Reconnecting

Crazy had A Tale of Two Cities for his reading assignment. Figuring he’d take a shortcut to reading the book, Crazy had only thumbed through the Cliff’s Notes version. Well, how stupid could you be, considering the fact that every single English teacher in the world has read A Tale of Two Cities maybe a thousand times and knows every single word in the book.
Crazy had only started presenting his report and Miss Hamilton automatically knew that he hadn’t read a word of the book. She had him by the literary balls and started to squeeze in an instant, asking him to tell her what Chapter 1 was about, how about Chapter 2, how about the last chapter. Crazy got a big “F” for his report. I couldn’t do the same with Ginny; I couldn’t get an “F” with her that would definitely mean I would have to kiss this Sleeping Beauty goodbye.
Even as I recalled Crazy’s screw-up in Miss Hamilton’s class, the better and saner part of my brain was trying to process Ginny’s comment, “If for some strange reason I’m there with you . . .” So I looked Ginny straight in her deep dark eyes, an experience which had always been and still was erotic for me, and said simply and matter-of-factly, “So the deal is, I read the books, you’ll come to Key West with me?”
“Not quite. You read the books and I may be inclined to consider visiting you in Key West. I’d do the same for anyone who took some intellectual interest in the arts.”
I didn’t have a quick, cute comeback, so I just looked at Ginny and tried to augur whether this day had brought any real clue as to whether Ginny could be my one and only Sleeping Beauty. Her gift of the two classics was a positive sign that she remembered us as we once were. She could have given me a couple of current best-sellers as a gift, She could have given me nada, nothing, for a gift. But this gift held a deep connection to our shared past. Maybe she was reaching out to me in her own way to crack the door open and allow me back into her life.
The Miss Ginny had arrived back at the dock and the clock on the wall read 2:20, which meant a quick ride back to the law firm. Then Ginny would be off to her 3:00 partner meeting, and I would be on my way to Key West. As we left the main salon, I thanked Ginny for a wonderful time on the yacht, for lunch, and especially for the two books. In front of the crew, she was very much the business person; no kissing or groping, not that we would be making out on the salon’s lime and white striped sofa in any case.
Our fifteen-minute ride back to the law firm in the limo was my best shot to have a few more quality minutes with Ginny and to put the sell on her as to why she should come to Key West. So, taking the bull by the horns, I turned to her and took her hands in mine. She didn’t seem resistant at all, and seemed to know instinctively that I wanted to speak from the heart.
“Ginny, I did read a book one time, a sci-fi book about a time traveler—can’t remember the title, maybe by Jules Verne, whoever. The point is, if I could have been that time traveler, I would have gone back to when we were dating in high school and I would have changed my beer drinking, my casual attitude to my education, anything and everything to have kept you. I really screwed up, losing you to stupid things like too much beer and too much play.”
Ginny had tears in her eyes as I told her how I felt about us. She said very softly, “The night you and your buddy showed up drunk for our get-back-together date, that said it all about you. I don’t know who was the bigger bum, you or your friend. But I’m glad it happened because I went on to a wonderful, successful life, a beautiful marriage with Everett, and, if not for wind shear that caused the jet to crash, we wouldn’t be in this limo together. I imagine you’ve changed over the years. I am sure your wife wouldn’t have put up with your drinking and immature attitude and irresponsibility. I’m sorry she fell ill with Alzheimer’s; what a shame for her, for your boys, and for you.”
Well, we were getting close to her building, so I simply asked her, “Do you think you could love me once more?”
“Life is full of compromise. Could I love you? Yes, I believe I could fall in love with you again. Can I walk away from this life I have in Miami, my law firm, the Children’s Hospital, my friends? The answer is probably no, but . . . nothing’s impossible. It would take me years to unravel the ties that bind me here. Could you wait a year or more for me to be with you?”
“If you told me you loved me and would make your life with me, I’d wait.” I leaned toward Ginny, took her in my arms, and kissed her more passionately than I have ever kissed any woman, other than Lucinda—even more passionately than I had kissed Stacey and Jackie. Ginny kissed me back, giving me one of her patented tongue-to-tongue kisses that made me want to declare an immediate winner in the Sleeping Beauty contest.
She put her hand to the side of my face and said, “My Macho Man still has it. You were always a great kisser.” Ginny then kissed me again, almost sucking my tongue from my mouth. I could tell she hadn’t been passionate with any other man since Everett’s death. I was becoming the benefactor of the gap in time since she had been affectionate with anyone.
The limo stopped, and the driver opened Ginny’s door. I said to her, “Well, that kiss gives me hope that we’ll be together very soon.”
“Yes, I’ll come see you in Key West in the next month or so, after I’ve completed our current case against British Petroleum for the Gulf spill.” Then, looking at the two books on the seat beside me, Ginny continued, “And in the meantime, promise me you’ll read the two classics.”
I got out of the limo and stood on the sidewalk with Ginny and any number of pedestrians quickly coming and going. We had no chance to finish our romantic mini-interlude in the limo. Ginny just gave me the Middle Eastern kiss goodbye and, almost yelling over the traffic noise from the street, said, “Call me in a week and maybe you can come up for dinner. You’re only three hours away. You’re welcome to stay on the Miss Ginny.”
I yelled back to her, “That’s a date! Will call! Thanks for the books; my IQ will probably double, maybe even triple, after reading them!”
Ginny laughed, touched my face with her hand, and for a second, I could tell from the smile on her still gorgeous face that she did still love me. The thought of dinner and sleeping on the Miss Ginny had a lot of appeal, especially if there was any possibility that Ginny and I could end up in the stateroom together with all those smoked mirrors on the wall.
Ginny disappeared into the building, and I walked around to the public parking attached to it and grumbled, “Damn, I forgot to get my parking ticket validated. Wonder if Miss Cuba would run down a parking sticker if I called the office.” Then, “Naw.”
The GPS kicked in when the car got out of the garage, automatically finding the satellites to compute my location. “Turn left on Biscayne Boulevard, proceed to Interstate 195 West, then right on I-95 South. Continue 160 miles to Key West.”
With the two classics on the front seat, I said to myself, “I have to get an ‘A’ from Ginny in reading these mammoth books. I wonder if they’re available in an audio version.”