Two Feet Off The Ground Page 17

  A red ribbon draped from the middle of the book. I opened it and found a red foiled envelope. Inside another clue. “Something’s brewing. Go to The Corner Street Bakery and grab an oversized mug to discover a delicious adventure.”

  I loved scavenger hunts! Once, I won one by finding a needle in a haystack. Literally. Of course, when the organizer handed me two tickets to the cinema matinee for all my efforts, I wanted to stab the organizer in the eye with the needle.

  Paying for our books was an adventure unto its own. Paula and the clerk must’ve exchanged at least a dozen sneaky glances. When we got out onto the sidewalk, I barricaded Paula against the side of the building. “What are you up to?”

  Just as I figured, she laughed and bowled me out of the way, heading south towards Angell Street. “You’re wasting valuable time.”

  Ah, how I loved this woman.

  The first thing I smelled when I walked into the bakery was iced cookies. Aziza and I ventured there many a time when bloated with our periods and needed to sink our teeth into something sugary and divine. Baked to the size of a Frisbee, indulging in one of them could easily pack on five pounds.

  She ordered two of them to go.

  Meanwhile, I eyed up the metal racks of mugs by the fireplace. I scanned them carefully. This could take me all night. There had to be at least one hundred of them in every color of the rainbow. Just as I was about to enlist the help of a couple college kids huddled up beside the crackling logs hugging a couple of hot chocolates to their lips, I saw my mug propped dead center. It stood out like a lighthouse on a foggy night with its cherry red shellac paint and a hand-painted bow wrapped over a white heart. P loves L scrolled along the handle.

  Joy bubbled out of me.

  I picked it up and stuffed inside sat yet another red foiled envelope. I tore it open. “A sweet melody is waiting in the room where Owen first heard ‘Twinkle Twinkle Little Star.’”

  Belfast Mansion? My heart skipped. Paula had to do some serious digging to find that out.

  I fell in love with Belfast Mansion early on. My family held every special occasion there. It was an historic mansion built in 1738 for a bride by her husband. From as far back as I could remember, I fell in love with its architecture and grandeur, not to mention the little phyla dough peach cobblers they served at Owen’s baptism. When I strolled Owen up through the wooded path to the front entrance that day, I felt like I had stepped into a postcard of the most elegant, secluded place on earth. Somehow Northern Rhode Island cherished this eighty-two acre plot of land so much that they declared it a national treasury, blocking out any would-be tree hoarders from ever touching their chain saws to the bark of the grand maples and oaks that sprinkled the gorgeous backdrop in a sea of green.

  Paula stayed quiet on the ride up route one-forty six. The suspense killed me. I turned the volume down on the radio. “You actually rented it out for us?”

  “Well, not exactly rented. But, it is ours for the night.”

  “They didn’t charge you? How’d you get that deal?”

  Paula raised her hand up. “Too many questions. All you need to do is relax and enjoy yourself.”

  I rested my head against the seat and closed my eyes, steadying for what was sure to be an adventure I’d definitely enjoy.

  * *

  I tiptoed behind Paula onto the dark porch. “Why’s it so dark?”

  She stopped and raised her finger to my lips. “Shh, we don’t want anyone to hear us.”

  “I don’t understand. Are we going to stand out here all night?” I grazed the dark landscape and shivered. “Actually it’s kind of spooky. Can we just go in?”

  She crept up to the corner of the porch and lifted a planted pot from the rail. “Ah, still here.”

  “Does anyone know we’re here?”

  “What fun would that be?”

  I had trespassed only once in my lifetime. During my junior year of high school, the entire varsity cheerleader squad snuck into the boys’ locker room while the guys were at basketball practice in the gymnasium. We sprayed every square inch of metal with shaving cream after hosing their gym bags down in the shower stalls. Payback was a bitch. The boys had started it after all. If they hadn’t stolen our skirts right before the homecoming rally maybe they wouldn’t have had to lug waterlogged bags over their shoulders that night.

  “I don’t like this.” I flew back towards the stairs. I couldn’t scale them quick enough to escape Paula’s fingers from gripping me and pulling me back towards her. “Come on. Where’s your sense of adventure?”

  “I’m not going to trespass.” I folded my arms across my chest and stood my ground. “This is insane. We can’t just walk into Belfast Mansion and claim it for ourselves. There’s a three year waiting period.”

  “For the weekends. No one stays here during the week unless there’s a conference.”

  “And, how do you know guests are going to start arriving for an early morning conference right now? They host company meetings all the time. One of my clients just had his quarterly sales meeting here last month, and some of their national sales guys flew in the night before and stayed overnight.”

  “Does it look like anyone is staying here tonight?”

  I crept my eyes up to the windows. “I don’t feel right about this.”

  She curled her arms around my waist. “Relax. We’ve got the place to ourselves. Trust me.”

  If I wanted to go to jail, I’d break into a bank and then buy one of every single pair of Jimmy Choo’s shoes ever created. Not this. “Can’t we just go back to my place and sip wine in front of my fireplace?”

  Paula nibbled on my neck and whispered, “Haven’t you ever done anything wild and crazy before?”

  I thought her question through carefully. Aside from hitching a ride from some guy in a pickup truck in Plymouth when I miscalculated the distance from one end of the beach to the other, nothing came to mind. “Can’t we just sneak into a movie or something crazy like that?”

  “Just close your eyes and enjoy the ride,” she said, shading my eyes with her hands.

  I turned away and peeked over my shoulder at the dark driveway and shook a chill away. “I can’t believe I’m going to break into the Belfast Mansion.”

  She giggled like a four-year-old and headed for the door.

  Once inside, I couldn’t even see my hand two inches from my face until she flicked on a flashlight.

  I looked around. Just as I remembered it. The coat rack made of antlers still hung in the foyer. And, that familiar musty smell still lingered in the air. I trailed my eyes up the winding staircase to the oil painting of Belfast Lake, where I spent many family picnics. I always slept in the guest room at the top of the stairs first door on the left. I used to like the flowery bedspread and curtains. I morphed into a princess in a fairytale when snuggled up in that room. Belfast was a magical place where great art met up with the delightful aroma of Italian cuisine and paired off with the laughter of guests. Every square inch of Belfast boasted a tradition of beauty and exquisite detail unique to its era.

  Here I stood unannounced, uninvited, intruding on a property few were privileged to enjoy.

  What a surprising rush.

  She bounced the flashlight around the ceiling. “This place is incredible. Look at the carvings on that woodwork.”

  “You’ve never been here before?” A stroke of panic pulsed through me masking my short-lived bravado. She had no idea what she was doing sneaking in here. If we got caught…Visions of flashing red lights and loud sirens danced in my mind. Do they have hairdressers in prison?

  “Ha! Of course I’ve been here. My friends and I have snuck in here many times.”

  “Really?” How naughty. Why did this little fact thrill me suddenly?

  “It’s fun being a little daring, isn’t it?”

  “What if we get caught?” I asked.

  She wrapped her arms around me and laughed. “So what? They’ll toss us in a jail cell for the night and we’l
l have a good laugh over it.”

  She had lost it. Someone must’ve whacked her in the head with a soccer ball. “Do you think we’d actually have to spend the night in jail?”

  She stared at me with that twinkle in her eye. “You look like a deer in headlights, babe.”

  I doubted I could keep up with Paula’s pace forever, but I could possibly risk severe heart palpations for a romantic night alone with her. “Just promise me you’ll protect me if some butch named Big Momma tries to violate me when we’re doing time in the slammer.”

  “You’re doing so much better than Aziza gave you credit for.”

  Huh? “What?”

  “You don’t think I’d really put you in danger of being butch-raped in jail, right?”

  I searched her eyes for answers. “So, we are supposed to be here?”

  “When Aziza told me how special this place is to you, I contacted the manager to ask if I could borrow the mansion for the night.”

  “Borrow the mansion?”

  “A friend of a friend of a friend sort of knows the property manager who lives in the house behind the lake,” she said.

  I brightened and planted a kiss on her lips. “Oh, thank God!”

  “I thought you were going to start sprinting down the dirt road for a second there.” She laughed.

  “So, when did you and Aziza talk about this place?”

  “I called her and asked her your most favorite place in the world.”

  “You called her?”

  “Yup,” she said more proud than if she just handed her the key to her very own estate. She flicked on the light switch. “Seeing the fear in your face was so funny.”

  “You’re going to pay for that.” I lunged forward and jumped on her back. Mid spin, I reached down her pants and yanked on her underwear and didn’t let go, giving her the wedgie of a lifetime. “No mercy!”

  She squealed and tickled my side. Her fingers dug in, sending me into a convulsive cackle. She twirled me around faster until we both wound up so dizzy, we fell into a heap on the hardwood floors.

  Breathless, we stared up at the ceiling.

  “The craftsmanship really is incredible,” I said, dancing my fingers around her palm. My eyes leapt from one beautiful carving to the next.

  I sat up and glanced around.

  She stood and took my hand. “Let’s go explore.”

  We walked through the hallway to the barroom, which housed thousands of books on the walls constructed of shelves. I detected the faint smell of smoldering wood. Next to the barroom was another hall that led to a vault with a foot wide metal door. “This room used to freak me out when I was a kid.”

  She scooped up my hand and led me to the Great Room. A Victorian flowery couch centered the room and a dainty marble round table anchored it. On it, baby’s breath and long sticks of velvety, cattail plants stuck out of a glass vase. I gazed down at the plush, oval rug that hugged at my heels, scanning across the room to admire the luxurious window shams that blanketed the room in elegance. To the right, a white grand piano sat majestic against a wall of windows.

  She walked me over to the couch. “Wait here.” She walked over to her gym bag, which she tossed to the floor. “I’ve got a surprise for you.”

  “There’s more?”

  She dug into the gym bag and lifted a present out of it. This one wasn’t so square and perfect, though still shiny red with a bow. It kind resembled the type of present Owen would wrap for me. It jutted out to one side and dented on the other, and smelled like a kettle of grease. I was pretty certain it wasn’t a necklace from Tiffany’s.

  “Open it.”

  My heart raced as I tore into my gift. I uncovered a bucket of KFC chicken, biscuits, mashed potatoes and Cole slaw. I busted out laughing. “Well, honey, you’ve outdone yourself.”

  Overcome with laughter herself, she grabbed the bucket. “Only the best for you, darling. With all the running around I did to get the mansion, it didn’t leave me much time to plan dinner.” She reached into the bucket. “Crap. It’s cold.”

  “Leave it to me,” I said. I lit the fireplace and we sat on the exquisite rug, cross-legged, holding our drumsticks over the flames.

  She dug in and spooned a pile of mashed potatoes in her mouth. “I love you,” she said.

  How could Paula walk away from all of this?

  Chapter Fourteen

  I rubbed the top of the rubber airplane just like book told me to do. “How the hell am I supposed to make it ‘my friend’?” I chucked it across the salon and it landed in the shampoo bowl. “These books are a load of crap. All of them tell me to do something ridiculous. They treat me like I’m a stupid monkey.”

  I plopped into my chair. “It’s useless. I may as well get used to being alone forever, because there’s no way in hell I’m ever going to be ready to get on an airplane.”

  Aziza sat on my lap and massaged my shoulders. “Well, there’s no saying she’s getting the job.”

  I brushed a wisp of hair away from her cheek. “You and I both know she’s getting it. And, I’m going to end up living the rest of my days as a lonely lesbian in Rhode Island.”

  “Stop feeling sorry for yourself. It makes you look ugly.”

  I dropped my head onto her chest. “What am I going to do? None of these techniques are working.”

  “What about Chuck? He’s a freaking pilot. He should be able to figure something out, right?”

  I considered Chuck after he offered his help, and I dropped that thought right away. “He’ll force me to go up in the plane with him.”

  She lifted her head up and kissed my nose. “That’s the point. He’s your best shot at this point.” She hugged me. “You can do this.”

  I would never get in Chuck’s plane. Never. No one ever survives those small airplane crashes. “Yeah, whatever. I’ll think about.”

  She climbed off me. She massaged my shoulders from behind. “So, did Paula seriously pull KFC out of her bag?”

  “Yeah, and she totally forgot to get napkins so she started wiping her mouth on her sleeve when she didn’t think I was looking. She is the cutest thing ever.”

  “Were you spooked in that big mansion?”

  “When I walked by that room with the vault—you know the one Uncle Len accidentally locked himself in at Owen’s baptism—chills ran up and down my spine.”

  “There’s a website that talks about that room. There’s definitely something there.” A crooked smile spread across Aziza’s face.

  “You know I don’t like to talk about ghosts.” I jumped up and ran to the backroom.

  She ran after me. “Okay, okay. I’ll stop.” She opened the fridge. “Let’s get drunk.”

  “I have to get back to Owen. He’s having girlfriend issues.”

  “Oh?” She poured them each a glass of wine. “At least have one drink so I can hear about his first love.”

  I reached out for the glass. “Her name is Miranda and apparently she’s mad that Owen doesn’t text her every five minutes.”

  She led us outside where she had recently set up a picnic table for the smokers. “Young love. Those were the days when you couldn’t see past a pretty girl, huh?” She clunked her glass against mine in good cheer.

  “What are you talking about? You still can’t.”

  She pulled out her cigarettes and offered one to me. I reached out to grab one and pulled back. “I shouldn’t. Paula hates cigarettes.”

  She lit hers. “One’s not going to kill you.” She winked. “How’s she going to know?”

  God, why did it have to smell so damn good? Once upon a time I hated cigarettes, too. “Oh, fuck it. Let me have one.”

  “Once you get to California, you can concentrate on quitting. I won’t be there to influence you.”

  “That is such a sad thought,” I said, inhaling my first drag.

  “The cigarettes or me?”

  I pouted. “What would we do without each other?”

  She stared through our cl
oud of smoke straight ahead into the woods. She shook her head. “I can’t think about it.”

  “It scares me, too.” I took a deep drag, lingering over the terrible conflict.

  “I guess I’ll have to break down and set up a Facebook account, huh?”

  “At least I have Owen to show me how to set it up. I hope Tania knows her way around the Internet.”

  “She knows her way around lots of stuff.” Aziza batted her eyes.

  “I don’t think I’ll be able to live without you,” I pressed her hand to my heart.

  “Yes you can. And you will. I can’t rely on you to keep my business alive forever. Eventually, I’ll have to take the driver’s seat. We’ll get you up and out of this state one way or another.”

  * *

  I shoveled a heap of raspberry ice cream in my mouth so fast that a glob dribbled off and splattered on my ankle. Owen already had devoured half of his sundae. We had taken took two weeks off from our Tuesday night ice cream ritual and he lapped his treat up like a dog afraid that his master would steal his bowl away.

  “Take it easy. You’re going to get a brain freeze,” I said, wiping his chin before bending down to clean my ankle.

  He ignored me and slurped up more.

  Aside from his bad table manners, I wondered how I ever raised such a mature, young man by myself. He depended on me alone and somehow he turned out fabulous. I walked, he learned to walk. I spoke, he learned to speak. I ate food, he ate food. I read books, he read books. I smoked, and gosh, he would eventually smoke.

  I really needed to act more responsibly. The next day, I would turn the smoker’s circle at Bella into a lunch patio. I’d remove all ashtrays and condemn smoking. I’d force Aziza to quit, too. No more. Both of us would return to being the smoke haters we once were in the pre-Tania days.

  Poor kid.

  If I moved, he had to move. He’d have to leave all his friends, girlfriends, teammates, everything—just because of me. I affected him in every sense.

  Mid-lick it dawned on me. What a terrible, selfish mother I was. How could I even think about uprooting my son at such a vulnerable age? He had set himself up with a great group of friends who voted him most popular just a few weeks earlier at the end of the school year. And what about his new girlfriend? I couldn’t break his little heart by ending their puppy-love.