breaking the silence.

His voice was so deep and serious I knew just what he was going to say: He was in love with the blonde. He had realized it as they ate at the little Italian restaurant in the Green Meadows shopping center. And they were going to get married. And he was wondering if I would ghostwrite a poem to her from him, now that I was an established writer and all.

“I want you to know that I’m sorry,” he said.

“It’s okay,” I sighed. “You have to move on.”

“Move on?”

I traced tiny circles in the sand with my toes. “Yeah. I know what you’re going to tell me. You’re going to tell me that you’ve found the girl for you. And I’m happy for you, I really am.”

Isaac watched my feet. “I guess that’s part of what I was going to tell you.”

“Well, good,” I said. “I hope that you and Caramello are very happy together.”

“I’m not talking about Candy,” Isaac said. “My overly concerned mother set me up with her because she thought I was sulking around too much. I’m talking about you, Annabelle.” Isaac paused for a moment and looked into my eyes. “You, the girl who would drive hundreds of miles for a cake. You, the girl who applauded Angel’s ‘La Cucaracha.’ You, the girl who went to The Artichoke House to comfort your best friend. You, the author of the most incredible article I have ever read.”

“You mean me, the liar,” I said.

Isaac shook his head intently. “No, I don’t.”

The sea breeze picked up and whipped through my hair. I brushed the brown strands out of my face. “Wait? Are you saying you don’t still think I lied to you about Pat—” I stopped myself from saying the name. “About pat . . . the pat . . . the patchwork of stuff that you thought I lied about.” I’m not quite sure there is such a thing as a patchwork of stuff, but it was better than saying the name of slime.

A serious expression came onto Isaac’s face. “I know you didn’t.”

“You really know that?” I asked, almost afraid to believe him.

“It’s because I know
you
,” Isaac said. “Remember that night when I ran into you at
Central Coast Living
?”

“Yes, I remember.” I had thought he was a mouse.

“Remember how you told me that for some reason you could never hide from me?”

“Yes.”

“The thing is, I loved everything that I saw. I loved . . .” Isaac let his voice trail off. “Anyway, I think I used the whole Patrique thing as a reason to run away from something I was afraid of. I blamed you when I was the one to blame. You were nothing but wonderful and beautiful to me, and all you wanted was not to upset me, and I was a total jerk to you. I am so sorry.” Isaac tentatively touched the apple of my cheek.

I pushed his hand away. “You really hurt me, Isaac,” I said rigidly. “Do you expect me just to forget all about that and go on like nothing happened?”

“No, I don’t,” Isaac replied. “There’s no excuse for the way I treated you. I let my insecurities cloud the truth, and I will do everything in my power not to let that happen again. And if you can’t forgive me now, then I’ll wait. I’ll wait until you can.”

“What if it takes me a week?” I asked, folding my arms across my chest.

“I’ll wait.”

“What if it takes me a month?”

“I’ll wait.”

“What if it takes me a year?”

“A year,” Isaac said slowly.

“Okay,” I said, a sudden softening taking place inside of me, “maybe it won’t take that long.”

Isaac touched my arm gently. “I’m so sorry, Annabelle.”

“I know.”

And the thing was, I really did know.

Wordlessly, Isaac and I both turned to gaze at the sea, and Isaac gently touched my fingertips with his, as if he were asking permission to hold my hand. Slowly I laced my fingers through his, and it felt even better than I remembered.

“Annabelle?” Isaac asked.

“Yes?”

“I really want to kiss you.”

Isaac turned to face me, gently put his arms around me, and leaned toward me slowly, purposefully. When he was inches away, I closed my eyes and let myself be carried away in the moment. His lips were so close I could almost taste them.

But before our lips met, I found myself blurting, “So do you believe everything I told you then?”

Isaac pulled away and looked at me, obviously surprised by my untimely outburst.

What are you doing, making me ask questions at a time like this?
I asked my kiss-ruining brain.
Don’t you know he was about to kiss me?

“Yes, I do,” Isaac assured me.

“Why?” my brain made me ask.

No more questions,
I begged my brain.
Kiss. Focus on the kiss.

“Because I’m in love with you, Annabelle.”

The words were so beautiful they made me gasp.

“You love me?” I asked. “Cheese-smelling, can’t-play-tennis, made-you-pay-for-a-sea-lion me?”

Isaac tightened his arms around me. “Yes, you.”

The most incredible warm sensation filled my entire being. “Oh, Isaac, I love you too. So much. You are the kindest, best man I have ever known. And the first man who has ever truly known me.”

Isaac looked at me the way I have always dreamed a man would look at me and softly traced my lips with his finger. Then he took my face into his hands and kissed me. The kiss I had been longing to feel on my lips for much too long. The sweetest kiss imaginable. And when it was through, I was smiling and crying at the same time.

“Do you want to know a secret?” I asked Isaac.

Isaac kissed me softly on the forehead. “Yes.”

“I put you in my Pink Notes.” Of course, I had, in a moment of anger, crossed off Isaac Matthews in the entry and replaced it with Jerky Jerkins, but that could easily be fixed.

“I have a secret too,” Isaac said.

“What?”

“I took a photo of you talking to Angel when we were setting up for the recital. And I put it in my wallet.”

“No, you didn’t.”

“Yes, I did.” Isaac reached into the back pocket of his suit pants, and showed me the picture in his wallet. “I wanted to capture the look you get in your eyes when you’re talking to him. You get the same look when you talk to any of the people you write about in your notes.”

I turned my head down, embarrassed.

“It’s beautiful,” Isaac said. “One of the things I love most about you.”

Isaac put an arm around me, and I gently rested my head on his shoulder. I listened to his breath as we silently stared out at the moonlit sea.

“You know,” I said pensively as I looked out at the water, “it’s crazy, really. Everything that’s happened. That day when I went out to the San Joaquin Valley looking for that cake, I had no idea what was in store for me. I was looking for a cake, but in the end I found so much more. I found so many wonderful people, and their incredible stories. I found you. I found parts of myself that I think I might have lost for a while. And all of that was . . . the icing on the cake.”

Isaac kissed the top of my head. “Well, according to this really amazing girl that I know, the icing is the best part,” he said.

I lifted my head slightly and smiled up at Isaac. “Yes,” I said. “It sure is.”

 

 

 

The End