Vows, Vendettas And A Little Black Dress

CHAPTER 3

Men are like rose stems in that rose stems of considerable length are nice but, ultimately, their size is not their most important attribute. What’s important is that the stem stays stiff long enough for your flower to hit full bloom.

–Fatally Yours

That night I dreamed of monsters. Before we had left the hospital the doctor had come out and told us that it appeared Dena’s surgery had been successful. That she should be able to walk again and that perhaps she eventually wouldn’t need a walker or braces in order to do it. He gave us a lot more details, but I didn’t hear them. All I heard were the lack of assurances. Their absence became a tangible thing that twisted itself into a multitude of awful images. Those images curled up in my mind only to uncoil in my sleep and attack my dreams. I hadn’t been able to see Dena either. Only blood relatives had been allowed admittance into her room. The rest of us had to wait for daylight hours.

Anatoly had held me all night but for once his embrace didn’t lead to sex. Having sex while Dena was unable to felt wrong. Like starting a rock band on the eve of Elvis’s death.

And now morning was here. My kitty, Mr. Katz, was rolled up in a ball by my feet and Anatoly still slept, understandable since it was only a little after 8:00 a.m. Last night we hadn’t even gotten home until almost 3:00 a.m. It was too early to go to the hospital; I certainly didn’t want to risk waking Dena. So where should I go? I couldn’t go back to sleep. There would be more monsters there.

As if he sensed the question, Anatoly’s eyes flickered open and glided over to me. “What time is it?” he muttered.

“Too early,” I answered.

Anatoly turned to check the clock and then paused as he tried to figure out the significance of my being conscious at such an obscene hour.

“I’m getting up,” I said.

“I’ll cook you breakfast,” Anatoly offered. He pushed the covers off himself, revealing his state of undress. Nothing but his fitted Calvin Klein boxers. Normally that would be enough to get my endorphins moving, but not this morning.

“I’m not hungry.”

“You’re always hungry, particularly if I’m cooking.”

“Today’s different.”

We lay there in silence for a few moments as Mr. Katz stretched his legs and abandoned us in search of a more peaceful resting spot, neither of us wanting to be the first to name the tragedy that had taken away my appetite for sex and food.

He sighed and pulled me into the crook of his arm. “Let’s stay here. We didn’t get enough sleep last night.”

I smiled and kissed his chin. “Sleep then,” I whispered before freeing myself and getting to my feet.

“Sophie—”

“No, I mean it. Stay here. I need to…think. To drive and think.”

“You’re sure you can’t think here in bed?” The red veins of exhaustion drew ragged lines across his eyes, making him look stoned and uncharacteristically vulnerable.

I leaned down and gave him another kiss, this time on the mouth. I let my tongue dance across his lower lip as I savored the taste of him. “Sleep,” I said when I finally pulled away. “We’ll talk later.”

Anatoly didn’t say anything as I pulled on my jeans and a T-shirt and brushed a thin golden layer of Bare Escentuals mineral powder across my face. I could feel him watching me as I left the room.

Outside the rising sun cast an eerie pale pink light across the sky. The fog that usually owned the mornings of San Francisco wasn’t there today. Without its insulation, the air had a harsh quality that felt out of place for May.

Of course, driving without coffee is almost as irresponsible as driving drunk, so my first stop was Starbucks. The barista recognized me and prepared my usual light mint mocha chip Frappuccino with a floating shot and extra whipped cream before I had the chance to order it. When tormented, always turn to your comfort foods.

I drove for over an hour and eventually I found myself in the South of Market district, only blocks away from O’Keefe’s, the nursery and flower boutique where Amelia worked. Of course she wouldn’t be there today. She and Kim were probably sleeping off a marijuana-induced high in some small corner of Nicaragua, blissfully unaware that here, in the highly developed city of San Francisco, the sky was falling.

But Dena liked the bouquets they made here…what was her favorite…did they call it the Aphrodisiac? Or maybe it was O’Keefe’s Pleasure? Whoever was working would know what I was talking about. I found a parking spot right in front and checked to make sure I had some cash on me before stepping inside.

South of Market was incredibly industrial but when you walked into O’Keefe’s it was as if you were entering a manicured jungle. Ivy and ferns dangled from the ceiling, forcing anyone above the height of five foot six to zigzag their way through the shop in order to avoid being smacked in the face by a leaf. Then there were the buckets of roses, the small potted plants, the ficus trees and the musty smell of damp soil. It was such a tangle of sensory delights that it took me a moment to identify what was wrong with the picture.

What was wrong was the employee on duty. Amelia stood frozen, partially hidden by a towering areca palm with leaves almost as wild and unruly as the mass of light brown curls that fell over her naturally tanned shoulders. “Sophie,” she said quietly.

“Amelia, what are you doing here?” I quickly closed the distance between us.

“I—I—I’m working,” she stammered and then held up a small watering can as if to prove her point.

“But you’re supposed to be in Nicaragua!”

“Yes, well, I didn’t…um…make it.”

“You and Kim canceled the trip?”

“Oh, Kim’s there. We just thought…or he decided…I decided…sometimes we all need to find ourselves, you know?”

“Wait, I’m confused. Is someone lost?”

“Kim is…sort of,” Amelia hedged. “Traveling alone can open your mind to what’s important,” she added. “It can help you see things differently and…and appreciate what you have a little more.”

“Okay, I get that.” I glanced around the shop. There was a bucket full of lilies that were such a deep red they were almost black. I wanted to ask Amelia a little bit more about Kim’s sudden decision to fly solo, though not because I was really all that interested. I just wanted to avoid telling Amelia the news.

“Did you come here for flowers?” Amelia asked. She shifted the watering can from hand to hand. Her eyes were even more red than Anatoly’s had been that morning.

“Amelia,” I said slowly, “something awful has happened.”

Amelia looked up suddenly, frightened. “Awful?” she breathed. “Have things gotten worse?”

“Worse? Worse than what?”

A small crease formed itself across Amelia’s forehead. “I…I don’t think I understand.”

“Well, that makes two of us. I have no idea what you’re referring to but what I’m talking about is Dena.” I took a deep breath for courage. “Amelia, Dena was shot last night.”

Amelia looked at me blankly for a moment, apparently absorbing nothing.

“I know it’s hard to take in but she is going to be okay.” Even as I said the words I knew how unconvincing they sounded. What was the definition of “okay,” anyway? Did you just have to live to be okay?

“You don’t know…” Amelia hesitated midsentence and stared down at the watering can as if it could give her some kind of clue as to what she should say next.

“No,” I said gently. “I don’t really know anything. But you know Dena. She’s going to want a full recovery and she always gets what she wants in the long run, right?”

Amelia kept her eyes down but I thought I saw her flinch. “Dena’s never had to wait for the long run.”

“Well, there you go!” I offered her a shaky smile. “She’ll be up and dancing in the clubs before the next major holiday.”

A large truck drove by, making the ground beneath our feet vibrate ever so slightly. Amelia looked up and I could see the tears forming. “What’s wrong with me?” she asked. “I should be at the hospital! What’s wrong with me?”

“Amelia, you didn’t know. No one expects you to be psychic.”

She shook her head fiercely as if not knowing was no excuse at all. “I’ll be there. I’ll get someone to come in and cover for me. Please tell Dena I’m coming, okay?”

“Yeah, sure…um…I actually came in because I wanted to bring her a bouquet. I know she likes the one that has these lilies in it.”

Amelia wiped her eyes. “I’m sorry for being like this,” she whispered as she stared at the dark red lilies.

“Come on, Amelia, you just found out that a friend of yours has been shot. There’s no way to handle that well.”

“I guess you’re right.” She took a deep steadying breath. “The bouquet you’re thinking of is the one we call Sense and Sensuality. I just finished putting one together for delivery. You can take it to her.”

“You were making one for someone else?” I asked.

Amelia didn’t seem to hear me. She wiped her eyes again and gestured for me to follow her to the counter at the back of the store. Next to the register was the bouquet, already prepared. “So I guess it’s a popular arrangement?” I asked.

“Not as much as you would think. It’s been months since I’ve put together one of these for anyone other than Dena…I mean, I did today, but before today months and months.”

“Really?” I asked. The bouquet was beautiful and the sinewy curves of the chosen flowers and leaves justified the name. “Who ordered the flowers today?” I asked as I fished out my wallet.

“What is this, the Spanish Inquisition?” Amelia snapped.

I stepped back and did a quick mental inventory of every word I had said in the past few minutes in hopes of finding the one that could have offended.

Amelia pressed her hand against her stomach, perhaps in an attempt to push the demon who had just spoken back inside her. “I think I’m a little on edge,” she offered. “I just didn’t expect this. How could any of us have expected this?”

I swallowed and glanced down at my watch. “It’s already eight. I should get to the hospital…find out what’s going on.”

Amelia handed me the bouquet. “On me. You will tell Dena I’m coming, right?”

“Yeah, of course. You know she really is going to be fine. Everything’s going to be fine.” I laid the flowers against my right arm, like the first runner-up in a beauty pageant after she’s accepted her lesser tiara. And like a runner-up, the smile I offered Amelia was forced.

CHAPTER 4

My ex-boyfriend is kind of like a cold sore. He’s always popping up at the most inconvenient times, he’s hideously embarrassing, and it takes forever to get rid of him.

–Fatally Yours

The person in the hospital bed was totally unfamiliar to me. I had expected to see a wounded Dena but this was a…a…girl. Not a woman. Without styling products, her thick, dark hair flopped carelessly around her face. There was no burgundy lipstick or meticulously applied eyeliner. Without the help of her powder foundation you could make out the beginnings of a pimple right on the bridge of her nose. The only things that hadn’t changed were her eyelashes. Naturally dark, curvy and thick, Dena had never seen a reason to coat them in mascara. Now, without the competition of all the other expensive cosmetics, those lashes seemed to dominate her features. The sexy dark lashes of a seductress mistakenly placed around the eyes of an uneasy child.

“You brought me flowers,” Dena said, but there was no appreciation in her voice. Just the quiet notation of fact.

“They’re kind of from Amelia,” I said as I placed them on the bedside table beside her.

“I thought she was in Nicaragua.”

“No, Kim went, she stayed behind.” I had forgotten to ask for a vase…but shouldn’t Amelia have thought of that? This couldn’t be the first arrangement she’d ever made for a hospital room.

“My parents are in town.”

I pulled a wooden chair up to the side of the bed. “So they’ve already been here this morning?”

Dena shook her head. “I guess they were here last night but I was out of it. Monty’s putting them up. Mary Ann’s going to be staying with him, too, for a little while.”

“She doesn’t want to stay in her apartment,” I said slowly. “God, of course she doesn’t. I should have asked her if she wanted to stay with me.”

Dena looked away, choosing not to comment.

I gently fingered the petals of a downy orchid. I had a lot of questions but I wasn’t at all sure I wanted the answers.

Dena stroked the blanket that covered her legs. Her nails were painted with OPI’s “I’m Not Really a Waitress” red. “I can feel them,” she whispered.

For a second I didn’t understand. It wasn’t until I noted the way she was staring at her legs that I got it. “Oh! That’s wonderful!”

“Wonderful?” she repeated. “Wonderful that I can feel a part of my body? We’re supposed to be able to feel our legs! We’re supposed to be able to USE them! But I can’t do that, can I? Maybe, someday if I’m lucky, I’ll be able to walk a block in less than ten minutes!”

I drew away from the orchid. “It’s not going to be like that.”

“NO?” She spat. “This morning I talked to my doctor about walkers and braces. WALKERS and FUCKING BRACES, Sophie!”

Outside the room we could hear the high-pitched sound of nurses laughing as they walked down the hall. Dena winced as if their merriment was a personal insult. “He did say that with intensive physical therapy I might get to the point where I can walk with only a cane,” she continued, “but I shouldn’t get my hopes too high. I shouldn’t expect to be able to walk as well as my fucking grandmother, right? I mean who do I think I am? A healthy thirty-two-year-old woman? A woman who hasn’t had everything taken away from her in five fucking seconds? Is that who I think I am?”

“You don’t need to get your hopes up,” I said. Every muscle in my body was tensing and I pushed myself to the edge of the chair. “This isn’t about hope.”

“You know, Mary Ann spent the night here and Jason was here a little less than an hour ago. They were both trying to fucking coddle me,” Dena went on, apparently not hearing me. “Hugging me all fucking morning. I don’t need sympathy and cuddles. I need to be okay again but that’s never going to happen!”

“Shut up,” I whispered. The muted pastel tones in the room were blurring together as I stared hard at my friend.

“What did you just say?”

“SHUT UP!” I was louder this time and my heeled boots pounded against the linoleum floor as I jumped to my feet. “You’re pissed off? Fine, great, I am, too. But don’t just roll over! You don’t roll over for anyone! You’re a friggin’ dominatrix for God’s sake!”

Dena recoiled slightly, her head making wrinkled patterns in her paper pillow case. “Sophie—”

“I’m not done talking. See, this is how it’s going to go. You and I are going to take all this anger and we’re going to channel it. We’re going to find this guy who shot you and we’re going to fuck him up big-time. And then you’re going to take the rest of your anger and you’re going to use it to fuel your recovery. You’re going to walk again without ANY help—just to spite your attacker. This isn’t about keeping hopes high. This is about kicking ass and making the asshole who did this cower and beg for mercy and YOU know how to do that!”

Dena stared at me for a moment as I tried to steady my breathing. “Was that a pep talk?”

“God, I don’t know. Aren’t pep talks supposed to be more…peppy?”

Dena’s lips curved into the tiniest of smiles.

“You’re right,” she said, softer this time. “I do want to stay angry.”

I sat back in my chair. “It’s an awesome emotion.” I blinked my eyes until the room came back into focus. “Where would you and I be if Susan B. Anthony hadn’t gotten pissed off? Hell, our whole country owes its existence to the temper tantrum a bunch of moody Bostonians had over some tea.”

“You have a point.”

“Don’t I always?”

“No, not always.” A small flock of birds could be seen from the window and Dena followed their path with her eyes. “There’s more, Sophie. My doctor told me…he told me that sex is going to be…different. He said that after an injury like mine some women have reported that they are no longer able to have orgasms. He said that some of the women started experiencing pain when they had sex.”

I felt my heart go into free fall. This was worse than losing the use of her legs. This was like blinding an astronomer or cutting off the hands of a pianist.

Dena grabbed my wrist. “Promise me that it was more than just a pep talk, Sophie. Promise you’ll help me make the guy who did this pay.”

And at that very moment Mary Ann’s ex-boyfriend, Rick Wilkes, stepped into the room.

It took us both a split second to recognize him. His hair was shorter than the last time I had seen him and he was wearing a suit that seemed way too formal, not just for the hospital but for the city as a whole. But what really threw me off was the fact that the bottom half of his face was hidden behind a bunch of tulips. He must have brought two dozen of them and they were all carelessly crammed together in a small vase.

“What,” Dena said in a tone of utter disdain and impatience, “are you doing here?”

“I heard what happened.” He lowered the tulips slightly and gave me a small nod of acknowledgment. “I thought I’d come by and…” His voice trailed off and he thrust the flowers forward to demonstrate the point of his mission.

“You’re not family,” Dena said evenly. “And we’re not friends. What made you think you owed me flowers?”

“I didn’t think I owed them to you.” Rick put his bouquet next to mine. My black orchids seemed all the more dark and moody now that they glared up at Holland’s national flower. “Besides, we are friends. We were practically family for a while there.”

“Are you kidding me?” Dena tried to raise herself up on her forearms, and when the pain from her wound stopped her she settled for making her automated bed lift her into a sitting position. “You’re here to score points with my cousin?”

“That’s not what I said!”

“You might as well have! We were practically family,” she mimicked. “We were never anything close to family, snot-face!”

Rick gingerly put his hand to his nose as if he thought the insult might be literal.

“But here you are,” Dena continued, “hoping that if you show up with some ugly ass flowers Mary Ann’s going to see how sensitive and considerate you are and fall into your arms!”

“That’s not true! And these flowers aren’t ugly!” He picked his bouquet back up and shoved them in her face. “They’re tulips! You love tulips!”

“I hate tulips!” She smacked the flowers aside and glared as a dislodged petal floated down onto her sheets. “Mary Ann is the one who gets all Holly-Hobby-giddy over them—but that was the point, right?”

“Listen, we were watching the news,” Rick said in a rush. “I heard what happened and I thought, well, I should be here. I should be here to support Mary Ann’s cousin.”

“We?” Dena repeated.

“Right…er…” He put the flowers on the side table again and became very involved in fluffing them back up.

“Rick, baby, don’t leave me hanging,” Dena jeered. “Who’s we?”

Rick’s hands fell to his sides. “Well, if you must know, Fawn was with me, but don’t take that to mean… We were just watching television after all.”

“So you’re not with her anymore?” Dena asked, although she didn’t sound as if she cared all that much.

“No…we are… I had to get on with my life after all. Mary Ann told me she’s getting married and, well… I mean if I had reason to think she was having second thoughts… She’s not, right?”

“Get. Out!” Dena hissed just as the door opened again.

This time it was a nurse. “Miss Lopiano, I’m supposed to run some tests…”

Dena raised her hand bidding the nurse to wait and turned to Rick. “Why are you still here?”

“I could just wait in the corner,” he said hopefully. “Wait until she…um, your family shows up.”

Dena gave me a meaningful look. I got to my feet and took Rick by the arm. “We’re leaving.” I pulled him through the door and down the hallway.

“I’ll wait here then,” he suggested once we had reached a vending machine.

“For Mary Ann?” I asked. “Really? What do you think is going to happen?”

Rick pulled away from me and looked up at the ceiling. “I know you and Dena hate me. You have the right to but—”

“Rick, someone shot Dena. Right now all my hate is reserved for the guy who pulled the trigger. I don’t have room in my mind to hate you. I don’t have room for you period. And neither does Dena and neither does Mary Ann.”

“I just want to talk to her.”

“Not today. She’s got enough to deal with.”

Rick reached out and grabbed my arm but his grip was much tighter than mine had been on his. “I am not something that Mary Ann has to deal with. I’m here to comfort her. I understand her, she can talk to me.”

“No,” I said, peeling his fingers away. “She can’t. You severed whatever special connection you had with Mary Ann when you decided to stuff your weasel inside Bambi slutty taxidermist.”

“Her name is Fawn.”

“Whatever. You’re being a burden, Rick. Accept it and move on.”

Rick’s eyes flashed in what could be either anger or pain. He leaned forward and for the first time I became aware of his height. Rick wasn’t very muscular but he had to be at least six foot three.

“Rick? Is everything all right?”

We both turned to see a woman in a bright orange belted sheath dress coming out of the elevator. The vividness of her clothes seemed to clash with her reddish-brown hair which was gathered up in a cheap plastic clip.

Rick immediately pulled away. “Everything’s fine,” he said. I have never seen a man look more guilty. “I didn’t expect—”

But the woman cut him off by turning to me. “You must be a friend of Dena’s. I’m Fawn.”

She extended her hand to me but I just stared at it. Fawn read my reticence correctly and quickly pulled her hand back. “I guess you’re also a friend of Mary Ann’s,” she said quietly. “We didn’t mean to cause any trouble. It’s just that after seeing it on the news Rick thought we should come…he did know Dena after all and he’s had nothing but nice things to say about her.”

“Dena doesn’t want to see Rick,” I said coolly. “And you…well, she doesn’t even know you.”

“Right, I’m sorry.” Fawn shifted from foot to foot. “We’ll go…or I’ll go wait in the car if you want to stay a little longer, Rick.” She looked up to Rick in a silent request for instructions.

“Rick doesn’t need to stay,” I said shortly. “You can both leave.”

Rick crossed his arms across his chest and for a moment it looked as if he was going to stomp his foot in protest, but instead he nodded to Fawn, who quickly fell behind him as he strode toward the elevator. Fawn turned to me and mouthed “sorry” as Rick jammed his finger against the call button. She didn’t protest when he pulled her inside as the doors parted.

It hadn’t been that way when Rick had been with Mary Ann. He had doted on her. Once, after consuming one too many glasses of scotch Rick had told her that she owned his soul. But men were always making wildly romantic declarations to Mary Ann. Just last month Monty had thrown rose petals at her feet and pronounced her to be queen of his heart. Anatoly didn’t do stuff like that. Thank God.