Ariel's Crossing - Bradford Morrow [142]
He patted her on the back. Inept fraternal gesture. Again he pulled his hands away from her in the dark. She hadn’t noticed, it seemed, any of these small conflicted movements.
“Have you ever found yourself at an impasse, where you really needed to make a tough decision, a crossroads decision, but instead of making the choice, this road or that, you just dropped everything and took off in another direction completely?”
He was speechless, reminded again of Mary.
“I didn’t think so,” she answered herself. “You’re smarter than that. More grounded, centered. I thought I was grounded, but there’s a big difference between being centered and being untested.”
“My guess is you’re being hard on yourself.”
“What makes you say that?”
“Like father, like daughter. Kip told me a lot about his life, you know. I think if he was here he’d tell you that when he left you and your mother for Vietnam, he was anything but grounded, and he’s out there right now still trying to prove to himself that he’s worthy.”
“Of what?”
“Seems to me he’s spent the second half of his life trying to make up for the first. Kind of sad, since I think he’s a far better person than he seems to think he is. He’s helped me in ways I’m sure he’s not aware of, helped my whole family. And now he’s doing what he thinks is best for my uncle, even though it’s turned out to be a pain in the ass for all involved.”
“When he left my mother and me, he may have thought he was doing us a favor. For all I know he was right. But sometimes when you think you’re doing the best for somebody, you’re really throwing a monkey wrench into their life.”
Marcos said, “Look, Ariel. I’m usually not so forward, but you might want to think twice about an abortion.”
“It’s ironic,” she said, standing up with his help.
“What?”
“To be talking about this in the middle of a proving grounds.”
Without giving any thought to whether such a gesture was grounded or not, Marcos drew Ariel toward him and kissed her. Less surprised than she might have been, she held him close, her breath quickening and shallow but her mind unexpectedly calm.
“I must taste awful,” she whispered.
“You don’t.”
“Besides, we probably shouldn’t,” though if asked, she might not have been able to explain why not.
“I know.”
Hand in hand, they walked back toward the dead fire, woke up Delfino, and the three of them retreated under the fallen casita eaves for the balance of their second night at Dripping Spring.
A week had passed since her mother shared with Rose the secret. That she’d spoken with a woman in Los Alamos who claimed to know Mary’s whereabouts. Like Edward Stratemeyer, who under the pseudonym of Carolyn Keene had written the immortal Nancy Drew tales that Rose loved to read to her toddler daughters, Mary had assumed an alias. Rather than thinking any of this weird, Rose marveled at how adventurous her big sister had become. Imagine, taking a pseudonym. It was fantastically romantic, something all of us should do once in our lives. She wondered what Mary’s new name was and how it would feel when she walked like a movie star right through the front door of the old house here in Gallup, glamorously triumphant. Stranger things happened each and every day.
“Mrs. Montoya called again,” Rebecca told Rose after the girls finished lunch and had been tucked in for their afternoon nap.
The house was warm and quiet. A jar of sun-brewed tea sat on the windowsill. Rose was slicing a small hard lemon to add to it.
“What did she say?”
“She said she thought I should meet with Mary.”
“What does Mary think about that?”
“I’m not sure she knows.”
“You’re gonna do it, aren’t you?”
“I should probably talk it over with your dad first.”
“What for? You know what he’ll say.”
“No, I don’t. We haven’t talked about her for quite a while. Your father’s a fair man.”
“Not when it comes to Mary,” Rose said, then mused, “Funny, here I thought she was in Hollywood or New York City all